Catching Fire

to take in, this elaborate plan in which I was a piece, just as I was meant to be a piece in the Hunger Games. Used without consent, without knowledge. At least in the Hunger Games, I knew I was being played with.
    My supposed friends have been a lot more secretive.
    “You didn’t tell me.” My voice is as ragged as Finnick’s.
    “Neither you nor Peeta were told. We couldn’t risk it,” says Plutarch. “I was even worried you might mention my indiscretion with the watch during the Games.” He pulls out his pocket watch and runs his thumb across the crystal, lighting up the mockingjay. “Of course, when I showed you this, I was merely tipping you off about the arena. As a mentor. I thought it might be a first step toward gaining your trust. I never dreamed you’d be a tribute again.”
    “I still don’t understand why Peeta and I weren’t let in on the plan,” I say.
    “Because once the force field blew, you’d be the first ones they’d try to capture, and the less you knew, the better,” says Haymitch.
    “The first ones? Why?” I say, trying to hang on to the train of thought.
    “For the same reason the rest of us agreed to die to keep you alive,” says Finnick.
    “No, Johanna tried to kill me,” I say.
    “Johanna knocked you out to cut the tracker from your arm and lead Brutus and Enobaria away from you,” says Haymitch.
    “What?” My head aches so and I want them to stop talking in circles. “I don’t know what you’re —”
    “We had to save you because you’re the mockingjay, Katniss,” says Plutarch. “While you live, the revolution lives.”
    The bird, the pin, the song, the berries, the watch, the cracker, the dress that burst into flames. I am the mockingjay. The one that survived despite the Capitol’s plans. The symbol of the rebellion.
    It’s what I suspected in the woods when I found Bonnie and Twill escaping. Though I never really understood the magnitude. But then, I wasn’t meant to understand. I think of Haymitch’s sneering at my plans to flee District 12, start my own uprising, even the very notion that District 13 could exist. Subterfuges and deceptions. And if he could do that, behind his mask of sarcasm and drunkenness, so convincingly and for so long, what else has he lied about? I know what else.
    “Peeta,” I whisper, my heart sinking.
    “The others kept Peeta alive because if he died, we knew there’d be no keeping you in an alliance,” says Haymitch. “And we couldn’t risk leaving you unprotected.” His words are matter-of-fact, his expression unchanged, but he can’t hide the tinge of gray that colors his face.
    “Where is Peeta?” I hiss at him.
    “He was picked up by the Capitol along with Johanna and Enobaria,” says Haymitch. And finally he has the decency to drop his gaze.
    Technically, I am unarmed. But no one should ever underestimate the harm that fingernails can do, especially if the target is unprepared. I lunge across the table and rake mine down Haymitch’s face, causing blood to flow and damage to one eye. Then we are both screaming terrible, terrible things at each other, and Finnick is trying to drag me out, and I know it’s all Haymitch can do not to rip me apart, but I’m the mockingjay. I’m the mockingjay and it’s too hard keeping me alive as it is.
    Other hands help Finnick and I’m back on my table, my body restrained, my wrists tied down, so I slam my head in fury again and again against the table. A needle pokes my arm and my head hurts so badly I stop fighting and simply wail in a horrible, dying-animal way, until my voice gives out.
    The drug causes sedation, not sleep, so I am trapped in fuzzy, dully aching misery for what seems like always. They reinsert their tubes and talk to me in soothing voices that never reach me. All I can think of is Peeta, lying on a similar table somewhere, while they try to break him for information he doesn’t even have.
    “Katniss. Katniss, I’m sorry.” Finnick’s voice comes from the bed next to me and slips into my consciousness. Perhaps because we’re in the same kind of pain. “I wanted to go back for him and Johanna, but I couldn’t move.”
    I don’t answer. Finnick Odair’s good intentions mean less than nothing.
    “It’s better for him than Johanna. They’ll figure out he doesn’t know anything pretty fast. And they won’t kill him if they think they can use him against you,” says Finnick.
    “Like bait?” I say to the ceiling. “Like how