The Hunger Games Part 1: The Tributes
Chapter 7
My slumbers are filled with disturbing dreams. The face of the redheaded girl
intertwines with gory images from earlier Hunger Games, with my mother
withdrawn and unreachable, with Prim emaciated and terrified. I bolt up screaming
for my father to run as the mine explodes into a million deadly bits of light.
Dawn is breaking through the windows. The Capitol has a misty, haunted air.
My head aches and I must have bitten into the side of my cheek in the night. My
tongue probes the ragged flesh and I taste blood.
Slowly, I drag myself out of bed and into the shower. I arbitrarily punch buttons
on the control board and end up hopping from foot to foot as alternating jets of icy
cold and steaming hot water assault me. Then I’m deluged in lemony foam that I
have to scrape off with a heavy bristled brush. Oh, well. At least my blood is
flowing.
When I’m dried and moisturized with lotion, I find an outfit has been left for me
at the front of the closet. Tight black pants, a long-sleeved burgundy tunic, and
leather shoes. I put my hair in the single braid down my back. This is the first time
since the morning of the reaping that I resemble myself. No fancy hair and clothes,
no flaming capes. Just me. Looking like I could be headed for the woods. It calms
me.
Haymitch didn’t give us an exact time to meet for break-last and no one has
contacted me this morning, but I’m hungry so I head down to the dining room,
hoping there will be food. I’m not disappointed. While the table is empty, a long
board off to the side has been laid with at least twenty dishes. A young man, an
Avox, stands at attention by the spread. When I ask if I can serve myself, he nods
assent. I load a plate with eggs, sausages, batter cakes covered in thick orange
preserves, slices of pale purple melon. As I gorge myself, I watch the sun rise over
the Capitol. I have a second plate of hot grain smothered in beef stew. Finally, I fill
a plate with rolls and sit at the table, breaking oil bits and dipping them into hot
chocolate, the way Peeta did on the train.
My mind wanders to my mother and Prim. They must be up. My mother getting
their breakfast of mush. Prim milking her goat before school. Just two mornings
ago, I was home. Can that be right? Yes, just two. And now how empty the house
feels, even from a distance. What did they say last night about my fiery debut at
the Games? Did it give them hope, or simply add to their terror when they saw the
reality of twenty-four tributes circled together, knowing only one could live?
Haymitch and Peeta come in, bid me good morning, fill their plates. It makes
me irritated that Peeta is wearing exactly the same outfit I am. I need to say
something to Cinna. This twins act is going to blow up in out faces once the Games
begin. Surely, they must know this. Then I remember Haymitch telling me to do
exactly what the stylists tell me to do. If it was anyone but Cinna, I might be
tempted to ignore him. But after last night’s triumph, I don’t have a lot of room to
criticize his choices.
I’m nervous about the training. There will be three days in which all the
tributes practice together. On the last afternoon, we’ll each get a chance to
perform in private before the Gamemakers. The thought of meeting the other
tributes face-to-face makes me queasy. I turn the roll I have just taken from the
basket over and over in my hands, but my appetite is gone.
When Haymitch has finished several platters of stew, he pushes back his plate
with a sigh. He takes a flask from his pocket and takes a long pull on it and leans
his elbows on the table. “So, let’s get down to business. Training. First off, if you
like, I’ll coach you separately. Decide now.”
“Why would you coach us separately?” I ask.
“Say if you had a secret skill you might not want the other to know about,”
says Haymitch.
I exchange a look with Peeta. “I don’t have any secret skills,” he says. “And I
already know what yours is, right? I mean, I’ve eaten enough of your squirrels.”
I never thought about Peeta eating the squirrels I shot. Somehow I always
pictured the baker quietly going off and frying them up for himself. Not out of
greed. But because town families usually eat expensive butcher meat. Beef and
chicken and horse.
“You can coach us together,” I tell Haymitch. Peeta nods.
“All right, so give me some idea of what you can do,” says Haymitch.
“I can’t do anything,” says Peeta. “Unless you count baking bread.”
“Sorry, I don’t. Katniss. I already know you’re handy with a knife,” says
Haymitch.
“Not really. But I can hunt,” I say. “With a bow and arrow.”
“And you’re good?” asks Haymitch.
I have to think about it. I’ve been putting food on the table for four years.
That’s no small task. I’m not as good as my father was, but he’d had more
practice. I’ve better aim than Gale, but I’ve had more practice. He’s a genius with
traps and snares. “I’m all right,” I say.
“She’s excellent,” says Peeta. “My father buys her squirrels. He always
comments on how the arrows never pierce the body. She hits every one in the
eye. It’s the same with the rabbits she sells the butcher. She can even bring down
deer.”
This assessment of my skills from Peeta takes me totally by surprise. First, that
he ever noticed. Second, that he’s talking me up. “What are you doing?” I ask him
suspiciously.
“What are you doing? If he’s going to help you, he has to know what you’re
capable of. Don’t underrate yourself,” says Peeta.
I don’t know why, but this rubs me the wrong way. “What about you? I’ve seen
you in the market. You can lift hundred-pound bags of flour,” I snap at him. “Tell
him that. That’s not nothing.”
“Yes, and I’m sure the arena will be full of bags of flour for me to chuck at
people. It’s not like being able to use a weapon. You know it isn’t,” he shoots back.
“He can wrestle,” I tell Haymitch. “He came in second in our school
competition last year, only after his brother.”
