Chapter Text
When Marcus had said: You’re gonna watch me die someday, Sejanus Plinth. He didn’t think he actually meant it.
But he would not deny it, as soon as the district’s punishment came to life, spilling onto his brain without remorse whilst he was shaking in his Ma’s arms in the Capitol, Marcus was the first and only person to flash behind his eyes. Then, he began to have nightmares. Of himself, of Marcus, dead in The Hunger Games.
He tried to make them go away, poor attempts at swatting away the inevitable. During the Capitol winters, he’d worn Marcus’s scarf until it was strings. When he had awoken from his sleep, sweat on his chest and dried tears on his cheeks, he’d fetch the marble heart, and try to make sense of it all. The first item he unveiled from his box upon moving, the one his father had forced every single one of his things into, was the class photo. Despite the sharp crack that now strung across the frame’s glass, he could still see Marcus and his smile. He sat it on the miniature table that was placed by his bedside.
Sometimes, when it was really quiet in his room, when the air was still and when his fingers couldn’t seem to find anything else besides the pieces from home, all Marcus embraced, he could feel a vibration in his chest. Along his neck. A vibration that was so faint and so fragile, that if he even dared to unfocus, he would lose it. He had known it was Marcus, his spirit though he was alive. He’d felt it when he first came to the Capitol, so scared and alone. He’d felt it when his father had his mark removed.
He wouldn’t dare to tell anyone, not even Ma, in fear that his father would overhear—but he doesn’t believe it’s actually gone. It couldn’t be, it’d been on his skin since birth, it was willed to stay forever. Who knows, maybe it really was erased, and he’s just continuing to hold onto the childish dream that he and Marcus’s fated links hadn’t rusted. That they were soulmates. That they were meant to be. That they were meant to meet again.
However, after an entire decade in the Capitol, Sejanus prayed to God Marcus never ended up here.
Away from Two, in the heart of the districts’ oppressors. It’s been as hard and horrible as anyone would imagine. Even at eighteen, Sejanus withholds the hope of running home on just his bare feet. He would do it, too. If it weren’t for Ma, who has dealt with so much unfairness over the years from the citizens here. All of them have, they did not spare his father, who came home more irritated each day.
The children here didn’t seem to leave Sejanus alone, his father only told him that his education was important, that the school was top tier and he had to push through. But he was little, nine and ten and eleven and so on. The insults didn’t ease, neither did the pushing and shoving. Through his drowning tears, he’d think of when someone had dropped everything to help him. Habitually kind and gentle, never needing anyone to command him. Sejanus would cry for hours, and hours, until one day, he’d gotten so used to the poor treatment, it was practically a part of his everyday routine. His life. Their words only stung rather than stabbed, at least he's convinced himself that.
His facade of tolerance began to crack on the morning of the tenth annual Reaping.
Crack, more like shatter. As he’s had a dreadful feeling since his eyes had opened. He’d been sensing it below his ribcage all week, every day that’s gone by since he was granted the role of a mentor. Due to his father’s deep money-swaddled pockets, he’d been hurled into a position that left him shook to his core. Growing up here, he’d been avoiding the Games as much as he could. He’d gone to bed the night before the Reaping ceremony as late as he could just so he’d oversleep. Or he’d confine himself to his ivory bed sheets, pretending as if it wasn’t happening.
He knew that wasn’t right of him, to merely turn a blind eye. It wasn’t helping nor stopping anything. But it was haunting, watching kids from Two be treated this way, being ripped from their homes to die, knowing his lifeline would’ve been just as threatened if he had still lived there. Just as district and just as dead.
Imagining it made him sick. But, he quickly reminded himself that they didn’t have to imagine it, they were living it. Every waking moment. And all he could do was envision the horror. Each time the thought crosses him, Sejanus thinks of Marcus, of him as a child and what he would do if he saw him on one of the stands at Two’s Reaping.
The memory of him blared against Sejanus’s eardrums once he changed into his ashen suit, dark and gray. Marcus was eighteen, the final year of eligibility, surely, he would make it. He’s lasted this long. But Sejanus couldn’t seem to eat, or sleep the night prior. An awful brewing twisted within him, Ma had noticed, and tried to give him some medicine, it didn’t aid his nausea in the slightest. Whatever he was feeling, was stronger and planning to overpower him. His weakness shines when Professor Sickle shoves the ornamental shield in his hands, he usually has no problem helping her out, even though she certainly was consistent with her calls. Ma thinks she’s irksome. He doesn’t disagree.
He brings a cup of posca to his lips before they enter Heavensbee Hall, the bitterness sends a jolt through him, a jolt of remembrance as his Ma had forced it down him in the midst of the war. He tenses up a bit at the taste, wishing they had water around instead.
His arms burn from the weight, even though it hadn’t really been that heavy. Even Coriolanus Snow had taken notice of his struggle. Just standing there, it felt like his essence was being sucked from his body. He doesn’t want to be here, he doesn’t want a mentorship. He doesn’t care how much of an honor it is. It was terrible, all of it. He cannot wait to graduate and move on from his father, he doesn’t know if he can withstand dealing with him any longer. Ever since he had brought them to the Capitol, Sejanus hasn’t been able to look at him the same. In his eyes, he wasn’t Pa. He was his father, a monster disguised as a war-profiteer. Sejanus was just an heir to him, he doesn’t know if he ever loved him like a son.
If he was capable of love, Ma was the only one he had a heart for. Though, had she always felt the same? She probably doesn’t remember, but the whole you’ll have to leave him, just like me stuck with Sejanus. Her mark, her past lover—her soulmate. Who was it? Where were they?
He’s never been afraid to come to his Ma when he has questions, but this seemed like a territory that was too emotional and raw to touch. He understands. He doesn’t let either of his parents forget about Marcus. The boy who was once his best friend, the most precious part of his childhood and his first love. Despite the joy bringing him up at dinner brought in the moment, it still hurt in the end, he’d cry afterward without fail. Breaking him all over again.
By the time takes his seat, the Dean is fumbling with his glasses and Sejanus’s skin feels clammy. Gradually, he reads off the first two tributes and their mentors, District One. He doesn’t even have to fully announce who the District Two boy belongs to, as his lips are barely forming Sejanus’s name when it all registers.
His rotten intuition was shaping up to be terribly correct.
He could hardly hear the following assignments, as his ears felt clogged. Underwater. Drowned out by fear as his worst nightmare inched closer and closer, it may as well have been clawing its nails into his shoulders from behind, from above.
Though, he knew all along, that as soon as they began to flicker past the Reapings, this poisoned feeling full of trepidation and sorrow, was no it. It was Marcus. The boy from District Two, a bloody shard from his past who had continued to linger within the brace of his membrane for years and years.
Who was now his tribute.
Somehow, even through the static film that was displayed on the narrow screen, Sejanus could delineate the mark on Marcus’s throat. Somehow, it was more evident than his features, than the face that Sejanus has been seeing in his dreams every single night. Somehow, it felt like this was always meant to happen. Through the Hunger Games, through the very thing his father had used as a reason to rip him away from Two forever, from Marcus.
An expression of blatant misery must’ve glossed over his face instantly, as he suddenly hears: What is it? Aren’t you happy? District Two, the boy—that’s the pick of the litter, in his ear.
You forget, I’m part of that litter, is what trudges from his own mouth. It’s resistant, shielding and something a Capitol citizen wouldn’t be surprised to hear from him, from someone who doesn’t let go of his home. It’s a good enough excuse. Not that he didn’t picture himself getting reaped every year, it was just, he doesn’t imagine anyone here understanding. He’d probably get laughed at. District nonsense, whatever they always said.
He can’t bear to stare at the screen for any longer, however he tries his best to contain the overflowing disgust when he realizes how easily this could’ve been his father’s doing. He’d gotten him the mentorship, who's to say he wouldn’t throw in an extra bundle of cash just to ensure Sejanus got assigned a tribute from Two? A blaring reminder that he would never go back home, a reminder that he would’ve turned out just like Marcus if they had stayed.
He’s still shaking as he walks home. Still struggling to grasp the truth of Marcus getting tossed into the Hunger Games, that he could die and it would be entirely Sejanus’s responsibility, as a mentor, to steer him. They speak of the tributes like they’re not people, like they’re grades on a paper and not human beings with real lives. Families and cultures and hearts. How would the other mentors react if he told them he had the luxury to know Marcus, his tribute, years ago? Would they see it as unfair? As a disadvantage?
No, certainly not. The only one at a disadvantage here was him.
When he finally makes it to the door of his apartment, he’s so cold he isn’t sure if anything would soothe it. It felt as if his bones were locking in place, or like he was dangling from a beam, tied by his wrists, all of his blood draining to the tips of his fingers and toes. He felt like a ghost. His throat even felt icy. Dry. He instinctively grazes the place where his mark once was with his nails, as if he was searching for the pluck of extra skin that he could peel back and reveal the birthmark again.
Ma is near the table, rearranging her small shelf that was decorated with her miscellaneous bits of Two. Flavia, the Avox his father had hired for them a little over a year ago, lingers by the stove, scrubbing the surface. Sejanus tries not to disturb her when he shuffles by, as she already appeared pained enough. Sejanus has never been struck with a deeper pang of disgust and horror when he found out what had happened to her. Her hair was a tinged brown, though he could tell that it was once a golden blonde, her lips always seemed to be red. As if her severed tongue was still pouring blood.
Within the year she’s been here, Ma has learned how to communicate with her without speaking. Sign language. And, of course, Sejanus helped her practice. Which he had learned and picked up on in the process. Flavia had seemed to follow along, trying her very best to sign what she had wanted to say, but sometimes, she ended up just writing it on one of the whiteboards Ma had gifted her when she showed up on her first day. That worked well, too.
He passes the table, and Ma catches his eyes. Like his, her once shimmering brown irises only appeared to become cloudy with an unfortunate dullness over the past decade. She knew how badly he was dreading today, the Reaping. She tried to reassure him with a kiss on the cheek this morning, smoothing out his suit with her palms. Giving him medicine. Now, she asks him what’s wrong. He already feels Marcus’s name on the edge of his lips, rounding out his mouth. Tightening his teeth like the metal braces that left his gums bloody when he was twelve.
So, he tells her.
Her own shock isn’t hidden. Not masked. He quite literally watched the color drain from her face. He isn’t sure if his blood would ever flood back within his cheeks, nothing really felt real. Not since the Dean had announced the boy from Two belonged to him and Sejanus would be the only one liable for his survival. Then, there was Marcus. And everything seemed to dampen and soak and thin away, dispersing so far apart that it’d felt like the torn bits had reanimated themselves, mustering enough strength to drag him home from the Academy as if they were a pair of strings from above, knotting around his limbs and pulling him along.
