I only realize it's raining when my clothes are soaked through.

From the minimal shelter the trees offer, I watch smoke waft up from the distance as the downfall starts putting out the fires. It rises in big ugly grey plumes to stain an-already bruised and weeping sky.

All those people, I think as I watch the curls of smoke rise in the distance. Wike's face surfaces in my mind again, followed by the kindly old woman's I used to wave to on my way to the forest in the early mornings. I wonder if they got out, or if, when I return to the city, I'll be walking over their ashes.

I don't speak to Leif, and he doesn't speak to me, which I'm perfectly content with. My anger is still there, a thin layer of it brimming above the torrential grief below, and one wrong move will cause it to pool over the rim. But I don't let the anger go; it's easier to handle than the grief. Because once grief consumes you, only time can pull you out of it.

And that's one thing I don't have.

I think I fall asleep at some point. Or maybe it's more of a trance I fall into, but it feels like minutes pass before Leif's movements jolt me back to reality. "Let's start down," he says, and I'm up in a second. It's not quite nightfall, but the sunlight is beginning to fail, falling behind the trees and fracturing between the woods. It's a good enough light source though, that we can ensure the peacekeepers are gone.

Peacekeepers. The thought of them in my city makes my vision go white and puts a chill in my blood that travels deeper than the one from my soaked clothes. I can't think about that now. Instead, I turn my attention to keeping my steps quiet, just in case anyone was left behind.

But when we finally make it to the city, any thought of carefulness ceases. My eyes widen and I think my jaw falls, as I stare out over the ruins that used to be a city. 

That used to be people.

It has literally been reduced to nothing but charred black debris and broken stone. It litters the cratered ground in masses, each different sizes and shapes. I don't even recognize where I am until I see half a sign from a shop Rye used to buy art supplies from, now erased from history with nothing but half a word on a plank to mark its prior existence.

A choked sound escapes me-halfway between a sob and a cough. I'd heard stories of bombed places. Of terrors that fell from the sky and tore land to shreds. I've seen echoes of it from where 12 was bombed before. But even your mind cannot comprehend the magnitude of destruction until you're witnessing it firsthand. Now I have, and yet I still I find it an almost impossible thing to grasp. 

I know better than to call out Rye's name as I pick my way over the remnants, gently, as if not wanting to disturb them. What used to be a place with bustling folks and loud roads has been silenced. Now it's just empty, the only noise being my pounding heart and the crunch of my boots upon the ashes.

Nothing is here, I know. Nothing living, that is. But the truth of it doesn't really sink in until I trip over something and look down, my eyes falling to what could be none other than charred bone.

My chest twists and I stumble back, away from the town and towards my house. I can't tell if Leif is following me until I hear his footsteps trailing after, down the road, past the crater, and to my mangled, broken home.

It's a horrendous sight, one that sends more pain gouging through me but I don't stop until I'm standing in the middle of the mess, nearly knee high in memory and ruin.

Then I start searching. I heft up pieces of indistinguishable material, searching for any sign that my brother was left here. It's morbid and awful, but I need to know.

I search and search, around what I think used to be the kitchen. But then I find a bent pan where I thought the guest room had been and get turned around once more. I keep digging though, until my hands are colored watery black and my knees are aching from crouching so much, yet I continue. I keep looking long after the evening light fades and I'm sifting through ash in the dark.

"I'm not . . . I don't see anything," I finally say, which I'm relieved by. If I don't find anything, it means my brother might still alive. I can be okay without a house and with things and precious items burnt to a crisp. All that is okay, and just as long as my brother is not among them, it's nearly downright euphoric.

He's not here, I tell myself, feeling an ember of that earlier certainty begin to revive. Which means he at least knew what was coming before it hit here.

"Maybe they took him," I mumble to myself.

"Or maybe he was in the city at the time of the attack," Leif says. I'd almost forgotten his presence altogether. I glare at him, his figure barely distinguishable in the ghostly light. "No, he wasn't."

My brother wouldn't have run into the city that was being bombed. He wouldn't-

"Unless he was trying to find you." Leif has enough decency to say the words softly, which is at odds with the way they seem to rip through my chest.

I close my eyes for a second, suddenly wishing Leif away. It takes physical effort not to slap him again and I force myself to take a breath. I will not admit that he's just put a voice to my greatest fear. Not yet. "He knows I hunt in the mornings."

