A Court of Roses ↠ Peeta Mellark ✓

11 ; Nightlock

{this may be the last chapter before the epilogue & the second book
dedicated to angel, for her endless support in the making of this book}

"Emberly."

The voice seems distant in Emberly's ears, like it's ten miles away and calling for her. Scrunching up her face, Emberly blinks her eyes slightly before opening them fully and instantly is greeted with Peeta's face looking down at hers.

"Nice to see your eyes again," Peeta teases lightly, a ghost of a smile milking its way onto his face. Emberly stares up at him, before she's in a hurry, lifting herself up and smacking her forehead with Peeta's so hard it makes her shudder.

"Sorry," Emberly grins, seeing Peeta rub his forehead with a pout on his face. A pout that reminds Emberly of a child who didn't get the chocolate he/she was begging their mother for.

Peeta stops rubbing his forehead, blue eyes trained on Emberly's amused face. Emberly's smile falls, her eyes locked with Peeta's before Peeta is slowly leaning into her direction. His eyelids sliding closed, as Emberly moves forward without thinking-

"You're up!" Katniss says, making her way into the cave, making Emberly shove Peeta away with her hand and give the other female tribute a nervous smile. Hoping internally that Katniss hadn't seen what her and Peeta were about to do.

"Ho-How long have I been out?" Emberly asks, making Peeta sigh and look at Katniss, both of them moving their lips as they count softly to themselves.

"Four days roughly. You'd passed out," Katniss states with a small shrug, and the fear on Emberly's face must be evident because Katniss gives Emberly a soft smile. "but you haven't missed much, except Peeta's leg is healed so we can start moving again and actually hunt game."

"You haven't?" Emberly asks, and Katniss shakes her head.

"There hasn't been any to shoot, it seems like the Capitol is making them scarce. Peeta and I think they're preparing for something." Katniss replies, taking a seat inside of the cave.

"We'll let's go hunt." Emberly says, ignoring Peeta's eyes on the side of her face as she grabs the bow on her belt. Which is miraculously still there even after all this time, but her knives are gone, which makes her scrunch up her eyebrows.

"Peeta took them, he needs a weapon." Katniss says, and Emberly instantly wonders how the female tribute managed to read her expression. Nodding her head, Emberly, Peeta, and Katniss remove themselves from the cave.

Their packs on each of their backs as they step into the light of the outside. Emberly quickly notices that it's close to dawn, meaning they have a few hours before they have to head back into the cave for refuge for the night.

"Be quiet," Emberly hisses at Peeta, her and Katniss both searching the forest area for any game. It becomes clear quickly that Peeta has never hunted a day in his life. Being that the blond boy seems to have gone out of his way to step on anything amongst the ground that seems to make noise.

Much to Katniss and Emberly's dismay.

"Are you trying to scare game away?" Emberly asks, whirling her head around to look at Peeta with a slightly angered expression. Her stomach growling softly underneath her dark thermal shirt, being it's already starving from only being awake for a few minutes.

"How about you go collect some berries or roots for us to eat?" Katniss asks, taking the slightly nicer approach to things. Emberly, though can detect the annoyance in her voice towards Peeta and his noisy footsteps.

"Fine, I can see when I'm not wanted." Peeta says, holding up his hands before moving in the other direction, his green jacket hanging off his shoulders. Emberly turns back around towards Katniss, a tiny grin on her face as she lifts her bow into the air.