Ma offers him a pastry, something sweet to relax his nerves, but he declines. He couldn’t eat, it’d splash back up and he’d regret ever touching it. Before he tries to saunter to his room, he has to ask: “Did you know?”
She appeared surprised. He wasn’t accusing her in the slightest, but he had remembered when Ma had told him about the move, how she had known weeks ahead of that moment. She didn’t break it to him when his father had first told her, because she was fully cognizant of how it’d ruin his little heart. She told him so when he was thirteen, as he’d asked about it on a night where he was feeling weightfully homesick. Sejanus can’t help but think of that now. She shakes her head anyhow, quickly as if the expression on his face had hurt her. “I didn’t—Sejanus, I didn’t know. I’m sorry.”
He didn’t have a reason not to believe her. She was the only one here who cared enough for him, enough to make him feel loved and still feel like he had a place in this world. She gives him a look of sympathy, embalmed with remorse, and he gives her a limp nod. Turning down the hall.
He was so nauseous that every step he took to his room dragged like a nail through the flesh amongst his stomach, digging and bleeding and causing his steps to become messy. He’s unable to discard his attire entirely, as the most he rips off is the jacket and paisley tie, leaving the white undershirt and dark pants on. He does flick off his shoes, however. And lands on his bed with a huff that rattles his bones. Black, crowded circles caved in the corners of his eyes, and his consciousness began to slip past his mind. Swiveling through his body and retreating toward the tarnished air, its presence welcomed by the smoke of his father’s burning cigars.
The last time Marcus had been this hungry, he’d been seven and it was during a snowstorm. With no vehicle, a father that was stubborn and afraid of the skin fracturing wind, he’d curled into himself in the corner of his room and tried to suppress the burrowing strides of hunger that thundered around his abdomen. Those couple of days were the furthest his body has ever been pushed. But, after the Reaping, he’s certain this was worse.
He wouldn’t curl into himself this time, though. Absolutely not. Not when a bunch of children were currently scattered within his vicinity, each and every one of them crying and mumbling about wanting more food or wanting to go home. He wasn’t sure where they were. Tall, skinny black bars circled them like a cage, plants and rocks were thrown in, too. It felt like an exhibit. The sun was now dipping into the clouds and darkness teased beyond the sky, he was thankful, as it was extraordinarily hot today.
While it was consistently these past few days, especially in the cattle car, the beaming rays seemed to direct right onto him here. Through the trees and bushes. It landed heavily on his neck. Right beneath his jaw and tearing toward his chest, it was like the ball of light above was targeting the specific spot on purpose, just to lengthen his torture. It burned like hell and he was positive he’d wake up with a rash tomorrow.
He squinted as his eyes scaled the area once more, some Capitol degenerates were standing on the outside now, sticking their arms through the bars and trying to speak to the rest of the kids. That blonde haired boy who’d ended up in their cattle car earlier could be credited for that. For his show and all with the girl in the myriad colored, ruffled dress after he’d been dumped inside. Their food and cheers.
It’s tame enough. Though, the pulsating that twisted in his abdomen was leering into pain, it’d pass. He could induce himself of that, at least until he dies. He swallows whatever drops of moisture remained in his parched mouth repeatedly as if the action was easing the rising crave to eat. It’s a distraction. Somehow, it works.
It works, but with his back pressed against the rocky wall, arms across his chest, he spots a new figure scurry to the front of the gate. And suddenly, he hears a voice, watches the person—who was another boy, stretch his hand out to one of the little girls, a thick sandwich in his palm. Marcus narrows his stare, brows furrowing as his tone becomes clearer, he stares, and stares, until a vortex of acrid familiarity sinks into his core. The ringing that zips through Marcus’s ears and cracks his skull could have sent him to his knees.
Of course, to make things more pleasant, a boy he desperately attempted to scrub from his once ingenious mind, a boy he wished he had never met and never wanted to see again, lingered ahead. Dressed in an ironed, pristine white button-up and glossy pointed shoes, was Sejanus Plinth. With his dark curls slipping past his brows and wide eyes, he almost looks like he used to.
Almost, is not acceptable. Almost, does not snuff out the gleaming flare that burns inside of his throat and consists of nothing but pure resentment. It’s a degree of anger that congests his nose, blurring his vision in the crossfire. How fortuitous was he? To get reaped at the last year of eligibility, then have to look at the boy he’s hated and wanted to forget for the past decade through a cage? He’s already accepted his fate upon hearing his name spread throughout the square, but this just felt like taunting. Death playing with its food.
Marcus is so caught up in the mess, that he hardly takes notice of that blonde haired boy returning. He’s by Sejanus, they’re discussing something whilst a bulging backpack sits beside his feet. He could make out a large stand that resembled some kind of camera, too. Like the one he saw a few hours ago.
He doesn’t know why he has the heart to care, to look. He shouldn’t.
He brings his eyes to the floor when he hears more and more footsteps scurry to the front of the gate.
Bits of him hope that Sejanus ignores him. Pretend like he doesn’t exist. He lifts his head, briefly, to ensure he’s not staring him down. He isn’t, but it only takes a handful of seconds for that to overturn. He now has the last sandwich in his hand, and his eyes are practically drilling into him. Dark brown and glittering of everything he despises. Marcus can’t seem to jolt away, then, his name falls from Sejanus’s mouth.
“Marcus,” he says, long and smoggy. “This is for you.” he pulls himself closer to the bars, like it had somehow made him hear his words better. “Take it. Please.”
Marcus keeps his expression, his statue and form, returning his glare so furiously that his own eyes begin to water. “Please, Marcus.” Sejanus couldn’t seem to take the hint. “You must be starving.”
He was an excellent performer. Acting as if he had any genuine intentions coming here. Offering starving children food, coincidentally, in front of all the cameras. Though, after Sejanus had told him they were destined, then had gotten up and left Two like it had meant nothing—Marcus had begun to believe that he'd been good at pretending all along.
A flash of something Marcus can’t quite unravel breaks across Sejanus’s expression once he understands that he doesn’t want his food, his help. That he doesn’t want him here. And for a dull moment, Marcus burns in it. A brief droplet of their past slipping through, of when Sejanus had given him half of his sandwich when they were children. When he had taken it. Quickly, he straightens up. And before he turns away for good, his eyes foolishly snap from the wavering sandwich, to the side of the boy’s neck.
How could he not let the flames of disgust engulf him even further once he realizes that his mark was no longer there?
Sejanus wasn’t sure if this could get any worse.
Between Marcus blatantly ignoring him, the arrogance that seeped from the Academy’s walls, the back-and-forth arguing with his father—he doesn’t know how much more he can take.
It was horrible. The anxiety, the fear, the horror of everything just swarmed his body. Inflating larger and larger like a strained balloon. It would burst eventually, but for now, he had to prepare for tomorrow's questionnaire.
Despite Marcus’s rejection, he stands in the kitchen now, watching Ma drag a flat knife across the surface of a freshly baked cake, icing colored pink and white follow. He’d asked her to bake it as soon as he got home from the Zoo, as he wanted to bring it to Marcus. Maybe he would accept it this time, no one has ever turned away from his Ma’s treats. It was worth a try. It was shot in the dark more than anything, though. He just couldn’t bear the thought of Marcus starving in that enclosure.
“I think it’s time for you to eat something as well, honey.” Ma says as she spun the cake one last time, it wasn’t very wide, not as big as the other cakes she’d baked in the past. Sejanus requested that. He knew how heavy they could get, and he wanted to be able to actually carry it to Marcus without it slipping from his palm.
Sejanus shrugs. “I’m not very hungry.”
Ma’s attention slowly gravitated from the cake, to her son. Her brows strung together in worry, and it was only a matter of time before Sejanus knew she had caught notice of the looming glint in his eyes. “What happened?”
He sighs, pressing his lower back against the marble counter. While he interlocks his fingers together, he runs a thumb over a white-lined scar. “Marcus was the only one who didn’t take a sandwich from me.” he admits, a pang of guilt builds up in his chest again. His own words of offer echoing within his shell, he regrets saying it. Attempting to toss Marcus to Coriolanus like he was cargo, a bet, just because he couldn’t handle the tragedy himself. “He’d rather starve than trust me.”
Ma frowns, and so does Sejanus when she tries to tell him it wasn’t any of his fault, that Marcus was here, that he was starving and that he was angry. He doesn’t believe any of it. Would Marcus have taken the food if it was brought by anyone else in his class? He can’t stomach the possibility of that question ending in yes. But maybe it would’ve been for the best.
“I’ll eat in the morning,” Sejanus assures her, hardly knowing if that was even true. “I just can’t right now.”
She asks if he would eat something small. A pack of pretzels and cheese, a bundle of crackers. He shakes his head, biting his tongue as he slips away and bids her good night. The expression of sadness on her face makes him feel bad for it, in hopes to suppress it, he swallows dryly as he returns to the hall, passing Flavia, who was dusting a shelf that was nailed to the wall. They share a look before he tears his gaze to the carpet once more, head hanging as he forces his legs to wheel toward his room.
The burrowing rage that rips up his body as he passes his father’s office seems to wake him right up. Resulting in a, yet another, sleepless night. His hands unable to find anything but the marble heart he’d been gifted so long ago.
It’s a shame he finds Sejanus instantly on the balcony.
With the too-tight shackles that clamped around his wrists and ankles, picking out this boy amongst the group of other kindly dressed Capitol students should have been the least of his concerns. He keeps his glare down afterward, humiliated due to not only netting eyes with Sejanus, but the state he was in. He could now see his blood tainting the inner-silver hue of the chains. Death could not come soon enough.
He craves it even more when the rich smell of strawberry cake and fresh sandwiches burns his nose.
He kept his sight engraved into the scuffed table as long as he could, however, when the plates replaced the surface—he turned to the floor instead.
Marcus knows how it feels to merely sense eyes on him. He’s felt the fire of his father’s burning glare all his life, every day, every moment, until it eventually turned cold as ice. Until his father did, too. Until the walls of the mines crashed down onto him, until Marcus didn’t move a muscle to save him. Despite the cries, the screams. Sometimes, he regrets it. It didn’t really matter, did it? His sins would catch up to him soon anyway.
But, the eyes he felt on him now didn’t contain a dash of fury. It was much worse. “Marcus,” he hears, as light as the wind. “I figured you’d want to eat today.”
Instinctively, he wants to shake his head. Though, he decides to retreat to the same very strategy he delved into yesterday. Ignore it. Ignore him. Ignore him until he goes away. Marcus listens to him breathe waveringly, like he was nervous. What did he have to be afraid of? His stomach no longer spreads with hunger, but anger, and he’s too blinded by it to comprehend that it wrapped around him the same way his father’s own wrath did.
Sejanus speaks once, twice, maybe a third—but he for sure gives up on the fourth try, Marcus hadn’t pieced together a single thing he had said. Didn’t care to. The sound of a slip of paper falling to the floor twirls below the table, and he’s unfortunate enough to catch a glimpse of it. The only word he can make out is his name, age, and sex, all handwritten. He blinks, reluctantly, and he knows that Sejanus notices it.