“What use is that? How many times have you seen someone wrestle someone
to death?” says Peeta in disgust.
“There’s always hand-to-hand combat. All you need is to come up with a knife,
and you’ll at least stand a chance. If I get jumped, I’m dead!” I can hear my voice
rising in anger.
“But you won’t! You’ll be living up in some tree eating raw squirrels and picking
off people with arrows. You know what my mother said to me when she came to
say good-bye, as if to cheer me up, she says maybe District Twelve will finally
have a winner. Then I realized, she didn’t mean me, she meant you!” bursts out
Peeta.
“Oh, she meant you,” I say with a wave of dismissal.
“She said, ‘She’s a survivor, that one.’ She is,” says Peeta.
That pulls me up short. Did his mother really say that about me? Did she rate
me over her son? I see the pain in Peeta’s eyes and know he isn’t lying.
Suddenly I’m behind the bakery and I can feel the chill of the rain running down
my back, the hollowness in my belly. I sound eleven years old when I speak. “But
only because someone helped me.”
Peeta’s eyes flicker down to the roll in my hands, and I know he remembers
that day, too. But he just shrugs. “People will help you in the arena. They’ll be
tripping over each other to sponsor you.”
“No more than you,” I say.
Peeta rolls his eyes at Haymitch. “She has no idea. The effect she can have.”
He runs his fingernail along the wood grain in the table, refusing to look at me.
What on earth does he mean? People help me? When we were dying of
starvation, no one helped me! No one except Peeta. Once I had something to
barter with, things changed. I’m a tough trader. Or am I? What effect do I have?
That I’m weak and needy? Is he suggesting that I got good deals because people
pitied me? I try to think if this is true. Perhaps some of the merchants were a little
generous in their trades, but I always attributed that to their long-standing
relationship with my father. Besides, my game is first-class. No one pitied me!
I glower at the roll sure he meant to insult me.
After about a minute of this, Haymitch says, “Well, then. Well, well, well.
Katniss, there’s no guarantee they’ll be bows and arrows in the arena, but during
your private session with the Gamemakers, show them what you can do. Until
then, stay clear of archery. Are you any good at trapping?”
“I know a few basic snares,” I mutter.
“That may be significant in terms of food,” says Haymitch. “And Peeta, she’s
right, never underestimate strength in the arena. Very often, physical power tilts
the advantage to a player. In the Training Center, they will have weights, but don’t
reveal how much you can lift in front of the other tributes. The plan’s the same for
both of you. You go to group training. Spend the time trying to learn something
you don’t know. Throw a spear. Swing a mace. Learn to tie a decent knot. Save
showing what you’re best at until your private sessions. Are we clear?” says
Haymitch. Peeta and I nod.
“One last thing. In public, I want you by each other’s side every minute,” says
Haymitch. We both start to object, but Haymitch slams his hand on the table.
“Every minute! It’s not open for discussion! You agreed to do as I said! You will be
together, you will appear amiable to each other. Now get out. Meet Effie at the
elevator at ten for training.”
I bite my lip and stalk back to my room, making sure Peeta can hear the door
slam. I sit on the bed, hating Haymitch, hating Peeta, hating myself for mentioning
that day long ago in the rain.
It’s such a joke! Peeta and I going along pretending to be friends! Talking up
each other’s strengths, insisting the other take credit for their abilities. Because,
in fact, at some point, we’re going to have to knock it off and accept we’re bitter
adversaries. Which I’d be prepared to do right now if it wasn’t for Haymitch’s
stupid instruction that we stick together in training. It’s my own fault, I guess, for
telling him he didn’t have to coach us separately. But that didn’t mean I wanted to
do everything with Peeta. Who, by the way, clearly doesn’t want to be partnering
up with me, either.
I hear Peeta’s voice in my head. She has no idea. The effect she can have.
Obviously meant to demean me. Right? but a tiny part of me wonders if this was a
compliment. That he meant I was appealing in some way. It’s weird, how much
he’s noticed me. Like the attention he’s paid to my hunting. And apparently, I have
not been as oblivious to him as I imagined, either. The flour. The wrestling. I have
kept track of the boy with the bread.
It’s almost ten. I clean my teeth and smooth back my hair again. Anger
temporarily blocked out my nervousness about meeting the other tributes, but now
I can feel my anxiety rising again. By the time I meet Effie and Peeta at the
elevator, I catch myself biting my nails. I stop at once.
The actual training rooms are below ground level of our building. With these
elevators, the ride is less than a minute. The doors open into an enormous
gymnasium filled with various weapons and obstacle courses. Although it’s not yet
ten, we’re the last ones to arrive. The other tributes are gathered in a tense circle.
They each have a cloth square with their district number on it pinned to their
shirts. While someone pins the number 12 on my back, I do a quick assessment.
Peeta and I are the only two dressed alike.
As soon as we join the circle, the head trainer, a tall, athletic woman named
Atala steps up and begins to explain the training schedule. Experts in each skill will
remain at their stations. We will be free to travel from area to area as we choose,
per our mentor’s instructions. Some of the stations teach survival skills, others
fighting techniques. We are forbidden to engage in any combative exercise with
another tribute. There are assistants on hand if we want to practice with a partner.
