Gilded Songbird 𓅚

1] The Victor

Rain, under the spell of frigid temperatures, transforms into delicate crystals of snow.

When those eyes rose to hers, they glinted like shards of ice; glacial as the frozen terrain. Age had sculpted him with sharp contours and a hardness to his features only time itself could mold.

She imagined that even the pad of a fingertip daring to touch him would sear like frostbite, a slow, continuous burn so cold it would fester deep beneath the skin. Flakes glimmered off the varying shades of frost in his hair, akin to a mythological being straight out of an otherworldly realm. A mythical novel once devoured as a coveted pastime when she'd been able to lay out in the golden fields with a book.

  But Lucy Gray no longer believed in fairytales. This one certainly had naught a happily ever after. His gaze alone was like that of a ravenous wolf far more primitive than those sought in the wild lands of the north.

  Tap, tap, tap. The continuous action of that single pale finger grated on her nerves, exacerbated by the anxiety she'd garnered from the games. A pregnant silence settled between them, a silent battle of wills neither was willing to relinquish.

  The angular curve of his jaw rested at an angle, broad chin tilted up rather than meeting her gaze in equal measure. Judgement was set in the curve of his brow; a Capitol elitist to District scum. From the heavily lined waistcoat tailored to his lithe physique to the cologne that laced the musky air.

She couldn't remember the last time she'd had a proper bathe.

As they say, Lucy Gray, never bite the hand that feeds you. Well, she'd done just fine without his aid.

Never provoke a snake that struck just as vicious.

Speed had been one advantage she'd had with the hundreds of acres at her disposal. The wilds had sharpened her soft curves and honed her into something feral. The lay of the land was mapped in her blood now. She dared him to outrun her, a raised scar left from the graze of his bullet, punctuated by the grim reminder of this man's ire.

"See the Capitol becomes you, Coryo." Let her words bruise that ego that had damned the both to this hell. The honeyed lacquer of her words had long been spoiled. He would see the monster he'd created.

The bite in her words seemed to have the desired affect as his eyes flashed once in warning. "Tread carefully with your words, Lucy Gray. That's an order from Panem's President."

A huff of a laugh slipped past her lips as she took a feigned courteous bow. She would bury her fear behind her venomous bite. "Well, here I am Mr. President," The rustic accent she laid deliberately thick. "What brings you to this neck of the woods?"

  It went without being said that they both knew. By his cocked brow and the furrowed line between her's. But a southern belle to a fault, simple pleasantries could still be afforded, however brittle and hostile the act. She was still a performer through and through and it had once led him to her, like a horse to water.

By his disinterested perusal of the little abode, it was clear he found it as a whole barbaric. "While old grudges do die hard, I've not summoned for your execution." He eyed the weapon in her hand, well versed in combat hence nary a flinch from him. "I admit, after it was reported the Mayor killed you in an act of vengeance for Ms. Lipp—the harlot she was—I thought you dead. You can imagine my surprise when I was informed by my men, of a rabid woman in these parts matching your likeness. Naturally, I exercised the necessary resources at my disposal since clearly, I was deceived. What has it been now six years—seven?"

  She bared her teeth as her lips twisted into a grin, "Time moves differently in these woods. You hunt only a ghost, Coriolanus."

  He tsked shoving his hands deep into the pockets of his jacket, one leather glove visible. An elongated leg remained draped over the other, the toe of his boot rutted to the floor. "My, how uncivilized you've become, Lucy Gray, even for a district."

"Fuck you, Coriolanus."

"Such tongue for a gaunt girl barely surviving on scraps. Tell me," His towering form leaned into her blade then as if to provoke her, "does your precious Covey know of your whereabouts? Last information received spoke of a cousin of yours, Maude Ivory. She's now with a child out of wedlock with some brute miner. My, quite the scandal and so young." He pressed a finger to his lips in mock contemplation. "If I recall it's the same age as you were at the 10th annual Hunger Games. Now with an unborn child in such a place..."

It felt as if a weighted stone had been shucked into the bowels of her stomach. The air left her in one fell swoop as her arm unconsciously lowered. "You wouldn't," she whispered, a slight tremor in her words.

"Test me again, Lucy Gray, this isn't the same man you abandoned to the woods." His threat resonated down to the weave of her existence. With a swift, practiced motion, he'd dislodged the dagger from her grasp before he continued. "Now here's what's going to happen: surrounding these perimeters are several Avoxes and armed men solely loyal to the long lineage of the Snows. Just as my father before me. Oh yes, you'd be surprised what comes out of the woodwork when status is reinstated. Now, they will only act on my order. Of course, I'd prefer you come willingly. But this isn't a negotiation."

  Anger simmered beneath the surface and shook her words. Instinctually she'd switched to fight or flight mode. "How can you be so cruel?"

  "If you dare run from me," he added in a quiet voice honed to be just as lethal, "then you'll get to personally choose who goes first. Tam Amber your mandolin player or perhaps Clerk Carmine Clade. That's Billy Taupes brother isn't it..?"

With a strangled cry, she lunged at him, grabbing for the crushed velvet lapels of his jacket hoping it ripped down to the seams. "I hate you!"

He just as quickly recovered, throwing her up against the wall with a sneer. "Hear this now, Lucy Gray Baird, this is your final warning. I will not ask again. Like that," he added with the snap of a finger, "I could call it in. So, what will it be?"

She grit her teeth nostrils flared as his arms caged her in like a trapped bird. She was well and truly caught in the devil's snare. "I'll go with you if you promise they won't be harmed."

He leaned in close, scraping a platinum strand that had fallen loose. "Not a hair on their head, darling." He seemed to breathe the words against her lips as his eyes traced over every delicate feature of the songbird just as much contorted in loathing.

It made her want to shrink under his gaze and disappear into the shadows themselves. Even as she squared her chin in defiance, she hoped he could taste the vinegar in her words. She was no melted sugar, least of all under him. "I'm nobody's darlin' sweetheart."

He tilted his head to the side with a small curl of his lip. He brushed a strand of her hair caught on the corner of her mouth she reactively flinched from. It had been years since her last physical contact with someone in her nomadic life.

As he eased back, an ivory budded rose was retrieved from a buttoned pocket. Her eyes widened at the practiced action, a reflection of their shared past. With his gaze fixed on her, he tore off a velvet petal and rolled it beneath his tongue as he said, "Ask me how it tastes... now."

Lucy tried to make herself as small as possible while trapped between himself and the wall, a nail embedded in the knotted groves of wood. Truly a rock and a hard place. "You tell me."

He chuckled, soft, the sound hardly filled with true mirth. Those eyes glimmered like a sea of glass before he leaned in close, his hot breath against the nape of her neck as he jerked her chin between the index of his forefinger and thumb.

"Tastes like victory."