“Marcus,” he repeats, somewhat in a different tone than before. Marcus still does not look at him. “Please, I want to help you. I want to help you get out of here, please. I’m sorry.” There’s a pause, and Marcus could feel his chest tighten.
With what, he wasn’t certain. Betrayal, probably. That’s all he felt when he thought of Sejanus growing up, everytime someone would mention the surname Plinth at school, or down in the mines, that hum would fill his ears, vibrating in his ribcage until it physically ached. The sensation might be something closer to heartbreak—however, he does not like to think of it that way. It only allowed memories of napping in the bright green grass, tiny, warm hands holding his, to bloom in his mind.
He doesn’t enjoy thinking of Sejanus’s goodness, because he had hurt him. He had hurt him so bad that he wished he could peel off the mark on his throat with his nails until they bled. Only he could know that he had actually tried it. Who knew a short-lived relationship from his childhood had the weight to leave him bleeding, who knew a childish belief would break his heart. He thought he was stronger than that.
“I’m sorry for everything, truly.” Sejanus says, “I’m so sorry. I wish I could have stayed. I would have if I was given the choice.” A beat of silence lingers in the air after that, “but, I know apologizing won’t change anything. So, let me help you now. Please, let me do something right. For once—for you.”
The way he said it made Marcus’s skin crawl. So saccharine that it made him sick. This was unbearable. How did his overwhelming sweetness remain so intact? How did he not change? Grow a little bit meaner? A little more strict? He makes the mistake of allowing his eyes to flit upward, he’s greeted with a look of pure desperation. Sejanus’s thick brows had curved inward, and while Marcus wasn’t the finest at detecting emotions, he somehow knew instantly that he was about to cry. It was like he could hear him before he even began.
Marcus bites his tongue, looks away, pledges to himself to never look at him again.
Nothing was going right.
His brain felt clogged. Tangled. He was positive half of his migraines were due to the frequent arguing he’d been doing during class. He wouldn’t take any of it back, though. Not after witnessing a dead girl hang by her throat, trucks dragging along the other shackled children. He couldn’t eat following the funeral, either. With the flashing images of Arachne Crane’s bloody slash and the girl’s bullet pierced corpse, he had known his stomach would reject it. Then, when he imagined Marcus that way, he could taste bile within his cheeks. Even though he hadn’t eaten a single thing.
More times often than not, his envisions of Marcus were terrible. Gory and awfully realistic. He doesn’t know why they keep flicking behind his eyes, but they occurred to him constantly. Everytime he crossed the path to the Zoo and found him in the back of the cage, a flash of red glistened in front of him like a camera’s flash. And when he had caught a hint of his throat, of the mark that still graced his skin so beautifully, he would feel a rush of coldness infiltrating his nerves, a coldness that could only be described as dread. He can’t help but remember when the mark on Marcus’s neck made him feel warm, like a rash from a rope.
But most of all, Sejanus hates that his head acts like Marcus is dead already. As recently, his nightmares do not involve him anymore. They all reek of Marcus, of their past and of death. He begins to believe the last time he’s had a peaceful sleep was when he was young.
When he hopped into the Academy van, on the road to the arena, his thoughts whirled loudly. So loudly, that he hadn’t even noticed they’d arrived until the back doors flung open. Professor Sickle went on about the tour, about what to expect and to take their places next to their tributes. And for the first time, he was anxious to stand next to Marcus. Maybe it was the fact that he had felt like he was plaguing his space—plaguing him, more like. Or maybe, it was because he’d felt that punch of cold dread desolate down his spine again, and the closer he got to Marcus, the harder it bounced against his vertebrae.
The heart in him just wants to protect him. He knows it’s the truth once he actually does plant his feet alongside Marcus’s. But, that was how it was supposed to go. It was in everyone’s wiring—to protect your soulmate. Your love. Sejanus doesn’t even feel his breath jump at the thought of him being his soulmate anymore, just sadness. Just sickness. He isn’t sure if he even believes in it anymore. His temples pulse with dizziness when his childish words bump between his eardrums: I’ll find you, when all of this is over. How cruel.
He wants to look up at him so badly, if only to ravish in the sight of him, of the boy who once walked him to the nurse’s office, that left him starstruck from the very moment he laid eyes on him. Of the boy who’d grown so brawn and taller and more naturally winsome than any man he’s ever seen in the Capitol. But he doesn’t. A part of him screams not to, as if his core had warned him that Marcus would know if his gaze had fallen on him.
When they began to barrel forward, into the wide mouth of the entrance, he hardly felt human. His limbs felt numb, his arms swung helplessly at his sides—and when his hand accidentally swiped past the rough knuckle of Marcus’s, his face flooded so deeply with embarrassment that his chest started to feel the flames, too. He didn’t dislike the feeling, though. It quickly replaced the cold, and for a moment, he felt at peace. For a second, he felt real. Of course, it was Marcus’s touch that soothed him, brought him back to the surface. Of course it had been, it always was.
Yellow rays slipped through the arena’s roof, and even though it was meant to be comforting, the fear trickled onto him once more. He instantly stopped thinking of his own comfort, and thought of all of the innocent children, victims, that would be sent here to fight to the death in a handful of days. One of them resided directly ahead of him, and then, the sun’s light felt taunting. As it buried Marcus’s dark strands of hair, his brown skin. Sejanus couldn’t map out his frame, let alone his mark, he couldn’t see any part of him. But he swears, for a blink of time, that he had looked back at him.
Before he could determine that for sure, the world around him crumbled until he saw nothing but bright orange and red. Until smoke left him coughing on the floor. Until he couldn’t conjure a thought that didn’t consist of Marcus’s safety.
Of his freedom.
He’s either dead or about to be, when you catch him and drag him through the streets in chains.
He sits up in bed, clutching his sheets harshly. Hard enough to make the beds of his nails ache. There was no point in trying to sleep. With a push, he brings himself to his feet and treads for his door.
The past few days have been nothing but a disaster. With Marcus’s escape, he’s all he sees on the television screens. He’s all he hears in the classroom, when Dr. Gaul mentions him directly to his face like he was a joke. He would admit that he let his anger get the best of him there, but he had said it for a reason. He knew what he said wasn’t wrong, he didn’t care what everyone else in there thought.
To his misery, Marcus did not only come up during class, but at home, too. Specifically, during dinner. It’s not like it hadn’t happened before, but this was something different entirely. More emotional, terrifying. When he and his father were meant to remain civil, when Ma’s wide eyes would dart in between the two of them while yet another Marcus-headlined broadcast would echo through their luxurious walls, he couldn’t contain himself.
He’d given Sejanus a mouthful when he returned home from the Zoo that first night, criticizing him for even daring to publicly side with the districts. He then told him that he was making a mistake by doing so, reminding him that Two was no longer his home, no matter how badly he wished it could be. It hurt, and he’d sent him to his room. Didn’t he miss home, too? Why couldn’t he understand? The tears followed, and so did the anger.
Dinner after dinner, broadcast after broadcast, Sejanus has accepted the fact that he and his father’s relationship was as broken as the shattered plate Sejanus had shoved off the table and onto the floor in the midst of an endless debate. He had never done anything to that extreme, he usually kept his temper in his skull and on his tongue, but the argument that had occurred that night evoked something in him.
His father was the only one to blame for it—for everything. Sejanus wasn’t sure if he had meant to say it or not, but knowing Marcus’s reaping was rigged, all credited to him, he realized he didn’t care. The point was, it was all done on purpose. To hurt him. To teach him some kind of lesson.
If Marcus were to die, it would be his father’s fault. A Plinth’s.
Sejanus thinks of allowing himself to teach his father his own lesson. If Marcus were to die, he would, too. It wouldn’t undo the pain Marcus would suffer, but it was fair. A life for a life.
He found himself at the kitchen sink, trying to keep down a glass of water, when Ma had called to him. She flicked on the light. “What are you doing up so late, sweetheart?” she asks gently, making her way for him. He could ask her the same question, really. He sets the glass down instead.
“Can’t sleep.” Sejanus answers as he feels a sharp pain shoot up his neck. Instantly, he clasps the side of his throat with his palm, wincing.
Ma is by his side now. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing—just,” he rambles, “my neck.”
It wasn’t the first time he’s felt it. It was like the more intense side of the faint vibrations he used to feel long ago, when he swore he was sensing Marcus. They’ve been painful recently, it sometimes brought tears to his eyes. He couldn’t decipher if it meant that Marcus was close, or that he was in danger. Maybe it wasn’t real at all. He feels like he’s going crazy.
“Oh, here. Give me a minute.” Ma says, and walks to the freezer. She returns to him shortly with an ice pack, and stands on her tip-toes to wrap it around the crook of his throat. “That should do some good.”
He nods, and stillness overtakes them. But before he allows his body to retreat to his room, he watches Ma scratch at her inner forearm. At her mark that spread along her skin, a question strikes him. “Ma, can I ask you something?” his voice shakes, her forehead creases. “What happened before you met my father? I just… I just remember when you told me you had to leave someone behind? Right before we left Two? You probably don’t remember it, but… I wanted to ask. I think about it a lot.”
Ma’s brows ease, and a sparkle that could only thrive in sadness shines in her eyes. She then blinks, and it seems to go away. However, it returns hastily when she actually begins to speak.
So, there was someone else before his father. A man that made her mother’s story about the matching marks deem true. A man she only described to be kind, to her, her family. She’d gone to school with him and had fallen for him in the process, it had felt like the most natural thing in the world, she had said. Like breathing. Sejanus assumes he loved her all the same.
Three years into their budding romance, he had ended up in the mines. Sejanus couldn’t not frown at her loose tone, like she didn’t want to touch the topic of the mines. Her discomfort showed greatly, especially when she began to describe his death. An accident in the tunnels, a severed arm, and blood loss. It was horrible to imagine, and Sejanus lets nausea consume him when he outlines her birthmark again, realizing how easily oozing blood could replicate the splash of white. Suddenly, she started to cry, admitting how she had never got to go to his funeral due to a trip.
Apparently, the funeral wasn’t planned directly after his death, and in the meantime, Ma had come across the man who would soon become her husband. One thing led to another, and eventually, the trip to the tall mountains of Two bled into the date of the funeral. The guilt of leaving him behind.
When Sejanus had opened his arms for her, she mumbled about the contrition, about how she still felt it now, but it had swarmed her the most when she had gotten married. He then thinks back to when he’d first brought up the whole soulmate thing at dinner, when he was little and didn’t understand why his father had looked so angry at the mention of it. It made sense now, he doesn’t ask about it—but he’s sure Ma had brought up her old lover to his father, talked about their matching marks, and it didn’t sit well with him.