When Atala begins to read down the list of the skill stations, my eyes can’t help
flitting around to the other tributes. It’s the first time we’ve been assembled, on
level ground, in simple clothes. My heart sinks. Almost all of the boys and at least
half of the girls are bigger than I am, even though many of the tributes have never
been fed properly. You can see it in their bones, their skin, the hollow look in their
eyes. I may be smaller naturally, but overall my family’s resourcefulness has given
me an edge in that area. I stand straight, and while I’m thin, I’m strong. The meat
and plants from the woods combined with the exertion it took to get them have
given me a healthier body than most of those I see around me.
The exceptions are the kids from the wealthier districts, the volunteers, the
ones who have been fed and trained throughout their lives for this moment. The
tributes from 1, 2, and 4 traditionally have this look about them. It’s technically
against the rules to train tributes before they reach the Capitol but it happens
every year. In District 12, we call them the Career Tributes, or just the Careers.
And like as not, the winner will be one of them.
The slight advantage I held coming into the Training Center, my fiery entrance
last night, seems to vanish in the presence of my competition. The other tributes
were jealous of us, but not because we were amazing, because our stylists were.
Now I see nothing but contempt in the glances of the Career Tributes. Each must
have fifty to a hundred pounds on me. They project arrogance and brutality. When
Atala releases us, they head straight for the deadliest-looking weapons in the gym
and handle them with ease.
I’m thinking that it’s lucky I’m a fast runner when Peeta nudges my arm and I
jump. He is still beside me, per Haymitch’s instructions. His expression is sober.
“Where would you like to start?”
I look around at the Career Tributes who are showing off, clearly trying to
intimidate the field. Then at the others, the underfed, the incompetent, shakily
having their first lessons with a knife or an ax.
“Suppose we tie some knots,” I say.
“Right you are,” says Peeta. We cross to an empty station where the trainer
seems pleased to have students. You get the feeling that the knot-tying class is
not the Hunger games hot spot. When he realizes I know something about snares,
he shows us a simple, excellent trap that will leave a human competitor dangling
by a leg from a tree. We concentrate on this one skill for an hour until both of us
have mastered it. Then we move on to camouflage. Peeta genuinely seems to
enjoy this station, swirling a combination of mud and clay and berry juices around
on his pale skin, weaving disguises from vines and leaves. The trainer who runs
the camouflage station is full of enthusiasm at his work.
“I do the cakes,” he admits to me.
“The cakes?” I ask. I’ve been preoccupied with watching the boy from District 2
send a spear through a dummy’s heart from fifteen yards. “What cakes?”
“At home. The iced ones, for the bakery,” he says.
He means the ones they display in the windows. Fancy cakes with flowers and
pretty things painted in frosting. They’re for birthdays and New Year’s Day. When
we’re in the square, Prim always drags me over to admire them, although we’d
never be able to afford one. There’s little enough beauty in District 12, though, so I
can hardly deny her this.
I look more critically at the design on Peeta’s arm. The alternating pattern of
light and dark suggests sunlight falling through the leaves in the woods. I wonder
how he knows this, since I doubt he’s ever been beyond the fence. Has he been
able to pick this up from just that scraggly old apple tree in his backyard?
Somehow the whole thing — his skill, those inaccessible cakes, the praise of the
camouflage expert — annoys me.
“It’s lovely. If only you could frost someone to death,” I say.
“Don’t be so superior. You can never tell what you’ll find in the arena. Say it’s
actually a gigantic cake —” begins Peeta.
“Say we move on,” I break in.
So the next three days pass with Peeta and I going quietly from station to
station. We do pick up some valuable skills, from starting fires, to knife throwing,
to making shelter. Despite Haymitch’s order to appear mediocre, Peeta excels in
hand-to-hand combat, and I sweep the edible plants test without blinking an eye.
We steer clear of archery and weightlifting though, wanting to save those for our
private sessions.
The Gamemakers appeared early on the first day. Twenty or so men and
women dressed in deep purple robes. They sit in the elevated stands that surround
the gymnasium, sometimes wandering about to watch us, jotting down notes,
other times eating at the endless banquet that has been set for them, ignoring the
lot of us. But they do seem to be keeping their eye on the District 12 tributes.
Several times I’ve looked up to find one fixated on me. They consult with the
trainers during our meals as well. We see them all gathered together when we
come back.
Breakfast and dinner are served on our floor, but at lunch the twenty-four of us
eat in a dining room off the gymnasium. Food is arranged on carts around the
room and you serve yourself. The Career Tributes tend to gather rowdily around
one table, as if to prove their superiority, that they have no fear of one another
and consider the rest of us beneath notice. Most of the other tributes sit alone, like
lost sheep. No one says a word to us. Peeta and I eat together, and since
Haymitch keeps dogging us about it, try to keep up a friendly conversation during
the meals.
It’s not easy to find a topic. Talking of home is painful. Talking of the present
unbearable. One day, Peeta empties our breadbasket and points out how they
have been careful to include types from the districts along with the refined bread
of the Capitol. The fish-shaped loaf tinted green with seaweed from District 4. The
crescent moon roll dotted with seeds from District 11. Somehow, although it’s
made from the same stuff, it looks a lot more appetizing than the ugly drop
biscuits that are the standard fare at home.
“And there you have it,” says Peeta, scooping the breads back in the basket.
“You certainly know a lot,” I say.
“Only about bread,” he says. “Okay, now laugh as if I’ve said something
funny.”
We both give a somewhat convincing laugh and ignore the stares from around
the room.
