The girl of glass

by desiideriium

Summary:

In the 68th Hunger Games, no one expected Sofia Wren Flores to survive. She was hardly seventeen, soft-spoken, and far too gentle for the Capitol's arena, she volunteered for her older sister and vanished into a battlefield of mirrored trees and illusion, where the sky was always beneath your feet and nothing was ever what it seemed.

They only clearly saw her twice. Once, holding the dying boy from her district, singing a song no Capitol camera could forget. And once at the end, alive. Victorious. No one knows how she survived—not even the Capitol.

To Finnick Odair, she was everything he couldn't say. To Haymitch Abernathy, she was the daughter he'd never get to raise. To Snow, she was the ghost of Lucy Gray—proof that some women don't die, they disappear.

She was called the girl of glass—the glass victor. And no one ever caught her.

Because Sofía Flores had already gotten away. And none of them knew how to catch their very own reflection.

Notes:

Hi guys!!

Chapter 1

The morning of the Reaping felt like too many endings. The sun was already high when Sofia Wren Flores stood barefoot on the cracked kitchen floor, the heat of District 11 settling over the house like a weight. Outside, the cicadas droned in the orchard beyond the fence, but inside, the air was still—thick with waiting.

It was Camila's last year of eligibility.

Sofia hadn't forgotten that. She never forgot things like that. Camila was the strongest person she knew, but that didn't mean she was meant to die. Not in the Games. Not for show. Camila belonged in the orchard with sun on her back, not under the shadow of a Capitol hovercraft. Sofia watched her sister's fingers move, quick and careful, weaving strands like they were roots she couldn't bear to cut. "You don't have to braid it," she murmured.

"Yes I do," Camila replied, too softly.

They didn't say the rest.

That this might be the last time Sofia has Camila braid her hair—or the last time Camila can braid Sofia's hair.

In the corner room, their little brother Mateo still slept, curled into the side of the bed where the morning light hadn't yet reached. He was only nine. Sofia had kissed his forehead earlier and told him it would be a regular day. That she and Camila would be back in the afternoon, and they could all eat sugared peaches together by the fence. She lied beautifully—so well he hadn't even stirred.

Sofia closed her eyes and listened to the quiet, as if the silence might hold the world together a little longer.

When Camila finished braiding, she tied the end with a fraying ribbon. "Do you remember that song Papá used to sing?" she asked it so suddenly, as if plucking the memory from nowhere.

Sofia nodded. She remembered it too well. It was a slow, winding melody, one their father sang when his back ached from the fields, when their mother's eyes were too tired to meet anyone's. He used to hum it when they were scared, especially when storms came through. It reminded Sofia of thunder, of his arms, of the night they took him away for stealing sacks of sugar. The Capitol said it was theft. They said District 11 couldn't spare sweetness for anyone who hadn't earned it.

Sofia had only been eleven.

Now she was sixteen—soon to be seventeen, with the same softness in her voice and the same ache in her chest. A quiet, unremarkable girl who cried at endings and left flowers in forgotten places.

"Are you ready?" Camila asked, tying her own braid with fingers that had already packed too many goodbyes.

She wasn't. But Sofia nodded anyways, for the sake of her sister.

They dressed in white. They always did in District 11—"funeral clothes", some said. A tradition passed through too many hands. Mothers who had lost too much, fathers who had disappeared into shadows, children who no longer dared to dream. Sofia tied Mateo's shoes before they left. He blinked up at her with round eyes and a thousand unspoken questions. She didn't answer any of them—she didn't know how to.

The walk to the square was slow. Sofía's feet brushed against the dust, her heart thudding louder with every step. Behind her, Camila's hand brushed hers—a brief touch that spoke of fear and something else, something unspoken. Mateo followed close behind, clutching their mother's hand so tight his knuckles were white. He didn't know what the day meant, but Mateo always copied Sofia—he could see her nerves and in turn, they became his own. Sofia clutched her hands together in front of her as she walked. She didn't want Mateo to see how tightly her fingers were trembling.

The crowd had gathered before the Justice Building. Faces turned upward, some blank with dread, others blinking back tears. Sofía felt the weight of a thousand eyes, none of them expecting anything from her. Not her district. Not the Capitol. Not even the Peacekeepers who stood with guns resting heavy against their hips. She spoke to a few people—briefly. A kind hello, a small smile, a quiet "excuse me" as she walked past them, because that's who Sofia was.

The reaping bowls sat on the stage, two carved wooden basins filled with slips of paper—the names of every eligible boy and girl in the district. Each slip was a promise, a threat, a bullet waiting to be fired. The reaping was full of names. Full of lives. Full of people who had only ever known work and fear. Names fluttered like trapped birds in glass.

The Capitol escort adjusted the microphone in his hand. Sofia could hear as the crowd held its breath.

"Camila Flores."

The silence cracked open like bone. Camila's name was called. It echoed through the square like a stone dropped into a well.

Camila's lips parted, Sofia watched them. She watched her fiery, strong sister, shaking as she took a step forward.

Sofía's body moved before her mind could catch up.

"I volunteer."

Her voice was low but clear, cutting through the silence like a blade. For a moment, no one moved. No one gasped. No one cheered. Just a collective breath, held too long and finally released in confusion.

Sofía Flores was the soft one, the gentle one who sang lullabies to dying birds, who gave her harvest share to neighbors, the one who wrote poems for her friends' birthdays, the girl who left bread at doorsteps when she thought no one was looking, who never lifted a hand in anger. She had volunteered for her sister. No one believed it.

The Peacekeepers didn't hesitate. They reached for her arms, guiding her gently—almost reverently—as if they too had been stunned, she didn't fight them, she went willingly. Camila's voice broke behind her, but Sofia knew the microphones didn't catch it. Mateo's name never passed her lips, but Sofía imagined him now, awake and confused, asking where they were. Asking where his sister had gone.

Sofía didn't look back.

She stepped onto the stage, the white of her clothes stark against her tanned skin, the sun burning hot on it.

The male tribute was called next, Milo Thorne. He was Eighteen—Camila's age. Sharp-jawed and silent, the boy Sofía barely knew but who had jokingly mocked her the night before, saying she was too soft for the Capitol to ever pick her.

Milo didn't look at her now.

Sofía's hands trembled, dirt-stained and rough from the orchard, but gentle—like they belonged to someone afraid to break the world. In that moment, even Milo Thorne felt a strange, quiet mourning. For her. For the girl who wasn't meant to be here. Because everyone in District 11 knew Sofia—everyone would miss the girl who bandaged scraped knees in the orchards, the girl who made work fun, the girl who found beauty in everyone.

And none of them were ready to say goodbye—not truly.

Chapter 2

Notes:

This chapters a little all over the place, sorry!!

The Justice Building was colder than she expected.

The stone walls held no warmth, no memory of the sun she had walked through to get here. A Peacekeeper had led her into a small room with shuttered windows and a ticking clock that reminded her of rainfall against a tin roof. The air was sharp with the scent of bleach and something floral, artificial and cloying. Sofía sat on the edge of a wooden bench, hands folded neatly in her lap. She had never been in a room so clean it felt unlived in.

It took a long time for the door to open. When it did, Camila stepped through it like someone surfacing from deep water. Her braid was half-undone now, curls falling loose at the sides of her face. Her eyes were red.

Sofía stood at once. "Camila—"

But Camila crossed the room before she could finish, wrapped her arms around her and held her too tightly. It was the kind of hug that hurt. Sofía pressed her forehead to her sister's shoulder and let herself be small again, just for a moment.

"You weren't supposed to," Camila whispered fiercely. "You weren't supposed to be the one to—"

"I know," Sofía said. Her voice was quiet. "But I did."

Camila pulled back to look at her. Her hands cupped Sofía's face like she was afraid it might vanish beneath her palms. "You were always like this," she murmured. "Papá used to say your heart was too big for your chest."

Sofía managed a trembling smile. "That's why I can't run very fast."

Camila laughed, but it cracked at the edges. Her thumb brushed beneath Sofía's eye. "They're going to eat you alive."

Sofía looked down. "Maybe," she said. "but I'll taste like apple seeds"

The door opened again. This time, it was their mother.

She didn't cry. Not even a little. Her eyes were hollow with something beyond grief—something resigned. Her mouth pressed in a straight line as she walked forward and rested one hand on Camila's shoulder. Camila moved away from Sofía then, quietly stepping aside to give their mother space.

For a long time, her mother didn't speak. She just looked at her youngest daughter, standing in the white dress of the condemned.

"Sofía," she said, barely a breath.

Sofía moved carefully, Camila still standing beside her. She stepped into her mother's arms.
Her mother touched her cheek, the pads of her fingers trembling. "Nine days," she said. "You'll be seventeen."

"I know mama."

"We'll leave something out for you. A cake, if we can get sugar. Camila said she'd sing."

Sofia didn't reply. She thought it sounded like they were already preparing to mourn on that day—Sofia knew they were right in thinking that. They held each other with a kind of quiet desperation that didn't need words. Just breath and warmth and the knowledge that this, too, was an ending.

"You look like him," her mother whispered. "When you get brave like this, it's your father I see."

Sofía pressed her forehead to her mothers shoulder, soaking in the scent of fruit. "Tell Mateo I'm going to the Capitol to pick flowers."

Her mother stilled. "What?"

Sofía pulled back, eyes shining with something that hadn't yet become tears. "He's too little. He'll be scared. Just...tell him I'm picking flowers. And that I'll send him the seeds. So he can plant them when he misses me."

Her mother's jaw clenched. "Sofía—"

"Please," she said. "Please Mama, let him believe something good, even if it's only for a little while."

Camila turned away then, pressing her hand to her mouth.

The two of them stayed there for as long as the Capitol allowed—holding her hands, brushing her hair back, trying to memorize her. The Peacekeepers returned before long, stone-faced and stiff, and said the visits were over.

But Sofía looked at them and said, "One more minute."

They didn't argue.

 

Milo Thorne entered the room like a shadow grown too large for the walls to hold.
The light from the high window stretched across the floor, stopping just short of his boots. He paused near the threshold, eyes sweeping the space like he was expecting it to be different—warmer maybe, or less gold. Sofía sat on the bench, spine straight, hands still folded neatly in her lap as if she were waiting for a lesson to begin. The room felt too big around her, too hollow, like it had already decided she didn't belong in it. He looked at her for a long time without speaking.

And then, finally, he stepped forward.

Each of his strides felt too loud in the silence, like the floor was registering his presence in a way it hadn't for anyone else. When he reached her, he didn't sit immediately. He just stood there, looking down at her with an unreadable expression—eyes too sharp for someone his age.

"You always sit like that?" he asked, voice low. "With your hands folded like someone's about to take your picture?"

Sofía blinked up at him. "It keeps them from shaking."

His brows knit together. "Are they?"

She nodded once.

He sat down beside her then, slowly, like he wasn't sure if he should. His frame made the bench look smaller, and when his shoulder brushed hers—barely—it felt like being pressed up against the side of a barn. He smelled like dirt and lemon soap. Like the orchard in late summer. Like safety, if she let herself believe in that.

They didn't speak for a while.

Sofía looked down at her hands again. They were still trembling, just slightly.

"I didn't think it would be you," he said, not unkindly. "You're not the type."

She gave a small smile. "I don't think there is a type."

"There is," he murmured. "And it's not girls who leave bread on doorsteps when no one asks."

Sofía didn't respond. She just stared at the seam in the floor tiles, trying to breathe past the tightness in her throat.

"You're turning seventeen," he said.

Sofía looked up, startled.

"In nine days," he added, quietly. "On the second day of the Games."

She blinked. "How did you...?"

"I remembered," he said, like it was the most natural thing in the world. "You told the twins last year—how your birthday felt like it was always interrupting tragedy"

Sofía stared at him.

He shrugged, a little awkwardly. "You talk like the flowers. It stuck."

For a moment, something tender passed between them. Not friendship, not exactly. Not love. But something soft and lonely, something made of glances and fragments and moments no one else remembered.

"You were kind to me once," Milo said suddenly. "Last harvest. I broke my arm and couldn't finish my rows. You did them for me when no one else wanted to. You didn't even tell me."

She glanced up at him, startled. "You knew that?"

"You didn't think I noticed?"

"I didn't think it mattered."

He shook his head. "It mattered."

His voice was quiet, not sharp like it sometimes was. There was something heavy in it—like he'd been holding that memory in his pocket, rubbing it smooth every day since.

She looked at him more fully now. The light hit his face, and she could see the dark bruise already forming on the side of his jaw—likely from the Peacekeeper's grip during the walk. He didn't seem to care.

Sofía pulled the muslin pouch from her lap, letting it rest in her palm. "I told my mom to tell Mateo I was going to the Capitol to pick flowers," she whispered. "That I'd send him the seeds."

Milo's gaze dropped to the pouch.

"What kind?"

"Peach blossoms. Sugarcanes. Whatever blue ones I find. I don't know if they'll let me send them."

"You'd try anyway."

"I will."

The room fell silent again.

It was this strange, open quiet between them. A boy who looked like he could win the Games without trying, sitting beside a girl who hadn't raised her voice in years. The difference between them felt ridiculous—cruelly so.

"Milo," she asked softly, "do you think it hurts? Dying?"

She asked it like she already knew, but needed to hear someone else say it.

Milo leaned forward, elbows on his knees, fingers laced together in front of him.

"I don't know," he said. "I think maybe it does. But I think... if you were the one holding someone when it happened, it might not feel so bad."

Sofía's breath caught.

She didn't mean to cry.

The tears didn't fall all at once. They came slowly—like morning mist, not storm. Her face stayed quiet, but her shoulders betrayed her, tightening under the weight of what hadn't been said. She turned slightly away from him, ashamed, clutching the flower pouch so tightly the seams dug into her skin.

He didn't move at first. But then, carefully—so carefully it almost broke her—he reached out and laid a hand on her back. Not hard, not bracing. Just warm. Steady. There.

Like an anchor.

She didn't lean into him, but she didn't pull away either.

"I don't know how to do this," she whispered, voice trembling. "I've never even hurt anyone."

"I know."

"I hate loud noises. I flinch when people raise their voice."

"I know."

"I've never even punched anything."

"I know."

"I'm not strong like you."

He let out a breath, slow. "You don't have to be strong like me."

She finally turned her head to him. His eyes were already on her.

"You're not what I thought," he said, almost quietly. "When I teased you last night—about being too soft for the Capitol—I didn't mean it."

She gave a watery laugh. "Yes you did."

"I did," he admitted. "But I was stupid. You're not soft."

She blinked.

"You're good," he said. "There's a difference."

For the first time since she'd been pulled onto the stage, she felt something settle inside her chest. Not peace exactly. But a stitch. A thread holding things together. Milo didn't look like a boy who'd be kind. But he was. Or at least, he was trying to be. And that was worse, somehow.

When they came to take her to the train, she stood slowly. Milo rose beside her like a structure built to last through every storm. His shadow stretched across hers, and for a moment, she let herself feel it—shelter.

Neither of them spoke.

But as she turned to go, she felt the warmth of his hand again, brushing hers. Not quite a touch. Not quite nothing.

Chapter 3

The Capitol train was not built for people like her. Sofia had known that before she stepped on board, but it didn't fully hit her until the doors closed behind her and the mechanical hiss of separation filled the air. As if the world had made a decision she couldn't come back from.

The hallway was paneled in mahogany and brass, polished to a gleam. She could see her reflection in the floor. Every step she took felt like trespassing. The carpets were soft underfoot, the walls curved gently inward, and chandeliers hung overhead like sleeping glass creatures. It was a palace on wheels. And yet—when she breathed in, it didn't smell like home. It smelled like citrus and cold linen. Like something preserved in ice. She missed the scent of sugarcane and woodsmoke already.

She hadn't known where to sit.

The moment they stepped into the lounge, her eyes had darted around for something familiar—something safe—but there was nothing. Plush settees, ivory tables, decadent fruit arrangements. The space was too quiet, too slow. Camila would've hated it. And then, just as the panic began to creep up her spine, Milo reached for her wrist. Not hard, not sudden. Just firm. A quiet claiming. He sat down in the corner booth and pulled her beside him before anyone else could move.

He didn't speak. Just leaned back, arms folded, eyes sharp as knives as he watched the door.

They were stark together—him, all stone and silence, and her, one of the smaller tributes that year, curled beside him like a patch of soft light. She smiled at everyone who entered. Not with her mouth, not necessarily. Sometimes just with her eyes.

And the tributes noticed.

One of the girls from District 5 walked past first. She had short, bleached hair and eyes lined in a way that made her look constantly surprised. She walked alone, shoulders squared, lips parted like she might say something but never did. When she passed Sofia and Milo, her gaze flicked toward them. Just for a second. Sofia nodded gently. The girl blinked, looked away, and sat across the room with her back to the window.

The boy from 7 passed by next—his boots tracked mud on the velvet carpet, his jacket was patched with mismatched fabric. He had a crooked smile and an even crookeder nose. He looked young, though not as young as his eyes suggested. He grinned at everyone, even the cameras, but when he met Sofia's eyes, his grin faltered. He gave a nod. Not disrespectful. More like...reluctant recognition. She smiled anyway and returned the nod.

Then came a pair from District 9. They walked in together, side by side, but not touching. The girl was tall and sharp-boned, her features so severe she looked like she'd been carved from wheat stalks and winter. The boy beside her was darker, broader, but quiet. She led. He followed. Neither looked directly at anyone until the girl's gaze snagged briefly on Sofia's face. Her eyes narrowed. Not cruelly. Just curiously. Like she couldn't quite place what she was seeing. Sofia offered a small smile. The girl looked away first. The guy stared for a second longer before looking away as well.

Another tribute passed, alone. The male tribute from three maybe—he had a wired contraption clipped to his wrist and a long scratch down one cheek, raw and fresh. He walked like he couldn't feel the weight of the train beneath him, like his thoughts were always somewhere else. Sofia had the strange instinct to reach out and say something—to try and ground him, maybe for his sake, maybe for her own. She didn't.

And then there was the girl who reminded her of home.

She was tall for fourteen, almost eye-level with Milo when she stepped in, but her face was soft—round cheeks, wide brown eyes, a small scar to the side of her lip like a half-drawn dimple. Her hair was in two uneven braids, and her jacket sleeves were too long. She looked like someone who still slept with a light on. When she passed, Sofía smiled. The girl paused.

"What's your name?" she asked.

"Sofia."

The girl looked her over for a moment. "You're not what I expected from District Eleven."

Sofia tilted her head "What did you expect?"

"Bigger," the girl said honestly. "Louder."

She laughed, so quietly it could almost be mistaken for a sigh  "And what district are you from?"

"Ten," the girl said proudly, as if it were the answer to a riddle no one else could answer "I train horses. I don't think I'm supposed to tell people that, but I don't really care."

"I like horses," Sofia said. "Especially the ones with white patches around their eyes. It's like they've seen something."

The girl smiled, full and warm, the way children do when someone meets them at their level, Sofia's seen it before, in Mateo, "You've got kind eyes," she said, then added, like it was a secret, "That means you probably won't win. But I hope you do."

And just like that, she walked away.

Sofia watched her go with a strange ache. She didn't know her name. But she wanted her to live.

She let out a soft breath and turned her gaze back to the room. More tributes had entered now. The space was slowly filling, but somehow it still felt quiet. Or maybe it was just that the noise didn't reach her the same way it did at home. Everyone's footsteps were muffled by the thick carpet, their expressions set in strange combinations of bravado and fear. It reminded her of storm clouds pretending they weren't rain.

Then she felt it.

A subtle shift in the air. Like someone had started watching her before they even moved.

She glanced up and saw two boys walking toward her. Not together at first glance—they didn't look similar, and their strides weren't matched—but something about the way they approached made it clear they were a pair. One was a little broader, with a jaw he clenched and unclenched like he didn't even know he was doing it. The other was lean, sharp-eyed, and smiling in a way that felt like it had been rehearsed until it looked natural.

Sofia kept her stance open, her expression still. They stopped in front of her booth, just far enough to leave space, just close enough to own it. They didn't look at Milo.

They looked at her.

"You're from Eleven, right?" the first boy asked. His voice was smooth—not Capitol-slick, not unkind. Just smooth. His gaze dropped to her hands for half a second, like he was memorizing the way she held her cup.

Sofia nodded. "Sofia Wren Flores."

"That's a pretty name," the second boy said. His voice was quieter, but heavier somehow. "It fits."

She tilted her head, the ghost of a smile forming. "Fits what?"

They didn't answer.

Instead, the first boy moved a little closer, one hand tucked into the waistband of his jacket. "You always smile at people like that?"

"Like what?"

"Like it costs you nothing," he said. "Like you mean it."

Sofia blinked, caught off guard. "I do mean it."

That seemed to surprise him. Not in a mocking way—just slightly. The second boy's eyes flicked to Milo, just once. Milo hadn't moved. He hadn't said anything either. But Sofia could feel the shift in him—like something inside had tensed and coiled. His stare, unblinking, tracked their every motion. She could feel it like gravity. Like a hand resting gently on the edge of a knife.

The first boy ignored it. "Have you ever been in a fight, Sofia?"

She shook her head.

"Ever thrown a punch?"

"No."

"Ever killed anything?"

There was a pause. Her eyes dropped to her lap.

"I stepped on a spider once," she said softly. "It was on accident."

The second boy laughed. Just once. A quiet, flat sound.

It wasn't cruel.

It wasn't kind either.

"You might be in the wrong story, sweetheart."

She looked up. Her voice didn't waver. "I don't mind endings."

That gave them both pause.

The taller one tilted his head, appraising her again—but this time without the thin veil of politeness. It wasn't leering. Wasn't exactly admiration either. Just... interest. As if he couldn't figure out how someone like her had made it onto a train like this.

"You're different," the first one said. "People will notice."

"They already do," the second added. Then, almost as an afterthought, "You're pretty."

It wasn't said with a grin. Not as a tease. It just landed there between them, like an observation. Sofia didn't respond. Not out of shyness, but because she wasn't sure what kind of reply was expected. Maybe none.

"Why did you come sit here?" she asked instead. Not accusatory. Just curious.

The boys exchanged a glance.

"We like you," said the first boy. "More than most."

It was a strange thing to say. Not that they liked her more than most tributes, or more than most girls. Just "more than most". As if they didn't even know what they were comparing her to.