Even if the peacekeepers do have him, they'll head to the Capitol which is where my parents are anyway.

"But he also knows you were instructed not to, right?" Leif continues. "He had no reason to assume looking in the forest."

Breathing becomes harder, and it's not because of the smoke. "I'm not sure. I didn't mention it to him."

"Have you ever shown him where you like to hunt?"

Breath saws through my teeth in small bursts. "No."

"Then how would he - "

"Stop!" I scream at Leif suddenly. I pick up a piece of something and throw it in what I think is his general direction. "Just stop talking! I don't want to hear your theories on what could've happened, okay? I don't need all your worst-case-scenarios, believe me." I shake my head, trying to get my bearings. "No, what happened was that the . . . the Peacekeepers,"-I choke on the title-"must have taken him with them. They had no reason to come in a truck if their only objective was to bomb the place. They came to get something."

Or someone.

I focus on calming my racing heart. Focus on slowing my breathing before I start wading out of the debris when all I want to do is fall apart in it. 

"So that's what you're going to do," Leif says, the suspicion evident in his voice. I don't say anything.

"You're very predictable, you know that?" he continues.

"So you've mentioned," I snap. "I'm going to find my brother. Super predictable." I tread carefully, testing each step as I go. The last remnants of sunlight are gone, leaving a smoky evening sky without stars. 

"And so you think you can just waltz into the Capitol?" I nearly jump at the proximity his voice comes in, almost directly tailing me. The man seems to move silently, and I'm suddenly surprised I have the energy to be irritated by that. "Really, after they just bombed this place?"

Whatever spark I felt instantly peters out. I'm suddenly so tired it feels as though I could lie on a bed of ash and sleep for days. I'm tired, thirsty, hungry, and terrified all rolled into one. I'm not in the mood for any lectures from him. "I'll figure something out," I grind. "You can just stay out of it, okay? I don't even know why you're still here."

And I don't. The fact that he seems so quick to follow me around is both unnerving and a bit suspicious. 

A beat of silence passes. "My apologies, Little Everdeen," he says, but I hear the subtle mockery in his words. "But even your company is better than a corpse's."

I don't even have enough energy to glower at him as I keep walking, retracing our steps to the trees that no longer smell of pine. No, the only scent burning my nose is the tang of acrid smoke and burnt wood and rain. I decide to leave now, just enough to get beyond the borders of the town. Besides, I'm less likely to be seen at night, and if the Peacekeepers had to stop along the way, their campsite would be visible in the darkness, waving like an oversized flag.

I don't care if I'm tired. I don't care if the chill of the wind bites into my sodden clothes. I just start walking.

Again, Leif's voice appears behind me and it makes my skin crawl. His suddenness is eerie in the dark. "You assume it'll be safer traveling during the night," he states.

I don't answer.

"You should be more careful."

I glance at his silhouette. "Of what? Of bombs falling from the sky? Or of strangers showing up on my doorstep?"

I feel him pause. "Of being so easy to read."

I am my mother's daughter, because I still have it in me to roll my eyes, mostly because he is not the first person to tell me as much. "Oh, yeah? And what's so wrong with that?"

His tone darkens, just a bit, and I picture those stormy eyes staring at my unguarded back. "You'll find out sometime."

_______________________

I plan to ditch Leif at a rest stop. Once we make it a few miles out of town and onto the rougher terrain, I finally force me legs to quit and offer them the break the muscles have been crying sweat for. I have to look behind to make sure Leif is still there-which he is; as silent and lithe as a cat. It will make it more challenging to get by him unnoticed.

My eyes are heavy as I stare out through the trees. It'll be a few hours until dawn, but already the sky is changing from inky black to a royal purple, wiped of any traces of the burning, dying city.

Just like that.

Again, I don't speak to Leif as I close my eyes, hoping he'll follow suit and get the memo to sleep. But I can't sleep. I have to stay awake until he isn't and leave. I decide to head deeper into the forest and cut South which will meet back to the road in less the time. Food would be a harder endeavor, since I lost my bow somewhere between the bombs and searching for Rye, I can't remember where or when. But it's gone and I'll have to figure a way to survive without it.

An hour later, I think Leif is asleep. It's difficult to tell, though, since his breathing is just as light as it's ever been, guarded even now. That's really annoying, I admit, and it forces me to give it another hour. My eyes are tempted to close over and over, but when they do, the scenes of fire and ash that appear before them is enough to keep them open. Finally, with the light of dawn peeking just over the horizon, I rise to my feet, as silently as humanly possible.