“All right, I’ll keep smiling pleasantly and you talk,” says Peeta. It’s wearing us
both out, Haymitch’s direction to be friendly. Because ever since I slammed my
door, there’s been a chill in the air between us. But we have our orders.
“Did I ever tell you about the time I was chased by a bear?” I ask.
“No, but it sounds fascinating,” says Peeta.
I try and animate my face as I recall the event, a true story, in which I’d
foolishly challenged a black bear over the rights to a beehive. Peeta laughs and
asks questions right on cue. He’s much better at this than I am.
On the second day, while we’re taking a shot at spear throwing, he whispers to
me. “I think we have a shadow.”
I throw my spear, which I’m not too bad at actually, if I don’t have to throw too
far, and see the little girl from District 11 standing back a bit, watching us. She’s
the twelve-year-old, the one who reminded me so of Prim in stature. Up close she
looks about ten. She has bright, dark, eyes and satiny brown skin and stands tilted
up on her toes with her arms slightly extended to her sides, as if ready to take
wing at the slightest sound. It’s impossible not to think of a bird.
I pick up another spear while Peeta throws. “I think her name’s Rue,” he says
softly.
I bite my lip. Rue is a small yellow flower that grows in the Meadow. Rue.
Primrose. Neither of them could tip the scale at seventy pounds soaking wet.
“What can we do about it?” I ask him, more harshly than I intended.
“Nothing to do,” he says back. “Just making conversation.”
Now that I know she’s there, it’s hard to ignore the child. She slips up and joins
us at different stations. Like me, she’s clever with plants, climbs swiftly, and has
good aim. She can hit the target every time with a slingshot. But what is a
slingshot against a 220-pound male with a sword?
Back on the District 12 floor, Haymitch and Effie grill us throughout breakfast
and dinner about every moment of the day. What we did, who watched us, how the
other tributes size up. Cinna and Portia aren’t around, so there’s no one to add
any sanity to the meals. Not that Haymitch and Effie are fighting anymore. Instead
they seem to be of one mind, determined to whip us into shape. Full of endless
directions about what we should do and not do in training. Peeta is more patient,
but I become fed up and surly.
When we finally escape to bed on the second night, Peeta mumbles, “Someone
ought to get Haymitch a drink.”
I make a sound that is somewhere between a snort and a laugh. Then catch
myself. It’s messing with my mind too much, trying to keep straight when we’re
supposedly friends and when we’re not. At least when we get into the arena, I’ll
know where we stand. “Don’t. Don’t let’s pretend when there’s no one around.”
“All right, Katniss,” he says tiredly. After that, we only talk in front of people.
On the third day of training, they start to call us out of lunch for our private
sessions with the Gamemakers. District by district, first the boy, then the girl
tribute. As usual, District 12 is slated to go last. We linger in the dining room,
unsure where else to go. No one comes back once they have left. As the room
empties, the pressure to appear friendly lightens. By the time they call Rue, we
are left alone. We sit in silence until they summon Peeta. He rises.
“Remember what Haymitch said about being sure to throw the weights.” The
words come out of my mouth without permission.
“Thanks. I will,” he says. “You . . . shoot straight.”
I nod. I don’t know why I said anything at all. Although if I’m going to lose, I’d
rather Peeta win than the others. Better for our district, for my mother and Prim.
After about fifteen minutes, they call my name. I smooth my hair, set my
shoulders back, and walk into the gymnasium. Instantly, I know I’m in trouble.
They’ve been here too long, the Gamemakers. Sat through twenty-three other
demonstrations. Had too much to wine, most of them. Want more than anything to
go home.
There’s nothing I can do but continue with the plan. I walk to the archery
station. Oh, the weapons! I’ve been itching to get my hands on them for days!
Bows made of wood and plastic and metal and materials I can’t even name.
Arrows with feathers cut in flawless uniform lines. I choose a bow, string it, and
sling the matching quiver of arrows over my shoulder. There’s a shooting range,
but it’s much too limited. Standard bull’s-eyes and human silhouettes. I walk to the
center of the gymnasium and pick my first target. The dummy used for knife
practice. Even as I pull back on the bow I know something is wrong. The string’s
tighter than the one I use at home. The arrow’s more rigid. I miss the dummy by a
couple of inches and lose what little attention I had been commanding. For a
moment, I’m humiliated, then I head back to the bull’s-eye. I shoot again and
again until I get the feel of these new weapons.
Back in the center of the gymnasium, I take my initial position and skewer the
dummy right through the heart. Then I sever the rope that holds the sandbag for
boxing, and the bag splits open as it slams to the ground. Without pausing, I
shoulder-roll forward, come up on one knee, and send an arrow into one of the
hanging lights high above the gymnasium floor. A shower of sparks bursts from the
fixture.
It’s excellent shooting. I turn to the Gamemakers. A few are nodding approval,
but the majority of them are fixated on a roast pig that has just arrived at their
banquet table.
Suddenly I am furious, that with my life on the line, they don’t even have the
decency to pay attention to me. That I’m being upstaged by a dead pig. My heart
starts to pound, I can feel my face burning. Without thinking, I pull an arrow from
my quiver and send it straight at the Gamemakers’ table. I hear shouts of alarm as
people stumble back. The arrow skewers the apple in the pig’s mouth and pins it
to the wall behind it. Everyone stares at me in disbelief.
“Thank you for your consideration,” I say. Then I give a slight bow and walk
straight toward the exit without being dismissed.