The silence between them stretched, gentle but edged. Somewhere in the far corner of the train, a Capitol attendant cleared their throat and adjusted a tray. No one was listening. And yet Sofía felt like the whole world had leaned in.

The second boy—he was the one who hadn't smiled yet—tilted his head at her again. "Don't let people mistake your softness, yeah?" he said. "Soft things still bleed."

She nodded once. She didn't know why. Maybe just to show she understood. Maybe because it felt true.

"Well," said the taller one, standing. "If you make it far, I'd be interested to see what you do."

"And if you don't," the other added, "at least you'll look good doing it."

It should've stung.

But it didn't. There was no venom in the words. Just a strange, detached honesty that belonged to people who'd already accepted the end of things.

"See you around," one of them said.

"Maybe," added the other, his voice unreadable.

They turned and wandered off, the second boy glancing back only once. It wasn't a leer. It wasn't warm, either. But it lingered longer than it needed to.

 

Eventually, Milo shifted beside her. It wasn't much—just the subtle movement of someone readjusting his weight—but it pulled Sofía's attention away from the window.

She turned her head to look at him.

His gaze was still forward, scanning the room, unmoving. But then, without glancing at her, he spoke.

"They're already writing you off."

His voice was low. Almost an afterthought. But it landed heavily.

She blinked. "Why?"

He tilted his head slightly, like the answer was obvious. "You smile too much. You're far from tall. You talk to everyone."

A pause.

"And?" she asked.

He turned his head then, just slightly—enough that his eyes finally met hers. They were darker up close. Not angry. Just old. Like he'd seen too much, even for someone who hadn't said a word since the Reaping.

"They'll think it makes you weak" he said.

"And what do you think?" she asked, carefully.

Milo studied her. Really studied her. His eyes moved slowly over her face, her posture, the way she was folded in on herself but still trying to take up space in gentleness. He didn't speak for a long moment.

Then he spoke again, "You don't move like someone afraid of dying."

She swallowed. "I am."

"I know," he said. "But you're still here."

The train shifted beneath them, humming over its tracks like it was carrying the weight of something sacred and cruel. Sofía looked down at her hands in her lap. She'd stopped shaking. She hadn't noticed when exactly.

Milo leaned back against the velvet booth, arms folded again. His voice came softer now, almost like something he wasn't used to saying aloud.

"They'll try to break you" he said.

Sofía looked back at him, her voice a whisper. "Do you think they will?"

He didn't answer right away. His jaw clenched once, then relaxed. His eyes never left hers.

"No," he said finally. "They won't."

It wasn't because he believed in hope. Or because he thought kindness was a strategy. It was because something in her had told him—this one doesn't shatter the way they think she will, even if he didn't think she'd win.

He didn't say anything else after that. Just sat beside her, as the sky outside turned the color of bruised violets and the Capitol's shadow drew closer with every mile.

But it was enough.

It was the first thing anyone had said to her since the reaping that didn't make her feel like she was already gone.

Chapter 4

Haymitch Abernathy knew about Sofia Flores long before he was officially told he’d mentor her.

He’d seen her name on the screens that flared in every public square across Panem, watched the grainy footage of the Reaping scroll by like a headline he wished he could ignore. He’d heard the whispers in the Capitol’s halls, smelled the rumors floating around like smoke from a fresh kill.

She was from District Eleven.

A district he’d never expected to cross paths with. Not directly, not like this.

When the first glimpse of Sofía’s face appeared on the broadcast—soft, delicate features framed by curly black hair, eyes wide as if already haunted—something deep inside him twisted. He saw a ghost. A shadow from his past.

Lenore.

That name lingered in his mind like a curse.

Lenore—the girl he tried to save, the girl who slipped through his fingers like sand, the girl the Capitol had crushed—killed, without a second thought. Sofia was not Lenore, but the resemblance tore open a wound he had stitched up with booze and bitterness.

He’d watched the Reaping footage from District Eleven with a bottle half empty in his hand, muttering curses under his breath. The way Sofia had stepped forward—small and trembling, but steady—turned his stomach. He’d seen that kind of courage before. The quiet kind. The doomed kind.

He’d told himself it wasn’t his problem. That he didn’t have to get involved. District Eleven had their own victors, their own ghosts. Let them deal with it, let them train her.

But of course, the Capitol never let anything stay where it belonged.

They summoned him that morning without true warning. A Peacekeeper knocked on his door with the kind of authority that meant he didn’t have a choice. He shoved a clean shirt over his head, still half-drunk, and followed the white clad bastard down a maze of sterile Capitol hallways.

He wasn’t surprised when they took him to the lower offices. That’s where they kept the twisted orders, the files not meant for public view. The ones with red stamps and silent cameras.

He was surprised when he opened the door and found President Snow waiting for him behind a desk. Not the usual aide. Not some Capitol bureaucrat with a clipboard and a too bright smile.

Snow. Himself.

Haymitch felt his jaw tighten instinctively. He didn’t sit down.

“I’m not in the mood for games,” he said.

Snow’s smile was a dead thing. “Well that’s fortunate. This isn’t a game.”

The file had already been laid out. Her name printed in all caps at the top.

WREN FLORES, SOFIA
District Eleven. Age sixteen. Volunteered.

Haymitch didn’t touch it.

Snow laced his fingers together. “District Eleven has only one active mentor this year. The others… declined.”

Haymitch scoffed. “You let them refuse?”

A flicker of amusement touched Snow’s face. “They were given a choice.”

Haymitch stepped forward, tension rising in his shoulders. “So what, now I’m mentoring tributes from other districts?”

“Just the girl,” Snow said softly. “The boy has someone.”

There was a pause.

“I’m already mentoring Twelve’s tributes.”

“No,” Snow said. “You were scheduled to. But we’ve reassigned them.”

“What?”

“The victor of the Sixty-Sixth Games has offered to mentor both tributes from District Twelve. She’s quite… enthusiastic. Your services are no longer required there.”

Haymitch stared at the folder, then back at the old man’s face.

“This is punishment.”

Snow smiled like winter, cold, dry. “It’s justice.”

“For what?”

“You know for what.”

Haymitch didn’t ask what that meant. He already knew.

He knew that Snow liked to break things slowly. Not with whips or chains, but with choices. Impossible ones. Ones that left you hollow whether you said yes or no.

Sofia reminded him of Lenore. That was the truth of it. Snow could see it in his eyes. Haymitch had flinched the first time they showed her face on screen. The Capitol cameras caught everything. Even that.

She was soft the way Lenore had been soft. Kind. Too kind for this world. The kind of girl who wouldn’t last long unless someone taught her how to kill, how to lie, how to pretend she didn’t care when someone else died in front of her. And now Haymitch was being ordered to teach her those things.

He stood in that office for a long time. Not speaking. Not blinking. Just staring at the photo paperclipped to the corner of the file.

She wasn’t looking at the camera. Just past it, slightly off-center, as if there were something she couldn’t name tugging at her mind. Her mouth was closed, but her eyes were open in a way that hurt.

He hated her a little, in that moment.

Hated her for looking like Lenore. Hated her for volunteering. Hated her for being the kind of person who would make him care again.

He was tired of caring. Caring got you killed. Or worse—left alive.

“Give her to someone else,” Haymitch said finally. His voice was hoarse.

Snow shook his head. “No one else wanted her.”

Haymitch blinked. “That’s not true. You just wouldn’t let them.”

“Semantics.”

Haymitch took a slow step toward the desk, planting his palms on the surface. He leaned in, lowering his voice like it might matter.

“I’ve buried more kids than I can count. Don’t make me bury one that looks like—”

“Like her?” Snow finished.

Neither of them said Lenore’s name.

The room went quiet.

Finally, Haymitch straightened. He didn’t say yes. He didn’t say no. He turned and left the room.

The hallway outside the assignment chambers was cold. Not literally—Capitol air was always sterilized and still—but it felt like the world had gone numb. Haymitch stepped out, the door clicking shut behind him, a final note on a song he hadn’t agreed to hear.

He hated this building. The smooth marble floors, the mirrored columns, the perfume of power so thick you could choke on it. He ran a hand over his face. The folder with Sofía’s name was still tucked under his arm, like a bad joke that wouldn’t stop following him.

He turned the corner and nearly walked into Finnick Odair.

The boy—no, the man now—was leaning against the wall with his arms crossed, an apple in one hand. His bronze hair was a little too perfect, Capitol-crafted, but there were dark crescents under his eyes and a heaviness to his gaze that said he knew more than just a few secrets—more than just a few losses.

“Rough meeting?” Finnick asked without looking up.

Haymitch grunted. “Aren’t they all?”

Finnick tossed the apple in his hand, caught it again. “Heard they’re mixing things up this year. Heard you’re mentoring someone outside of District Twelve.”

Haymitch didn’t answer. He moved to pass, but Finnick straightened, stepped into his path just slightly—not blocking, just existing there. A polite trap.

Haymitch looked at him. “You got spies now?”

“I have ears,” Finnick said. “And Capitol people love to talk. Especially when it’s about this.”

Haymitch said nothing. The silence between them stretched, familiar.

“You know who she is,” Finnick said. Not a question.

Haymitch almost said no. Almost lied.

But his fingers twitched on the folder, and that was enough.

“Her name’s Sofía,” he muttered.

Finnick blinked, then nodded like he already knew that too. “District Eleven.”

Haymitch scowled. “She’s a kid. A soft one.”

“They all are, at first.”

Haymitch studied him. “You offering something?”

Finnick’s eyes flicked down, just briefly, to the file under Haymitch’s arm. “I’m not offering anything yet. But if you need help… you’ll ask?”

Haymitch hesitated.

Then, “Sure.”

It came out rough. Barely a word. But Finnick seemed to accept it.

He stepped back, gave a parting look—a quiet sort of warning wrapped in compassion.

“She reminds you of someone, doesn’t she?”

Haymitch didn’t answer. He just walked past, folder clutched tight, like a wound he didn’t want anyone else to see.

Outside, the Capitol air was thin and bright, too artificial to feel real. He lit a cigarette with shaking hands. He didn’t know if it was the hangover or the assignment or the memory of a girl he hadn’t saved, but something in him felt loose. Unmoored.

He exhaled.

Smoke curled into the sky like a prayer.

Sofia Wren Flores was going to die.

He could already feel it.

And he was going to be the one who had to watch her do it.

Notes:

Haymitch introduction!! I’m not too sure if I like the switch to a Haymitch centered perspective but it felt necessary, especially for this chapter, please lmk if you guys like the idea of writing him and Sofia’s official meeting twice, one in his perspective, one in hers!!

Chapter 5

Finnick Odair didn’t know why he wanted to mentor Eleven’s girl.

It wasn’t strategy. It wasn’t politics. It wasn’t even pity—not the kind that made you lean over a casket and say “I’m sorry” when you truly weren’t. It was something else. Something quieter. Quicker. A spark in the blood he couldn’t shake.

He leaned against the wall long after Haymitch left, arms crossed and thumb brushing the apple’s waxy skin. The hall was still, cold in that Capitol way—whitewashed, elegant, dead. He could smell the perfume drifting from some unseen corridor, roses and rot, and something in it made his skin crawl.

Her name echoed in his mind like saltwater in an open wound.

Sofia.

He didn’t know her. He didn’t need to. The way Haymitch had clutched that file—like it burned him. The way he didn’t deny anything. That was enough.

Finnick stared down the hallway, then took a bite of the apple. It cracked between his teeth, too sweet, too polished. Capitol fruit always tasted like it was trying too hard.

He spat the skin into a napkin, turned, and walked.

 

The route to Snow’s office hadn’t changed. He knew it too well—an awful privilege. The clicks of his boots echoed against the marble like a countdown, and with every step he took, that itch under his ribs worsened. The Capitol always did that to him. Made him feel like a weapon still warm from the last war.

The Peacekeeper outside didn’t move when Finnick approached. Just flicked a glance at him—young, hard-jawed, already half-dead behind the eyes—and knocked twice before pushing the door open.

Snow looked up, calm as ever, the faintest smile twitching on his lips. “Ah, Odair. To what do I owe this unexpected visit?”

Finnick’s own smile was slower, tighter. “We need to talk about Sofia Flores.”

Snow’s eyes flicked downward, acknowledging the name like it was a thorn beneath his skin. “The girl from District Eleven? The volunteer?”

“Yeah,” Finnick leaned against the doorframe, crossing his arms. “Haymitch brought her up. Said you’re assigning her to him.”

Snow’s smile grew thinner. “That’s correct. I find it best to keep things… efficient.”

Finnick’s gaze didn’t waver. “Efficient, sure. But… you know what I think? I think she deserves more than efficiency. She deserves someone who knows how to survive this world—someone who understands what she’s up against.”

Snow raised an eyebrow. “And you believe that someone is you?”

Finnick’s grin sharpened. “I do.”

The silence stretched.

Snow leaned back in his chair, fingers steepled. “Odair, you are a victor of the Sixty-Fifth Games. Your experience is noted. But you also understand the delicate balance we must maintain. The Capitol expects order.”

“And order is what you think you’re giving her? By forcing her onto Abernathy? You’ve seen the man. He was drunk walking in here. What kind of mentor do you think that makes?”

Snow’s eyes flickered with something—perhaps irritation? Amusement? “Haymitch Abernathy is a man who knows death better than most. That has value.”

Finnick’s laugh was low, sharp. “Yeah, value if you want her broken. If you want her dead.”

Snow’s smile didn’t waver, but his eyes darkened. “Are you suggesting I’m making a mistake, Odair?”

“Not suggesting.” Finnick straightened, stepping fully into the room. “I’m warning.”

For a moment, the only sound was the faint hum of the ventilation system, the distant murmur of Capitol life beyond the heavy door.

Finnick dropped the file he’d brought onto Snow’s desk. The edges were worn, but the contents were sharp—a collection of whispers, rumors, and truths he’d gathered over the years. Secrets Snow had buried deep. The kind that could unravel alliances, topple officials, ruin careers.

Snow’s gaze locked onto the file. His expression flickered, just for a second—a crack in the icy facade.

“You really think you have something on me?”

Finnick’s grin was steady. “Oh, I don’t think. I know.”

Snow’s fingers clenched into a fist on the desk, the veins tightening beneath his pale skin. He recovered quickly, voice calm, almost amused. “Very well. Suppose I humor you. What do you want, Odair?”

Finnick leaned forward, voice dropping to a dangerous whisper. “I want to mentor Sofia Wren Flores. Alongside Abernathy. Without him. I’ll leave you choice there.”

Snow’s laugh was quiet, almost condescending. “You think I will simply hand you that privilege?”

“I think you don’t have much choice.”

Snow’s eyes narrowed. “Is that a threat?”

Finnick shrugged, an effortless gesture that barely masked the tension coiling beneath his skin. “Call it what you want. I call it…an opportunity. For both of us.”

Snow leaned back again, studying Finnick as if measuring the weight of a gamble. The seconds stretched thin and taut.

Finally, Snow’s voice came low, deliberate. “You understand the consequences if this little arrangement comes to light?”

Finnick smiled, a slow, confident curve. “The Capitol thrives on secrets. Some just have better currency.”

Snow’s cold gaze held his for a long moment. Then, with a tilt of his head, he nodded. “Very well, Odair. We shall see if you’re as useful as you believe.”

Finnick took a step back, the threat hanging in the air between them like a sharp blade.

“Thank you, Mr. President.”

He turned toward the door, but paused.

Snow’s voice stopped him again, softer now, almost reflective.

“Why her? What is it about this girl that draws you?”

Finnick’s shoulders tightened. He didn’t know the answer—not yet.

He shook his head, a small, bitter smile. “I don’t know. Maybe I just don’t want to see her die.”

He knew Snow couldn’t kill him. Not yet. Not without unraveling a very expensive, very dangerous illusion. But there were worse things than death. Finnick knew that too.

Still, he didn’t think they would reach him—not quite yet.

 

The Capitol air outside the office felt different. Too thin, too sharp. Finnick walked without knowing exactly where he was going, something electric thrumming in his veins. His heart felt like it didn’t belong in his chest anymore.

He hadn’t expected to say any of it. Hadn’t planned the threat. It just came out. Like something old and hungry rising up through the floorboards of a house long thought quiet.

He hated that he’d used it.

He hated that it worked.

But he also knew, that it had worked.

He’d seen it in Snow’s eyes—the way power shifted, just for a breath. The moment when the predator realizes it might not be the only one with teeth.

He didn’t want to mentor Sofía Flores because she reminded him of someone. He didn’t want to protect her. He didn’t even know what she was yet. All he knew was he’d seen something in Haymitch’s face. Something raw. Unguarded. Rare. And when he’d said her name, it felt like tossing a rope into dark water. Not a lifeline. Not yet. Just a question.

Who is she?

He didn’t have an answer. And he wasn’t sure he wanted one.

Back in the apartment the Capitol kept for him, Finnick peeled off his jacket and let it drop to the floor. He walked to the bathroom, turned on the faucet, splashed cold water over his face.

Then he looked up.

The boy in the mirror was eighteen. That’s what the record said. Eighteen, trained, tailored. The kind of person who could seduce secrets and survive a war without making a sound.

“I don’t know why I did it,” he whispered to no one but himself.

The mirror didn’t answer.

He left the water running.

 

Later that night, a file appeared on his table. No knock, no courier, no explanation. It was simply a folder.

He sat in the velvet armchair and opened it with a strange kind of reverence, like flipping through someone’s diary without permission.

WREN FLORES, SOFIA.
Sixteen. District Eleven. Volunteered.

There were photod. Handwriting samples. Psychological evaluations. Medical records. None of it told him what he wanted to know.

But the photo did.

Not the Capitol headshot—flat lighting, doomed eyes. No. The candid one clipped to the bottom corner. A Reaping capture. She wasn’t looking at the camera.

She was looking past it, toward something else. Something unseen. Her shoulders were squared. Her hands at her sides. Her mouth closed, her expression unreadable. But her eyes—Her eyes looked like the sea during a storm.

Finnick closed the folder.

Chapter 6

The train arrived just after sunrise. Sofia pressed her forehead to the window, watching the golden light catch on the glass of the Capitol’s skyline—monoliths of cold brilliance, their sharp spires stabbing at the soft morning sky. For a moment, the whole city shimmered like it was underwater. Then the train pulled into the station, and the illusion snapped.

Her legs ached when she stood. The ride had lasted a day, but it felt like more. Like time had stretched itself thin across the rails. Her body moved, but her mind lagged behind, still somewhere in that first hour after the Reaping. Still in the orchard. Still in the silence that came after she said her sister’s name.

Now there were handlers waiting—Capitol people with pinched smiles and perfectly bleached teeth. They looked like porcelain dolls, too delicate to exist in the same world as train smoke and coal dust.

Sofía followed Milo down the corridor, not close enough to touch but near enough to feel his weight beside her. He hadn’t spoken since they boarded, not really. She’d learned to read silence in gradients—neutral, irritated, dangerous. This one was unreadable. Unmoving. He was trying to scare the tributes—fortunately, Sofia was hard to scare.

The station opened into a pale marble atrium with ceilings so high they seemed to belong to a different planet. Glass panels caught the sunlight and bent it in impossible directions, so everything glowed: the walls, the floor, the faces of the Capitol crew. Sofía blinked up at it all, trying not to gape, and wondered if her awe looked like fear. It probably did.

“Don’t look like that,” whispered the escort, the same powder-faced man who had greeted them in District 11. “The cameras are already watching.”

Sofía straightened her back and said nothing. It wasn’t hard. She had long practice in holding her breath.

They were led through whitewashed corridors that smelled like bleach and smoke—clean and burning all at once. Sofia could feel the city crawling over her skin, pressing into her like frost. It was beautiful, but wrong.

And then, she saw Seeder.

She had been waiting just outside the elevator, arms folded, eyebrows lifted like she’d been standing there for hours and would keep standing there until someone came to their senses.

“It was about time,” she muttered.

Sofia didn’t think—she just moved. Crossed the space between them and threw her arms around the woman’s waist. Seeder hugged her back just as fiercely, a rare break in protocol, and for a moment, Sofía felt like a child again. The smell of fresh earth, the warmth of callused hands. She buried her face into Seeder’s shoulder and forgot, briefly, that she was being watched. Everyone in district eleven was close—some closer than others. Seeder had grown alongside Sofia’s father, and whenever she was in the district, she would visit. Seeder was Sofia’s aunt—makeshift—but an aunt all the same.

“You shouldn’t have come.” Seeder whispered, her voice rough, her embrace tight. “You should’ve let Camila go.”

Sofía didn’t answer. There was nothing to say. The choice had been made.

When they stepped apart, something cold slipped back into place. It wasn’t until Seeder turned toward the elevator—toward the others—that Sofía realized something was wrong.

Haymitch Abernathy stood there, hands in his coat pockets, eyes bleary but alert. Sofia had seen him before, of course—on the broadcasts, at Victor events. Always drunk. Always sneering. He looked like a man perpetually on the edge of leaving the room. But the sight of him wasn’t what made Sofía’s chest go tight.

It was the silence between him and Seeder.

She knew Seeder. Knew the way she lingered with tributes she’d guide. The way she laid a hand on a shoulder, or spoke low and gentle in private. But she didn’t reach for Sofía again. She didn’t speak. Instead, she gave Haymitch a look. Not a goodbye. A passing of something. Like a torch, or a weight.

And Sofia understood.

Seeder wasn’t her mentor.

Haymitch was.

Something must’ve shown on her face—something raw and breaking—because Seeder flinched, just slightly.

“I’ll see you soon,” was all she said, then she was gone.

The elevator doors closed behind her, and Sofía was left standing under the artificial lights, suddenly aware of the silence pressing on her like wet wool.

“Guess we’re all feeling chatty today,” Haymitch muttered, his voice coarse with old exhaustion. “Come on. You’ve got a schedule.”

Sofía followed him, her feet numb inside her boots. She didn’t look at where Milo had been, she knew he was gone. Sofia knew Seeder was his mentor, she could feel it, like a secret that had been whispered through a million corridors yet wasn’t spoken out loud.

The elevator ride was quick and too quiet. She stole a glance at Haymitch and saw him glance back. Not cruelly. Not unkindly. Just…hollow. Assessing.

Like he was trying to gauge how long it would take her to die.

She looked away. That made sense, didn’t it? Haymitch had won the Games once and spent the rest of his life watching kids burn. Maybe he was just getting a head start on mourning her.

