Catching Fire

your sunny personality.”
    “They saw her shoot,” says Peeta with a smile. “Actually, I saw her shoot, for real, for the first time. I’m about to put in a formal request myself.”
    “You’re that good?” Haymitch asks me. “So good that Brutus wants you?”
    I shrug. “But I don’t want Brutus. I want Mags and District Three.”
    “Of course you do.” Haymitch sighs and orders a bottle of wine. “I’ll tell everybody you’re still making up your mind.”
    After my shooting exhibition, I still get teased some, but I no longer feel like I’m being mocked. In fact, I feel as if I’ve somehow been initiated into the victors’ circle. During the next two days, I spend time with almost everybody headed for the arena. Even the morphlings, who, with Peeta’s help, paint me into a field of yellow flowers. Even Finnick, who gives me an hour of trident lessons in exchange for an hour of archery instruction. And the more I come to know these people, the worse it is. Because, on the whole, I don’t hate them. And some I like. And a lot of them are so damaged that my natural instinct would be to protect them. But all of them must die if I’m to save Peeta.
    The final day of training ends with our private sessions. We each get fifteen minutes before the Gamemakers to amaze them with our skills, but I don’t know what any of us might have to show them. There’s a lot of kidding about it at lunch. What we might do. Sing, dance, strip, tell jokes. Mags, who I can understand a little better now, decides she’s just going to take a nap. I don’t know what I’m going to do. Shoot some arrows, I guess. Haymitch said to surprise them if we could, but I’m fresh out of ideas.
    As the girl from 12, I’m scheduled to go last. The dining room gets quieter and quieter as the tributes file out to go perform. It’s easier to keep up the irreverent, invincible manner we’ve all adopted when there are more of us. As people disappear through the door, all I can think is that they have a matter of days to live.
    Peeta and I are finally left alone. He reaches across the table to take my hands. “Decided what to do for the Gamemakers yet?”
    I shake my head. “I can’t really use them for target practice this year, with the force field up and all. Maybe make some fishhooks. What about you?”
    “Not a clue. I keep wishing I could bake a cake or something,” he says.
    “Do some more camouflage,” I suggest.
    “If the morphlings have left me anything to work with,” he says wryly. “They’ve been glued to that station since training started.”
    We sit in silence awhile and then I blurt out the thing that’s on both our minds. “How are we going to kill these people, Peeta?”
    “I don’t know.” He leans his forehead down on our entwined hands.
    “I don’t want them as allies. Why did Haymitch want us to get to know them?” I say. “It’ll make it so much harder than last time. Except for Rue maybe. But I guess I never really could’ve killed her, anyway. She was just too much like Prim.”
    Peeta looks up at me, his brow creased in thought. “Her death was the most despicable, wasn’t it?”
    “None of them were very pretty,” I say, thinking of Glimmer’s and Cato’s ends.
    They call Peeta, so I wait by myself. Fifteen minutes pass. Then half an hour. It’s close to forty minutes before I’m called.
    When I go in, I smell the sharp odor of cleaner and notice that one of the mats has been dragged to the center of the room. The mood is very different from last year’s, when the Gamemakers were half drunk and distractedly picking at tidbits from the banquet table. They whisper among themselves, looking somewhat annoyed. What did Peeta do? Something to upset them?
    I feel a pang of worry. That isn’t good. I don’t want Peeta singling himself out as a target for the Gamemakers’ anger. That’s part of my job. To draw fire away from Peeta. But how did he upset them? Because I’d love to do just that and more. To break through the smug veneer of those who use their brains to find amusing ways to kill us. To make them realize that while we’re vulnerable to the Capitol’s cruelties, they are as well.
    Do you have any idea how much I hate you? I think. You, who have given your talents to the Games?
    I try to catch Plutarch Heavensbee’s eye, but he seems to be intentionally ignoring me, as he has the entire training period. I remember how he sought me out for a dance, how pleased he