Of Salt and Sacrifice

The people of Panem-the ones in the districts-know better than to think about death. Luck is a rare commodity, and tempting fate is an invitation to horrors that'll haunt you long after the Capitol forgets your name.

Most kids, twelve to eighteen, already carry enough fear in their bones to fill the arena twice over. And now, with the 75th Hunger Games-the Quarter Quell-coming, their imaginations run wild with all the ways they might die.

I thought I wouldn't leave that arena alive. Luck barely exists, and the odds? They've never been kind to me.

And yet... I survived. Somehow. By the thinnest thread imaginable.

This time, I doubt the odds will smile. Maybe I won't make it. And if I don't... I'll make sure they remember me. I'll go down screaming, thrashing, giving the Capitol exactly the spectacle they crave. Let them watch. Let them cheer. If I'm dying, it won't be quietly.