They exited into the penthouse suite. The Capitol’s stylists weren’t there yet, which was a mercy. The space was dizzyingly bright, full of silk furniture and mirrored walls that multiplied her face a dozen times. Sofía avoided the reflections.

Haymitch drifted toward a small bar in the corner of the room, where an array of polished bottles stood like Capitol trophies. He poured himself something clear into a crystal glass, ice already clinking.

Sofía tried not to watch. Tried not to care.

But she couldn’t help it.

He lifted the glass. For a moment it hovered there, just below his mouth. Then he stopped.

Something in his hand twitched.

His gaze dropped—not to the drink, but to the floor. As if he were somewhere else entirely. Then, after a beat, he set the glass down. Carefully. Quietly. Sofía blinked.

He hadn’t taken a sip. She didn’t know what that meant.

Finnick Odair entered the room not long after. His arrival was quieter than she expected—no grand entrance, no Capitol dramatics. Just the soft sound of leather shoes against the tile. He looked young, but too beautiful to be real. Like a statue carved by someone trying to remember a dream.

“Morning,” he said.

Sofía didn’t answer. Her mouth was dry.

Haymitch gestured vaguely toward her. “This is her.”

Sofía stood straighter under his voice, unsure what to do with her hands. She folded them in front of her, then behind, then back again. She hated how childish it made her feel.

Finnick looked at her, but not the way Capitol people did—like she was meat, or entertainment. He looked like someone watching a ship in the distance, unsure if it was arriving or leaving.

She couldn’t tell what his eyes held.

It was not hope.

It was not pity.

Maybe it was something worse.

Misery.

Like he’d already seen the ending and couldn’t bring himself to say it aloud. She found herself holding her breath.

“Well,” Haymitch muttered, clearing his throat, “you’ve got a lot to do. Assessments start soon. Interviews. Parade. The whole circus.”

“I know,” Sofía said quietly.

Haymitch turned toward the window, squinting against the morning sun like it offended him. “You should eat. You’ll need the energy.”

Sofía didn’t move. “Do you think I’m going to die?”

The question wasn’t planned. It came out bare and bleeding, before she could hide it. Haymitch’s back stiffened. He didn’t turn.

Finnick was the one who answered, voice low. “Everyone dies.”

“But not everyone here,” she said, sharper than she meant. “Not you. Not him.”

Haymitch finally looked at her then. Not cruelly. But not kindly either.

“No,” he said. “Not us.”

Sofía nodded once. The room felt too big around her.

“I’ll get ready,” she said, already moving toward the hallway that led to the bedrooms. She didn’t wait for permission. Just walked.

Once inside her assigned room, Sofía sank to the edge of the Capitol bed and stared at her hands. They didn’t look like fighter’s hands. They looked like what they were, a girl’s hands. Orchard hands. Small, bruised, half-healed. She didn’t know if Seeder had chosen not to fight for her, or if she’d been told not to.

She didn’t know what Haymitch saw when he looked at her. But she thought it must’ve been something fragile. Something really doomed. He wouldn’t even drink. He couldn’t even look her in the eye.

She didn’t cry.

She just sat there until the stylists came.

And when they did—blazing in with their neon hair and chemical laughter—she let them strip her of dirt and dignity, let them paint her like something being preserved. She was no longer a girl. She was a symbol. A body. A doll to be paraded before a nation. She still smiled. She still spoke to the stylist like they were people—because they were. And Sofia knew, even as they pampered her like a project they have due, they appreciated her kindness.

 

The Capitol suite was too quiet. Even with all its mirrors and silk and faint music humming through unseen speakers, it still felt like a place built to swallow people whole.

Haymitch had left a while ago—after standing too long by the window, after pouring a drink he didn’t finish, after looking at her like something between a burden and a ghost. She didn’t know where he’d gone. She wasn’t sure it mattered. He’d left the second he could. It was as though Sofia’s tragedy was causing him more misery than it did her. He knew Sofia wouldn’t win.

Finnick had stayed behind.

She could hear him, moving faintly beyond her door. Soft footsteps, the whisper of fabric. He wasn’t pacing. Just existing. It was strange, realizing how quiet someone could be when they weren’t pretending to be anything at all.

Sofía sat curled at the corner of her bed, arms wrapped around her knees. The Capitol training uniform was too big, all stiff fabric and sharp seams that hadn’t yet been worn soft by time. It didn’t feel like her skin. None of this did.

Her boots were lined neatly under the chair across the room—hidden. She hadn’t wanted them to look out of place, and everywhere looked out of place.

Nothing about her belonged here.

She was trying to disappear into herself when the knock came—soft, not sharp. Hesitant. Not like Capitol people. Capitol people didn’t hesitate. Capitol people burst in. For a moment, she didn’t move. She thought if she stayed still enough, whoever it was might go away. But the knock came again, gentler this time. And somehow, she already knew who it would be. When she opened the door, there he was.

Finnick Odair.

For someone who had the Capitol wrapped around his little finger, he didn’t look like someone who believed it. He stood with his hands at his sides, like he didn’t want to startle her, like he was waiting for her to decide who he was allowed to be tonight.

“Can I come in?” he asked.

His voice wasn’t smooth or charming the way it had been on the broadcasts. It was careful. Almost…soft.

Sofía blinked, then nodded, stepping aside.

He entered without looking around like most people did. He didn’t gawk at the mirrored ceiling or the satin pillows. He didn’t make a joke to fill the silence. He just moved to the single chair in the corner and sat, hands resting loosely on his knees.

She didn’t sit. She wasn’t sure she could. It felt too much like something real.

“You asked Haymitch if you were going to die,” he said quietly.

The words hung there for a moment, heavy and obvious and cold.

Her shoulders tightened. “I wasn’t trying to be dramatic.”

“I know.”

She looked away, curling her fingers into her palms. The room suddenly felt too bright. “He didn’t answer.”

“He did,” Finnick said. “Just not the way you wanted.”

Her gaze flicked back to him, wary. “What way was that?”

“You wanted him to lie.”

That stung more than it should have.

She looked down at her hands, small and still callused from the orchards back home. She’d picked apples with those hands. Braided Mateo’s hair. Held Camila’s face and begged her to understand. But here, they just looked… wrong. Not big enough to hold a knife. Not strong enough to survive.

“I think I already know how I’ll die,” she said, barely above a whisper. “I think I’ve known since I volunteered.”

Finnick hadn’t interrupt. She didn’t know why she had kept speaking—why she had admitted that. Maybe it was because someone was listening.

He leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “Most tributes do die,” he said. “Most don’t even make it past the first day. The Capitol built it that way.”

She nodded. She knew that already.

“But,” he added, “you’re not most tributes.”

That made her look up.

And she hated that her first reaction was to feel embarrassed. Like he’d just said something kind out of pity. Like she needed soft lies from a stranger to keep her from breaking. But when she met his eyes—really met them—she saw no kindness there. Not cruelty either.

It was simply recognition. And something that looked an awful lot like truth.

“I’m not strong,” she said, almost ashamed. “You don’t have to pretend I am.”

“Neither was I,” he said.

That startled her.

She tilted her head. “You’re Finnick Odair.”

He smiled, and for the first time, it didn’t look like something sculpted for the Capitol’s approval. It looked old. Tired. Like it had taken years to learn how to fake it.

“I was seventeen the first time someone screamed my name for blood,” he said. “The Capitol makes you strong, Sofia. Or it eats you.”

She swallowed, unsure whether that was a warning or a prophecy.

“Why are you here?” she asked, not out of anger, but confusion. “Why me?”

It wasn’t self-pity.

It was honest bewilderment.

There were twenty-three other tributes. Most were already louder, stronger, faster. Some who were born to hold a blade. Sofía had never even held a real weapon. Her hands were for pruning trees, not ending lives.

Finnick hesitated.

“I don’t know,” he said, with a breath like it cost him something to admit it. “I just…didn’t want you to feel alone.”

She stared at him. For a moment, something in her wanted to cry. Not because he’d said the right thing. But because she hadn’t realized until now how desperately she’d wanted someone to say it.

She hadn’t cried since the Reaping. Not really. She’d wept when Milo said it wouldn’t hurt—dying—if she was the one holding him. She’d wept when there was the first quiet admission that she would not make it far. But since then, it had all felt distant. Like the grief was there, but behind a wall. Untouchable.

Now it pulsed, raw and sharp and close.

She blinked quickly. Too quickly.

Finnick didn’t reach for her. Didn’t move. He just sat there and let her be a girl again, not a tribute. Not a chess piece.

Just someone who missed home.

“I was going to be seventeen in eight days,” she said suddenly, her voice quieter than before.

He looked up.

“I still will be. In the arena.” She tried to laugh, but it came out like a breath cracked down the middle. “I think Milo was the only one who remembered.”

Finnick was silent for a long time.

Then, “Do you want to survive?”

The question took her off guard.

It shouldn’t have. But it did.

She looked down again. Her throat felt tight.

“Yes,” she said. “But I don’t think I will.”

“That’s different,” Finnick replied. “Most people want to survive. Few admit when they don’t think they can.”

Sofía was still for a long time.

Then, Finnick stood.

“You don’t have to trust me,” he said. “But I want to help you survive this.”

Sofía didn’t answer.

But she didn’t look away either.

 

The door closed softly after him. She stayed in the same spot for a while. The silence returned—but it wasn’t quite the same.

There was a weight in her chest that hadn’t been there before. Not hope. Not strength. But something else. Like the stillness before a tree breaks through frost.

Maybe she wouldn’t survive. But for the first time, she wanted to try. Not for a crown. Not for vengeance.

But for the girl who would tie bows on the shoelaces of Sofia’s boots simply to see her smile. For the boy who braided her hair with apple blossoms yet would never truly figure out how to rotate the strands. For her mama’s hands in her own, the way she held Sofia as though she were the missing piece of a puzzle she’d spent years solving.

Chapter 7

Haymitch Abernathy didn’t see a lost cause when he looked at Sofía Flores. He saw a lost future. He saw a ghost with his daughter’s eyes.

The Capitol had taken Lenore from him, piece by piece. First her presence. Then her breath. Then the child she could’ve carried. The life they could’ve made.

And then they made him watch.

Years later, when the screens lit up with the image of a girl from District Eleven stepping forward to take her sister’s place, Haymitch didn’t think about strategy or odds. He thought about Lenore. He thought about the daughter they’d never had. He thought about all the reasons he should stay drunk forever.

But he couldn’t stop watching.

The footage was grainy—District Eleven’s cameras always were—but Sofia’s face cut through like glass. Not because she was loud. She wasn’t. She didn’t scream or flinch. She just stepped forward. Quiet. Clear eyed. Small in stature, but not in presence.

She didn’t cry. Not even when they took her.

The mentors had muttered doomed—young, soft, already cracked down the middle.

But Haymitch didn’t see a girl destined to die. He saw her.

He saw his.

And now, here she was. Alive, for the moment. Standing in front of him in the Capitol like some ghost that didn’t know it was a ghost yet. He stood in the penthouse, watching her emerge from the elevator beside her district partner. Milo Thorne—broad, unreadable. Dangerous, probably. But Haymitch barely glanced at him.

His eyes were on her.

“Guess we’re all feeling chatty today,” he muttered, rubbing his neck. His voice scratched the air like it hadn’t been used right in years. “Come on. You’ve got a schedule.”

He didn’t wait for her to respond. Just turned, walked to the elevator. Didn’t look back. Couldn’t. But he heard her. Light steps, soft and sure. He knew that sound. It was the sound of someone walking carefully through a world that could collapse under them at any moment.

In the elevator, he risked a glance. She was still, arms tucked against herself like she didn’t know what else to do with them. She wasn’t afraid—not exactly. She was waiting. Watching. She didn’t look like a tribute, not some blood thirsty career or someone who didn’t know what they were stepping into, just that they did. No, she looked like a kid, he thought bitterly. Just a kid.

But her eyes—they weren’t hollow. That was the part that hurt. They weren’t scared in the Capitol way. They were scared in the human way. Like she knew exactly what waited for her.

She looked at him like she wanted to ask something. Like maybe she already knew what he thought of her. And maybe she did. Because her eyes said it—“You don’t think I’ll make it”

And for a split second, he almost confirmed it. Not because it was true. But because it was easier. It was easier than telling her she reminded him of everything he couldn’t save.

They exited into the penthouse. Too bright. Too clean. The Capitol’s idea of comfort looked like punishment to anyone with a soul. Mirrors lined the walls. Sofía’s reflection multiplied a dozen times. She winced like it hurt to see herself in so many ways at once.

She was still just a kid.

Haymitch drifted to the bar. He always did. It was muscle memory. A corner lined with Capitol gloss and poisoned promises. His fingers found a bottle like they were meant for it. He poured clear poison over ice. His hand didn’t shake. Not anymore. Not until he lifted the glass and caught the shape of her reflection in the mirror behind the bar.

She wasn’t watching him. Not really. But she’d seen. And somehow, that mattered.

He felt her eyes on him. And suddenly the drink felt heavier than usual. Not with judgment.

With grief.

His hand stalled.

The glass hovered beneath his mouth. A breath from oblivion. And then, as if someone else moved his hand, he set it down. Not angrily. Not like a decision.

Like a memory.

He saw her again, standing behind him. Not saying anything. She’d seen. He knew that. He just didn’t know what she’d seen.

Finnick arrived not long after. He moved like someone born of sea and silence—graceful, distant, beautiful in that unbearable Capitol way. The kind of boy they built statues of because they didn’t know how to bury him.

“Morning,” Finnick said softly.

Haymitch gestured toward the girl. “This is her.”

Sofia stood straighter, like the words meant she was supposed to be seen. Her hands shifted again—front, back, front again—like she didn’t know where to put them, like she was trying to fold herself small enough to vanish. She looked too young for the room. Too still for a world like this one.

And god, she looked like someone’s kid.

No, not someone’s. His.

Not literally—of course not. But there was something in the shape of her eyes, the sharpness of her cheekbones, the way her mouth pressed flat like she was bracing for a storm. Something Lenore might’ve passed on. Something he might’ve taught her by accident—how to hold your silence like armor.

Haymitch felt something in that moment—low and sudden, a kind of grief that came not with sharpness but with ache. A hollowness in the gut. He didn’t want to look at her and think “mine”, but there it was. No matter how he fought it.

She didn’t belong here. Not in this Capitol suite with its silk and surveillance. Not in the Games. Not in this life that turned children into ghosts before the cannon ever fired.

She should’ve been in a field somewhere, sleeves rolled up, mud on her knees. Laughing at some stupid joke a boy told badly. Wrapping a ribbon around her sisters wrist. Making a mess in a kitchen, or a life.

Lenore would’ve loved her.

The thought hit him so hard he almost swayed.

Lenore, with her storm-colored eyes and blunt mouth, would’ve pulled this girl right into her arms and told her she mattered—told her the world didn’t get to break her, no matter how hard it tried. Haymitch could almost see it—the two of them at a table, Sofía peeling fruit, Lenore teaching her how to react to men who wanted to use her.

He blinked hard. Shook it off.

Finnick studied her. Not with cruelty. Not with hunger. Just…measured. Like he wasn’t sure what he was looking at yet. Like he couldn’t decide if she’d sink or swim.

Haymitch saw it in both their faces—neither trusted the odds, but they both would play the game anyway.

However, it wasn’t a game to him anymore.

Not with her.

He didn’t want to teach her how to win. He wanted to build a wall around her. Put a sword in her hand. Carve out an exit the Capitol couldn’t see. Anything to keep her from becoming just another name in a long, unbroken line of children he’d failed.

He knew better.

But knowing didn’t mean he didn’t feel it.

He wanted to keep her alive for all the reasons he’d never speak aloud. And because somewhere—deep down where the bottle couldn’t reach—he already saw her as his.

Not as a tribute.

As a daughter.

And Panem was going to eat her alive. Unless he figured out how to stop it.

“Well,” Haymitch rasped. “You’ve got a lot to do. Assessments. Interviews. Parade. The whole damn circus.”

“I know,” she said. It was quiet. But not weak.

He turned toward the window. The city outside looked like a wound stitched up with neon. He squinted, like it hurt.

“You should eat,” he said.

She didn’t move.

“Do you think I’m going to die?” she asked.

Haymitch froze.

The words were small—soft, even—but they cut clean. Like a blade hidden in a sleeve. She hadn’t meant to ask it. He could hear that in her voice. It slipped out like a wound she thought she’d hidden well enough. But it was out now. And it was his to answer.

He didn’t turn. Couldn’t.

Because the question cracked something deep. Not the part of him trained to bury kids before they were dead. Not the mentor. The man. The one who’d once imagined a life with a child whose smile might’ve looked like Lenore’s. A child who might’ve asked him that same question one day, voice trembling beneath the weight of the world. “Do you think I’m going to die, Dad?”

His heart broke—not like thunder, but like tired wood splitting beneath pressure. Quiet. Complete.

Finnick stepped in. His voice was steady, practiced. “Everyone dies.”

“But not everyone here,” Sofía replied. Her voice was stronger now, the same stubbornness Lenore had spilling into Sofia’s voice. “Not you. Not him.”

Haymitch turned around.

He didn’t want to. But he did. And she was looking at him. Not pleading. Not desperate. Simply asking. Simply waiting.

Her eyes were too big for her face. Too alive to belong to someone already sentenced. He met them. And it hit him again, that same ache—deep and brutal. A father’s ache. The kind that knows there’s nothing in the world more terrifying than a child who already thinks she’s doomed.

“No,” he said.

It came out low. Rough.

“Not us.”

And it wasn’t an answer. Not really. Just the truth.

She nodded.

But something in her closed. You could see it. The small retreat.

She thought he didn’t care. She thought he had counted her out.

She didn’t know he looked at her and saw the daughter Lenore never got to raise. She didn’t know he saw her and wondered what name they would’ve given her. What lullaby he would’ve sung to get her to sleep during a storm. She didn’t know he hadn’t drank because of her. Because something in him recognized something in her.

It was not weakness. It was not doom.

It was home.

“I’ll get ready,” she said.

Then, as though the conversation didn’t matter, she walked away. She didn’t wait for permission. She didn’t ask if there was more to say.

The door closed behind her.

And Haymitch stood there, glass still full, throat still dry. He lifted the drink again. Paused. And set it down—again—Sofia’s face fresh in his mind.

“Fuck,” he muttered.

Haymitch hadn’t moved from the window. His hand still rested near the glass he hadn’t touched. The skyline outside burned gold with morning. Capitol gold. The kind that glared, not glowed.

It was Finnick who finally spoke.

“You didn’t drink,” he said quietly. Almost like the words startled him by forming aloud.

Haymitch didn’t look away from the Capitol’s shining towers. They pierced the clouds like promises—empty ones. “Guess I didn’t,” he muttered.

And he hadn’t. That was the problem.

He’d poured the drink out of habit. That part still came easy. The reach, the clink, the weight of it in his hand. But when it came time to lift the glass, to chase oblivion like always…he couldn’t. His fingers had tightened. Not out of restraint. Out of recognition. Out of her. Sofía Wren Flores, standing there in that mirrored suite, trying not to flinch at her own reflection. He didn’t know what had stopped him. Or—no. That was a lie. He did.

It was her face.

That flicker of something familiar in her jaw. That quiet, stubborn way she kept standing. That way she hadn’t asked for pity—only truth.

Finnick moved closer. His footsteps were soft, careful. “Why not?” he asked.

Haymitch didn’t answer.

Because what was he supposed to say?

She looked like the girl I never got to raise? She reminded me of what the Capitol stole from me before I ever had a chance to fight for it? If I start drinking now, I’ll never stop—and I want to be sober if she dies.

His jaw clenched. That was the answer.

She looked like Lenore.

Not entirely—her features weren’t identical—but the shape of her face was close enough to stop his heart if he caught her at the wrong angle. The high cheekbones. The mouth that tightened instead of trembling. The eyes—soft yet dark in color, watchful, and too old for her years.

But that wasn’t all.

There were pieces of him in there, too.

The stubborn set to her jaw. The way her hands stayed still even when the rest of her looked like she might break. The way she hadn’t begged for comfort—hadn’t even flinched—when she looked him dead in the eye and asked, “Do you think I’m going to die?”

And then she’d stood there, waiting for the answer like it was already carved into stone. Like she’d accepted the worst long before he opened his mouth. And maybe that’s what gutted him most. Not the question.

The familiarity of it. Like watching a ghost say something he never got to forget.

She looked enough like Lenore to make his heart ache. But it was the pieces of himself scattered through her face that made him want to crawl out of his skin.

Finnick didn’t press. He simply stood there, eyes on the hallway. “She’s not like the others.”

“No.” Haymitch finally turned, his voice hoarse. “She isn’t.”

He didn’t mean it the way most mentors might’ve. Not “she’s clever”, or “she’s a fighter”. Not even “she might win”. None of that applied. What Haymitch meant—what he couldn’t say—was that “she was supposed to be mine.”

He thought he’d buried that part of himself a long time ago. Back when Lenore was buried. Back when he realized he would never have a family, never have a daughter, never have someone to protect again.

But then there she was.

Sofia Wren Flores.

And some broken, rusted-out part of him started whispering “You could try. One more time. You could try with her.”

“She remind you of someone?” Finnick asked, his voice gentle but sharp at the edges. Testing.

Haymitch didn’t answer.

He didn’t have to

Finnick wasn’t stupid. The boy was Capitol polished but District born. He knew grief when he saw it. He just didn’t know the name it wore. She didn’t remind Haymitch of a tribute. She reminded him of a life that had been stolen before it ever began.

Of soft cotton dresses, of dirty knees, of a laugh that sounded like a lovely Dove. She reminded him of Lenore’s eyes, fierce and wondering, and of a ghost of a girl that never made it past the idea of her. He hadn’t seen her ghost in years.

Now she was walking through the Capitol in borrowed boots and calling herself Sofia.

And he was terrified.

“You’re not going to let her die,” Finnick said.

Not a question. A fact.

Haymitch huffed something between a laugh and a cough. “You really think I can stop it?”

Finnick’s gaze didn’t falter. “I think you already decided to try.”

And there it was. The part that scared Haymitch the most.

Because it was true.

He had. Somewhere between the Reaping footage and the elevator ride, somewhere between the way she asked him that question and the way she stood beside her boots like she might still need to run—he’d decided.

