The Hunger Games - Peeta Mellark (1)

}21{ - Tribute Feast

In the remaining hours before nightfall, Livia gathered rocks and did her best to camouflage the opening of the cave.

It was a slow and arduous process, but after a lot of sweating and shifting things around, Livia was pretty pleased with her work,.

The cave now appeared to be part of a larger pile of rocks, like so many in the vicinity.

Livia could still crawl in to Peeta through a small opening, but it was undetectable from the outside.

That was good, because she would need to share that sleeping bag again tonight.

Also, if she didn't make it back from the feast, Peeta would be hidden but not entirely imprisoned.

Although Livia doubted he could hang on much longer without medicine.

Livia made a meal out of the smaller, bonier fish that inhabited the stream, filled every water container and purified it, and cleaned her weapons.

She had six discs still left in all.

She debated leaving the knife with Peeta so he would have some protection while she was gone, but there was really no point.

He was right about camouflage being his final defense.

But Livia still might have use for the knife.

Who knows what she would encounter?

Here are some things she was fairly certain of.

That at least Cato, Kirin, and Thresh would be on hand when the feast starts.

She wasn't sure about Foxface since direct confrontation wasn't her style or her forte.

She was even smaller than Livia was and unarmed, unless she had picked up some weapons recently.

She would probably be hanging somewhere nearby, seeing what she could scavenge.

But the other three.

Livia was going to have her hands full.

Her ability to kill at a distance was her greatest asset, but she knew she would have to go right into the thick of things to get that backpack- the one with the number 12 on it that Claudius Templesmith mentioned.

Livia watched the sky, hoping for one less opponent at dawn, but nobody appeared tonight.

Tomorrow there would be faces up there.

Feasts always resulted in fatalities.

Livia crawled into the cave, secured her glasses, and curled up next to Peeta.

Luckily she had a good long sleep.

She would have to stay awake.

She didn't really think anyone would attack their cave tonight, but she could risk missing the dawn.

So cold, so bitterly cold that night.

As if the Gamemakers had sent an infusion of frozen air across the arena, which may be exactly what they had done.

Livia laid next to Peeta in the bag, trying to absorb every bit of his fever heat.