Once she pulled back, she reassured Sejanus that she still loved his father. But there had always been a place in her heart for her past, that it would never tarnish. Sejanus’s chest hurt, as he accepted that was exactly how he was built, too. Ma slowly repeats that she wishes she could’ve been there for him in his final moments, wishes she never left and wishes they had stayed as one.
Sejanus’s mind bursts with realization.
“I’m gonna go find him.” he blurts, tearing the ice pack off of his neck. Ma’s expression lifts, confused but intrigued.
“What?” her head follows him as his legs move for the hall.
He doesn’t answer until he returns to the kitchen where she still stands. His backpack now full of medical supplies he’d found in the closet, he then opens the fridge, takes two sandwiches and bottles of water. “I’m gonna go look for him.”
Ma backs against the sink. “Marcus?”
Sejanus swallowed dryly, it felt like thorns had slipped down his throat. “Yeah.” he answers, “I thought about what you said. About how you regret things.” he says.
“Sejanus—wait, please. It could be dangerous. Do you even know where he could be?” Ma ushers to the door, as if to block him.
“They said something about a displaced manhole cover. He could… he could be underground. I need to get to him before they do.” Sejanus articulates in a rush, “it’s worth it. He’s worth it. Just let me go.”
Gloss crosses the color in Ma’s irises, like she was remembering something. Sejanus knows what she’s thinking about, and hopes it’s enough for her to let him leave.
“Okay.” she finally says, and steps away.
“I’ll come back,” Sejanus moves for the door handle, he takes in a shallow breath, studying the exhaustion in his mother’s eyes. He wonders if she’s looking at him the same way. “Get some rest, Ma.”
“I will.” she says, “be safe, my boy.”
And then he is gone.
As he scales the deep alleyways of the Capitol, the vague vibration seems to return rather than the sharp pain that’d once strung up his neck. He drags his fingertips along the brick walls, feeling more and more lost the further he walked. He wants to think something foolish, like: Lead me to you. But quickly realized that it was, more likely than not, the opposite of what Marcus was calling out for. He needed to be rational, he needed to concentrate and he needed to find a manhole cover.
It was untelling which one was the exact one Marcus had escaped beneath, it didn’t particularly matter. They all lead to the same place, right? Hesitancy seeps into him, as he remembers that they didn’t even know for sure if he had gone that way. It was merely speculation. There was no achievement, or Marcus, in waiting around, though. Sejanus would take what he could get, this was the closest way to finding him. If they haven’t already captured him.
The area amongst him was so dark. The sky was pitch black, no stars in sight. The transfer must be even darker. All he can think is how scared Marcus must be, he’s starving, he’s angry, and he’s accompanied by darkness, not to mention he’s being hunted like an animal. Sejanus’s stomach churns, and he doesn’t even take notice of the change in texture below his soles until he trips and nearly busts his face on the concrete. Scrambling back to his feet, he brings himself upward and squints at the bronze cover.
He was smart enough to bring a flashlight with him. He fetches it in his pocket, and clicks it on. The cover looked as if it hadn’t been touched, he set the light down for a moment, and wedged his fingers in between the small holes that were stabbed through the top. It was as heavy as he was expecting, but with a hard lean backward, he pried it off the hole, and peered inside.
A ladder was attached to the wall, its long poles were dripping with condensation and some chips of paint were still visible. All he could hear was little droplets, he was correct about it being pitch black. He couldn’t even see the bottom. He angles the flashlight downward, and feels a sigh of relief tease his lips when he does in fact see solid ground.
Sejanus takes one last look around him, slowly stretches his leg out until the tip of his shoe slides on top of one of the rungs, and begins to descend.
Once he finally reaches the floor, he takes a few breaths. The place was not only dark, but hot. Muggy. His skin felt sticky already. He turns his light on again, and unhurriedly scans the place with the pale beam. Silence loomed within the long tunnels, and Sejanus started to ponder on the possibility of roaming peacekeepers. The thought made him shudder, and forced him to move.
For a long while, he seemed to be walking aimlessly. He stayed on the far right side of the tunnel, keeping his feet intact so he wouldn’t topple over onto the low train tracks. He’d taken turn upon turn, and still hadn’t heard a single sound that may indicate Marcus’s presence. Worry twisted around his throat like vines, had he gotten himself lost?
It wasn’t until his eyes met a tunnel that looked as if the tracks were unused, drowned out by a shallow stream, that he began to have hope. It wasn’t the sight that brought him light, but the noises. It sounded like walking, slow paced. Heavy. Sloshing. He couldn’t see anything from where he was standing, though. So, with gritted teeth, he jumped down, and let the water fold over his ankles.
The splash that followed wasn’t as quiet as he had intended. His next few steps, he takes them very carefully. Even with the discomfort of his socks soaking up the murky water, he pushes through. What he comes to realize, though, is that the other set of footsteps was no longer within earshot. Marcus, or—whoever it was, had they heard him and fled? If it was Marcus, that would be a problem. But, could he blame him? Marcus did not trust him anymore, Sejanus knew that. Accepted it.
Well, maybe not. He wouldn’t be here if that was the truth.
His body twists as he takes a slow turn, it’s even darker this way, he lifts the flashlight higher, and catches his breath as it flickers. At the same exact time, that spring of pain bolts up the crook of his neck again, and what soon follows nearly chokes him.
It all happens quickly. A rush of feet, he isn’t sure what hits him. It was certainly a human, though. He confirms that for himself as he’s pushed so hard onto his back that his mouth produces nothing but a groan of pain. If it weren’t for his stuffed backpack, the concrete would’ve collided with his spine. The low water pools into the rest of his clothes and ears, secluding his hearing. He doesn’t stay there for long, however.
No more than a minute passes before he feels himself being lifted by the front of his shirt. He’d allowed his eyes to slip shut, when he opened them again, blood from a bitten tongue completely blanketed the flesh of his inner cheeks. His flashlight had fallen into the water, but its glare had shone off the wall and bounced directly onto the face of a boy he’d been so desperately looking for. “Marcus!” he blurts, slightly groggy and bubbly. “You’re—“ he goes to say alive, but he is cut off.
“Keep your mouth shut, will you?” Marcus hushed above him harshly. He still has a hold of Sejanus’s shirt, he could hear his hard, exhausted pants from here. It was almost comforting. Marcus must’ve realized this, too, and drops him. Sejanus catches himself this time.
He stands, now shivering from his damp clothing. “Marcus, I—“ he pauses, taking in his expression. His eyes are angry, dark and burning. He bends down to grab the light, wiping his lips in the process, it was starting to hurt. He keeps his sight on Marcus as he lowers, though. Just in case he ran. Marcus’s glare followed him all the way down. “I am so glad to see you.”
Marcus scoffs mockingly, shaking his head. “Thought you were a damn keeper’. Why’d you sneak up on me like that?” he asks, so bitterly and upfront that Sejanus gets the impression that he wants to clock him.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know it was you.” Sejanus answers, he then takes in a slow breath through his nose, wincing. Subtly, he glides the beam up to Marcus’s frame, he thinks of the bombing. “How are you? Are you hurt?”
“You can’t take a hint, can you?” Marcus snaps, scowling.
He smiles loosely. “Guess not.”
It’s a surprise to hear Marcus’s voice repeatedly like this, just as husky and broad as his build. Sejanus had gotten so used to his silence. His turned backs and brutal stares. It’s not like he ever forgot how he used to speak, though. The slight accent, the way the tips of his front teeth slightly dragged across his bottom lip when he talked. The only thing that had changed was his tone, of course.
Stillness fills the space between them, Sejanus’s hands had started to shake. “Can you answer me?” he questions with a step forward, the light gravitating to Marcus’s face. He had black streaks of ash drifting down his right cheek, it looked like a bruise had bloomed beneath his chin, too. “Are you hurt?”
Marcus’s shoulder angles away, Sejanus is ready to sprint after him, but he doesn’t run. “Don’t see why that matters to you.”
From behind, Sejanus could now see the tears in his vest. His cut skin. “Why wouldn’t it?” Sejanus moves with him, his fist clutching the bag. “I see your wounds. Let me help, please. I have supplies. Food, too.”
Marcus shakes his head.
“Marcus, I care about you. I’m sorry that—that you don’t want to believe that, but I do. Really.” Sejanus had caught up with his pace, gazing at the side of his stained, clenched jaw. He continues to walk alongside him as if he knows where they’re going. “I wouldn’t have come down here to find you if I didn’t.”
Abruptly, Marcus stops, and Sejanus has no option but to as well, because his shirt is being clenched again and Marcus is yanking him forward like a misbehaving dog. “Where is it, huh?”
Sejanus gasps sharply at the action, but is able to collect himself within a few rapid blinks. His shot apart eyes melting into Marcus’s squinting ones. “What?” it comes out shakily.
In lieu of answering, his dark glittering eyes fell past Sejanus’s face. His glare was not gracing his chest, but above. It all fell together, his heart began to pat against his ribs.
Physically, he felt the horror return like it was happening right here, right now. The fear, the realization, of looking into that Capitol hospital mirror as a little boy, pulling apart that bandage and sensing his stomach sink with dread. “Oh, Marcus,” Sejanus frowned, he wanted to cry. Sob, even. “My father… he had it removed the first night we arrived here.”
For the very first time, the glint in Marcus’s pupils doesn’t resemble hatred. It’s something Sejanus can’t quite place.
“I’ve been heartbroken ever since, I mean that.” Sejanus says, Marcus lets him go. “You want to know something strange, though?” he begins, Marcus looked uneasy. “I get these… pains. Vibrations, too. In my neck. Right where it used to be and—and sometimes, I swear it’s you.” There, he’d gotten too comfortable, and inched closer to him.
He stretches to touch Marcus’s mark. He could see the outline, rugged and sharp at the ends. A gash. His fingertips barely graze his skin when his hand is slapped.
“Why can’t you just leave me alone?” Marcus booms, his voice echoes tauntingly through the tunnels, drilling into Sejanus’s skull.
“Because I wanted to find you before they did!” Sejanus bursts just as loudly, “they’re hunting you like an animal, Marcus. I wasn’t even sure you’d be down here at first, the broadcasts were nothing but speculation but—I had to take that chance. I just couldn’t let them catch you. I’d never forgive myself.”
A fragment of something Sejanus dissects as a mocking laugh coughs from Marcus’s throat. “Well, you better start forgiving,” he says, “because you’re not any better than they are.”
He backs off, suppressing an even deeper frown. If he was being honest, truthful, that may have been the most hurtful thing that’s ever been said to him. As if Marcus not seeing him as district, as a piece of home, didn’t ache enough. He could crumble to his knees, tears fill his eyes instead. “I’m sorry,” Is that all he can say? “I will always be sorry,” He thinks of Marcus starving, of his blood. But of his childhood, too. Of his sweet hands, of his tired eyes and of his mean father. “I just wanted to save you.”
