What am I going to do?
I take a deep breath. My arms rise slightly—as if recalling the black-and-white wings Cinna gave me—then come to rest at my sides.
«I’m going to be the Mockingjay.»
3
Buttercup’s eyes reflect the faint glow of the safety light over the door as he lies in the crook of Prim’s arm, back on the job, protecting her from the night. She’s snuggled close to my mother. Asleep, they look just as they did the morning of the reaping that landed me in my first Games. I have a bed to myself because I’m recuperating and because no one can sleep with me anyway, what with the nightmares and the thrashing around.
After tossing and turning for hours, I finally accept that it will be a wakeful night. Under Buttercup’s watchful eye, I tiptoe across the cold tiled floor to the dresser.
The middle drawer contains my government-issued clothes. Everyone wears the same gray pants and shirt, the shirt tucked in at the waist. Underneath the clothes, I keep the few items I had on me when I was lifted from the arena. My mockingjay pin. Peeta’s token, the gold locket with photos of my mother and Prim and Gale inside. A silver parachute that holds a spile for tapping trees, and the pearl Peeta gave me a few hours before I blew out the force field. District 13 confiscated my tube of skin ointment for use in the hospital, and my bow and arrows because only guards have clearance to carry weapons. They’re in safekeeping in the armory.
I feel around for the parachute and slide my fingers inside until they close around the pearl. I sit back on my bed cross-legged and find myself rubbing the smooth iridescent surface of the pearl back and forth against my lips. For some reason, it’s soothing. A cool kiss from the giver himself.
«Katniss?» Prim whispers. She’s awake, peering at me through the darkness. «What’s wrong?»
«Nothing. Just a bad dream. Go back to sleep.» It’s automatic. Shutting Prim and my mother out of things to shield them.
Careful not to rouse my mother, Prim eases herself from the bed, scoops up Buttercup, and sits beside me. She touches the hand that has curled around the pearl. «You’re cold.» Taking a spare blanket from the foot of the bed, she wraps it around all three of us, enveloping me in her warmth and Buttercup’s furry heat as well. «You could tell me, you know. I’m good at keeping secrets. Even from Mother.»
She’s really gone, then. The little girl with the back of her shirt sticking out like a duck tail, the one who needed help reaching the dishes, and who begged to see the frosted cakes in the bakery window. Time and tragedy have forced her to grow too quickly, at least for my taste, into a young woman who stitches bleeding wounds and knows our mother can hear only so much.
«Tomorrow morning, I’m going to agree to be the Mockingjay,» I tell her.
«Because you want to or because you feel forced into it?» she asks.
I laugh a little. «Both, I guess. No, I want to. I have to, if it will help the rebels defeat Snow.» I squeeze the pearl more tightly in my fist. «It’s just…Peeta. I’m afraid if we do win, the rebels will execute him as a traitor.»
Prim thinks this over. «Katniss, I don’t think you understand how important you are to the cause. Important people usually get what they want. If you want to keep Peeta safe from the rebels, you can.»
I guess I’m important. They went to a lot of trouble to rescue me. They took me to 12. «You mean…I could demand that they give Peeta immunity? And they’d have to agree to it?»
«I think you could demand almost anything and they’d have to agree to it.» Prim wrinkles her brow. «Only how do you know they’ll keep their word?»
I remember all of the lies Haymitch told Peeta and me to get us to do what he wanted. What’s to keep the rebels from reneging on the deal? A verbal promise behind closed doors, even a statement written on paper— these could easily evaporate after the war. Their existence or validity denied. Any witnesses in Command will be worthless. In fact, they’d probably be the ones writing out Peeta’s death warrant. I’ll need a much larger pool of witnesses. I’ll need everyone I can get.
«It will have to be public,» I say. Buttercup gives a flick of his tail that I take as agreement. «I’ll make Coin announce it in front of the entire population of Thirteen.»
Prim smiles. «Oh, that’s good. It’s not a guarantee, but it will be much harder for them to back out of their promise.»
I feel the kind of relief that follows an actual solution. «I should wake you up more often, little duck.»
«I wish you would,» says Prim. She gives me a kiss. «Try and sleep now, all right?» And I do.
In the morning, I see that 7:00—Breakfast is directly followed by 7:30—Command , which is fine since I may as well start the ball rolling. At the dining hall, I flash my schedule, which includes some kind of ID number, in front of a sensor. As I slide my tray along the metal shelf before the vats of food, I see breakfast is its usual dependable self—a bowl of hot grain, a cup of milk, and a small scoop of fruit or vegetables. Today, mashed turnips. All of it comes from 13’s underground farms. I sit at the table assigned to the Everdeens and the Hawthornes and some other refugees, and shovel my food down, wishing for seconds, but there are never seconds here. They have nutrition down to a science. You leave with enough calories to take you to the next meal, no more, no less. Serving size is based on your age, height, body type, health, and amount of physical labor required by your schedule. The people from 12 are already getting slightly larger portions than the natives of 13 in an effort to bring us up to weight. I guess bony soldiers tire too quickly. It’s working, though. In just a month, we’re starting to look healthier, particularly the kids.
Gale sets his tray beside me and I try not to stare at his turnips too pathetically, because I really want more, and he’s already too quick to slip me his food. Even though I turn my attention to neatly folding my napkin, a spoonful of turnips slops into my bowl.
«You’ve got to stop that,» I say. But since I’m already scooping up the stuff, it’s not too convincing.
«Really. It’s probably illegal or something.» They have very strict rules about food. For instance, if you don’t finish something and want to save it for later, you can’t take it from the dining hall. Apparently, in the early days, there was some incident of food hoarding. For a couple of people like Gale and me, who’ve been in charge of our families’ food supply for years, it doesn’t sit well. We know how to be hungry, but not how to be told how to handle what provisions we have. In some ways, District 13 is even more controlling than the Capitol.
«What can they do? They’ve already got my communicuff,» says Gale.
As I scrape my bowl clean, I have an inspiration. «Hey, maybe I should make that a condition of being the Mockingjay.»
«That I can feed you turnips?» he says.
«No, that we can hunt.» That gets his attention. «We’d have to give everything to the kitchen. But still, we could…» I don’t have to finish because he knows. We could be aboveground. Out in the woods. We could be ourselves again.
«Do it,» he says. «Now’s the time. You could ask for the moon and they’d have to find some way to get it.»
He doesn’t know that I’m already asking for the moon by demanding they spare Peeta’s life. Before I can decide whether or not to tell him, a bell signals the end of our eating shift. The thought of facing Coin alone makes me nervous. «What are you scheduled for?»
Gale checks his arm. «Nuclear History class. Where, by the way, your absence has been noted.»
«I have to go to Command. Come with me?» I ask.
«All right. But they might throw me out after yesterday.» As we go to drop off our trays, he says, «You know, you better put Buttercup on your list of demands, too. I don’t think the concept of useless pets is well known here.»
«Oh, they’ll find him a job. Tattoo it on his paw every morning,» I say. But I make a mental note to include him for Prim’s sake.
By the time we get to Command, Coin, Plutarch, and all their people have already assembled. The sight of Gale raises some eyebrows, but no one throws him out. My mental notes have become too jumbled, so I ask for a piece of paper and a pencil right off. My apparent interest in the proceedings—the first I’ve shown since I’ve been
