Rise From the Ashes

Chapter Seventeen

I wake up the next morning with Cato holding me in his arms. I cuddle up to him for a moment and then sit up.

"Morning." Cato says softly. "How'd you sleep?"

"Good." I answer. It's still raining. It's turned from a normal rain to a downpour giving us a brief break from the Games. I'm starving but Gale is still on my mind. He must've been sent back to Twelve by now. He's now in a wooden box forever. He never got to tell Katniss how he felt about her. He barely had a chance. I took the only bow. I carefully open the backpack which I only had rooted around for the medicine. I carefully take out a bow and soon a quiver follows. He was finally going to have a chance. I press my hand against my mouth to muffle my pain filled scream and the sob that follow. I didn't even fight for him. I didn't even give him a chance to fight for himself.

"Hey it's okay." Cato wraps his arms around me and lets me sob into his shirt. My mind goes blank and I let him redress me. He coaxes me into eating some groosling and roots before tucking me back into bed. He lets me stay there while he eats and takes care of our wounds. He cleans off my arrows and carefully restocks my quiver. We aren't riveting today. I can almost hear Haymitch groaning.

"Have I told you about Drift?" I ask. Cato shakes his head. "She likes to dance around and braid my hair. She'll spend hours doing and redoing my hair. I gave her my moms old locket for her fourth birthday and she now refuses to take it off. She always tries to give it to me before the reapings. She says I take care of them so I need mom and dads protection. She needs it more then I do. She was two when she died so she doesn't really remember them. I try and remind her of them as regularly as I can but it's hard."

"I can't wait wait to meet her." Cato says softly kissing me.

"I can't wait for you to meet her." I say. I'm starving again. "We should eat. Our food is getting old and there's not much left."

Cato nods and watches me get out our food and split it in half.

"I can go hunt tomorrow. Once the rain stops we'll have a whole forest to feed ourselves with." I say. He takes his half and we both wolf down the food until it's just a pile of bones.

"Yeah. Plus maybe we'll get some sponsors." Cato says. I nod.

"Yeah but for now we should sleep." I say. I make him put his jacket back on and he spreads the sleeping bag out. He carefully zips our second sleeping bag to the first and zips it until we can both slide in comfortably. He slides in and I join him. He pulls me close to him and kisses my head. "I'll take first watch."

"Alright. Wake me up before too long." He says. He settles down and falls asleep holding me tightly. I cuddle up to him and keep my hand on my loaded bow. He's warm and his arms still feel safe. After a few hours I wake him up and he makes me go to sleep. I cuddle up to him and slowly fall asleep.

The next morning it's still raining. It's been a nice break from the Games. No one coming after us. No one being able to find us. I'm ready for it to rain and to let the Games stop. I know everyone is watching us at this moment despite the fact that we're just huddled together for warmth.

"So mind telling me about Katniss?" Cato asks.

"No, Katniss is," I pause. It's hard to describe Katniss without bringing up her hunting. "She's everything I've ever wanted to be. She smart and brave and hardworking. She's spent years taking care of her family in anyway that she can and she still cares so so much. I'm sure if she were here she would be saying the same thing about me but she is the best version of herself already. She can be kind of standoffish and she does have a problem with letting people in but once you get to know her, she will always have your back. She's so very loyal to the people she considers her family. It's hard for her to care for people. She's had a hard life but she somehow manages to do it. I can barely let the people I used to know in anymore. Not that she ever had to deal with that. My walls grew around her."

"You let me in." Cato says softly. It's only half true. He doesn't know about the way the darkness is always threatening to close in on me. It has been for years. He doesn't know that loosing one more person might be the last straw and I might not recover from that. He doesn't know that I'm partially fighting to keep him alive because I couldn't forgive myself if I didn't. He doesn't understand that I'm selfish at my core. Even my volunteering was selfish. While I did volunteer to protect Katniss, it was also to protect me. I can't lose her or Prim. It would break me.

"Well that wasn't that hard." I answer softly. "It was like you were always there."

"I love you." Cato murmurs. I'm about to respond when there's a clunk outside of the cave. I've got an arrow ready to fly before I know it. We haven't eaten all day and it's almost late afternoon. Cato runs out and whoops. He comes back in with a parachute full of food. It's plum pudding and rice with apples, goat cheese, and rolls. They've also given us utensils and plates to eat with. "Okay let's eat a little bit now and we can eat more later if we want."

"Alright sounds good." I answer. I carefully spoon out some for both of us and hand him his plate. While I hand him his plate I kiss him quickly. "I love you too." I say softly enough that he can hear but it would be hard to overhear. I'm sure the Capitol is hanging onto my every word anyway. He takes it and smiles at me.

"Well once this rain stops we should go hunting or something." Cato says. I nod and start eating.

"Yeah hopefully it'll be done by tomorrow." I say. We both eat hurriedly and settle down. He starts telling me about his family and life in Two. He's so excited to show me around when we can finally visit it.

About an hour has passed as Cato just talks about his home and I tell him about Drift and Terra. I eventually open up about mom and dad too. About how mom learned how to braid my hair from my dad so she could make sure it was taken care of and how she always used to kiss my cheek before I left for school. How my dad always helped me gather dandelions. I omit the part about him teaching me how to hunt. The anthem starts playing right as I'm rooting around for more food.

"Looks like Clove got to Thresh." Cato says. I freeze for a second. I wanted him to win if we couldn't.

"Guess we're that much closer to home." I say. Cato smiles and nods.

"That much closer to home." He agrees.