He wouldn’t bury her.

Not if he could help it.

Not if there was still a world left to fight for.

“And that scares the hell out of you,” Finnick said.

Haymitch didn’t respond. He didn’t need to. Because Finnick was right. He wasn’t afraid Sofia would die.

Haymitch was afraid he’d care when she did.

Notes:

I know dual perspectives aren’t usually super fun to read (my apologies), but I thought it was necessary for these last two to almost build up the dynamic between Sofia and Haymitch (possibly even Finnick). Also if you’d like to see Finnick’s perspective of these scenarios lmk, I’m open to writing it at least just this once since it is also the first time he interacts with Sofia but I’m not too sure if it would feel repetitive to read the same scenario(s) all over again just centered around another character

Chapter 8

Notes:

Okay so this is practically the same chapter as the last two, just from Finnick's perspective, I promise the whole stories not going to be like this but take this as you’re forewarning if you don’t feel like reading the same scenarios again!! The only difference between this and the last two chapters is that you get more of an insight on Finnick/his thoughts—everything else is the same

Finnick had always been good at reading people.

It wasn’t a skill, not exactly. More like a survival instinct. The kind you honed when every glance might mean the difference between charm and chains, applause and agony. You learned to listen to silences. To hear what was not said. To watch the shift of weight in a man’s stance and know what he feared most.

So he watched her.

Sofia Wren Flores.

She stood like someone trying not to take up space. Like someone who’d taught herself to fold in at the edges—to be quiet enough, kind enough, invisible enough that the world wouldn’t touch her. But the world always touched you. Especially here.

She didn’t speak after she walked away. Didn’t cry. Didn’t linger. She moved like a girl who’d already mourned her own death and was simply waiting for the date to match the feeling.

Finnick didn’t watch her go. He watched Haymitch.

The older man hadn’t moved from his place by the window, he had muttered a quick, “Fuck”, but that was all. His back was hunched like someone waiting for a storm that might never break. He still hadn’t touched the drink.

That was what startled Finnick most.

In all the years since the Games had eaten Haymitch alive, Finnick had never seen him pour a drink and not follow through. That glass should have been gone. He should’ve been pouring another. But instead, it sat there like a question neither of them could answer.

“You didn’t drink,” Finnick said softly, almost surprised to hear his own voice.

Haymitch’s eyes didn’t move from the skyline. The Capitol gleamed before them, glass and hunger and gleaming lies. “Guess I didn’t,” he muttered.

Finnick stepped closer, the silence stretching too tight between them. “Why not?”

Haymitch didn’t answer. But his jaw clenched, and that was an answer in itself.

“She’s not like the others,” Finnick said.

“No.” Haymitch finally turned, eyes ringed with red that wasn’t from drink. “She isn’t.”

They both looked toward the hallway. Toward the room where Sofía had disappeared behind too-quiet walls.

“She remind you of someone?” Finnick asked, though he already suspected the answer.

Haymitch didn’t speak.
But the answer was yes.

Yes, she did.

Not of a tribute. Not of some girl who died in the blood-slick dirt of an old arena.

She reminded him of a future.

Finnick could see it now. In the way Haymitch had hesitated. The way he’d looked at her—not with the hollow defeat he usually gave to tributes, but with something worse. Something tender. A grief that hadn’t happened yet.

“You’re not going to let her die,” Finnick said.

It wasn’t a question.

Haymitch let out a low, bitter laugh. “You really think I can stop it?”

“I think you already decided to try.” Finnick let the silence settle, then added, “And that scares the hell out of you.”

Haymitch didn’t respond. He didn’t need to.

Finnick stepped away from the window and toward the kitchen counter where the file on Sofía still sat, unopened. The Capitol’s version of a biography—clinical, cold, irrelevant. They thought they knew her because they’d compiled the facts: Age, District, Blood Type, Volunteer. The rest was noise to them. Static.

But Finnick knew better.

He remembered the photo from the folder Snow had sent him. The candid one. Her eyes hadn’t looked like prey. They hadn’t looked like they were asking to be saved.

They’d looked like they already knew what was coming.
And were walking into it anyway.

Finnick touched the file but didn’t open it. He didn’t need to. He already felt it. The quiet pull, the way her name clung to his thoughts like sea salt.

He didn’t know why he cared.
He only knew that he did.

Maybe because she wasn’t pretending to be brave.

Maybe because she reminded him—just a little—of what he might have been if no one had ever called his name.

 

Later, when Haymitch finally left to find a corner dark enough to sulk in, Finnick stayed behind. The suite was empty, silent except for the distant hum of Capitol life far below the windows.

He didn’t know why he knocked on her door.

He almost didn’t.

But something in him—a voice that didn’t sound like his own—told him to.

A long moment passed before it opened.

Sofía stood in the threshold, hair down around her shoulders, her training uniform too big on her thin frame. She looked up at him like she wasn’t sure he was real.

Maybe she thought he came to give her some lecture.
Or to say something like, “We’re going to make you a star.”

He didn’t.

“Can I come in?” he asked, gently.

She blinked, then nodded, stepping aside.

The room was sterile, Capitol-made. Clean and hollow, like it hadn’t been lived in and never would be. But there were small touches already—her boots tucked neatly beneath the chair, the sheets pulled tight like someone used to making their own bed.

He sat in the chair. She didn’t sit. Just stood there, uncertain.

“You asked Haymitch if you were going to die,” Finnick said, finally.

Her shoulders stiffened. “I wasn’t trying to be dramatic.”

“I know.”

Sofía looked away, fingers curling at her sides. “He didn’t answer.”

“He did,” Finnick said. “Just not the way you wanted.”

She glanced back at him, her eyes dark and cautious. “What way was that?”

“You wanted him to lie.”

She didn’t deny it. Only looked away again.

Then she spoke again quietly, “I think I already know how I’ll die,” she took a breath before continuing “I think I’ve known since I volunteered.”

Finnick felt the words settle like stones in his chest. It wasn’t fear he heard in her voice—it was acceptance. A kind of quiet certainty that belonged to someone far too young to carry it. He’d seen it in dozens of tributes who’d screamed and begged and lied to themselves, who clawed for hope even when it slipped through their fingers—hell, he’d probably been one of them. But Sofía wasn’t clawing. She wasn’t even reaching. And that scared him more than the bravado ever had. Because she hadn’t volunteered to live—she’d volunteered to keep some else alive. He couldn’t respond—not to that—instead, Finnick offered his true thoughts on the question she asked in their first meeting.

He leaned forward, his elbows on his knees as if that would make it any more genuine. “I’m not going to lie either. Most tributes do die. Most don’t even make it past the first day. The Capitol built it that way.”

She swallowed hard.

“But,” he added, “you’re not most tributes.”

That made her look up.

He saw it again—that storm. Not in her posture. Not in her hands. In her eyes.

“I’m not strong,” she said quietly.

“Neither was I,” Finnick said.

Sofía tilted her head, disbelief plain on her face. “You’re Finnick Odair.”

“And I was fourteen the first time someone screamed my name for blood.” He smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “The Capitol makes you strong, Sofia. Or it eats you.”

She nodded slowly, unsure if that was supposed to be a comfort. “Why are you here? Why me?”

It was a fair question. One he’d asked himself a dozen times already.

“I don’t know,” Finnick said, honest. “I just…I didn’t want you to feel alone.”

She stared at him, and for a moment the mask slipped. Her lips parted like she might speak, then shut again. She blinked too quickly. He saw the grief there. The quiet weight of a girl who’d left her family behind. A sister, maybe. A mother. Someone who still believed in her. Someone she couldn’t afford to fail.

There was a kind of stillness to Sofia Wren he hadn’t seen in years—maybe ever. Not since the moment he’d realized what it meant to be chosen by the Capitol. She looked like a girl trying not to collapse under the weight of everything she hadn’t said. And for a second, he thought she might cry.

She didn’t. But it was there. Right there, behind her eyes. Not fresh and loud like the Capitol wanted—no sobbing, no spectacle. Just a quiet, aching crack in something she’d held together since the Reaping.

He didn’t say anything. Didn’t reach for her. That would’ve been easy. That also would’ve made it worse. So he sat still.

And let her be what no one else would let her be—not a tribute, not a symbol. Not even a victim. Just a girl. A girl who missed home.

She was folded into herself—arms loose at her sides, but not defenseless. It was almost reverent, the way she stood there. Like she was holding the shape of her own grief carefully, afraid if she dropped it, she wouldn’t be able to put it back together.

Then her voice cracked the silence.

“I was going to be seventeen in eight days.”

He looked up.

The words shouldn’t have hit him the way they did. It was such a small thing—a birthday. But she said it like it was a confession. A secret she’d been carrying in her chest like a thorn she hadn’t dared to pull.

Her mouth twitched, trying to smile. “I still will be. In the arena.”

The laugh that followed wasn’t really a laugh. It was brittle. Shattered breath.

“I think Milo was the only one who remembered.”

That name again. Milo. The boy from her district—the one who hadn’t said a word since the train and yet hovered near her like a storm waiting to break. Finnick had noticed the way Milo watched her. Not cruelly. Not protectively either. But with a strange, hollow reverence, like he knew her fate before she did and hated the world for it.

Finnick didn’t speak for a long time.

What was there to say?

Capitol birthdays meant diamonds and crowns and parties that lasted until dawn. But a birthday in the arena? That was a countdown to a death no one would mourn, celebrated with knives and fire.

And yet—she said it like it mattered. Like it still mattered, even in a place designed to erase everything good. So he asked her what he needed to know.

“Do you want to survive?”

Her eyes flickered. The question caught her off guard.

It shouldn’t have. But he knew why it did.

She didn’t flinch. Didn’t pretend.

She looked down, her fingers curling in again, and said—quiet, almost ashamed—“Yes. But I don’t think I will.”

Something in him pulled taut.

Because that was the difference. That was what set her apart from every tribute he’d seen in the years since his own Games. Most of them lied. To themselves, to their mentors, to the cameras. They said they could win. Said they’d fight. They screamed when they were Reaped and clung to bravado like it could shield them from the truth. But Sofía wasn’t pretending. She wasn’t even trying to convince him. She just…admitted it.

“That’s different,” he said, keeping his voice level. “Most people want to survive. Few admit when they don’t think they can.”

She didn’t respond.

She didn’t need to.

He saw it in the slump of her shoulders, the way her mouth pressed into itself like she didn’t want to make room for anything weak.

Still. She was listening.

That mattered.

He watched her for a long moment, trying to understand the knot forming in his own chest.

“You don’t have to trust me,” he said softly. “But I want to help you survive this.”

And with that, Finnick stood, stared at Sofia, and then left. Maybe that was why he wanted to mentor her so bad. Because deep down, Finnick knew there was something more than tragedy to Sofia’s story; there was an ending—but it wasn’t this one, it wasn’t now.

 

He didn’t go back to his own apartment that night.

Instead, he sat in the empty suite, beneath Capitol chandeliers that cast fractured light across the floor, and thought about the girl with stormwater eyes and a volunteer’s heart. Haymitch saw something he’d lost.

Finnick didn’t know what he saw yet.

But he knew he would follow her story to the end.

Even if it broke him.

Notes:

Okay this is the last chapter set on the first day I promise, the next one’s going to probably be about the tribute parade but no promises that it’ll be good because so far it’s been PACKED with things happening

Chapter 9

Notes:

DIFFERENT CHAPTER YAY!! This ones PACKED it might be the longest one so far and there’s a lot going on but I promise it’s all purposeful—I’m sorry for how jumpy (and bad) the chapter is, there’s a lot of Haymitch and Sofia moments though! 🩷

The city lights in the Capitol never truly sleep. Sofía had found that out the moment she closed her eyes after the previous day’s roller of trains and speechless arrivals. She’d slipped into a few hollow hours of sleep, eyelids heavy like curtains drawn too tight, but it wasn’t true rest. No candles flickered amid the darkness of her dreams, only the echo of her own breath and the sting of dawn before she had time to remember where she was.

And she hadn’t eaten. Not since Milo offered her a silver apple on the train, which tasted like nothing but fear and hope. The Capitol suites were full of heaps of ice and trays of peaches, berries, meats, but she hadn’t dared. Other tributes drifted among them like moths drawn to light; their laughter glittered in the hush of she-can’t–believe–how–much wealth, and the sweetness on their fingers felt alien. Hunger gnawed quietly inside her, the dry kind that hollowed bones instead of the belly. But she kept her hands clasped, held brushes at arm’s length, stood like a statue at the edge of living history—waiting.

This was the actual day one of the Games—The Tribute Parade. Tonight, the world would watch her walk through the streets, dressed in a coat of flowers and whispered fates. If she survived that far.

 

They stylists at dawn. Not with kindness, but with certainty. They spilled into her suite like doves with teeth—graceful, smiling, carrying spools of silk and brushes that gleamed like surgical tools. They were gentle, but never slow. Their hands were warm, practiced. Their compliments were soft and constant, like raindrops: “You’re lovely, Miss Wren.” “That skin, my god, that skin.” “Such a delicate frame—you’ll photograph like a dream.”

Sofía stood still.

She offered them soft smiles. Mutters of “thank you” when they pinned her sleeves in place. A small compliment in return when one of them adjusted the embroidery on her shoulder. “That color’s beautiful,” she said, voice almost breathless. “It looks like lavender from the orchards.”

They beamed. She smiled back.

But beneath the pleasantries, something had begun to stir in her chest. Panic—not sudden, not sharp, but slow, like a rising tide. It crawled up the back of her throat as they lifted her arms again, fastened ribbons around her elbows, dusted powder over the curve of her jaw. Her breath was coming thinner now, and she tried not to show it. Tried to hold herself together the way Camila used to do after arguments with their mama.

She stood with her arms open, quiet as a crucifix. The dress was heavier than it looked. Soft, yes, but tight around her ribs—tighter still around the seams of her shoulders. Woven blossoms climbed from her chest to her collar like ivy made of silk and glue. Her skin prickled beneath it.

The mirror didn’t reflect a person.

It reflected an idea. A myth. A girl made of flowers and fate and someone else’s hands.

Her own hands, now tucked politely at her sides, were trembling.

Still, she smiled.

A stylist swept a curl behind her ear. Another reapplied gloss to her lower lip. “Breathe easy, sweetheart,” one cooed. “You’re going to be a Capitol favorite.”

Sofía nodded. “Thank you.”

But she wasn’t breathing easy.

The petals smelled like powdered sugar and fake summer. The weight of her dress pressed into her chest. Her legs were bare beneath the hem—it hit higher than she liked, not scandalous, just unfamiliar. She’d never worn something that didn’t belong to Camila first. This wasn’t hand-me-down cotton or orchard mud. This was artifice.

It felt like a costume. Sofia’s skin felt like a costume.

“You’re all set,” one of them said finally, stepping back.

The others hummed their agreement, satisfied. One kissed her cheek. And then, like leaves on the wind, they were gone—vanishing with a flurry of perfume and purpose, already chasing down the next tribute. The door clicked shut behind them, and for a second, the suite was too still.

Sofía stood alone—in front of the mirror, wrapped in silk and stitched flowers, and couldn’t feel her own skin.

She could feel everything else—the way the hem tugged too high on her thighs, the fabric cinched too tightly around her ribs, the unnatural slope of her collarbones framed by petals that didn’t belong to her. She could feel the heat of the lights, the weight of the Capitol’s attention like a thousand invisible hands pressing in.

But not herself. Not really.

And then Haymitch was there. Just behind her in the reflection. A blur of coarse fabric and stubble. Watching. Not saying anything.

The air caught in her throat. Her chest rose but didn’t fall. Her arms locked in place, shoulders drawn as if bracing for some unseen blow.

She turned, and the movement broke something.

“I’m…” Her voice faltered, split down the center. “I—I don’t think I can do this.”

Haymitch didn’t speak.

She felt it then—the way her pulse climbed. Her knees weak, her breath coming shallow. She curled her hands against her ribs, pressed her fingertips into the fabric. The floral embroidery wrinkled under the pressure, but she didn’t stop.

“The lights,” she whispered, as if saying them gave them more power. “The mirrors. The petals. The way they keep looking at me like I’m not a person—like I’m something to be seen.”

She looked up, eyes wide, burning. “I feel like I’m breaking. Like the lights, the flowers, this… you… are going to crush me.”

Her breath caught, sharp and quick. “I can’t do this parade. I can’t be this… thing they want. I don’t even know what they see when they look at me. I don’t know if I’m real anymore.”

Haymitch didn’t speak. Not right away.

Instead, he stepped forward, slow as gravity. He lowered himself until he was eye level, kneeling before her like it was instinct, not ceremony. His hands hovered near hers, uncertain. She didn’t pull back. Her fingers were trembling.

There was no pity in his eyes.

But there was something else.

Something old and ragged and human.

“It’s okay,” he said quietly. “You’re safe.”

She shook her head too fast, too hard. “I’m not,” she gasped. “I’m not. I don’t—” Her voice snapped like a thread pulled too tight. “I don’t think I can keep breathing like this.”

Haymitch’s gaze didn’t waver. Slowly, carefully, he reached out and lifted one of her wrists, like he was checking for the pulse beneath her skin—but she knew that wasn’t it. He was grounding her. He was there.

“Do you need a moment?” he asked, voice gentler than she thought it could be.

She opened her mouth to answer—and what came out wasn’t what she expected.

“I need my dad,” she breathed.

The words hit the floor like glass. Sharp. Loud. Irretrievable. Her hand went to her mouth too late.

She didn’t mean to say it. Not like that. Not now. But something about Haymitch—the steadiness in his eyes, the careful way he held her hand like it mattered—had made the memory of her father lurch forward, sudden and sharp.

Her father had held her this way once. When she’d scraped her knees running through the orchard. When she’d buried her face in his shirt and sobbed because Camila had said something cruel, and he had carried her back to the house even though she was too old to be carried.

That was what she wanted now. That kind of warmth. That safety.

And for a second—for a single, breathless second—she thought she felt it in Haymitch. Not in what he did, but in what he didn’t do. He didn’t flinch. He didn’t mock. He didn’t pull away.

She let her fingers curl gently into the sleeve of his coat.

He didn’t move.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I didn’t mean to say that.”

But when she looked up, his eyes weren’t cold or distant.

They were wrecked.

Not from her. But from something he saw—maybe someone else. Maybe a ghost. Like he wasn’t holding a tribute at all. Like he was holding something he had lost and never thought he’d find again—or perhaps something he never even got to hold.

She looked up at him, tears welling but not falling. “Hold me,” she said, so quietly it barely made sound.

And he did.

Not like someone trained to comfort. Not like someone used to it. But like someone who remembered how. Like someone who hadn’t held softness in a very, very long time and didn’t know what to do with it.

His arms came around her with a kind of ache. Not polished, not practiced. Just real.

He held her like he was afraid she might vanish. Or maybe like he was afraid he would.

And for one long moment, neither of them moved. Her forehead pressed into the edge of his collarbone. The wool of his coat smelled like smoke and old storms. Her fingers clutched the fabric like roots.

And in the space between them, Sofía felt it—how still he went. How breathless. Like he was holding something he lost many years ago and was just now finding. He didn’t speak. Didn’t murmur comforts. He just let her be held.

And she let herself believe he wasn’t her mentor. That he wasn’t assigned to her like an obligation. That he had chosen her. That he saw her. Eventually, she pulled back.

The air between them buzzed with unsaid things. She wiped at her eyes, catching the tears before they fell. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “You didn’t sign up for this.”

He didn’t answer right away.

Then he stood, slow and tired. His expression unreadable—except in the places it cracked. He looked at her like she wasn’t a burden, but something heavier. Something holy. A memory dragged from the grave.

“You don’t have to be sorry, little bird” he said. But it didn’t sound like it was meant for her. It sounded like it was meant for someone already gone.

Sofía nodded faintly.

Her hands dropped back to her sides. She was still shaking.

He glanced at the chariot schedule on the wall, then back at her. “The parade’s soon,” he said. “You’ll need to hold on to something.”

Sofía didn’t answer. She didn’t know what she could hold. Not anymore.

Haymitch reached into his coat pocket, then paused. His eyes flicked to her hands. Then back to her face.

He pulled out a dark woven band—something simple, something old. The frayed edge showed it had been wrapped and rewrapped a hundred times.

He offered it to her.

“It was hers,” he said, so low she almost didn’t hear. “Just for tonight. Give it back after.”

Sofía’s breath caught.

She took it carefully, like it might burn. She didn’t ask who hers was. She didn’t need to. She just slipped it around her wrist, under the flowers, where the cameras wouldn’t see.

It was warm from his coat.

She looked at him again, a thank you burning in her throat, but no words came. Only the smallest, trembling nod.

And just like that, he was gone.

Sofía stared at the flowers on her dress, then at her hands—still shaking. Not because she’d been touched by Haymitch Abernathy. But because, for a moment, she’d believed he’d seen her.

And now, she wasn’t sure if that made it better or worse.

Sofía walked behind Haymitch as he left the suite. He didn’t look back. She didn’t expect him to.

Her hands stayed clasped just above her stomach, one thumb rolling the edge of the leather bracelet he’d given her. She hadn’t really noticed it during the panic, only that it steadied her. But now, in the hush after the storm, she couldn’t stop touching it. The strap was worn, soft at the edges. Familiar. Like something handed down—not given for charm, but for comfort.

The flowers on her dress brushed her knees with every step. They whispered with every movement, a fabric reminder that she was no longer just a girl from District 11. Not to the Capitol. Not to anyone watching.

She didn’t reach for Haymitch. She couldn’t. There was no space for that—not in this hall, not with the cameras so near. Instead, she pressed her lips together and followed.

The suite doors hissed open—and there was Milo.

He stood just outside, broad and unmoving, his silhouette almost carved into the marble. Capitol light gilded the silver accents of his suit, but it didn’t soften him. He looked like stone—burnished and rough, unmoved by the gleam around them.

Except, when he looked at her, something small shifted.

It wasn’t warmth. Not quite. But the edge in his eyes softened. Just barely.

Sofía inhaled sharply. She hadn’t realized how tightly she’d wound herself until then. It was as though she had forgotten—somehow, impossibly—that she wasn’t entirely alone.

She stepped toward him, drawn like tide to shore. Her fingers found the edge of his sleeve and held. A soft grasp—instinctive, familiar. The way she used to cling to Camila’s elbow after thunderstorms or bad dreams. By now, she was sure Milo understood.

