Mockingjay: The New Story

Chapter Fourteen

Katniss's POV

"No, it's Dace, Katniss."

I take a look again at the boy holding onto me. Sure, it wasn't Peeta like I had seen and wished, but Dace, Peeta's oldest brother. I was never informed any of his family made it safely to Thirteen after the bombing of Twelve, I never asked either. I never even bothered to look for or think of anyone but Peeta since I have returned from the Capitol.

I met Dace when I was young, Peeta the same age of course, and Dace in his early teens. My father took me to the back of the bakery after a long Sunday hunting in the woods, it was one of my first times selling my own game I shot down. I was so proud and happy, my father taught me how to skin animals that day. We always took turns after that one day. At the bakery's backdoor, Dace opened instead of Mr. Mellark. He was out and their mother was sleeping. Dace gave my father some bread, he didn't know how much and my father only took as little as he could. My father told Dace to hide the meat somewhere where his mother wouldn't find it but his father would. I remember peeking inside the bakery. My mother told me not to when we went to trade, but I was a child who had a curious mind and was willing to do about anything. Not a care in the world, yet. I saw two boys, wide, blue eyes on me. Peeta comes up so clearly as a child, that I imagine that little child as my own. Ryean, just two years older than Peeta, stood in front of Peeta where he hid behind his brother watching my father and Dace trade. Dace waved goodbye to us, the younger two stayed inside with their big eyes.

"Dace?" I whisper. His eyes were darker than Peeta's and Ryean's. His hair more brunette rather than blond compared to Peeta's and Ryean's. He indeed has the looks to be the oldest. His scruffy chin, some wrinkles forming around his eyes and mouth. "Where's Ryean? Who else made it?"

"My father-"

"Is right here."

I turn from Dace to see Mr. Mellark coming down the hall. He has a great smile on his face, Peeta's smile. He pulls me into a hug and just looks at me.

"Look at you, you're so big now. How far along are you?" he asks.

"Um, five months at the most."

His smile grows. "Not much left then, eh?"

"Nope," I say. I have to smile, seeing Peeta's family again makes me feel less guilty of the crimes I have committed that lead to the destruction of Twelve. I got to have all of my family safe from the flames of Twelve. Peeta, he only had me left to come home to. What if his family didn't get out? How would that feel to lose all of your family? Some people here in Thirteen know that feeling. I don't. "Where's Ryean and-"

"Katniss," Mr. Mellark starts, "they didn't make it."

I'm surprised. I knew them not making it was an option, took up most of my thoughts at this time, that there was the possibility only Dace and Mr. Mellark got out. But, I was expecting them to walk down that hallway too. Even seeing Mrs. Mellark would have given me more relief. If Dace and Mr. Mellark made it, why not the others?

"What? What happened?"

"Ryean saved us," says Dace. "He tried to get us all out, but he and mum didn't make it."

Tears well up in my eyes. Their mother might have been a witch who hated her children, but she was going to be a grandmother and, sooner or later, my mother-in-law. Ryean. Oh, poor Ryean. The middle child, who will be the one to explain why Peeta has the lights eyes and the brightest hair? Why Dace has the darkest eyes and most brunette hair? Ryean made Peeta and Dace make sense. Ryean was in between, not yet grown, not still a child. How could they be gone? The question is compared to how could Twelve be gone? Both have an answer that doesn't make sense. It is too unbelievably true. I will never see the three of them together. Peeta will never say his final goodbye. Dace and Peeta will both only have one brother, and both be so different in age and features that it seems impossible they are related as brothers.