Marcus lifts a brow, smiles a bit. It’s not a kind one, though. Sejanus feels his core twist with sickness. “Must be hard,” he retorts plainly, “feeling this guilty all the time.”
That’s what has been clogging his soul all this time. Since the Reaping, since the Zoo, since everything. Guilt. That ripped him to shreds. Sejanus cannot speak, could hardly breathe. He feels the need to vomit, maybe due to the nausea or maybe as some kind of self-punishment. He’s already felt the tears slip down his cheeks.
“Go, Sejanus.” Marcus says his name in the most cruel tone, he says it like poison. Like a curse. Sejanus’s heart is in his throat, the longer he stares into his contained rage, the more he feels himself shattering. A deep, low sigh drags from Marcus’s tongue, it’s rough and raw and tightens around Sejanus like barbed wire. “Don’t let me see you again.”
It hits him like a ton of bricks. Somehow, he felt just as he did when he saw Marcus’s face on that screen when he was reaped. When his father purchased him for Sejanus, like he was less than human. He felt cold. He felt dead. He felt like a ghost. Even though he was still staring at him, he felt like Marcus was dead, too. Maybe they both were.
Sejanus leaves the backpack of food and supplies in the water, and disappears into the darkness once more with shaking shoulders, pressing his bloody lips together. He can’t bring himself to look back.
He does see him again, though.
Marcus was right, he couldn’t take a hint. He may have just been bad for that, disrespectful. Annoying, more like. But he didn’t care.
Ma was consoling about it. Telling him how sorry she was for all of this, for Marcus. His father, however, left him plugging his ears at the dinner table.
He had known Ma meant no harm telling his father what happened, it had innocently slipped. But it was the last thing he had wanted, needed. Him knowing of Marcus’s whereabouts made his heart race. He didn’t trust him. He’d already forced him into the Games, into the Capitol. He would surely do it again.
“Please, don’t say anything.”
“He could have killed you, Sejanus.”
And if he had, who cared? Honestly. His classmates hate his guts, so does Two, so does Marcus. Who cared? He didn’t. Perhaps it’d soothe the building sense of dread he’s felt all his life, the avalanche that would eventually tumble down and take him out of this miserable world. To be killed by Marcus would be the closest thing to mercy.
“But he didn’t.”
His father had looked at him sternly, before groaning and rubbing his face like he’d been sprayed with something. “Don’t you dare go down there again. Those peacekeepers will beat you, too, if they see you with him.”
Sejanus couldn’t promise that, he nods anyway. “Please, don’t get him killed. Please.”
His father only shared a look with Ma, and then disappeared down the hall. She apologized to Sejanus later that night, kissing his forehead and promising him she’d never speak of Marcus in front of him again. He hardly slept afterwards.
Deep down, he knows Marcus is not capable of that. Killing. Or, maybe he is. Maybe he’s not that kind, sweet little boy anymore that took his bleeding hand into his and made him believe in sandbox love. Maybe, now, he’d let him bleed. Ten years is a long time. A long time to let hatred consume you. He wonders how much Marcus thought of him growing up, if he ever did.
Sejanus’s heart tells him yes, because the gentle hums that vibrated within his masked mark was almost unexplainable. His head tells him otherwise. It tells him that Sejanus was only a sliver of Marcus’s life, a dull piece. That he was practically meaningless and meant nothing to him in the end.
There had to be something before all that loathing though, right?
He returns to the tunnels two days after he’d first found him, with a whole new bag of food and other miscellaneous items Marcus might need. It doesn’t surprise him that it doesn’t go well.
But it certainly had started off better. He hadn’t startled Marcus half to death and nearly gotten a bloody nose in return, instead, he got silence. Sejanus had tried to coerce him to speak, asking him small, short questions about how he was feeling and if he needed anything in particular. He was not answered. It felt like the questionnaire all over again, with Marcus’s cold shoulder and Sejanus’s pleading.
He’d kept his feet glued on the damp concrete, the muggy, hot air swarming him, waiting for any kind of response. Occasionally, he heard steps from a distance, and horrible thoughts of Peacekeepers finding them and taking Marcus away knocked against his brain. What could he do if that had happened in front of his eyes? Try to fight them off? He’d patently try. If he had gotten a hold of one of their guns, Marcus may have a real chance at escaping. Not that he’d want to use it, he’d rather not prove his father right. How he told Sejanus that this, the training, would be the best for him and his future in the end, when he was too young to even comprehend the gun’s use.
Perhaps he could prove him wrong instead, though. By using the unwanted skill to benefit Marcus rather than himself. He then shook the thoughts away, no need to imagine terrible scenarios when they were already in one.
Sejanus had to leave eventually, though. He knew he couldn’t stay down there during the day. He’d risk getting caught, he’d risk Marcus. Especially when he’d come across dozens of Peacekeepers just walking to the Academy, they were everywhere. His father was right about that, they would surely hurt him too if they had found him with Marcus. With the fervent searches, it was a blessing they hadn’t come across the very tunnel where Marcus was. It was untelling how many times they’d come close, though. Marcus never said anything.
On the fourth day, Sejanus slipped down the ladder again, and was rewarded with a quick, sightless stare from Marcus. Even through the darkness, he could see how sick he looked. How starved and hurt. He begged to let him feed him and take care of his wounds, Marcus just turned away.
Day after day, the same routine seemed to occur. Sejanus would go to class, try to maintain his composure. Then he’d come home, avoid his father’s presence and say hello to Flavia, talk to Ma about Marcus while they ate dinner, attempt to swallow her concerns. He’d leave home at about ten, scurry through the alleyways with bags of food and hope. Once he’d successfully fell into the transfer and found Marcus, he’d plead, and study him. Still, somehow, seeing that young boy he’d fallen in love with all of those years ago. A boy he called his soulmate, his love, the boy he envisioned marrying. The boy he mourned over for a decade of his life.
Things stayed like that. Until, on the eleventh day, something switched in Marcus.
Sejanus was taken aback by the sudden shift, but eternally grateful. That night, when he’d stepped foot in that drowned out tunnel and climbed up to make sure Marcus was aware of his arrival, he was not greeted with the sightless stare like before, something else colored his eyes and Sejanus instantly knew he was in desperate pain.
He leant down. “What’s the matter?”
Marcus bit his lip, the skin cracked at once, blood began to stain his teeth. “The burns,” he says, softly and in a tone so discreet Sejanus had to scoot closer to hear him. “I can hardly move.”
Sejanus nods, but still scouts out his expression for approval. “Do you… do you want me to help you?” he asks, Marcus’s ashen stained cheek sucks inward. “Is that okay?”
Marcus had now looked elsewhere, his stare finding the bag Sejanus brought on the very first night. Within seconds, Sejanus follows, and hurdles behind him to retrieve it.
Sejanus was severely undisciplined.
He'd told him to stay away. To Marcus, it was at least some form of respect. Because waving food in his face surely wasn't. But, of course, he had not listened to him. It'd been eleven days since Sejanus crashed his way down here. Into his hiding place, into his void where he didn't want to be found. Really, the plan was just to starve and wither away. Become a skeleton in these Capitol tunnels. He didn't care what happened to his body, nothing mattered. He had no family back home, no one to wail over his body and no one to spread breadcrumbs over his corpse.
Despite Marcus banishing Sejanus, he'd come back every single night. Every damn night and he didn't understand why. He’d been so rude. Purposefully crude and cold. But, still, he'd returned with bagged food (that he didn't take) and bandages. Marcus could see the deep bags beneath his eyes, how they continued to glitter with kindness, he didn't know. It made his stomach churn.
However, tonight, he gave in. And he’s unsure if he’ll ever forgive himself for it.
Marcus has been burned before. In the mines, he’d experienced light burns on his palms, on his arms. But never like this. The flames from the arena’s bombing had buried him before he even decided to run, the pure adrenaline masking it all until he’d disclosed himself. Even with his clothes remaining on his body, the skin on his back felt like it'd melted off completely. And the hard, gritty concrete was offering no support. After the escape, it’d gotten progressively worse.
He doesn’t know why he reaches for Sejanus for help. He doesn’t know why Sejanus keeps on coming for him and he doesn’t know why he still dreams of him every night. He doesn’t understand anything. Marcus can’t even try to unravel all of this, as he senses hands peeling his vest and button-up off.
His first instinct is to jolt away, tell Sejanus to scram and to think of something hurtful enough to say so he has no choice but to leave.
“It’s alright,” Marcus hears Sejanus say, “I know this is uncomfortable for you, I’m sorry.” Sejanus then opens some kind of box. “I’ve never done this before, but… I’ll do the best I can. Tell me if something feels wrong.”
He feels a set of padded fingers grace his wounds gently, along with a cool substance that immediately brings relief. He closes his eyes, and allows himself to breathe.
By the time he opens them again, he’s felt a bundle of bandages and ointments swab his scarred backside. Sejanus’s voice also accompanied him as his consciousness drifted in and out, then he caught his attention. “The first thing my father said was… that you could’ve killed me.” he says, “but, I don’t know… I can’t picture that happening.”
Marcus feels anger prickle his throat, why was he discussing him with his father? “You don’t know me.”
Sejanus chuckled as he plastered another bandage aside Marcus’s hip. “I know enough.”
He scoffed, exhaustion began to pluck at his eyelids. “Okay,” Marcus began, “tell me, then.”
“What?” Sejanus asks, Marcus did not feel the warmth of his hands anymore.
He blinked, swallowing a rush of air. “Tell me what you know about me.” Marcus insists, “go on, prove it.”
Sejanus doesn’t speak for a split moment. “Alright,” he eventually says, Marcus couldn’t swat away the notion of heat when Sejanus’s palms returned, beginning to put Marcus’s clothing back on his body. “I think you’re thoughtful—“
“Not think.” Marcus stopped him, “what you know. Big difference.”
“You’re right,” Sejanus smooths out his vest, “I know you’re thoughtful.” he pauses, “you’re attentive. Sweet. You love strawberry chip cookies and you always drag your top teeth across your bottom lip when you speak. You don’t like to take things that aren’t yours.”
Marcus is thankful Sejanus can’t see him grin. The cookies. How did he even remember that? Marcus had, absolutely, because of how good they were and how badly he craved them on days where the fridge was empty.
“How am I doing?” Sejanus chirped, then, before Marcus could even answer him, continued. “Good? Okay, here we go—I know you’re liked back home. I know someone there misses you, and I know you don’t believe it.” Marcus thinks of the men in the mines, how they’ll pat him on the back or give him plates of casserole, some of them were better fathers to him in two years than his own father was his entire life. Maybe that was true.
Sejanus’s voice falls suddenly. “I know you have no faith in surviving,” he sounds choked up, like he’s crying, or about to. Marcus can’t meet his eyes yet. “But I know you don’t really want to die.”
