Lucky Forest, after hours of exhausting climbing, pokes his head out of the top of the snowdrift.
It's night. The entire mountain gleams an eerily perfect white, blanketed in snow. It takes him a moment to work out what is so odd about it; there's no clouds. A full moon, surrounded by speckled stars, lights the desolate scene. He looks at the moon with a sigh. This is the moon Phoebe sees. Is she looking at it now? Or is she looking at him looking at the moon, thinking of her?
He knows he shouldn't just lie down on the floor, but he can't help it. He's got no more energy left in his arms. Besides, with the moon he should be able to see people coming. Not just people either. That goat thing. It moved quickly but he should be able to pick it out if it finds him.
A cannon went off while he was down there, and maybe while he was tumbling down the avalanche too. So how many people are left? Seven or eight? There were a lot of deaths today.
His axe, still faithfully pressed into his hand, is still edged with blood. He did a good thing there, he knows that. And he's got further than perhaps anybody expected. He knows he can win. But it's going to be a long slow slog to the finish and he's starving hungry. Maybe he should find that goat; perhaps it's edible. There must be small creatures for it to eat somewhere.
He should have grabbed something else at the Cornucopia all those days ago. He had the time. But he didn't think; he'd seen the axe, hung around and panicked.
Well, there's nothing he can do about it now!
The anthem, the familiar fake trumpets, bursts out over the arena and a section of sky, including the moon, blacks out to make way for the pictures. He's expecting a lot of them. He doesn't know who. He never gave himself the chance to get to know people; if things went his way they would all be dead anyway. And so far for Forest, things are going his way.
First is Emerald, smiling confidently down on the arena, which makes him sit up in surprise. Another Career down. Are they becoming vulnerable? With luck falling his way, should he go after them, seek them out?
No. He's trying to stay alive now, not aim for a quick and easy death. That was for the bloodbath. Now he has the chance. Emerald looks very much alive in her picture. Now she's just an image in the sky, a memory in the mind, perhaps a name carved on a memorial somewhere. Or do District 1 only remember their winners?
Chuck's broad snarl looks so realistic that Forest almost thinks the boy with the 12 will reach out of the screen and strangle him. Then he realises what that means. Chuck is dead. The larger than life ego, the one who 'accidentally' buried an axe in the girl Forest later killed, no longer exists. Forest wonders if his axe now is the same one. Surely the Capitol are trying to save on provisions, with the ever-present threat of another rebellion. On the other hand, perhaps they don't care. Perhaps it doesn't seem as serious to them as it does back home. What happened to the Careers, anyway? Did the avalanche hit them too? Did he just happen to be in the way?
He almost expects Cinder to be the next one, but it isn't. It's Jackson, looking down at him with a sad expression. Jackson who was forced into volunteering. Forest thinks. Five cannons today. Three pictures in the sky. Who else is left? The volunteer from Five. Nobody from Six or Eight. Himself from Seven. Nobody from Nine. The pair from Ten and Eleven, and the girl from Twelve.
Not the pair from Ten. Gemini looks down at the arena with a tired, kindly smile. He dearly hopes that she felt no pain. She always seemed nice. She reminded him a little of Phoebe in that, only Phoebe is beautiful whereas Gemini is merely plain.
Gemini is followed immediately by Louis, the one with the Career-like bulk. Forest paid him little attention. But it's still one more death and he closes his eyes and sighs. He's made it through another day. And so far he hasn't run into anybody, unless you count Verona. He's hungry but uninjured.
Things are going well for him.
Cinder climbs. He wants to hunt; he wants to hunt these people in particular. He knows they'll have gone up, which means he should be able to find them, easy. He's only got the knives but they'll be enough. And one of him can take on the three of them anyday, even if he has only got one hand. Good job he's ambidextrous.
The raw stump of his hand sears with pain, but the cold takes the edge off it. The pain is good, anyway. It's keeping him awake. He ignores the faces in the sky and doesn't notice that the stars are out. His free hand goes automatically to the tattoo on his right bicep. His token, his reminder. His mother was furious with him, and she was usually very lenient. It's a simple tattoo and he can picture it in his mind now, the number Two with his name and his brother's name underneath it. A training accident, they said. Slate Ovlen was never the strongest of people. Cinder had adored him anyway. Slate had always been able to make him laugh. And nobody could wield a mace better; he taught Cinder about it. Volunteering had never been on the cards for Slate. He would never have been allowed. Not enough passion, the coaches said. Not mentally tough enough.
