CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The Capitol's coverage droned on, saccharine and smothering. Flashing across the screen was Caesar Flickerman, all teeth and charm, delivering his usual brand of gossip with a grin so wide it could have been cut with a knife.
"- and of course, we can't forget District Seven's very own Cillian Darya-"
Cillian had tuned the man's voice out long ago. Flashes of the content- District Darlings, Finnick Odair- cut through the silence, but they ran past Cillian's ears, ignored. He sat slouched in his chair, fingers drumming against his glass, watching himself be paraded like livestock. The images were from the other night. His face was glimmering with gold, a fake smile plastered on his face as he made his way toward Oberyn's party.
He didn't flinch when Johanna stormed in, slammed the remote against the table, and switched it off.
"You shouldn't watch that shit," she said, eyes sharp, mouth twisted with something bitter. "They'll brainwash you too."
"That isn't possible," Cillian replied, voice flat, empty. The Capitol had already scraped out everything worth brainwashing.
A beat passed. The silence wasn't comfortable, but it wasn't hostile either.
"How're you holding up?" he asked.
Johanna's face didn't change, but something shuttered behind her eyes. "Fine. Freyja knew what she signed up for." Her tone was too casual. Too rehearsed.
Cillian didn't press. He knew the feeling. Grief tasted better when you let it ferment in anger. Grief was easier when it started before death.
Freyja hadn't signed up for any of it, of course. None of them had. But sometimes taking agency was easier, hurt less. Gave them an illusion of control.
The communipad across the room lit up blue, the light throbbing. Eirlys. Her image bloomed to life, all gleaming teeth and predatory sweetness.
"Cillian, darling, so glad you're available. We've secured a very generous sponsor who's been simply dying to meet you. Tonight."
He said nothing. He didn't need to.
"Now, I understand you've been... selective lately. But let's not make this a habit, hm? Even Finnick knows how to play nice."
Her smile lingered a beat too long before she disconnected.
Johanna was already halfway down the hall, shoulders set like a shield.
Cillian poured another drink. The glass clinked against the bottle's rim, sharp in the quiet. He drank, not to forget, but to dull the sick feeling of being handled, parcelled out like a luxury good.
His thoughts drifted. Oberyn.
The memory of Oberyn's hand on his wrist. The way he had looked at him, not with Capitol hunger, but with something steadier. Something patient.
Cillian exhaled, set the glass down, and stood.
Tonight, the Capitol would not have him.
The streets of the Capitol at night had always made Cillian feel as if he were walking through the inside of a jewel. Every building was cut into strange, gleaming angles; every window threw his reflection back at him, fractured, multiplied. The car Eirlys had called for had taken him to the usual district of velvet-draped sponsor apartments, but when the doors slid open, Cillian stepped out, crossed the street, and kept walking.
He wasn't even sure when the decision had been made. It had slotted itself between his ribs sometime between the second and third glass, a quiet, dangerous whisper that told his feet to turn left instead of right. Oberyn's building rose like a polished needle into the sky, its windows glowing a low amber. The doorman didn't question him. He never did. Oberyn had told him once, voice light as air, "If you want to come, come. No one will stop you."