At first, he wants to say wrong. Then, his mind starts to whirl. If he was so set on dying, why did he run? The fire would have burned him alive if he had not bolted to his feet. If he was so set on dying, why did he not stay? What had made him do that? He’s never thought of it until now. Damn you, Sejanus Plinth.
His arms are urging him to rotate before he can intervene, and slowly, Sejanus’s teary glint collides with his heavy one. Neither of them say anything to one another, as all Marcus can comprehend is how angelic he looks here. For a boy he’d compared to the devil growing up, for a boy he grew to despise for leaving, he had never appeared so precious. All that hatred had clouded Marcus’s vision, and he’d completely missed how beautifully Sejanus had aged. Of course, it’s not like he wasn’t before. His deep brown eyes had captured him from the moment they met his own, freezing him like the snow he’d pressed against his bleeding flesh.
He doesn’t think he’ll ever admit it to Sejanus, but he’s felt those strange sensations, too. In his neck. His chest. His stomach and head. He thought he was crazy. So, he snapped at the mention of it. He hated his mark growing up, he hated how it looked like a rugged cut that he’d received from a weapon. He hated how his father made fun of him for it. Though, when Sejanus came along, spitting soulmates and destined, he began to think otherwise. Until he left.
“Is it… my turn now?” Marcus let pour from his mouth.
Sejanus’s brows raised a bit, signaling confusion.
“Is it my turn to tell you what I know about you?” Marcus asks, slightly humorous.
Sejanus understood. “Oh, uh—yeah. Please.” he nods, bringing the sleeve of his shirt up to his eye. “If you want.”
Marcus couldn’t suppress his laugh, and began to think.
“You’re… insistent.” he began, this was a bit awkward. With Sejanus staring him down, it felt like a bright light was directly blaring onto him. Sejanus smiles though, and somehow, that made him feel at ease. He envisions young Sejanus handing him half of his own sandwich, of his juice box and of his cookies. Then, of Sejanus now. At the Zoo, the questionnaire, everything that’s happened in the tunnels. “You’re willing to give away anything that’s yours, because you don’t feel like you deserve it, right?”
Sejanus doesn’t answer, but flattens his lips, and bows his head. “You’re not liked here. You’re not liked at home. You’re stuck in the middle.” Marcus bit on his tongue when Sejanus’s shoulders rose with a deep breath, maybe in defense. Maybe in acceptance. “But… I don’t know.” his tone lowers, the air around him felt thick.
“You’re gentle.” Bitterness tries to slip through. Pathetic.
“Loving.” Liar.
“I know that… really, you're a good guy.” Traitor.
His heartbeat relaxes, just as he opens his mouth again, “and, I know…” the boiling abrasiveness wins. “I know that you broke my heart.”
That seems to stun Sejanus. His eyes are wide, still sad, but now the tears are basically trickling down onto his cheeks. He looks as if he’s stopped breathing. Marcus wants to reach out and wipe them off, he speaks instead. “I know that you’re sorry.” Now, it felt like he was being suffocated. “And so am I.”
“For what?” Sejanus manages to say.
“For shutting you out.” he tells him.
Sejanus strains another smile. “It’s okay.” his upturned lips then disappear, and his eyebrows lower in compassion. “And I understood. All of it. You don’t owe me anything.”
“You weren’t angry?”
“Never. Just… scared. Angry with everyone else, maybe. But never with you.” Sejanus assures him, Marcus watches his nails dig into the rough ground beneath his leg, his expression flashes with doubt. “Do you trust me?”
“Enough to stay.” Marcus nods.
“Okay,” Sejanus seems to have a hard time not grinning again, his pearly teeth protruding behind his reddish mouth. “Will you try to eat, then? I have sandwiches, cookies, water.”
Marcus has no reason to decline anymore.
“Any more news on me?” Marcus had asked teasingly whilst Sejanus was removing his bandages, replacing them with clean ones.
“What do you mean? The broadcasts?”
“Yeah. Whatever it is.” Marcus shrugs.
To be honest, Sejanus hadn’t been keeping up with the news much. Ever since he found Marcus, he’s felt no need to. However, not even Dr. Gaul brought him up anymore during class, and she somehow always did in the past. Taunting him with Marcus’s disappearance when he expressed his disgust with the Games and her ways. Should he be worried about that?
“Oh, I’m not really sure. I think it’s definitely died down, though.” Sejanus answers, “maybe they gave up.”
Marcus slips away from him once Sejanus tapes the last string of gauze into his soft skin. “Once I… heal, fully, I’m gonna try and find my way out.” Sejanus doesn’t interrupt him. “Don’t think Two is too far from here.” He then cranes his neck and looks over at Sejanus, who must’ve done a horrendous job at masking his worry. “What? Not a good idea?”
“No, it’s, I—“ I don’t want to leave you again is what threatens to spill, he gulps it down. “I think it’s good. Really. I’m just worried about… the security. You know? I still see a lot of Peacekeepers when I walk to school. They could still be monitoring the tunnels.” Sejanus tries to explain, while that was true, something more sensitive outlined his objection. “I don’t want you to get hurt.”
“I think they’d do a lot more than hurt me.” Marcus says with a deep laugh, twisting free of Sejanus’s hands and now facing him. “Now, tell me the real reason why you don’t want me to go.”
Sejanus widens his eyes, cheeks flooding with warmth. “What?—that is the real reason.” he stutters, unable to keep his gaze on Marcus. “Honest to God.”
Sejanus expects Marcus’s voice to return, perhaps he’d snap back with a response that’d made him chuckle, a response that eased the foggy tension between them even further, strengthening the comfort they’ve been building these past few days, but, no. When he finds Marcus’s eyes again, they’re colored with the same intensity he’d seen in the Zoo, and the same betrayal he’d sensed in his glare when he ran up to him in front of their school in Two, telling him that all of the rumors were true. He’s never forgotten that look.
He goes to open his mouth to take it back.
“I don’t like liars, you know.” Marcus reminds him. “Just tell me the truth. How you feel.” he gnaws at the cracked skin on his lips, “maybe I don’t really want to die, but we don’t have all the time in the world. Not anymore. So, stop pretending like we do.”
Sejanus sighs, an unknown heaviness pouring over his chest and burning into his ribs. His heart stilled. “I don’t want to leave you again.”
“Who said I wouldn’t want you to come with me?” Marcus queries with a set of angled brows, “you ever want to go home?”
He’s surprised by his words. An offer to join him on escaping the Capitol… when, last week, Marcus had chosen starvation over his food. It makes him giddy. But, he thought of Ma. He couldn’t just leave her. “All the time.” Sejanus nods, quickly and in the same motion, moves forward. “I can’t leave my Ma, though.”
Marcus seems to deflate in disappointment. “Didn’t even think of that.” he says, “sorry.”
“It’s okay.” Sejanus assures him, “she misses it, too. Maybe more than me.”
Marcus smiles at that.
“I… I still have your things. From home. Did I ever tell you?”
Sensations from the cool marble heart cross his mind, from the warm scarf he’d worn so frequently throughout the winters. “Do you remember the heart of marble you made me? You said you had to be quick because your father was around.” he then continues, “I wore your scarf for so long. It’s just a bundle of strings now, but—I loved it to death.”
The grin remains on Marcus’s mouth, except now, it seemed more sad. “Yeah, I remember.”
“You were so sweet.” Sejanus tucked his legs beneath him, he began to not mind the gruffness of the concrete. Suddenly, he is drenched in gloom, reminiscing a time he was not there for. “I wish I could’ve watched you grow up.”
Marcus breaks eye contact for a moment, before eventually returning it once more. Sejanus feels his body sink. “Me, too.”
He begins to hear the periodic dripping of the tunnels again. “Can you tell me about your life? About what’s happened since I left?”
Marcus shrugs. “Only if you tell me about yours.”
Sejanus agrees, and so, he tells him about the first time someone pushed him on the playground for being district, and Marcus tells him how he had no choice but to be sent to the mines at sixteen, abandoning school. Sejanus tells him how he mostly spent his days with his Ma, Marcus tells him how he watched his father die. They take turns sharing bits of pieces of the lives they never got to share with one another, and Sejanus can’t help but feel terrible. Marcus has experienced things Sejanus couldn’t even imagine going through.
A sprout of anger floods his mind, and he can only form one coherent thought. Marcus does not belong here. In the Games, in the Capitol at all. He deserves to live, deserves to be free and deserves to live a life outside of suffering. Outside of Sejanus. Another one is born, and it somehow is even more furious: he despises his father for doing this to Marcus. The lesson his father had assured he’d learn from this almost made him laugh out of irony. It, in fact, did not show him that siding with the districts would end in misery. He already knew that. All it did was make his heart beat broader for them.
“You live alone?” Sejanus asks sweetly, he’d now pressed his back against one of the many pillars that were lined up alongside the depth of the tunnels, Marcus had slid next to him, his body heat had felt nice despite the layered humidity that clamped the transfer.
Sejanus could feel Marcus’s shoulder shift aside his own. “I do.” he answers, and another I’m sorry tries to escape from his lips, but Marcus must’ve known it was coming. “Don’t say it. I know you are. It’s not as bad as you think.”
Still, you must feel so alone, he wants to say, I should’ve been there for you. He feels like an idiot for thinking it. Even more so when he actually says it out loud.
“You wouldn’t have changed anything.” Marcus is looking at him now, his brows strung together in an assuring furrow. Sejanus doesn’t allow himself to not stare back, sweat taints the bridge of his nose. It’s making it a lot harder to breathe, especially when he’s being studied like this. “But, I don’t know.” Marcus says, sounding as if he’s trying to keep his tone firm. “Maybe I wouldn’t have been a dead man walking if you were around.”
Sejanus frowns, wanting so desperately to reach out and cup Marcus’s cheek—run his fingers through his hair and grace his skin, pull him closer. His own face is already burning, and before he knows it, he hears a voice that does not belong to either of them. It’s gruff, authoritative. “Wait,” it echoes between the walls. “I heard something—this way.”
It had to have been a Peacekeeper. Or multiple. Sejanus rises to his feet instantly, tugging on Marcus’s wrist in the process, he’s dragged behind the pillar as well. With his palms wrapped around Marcus’s arms, Sejanus’s lips are just forming his name, volume trickling past his tongue, when a hand is clamped over his mouth. It’s gentle, but he could still sense the force behind it. The fear. Protection, too, possibly. But he may just be imagining that.
They gape at one another silently for what feels like a lifetime, Sejanus could feel the rush of Marcus’s blood through his pulse. The alarm in his eyes. He might be the worst person in the world for wanting to kiss him.
Once Sejanus has convinced Marcus that he wouldn’t dare to speak again, he releases him, and he squeezes next to him. Sets of footsteps begin to pat closer, he could pick out some sloshing in the water, too. They’re so close to them, Sejanus couldn’t even take in a breath.