Chapter 7
My slumbers are filled with disturbing dreams. The face of the redheaded girl
intertwines with gory images from earlier Hunger Games, with my mother
withdrawn and unreachable, with Prim emaciated and terrified. I bolt up screaming
for my father to run as the mine explodes into a million deadly bits of light.
Dawn is breaking through the windows. The Capitol has a misty, haunted air.
My head aches and I must have bitten into the side of my cheek in the night. My
tongue probes the ragged flesh and I taste blood.
Slowly, I drag myself out of bed and into the shower. I arbitrarily punch buttons
on the control board and end up hopping from foot to foot as alternating jets of icy
cold and steaming hot water assault me. Then I’m deluged in lemony foam that I
have to scrape off with a heavy bristled brush. Oh, well. At least my blood is
flowing.
When I’m dried and moisturized with lotion, I find an outfit has been left for me
at the front of the closet. Tight black pants, a long-sleeved burgundy tunic, and
leather shoes. I put my hair in the single braid down my back. This is the first time
since the morning of the reaping that I resemble myself. No fancy hair and clothes,
no flaming capes. Just me. Looking like I could be headed for the woods. It calms
me.
Haymitch didn’t give us an exact time to meet for break-last and no one has
contacted me this morning, but I’m hungry so I head down to the dining room,
hoping there will be food. I’m not disappointed. While the table is empty, a long
board off to the side has been laid with at least twenty dishes. A young man, an
Avox, stands at attention by the spread. When I ask if I can serve myself, he nods
assent. I load a plate with eggs, sausages, batter cakes covered in thick orange
preserves, slices of pale purple melon. As I gorge myself, I watch the sun rise over
the Capitol. I have a second plate of hot grain smothered in beef stew. Finally, I fill
a plate with rolls and sit at the table, breaking oil bits and dipping them into hot
chocolate, the way Peeta did on the train.
My mind wanders to my mother and Prim. They must be up. My mother getting
their breakfast of mush. Prim milking her goat before school. Just two mornings
ago, I was home. Can that be right? Yes, just two. And now how empty the house
feels, even from a distance. What did they say last night about my fiery debut at
the Games? Did it give them hope, or simply add to their terror when they saw the
reality of twenty-four tributes circled together, knowing only one could live?
Haymitch and Peeta come in, bid me good morning, fill their plates. It makes
me irritated that Peeta is wearing exactly the same outfit I am. I need to say
something to Cinna. This twins act is going to blow up in out faces once the Games
begin. Surely, they must know this. Then I remember Haymitch telling me to do
exactly what the stylists tell me to do. If it was anyone but Cinna, I might be
tempted to ignore him. But after last night’s triumph, I don’t have a lot of room to
criticize his choices.
I’m nervous about the training. There will be three days in which all the
tributes practice together. On the last afternoon, we’ll each get a chance to
perform in private before the Gamemakers. The thought of meeting the other
tributes face-to-face makes me queasy. I turn the roll I have just taken from the
basket over and over in my hands, but my appetite is gone.
When Haymitch has finished several platters of stew, he pushes back his plate
with a sigh. He takes a flask from his pocket and takes a long pull on it and leans
his elbows on the table. “So, let’s get down to business. Training. First off, if you
like, I’ll coach you separately. Decide now.”
“Why would you coach us separately?” I ask.
“Say if you had a secret skill you might not want the other to know about,”
says Haymitch.
I exchange a look with Peeta. “I don’t have any secret skills,” he says. “And I
already know what yours is, right? I mean, I’ve eaten enough of your squirrels.”
I never thought about Peeta eating the squirrels I shot. Somehow I always
pictured the baker quietly going off and frying them up for himself. Not out of
greed. But because town families usually eat expensive butcher meat. Beef and
chicken and horse.
“You can coach us together,” I tell Haymitch. Peeta nods.
“All right, so give me some idea of what you can do,” says Haymitch.
“I can’t do anything,” says Peeta. “Unless you count baking bread.”
“Sorry, I don’t. Katniss. I already know you’re handy with a knife,” says
Haymitch.
“Not really. But I can hunt,” I say. “With a bow and arrow.”
“And you’re good?” asks Haymitch.
I have to think about it. I’ve been putting food on the table for four years.
That’s no small task. I’m not as good as my father was, but he’d had more
practice. I’ve better aim than Gale, but I’ve had more practice. He’s a genius with
traps and snares. “I’m all right,” I say.
“She’s excellent,” says Peeta. “My father buys her squirrels. He always
comments on how the arrows never pierce the body. She hits every one in the
eye. It’s the same with the rabbits she sells the butcher. She can even bring down
deer.”
This assessment of my skills from Peeta takes me totally by surprise. First, that
he ever noticed. Second, that he’s talking me up. “What are you doing?” I ask him
suspiciously.
“What are you doing? If he’s going to help you, he has to know what you’re
capable of. Don’t underrate yourself,” says Peeta.
I don’t know why, but this rubs me the wrong way. “What about you? I’ve seen
you in the market. You can lift hundred-pound bags of flour,” I snap at him. “Tell
him that. That’s not nothing.”
“Yes, and I’m sure the arena will be full of bags of flour for me to chuck at
people. It’s not like being able to use a weapon. You know it isn’t,” he shoots back.
“He can wrestle,” I tell Haymitch. “He came in second in our school
competition last year, only after his brother.”