He fell down one of the mountain sides, trying to skip training. Cinder was fourteen; they always trained together but he was at a seperate session and didn't know Slate was planning on skiving. He'd been questioned before he'd even known what had happened. Then he'd gone out into the sparse woods to be on his own and think about what he'd lost. By the time he'd got back, they'd decided to call it a training accident. To say that he'd died whilst skipping training would have brought dishonour to the family. But Cinder knows that people never really believed that.
And that's why Cinder is here. To bring that honour back. To show them that they were wrong about Slate. He's four years older, tougher, stronger. And it will take more than a mashed-up hand to stop him.
Agatha has other plans. She can smell the meat from a mile away, the blood. She treks up the ledges, the unmistakable smell of tribute slamming into her nostrils as she passes a small cave and peers inside.
She doesn't like small spaces. She likes to be open, wild and free. And the cave stinks of ashes and smoke. So though there's blood on the floor and these sleeping creatures look like an easy meal, a thin male and a small female, she leaves them. The snow melts the second it hits her coat. The tantilising smell of rust, blood, gets closer, and her enhanced ears pick up shuffling footsteps and the occasional grunting noise.
There's a noise behind him, on the path. He spins around, readying the knife, but there's nothing there but the silverly moonlight and the mountain stretching below him, blanketed in white. In this light everything looks sharper, more deadly. But he knows that goes for himself as well.
"I know you're there," he hisses, just in case there is someone there.
The words mean nothing to Agatha. They sound like food. That is what matters. The footsteps, after a pause, carry on. She springs up several feet, onto a thin ledge, landing without so much as a soft thunk. The snow muffles any sound she might make. And now she can see her meal, a great slab of meat with blood splattered all over him, one hand not even recognizable. It crawls close to the wall, grunting in pain every so often. An injured meal, even easier. Her shadow passes over him and it looks up, any colour draining from his face.
It swears, but that doesn't mean anything to her either.
Cinder swears again, even though he knows it won't do any good. The creature - it looks like a goat with massive teeth - is matted with blood and looks down at him through beady eyes, obviously hungry. There's no hiding from it.
Essentially, he tells himself, it is a goat. A farm animal. These creatures are made to be slaughtered. Ignore the teeth and look on the bright side. It's an animal.
"Go away," he insists. The goat shows no sign of hearing him, getting ready to pounce. Do goats pounce?
He suddenly realises that this goat is taller than him, and not just because its higher up. And its teeth really are too sharp...
It's still just a goat. And he can outrun almost anything. He beat Chuck in a sprint, didn't he? He can get to safer ground.
I'm not running away, he thinks as he bursts into a sprint, I'm making a tactful retreat. In his head, Slate laughs. That's just the sort of thing he would have said. Even in the boots, Cinder's bulk slips several times on the jagged edges. His breath comes heavy and he can hear the goat bounding above him, the shadow flickering over his head. The mountain, sharp in the moonlight, totters below him. Either way is death, and loss. He's not sure which he fears most and doesn't have the brainpower to consider that and run away.
The path crumbles under his feet and he jumps just in time. The wind whips back his hood, toying with strands of his hair and ripping into the whorls of his ears. All they can hear now is his desperate panting, the thudding of the goat, the rushing wind. Bursts of hail dig into his face. His feet slip on a patch of ice and he tumbles to his knees, almost crying out aloud.
No!
He scrambles upright and carries on.
Agatha quite likes this game. If she tires the food out it will be easier to fight, and all she has to do is trot along after it, not even breaking up a sweat.
It falls over but gets back up before she can pounce.
Cinder only has one knife. His lost hand burns whenever it comes into contact with the wall. Images jerk in front of his eyes; wall, floor, stars, mountain side, goat. It doesn't even seem tired and that safer ground isn't coming.
He'll have to fight.
As long as he believes he can win, he will. They'll laugh at this back home, when he gets back. Cinder, afraid of a goat! And he'll laugh too, his arm curled around his latest girl, and say well, maybe I was scared of the goat, but I'm back here now.
And in that second, his concentration slips a little bit more.
Agatha, bored of this now, springs into the air and lands in front of his, neatly as a gymnast, even though the ledge is barely big enough for her. The food barks; laughter, though she doesn't know it.
"Bring it on, grizzly!"
She brings it on, alright. She jumps at him, aiming her teeth for the soft flesh around the neck. Her claws rake through cloth, though something digs into her side and makes it wet. The food shouts something that makes no sense to her and something glints in the silver light, but before whatever it is can hurt her she's finally got the taste of meat in her mouth.
Ew. It's disgusting, rubbery and full of little tube things. Not like it smells. She laps up some of the blood instead, having to be content with that, and saunters off in disappointment when something booms in the distance.
Cinder's body is lifted into the air and hoisted away.