He didn’t move away.

He didn’t look down.

But something in his shoulders eased, just the slightest bit. As if her presence steadied something in him, too.

They walked together into the hall. It was too polished. Too bright. A place that belonged to chandeliers and echoes, not tributes. Stylists swarmed like birds in velvet, all moving in flocks around their chosen contestants, guiding them toward the transport staging bay. Perfume clung to the air. And beneath it—fear.

Sofía let her gaze drift across the other tributes. Unfamiliar faces, but not unfamiliar stories. They were all girls and boys dressed like legends. All trying not to be seen as what they were.

Then—him.

The boy from District 4.

She recognized him now, not just from the corridor, but from the train. One of the two who’d approached her when she’d been too soft-spoken to push them away, and too afraid to know if they were cruel or kind. He’d laughed when she told them she’d only ever stepped on a spider. But not unkindly. Not like Wyatt.

He passed beside her, tall and salt-kissed, his skin glowing from either oil or nerves. His shoulders were broader than she remembered. The blue of his tunic clung like water.

He paused to retie a ribbon around his waist—quick, precise. Not for show, but for control. Like he knew anything left imperfect would be counted against him.

Sofía met his eyes. Gave a small, instinctive nod—not pity. Understanding.

He looked up, caught the glance, and for a heartbeat he blinked like he’d been startled. Then, slowly, he tilted his head in return. A silent thanks. Or maybe just a reminder that he’d seen her, too.

Then the other.

District 6.

The sharper one. The quieter one. The boy with the lean frame and restless hands. The other who’d spoken to her on the train, the one who had said she might be in the wrong story, sweetheart, but hadn’t said it cruelly.

He moved like his thoughts were a beat too slow for his body—or maybe the other way around. His eyes flitted fast, calculating. Then they landed on her.

And stilled.

He read her in the space of a blink. Not like the Capitol did. Not like the cameras. But truly.

Then he offered her something—his hand, palm up, no words. Not a gesture of help. Not even a warning. Just… an offering.

Like a question.

Sofía’s breath caught.

She looked away before she could make sense of what it meant. Her fingers tightened around Milo’s coat. And just like that, she remembered how to keep walking.

Until she saw her.

Callie Harper.

She stood near a pedestal overflowing with fruit, her boots worn, her braids neat, her dress stitched from something real—not made for parade routes or Capitol gloss. Her fingers tapped restlessly at her sides, but her eyes were steady.

There was no mistaking it now. She was just a girl. A tall, strong, sun-warmed girl. Still growing into herself.

A peach sat at the edge of the tray between them. It shimmered gold-pink in the light.

Sofía reached for it without thinking. Not for hunger. For memory.

But Callie’s hand landed there first.

Their fingers touched.

“You can have it,” Sofía said softly.

Callie blinked once. Then, “Split it?”

It startled her.

Dozens of peaches sat on the tray. But none of them mattered. Only this one.

Because it reminded her of home. Of Camila’s juice-slick fingers. Of Mama’s kitchen light. Of Mateo crowning himself king of the orchard.

She nodded.

Callie drew a blade from the seam of her dress—clean, small, sharp. She cut the peach in one motion. No fanfare.

“I don’t waste things,” she said.

She handed Sofía half.

Sofía tasted it.

Sunlight. Dirt. Summer. Everything she’d lost.

She swallowed. “Thanks.”

The word landed and lingered.

Callie smiled. “We’ll probably meet inside, too.”

Sofía looked at her—not with fear, but something gentler. Truer. A thread of realness in the middle of all this performance. She watched Callie walk away with her half of the peach still in hand.

And, for the first time since she’d arrived in the Capitol, Sofía’s pulse softened.

Not because she’d been seen.

But because she had seen someone else.

And that made her feel not bigger—but older. Not in years. In grace.

In strength.

In the way that mattered.

 

They were ushered to transport soon after. A sleek black hovercar waited with doors wide like jaws.

Sofía climbed in beside Milo. The seat was too soft. The space too clean. The quiet too sharp. Outside, the Capitol blurred past in streaks of gold and violet, like a fever dream lit on fire. She pressed her hands to her knees. Felt the petals rustle. Her fingers still smelled faintly of peach.

She didn’t speak. Neither did Milo. But the air between them felt steadier than silence.

The city roared outside the glass. People screamed. Lights flashed. But all of it stayed distant.

The hovercar began to slow.

Milo turned his head, just slightly. His eyes found her. She didn’t reach for him. She didn’t have to. The door hissed open.

Light rushed in like floodwater.

And Sofía stepped into the noise.

 

They were then led toward the staging area beneath the Avenue of the Tributes. Carved pillars stretched high above their heads, shadowed with flickering violet lanterns. The chariots loomed in a row like creatures from an old dream—steel-limbed, flower-strewn, waiting to be filled.

Her stylist had clucked softly at the sight of the woven leather band around her wrist.

“This doesn’t match, sweetheart,” she murmured, brushing a cool hand along Sofía’s arm. “It’ll draw attention from the stitching.”

Sofía’s breath hitched. Her hand moved instinctively to the band—thumb pressing against the worn weave Haymitch had fastened there. She hadn’t really thought about it before. Not when she put it on. Not even when it brushed against the silk of her parade dress. But now, the idea of taking it off twisted something in her chest.

“Please,” she whispered. “I…I’d like to keep it.”

Her voice was so soft the stylist leaned closer, not having been able to make out what she was saying. “What was that, darling?”

Sofía raised her eyes. “Please let me keep it.”

The room fell quiet—not in protest, but in surprise. The stylists, who had grown to love Sofia for her gentle spirit and easy compliance, exchanged a look. She had never asked for anything. Hadn’t complained once as they cinched the blossoms tight around her ribs or pinned flowers into her scalp until it stung. She had said “thank you” more times than they could count. But now—this. A whisper of insistence, unexpected and unshakable.

The head stylist blinked, then gave a faint nod. “Of course,” she said, recovering. “Of course, sweet girl.”

They didn’t ask why.

Sofía didn’t have the answer, anyway.

It wasn’t that she thought Haymitch cared for her—he didn’t. Not really. She was a burden to him, another name on a list. But the band didn’t feel like a burden. It felt like something lifted. As though, even unknowingly, he had handed her a weight she could carry.

So she wore it. Even if it clashed.

Even if it marked her.

Even if it meant nothing to him.

The stylist murmured instructions in her ear, something about holding her shoulders higher, chin to the crowd. But the words dissolved beneath the roar outside.

Sofía climbed the ladder with careful steps. Her dress snagged slightly on the metal rung, and her heart stuttered.

A hand closed around her waist.

It had been Milo’s.

He steadied her, the way he had on the train when she’d simply stood there—not knowing where to go. The way he always did—with no words, no softness, just presence. Solid. Assured.

She settled beside him, half-hidden by his shape. His arm close enough to brush hers. Then the music began.

The doors peeled open.

Light burst over them like a second sunrise—gold and white and brutal.

The anthem roared from hidden speakers. And then the crowds screamed.

 

District 1 led the procession with practiced elegance. They shimmered beneath the stadium lights, cloaked in something translucent and gold—designed not to resemble wealth but to declare it. The girl was all silk and starlight, seventeen at most, with posture so straight it seemed held up by pride alone. Her head was high, neck swan-like, eyes cool and clear as gemstones. Every inch of her shimmered with intention. Power, polished.

Beside her, the boy looked sculpted from light and cruelty both—his smile sharp enough to cut, jaw tight beneath a dusting of shimmer. He moved like someone who’d rehearsed victory in the mirror since childhood. His wave was perfect. Dismissive.

Their eyes swept the crowd—and then flicked to Sofía.

Not scornful. Not yet. Just calculating.

As if they were asking themselves: Will she break? Will she matter?

Sofía didn’t look away. She didn’t flinch. She wasn’t sure if that made her brave or simply naïve.

 

District 2 followed, iron and silver stitched into their uniforms like threads of threat. The girl’s braids were thick and coiled, like they could hold secrets or strangle them. She didn’t blink when the lights hit. Her grin was the kind that invited no closeness—just awe. Maybe fear.

The boy moved like stone come to life—massive, immovable. His face was carved into command, his shoulders so broad they made his chariot look small. He didn’t wave. He didn’t need to.

But as they passed, Sofía didn’t see monsters.

Just children in armor. Teeth bared out of fear.

She thought of Camila once, laughing with a split lip and a scraped elbow, triumphant after beating three boys in a race back home. Proud of the bruise blooming on her knee like it meant something. It was that kind of fierce. That kind of young.

Sofía’s heart pulled painfully.

 

District 3’s tributes were smaller, more subdued though they glimmered beneath cables and metallic sheen. The girl had a narrow frame, her hands folded neatly—but her eyes moved constantly, curious and cold, as if she were cataloging the entire world just to rewire it later. She looked barely fifteen, and yet completely unafraid.

The boy next to her had twitching fingers, always adjusting something. His gaze wasn’t on the crowd—it was on the mechanisms beneath the chariot itself, like he was trying to solve it, dismantle it. He looked like he was already ten steps deeper into some invisible plan.

They didn’t seem dangerous. But they didn’t seem here, either. And it wasn’t performative, it was simply them.

Sofía wondered what it felt like to live inside your head that completely.

 

District 4 came next.

The boy from the train—who’d she’d learned was named Thayer—storm-eyed, ribbon still perfectly tied, caught her gaze again. He didn’t smile. Just nodded.

It wasn’t friendly. But it wasn’t cruel.

Recognition. A reminder almost, as if saying ‘I remember who you were on that train.’

Sofía nodded back, then shifted closer to Milo, her elbow brushing his. Rooting herself.

The girl beside Thayer was taller, older. Salt clung to her like perfume—Sofia had noticed earlier. Her hair was slicked back, and a blade glinted at her ankle—not hidden, but daring anyone to question it. She looked like she’d been carved from wind and tide, and if she had a smile, it was somewhere beneath the horizon. She didn’t acknowledge anyone. Not the cameras. Not the crowd. She stared forward, unwavering.

 

District 5’s costumes shimmered like solar panels, sleek and angular. The girl was all tension and flicker—eyes alive, like lightning under skin. She was beautiful, in a half-charged way, as if always one breath from sparking into motion. Her hands wouldn’t stop moving. Sofía watched her mouth something to the crowd she didn’t understand.

The boy was younger. Sofía might’ve thought him harmless if not for the eyes—flat, calculating, with a kindness so carefully placed it felt like a trap. He waved, slowly, like he was playing a part he didn’t believe in.

Sofía’s heart twisted. They both looked like wires pulled too tight. And yet they looked ready to sell a story. Sofía saw the Capitol watching them with hungry eyes—and she saw them willing to play the game.

 

District 6 followed.

The girl was wiry, her limbs tense and always half-turned toward somewhere else—like she’d bolt if not for the chariot’s rails. Her gown shimmered in strange places, stitched in colors that reminded Sofía of wet asphalt and rusted steel. Even when she smiled, her eyes looked far away. Haunted. Like she’d seen things no one should carry. She looked exhausted. Not just physically. Deeply, achingly tired. Her eyes never lifted.

Sofía wondered how long she’d been holding herself up.

Kellan—the other boy from the train—stood beside her. Sofia remembered how his voice had been calm, how his gaze had been quick. He didn’t wave now. Didn’t perform. He just looked.

Not at the crowd.

At people.

At her.

His eyes flicked once, steady and unreadable, and met hers again through the crush of sound and spectacle.

It was the second time he’d looked at her like that—not as a girl in flowers, not as a tribute, not as someone soft to be dismissed. But as someone seen.

And then he turned away.

 

District 7 came in cloaked in leaves and bark, their chariot strewn with actual branches. The girl wore bracelets that clinked against her wrists—too many. She twisted them constantly, hands restless. Her gown was green and bark-colored, layered like leaves. She couldn’t be more than fifteen, and yet she stood taller than the Capitol’s cheers.

The boy was barefoot, and massive. His legs were thick as trunks, and he moved with a kind of groundedness that seemed older than he was. He didn’t wave. Didn’t nod. He just looked ahead, steady. They looked like they’d grown from the forest itself.

Sofía wondered if that meant they missed the wind.

 

District 8’s outfits looked like thread come to life—swaths of fabric looped in impossible shapes. The girl’s sleeves were frayed at the edges, her fingers nervous but clever-looking. Her mouth curled like it had been stitched from scraps—smiling only when she had to. Still, she walked like someone who could mend herself if no one else would.

The boy beside her had broad shoulders and skin inked in faded marks. His expression was spare, his nods measured. He looked like someone who didn’t waste words—and didn’t need to.

They looked more like pieces of art than people.

Sofía wondered if the Capitol even saw the skin beneath the silk. Or if that was the point.

 

District 9 left a faint smell of grain and dry sun. Their outfits were dyed in earthen tones, cut to resemble fields of wheat. The girl stood tall, seventeen maybe, with curled blonde hair and a mouth painted deep red—Sofia had seen her on the train, the girl who wore lipstick like armor. Her dress caught the light like fields just before harvest, and though she barely moved, there was something fierce in her stillness.

The boy beside her was smaller. He slouched like someone used to hard ground, his hands rough, his gaze low. He didn’t look at the crowd—not out of fear, but fatigue. Like he’d already seen enough.

Sofía watched them, unsure what to feel. The girl reminded her of something she couldn’t name—something unyielding and still somehow beautiful.

Like a stalk of wheat that refused to bend, even when the storm came.

 

District 10’s chariot was draped in hide and fur. That was Callie’s chariot.

District 10 came into view—Callie at the front, her expression sharpened into something it hadn’t worn earlier. She stood proud, back straight, boots planted like she belonged on a battlefield. Her leather dress caught the light, edges frayed like something wild had been stitched into shape. She raised her chin, jaw set, and even lifted her half of the peach like it was some kind of offering to the crowd.

There was performance in the way she carried herself now. Something practiced. Like she’d decided—if the Capitol wants a fighter, I’ll show them one. And still, beneath it all, Sofía saw the same girl she’d split fruit with beside a satin-draped pedestal. A girl who knew how to hold still. How to wait.

The boy beside her—broad-shouldered and thick around the middle—didn’t play at anything. He didn’t look toward the cameras. Didn’t lift his chin. His eyes were sunk deep, unreadable. There was no performance in him. Just weight. And the sense that something had already cracked behind his ribs.

Sofía blinked once, let the moment pass. She didn’t need names to know what she saw.

 

District 11—her own—had always come near the end.

Her heart thundered beneath the dress. Her hand gripped the woven band at her wrist—still hidden beneath the sleeve.

She still didn’t know why it meant so much. Haymitch saw her as a burden, surely. But the band—rough, woven, quiet—felt like it had lifted something from her shoulders the moment he gave it to her. And now she held it as the parade blazed on.

The lights burned brighter as they crested the hill. Milo’s thumb brushed the inside of her wrist.

A signal. A question. A tether.

She leaned in slightly. Not for balance. For truth. She was shaking—but still here.

And as the Capitol roared around them, as the banners waved and the anthem echoed like thunder, Sofía didn’t wave.

She didn’t perform.

She stood, smiling as she always did, but not acting—not like everyone else.

And somewhere beneath the fear and fabric and lights, she began to believe that maybe she wouldn’t break after all, even if she knew her ending was to come in that arena.

 

By the time they returned inside, her legs ached and her mouth felt dry with silence.

The applause had faded. The lights had dimmed. The cameras had turned elsewhere. The scent of crushed petals trailed her like ghosts. She climbed down again, the dress making it hard for her to move without feeling as though she were about to destroy it. The ground felt too real. Too cold.

Milo steadied her without a word.

The chariot doors clanged shut behind them, leaving behind the roar of applause and the golden flood of Capitol lights. It should’ve felt like relief. Like stepping into the quiet after a storm. But the silence had teeth. It scraped at her ears, made her skin feel too tight for her body. Her chest still heaved like she’d run miles. Her palms ached from how tightly she’d clung to Milo’s coat.

She couldn’t feel her feet. Couldn’t feel her fingers. Her vision was grainy at the edges.

She hadn’t eaten. Not really. A bite of peach—sweet, soft, distant—and nothing since. Not since Milo offered her that silver apple on the train. Not since home. The food in the Capitol was too clean, too polished, too much—it all felt like it belonged behind glass in a museum. Meals were supposed to be touched, passed around, scraped onto someone else’s plate if they’d had a bad day. Sofía had never eaten alone. She always split her meals with Mateo, always handed Camila the bigger half of a biscuit without thinking. Food was warmth, not theater. Here, it felt wrong to take. Like she’d ruin it just by breathing on it. Her stomach was a dull echo now, not crying out but sinking—like everything else inside her, folding inward, smaller and smaller with every hour.

They walked the narrow back corridor, the rustle of petals around her thighs too loud, like paper being torn. Her body wanted to sit, to collapse. But the cameras might still be on them. So she walked.

Then—

“Sofía.”

She froze.

The voice was soft but solid. No Capitol lilt. No parade polish.

She turned.

Haymitch stood just inside a small side room—stone-tiled, dim, a place meant for nothing more than passing through. He wasn’t slouched like usual. Just standing. Hands in his coat pockets. His expression unreadable. He didn’t move. He didn’t call her again.

He just waited.

And her breath caught in her chest.

Her legs stopped working. Her lungs pulled too fast, too shallow. She felt for a split second like she might move toward him—might wrap her arms around his coat and press her cheek to the scratchy wool, the way she used to do with her father after long days in the orchard when she was too tired to speak. Her whole body ached for that comfort. For someone to hold her and mean it. And while he may have not meant it—Haymitch had held her. In the suite, when everything felt like it was slipping through her fingers and she needed someone, anyone, to hold her together. He’d held her then. Steady. Solid. Not warm, exactly, but real. Present.

And now, just the sight of him stirred that ache all over again.

But she didn’t go to him.

She couldn’t. Not because she didn’t want to—but because she didn’t believe she had the right.

Because she remembered. She remembered the look on his face before they left. The distance. The way he hadn’t wanted her in the first place. Hadn’t chosen her. He didn’t see her the way she wanted to be seen. Not as a girl. Not even as a tribute. Just another responsibility. Another funeral on a list too long for him to memorize.

So she didn’t reach for him. She stepped into the room with her arms at her sides and her shoulders back, as if she could fake steadiness long enough to fool herself.

Haymitch didn’t glance at her dress. Not at the Capitol flowers stitched into her sleeves or the shimmer on her cheeks.

He stayed looking straight at her.

And it felt like a blow.

It felt like he saw her. The real her. The too-tight breathing, the hunger stretching under her skin, the tremble in her knees she’d been trying to hide since the doors opened. She felt naked beneath it.

His jaw ticked. He lifted a hand halfway, a reflex she didn’t understand, then dropped it again.

“Everyone saw you,” he said.

It wasn’t pride. Wasn’t admiration. It was fact. But it wasn’t cold.

Sofía swallowed around the dryness in her throat. “I guess so.”

“You held yourself well.”

Another fact. But his voice softened just enough that she could feel the weight under it. A splintered kind of care. Like it hurt him to give it. She didn’t know how to respond. Her tongue felt slow. Her body wrong.

“I saw people too,” she managed. Her voice was thin. “Faces. Not just…lights.”

Haymitch tilted his head. “That’s good.”

She nodded once. Her head felt too light.

“I saw Callie.” Her hand touched her skirt, her fingers brushing over the hidden fold. “She split a peach with me.”

She didn’t say why it mattered. That it had been the first real thing in days. That the fruit reminded her of home—not just the orchard, but her mother’s callused hands, her brother’s giggle, Camila’s quiet way of placing peaches by her pillow after fights. That sharing it brought a comfort she hadn’t been sure she would find here.

Haymitch didn’t speak. But his posture changed. He shifted his weight, just slightly, as if something inside him leaned toward her.

Sofía reached into the pocket where she’d tucked the cloth. She unwrapped it with careful hands and held out the fruit. It was bruised now. A little warm. But it was still hers.

“I saved the rest.”

He stared at it. Long enough that she wondered if he was going to refuse it. Then he took it, turning it once in his palm like he was memorizing the shape.

But instead of keeping it, or throwing it away, he offered it back.

“Don’t waste it,” he muttered.

She took it again, cradled it without understanding why that made her throat tighten.

Then Haymitch’s eyes dropped to her wrist.

The woven band was still there—frayed at the edge, too dark for the pastel silk. It looked like it didn’t belong. She’d begged her stylists to leave it, voice trembling, and they’d stared like she’d grown antlers.

“You’re still wearing that?” he asked, low.

She nodded. “They didn’t want me to.”

“But you did.”

She didn’t answer that. Didn’t have to.

He stepped closer—just enough for his voice to drop further.

“Keep it,” he said.

Sofia blinked.

“What?”

“You can keep it,” he said again, and his tone shifted just slightly. Like the words mattered more than he wanted her to know. “It’s yours now.”

Sofía stared down at it. The bracelet wasn’t beautiful. It wasn’t powerful. It didn’t sparkle under the lights. But it was real. It was his. Or rather—it used to be someone’s, someone Haymitch cared enough for to keep it.

“For good?” she asked, quietly.

He nodded.

She swallowed. It was such a small thing. But she felt the weight of it settle into her bones like warmth.

“Thank you,” she said.

He shrugged, almost too fast. “It looked better on you anyway.”

She almost smiled—but her stomach twisted, hollow and sharp. He must’ve noticed. Because he squinted a little, then asked, “What’ve you eaten today?”

Her spine went stiff.

“I—just a bite. From the peach.”

Haymitch’s expression didn’t change right away. But his silence stretched too long.

“Just that?”

“I wasn’t hungry,” she said. It came out rushed. “Before the parade.”

He exhaled through his nose. Not angry. Not annoyed. Just tired.

“Peach isn’t a meal, Flores.”

“I know.”

He stared at her. Like he was trying to figure out how to make her understand something without saying it outright. Then, quieter,

“Promise me you’ll eat. After this.”

She didn’t want to promise. She wanted to lie. But she nodded.

“I’ll try.”

“Not enough,” he said. “Trying doesn’t count here.”

She looked down. Her fingers played with the edge of the bracelet again, like it might protect her from the burn behind her ribs.

Haymitch’s voice softened again. “You’ll need more than flowers and peaches to make it through this.”

She didn’t answer. Just stood there, swaying slightly, the room flickering at the corners of her vision.