“What use is that? How many times have you seen someone wrestle someone
to death?” says Peeta in disgust.
“There’s always hand-to-hand combat. All you need is to come up with a knife,
and you’ll at least stand a chance. If I get jumped, I’m dead!” I can hear my voice
rising in anger.
“But you won’t! You’ll be living up in some tree eating raw squirrels and picking
off people with arrows. You know what my mother said to me when she came to
say good-bye, as if to cheer me up, she says maybe District Twelve will finally
have a winner. Then I realized, she didn’t mean me, she meant you!” bursts out
Peeta.
“Oh, she meant you,” I say with a wave of dismissal.
“She said, ‘She’s a survivor, that one.’ She is,” says Peeta.
That pulls me up short. Did his mother really say that about me? Did she rate
me over her son? I see the pain in Peeta’s eyes and know he isn’t lying.
Suddenly I’m behind the bakery and I can feel the chill of the rain running down
my back, the hollowness in my belly. I sound eleven years old when I speak. “But
only because someone helped me.”
Peeta’s eyes flicker down to the roll in my hands, and I know he remembers
that day, too. But he just shrugs. “People will help you in the arena. They’ll be
tripping over each other to sponsor you.”
“No more than you,” I say.
Peeta rolls his eyes at Haymitch. “She has no idea. The effect she can have.”
He runs his fingernail along the wood grain in the table, refusing to look at me.
What on earth does he mean? People help me? When we were dying of
starvation, no one helped me! No one except Peeta. Once I had something to
barter with, things changed. I’m a tough trader. Or am I? What effect do I have?
That I’m weak and needy? Is he suggesting that I got good deals because people
pitied me? I try to think if this is true. Perhaps some of the merchants were a little
generous in their trades, but I always attributed that to their long-standing
relationship with my father. Besides, my game is first-class. No one pitied me!
I glower at the roll sure he meant to insult me.
After about a minute of this, Haymitch says, “Well, then. Well, well, well.
Katniss, there’s no guarantee they’ll be bows and arrows in the arena, but during
your private session with the Gamemakers, show them what you can do. Until
then, stay clear of archery. Are you any good at trapping?”
“I know a few basic snares,” I mutter.
“That may be significant in terms of food,” says Haymitch. “And Peeta, she’s
right, never underestimate strength in the arena. Very often, physical power tilts
the advantage to a player. In the Training Center, they will have weights, but don’t
reveal how much you can lift in front of the other tributes. The plan’s the same for
both of you. You go to group training. Spend the time trying to learn something
you don’t know. Throw a spear. Swing a mace. Learn to tie a decent knot. Save
showing what you’re best at until your private sessions. Are we clear?” says
Haymitch. Peeta and I nod.
“One last thing. In public, I want you by each other’s side every minute,” says
Haymitch. We both start to object, but Haymitch slams his hand on the table.
“Every minute! It’s not open for discussion! You agreed to do as I said! You will be
together, you will appear amiable to each other. Now get out. Meet Effie at the
elevator at ten for training.”
I bite my lip and stalk back to my room, making sure Peeta can hear the door
slam. I sit on the bed, hating Haymitch, hating Peeta, hating myself for mentioning
that day long ago in the rain.
It’s such a joke! Peeta and I going along pretending to be friends! Talking up
each other’s strengths, insisting the other take credit for their abilities. Because,
in fact, at some point, we’re going to have to knock it off and accept we’re bitter
adversaries. Which I’d be prepared to do right now if it wasn’t for Haymitch’s
stupid instruction that we stick together in training. It’s my own fault, I guess, for
telling him he didn’t have to coach us separately. But that didn’t mean I wanted to
do everything with Peeta. Who, by the way, clearly doesn’t want to be partnering
up with me, either.
I hear Peeta’s voice in my head. She has no idea. The effect she can have.
Obviously meant to demean me. Right? but a tiny part of me wonders if this was a
compliment. That he meant I was appealing in some way. It’s weird, how much
he’s noticed me. Like the attention he’s paid to my hunting. And apparently, I have
not been as oblivious to him as I imagined, either. The flour. The wrestling. I have
kept track of the boy with the bread.
It’s almost ten. I clean my teeth and smooth back my hair again. Anger
temporarily blocked out my nervousness about meeting the other tributes, but now
I can feel my anxiety rising again. By the time I meet Effie and Peeta at the
elevator, I catch myself biting my nails. I stop at once.
The actual training rooms are below ground level of our building. With these
elevators, the ride is less than a minute. The doors open into an enormous
gymnasium filled with various weapons and obstacle courses. Although it’s not yet
ten, we’re the last ones to arrive. The other tributes are gathered in a tense circle.
They each have a cloth square with their district number on it pinned to their
shirts. While someone pins the number 12 on my back, I do a quick assessment.
Peeta and I are the only two dressed alike.
As soon as we join the circle, the head trainer, a tall, athletic woman named
Atala steps up and begins to explain the training schedule. Experts in each skill will
remain at their stations. We will be free to travel from area to area as we choose,
per our mentor’s instructions. Some of the stations teach survival skills, others
fighting techniques. We are forbidden to engage in any combative exercise with
another tribute. There are assistants on hand if we want to practice with a partner.
