The Lone Wolf

Chapter 24: Peeta

"Which way do you think she would have gone?" I ask Cato as we reach the tree that I know Katniss used to make her home in.

"I'm not sure," he says. "My guess would be home but it's been so long since I was in the Miner's Seam. I'm not sure which way to go." He lifts his pale golden head to the wind, trying to catch his sister's scent. He suddenly perks up his ears and takes off.

"What is it?" I ask as I begin to sprint after him, my black paws kicking up freshly fallen snow in my wake.

"I smell wildflowers in early winter and last I checked, that was part of her scent," he says. We keep running and eventually I too pick up Katniss' scent, laced with fear, through the fresh snow. It seems that we run for hours before my lone hind legs gives out. I fall to the ground with a groan. Cato stops about a hundred feet away and then trots back, his pale yellow paws kicking up snow.

"You okay?" he asks.

"Yeah, I say. "I just need to rest for a little while."

"I'll go see if I can find something to eat," he says nodding to me and heading west. I pull myself into a sitting position as I watch him dash away. I look up to the moon and the sliver smile of the crescent seems to mock me. As I sit here, feeling lost and confused, I finally feel the same resentment towards the goddess that Katniss felt even after she found out she was her mother.

"Selene," I growl. "You sorry excuse for a goddess and even sorrier excuse for a mother, how dare you mock me?! You claim to protect us, to give us light when we are shadowed. Where are you now? Your daughter has strayed and you give me no sign to find her. I cannot survive without her by my side. Our daughter cannot survive without her mother. Show me the way if you are as great as they all say. If not, I shall look upon your light no longer and I promise you not a single child from my pack will ever no your name. Not even your granddaughter. It is your choice you lunatic! Give me your answer!"

I glare at the moon and stars and at first nothing happens. I know she heard me. She has spoken to Katniss many times in dreams and supposedly thinks very highly of me, designing me to be the one to care for her daughter for the rest of her days. Yet now she lies silent. No sign that she even cares anymore. I shake my head and turn me face away from the moon before I feel the warmth of summer though it is the is the dead of winter. I turn my head to see an image that looks so much like Katniss it is erie. She is dressed in fine silver robes and her dark hair moves as though it is in water and stares dance in it.

"Now Peeta," she says. "I would have come if you simply asked nicely. Is your anger the only reason you want to talk to me. I am family after all."

"You let her leave!" I say. "I can't speak to her or feel her warmth. My daughter cries because she can't hear her mother's voice soothe her back to sleep. Do you no longer care about her? Have you ever cared?"

"I do care," she says. "Just as I chose every mate, I chose you to care for her, to be the other half of her fragile heart. And just as I choose every destiny for my children who have the spirit of a wolf and the rationality of a human, I chose that Rain would be the first of what I hope will be many children Katniss will carry care for you. But this is her choice Peeta. This is part of her destiny. She needed to go home. It is your destiny to bring her home. And she will, once she has come back."

"Come back?" I ask. "You mean from the Seam?"

"No," she says. "That is where she resides as we speak and she will not return until she wakes."

"What are you saying?" I ask, standing. "I don't understand."

"When you find her, you will know what my words mean," she says. "All I can say, is that you will not find the one you know well, the one that seems to sleep." Suddenly, before I can question her again, she disappears in a glow of silver light.

"What are you looking at?" I hear a familiar voice behind me ask and I turn just as Cato sets two plump rabbits on the ground.

"Would you believe me if I said your mother?" I ask.

"I know I shouldn't, but yes, I do," he says. "You have the glow of the moon in your eyes. You have looked upon the Goddess." He nudges one of the rabbits towards me and I tear into it gratefully, the animalistic side of me happy for the fresh meat. "What did she say?"

"I don't know," I reply. "Something about not finding Katniss when I get to the Seam, but the one that seems to sleep. But she says that Katniss is in the Seam. How can we go there and not find her."

"She speaks in riddles," he replies. "No sane person would know what she means." He stands up and looks at me. "You ready? I smelled the old scent markers just barely through the snow. About a hundred yards from here, the abandoned camp should be visible."

"Yes," I say. "We need to go." I get up and follow him as he leads the way to the place that was once his home. That was once Katniss' home.

Just as we cross the boarder, we are jumped by about seven pure wolves. Pure animals with no human train of thought. They surround us and one snaps at me. He raises his tawny head to speak.

"Where are you from?" he growls. "This is not your land! Our home! Leave or face our leader!"

"You live here?" I ask. "You live in the Seam?"

"What do you mean seed?" a silver female asks, her black ears raising from the sides of her head, her aggression turning into curiosity. "I know not of seed. But if you mean this place, this is the Ash mountain."

"He said Seam, Blackear!" a large brown she-wolf with large yellow eyes says. "He calls it what Nightmoon does. Perhaps he knows of her." She steps forward and her nose twitches as she takes in both mine and Cato's scents. The tawny wolf shoots forward and shoves her away.

"Stay away from them Owleyes!" he barks. "They are strangers!"

"They carry the same territorial scent of Nightmoon, Duskfoot!" she says. "Especially the black one. We need to take them to her. She will tell us what to do."

"I agree," a black wolf with green eyes says. "This is her decision. She is the leader Duskfoot. Her word is law."

"What is my decision?" I hear a voice say and the crowd parts, bowing their heads respectively as a large black shewolf walks through them. I look up and feel my heart swell.

"Katniss?" I ask. "Is it really you?" I take a step forward, but Duskfoot takes a step to block me from her. He lets out a growl but Katniss pushes him aside and looks at me and in that moment I notice her eyes are different. A silver that seems to be moonlight itself instead of Katniss' usual dark grey. And her voice when she spoke, it was like Katniss', but it almost wasn't. It was more wolf like, like the other pure wolves.

"It's okay Duskfoot," she says to the tawny wolf. They are friends. She looks to me and I see a slight sadness in her eyes. "I'm sorry Peeta, but Katniss isn't here right now. It's me, Taylor, although my friends here call me Nightmoon."

"What?" Cato asks making the same words running through my head. "How?"

"Come," Taylor says turning and gesturing with her tail to follow. "This is complicated and I have much to tell you."