He didn’t touch her this time. Didn’t reach out. But before he turned to go, he paused.

“You remind me of someone,” he said, like it cost him something to say.

She looked up.

“Someone I lost.”

And then he walked away.

Sofía didn’t follow. She stood in the doorway, her hand on the bracelet, her other still cupping the bruised fruit.

She hadn’t cried.

But her throat felt scraped raw.

Not because Haymitch had given her something. But because for a moment, when she’d needed it most—He’d given her back to herself. And she didn’t know what to do with that kind of kindness. Not when she still wasn’t sure if she deserved it or not.

 

Later, in the communal lounge of the training center, Sofía found Callie again.

She was perched on a too-tall stool, her bare feet swinging idly above the tile. Her shoes—shiny and stiff—sat discarded at the base of the chair, like they didn’t belong to her. She held an orange in her lap, already half-peeled, its scent sharp and sweet in the too-clean Capitol air. Juice glistened on her chin, catching the light like it belonged somewhere else—some orchard, some kitchen, some childhood still left untouched.

Callie looked up and grinned when she saw her.

“You looked lovely,” she said without hesitation.

Sofía blinked. The word struck her soft and strange. Lovely was what her mother had once whispered when braiding her hair. It wasn’t something she expected here.

“Thank you,” she said, voice catching. Then, because it felt like the truth “You looked…perfect.”

Callie patted the empty space on the stool beside her, her knees tucked in like a child pretending not to be one.

Sofía climbed up beside her. Her legs dangled, too, not quite brushing the ground. The room around them hummed with Capitol hush and distant footsteps, but here there was a quiet pocket—just two girls in dresses that didn’t belong to them, sitting shoulder to shoulder.

They didn’t speak for a moment.

Then Callie glanced sideways and said, “I worry about you.”

Sofía turned her head. “Why?”

“You didn’t eat yesterday,” Callie said plainly. “And this morning you only had the peach.”

She broke off a piece of her orange. “You’re smaller in the light.”

Sofía froze. The words weren’t meant to be cruel—they weren’t. But they lodged deep anyway.

She looked down at her hands. Her wrists. The way her fingers curled, tight and still. She hadn’t eaten. Not really. A bite of peach—shared, soft, full of memory. But since arriving in the Capitol, the food had felt too clean, too museum-like. Everything here was polished and precious, things meant to be admired, not consumed. She didn’t know how to eat in a place like this. Not without her brother teasing her, not without Camila reaching over to steal a bite. Eating alone felt wrong. Like pretending she belonged in a world that wasn’t hers.

But Callie didn’t know that. Callie was just a kid.

Not in the way Capitol cameras would dress her up—no. She was tall, yes, but soft. Maybe fourteen, maybe not even. And still somehow unscarred. Still tender around the eyes. She looked at Sofía not like an equal, but like someone trying very hard to be brave for her. And that made Sofía ache.

“I’m alright,” she whispered, but it sounded weak even to her.

Callie shook her head and gently offered the piece of orange. “Let me help.”

Sofía stared at it.

Then at Callie’s hand.

She didn’t want her to worry. Not when she was so young, not when the world would already ask too much of her. She took the segment from Callie’s hand. It was warm from having been held. She forced it past the tightness in her throat. The juice was cool and bright on her tongue, and her stomach flinched like it wasn’t ready for kindness. But she ate it anyway. Not because she was hungry. Because Callie had asked. Because Callie cared.

And because it reminded her—just faintly—of home. Her mother peeling them. Mateo laughing through sticky fingers. Camila nudging her when she didn’t eat enough.

She blinked back the sting behind her eyes and forced down another bite.

“Will you eat tonight, too?” Callie asked, voice small but steady.

Sofía paused, mouth still full. She looked at the girl beside her—at her too-big of eyes and knobby knees and the scab on her shin. A child, really. Not a tribute.

“I will,” she whispered. “If I can.”

Callie nodded with all the solemnity of a vow.

And before Sofía could stop herself, she leaned over and wrapped her arms around her.

It wasn’t graceful. It wasn’t Capitol-poised. She just hugged her—tight and clumsy, the way she used to hug Mateo when he had nightmares. The way Camila hugged her when she scraped her knees. She pressed her face to Callie’s shoulder—not out of habit, but because it was the only place she could reach.

Callie stilled, surprised. Then hugged her back.

Sofía didn’t cry. But her throat ached like she might. And for a moment, just a moment, it felt like they were on a porch back home, sharing fruit because it was sweet and warm and good, and not because the world was watching them die.

 

When she stepped back into the corridor, the lights were low. The crowd had thinned to whispers and velvet.

Milo had stood waiting near the elevators.

She slipped her hand into his, just how she used to do with Camila when they were too tired for words.

He didn’t squeeze. He didn’t speak.

But he turned his head just slightly, enough to glance down at her. As though reminding her: You’re still here.

She looked once across the corridor. Haymitch leaned against the wall, arms folded, eyes steady on her.

Her chest ached with all the things she didn’t know how to give him. She wanted to offer something small—something real. A piece of peach. A piece of herself.

Instead, she just nodded.

He nodded back.

No words. Just the quiet understanding of two people who had both lost too much and kept walking anyway.

 

In the elevator, she sank onto the bench and folded her hands in her lap, staring at the gold trim on the wall as though it might hold her together. Milo stood above her. After a moment, his hand settled at the middle of her back—not pushing, not even really holding. Just there.

Outside, the Capitol rose around them, all glass and curved steel, wrapped in a thousand points of light. Like it was watching her back. Neither of them spoke. The silence wasn’t comfortable, but it wasn’t cold. Just worn out. Tired.

When the elevator doors opened, Milo stepped out first. She followed.

The District 11 lounge was too bright. No voices. No music. Just the mechanical hum of filtered air and a faint citrus scent in the corners. A feast had been laid out for them, but nothing had been touched.

Someone was already there.

Finnick.

He stood by the window, his back to the room, both hands braced on the frame as though holding the building in place. The overheads were dimmed, casting the whole room in soft shadow. One tray of food sat beside him—still covered, still steaming.

It hit Sofía then.

He hadn’t watched the parade.

Everyone else had. Even those who couldn’t stomach it, even the stylists. Even Haymitch. But not Finnick. She hadn’t seen him anywhere along the route. And now he stood like a ghost in the Capitol light, untouchable, unlit.

When he turned, his eyes found her instantly.

He went very still.

“You looked…” he started, then paused, his voice lower than usual, as if afraid to break something fragile. “You look beautiful.”

The silence that followed wasn’t awkward. Just deep. Like the ocean pulling back before a wave.

“Thank you,” she said, her voice smaller than she meant.

He smiled, but only with his mouth. The rest of his face didn’t follow. His eyes looked far older than they should’ve—hollowed out around the edges, like he’d seen something terrible and kept walking with it buried in his chest. The look made her shiver for a reason she didn’t understand.

Milo touched her arm lightly, then murmured something about needing a shower. He left without waiting for a reply.

She stayed.

Finnick had sunk into the couch by then, one arm draped over the back, the other reaching up to rub at his shoulder in slow, habitual circles. Milo had done the same thing earlier. Maybe that was what Victors did when they didn’t have anything else left to comfort.

“I didn’t see you” she said, not asking why.

“I wasn’t watching,” he replied, simple and flat. But it landed heavy, like something final. “Didn’t think I’d be much help if I did.”

She nodded, but her hands were still on her lap, fingers working the hem of her skirt.

“You did more than fine,” he added. “You… handled it.”

You survived it, she heard, though he didn’t say it.

Finnick stood after a moment, offered her a small nod, and disappeared down the hallway without another word.

She stayed behind.

The couch was still warm where he’d sat. She shifted into the spot, tucked one leg beneath her, and stared out the window where the city blurred into soft gold. A hovercar passed in the distance, light trailing like a firefly.

She wondered if Mateo had started counting the days yet. If he was waiting by the window for the flower seeds she said she’d send, even though she hadn’t known if it was a promise she could keep. If Camila missed braiding her hair before bed. If their mama still whispered “Goodnight, mi amor” to an empty bed and waited for a kiss that wouldn’t come.

She pressed her fingers to her lips.

The lounge felt too quiet.

Not peaceful. Just hollow. Like a house that used to hold something sacred.

The door slid open again.

Haymitch stepped in, carrying a tray.

He didn’t speak. Just crossed the room with the slow, deliberate gait of someone used to ghosts. He set the tray in front of her, peeled the lid off, and sat beside her without asking.

Steam rose—rice, soft bread, a few slivers of fried fish, bright slices of fruit.

“I’m not hungry,” she said quietly.

“Don’t care,” Haymitch replied, flat as stone. “Eat it anyway.”

She didn’t reach for anything right away. Just looked at him. He didn’t return the stare. Just leaned forward with his elbows on his knees, like he was waiting for her to decide whether or not she was real.

She picked up the bread. Tore a piece off and took a bite. It caught in her throat like cotton.

Then, without thinking, she offered the rest to him.

He frowned, as though caught off guard. “What’re you doing?”

“I always share,” she said. Her voice barely above a whisper. “I—sorry. I didn’t mean—”

He took it. Ate it.

No comment. Just quiet chewing.

She blinked at him.

Then slowly passed him part of the fish. A quarter of the rice. A slice of pear. He took each without asking why.

They sat like that, passing pieces back and forth in silence—like it was a memory, not a meal. Like they’d both forgotten what it meant to be fed just for being alive.

Eventually, Haymitch said, “You need to sleep, little bird. You’ll fall apart tomorrow if you don’t.”

She nodded.

He didn’t move to follow. Just leaned back, expression unreadable but watching her with that same silent crease between his brows. As if he were looking at something that used to be his and trying to remember why it mattered.

She stood, leaving half the tray untouched.

Her shoes were quiet on the floor as she crossed the room, toward the hall, entering a room she had been forced to call her own.

It was dim. The Capitol’s lights flickered faintly through the curtains, pale reflections sliding along the walls like ghostly hands.

She had her pajamas in her arms already—crumpled, soft cotton, loose and familiar, she’d grabbed them the second they came into her view. She just wanted to put them on and forget the flowers and the silk, forget how the crowd had screamed and reached and roared. Forget the weight of beauty being something demanded, not given.

She stood in front of the mirror and reached behind her.

The zipper wouldn’t move.

She shifted, tried again—harder this time, tugging until her shoulder ached. The fabric didn’t budge. Her hand slipped, nails scraping skin.

A sharp breath caught in her chest.

She turned toward the wall and pressed her back against it, thinking maybe that would help—maybe the angle would change, maybe the zipper would give. But it held firm.

The flowers on the bodice scraped her arms like needles.

“No,” she whispered, tugging again. “No, no—come on—”

She dropped the pajamas.

Her fingers were slick with sweat now. The dress felt tighter than before. Her breath caught higher in her throat—tight, ragged.

She backed away from the mirror.

Everything felt too close. Too bright. She could feel the gaze of the Capitol again—not just memory, but something real, something waiting just outside the door, watching the way a predator watches a rabbit trap itself.

“I can’t—” she gasped. Her chest rose fast, too fast. “I can’t—I can’t get it off—”

She stumbled to the door and yanked it open. The hallway was empty and endless, lit in gold.

“I can’t breathe—I—please—”

Her voice broke. Her feet were bare. The pajamas were somewhere behind her, forgotten in the panic.

Then he was there.

Finnick.

He didn’t hesitate. Didn’t ask questions. He moved toward her quickly, carefully, and took her by the shoulders before she collapsed.

“Sofía,” he said, his voice steady but low, urgent. “Look at me.”

She tried. Her vision blurred, breath stuttering.

“I can’t—I can’t breathe—it’s too tight—I thought I could, I thought—”

“You’re okay,” he said. “I’ve got you.”

She clawed at the bodice, trying to pry the petals off her ribs. “I just—I want it off—I can’t—Finnick, please—help me—”

“I will,” he said. “But you need to stop pulling. You’ll hurt yourself.”

He turned her gently. She couldn’t stop trembling.

“Where’s the zipper?” he muttered.

“Back—it’s in the back,” she choked out.

His fingers found it—half-hidden under thick seams of decorative stitching. It had been designed not to come off without help. Not unless the Capitol said it was time.

She stood in her Capitol issued slip and the weight of panic.

He worked it free, slow and sure.

The zipper slid down.

The bodice sagged.

But Sofía didn’t move. Her breathing hadn’t calmed. Her hands were shaking so hard her knuckles ached.

“It’s off,” Finnick said quietly. “You’re okay now.”

But she wasn’t.

Not yet.

Her arms stayed crossed tightly over her chest, and she just stood there in the hallway like something had broken. Not the zipper.

Something inside her.

Her breathing was still fast. Shallow. Her eyes darted like she didn’t know where to land them. The dress lay in a wilted puddle around her feet, but even with it gone, she didn’t feel free. Just cold. Just exposed.

She spotted the silk nightgown she’d dropped—light lavender, soft and fine, the kind her stylist had called “a Capitol luxury.” It was more elegant than practical, barely thicker than the slip she’d just been freed from. But at least it wasn’t covered in stitched petals or designed to be seen by millions.

She stared at it on the floor. Then at Finnick. She couldn’t bring herself to move, couldn’t bring herself to pick up the gown and put it on all alone.

Her voice cracked when she spoke. “C—Can you help me?”

His answer was a quiet nod.

He didn’t ask if she was sure. Didn’t hesitate or act surprised. He just bent, picked the nightgown up carefully from the floor, and held it in his hands like something delicate.

“Let’s get you out of this first,” he said gently, his tone careful, not coaxing. Just steady. Present.

The slip clung to her, still damp with sweat and panic. Her hands barely moved. She didn’t want to ask again, but he seemed to understand anyway.

He stepped forward and helped guide the straps down her shoulders, slow and clinical. She let her arms fall to her sides, trembling. He never looked directly at her—just focused on the fabric, making sure it didn’t snag or tangle. When the slip slid down her frame and pooled at her ankles, she shivered.

Not from cold.

From everything.

He didn’t comment. Didn’t fill the silence.

He lifted the nightgown instead. “Arms up,” he said softly.

She obeyed, not trusting her voice anymore.

The silk slipped down over her head like water. It was smooth. Weightless. But not warm. Not comforting. It whispered against her skin like the air in the Capitol—designed to please the eye, not the body.

It was supposed to be luxury, but all she could think about was how she missed cotton. Missed the stupid hand-me-down flannel shirts. Missed the oversized sleep shirt she stole from Camila last winter and wore every night until she started needing them again.

The silk clung too closely. Even now, she didn’t feel like herself.

Still, she could breathe.

That was something.

Once the gown settled around her knees, Finnick adjusted the thin straps to sit correctly on her shoulders. Then, as gently as if she were made of glass, he reached out and tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear.

“There we go,” he said, voice low. “You’re alright now. You’re safe.”

It was only then she realized they were still in the hallway.

Still in the Capitol’s eye.

She clutched her arms around herself and stepped back toward her room.

But she paused in the doorway.

“Will you…” Her voice cracked. “Can you stay? Just for a minute?”

He didn’t answer right away.

Then he spoke, softly, “Of course.”

He followed her inside and sat on the edge of the armchair, hands clasped, not looking at her bed. Not looking at her like someone who wanted anything. Just…someone who understood the quiet, gnawing terror of being seen too much and never truly known.

Sofia curled under the covers. She didn’t say thank you. She didn’t say goodnight.

But she breathed.

Steady. Then steadier.

Finnick watched the wall, silent.

She wasn’t sure when she fell asleep, but when she opened her eyes in the morning, the chair was empty.

And the dress was folded neatly on the other side of the room, its flowers wilted by moonlight.

Notes:

Someone PLEASE get the reference with Haymitch calling Sofia little bird

Chapter 10

Notes:

THE A03 CURSE GOT TO ME 😭😭 Guys I fully got hospitalized over my anemia last week, so I’m sorry this chapter’s so bad but I’m not sorry for how late it is because I was SUFFERING

The morning after the parade felt hollow.

Not empty-hollow. Like a room with too many echoes and not enough warmth. Like her own body had been rung like a bell and now there was only the aftersound, vibrating faintly through her ribs.

Sofia had awoken to an absence.

The chair beside her bed was empty. The soft light leaking in through the curtains caught only the curve of polished wood, the faintest imprint where someone had sat, hours ago, knees angled toward her like they hadn’t wanted to leave. But they had. The room was still.

Across from the bed, the dress was folded neatly.

Its flowers had wilted in the night.

Moonlight had sapped the color from them, leaving something gray and fragile in its place, like the echo of a memory not quite strong enough to last. The silk shimmered faintly when the light moved, but even that felt dulled, like it no longer belonged to her. Like it never really had.

It took her a long time to remember she’d been helped.

Finnick had unzipped the dress. He’d spoken softly, not looking her in the eye unless she needed him to. He’d lifted her arms when she couldn’t, found the sleeves when her fingers wouldn’t grip them, pulled the fabric away like it might bruise her if he moved too fast. She hadn’t spoken—not really—but he hadn’t asked her to.

He’d found her pajamas thrown on the ground and held them out like a peace offering. She remembered his hands. Gentle. Not soft, but steady.

He’d waited until she was beneath the blanket. Waited until her eyes had shut, or pretended to. Then he’d sat in the chair with one hand covering the other, like he didn’t trust himself to reach for anything.

She hadn’t seen him leave. Now, it was morning. The dress was there, but he wasn’t.

Sofía shifted her legs over the side of the bed, let her feet find the coldness of the floor. For a moment, she stayed like that—hands resting in her lap, eyes soft with fatigue, her mind only half inside her body. The warmth of sleep had already faded.

The suite was quiet. Everything was quiet. She hadn’t heard Milo. Haymitch’s door was closed. If the stylists were around, they hadn’t made their presence known.

She breathed.

Stood.

And walked to the folded uniform on the table.

The Capitol’s training clothes were meant to fit everyone. One size, supposedly fair. A dark gray base with deep green accents at the collar and cuffs, a mockingbird silhouette faintly stitched across the shoulder. Standard. Efficient. Almost clinical.

She held the fabric between her fingers and thought about how it would feel against her skin—rougher than silk, unfamiliar. Not made for her body. Not really made for anyone’s. She pulled the shirt over her head and felt how the seams hung tight to her skin, as though it were trying to fuse into her body. The pants weren’t any better.

Her eyes drifted toward the nightstand.

The woven bracelet still lay there.

She reached for it without thinking, fingers brushing the coarse threads, the familiar loop Haymitch had tied for her the day before the parade. It had held steady through the silk and the spotlight. It would hold again now. She slid it over her wrist, pulling it tight, then tighter still, until the weight of it was something she could feel.

Something that kept her from floating too far outside herself.

 

She only ate an apple.

The sweetness was hollow, the kind that lingered in the teeth rather than on the tongue. It didn’t taste like the orchard back home. Didn’t taste like Camila’s laughter when she stole the ripest ones from the low branches, or the ones Papa picked with dirt still clinging to the stem. This one tasted like performance. Like something waxed and polished and handed to her not because she was hungry, but because someone might be watching.

She ate it anyway.

Because Haymitch would ask. And she knew he wouldn’t be happy with “nothing” as an answer. It wasn’t about the fruit. It never was. It was about not fading. About still being someone who could answer a question out loud.

She didn’t look in the mirror—not really.

Her reflection was there, of course. Dimmed in the silver backing of Capitol glass, she looked paler in the unforgiving light. But she didn’t meet her own eyes. Just washed her face in silence, wet the edges of her hair at the sink, and parted it with careful fingers.

The braid came next.

Her arms moved on instinct, slow and practiced—three sections, tight from the roots, tucked low at the nape. Her hands were smaller than Camila’s had been, less certain, but the motion was the same. Her sister used to braid her hair like this everyday, even tighter on Sunday’s before harvest inspections, whispering stories as she worked. When Sofía was little, she’d pretend to fall asleep so Camila wouldn’t stop. There was something sacred about the weight of fingers in her hair. About the way Camila never tugged.

She missed that. Not just the braid, but the presence. The stillness that came with being held in someone else’s care.

Now, she did it herself. And the silence felt heavier without Camila’s breath behind her.

Her boots were already by the door when she looked for them. They were polished—not by her, but by the stylists before the parade. Not because she had worn them then, but because—as one of them had whispered in some sort of apology—“the Capitol wouldn’t approve” of sending her into the spotlight with scuffed soles, even hidden beneath silk. She hadn’t argued. She never did. Not about that.

The shine had mostly held.

She crouched slowly, tugging each boot on with both hands. Then laced them tight. Double-knotted each side. Like Camila used to, with her own.

And she tied Mateo’s ribbon to the right shoe—the green color faded now, but still soft between her fingers. It had been his, in theory. Something she’d pocketed on Reaping Day without knowing why. A frayed scrap of fabric, once a rich green, now it looked faded. Mateo had never worn ribbons on his boots, not even when Camila insisted. But he’d always laughed at hers. He’d say it helped him know where the wind was going.

Sofía had known, even then, that it wasn’t true.

It was the kind of thing Mateo said when he didn’t want to admit he was copying something their papa used to do—tie a strip of cloth around one boot when the weather turned. Said it kept the dust spirits from getting in. Sofia hadn’t understood it then. But now she thought maybe it had helped them both feel like they were following something bigger than fear.

She stood. The braid hung steady down her back.

The uniform fit, more or less. The boots shone. The dark woven bracelet from Haymitch rested against her pulse.

She looked complete.

But she didn’t feel it.

 

She walked down the hall without seeing the walls. The Capitol lighting was always too bright, too colorless, like daylight without warmth. She didn’t knock on Milo’s door. Didn’t glance at Haymitch’s or Finnick’s or Seeder’s.

The elevator arrived without being called.

She stepped in alone.

The elevator doors slid shut behind her with a sound too smooth to be human. Capitol metal always did that—closed softly, like a secret, like it hadn’t swallowed you whole. Sofía didn’t press any buttons. She didn’t need to. The elevator knew where she was going.

She stood without shifting, hands clasped gently in front of her, her thumb brushing against the woven bracelet Haymitch had given her. She didn’t even realize she was doing it until the doors whispered open again, and light poured in like cold breath on skin. It was not a kind cold—it was one that waited.