When Atala begins to read down the list of the skill stations, my eyes can’t help
flitting around to the other tributes. It’s the first time we’ve been assembled, on
level ground, in simple clothes. My heart sinks. Almost all of the boys and at least
half of the girls are bigger than I am, even though many of the tributes have never
been fed properly. You can see it in their bones, their skin, the hollow look in their
eyes. I may be smaller naturally, but overall my family’s resourcefulness has given
me an edge in that area. I stand straight, and while I’m thin, I’m strong. The meat
and plants from the woods combined with the exertion it took to get them have
given me a healthier body than most of those I see around me.
The exceptions are the kids from the wealthier districts, the volunteers, the
ones who have been fed and trained throughout their lives for this moment. The
tributes from 1, 2, and 4 traditionally have this look about them. It’s technically
against the rules to train tributes before they reach the Capitol but it happens
every year. In District 12, we call them the Career Tributes, or just the Careers.
And like as not, the winner will be one of them.
The slight advantage I held coming into the Training Center, my fiery entrance
last night, seems to vanish in the presence of my competition. The other tributes
were jealous of us, but not because we were amazing, because our stylists were.
Now I see nothing but contempt in the glances of the Career Tributes. Each must
have fifty to a hundred pounds on me. They project arrogance and brutality. When
Atala releases us, they head straight for the deadliest-looking weapons in the gym
and handle them with ease.
I’m thinking that it’s lucky I’m a fast runner when Peeta nudges my arm and I
jump. He is still beside me, per Haymitch’s instructions. His expression is sober.
“Where would you like to start?”
I look around at the Career Tributes who are showing off, clearly trying to
intimidate the field. Then at the others, the underfed, the incompetent, shakily
having their first lessons with a knife or an ax.
“Suppose we tie some knots,” I say.
“Right you are,” says Peeta. We cross to an empty station where the trainer
seems pleased to have students. You get the feeling that the knot-tying class is
not the Hunger games hot spot. When he realizes I know something about snares,
he shows us a simple, excellent trap that will leave a human competitor dangling
by a leg from a tree. We concentrate on this one skill for an hour until both of us
have mastered it. Then we move on to camouflage. Peeta genuinely seems to
enjoy this station, swirling a combination of mud and clay and berry juices around
on his pale skin, weaving disguises from vines and leaves. The trainer who runs
the camouflage station is full of enthusiasm at his work.
“I do the cakes,” he admits to me.
“The cakes?” I ask. I’ve been preoccupied with watching the boy from District 2
send a spear through a dummy’s heart from fifteen yards. “What cakes?”
“At home. The iced ones, for the bakery,” he says.
He means the ones they display in the windows. Fancy cakes with flowers and
pretty things painted in frosting. They’re for birthdays and New Year’s Day. When
we’re in the square, Prim always drags me over to admire them, although we’d
never be able to afford one. There’s little enough beauty in District 12, though, so I
can hardly deny her this.
I look more critically at the design on Peeta’s arm. The alternating pattern of
light and dark suggests sunlight falling through the leaves in the woods. I wonder
how he knows this, since I doubt he’s ever been beyond the fence. Has he been
able to pick this up from just that scraggly old apple tree in his backyard?
Somehow the whole thing — his skill, those inaccessible cakes, the praise of the
camouflage expert — annoys me.
“It’s lovely. If only you could frost someone to death,” I say.
“Don’t be so superior. You can never tell what you’ll find in the arena. Say it’s
actually a gigantic cake —” begins Peeta.
“Say we move on,” I break in.
So the next three days pass with Peeta and I going quietly from station to
station. We do pick up some valuable skills, from starting fires, to knife throwing,
to making shelter. Despite Haymitch’s order to appear mediocre, Peeta excels in
hand-to-hand combat, and I sweep the edible plants test without blinking an eye.
We steer clear of archery and weightlifting though, wanting to save those for our
private sessions.
The Gamemakers appeared early on the first day. Twenty or so men and
women dressed in deep purple robes. They sit in the elevated stands that surround
the gymnasium, sometimes wandering about to watch us, jotting down notes,
other times eating at the endless banquet that has been set for them, ignoring the
lot of us. But they do seem to be keeping their eye on the District 12 tributes.
Several times I’ve looked up to find one fixated on me. They consult with the
trainers during our meals as well. We see them all gathered together when we
come back.
Breakfast and dinner are served on our floor, but at lunch the twenty-four of us
eat in a dining room off the gymnasium. Food is arranged on carts around the
room and you serve yourself. The Career Tributes tend to gather rowdily around
one table, as if to prove their superiority, that they have no fear of one another
and consider the rest of us beneath notice. Most of the other tributes sit alone, like
lost sheep. No one says a word to us. Peeta and I eat together, and since
Haymitch keeps dogging us about it, try to keep up a friendly conversation during
the meals.
It’s not easy to find a topic. Talking of home is painful. Talking of the present
unbearable. One day, Peeta empties our breadbasket and points out how they
have been careful to include types from the districts along with the refined bread
of the Capitol. The fish-shaped loaf tinted green with seaweed from District 4. The
crescent moon roll dotted with seeds from District 11. Somehow, although it’s
made from the same stuff, it looks a lot more appetizing than the ugly drop
biscuits that are the standard fare at home.
“And there you have it,” says Peeta, scooping the breads back in the basket.
“You certainly know a lot,” I say.
“Only about bread,” he says. “Okay, now laugh as if I’ve said something
funny.”
We both give a somewhat convincing laugh and ignore the stares from around
the room.