I watch for pesky stones, careful not to sift dirt or pine needles, placing the soles of my feet gingerly on the ground. I skirt bushes and trees and keep Leif within my line of vision. Three yards. Six. The casing of a bird scares me and I nearly jump, cursing under my breath.

When I think I'm far enough where the noise won't travel back and see Leif's still-lying figure, I take off. My legs are wobbly and shaking, my stomach a pit of hunger, but I keep going, even as I trip and fall and the world becomes too blurry to distinguish branch from bush.

I don't know how far I go, feeling as if I'm on autopilot, letting instinct take over. Exhaustion weighs me down and has me questioning my route, but when the woods begin to clear, I know I'm nearing the road. Where exactly that is, I have little idea.

Rye and I used to talk about leaving the town; find something beyond this town and explore what the new cities have to offer. We both wanted to discover a life past the potholes of our borders that used to hold an electric fence.

But I never dreamed of this circumstance being the ramrod to fire that shot. I couldn't even leave my home by my own violation, but by necessity and it hurts that I don't even have the option to return to it.

When I see the road, I duck down beneath the brush and finally allow myself to rest. It isn't very fitful, too drenched in blood and bathed in fire to offer much relief from it, but I still wake a few hours later feeling less off balance.

I don't know if Leif is following after or decided to give up and let me walk to whatever fate awaits me but I don't mull it over for long, resume my trek through the woods. I stay by the road, but far enough into the trees for shelter and camouflage, suddenly grateful for the dark colored tar helping me blend into the dark greens of the trees. I take it a step further and rub my blackened arm on my face.

By the time I reach my next resting point, my throat is raw from thirst. Thanks to the recent rainfall, I'm able to scour some few drops bowled in leaves. The meal I find, however, is much less appealing. If it hadn't been for my own hunting and survival ambition, plus the tips dad gave me whenever I mustered up the courage to ask him about his time spent in the arena, I wouldn't know the protein value of a bee's larvae.

It's better than going hungry, I tell myself. I take a deep breath and try to imagine swallowing bread crumbs opposed to baby bees.

When evening comes again, I pick up the pace, my eyes growing accustomed to the dim light as the sun falls away. Tonight, it's clear, with a slight biting wind but at least I can see the moon, making it a little easier to maneuver through the dark.

To keep myself from falling back into the pit of my own thoughts, I start mumbling a song to myself, quiet so as not to give myself away, but loud enough to offer comfort.

Deep in the meadow

Under the willow....

A memory surfaces of a younger version of me, sitting in my mom's lap as she sang that song. There's something haunting about it, something sweet and sour that tells me it's been sung in both happy times and sad ones. It's also the inspiration to my name, and I feel closer to my parents now, whispering the lyrics to myself.

 A bed of grass

A soft green pillow....

Something flickers in my vision suddenly and I duck down, so quickly the moon's light smears across my vision. I narrow my eyes.

I'm standing above a ridge, a small cleft in the hills by the road that allows me to see some distance ahead, and I don't miss the faint glow of firelight there.

My chest contracts and I pick up a decent sized branch before I begin walking.

Each crunch of leaf is amplified in my ears, sending off blaring red lights of warning. But nothing comes for me and I continue on, watching as the firelight grows into a very distinguishable flame.

Then I hear the noises.

It's a low cacophony of whispers carried to me on the light breeze. Words I can't clearly make out and I take steps closer, easing my way through the branches until I can see.

Between the trees, my eyes fall to a small cluster of men sitting around the fire. Bottles are clutched in their hands and the heavy tang of whisky wafts to me. I only have to look at their clothes-browned and torn with poverty-to know they aren't Peacekeepers and the wait is crushing. My brother won't be among the throng of these alcohol guzzlers. Tears spring to my eyes at the disappointment but I'm already turning my attention to skirting around them.

Peacekeepers or not, I need to stay alert and cautious.

I head to the right, gently pulling down the branches in my way, skirting over the logs, flinching at every snapping twig. But they're also drunk, which is beneficial to me. Drunk men are clumsy men, after all.

Something sounds behind me and I turn around, so fast I almost don't see him. But I register a man with scraggly black hair and stained beard, just before pain explodes over my temple and sends me seeing fireworks.

Lay down your head

and close your sleepy eyes....