There's Nothing More Important than Family, chapter 14

When I wake, I am in a sleeping bag with Nathan and the blanket is over top of the two of us. He’s still asleep, snoring peacefully. I vaguely remember him moving me because I was freezing, lying on the cold ground. Careful not to wake him, I crawl out of the bag and out into the woods.

Jason is on watch. He looks tired and bores, like he’s been sitting there for a while. “I can take watch; you go ahead and get some sleep.” I tell him.

He smirks at me. “No, no. I’ve got it, Zania. I’m just a little hungry, that’s all. Could you pass me more of that beef jerky?”

I roll my eyes and hand him the nearly empty package. “How long have you been up?”

“Four hours, I’d say. I relieved Breah. She said she thought she heard footsteps, but she didn’t see anyone. Probably an animal, I suppose.” He yawns and stuffs his face full of meat.

“What are we gonna do today?” I ask him. He may not be the ‘team leader’ or anything, but he seems to know what he’s doing, and I don’t question that.

“We’ll let the others have another hour or so of shut-eye, we’ll pack up and then we’ll start hiking higher; farther away from the Careers. We can follow the stream uphill.”

“You should get some sleep then!” I urge.

“No, I’m not going to leave you here alone. I’ll wait until one of the others are up, then I’ll go have a quick nap.” I scowl at him; he’s babying me. I got a six! I’m smart enough to be a lookout. Jason notices me glaring at him, and says hastily, “Hey, it’s not my fault! Nathan made us all promise that we wouldn’t leave you alone!”

“Since when was Nathan the leader?” I yell

“Since he’s the smartest and he’s right! I’m not saying you’re not good enough for guard duty. I’m just saying you might not be able to kill when the time comes.”

I raise my eyebrow. “I guess you have a point. But you should still sleep. I’ve got enough sense to call for the rest of you if someone comes.”

Breah crawls out of the tent. “Zania, there’s a chance that if you did that, we’d be too late.” She says, and she turns to Jason. “I’ll take watch. And since when was Nathan the smartest?”

Jason smiles slyly. “Goodnight!” he says evasively. Breah sits on the tree stump beside the tent, and plays with her chakrams. I eat some of the dried food and tend to the fire, which is still weakly blazing.

“Don’t make it too big.” Breah warns me. “We’ll be leaving soon, so we’ll have to put it out anyway.” I nod comprehendingly as I chew the processed Capitol cheese. It tastes like plastic.

“I wonder if anyone else died last night!”I say curiously.

“I doubt it.” Replies Breah. “We would’ve heard the cannon.”

“What if we were sleeping too deeply?”

“There was always someone on watch. They would’ve heard it.” I roll my eyes and toss her an apple. She slices into quarters with the edge of a chakram and eats it, core and all.

When Addalie stumbles out of the tent, she trips on a tree root and falls to the ground. She swears audibly and the boys wake up with a start.

“What happened?” calls Nathan.

“Damn, that hurt!” curses Addalie. “I’m going to get a bruise on my knee now!”

“Yeah, because that’s the worst thing that could happen to you in this arena.” Smirks Jason.

Addalie sulks. Obviously, she doesn’t like getting teased. “Whatever! I’m going to get a bruise!”

“Join the club!” I giggle. “You, Nathan and I can have matching bruises!” Addalie turns bright red and I laugh even harder.

“Alright, alright guys.” Chuckles Nathan. “Focus. We should probably pack up now.”

I whisper “party pooper.” and we get to work. Breah organised the site so well, we’re done packing in about fifteen minutes. Addalie and Breah carry the backpacks. Jason carries the tent bag. Nathan carries me. Everyone holds their weapons tensely in their hands; even I wield a knife. Jason’s right, I probably couldn’t kill anyone, but I have to be ready. Maybe I could hold my attacker off until one of the others killed them.

Jason and Nathan lead us to where they found the small stream, and we start to climb higher up the mountain. It’s steeper, but there are flat patches here and there. I think the gamemakers probably put those there on purpose. Whenever we come across one of those areas, Jason studies them and then tells us to keep climbing.

“What are you doing?” I ask him when we’ve stopped for the fifth time.

“Trying to find a place to set up, where the Careers won’t see us.” He answers me. We keep walking, and I fall asleep on one of Nathan’s shoulders.

I open my eyes suddenly when Nathan lowers me to the ground. “Jason found a site he likes.” He whispers to me. “It looks recently used. Whoever was staying here before has moved, but I found a couple of dead rabbits stashed in a bush.” I nod drowsily and stretch as Nathan goes over to give the others a hand. I realize I’m still holding my knife, so I drop it to the side and curl up with my eyes closed.