The sweat that had stuck to his nose seemed to spread over every inch of his skin now, down his shirt and in the midst of his fingers. He’s shaking terribly, not for himself, but for the boy next to him. He finds the strength to look up at Marcus, whose face was stern. Sejanus could see his clenched jaw, though. It was like he could not only see his panic, but feel it, too. Then, a blanket of deep heat spreads over his neck, and Marcus finally returns his gaze.
It’s okay, Marcus mouthed. All Sejanus can do is reach for his hand.
He fully awaited Marcus to swat him away, flashing him an expression of disapproval and disgust. Instead, he grapples Sejanus’s knuckles tighter than he could’ve ever expected. “Not seeing anything, D.” another Peacekeeper says. His heart is beating so aggressively within his chest that he’s afraid he’ll faint, he wonders if Marcus would catch him if he did. “You think he’s still down here?”
“It’s been weeks,” Sejanus recognized this voice, it was the one he’d heard before. “He could be anywhere by now.”
“Probably killed an entire family or two by now, you mean.”
He thinks of the faulty scenario he’d envisioned days ago. What he’d do if the Capitol had caught Marcus. He thinks of his plan with the guns, and for a split second, he doesn’t know if he’d feel too horrible about defending Marcus against these men.
“Well, let’s scope out the streets again, then come back tonight.” One suggests. “They’ll want him back by tomorrow. We gotta find him, no way he got back to the districts without someone seeing him.”
Sejanus could throw up. Someone.
“Fine.” The other says harshly. “Let’s go out the south end, then we’ll start from there. Again.”
There’s a pause, then the footsteps start up again. They go on, and on, until they eventually descend into silence. Sejanus still cannot capture air for his lungs, Marcus’s touch brings him back to life.
“They’re gone.” Marcus whispers, fingers dancing along Sejanus’s thin-lined shirt, he steps away from him. Sejanus follows, and feels the warm light of the sun from a crack in the ceiling. “Should probably go.”
Sejanus’s eyes divert from the fracture above, to Marcus. There’s a shiver in his words, and they’re still close. “Come with me,” he releases in a gasp-like manner, it comes out without much thought. “Please. The Games start tomorrow. They’re gonna be searching high and low and—“
“I’m not doing that.” Marcus cuts him off, it’s sharp, jagged. But there’s a softness in it, too. Sejanus’s eyebrows lift in worry, his heartbeat hasn’t relaxed. “I won’t.”
“Why?” Sejanus can’t contain his volume.
“Because they’ll come for you, too.” Marcus returns just as loudly, he hopes those peacekeepers are in the streets by now. “Please, go.” he huffs, it’s almost desperate. Almost. “I want you to.”
“I’m not going without you!” Sejanus snaps, maybe out of distress or frustration, but certainly heartbreak. The feeling jolts and sends chills throughout his entire body, rattling his ribcage and leaving him trembling even more than before. “I can’t.”
“You will.” Marcus stepped closer, it didn't take long for Sejanus to feel two mellow palms on either side of his neck, thumbs trailing below the bone of his jaw. If he couldn’t breathe back then, he surely could not now. “Or I will never, ever, forgive you. Do you understand me?”
Tears sting his eyes. “You can’t say that.”
Marcus’s lip flits into a smirk for a second, just did. Sejanus practically hears it. He wants to melt into the ground. “Look at me,” Marcus says after too many beats of stillness, Sejanus does so. Even if the tears have completely blurred his vision. Marcus’s face is somehow the clearest thing he’s ever seen, his birthmark just as bright. Just as beautiful. “If this is the last time we see one another, I just… I just wanted to say that—“ he interrupts himself with a quick shake of the head, looking away. Why was he avoiding him now?
Sejanus cannot stop his hand from gravitating upwards and angling his cheek toward him. “Tell me.”
Marcus swallows, seems to steer himself. Sejanus’s fingertips fall to his frame. “I just wanted to say that I never forgot about you.” he begins, “I never forgot your smile, who you were.” he blinks, his dark eyes have never shimmered so sweetly. The sunray had caught its color, causing its amber hue to glisten like a pouring pot of honey. The sage specs resembling a fresh meadow. All Sejanus’s mind can paint in front of him is that kind boy who tended to his finger. “And I don’t think I’ve ever hated someone as much.”
To his own surprise, that does not hurt him. He lets Marcus continue. “I never forgot what you said about our marks.” he says, “I held onto that for so, so long. I wanted it gone. Because all I thought of when I saw it was you. And all I thought of when you crossed my mind was betrayal.” Now, Sejanus felt a pain in his chest. “I meant it when I said you broke my heart.”
“I know.” Sejanus goes to wipe his face, but Marcus is already there. “I swear… I could feel it.”
Marcus gives him a gentle smile, the pad of his thumb still on his cheek, it’s soft and leaves a trail of warmth behind it. Sejanus wishes he could be handled like this all the time. “I swore I did, too. And I swore I was crazy.”
Sejanus releases a weak laugh, he wonders how his laughter makes Marcus’s heart feel. He hopes it mends it, in a way.
“But, you might be the one good thing that’s ever happened to me.” Marcus confesses, slowly as if he’s lost in something. He’s leering at Sejanus with so much reverence that he hardly has time to pick it apart. “All this time… I think I just missed you.”
Sejanus could feel his face blooming with a smile, while he does so, his stomach twists with the urge to perform an act that would absolutely make leaving ten times harder. He does it anyway.
And with a push forward, he presses his lips onto Marcus’s. He knows it’s messy, maybe even terrible. But, that doesn’t seem to show. Marcus only kisses him back. It felt natural, destined. The way one of Marcus’s hands clutched at his hip and the other cradled his face like it was precious to him. He tasted of blood, but, still, he was sweet. Not pastry-like. He could compare the tinge on his tongue to the way whiskey was flavored, even though Sejanus has never sipped it before, he has smelt it. Malty. Bubbly and smooth.
When Marcus positions his grasp, both of his hands gliding up to Sejanus’s neck, the kiss deepening and sending shocks from the skin on his lips to his core, he wonders if he could get drunk on him like this. Then, Marcus pulls away, wide-shot eyes staring into his. He could still feel his breath on him. And, very quickly, he realizes that he already is. He’s as dizzy and wasted as he’ll ever be.
For a moment, it looks like Marcus is leaning in for another. Sejanus’s eyes slip shut in preparation, a warm kiss is planted on his forehead instead. Then, on the bridge of his nose, ever so lightly. “Sejanus,” Marcus finally says, “I need you to go now.”
Sejanus can’t move. Why can’t he stay here forever?
“Sejanus,” he repeats, removing his hands from his cheeks. Something rotten sits between them and he hates it, so, so much. He just wants to kiss him again, forget everything. “Let me go.”
He’s selfish. He knows that. “No.”
Marcus laughs, and shrugs. “Fine. Then I’ll go first.” he sighs, Sejanus can’t tell if it’s out of defeat or acceptance. He starts to walk away, Sejanus wants to run after him. Run until his body shuts down. Marcus suddenly flips his gaze over his shoulder, “said you’d come and find me after all of this is over, right?” He waits for an answer.
“Yes—yes. I will.” Sejanus assures him, however, he’s confused. He had found him. It was in an awful, tragic manner, but he had found him.
Marcus tips his head back. “Good.” Nausea strikes Sejanus repeatedly. “Because you know I don’t like liars.”
“Marcus,” Sejanus is able to get out his name, that’s it. Within an instant, his tears return, and he succumbs to them. “Don’t leave.”
He doesn’t say anything in retaliation to that. And Sejanus feels like it was a goodbye, a real one this time. “Marcus!” he yells for him, Marcus keeps on strolling along the tunnel. “I did!—I did find you!”
No response. No reaction.
“I’m right here!” Sejanus protests, “please, come back, I can’t do this again!”
The only voice that calls back to him is his own, he is left with nothing else to do but leave him behind. The guilt has already stabbed its thick thorns through him.
For a while, he just laid there. In his bed, squeezing the marble heart until the joints of his fingers burned, unable to make sense of anything. It was not the first time he’s felt it, but it had been lethal, now. With the rush of morphine flowing through him, he felt so heavy. Heavy enough to make him feel like a corpse, it was the best way to describe it. Because he did not feel alive at all. He did not want to be.
He tries to look out his window, turning his head despite his neck aching. The sun was cheerful this morning, beaming through his silk curtains and spilling over him, usually, he would relish in this. He doesn't care for it today. Right now, all he wants to do is turn back time, make some different decisions. Do different things. Say something meaningful. He knows he can’t, the truth just makes it so much worse.
It’d been two weeks. Two weeks since he’d lept onto Marcus’s lips, tasted his sweetness, felt his captivating touch on him. Two weeks since he walked into the Academy with the most awful feeling in the world. Two weeks since he’d watched the Capitol display his bloody, dismantled body as if he was decoration for their enjoyment, since he’d watched him die. And, two weeks since he’d attempted to commit suicide.
Two weeks later, he lies here, even though he shouldn’t be. He doesn’t think he’s moved for days, his nightmares and dreams keep him chained. His dreams where Marcus dances upon his closed eyelids, sometimes he’s alive. Sometimes, he’s young, small and caring and caressing young Sejanus’s tear stained cheeks, telling him it’ll be alright, it’ll be okay. Sometimes, he’s dead. Cursing, spitting at him. Showing him the missing chunks of his flesh. Wiping his blood on his face. He drowned him in it once. Blaming him for it all.
Sejanus couldn’t even deny it, it was all his fault. Everything was. He talked too much, voiced his words. He’s begun to realize that Dr. Gaul must’ve known where Marcus was all along, and just strung it out for her own fun. Ma may disagree with him, but he knows Marcus’s torture was partly his liability, too. Though, it would be more realistic to say that every bit of it was. How could he live after that?
But he is always there when Sejanus falls asleep. He is always there.
There was one time, though, where he was there when Sejanus was awake.
It’d been directly after he’d taken a dosage of his prescription. Ma didn’t like giving it to him because it made him so exhausted, so tired and he kept ending up sleeping throughout the day. But she knew he could not fall asleep otherwise. She also had known that being awake was the last thing he wanted to be, so she had agreed, in hopes of saving her son. His father paid for it, Sejanus still doesn’t know if he understands.
Sejanus had begun to feel the sleepiness prickle his eyes when he saw Marcus emerge from the shadows. He was covered in a dark substance, and had looked soaking wet. It was strange, horrifying seeing him here like this. It wasn’t the same in his dreams, as he was always in some kind of black box, secluded by his own horrors. But now, he is in his room, standing next to his sheets and above his bed, staring down at him. Somehow, Sejanus does not mind this, and reaches for him. Marcus ignores it.