“All right, I’ll keep smiling pleasantly and you talk,” says Peeta. It’s wearing us
both out, Haymitch’s direction to be friendly. Because ever since I slammed my
door, there’s been a chill in the air between us. But we have our orders.
“Did I ever tell you about the time I was chased by a bear?” I ask.
“No, but it sounds fascinating,” says Peeta.
I try and animate my face as I recall the event, a true story, in which I’d
foolishly challenged a black bear over the rights to a beehive. Peeta laughs and
asks questions right on cue. He’s much better at this than I am.
On the second day, while we’re taking a shot at spear throwing, he whispers to
me. “I think we have a shadow.”
I throw my spear, which I’m not too bad at actually, if I don’t have to throw too
far, and see the little girl from District 11 standing back a bit, watching us. She’s
the twelve-year-old, the one who reminded me so of Prim in stature. Up close she
looks about ten. She has bright, dark, eyes and satiny brown skin and stands tilted
up on her toes with her arms slightly extended to her sides, as if ready to take
wing at the slightest sound. It’s impossible not to think of a bird.
I pick up another spear while Peeta throws. “I think her name’s Rue,” he says
softly.
I bite my lip. Rue is a small yellow flower that grows in the Meadow. Rue.
Primrose. Neither of them could tip the scale at seventy pounds soaking wet.
“What can we do about it?” I ask him, more harshly than I intended.
“Nothing to do,” he says back. “Just making conversation.”
Now that I know she’s there, it’s hard to ignore the child. She slips up and joins
us at different stations. Like me, she’s clever with plants, climbs swiftly, and has
good aim. She can hit the target every time with a slingshot. But what is a
slingshot against a 220-pound male with a sword?
Back on the District 12 floor, Haymitch and Effie grill us throughout breakfast
and dinner about every moment of the day. What we did, who watched us, how the
other tributes size up. Cinna and Portia aren’t around, so there’s no one to add
any sanity to the meals. Not that Haymitch and Effie are fighting anymore. Instead
they seem to be of one mind, determined to whip us into shape. Full of endless
directions about what we should do and not do in training. Peeta is more patient,
but I become fed up and surly.
When we finally escape to bed on the second night, Peeta mumbles, “Someone
ought to get Haymitch a drink.”
I make a sound that is somewhere between a snort and a laugh. Then catch
myself. It’s messing with my mind too much, trying to keep straight when we’re
supposedly friends and when we’re not. At least when we get into the arena, I’ll
know where we stand. “Don’t. Don’t let’s pretend when there’s no one around.”
“All right, Katniss,” he says tiredly. After that, we only talk in front of people.
On the third day of training, they start to call us out of lunch for our private
sessions with the Gamemakers. District by district, first the boy, then the girl
tribute. As usual, District 12 is slated to go last. We linger in the dining room,
unsure where else to go. No one comes back once they have left. As the room
empties, the pressure to appear friendly lightens. By the time they call Rue, we
are left alone. We sit in silence until they summon Peeta. He rises.
“Remember what Haymitch said about being sure to throw the weights.” The
words come out of my mouth without permission.
“Thanks. I will,” he says. “You . . . shoot straight.”
I nod. I don’t know why I said anything at all. Although if I’m going to lose, I’d
rather Peeta win than the others. Better for our district, for my mother and Prim.
After about fifteen minutes, they call my name. I smooth my hair, set my
shoulders back, and walk into the gymnasium. Instantly, I know I’m in trouble.
They’ve been here too long, the Gamemakers. Sat through twenty-three other
demonstrations. Had too much to wine, most of them. Want more than anything to
go home.
There’s nothing I can do but continue with the plan. I walk to the archery
station. Oh, the weapons! I’ve been itching to get my hands on them for days!
Bows made of wood and plastic and metal and materials I can’t even name.
Arrows with feathers cut in flawless uniform lines. I choose a bow, string it, and
sling the matching quiver of arrows over my shoulder. There’s a shooting range,
but it’s much too limited. Standard bull’s-eyes and human silhouettes. I walk to the
center of the gymnasium and pick my first target. The dummy used for knife
practice. Even as I pull back on the bow I know something is wrong. The string’s
tighter than the one I use at home. The arrow’s more rigid. I miss the dummy by a
couple of inches and lose what little attention I had been commanding. For a
moment, I’m humiliated, then I head back to the bull’s-eye. I shoot again and
again until I get the feel of these new weapons.
Back in the center of the gymnasium, I take my initial position and skewer the
dummy right through the heart. Then I sever the rope that holds the sandbag for
boxing, and the bag splits open as it slams to the ground. Without pausing, I
shoulder-roll forward, come up on one knee, and send an arrow into one of the
hanging lights high above the gymnasium floor. A shower of sparks bursts from the
fixture.
It’s excellent shooting. I turn to the Gamemakers. A few are nodding approval,
but the majority of them are fixated on a roast pig that has just arrived at their
banquet table.
Suddenly I am furious, that with my life on the line, they don’t even have the
decency to pay attention to me. That I’m being upstaged by a dead pig. My heart
starts to pound, I can feel my face burning. Without thinking, I pull an arrow from
my quiver and send it straight at the Gamemakers’ table. I hear shouts of alarm as
people stumble back. The arrow skewers the apple in the pig’s mouth and pins it
to the wall behind it. Everyone stares at me in disbelief.
“Thank you for your consideration,” I say. Then I give a slight bow and walk
straight toward the exit without being dismissed.
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