I hear leaves rustle, but I think nothing of it. It’s probably an animal or just the wind. I twitch a little, just to get comfortable. The air is warm and fresh, and I can feel the sun on my back. It seems like a great place to have a catnap.

All of the sudden, I hear a twig break. I sit up and flash my eyes open warily. The girl from 3 is standing over me, holding my knife. There are leaves and branches in her snow-white hair and her grey eyes survey me angrily. This flat area is quite large and there are trees in the middle of the clearing, so I can see my friends, but the don’t notice the intruder.

“What are you doing here?” she hisses savagely. “This is my campsite! Why are you here?”

“I-I don’t know!” I gasp.

“Where’d you take my rabbits, huh?” She spats at me. “That’s my food. Do you know how long it took me to trap those rabbits?”

“I didn’t steal it!” I sputter anxiously.

“Where’s my food?” she yells, and I see my team jump and look around. “Tell me, NOW!”

“I swear I didn’t take it!” I cry.

She scowls at me violently. “You ate them didn’t you? DIDN’T YOU?”

“No!” I scream. She growls and leaps at me, and I call, “Nathan! Jason! Breah, help!”

The girl from 3 flips her hair back and looks around hastily. “You’re lying. There’s no one here. Just you. It doesn’t matter. You have my rabbits, give them to me now, and I’ll leave.”

“No, my brother has them!” I say weakly. “I can get them back for you if you want!”

Her gaze softens. I can see she’s about to get off me, but before she can, the tip of a sword rams through her chest, splattering me with blood. Nathan pulls his sword out from her body and pushes her to the side. The cannon fires.

“I guess the site wasn’t as vacant as we thought.” Addalie murmurs.

Breah rolls the girl over and examines her face. “Her name was Maria, from 3.”

I wipe the blood off my face and look at Nathan angrily. “All she wanted was her rabbits! Why’d you kill her?”

“In case you didn’t notice, she was going to kill you!” roars Nathan.

“No she wasn’t! I could tell!” I stand up and look into my brother’s eyes. He’s much taller than I am, but I don’t care. “She was about to get off me, but you killed her! This was her campsite!”

“Zania, it doesn’t matter. This is a good thing! We’re one step closer to getting home! She has to die for you to live!”

“That doesn’t make it right.”

“Zania! Seriously...” Nathan shakes his head. “You’re being silly.”

“No, I’m being myself. I’m not going to let this stupid arena change who I am. I don’t care about the Careers, and if she was about to kill me, that’d be different. She was as scared as I was! All she wanted was her food back. You’d have done the same thing.” I pick up the knife off the ground. “I’m going to the tent so they can retrieve her body. I hope those rabbits were worth it.”

Nathan rubs his forehead in exasperation. “Zania, I’m just trying to get you home.”

“Did you not realize she could have helped us? She could have been another ally!”

To my surprise, Nathan pulls me close, so the others won’t hear what he has to say. “The more allies we have, the more dangerous it is for us, Zan.” I flinch at my pet name. That’s what my dad used to call me when I was a toddler. It’s kind of patronizing to be called that. Nathan continues in a hushed voice, “Any of them could kill us while we sleep.”

“They won’t.” I mutter firmly.

“So, say they won’t! What if it comes down to the five of us? Are you prepared to kill them?”

“No! Why would you even say that?”

“Zan, it’s a possibility! The only people we can trust for certain are each other.” He pulls me into a hug, and I reluctantly return it.

“Glad that’s over.” Addalie says awkwardly. I smile sheepishly at her.

“Guys, we should probably move away from Maria’s body.” Says Breah.

“Yeah, the hovercraft need to come get her.” Jason agrees.

“Come on.” Nathan says to me, holding out his hand for mine. I ignore him and storm ahead on my own. Oh, how Nathan’s changed since the start of the Games.

I remember once when we were back in District 9. I was about five, and Nathan was eleven. We were out playing in the fields with David, tossing a rock around and playing catch. More like fetch, actually. None of us were all that good. David threw the rock at me, and it somehow hit a bird flying by. It dropped straight to the ground; I knew it was dead. But Nathan wrapped it up in his shirt and brought it home. Mom did all she could to save it, but in the end, the sparrow died. Nathan cried for days. I don’t think we ever played catch out in the fields again. David and I went to play occasionally, but never with Nathan. I compare that boy to the one walking behind me now. Nathan just killed a girl without thinking twice. And he tried to justify his actions, too. He tried to reason with me. I feel like I don’t even know him anymore.

I look up just in time to see the hovercraft lower a claw to pick up Maria. There is still forest debris in her hair. She probably had family back in District 3. Maybe she had a little brother and sister watching at this very moment. How gruesome.

As she’s lifted away, I silently apologize to Maria and wonder where Nathan, my brother, has gone.