The Training Center stretched out before her like a temple to something ancient and bloodstained or a cathedral to violence. It gleamed in the light of the Capitol morning, its façade caught between beauty and severity. All white columns and glass and polished tile—every surface clean enough to reflect a version of yourself back at you, only slightly altered. Enough to make you wonder what was real—wonder who was real

Sofía stepped out of the elevator and onto the stone terrace. It was vast. Empty, but not quiet. The sound from inside reached her like thunder muffled in velvet—thuds, shouts, the rip of fabric, laughter, the sharp bark of a trainer correcting form. Movement echoed, though she could not yet see it. Blades being sharpened. Weapons being lifted. Dummies being destroyed. Laughter that didn’t sound joyful but rather victorious. Triumphant. Like someone had landed a hit and wanted the room to know it. It wasn’t laughter she trusted—it wasn’t laughter she wanted to hear.

Everything about the building gave the impression of control. Mastery. As though violence here was not only encouraged—but elevated.

She didn’t move.

The light caught the sheen of her braid. Her boots were still clean. Her chest rose and fell without tremble.

Still—she didn’t move.

The doors weren’t locked, but they may as well have been. Because stepping through them meant stepping into a new kind of truth—not the pageantry of the parade, not the lights or cameras, not the flashbulb version of who she’d been dressed up to be. This would be different. Measured. Recorded. Observed not by crowds, but by judges. People who wouldn’t clap, wouldn’t smile—would only write things down and remember them later when deciding who should live and who should be made an example of. She felt her knees lock. Her shoulders pull taut.

And then—

“Sofia.”

Her name, spoken quietly. Not like a command. Not even a greeting.

She turned.

Finnick stood at the edge of the marble arch, tucked half in shadow, his shoulder brushing the curve of the column nearest the wall. His hands were in his pockets. His jacket had been unzipped. His eyes—which were still soft with sleep or something close to it—met hers like he’d been watching for a while. He didn’t smile. But something in his expression folded slightly, as though part of him had been holding its breath and only now let it go.

He looked less like a Victor than he ever had. More like someone who had wandered in from a place far away, like a beach in winter, all quiet colors and weathered stone. The lines under his eyes weren’t just from sleeplessness. They were carved from memory. And she knew.

Sofia knew he hadn’t watched the parade.

She hadn’t asked why.

She wouldn’t.

He’d done her the quiet kindness of helping her out of that dress, of putting her in pajamas and not looking too closely. Of not asking why her hands shook when they didn’t need to. She wouldn’t undo that now by touching something that hadn’t been offered. Still, it sat between them. The not-watching. The not-saying.

His voice, when he spoke again, was lower. “I thought I’d find you here.”

“I’m not late,” she said quietly, more to comfort herself than him, her fingers toying with the woven bracelet Haymitch had given her.

“I know.”

She hesitated, then added, “I just…haven’t gone in yet.”

A nod. He didn’t press her. He looked down at his hands. Flexed one. The nails were short. Well-kept. Not chewed nor bitten. “It helps. Having a moment before it starts—waiting.”

She didn’t nod. But she didn’t step away.

Finnick didn’t look like he was here to guide her—or to shield her. He looked like someone who had once stood where she was now and hadn’t forgotten the cost, and maybe he had. Sofia supposed every victor went through the same process as her, some must have faced similar feelings.

“This isn’t you waiting, is it?” she murmured, repeating his words in her head before she spoke her own—not mocking, just curious.

His mouth twitched slightly, not with humor. Just weariness softened by time.

“No,” he said. “This is me remembering.”

That stopped her.

There was something in his voice that didn’t ask for sympathy. Something too cracked around the edges for pity. Not a warning. Not a confession. Just truth. Whatever he remembered, it wasn’t made for words.

Sofia didn’t ask what the Capitol had done. Or what had happened in his Games. She felt she already knew what wasn’t spoken. That he hadn’t watched the parade last night. That the lights, the costumes, the roar of the crowd—it was more than just distant for him. It was something he couldn’t bear to see. Sofía understood the silence that followed. She had no desire to fill it.

They stood there—two shadows held outside the place they both knew too well. His quiet beside hers felt like a kindness, not a comfort. Like company for a moment meant to be walked alone.

After a while, she let her arms fall to her sides. Finnick didn’t say anything else. But she could feel his attention on her still, not sharp, not pressing. Just there.

And when the doors finally opened—mechanical, smooth, without ceremony—it was not for her. Not because she’d moved. Just because it was time.

Inside, the Training Center waited. Soaring ceilings. Marble floors. The clatter of wood and metal and breath.

She looked at him once more.

Finnick didn’t move. But his gaze didn’t waver either. He didn’t smile. He didn’t nod. But something softened in his expression—just enough for her to feel it in her chest.

Like a quiet message passed between them in a language neither had been taught.

 

Sofia took a step forward, and suddenly the doors closed behind her with a hush, and suddenly the world was colder. Not in temperature—though the air did feel strangely sharp—but in something deeper. Something under the skin. The gym loomed ahead of her, vast and sunlit, each corner carved by shadows from the high glass ceiling above. Beams of afternoon light poured through in clean, golden slabs, breaking across the polished floor like a fractured windowpane.

The room was too quiet.

Not silent—there were soft thuds, distant clinks of metal, an occasional shout from the sparring mats—but the kind of quiet that made every sound feel too loud. Capitol trainers moved between stations with the clinical stillness of surgeons, their voices low and clipped, like they didn’t want to wake the building itself. Overhead, cameras blinked red and watched like birds in a nest, always hunting, always fed.

Sofia took a step forward, and then another. Her shoes barely made a sound against the gleaming tile, but it still felt like she was disturbing something sacred—or cursed. She didn’t know which. The gym was different from what she expected. It wasn’t chaotic or full of yelling, like she’d imagined when she was younger and still thought the Hunger Games were a test of brute strength and loud, vicious victories—curtesy of her father who seemed to think the only way to win was through physical strength. This place felt quieter than a funeral but just as heavy, maybe even more.

Her eyes moved slowly across the space. Stations were arranged in wide arcs—edible plants, fire-building, camouflage, traps, weapons, combat—like offerings laid at the feet of something larger. Each one seemed to hum with its own rhythm, tributes drifting between them like moths caught in different beams of light.

She hadn’t even taken a full step onto the main training floor, but already, she could feel it in her chest—how little space she took up here. Not just in size or muscle, but in something deeper.

It was the way other people walked—the way the Careers did. The way they moved like they belonged here.

Sofia didn’t. She never would.

She kept moving anyway. Slow, careful steps that made no sound. She traced the edge of the gym, trying to avoid the spotlight, letting her gaze flicker over the other tributes like she was trying not to be caught staring. Her stomach was tight. Not quite fear. Not quite dread. Something more complicated—like grief for a version of herself she’d had to leave in the hallway.

She exhaled softly and turned to the first station she found tucked away.

 

The camouflage station was set off from the others, half-shadowed beneath a scaffolding of artificial branches and netting. Buckets of paint—thick, earthy, and smelling faintly of moss and metal—sat open on a long table. There were trays of leaves, crushed charcoal, ground clay powders. A curved wall stood behind it all, designed like a piece of terrain—textured bark, uneven stone, patches of bramble and faded green.

Sofía stopped just short of it. For a moment, she only watched.

One tribute crouched low, fingers smeared with dark pigment, pressing leaf prints into the fabric of his uniform. Another, already painted in blotches of black and green, pressed herself against the wall, disappearing so completely Sofia had to blink twice to find her again. The trainer—a middle-aged man with coppery hair and a quietly amused expression—was giving instructions in a voice that barely carried. He didn’t seem to notice her.

That was fine. She didn’t want to be noticed. She stepped toward the table. No one looked up.

Sofía dipped two fingers into the ochre-colored pigment first, then into the darker green beside it. She smoothed the colors across her forearm, dragging it up into the sleeve, blending the edges where her skin ended and fabric began. The motions were steady, unhurried. She remembered moments in the fields after summer storms—mud clinging to her knees, dirt dried beneath her fingernails. This was familiar in a way almost nothing else in the Capitol had been.

She took her time.

She dragged the heel of her hand through charcoal dust, rubbing it over her cheekbone and across her nose, dulling the shine of her skin. Then she traced a line of cracked earth along her jaw, pressing pigment into the creases of her knuckles. She was careful, deliberate.

Then, without waiting for instruction, she moved toward the wall. The other tribute who had tried it—someone from District 8, she thought—had shifted too much. Sofía remembered that. Every twitch had given them away. So she breathed out, slow and quiet, and let her body fold into itself. Her knees bent. Her back curved toward the jagged stone edge. Her hands spread like leaves against the grooves of the panel.

And she stilled.

The air moved faintly around her. Dust hung suspended in the light filtering from above. Voices murmured nearby—Capitol, tribute, trainer—but none of them aimed at her.

No one noticed.

She could hear her heart, steady and calm, like it had remembered something she had forgotten: how to hide. Really hide. Not behind silence or small smiles or lowered eyes. This was something older. Something instinctive. A disappearing act.

She didn’t know how long she stayed there. Maybe a minute. Maybe longer. Then the trainer’s voice called out—“All right, anyone else?”—and she stepped away from the wall, quiet as a shadow leaving the edge of a tree. There was a pause. He looked up, scanning for his next volunteer.

And then he blinked at her.

His eyebrows rose slightly, not unkindly. “Were you—” He squinted, then laughed once. “I didn’t see you.”

Sofia gave him a small nod, a small smile painting her lips. The pigment on her cheeks cracked slightly as her jaw shifted.

“Well done,” he said, a touch of admiration in his voice now. “Very well done. That’s the idea. Use the texture. Let the wall do the work.”

She murmured a thank you and stepped back. Her hands were still painted to the wrists, fingertips mottled with mud-colored streaks. A few others had turned to glance her way. She avoided their eyes.

She moved toward the edge of the station, where a shallow basin had been placed for cleanup. A spigot dripped slowly into a metal bowl already clouded with dirty green and brown water. Another tribute stood there, rolling up her sleeves.

She was tall and had this red-brown hair that had been braided down her back. An array of bracelets were on her wrist, twisting between her fingers like she couldn’t quite stop moving. Her forearms were slick with water and faint traces of paint still clung to the edges of her collarbone.

District 7, Sofía remembered. Lumber and nature. She’d seen her during the parade—silent, unsmiling, a little hyperactive, but watchful. Sofia waited quietly as the girl washed her hands, then stepped up beside her.

For a while, they said nothing. Just the drip of the faucet and the soft splash of water over skin.

Then, softly, Sofia said, “You and Milo have the same last name.”

The girl blinked, glancing sideways, but didn’t seem surprised by the observation. She shrugged, brushing her wet hands through the air like drying leaves. “Yeah. Weird, right?”

Sofia shrugged back. “I didn’t think it at first. But then I saw it on the roster when I walked in.”

“No relation,” the girl added quickly, more out of reflex than offense. “Spelled differently, anyway.”

Sofía nodded. She hadn’t looked that closely. “Still, I don’t know—it made me look twice.”

The taller girl tilted her head. “You his partner?”

Sofia hesitated, then nodded again. “From Eleven.”

The girl’s expression didn’t change much. But something in her gaze softened. She reached for a towel and wiped her arms in slow strokes. “I’m Kaia,” she said. “District Seven.”

“I’m Sofia.”

Kaia gave a short, practical nod. “You were good at that,” she said, nodding toward the wall. “The trainer didn’t even see you until you moved.”

Sofía looked down at her stained fingers. “It’s quiet work,” she murmured. “I like quiet work.”

Kaia made a low hum of agreement. “Same. You don’t need knives to be dangerous, makes me wonder ‘bout people like you.”

Sofía glanced up at her, surprised.

Kaia gave a small smile—not wide, not warm, but not unkind. “You spend enough time in the woods, you learn what hides best.”

Sofia thought of her father again. Of the years spent beneath the high green stalks of the orchard rows, running from shadow to shadow, just to scare her or Camila, sometimes even Mateo. She thought of how her sister used to say she could vanish if she held still long enough.

“I guess some of us already knew how,” Sofia said.

They didn’t say much more. Kaia dried her hands, nodded once in quiet farewell, and disappeared back into the gym.

Sofía stood alone at the basin for a moment longer, rubbing a smear of paint from beneath her thumbnail. Her reflection in the water was barely there—mud-dark and blotted by movement.

She preferred it that way.

And when she turned back to the floor, her eyes scanned again—not for weapons, not for open challenges—but for more corners to vanish into. More quiet places. More useful truths.

She found her next one tucked beneath a banner that hung low over a modest stretch of tables. The knot-tying station had no weapons, no sharp edges, no glamor. Just coils of rope—thick and thin, rough and silken—looped and waiting like sleeping snakes.

It was, in a strange way, comforting.

Sofia drifted toward it like something pulled by instinct. The clang of swords and the shouting from the hand-to-hand ring softened as she stepped into the knotting corner. There was a low hum of concentration here, not much conversation. The tribute from District 8 sat hunched over a length of braided cord, tongue caught between her teeth in focus. A boy from District 3 made tight, analytical loops with twitching fingers like he was wiring a circuit. The Capitol trainer—a gray-haired woman with shrewd, steady eyes and the calm of someone who had spent a lifetime teaching kids to tie tourniquets—stood at the front, patiently unraveling a clove hitch and tying it again in slow motion.

Sofía sat on the edge of a bench and reached for the nearest coil.

There was something comforting about the ropes—raw jute, thick cotton, coiled hemp dyed in dull forest colors. They reminded her of home. Not in the sweet way people meant when they said “home,” but in the layered, uncomfortable way only real memories could be—sharp with tension, softened by time. She ran her fingers over a coiled strand, watching how the fibers split at the edges.

Her papa used to keep ropes in a barrel under a kitchen cabinet. It wasn’t strange, not in District Eleven—everyone had rope for hauling crates or tying off harvest sacks—but her papa kept more than anyone else. Coils upon coils, tucked and hung and bundled tight as bones in a mausoleum. He’d had names for the knots. Bowline. Clove hitch. Figure-eight. Slipknot. His voice low and measured, always more animated around rope than people. When Sofía was younger—eight, maybe nine—he’d sat her and Camila down at the kitchen table and made them tie and untie knots for hours. He called it a “useful practice.”

He used to say things like, “No one’s safe in District Eleven. Don’t forget that.” or how “One of you’s going. All of you maybe. Don’t act like it’s not true. They’ll come for us sooner or later.”

He used to say it all the time, even when Mateo was still just a toddler learning how to walk in straight lines, even when their mama begged him to not “scare the kids”.

At the time, Sofía thought it was just one more of his strange spells. He’d had plenty—months where he spoke to no one, days where he tore through the house looking for a photograph he was sure someone had stolen. Sofia never questioned it, Camila didn’t either, and Mateo—well he hardly had memories to question. Sofia had always just done what he asked. She hadn’t known what it meant for a man to unravel quietly in his own mind. It was only a year or two ago that she’d begun to understand he hadn’t been well. That the things she thought were part of his temperament were symptoms. Illnesses. Fears that made him cruel without realizing it. Sofía didn’t talk about that. Not to anyone. Not even to herself, really.

But now, here, her hands moved with a kind of reflex that felt like breathing. The Capitol trainer drifted by her elbow without a word. She paused for a beat, watching the way Sofía’s fingers worked the rope—deft and steady, looping through a perfect figure-eight. Then the trainer gave a nod, faint but approving, and moved on. Sofia didn’t really need more than that.

“Saw you disappear into a wall earlier,” said a voice—flat, dry, vaguely impressed.

Sofía glanced up.

Callie Harper had settled cross-legged across from her, elbows propped on the table, a fraying rope clutched between her hands. Her copper curls were tied into a loose knot on the top of her head, and there was still a streak of green paint smeared across one cheekbone like she hadn’t bothered to wash it off.

“You’re good at the sneaky stuff,” Callie muttered, eyes locked on her rope as she tried to force it into something resembling a knot.

Sofía gave a soft, hesitant nod. “I guess so.”

Callie’s brow wrinkled as the rope slipped loose again. She muttered something under her breath and pulled it tighter, too tight, until the cord curled back on itself in protest. Her frustration clung to her like static.

“They ever make you do this back home?” she asked, without looking up.

“My dad did,” Sofía said, voice low and even. “Used to sit us down and make us practice. He thought it would help. Thought it might save us.”

Callie blinked, surprised. “What, just…randomly?”

Sofía shook her head once. “Not randomly. He thought one of us would get picked—maybe all of us.” Her fingers tightened slightly around the rope. “Said it like it was inevitable.”

Callie set her rope down. Her expression wasn’t mocking. Just quiet. “That’s…dark.”

“He wasn’t technically wrong” Sofia said softly.

There was a silence between them—not awkward, but full. Like something unspoken had settled onto the table between their hands.

Callie tilted her head. “So how’d you end up here, then? You don’t seem the volunteering type.”

Sofía’s hands paused mid-knot.

“They called my sister’s name,” she said after a moment.

The rope in her lap shifted slightly with the weight of the words.

“She’s a year older than me. Her name was in more times. Papa always thought it would be her, if anyone.” She looked down. “He wasn’t far off.”

Callie stared. “You took her place.”

Sofía nodded.

“Why?”

Sofía gave a small shrug, but it wasn’t careless. It was just…tired. “Because I couldn’t watch her die.”

Callie’s mouth twitched like she was about to say something—but didn’t. She picked up her rope again instead, trying and failing to get it into a basic hitch.

“I don’t know if that’s brave or stupid,” she muttered.

“Probably both,” Sofía said, giving Callie a soft smile.

Callie grunted. “You don’t look like someone who volunteers for this.”

Sofia’s rope stilled in her hands.

“I don’t look like someone who wins either.”

That made Callie pause. Her eyes flicked up, sharp and searching. Sofia wasn’t sure why she said it aloud. Maybe because saying it felt like peeling off a layer of armor that had never fit right in the first place. Maybe because it wasn’t armor at all—it was truth.

“I’m not making it out of that arena,” she added, quiet enough that it could’ve been mistaken for a thought, not a statement.

Callie didn’t reply right away. Her jaw tensed, like she was chewing the words before deciding what to do with them. Then, suddenly, she shoved the rope away from her and stood.

“Come on,” she said.

Sofía blinked up at her. “What?”

“Knives,” Callie said. “I hate them. You look like you hate em’. Let’s go hate knives together.”

She didn’t wait for an answer. Just turned on her heel and started toward the throwing range, expecting Sofía to follow.

And after a heartbeat—Sofía did.

 

The knife-throwing station was more crowded than the others, but Callie didn’t wait for an opening. She marched to the front like she had every right to be there and handed Sofia a dulled training blade. Sofía took it awkwardly, testing the weight.

“You ever thrown one before?” Callie asked.

Sofía shook her head. “I’m better at quiet things.”

“That’s not a no,” Callie muttered. She pointed toward the row of wooden targets lined up against the back wall. “Big one on the left. Don’t aim. Just throw.”

Sofía eyed the distant circle. Her palms felt suddenly damp.

She squared her stance, lifted her arm, and threw. The knife landed handle-first and clattered to the floor.

Callie snorted. “Okay. Not that good. Again.”

Sofía tried again. This time, she focused less on the target and more on the motion—shoulder, elbow, wrist. The knife spun out of her grip and embedded itself in the bottom corner of the target.

It stayed.

Her chest lifted, just a little.

Callie gave a sharp, satisfied nod and plucked a knife from the table for herself “Not bad, tree girl.”

Sofía turned, exhaling. “Not good, either.”

“Better than mine’s about to be,” Callie said, then stepped forward.

She took only a second to line up her stance. She didn’t pause. Her arm moved with the muscle memory of someone used to throwing hard things—wrenches, probably, or fence wire.

The blade hit the bullseye with a sharp, clean sound.

Callie grinned, almost how kids in eleven do when they’re proud of a plant they grew but want to hide their pride. “I like proving myself wrong.”

Sofia blinked. “That was…”

“Beginner’s luck,” Callie said lightly, but she was glowing just a little.

Sofía smiled. And this time, it wasn’t just polite. It felt real.

They stood side by side for another few minutes, tossing blades and missing more than they hit, until a Capitol trainer clapped sharply for a rotation.

Callie stepped back. “Still hate knots,” she muttered. “But you can show me again tomorrow.”

“I will” Sofía said.

She didn’t know if she’d get the chance to speak with Callie. But she meant it

Callie gave a nod like a promise and headed off toward the direction of the weight stations. They parted easily—not with promises or awkward smiles, just a nod, like an understanding had been reached. Callie wandered toward the sparring mats, where her District partner was sulking near a rack of throwing axes, and Sofía turned back toward the quieter edge of the gym. Sofía lingered a second longer, watching her go, then turned and moved on.

 

The next station was quieter still—no clang of metal, no tension drawn into bows or the hiss of knife blades slicing through air. Just a long, low table, a few clear pitchers of water—clouded with sediment—and a neat arrangement of cloths, crushed charcoal, ceramic filters, and mismatched cups.

She followed the silence like a trail. The water purification station was small and unobtrusive, tucked into a far corner beneath a ceiling vent that hummed quietly. The table was low and ringed with various containers—cloudy pitchers filled with murky water, strips of clean cloth, charcoal tablets, glass jars, tiny makeshift filters. It was, in every sense, plain. But Sofía felt herself exhale as she knelt beside it.

There were no blades here. No noise. No watching trainers calling out corrections. Just the simple promise of clean water, if she could figure out how to make it.

She reached for one of the pitchers, careful not to slosh, and began working through the process the way the Capitol trainer had shown a few minutes earlier. The water was cloudy, brown-tinged with faint flecks of something that might have been dirt or something worse. It smelled faintly of rust. Sofía folded a cloth into quarters, passed the liquid through into a second cup, and added a thin disc of charcoal.

Her fingers moved slowly but with purpose.

She didn’t have the speed of someone from the Districts with machinery, or the confidence of those from survival-heavy territories like 7 or 10—but she had patience. And focus. She poured, filtered, and waited. Again. And again. And again.

She had never purified water to Capitol standards, but she had boiled river water during the dry seasons back home, filled old jars with rain runoff, packed filters with sand and hope.

“You take your time,” said a voice.

It wasn’t loud, but it still made her flinch.

Sofia looked up sharply.

Thayer Morven stood a few paces away, sweat still dampening the collar of his training shirt, a faint trail of chalk across one forearm. He’d clearly come from the climbing wall—the powder still clung to his hands, and a small scrape was fresh across one knee. His jaw was just as she remembered it—scarred, a little crooked. His shoulders sunburned despite the Capitol’s artificial lighting, like the sea hadn’t fully left his skin.