Sejanus analyzes every part of his ghost, but what his eyes really land on is the rugged gash that had drifted down Marcus’s throat. The sharp blade of an ax replacing his birthmark. That was no illusion, as it was the only thing he could stare at in the arena. Just frozen over top of him, he almost wanted to trace it, just as he did all those years ago.
It made sense. If Sejanus’s mark were to disappear, Marcus’s would, too.
Marcus is looking at him in the same way now, lingering above, eyes wide and milky. It would’ve been a night terror to anyone else, but he is nothing but an angel to Sejanus. Take me with you, he thought. Marcus heard it, no surprise there. He lives in his head. Even if he had spread the breadcrumbs over his corpse, prayed he arrived safely in the afterlife—he is knocking on his skull daily.
He then leaned closer, right next to his ear. Sejanus listened to his shattered bones snap even further, matching his dead stare with his own. “Don’t worry, Sejanus,” he whispered. “It won’t be too long, now.”
He understood. And he hoped he was right.
When he’s packing his things for his departure to Twelve, he cannot stop shaking.
“Are you alright, honey?” Ma bent down next to him, placing another folded pair of socks on top of his stacked clothing. Sejanus found her dull eyes, she’d appeared more exhausted than him. He was culpable for it. He and his father have been arguing like mad again, snapping at one another at dinner or in the back of their car.
Dr. Gaul believes he’d committed treason. Then his father offered him a place in the Peacekeepers. In Twelve. Apparently, that’s where Coriolanus Snow had gone. At least he’d be there, that’d make it all a little better, he wonders what he’d done to get exiled.
“I’m okay, Ma.” Sejanus answers, “just nervous. I think.” Really, he was. He’s never been away from his Ma before, and besides that, an eerie sensation kept trickling up his throat. It gave him chills everytime he felt it.
“I know.” Ma says, leaning forward and brushing her nails through his hair. She deeply sighs.
Sejanus lifts a brow in concern. “What?”
“They’re gonna shave off all your curls, son.” Ma frowned, it’s the first time Sejanus has genuinely smiled in weeks.
“It’ll grow back.” he reassures her.
“I know, I know.” Ma nods along, and eventually stands, looking down at the items in Sejanus’s suitcase. “Got everything?”
Sejanus brings himself to his feet, too. Stares at it just as hard. For some reason, he felt like he was forgetting something. He pats his pocket to ensure the marble heart had been inside, once he clutched the familiar shape of the gift, he still feels it. “I feel like I’m missing something.”
Ma hums, and begins to hover around his room. He resorts to lowering himself down to his suitcase again, curving his hands beneath his folded shirts and pants, searching for something he cannot see. But then Ma returns, gently tapping his shoulder. Sejanus falls back on his bottom as he gapes up at her. She’s holding a shiny framed photograph. “I think this would be nice to have with you.”
Sejanus stands, and can’t contain his small grin as Ma transfers it to his hands. Straight away, the tip of his thumb swipes across the tiny face he’d dreamt so much of. His eyes are drawn to his own young form, and he had forgotten how uncomfortable he had been that day. He remembers it now. The rumors that were spreading, that all ended up true. That ended up ruining him. Still, he was smiling, and Marcus was alive.
He gives her a sharp bob of the head, agreeing with tears pooling along his lashes. “Thank you.”
Ma kisses his temple, she backs up, and they stare at one another in silence. A strange sentiment rested between his chest and hers, it felt like loss. “I’ll miss you so very much, my boy.”
“I’ll miss you more.” Sejanus says, “and I love you.”
“I love you.” Ma repeats, pulling him in for a crushing hug. He does not want to let go of her, he had felt like a little boy again. So loved. So innocent.
When he finally detaches himself, he mourns her embrace. Even more so when he steps on the train one day later. Alone.
His father had patted him on the shoulder before he left. It was the coldest touch he has ever felt.
He finds himself thinking of it on the train, while he stares out the window and watches the sea of grain pass by. After it leaves a sunken punch in his stomach, he shakes his head, as if he’s physically rattling the memory out of his ear, and allows his mind to take control.
His brain flips images beyond his eyes as the hours tick. Flashes of his childhood, of Two, of Marcus, of Ma. In the midst of all that, he thinks of what his life would be like now. He was no longer in the Capitol, he would be stationed with someone who had been his friend throughout the worst time in his life. He was away from his father.
Could he have a chance out there?
He would be trained to be a peacekeeper, yes. A piece in the military. But, he starts to ponder on the possibility of becoming something else. His fingers begin to tingle when his body reminds him of when he’d tended to Marcus’s wounds, when he had made him feel better. Even with no experience, even though it hurt to see, he had done it. He had helped him.
A medic.
How hard would that be to get into? Could he change courses? Was that allowed?
He decides to think about it all once he gets there, he would find out soon enough.
It all happened very quickly.
How did everything unravel so easily? So terribly? He thought he had done something good for once—thought he could save someone for once. But, no. Coriolanus had been right. He wasn’t thinking. And now he would pay the price for it.
Not with his fathers money, though. Not like before. He would pay with his lifeline, as a traitor to the Capitol. Sejanus’s blood has been running cold for what has felt like forever, he was going to die. He was really going to die. He was going to be inhaled by death, something he begged to let overtake him every single night just a month ago. Regret is the only thing that pumps through his veins now.
Maybe he should have held Ma longer that day. Maybe he should have forgiven his father. Maybe he should have been a better friend to Coriolanus. Maybe he should have tried harder to ensure Marcus’s safety.
As his back presses against the hard bricked cell, his neck begins to burn so painfully that he wishes he had the marble heart to soothe himself. But it was no use, he knew what was coming. There was no escaping it now.
When a windy voice slips past his ear, migrating all the way down his spine, he got the sense that it’d been inescapable from the moment he took his very first breath. It sounded so familiar, so sweet and he instantly knew who it had belonged to.
Sejanus wants to call out for him, just one last time, but he doesn’t feel the need to. As his head spins, he swears he feels warmth cave in around him. Perhaps it was the hunger getting to him, he could care less. It felt real, and that was enough for him.
He can’t help himself from thinking of all the times his Ma had told him about the afterlife. She told him that it was a place of no pain, no suffering. It was all bright and beautiful and would grant you immense peace. She told him about their district’s tradition. When he was young, he did not understand it. How do you know what happens? He remembers asking, quiet and curious. She didn’t have an answer, she only assured him that it was real, and that he would find it someday.
Now, he understands. When it was just breaths away, he welcomed its presence like air. And when he gets closer and closer to the stage, the loop of the thick rope dangling ahead of him, he comes to terms with two things.
He can’t wait to go home.
He hopes Marcus is waiting for him.
Sejanus is unsure if he screams for his Ma or Marcus when the noose rips the skin off of his throat.
Marcus has been patiently waiting.
When he first arrived, he thought he was dreaming. His skin was unscathed, his teeth had been in his gums, he could feel his body again. He tasted something other than blood. He touched his neck just to be sure he was really here, and when he felt no deep, gory slash, he sat against one of the many maple trees that spread across the shiny, green, dewy meadow.
The honey lit sky above has been raining on him through the amber leaves, warming his face and allowing his lungs to breathe. No smoke from the mines, no hatred burning him from the inside out, no sobs choking him after being hit again and again, no axes slicing him dead. He could finally breathe.
He was finally free.
But something was missing, someone. Marcus has been searching for him, wondering if he’d passed already and he’d somehow missed him. No—he reminds himself, that was not possible. This was always meant to happen, it was destined. Sejanus has been entwined with him from the very moment they met, even before that. There was no universe where Sejanus wouldn’t be where Marcus was after death.
He prays Sejanus knows it, too. His Ma had been the one to tell him after all. They would always wound up following one another, as soulmates do.
It feels like time passes so fast here. Because it’s like he blinks, just once, maybe twice—it doesn’t matter. It won’t change the fact that a silhouette is forming ahead of him, bright and golden and shaped like a boy he used to know. Marcus’s knees bend, causing him to rise to his feet. And he begins to walk.
“Sejanus.” Marcus can’t tame the smile that spreads across his face.
Sejanus had kept his word.
Sejanus turns, brown eyes wide and shimmering, he then returns the smile just as strongly. “Marcus,” his voice breaks, and he runs to him. “You’re here—you’re really here.”
He crashes into him, Marcus still holds him like he’s glass. “Why wouldn’t I be?” he asks with a gentle laugh, tangling his fingers in Sejanus’s linen button-up, he smelt of flowers. “You said you’d come and find me.”
“I don’t know. I just—“ Sejanus mumbled into his shirt, then he leaned back, seeming to study Marcus for a long while. His pleasant expression suddenly shifted, and tears began to trickle down his cheeks. Marcus’s brows contract in concern. “I’m so sorry,” Sejanus exhales, wrapping his arms around him and hugging him tighter than before. “I just wanted you to be free.”
Marcus could laugh again, instead, he allowed his hand to drift up Sejanus’s back, interlacing his nails with his curled strands of hair. “I am.” he says into the top of his head, resisting the urge to kiss it. “And so are you.”
Somehow, he knows Sejanus is smiling, and he pulls him closer. They stay like that. Softly swaying, feeling Sejanus’s chest rise and fall, feeling his fondness through his skin. He could remain this way forever, but an impulse in him presses him to shift away, so he does, only for a moment. Sejanus looks up at him, the golden sun has never made him appear so beautiful. But, the one thing that brings another gleaming simper to his lips is Sejanus’s birthmark.
“Hey,” Marcus says, dragging his palm along the side of Sejanus’s neck, grazing the light color. Sejanus follows his touch with interest, awaiting him. “Your mark is back.”
“What?—Is it really?” Sejanus bursts, head immediately turning downward. Marcus chuckles at it.
“Yes,” he assures him after a couple of laughs, “I promise. It’s really there.”
Sejanus’s gaze floats up to him once more, and they do not speak for a bundle of seconds. It’s quiet. Marcus listens to his breathing while Sejanus’s eyes burn into him. The cool wind graces them, birds in the distance chirp and chirp until he believes they’re singing some kind of song. He feels so at peace, so calm and so alive that he grips his face and directs him onto his mouth.
Sejanus kisses him back, deeper and deeper until he’s breathless. “I love you,” Marcus says as he takes a moment to catch himself, though he knows he has already fallen. He did years ago. “I’ve always loved you.”
The tears accompany Sejanus’s face again, he holds Marcus’s hands. “I’ve loved you all my life, Marcus.” he doesn’t mind that he feels tears streak down his cheeks, too. “I’m so grateful you waited for me.”
“I never stopped.”
Sejanus’s embrace engulfs him again, and he returns it just as lovingly. He inhales him like the sweet breeze that swam through the azure sky, like the melodic birds, like the fresh blades of grass that was carpeted beneath their feet. He kisses and kisses him until the life before all of this becomes a memory.