Die for You | Catching Fire

prologue

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prologue
AN UNLIKELY ROMANCE

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It made no sense, really. They couldn't have been more different.

A boy raised by two heartless killers, shaping and molding him into something they could be proud of only if he mirrored them perfectly. The youngest and only son expected to make up for his older sister's embarrassment and failure in the Sixty-Fifth Games. Ptolemus leaned into brutality, to rage, to a steely cold because they told him to. It was the only way he would ever obtain their conditional love. With a starved heart, he would cut down anything and anyone that stood in his way.

And he did. He brought the glory and pride to his alumni parents and to his notorious District as he won the Sixty-Ninth Hunger Games. But even after all that, their half-hearted affection was nowhere near nourishing. All he had left was still his brutality, his rage, that steely cold and now— grief.

This took many forms in the boy, whether mentoring children into ruthless warriors or cutting down mannequins with his heavy sword for training videos. Impatient sarcasm and self-inflicted isolation. Then there was one of his more favorite pass times, which involved taking his blood-stained hands and using them to mold and create from clay, giving himself a purpose besides being a symbol of destruction.

Growing up in the Dairy Sector of District Ten, Sage would be spared from the constant gore of raising livestock just to slaughter them so a Capitol citizen might have filet mignon on his or her plate. But that didn't mean she was completely shielded from it. She was nine years old when her favorite dairy cow, Petunia, stopped producing milk. From the grim look in her father's eyes, she knew what she had to do.

Packing only a day's worth of food with her, she and Petunia would set off to start a new life somewhere past the pasture. They only made it three miles before her father found them and brought them back home. She sobbed and pleaded for days to hide her beloved animal companion, to not send her to the Beef Sector, to not let her end up on a Capitol citizen's plate. An act that would be considered treasonous and get her father killed.

Petunia would be buried underneath an old Spanish Oak two years later, passing from disease, far away from anyone's plate. A secret the earth would keep.

Where one was raised with bloodthirst, the other shied away from it whenever she could. He was trained to kill, she was taught to wield her compassion. Something she desperately tried to hold onto in the Arena.

When the Seventy-Second Hunger Games came around, the Navarro family would have their worst nightmare come true. They were almost safe, with her three older brothers aged out and Sage being eighteen. Despite being so close, it wasn't close enough, as her name would be called to be District Ten's female tribute that year. She tried not to cry, but what else can you do when you've been given a death sentence at eighteen?

Where Ptolemus was clearly expected to come out on top in his Games, Sage was more of an underdog in hers. She was well-fed compared to her counterparts, and had spent many nights sleeping under the stars. She even could throw a hatchet— a pass time her and her brothers would practice on the farm when they were supposed to be doing chores. Despite all this, her being a tribute from an outlying District continued to label her as not a threat until she made the final eight.

What really saved her though was her brain. Sage was always clever, and when going up against an arrogant but lethal tribute from One, she needed to be smart. Smart she was, because she led her adversary right along a dead but fallen tree she knew couldn't hold his weight over a ravine, leaving her as the last tribute standing. Literally.

From a quick glance, their love story didn't make much sense. That's part of why The Capitol found it so intriguing. A legacy from Two and a farm girl from Ten? Somehow, it happened.

And it was the realest romance for Panem to spectate in decades.

Even if there were others who didn't want it.

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This prologue isn't my favorite but all well, it is done! I wanted to give some basic background for my two honeys :) flip on over to chapter one when you're done :)

Word Count: 742