“You’re methodical,” he said, clarifying. “Good way to be.”

Sofia stared at him a moment too long before realizing she hadn’t responded.

“I didn’t know anyone was watching,” she murmured.

Thayer’s mouth twitched—not quite a smile, not quite not. “Didn’t mean to hover. Just…noticed.”

He shifted slightly, still keeping a respectable distance.

“I remember you from the train,” Sofía said before she could overthink it. “You were with the boy from Six.”

“Kellan.” He nodded. “You remember him?”

“I do.”

He tilted his head. “We were both trying not to scare you, if that helps.”

“It does,” she said quietly. “You told me I was different.”

Thayer gave a small breath of a laugh, like she’d reminded him of something he hadn’t expected to be remembered.

“We said we liked you, too,” he added.

Sofia’s fingers were still resting on the rim of the cup, the water within now settled and clear. She didn’t quite know what to say to that. The words warmed and stung all at once, like a compliment you knew wouldn’t last.

She looked back down at her hands. “Most people don’t like what’s quiet.”

Thayer was quiet himself for a beat. Then,

“Kellan does. I do.”

Sofia glanced up again, brows slightly raised.

“I don’t know,” he said, shrugging. “It’s loud in here. In the Capitol. In the arena, probably. Quiet’s rare. Doesn’t mean weak, could mean dangerous.”

She wasn’t sure what she felt then. Gratitude? Disbelief? Maybe both. She had spent the last however long watching people swing blades and scream at dummies, seeing trainers nod approvingly when someone cracked a rib or disarmed a partner. Here was someone who didn’t mock quiet.

Sofia turned back to her filter, lifting the cup to her lips. The water tasted like nothing. Clean. Flat. She hadn’t realized how strange and comforting that could be until it hit her tongue.

“You from near the orchards?” Thayer asked, nodding toward her hands.

She looked down. Her fingertips were stained faintly green from the camouflage station, the skin dry and roughed with rope-burn at the knuckles.

“I used to work them with my sister. Camila. Before…all of this.”

Thayer nodded again, slower this time. “I grew up pulling nets. Fishing lines. Not the same, but close enough.”

“Is that why you’re good at climbing?” she asked before she could stop herself.

His expression flickered with mild surprise—like he hadn’t expected her to notice.

“Guess so,” he said. “Ropes and boats’ll do that.”

Sofia smiled. A small one, brief and fleeting. But real. She set the cup down carefully, lining it up with the others.

“You always watch people this much?” she asked.

He looked startled by the question—but not offended.

“Habit,” he said. “You don’t talk much, but you’re paying attention. I noticed that early. Most of the others are trying to impress the cameras.”

“I’m not trying to impress anyone,” she said.

“That’s the part that stands out.”

He crouched beside the table then, folding one leg underneath him. Not too close, but enough that they were level.

“Have you ever gone days without water?” he asked suddenly, tapping the edge of a pitcher.

“Once,” she said. “Not long. We were out in the west groves. The irrigation lines were cut.”

He nodded. “Happens at sea too. Engine fails. Rain barrels dry.”

They didn’t say anything after that for a while. Just sat. Just existed beside one another. Sofía didn’t know what Thayer was. Not really. But she didn’t feel the need to move away from him.

“You and Kellan,” she said after a pause, “you talk a lot.”

Thayer chuckled. “He talks. I listen.”

“He seems nice.”

“Too nice,” Thayer replied, but there was fondness beneath it. “Keeps finding ways to help people. He helped that girl from Nine with the fire station. Showed the boy from Five how to use a pulley. Keeps forgetting we’re all gonna have to kill each other.”

Sofía didn’t reply. She didn’t think she needed to.

Thayer stood up, brushing dust from his knee. “Don’t lose that patience of yours. It’ll do more than a knife ever will, or not.”

Sofia nodded once. He started to walk away, then paused, glancing over his shoulder.

“If we’re dropped somewhere green,” he said, “stick to the edges. Shadows are more forgiving.”

Then he was gone. Sofia stayed still for a breath longer, watching the space where he had been. The filtered cup of water still rested in her hand. She placed it gently on the table, wiped her palms on her pants, and rose.

She didn’t know what had passed between them—only that it hadn’t felt rehearsed, and that she wasn’t sure what it meant. There was no offer of alliance, no overt threat. Just a quiet suggestion and a name spoken like it mattered. Kellan.

Sofia crossed the gym floor with quiet steps, moving past the knot-tying tables, the shadow of a girl testing a bow and arrow, the flicker of another tribute struggling with a net trap. She kept her eyes low and her movements soft, following the scent of crushed leaves and bitter stems until she reached the edible plants station tucked beneath the windows. Light slanted through the glass above, sharp and clinical, catching on metal labels and the fuzz of flower petals. It was quieter than the others—less dramatic, less occupied.

The tables were crowded with greens and blossoms—some vibrant and lush, curling with ripe invitation. Others drooped with pale veined leaves and spotted berries that made her throat tighten just to look at. Sofía hesitated at the edge of the station, letting her gaze drift across the arrangement. It looked like a garden trying to lie to her.

She stepped closer.

This was the kind of test her father would have loved. Not because it was gentle—because it was quiet and lethal at the same time. He used to quiz her and Camila in the orchard, pointing to roots and tree bark, warning that hunger made everything look safe. “If it’s shiny or smells sweet, don’t trust it,” he’d told them. But he’d never taught them much beyond that—he didn’t get the chance to. He didn’t care about berries or blooms. He cared about traps. So Sofía moved carefully now. She didn’t reach for anything. Just hovered. Reading.

And then before she even realized there was someone behind her—

A voice drew her attention. “They like to use the ones that look beautiful,”

Sofia turned. Kellan Markell was crouched at the edge of the table, elbow resting on one knee, a sprig of something pale-green turning idly between his fingers. He didn’t look at her at first. His eyes were on the leaves. When he did glance up, the smile he offered didn’t reach his mouth. But it warmed his eyes, like flickering lights in the dark corners of a moving train.

“Some of the deadliest things look the most welcoming,” he added. “Kind of poetic.”

Sofia stepped closer, eyes scanning the table. She didn’t speak right away. She was still weighing the shape of him—quiet, but not meek. His voice didn’t tremble, didn’t boast. It just was.

“Learned the hard way?” she asked, voice low.

“Something like that,” Kellan said. “Back home, people get desperate. You eat what’s there. Sometimes what’s there wants to eat you back.”

Sofia studied him for a moment longer.

He didn’t look like someone who’d survived poison—but maybe that was the point. His skin was pale beneath the hollows of his eyes, like he hadn’t slept right in months. But there was a sharpness beneath the tiredness, like his thoughts moved faster than his body could follow.

She reached toward a berry cluster, hesitated, then pointed to a second one, “This?”

Kellan’s head tilted slightly. “Red stem, smooth leaves? Poisonous. Binds the throat.”

She withdrew her hand. He leaned forward, brushing past her gently to indicate a broad-leafed green with a waxy finish.

“This one’s edible. Better if you boil it first, but safe either way. It grows in wet soil.”

Sofia crouched beside him now, mirroring his posture without meaning to. She nodded.

“You’re good at this,” she said.

He didn’t answer for a moment. Then, quieter than he had spoken before “Better to be good now. In the arena, the costs higher.”

She didn’t look at him directly, but she could feel the weight of his attention on her—not heavy, but exacting. Like he was listening for something she hadn’t said yet.

“Thayer practically sent me,” she murmured, before she could talk herself out of it.

That got a flicker of amusement from him.

“Of course he did,” Kellan replied, the smile on his face alluding to the fact this wasn’t the first time someone approached him because of Thayer. “Did he warn you about me or something?”

“No,” she said, watching the way his fingers moved from one plant to another, confident and quiet. “He just said you were smart. And good with poisons.”

“That sounds like Thayer,” Kellan said. “Kind enough to recommend me. Just vague enough to make me sound dangerous.”

She didn’t respond. Not at first.

“You two,” she started, speaking carefully, as though she were standing at the edge of a bad fall, “seem pretty close.”

“We are,” Kellan said simply. Then he turned a leaf between his thumb and forefinger and added, “But not the way people want us to be”

That startled something in her. Not the words—but the way he said them. Like he’d rehearsed them for himself already.

“Do you trust him?” she asked quietly.

Kellan smiled again—but this time it was all eyes, no mouth.

“I trust him as much as you can trust someone in a place like this.”

Sofía didn’t know what to make of that.

He shifted slightly and nodded toward a different bloom. “This one’s called bloodvine. It looks harmless, grows near clean water. It’s not. Two mouthfuls and your stomach turns inside out.”

She memorized the shape of the leaf. She didn’t know if she could trust Kellan. Or Thayer. She didn’t know what they wanted—if they wanted anything. But she believed him when he said that bloodvine could kill her.

They fell quiet. Sofía picked up a pale yellow flower, inspecting its stem. It looked familiar in the way nightmares did—beautiful until remembered. She turned it gently in her fingers.

“Don’t eat that one,” Kellan said, not unkindly.

She set it down.

He pointed to a cluster of berries—one bright red, the other a bruised purple. “Left is safe, right is not. The red one’s flesh stains, but not your insides. The purple might slow your breathing.” He pointed again, this time toward a broad green leaf with serrated edges. “Fine veins, slight fuzz, smells like cucumber? Edible. Same leaf with smooth surface and a sweet smell? Don’t touch it.”

Sofía gave a quiet nod, her hands hovering above the table like a pianist unsure of her next chord. Kellan rose from his crouch, stepping around the table so he stood beside her instead of opposite. He didn’t get too close. But his presence felt intentional.

They fell back into silence after that, identifying roots and categorizing leaves. Kellan would occasionally ask what she thought a certain plant was, and she’d hazard a guess—sometimes right, sometimes wrong. He never mocked her mistakes. He just correct her, like a teacher who didn’t want to be remembered as one. There was a tension beneath Kellan’s stillness, something she couldn’t name. He moved carefully, but not in a fearful way. More like someone aware of the weight of their own steps.

She remembered how Thayer had looked at him—not like a stranger. Not like a competitor. Something closer to kin. She wondered if this was a plan. If the two boys had already whispered her name in some shadowed corridor—marked her as useful, or easy to eliminate, or someone worth observing for later.

And maybe they had. But she didn’t feel afraid of it. Not exactly. Kellan placed a bundle of leaves beside her, labeled with a Capitol-issued placard that said safe in glossy block letters.

“They get these things wrong sometimes,” he said. “Don’t trust every sign you see.”

Sofia looked at him, her head tilting in confusion. “What should I trust, then?”

He gave a slow blink, like he hadn’t expected the question to come back to him.

“Instinct,” he said.

And then, with a hint of something like wry amusement “And me. For now.”

That made her smile, but just barely. She looked back to the leaves. Some green. Some gold. Some nearly black.

“Some of these would kill you slowly,” she said, almost absently. “Make you think you were okay for a while.”

He nodded. “Those are the worst ones.”

And though he didn’t say more, something in the way he looked at her—steady, unblinking—made her feel like they were no longer just talking about plants. Sofia nodded once, placed her fingertips against a safe leaf, and pressed it gently into her palm like a promise she hadn’t made yet or a memory she couldn’t risk losing.

Kellan’s gaze dipped briefly to her hand, then returned to her face. “Be careful what you carry,” he murmured. “Some things stain.”

Sofía didn’t answer. She didn’t need to. The silence between them held enough weight to pass as understanding. She slipped away from the edible plants table, the leaf still in her hand. She folded it, gently, and slipped it into her pocket.

 

The gym floor opened ahead of her in lines and stations. Tributes moved like restless pieces on a gameboard—testing, training, fighting. She wasn’t planning to stop. She had only meant to pass by, eyes fixed on the archery targets a few stations ahead—something distant, something safer. But the moment she neared the hand-to-hand mat, her steps slowed against her will. A Capitol trainer stood sharp-eyed at the edge of the square, clipboard tucked under her arm, while three boys in dark Training Center uniforms circled each other on the padded flooring.

They moved like water turned to stone.

At the center of them stood Sterin Carroway—District 1’s “golden boy”. His posture was clean and sharp, as if drawn by ruler and compass. Every motion was deliberate, they were all coiled with control, even when he wasn’t moving. He cracked a grin at something one of the other careers had said, and it made the room tilt slightly, like the floor leaned toward him without his asking. Sofía would’ve kept walking. She should’ve.

But then his eyes slid toward her, pale and cutting like slivers of glass.

“Need a partner?” he asked, his voice dropping through the silence like a coin in a wishing well.

She startled—visibly—and cursed herself for it. Her spine straightened on instinct, trying to smooth away the reaction, but he’d already caught it.

Sterin grinned wider, amused. “You’ve got fast feet,” he said. “Wonder if you’ve got fast hands.”

There was no malice in the words, but no softness either. It was a dare wrapped in charm. She glanced toward the trainer, half-hoping the woman would wave her on or tell Sterin to not waste energy—something to get her away, but instead, the trainer raised her eyebrows with faint interest and gestured toward the mat.

Sofia didn’t move right away. Her heart thrummed like moth wings in her throat. Though in the end, she followed him.

The mat was cool beneath her feet. Sofía rolled her shoulders back and tried to remember what her father had once said to her when his mind had fully spiraled into the quiet fury and unspoken fears.

“Don’t try to win,” he’d whispered one night while teaching her to block a punch. “Try to leave standing.”

Sofía rolled her shoulders back and took a breath deep into her ribs, the way she used to before working through sun-heavy harvests. She stepped up. Sterin looked mildly delighted.

They faced each other at the center of the ring. Sofia’s chin tilted slightly down, her weight shifting toward the balls of her feet. He studied her with a look that was both appreciative and disarming.

“You know,” he said, circling slowly, “you’re prettier than most of the ones I’ve dropped.

His voice dropped to something silkier. “Like a wildflower.”

The comparison struck oddly. She didn’t know whether to take it as insult or observation, so she said nothing.

Sterin moved first.

It wasn’t an attack, not quite. A feint, a flick of motion designed to test her reflexes. She dodged—barely—and circled left, her breath catching in her throat. Her arms came up, unsure of what to guard or strike.

He watched her, almost lazily. “You’ve got good instincts,” he said. “You’re not completely helpless.”

“I’ve seen worse,” she murmured, circling again. “But you’re better. You move like the floor belongs to you.”

He chuckled at that. “It does.”

And then he actually struck.

Sofía ducked just in time, his fist whistling past her ear. She dropped low and darted behind him, trying to stay in motion. A brush of fabric. A near-contact elbow. Her hands shot up, and one landed a slap of a strike to his rib—more surprise than skill, because she didn’t have any of that—not with this. He raised an eyebrow.

“You hit like you mean it,” he said. “Almost.”

She didn’t answer. She was moving again, legs darting around his reach, trying to stay unpredictable. Her goal wasn’t to win. It was never to win. It was to just make it through.

But he was faster. Not necessarily because of speed—because of control. Sterin was the kind of fighter who could predict patterns before they existed, Sofia noticed that. He lured her into a dodge with one shoulder and was already pivoting before she could recover. She didn’t see it happen.

One second she was moving. The next, her wrist was caught midair—caught mid-thought—and twisted just enough to unbalance her.

She gasped, stumbling, and he pressed forward, his other hand catching her shoulder. He didn’t slam her down. He didn’t have to. Sofia hit the mat hard enough to feel the breath punch from her lungs. The padded floor was cool beneath her back, too.

Sterin crouched over her, one knee pressing near her ribs, both her wrists pinned in one practiced grip. His other hand braced near her temple, not touching but close enough that she could smell the sharpness of Capitol soap and combat sweat. Her chest heaved once. Then twice. Wildflower or not, the ground was unforgiving. Sterin leaned close, breath cool against her cheek.

“Pretty,” he whispered. “But not strong enough.”

Sofia didn’t answer. But she didn’t look away, either, she knew how the games worked, she knew they had started the second their names had been picked for them, she knew looking intimidated would not help. The trainer blew a whistle—match over—and Sterin stood, fluid and unhurried, like he’d only just stretched. He offered her a hand, clearly expecting her not to take it.

Sofia accepted it anyway. Her fingers closed around his—and even if the grip was weak, it was steady. He pulled her up, brushing nonexistent dust from his shoulder.

“You learn fast,” he said, echoing the same words Kellan had spoken earlier. But this time, it didn’t feel like a compliment. It felt like a warning.

“I’m trying,” she replied.

Sterin stepped back, his smirk lazy again. “Try harder.”

And then he turned away—vanishing into the next fight, the next audience, the next performance that was expected of him. Sofia stood in the center of the mat, heartbeat still in her throat.

She hadn’t won. Not even close to it. But she’d lasted longer than she expected.

 

The mat cooled quickly beneath her soles, sweat evaporating where her boots had scuffed the floor. Around her, the Training Center hummed toward its final hour—movements slowing, voices thinning, as tributes and trainers alike edged toward exhaustion. It was the end of the day. And though no bells tolled and no flags fell, Sofía could feel the closing of something—or maybe the beginning. A curtain, maybe. Or a trap.

She stepped off the mat carefully, her pulse still tucked beneath her ribs like a fist. Every part of her ached—not just from injury, but from the act of bracing. From being watched. Measured. Jotted down.

She passed through a stretch of polished floor, heading toward the exit elevators at the far end of the gym. Behind her, the sounds of combat had thinned into fewer matches—careers still circling each other, trainers clearing out. But the air had changed. It was heavier now. Filled with something like…observation.

She slowed near the far wall. A glass panel stretched overhead like a vaulted skylight, and up in the shadowed gallery behind it—barely visible unless you were looking—moved the figures of Capitol officials. Judges. Gamemakers. Stylists. Sponsors. Whispers snaked down from them like cold drafts. She tilted her head slightly, as if adjusting her braid, and caught the tail end of a sentence.

“…unexpected chemistry… the spar was compelling…”

Another voice, this one more clipped and fanged. “The Eleven girl? Yes. Pretty in a soft way. Looks breakable.”

“Ironic, isn’t it?” someone else murmured. “They always love a good contrast. Her—so gentle. Him—District one’s finest.”

Laughter, muffled but distinct, slid through the glass.

“She flinched so delicately when he moved. That restraint—it’ll sell. The soft, garden girl and the Capitol’s golden boy.”

Garden girl.

Soft.

Breakable.

Sofia turned her gaze back to the floor. Her steps resumed, steady again, despite the pulse that had quickened behind her eyes. She was almost to the elevator when she heard a voice she could actually respond to.

“Funny,” said Sterin Vale Carroway. “You don’t look like the gentle garden girl to me.”

Sofía didn’t startle this time. She turned halfway, keeping her posture quiet, guarded.

Sterin was sauntering toward her with his usual precision, every step felt measured, like he was still performing for a panel. He wasn’t bruised—of course he wasn’t. Whatever marks her fists might’ve left had already faded. Or never mattered enough to be felt. He looked exactly like what the Capitol wanted him to be—tailored, golden, practiced. He stopped too close.

“You heard them,” he said, glancing upward briefly. “All the buzz. “soft, sweet thing from the soil, ensnared by the boy with the teeth.””

Sofia said nothing. Her hand moved to press the elevator call button. The light glowed red. He waited half a beat.

“No comment?” he asked, tilting his head. “It’s a story, you know. One the Capitol likes. You and me. You don’t have to like me, wildflower, but you might want to consider playing the part. Pretty, maybe deadly—they love that.”

“I’m from the orchards,” Sofía said, not looking at him. “Not a garden.”

Sterin gave a soft laugh, more amused than offended. “Orchards. Of course. That tracks.”

He stepped beside her, enough to stand parallel now, and leaned back against the wall casually—shoulders touching the Capitol marble like it belonged to him.

“You’ve got something, you know,” he said. “Not fight in the traditional sense. Not strength. But something. Soft things that survive tend to be smarter than they look.”

Sofia didn’t respond. Her arms stayed folded in front of her, hands still raw under the tape.

“You surprised me,” Sterin continued, “Most tributes just swing. You didn’t swing much. You moved. You read.”

“I wasn’t trying to win,” Sofía said. “I was trying to leave standing.”

He glanced over. “Poetic.”

“Practical.” she corrected.

The elevator dinged softly. She stepped forward, but he moved with her, shoulder to shoulder, hands slipping into his pockets like he was thinking about which angle the cameras would prefer.

“Tell me, orchard girl,” he said, voice low and theatrical, “do you think you’ll survive long enough for them to love you?”

Sofia’s back straightened.

She turned to him slowly, eyes calm.

“I don’t care if they love me,” she said.

Sterin didn’t blink. His smile didn’t falter, either—but something in it flattened, dulled, like he hadn’t expected her to meet him head-on.

“No wonder they’re watching,” he said. “Even your silence has an edge.”

“Then maybe they should watch someone else,” Sofía murmured.

That made something flicker in his expression—amusement or irritation, she couldn’t tell. She moved to step past him, but he caught her wrist. Not roughly. Not sweetly either. Just firmly enough that she felt the heat of his skin against hers and knew it was intentional.

“You can pretend you’re not part of the story,” he said, getting close enough that she could smell the clean, expensive sharpness of his training gear and feel the mint from his breathing brush her neck. “But that doesn’t stop the Capitol from writing it.”

Sofia looked down at his hand. “Let go.”

For a beat, he didn’t. And then he did.

“See you tomorrow, my flower,” he murmured, flashing her a quick wink.

She didn’t look back.

The elevator swallowed her in silence.

 

Inside, she pressed the side of her thumb against her other palm, feeling the faint tremble in her bones where Sterin had gripped her. It hadn’t hurt. Not really. But it was the sort of touch that lingered for what it meant, not what it did.

She stared at the glass wall as the elevator rose—Capitol trainers shrinking beneath her, and beyond them, the wide stretch of gym floor where the last eight hours of her life had been pulled apart and sorted into columns: strengths, weaknesses, maybe’s, and please-gods.

Her reflection floated in the glass.

She did look like a story. And she hated that they’d already written her ending.

Even more than that—she hated that she’d accepted that ending before it had even been drafted.

Notes:

On a serious note: I actually am sorry for how bad the chapter turned out! I’m going to be honest, these next few ones won’t be the best because training days/private sessions w the game makers are proving to be REALLY difficult to write, but I promise I’ll try to make the next chapter at least a little better written and maybe published a little bit earlier (no promises….)