Heart of Gold • Finnick Odair

-27-

ROSALIE POV

Rue screams out for Katniss' help and the girl with the bow sprints to the forest to find Rue squirming under a net.

She hurried to cut at the rope and frees Rue, who throws her arms round the older girl.

Rue's attention switches from Katniss to Marvel who throws his weapon into Rue's stomach before Rue can even mutter a warning to her ally.

I gasp as Rue looks down, pulling the weapon from her body as Marvel simultaneously falls to the ground dead as a result of Katniss' arrow in his own chest.

Rue falls into Katniss' arms as tears well in her dark brown eyes. Rue asks if she blew up the food.

"Every bit of it," Rue smiles and tells Katniss,

"You have to win." Katniss nods and, after a moment, Rue asks, "Can you sing?"

Rue's voice breaks and Katniss looks at her confused, "what?"

"Rose sings me to sleep sometimes back home, can you?"

I feel my heart break as I watch the scene on the tv, unable to take my eyes from the screen.

Katniss begins to sing as Rue focussed on the trees in the distance. Her eyelids begin to flutter until her vision is gone, and so is Rue.

Katniss closes her eyes and arranges a bed of flowers around the girl.

I'm not a huge fan of the archer, mainly because of my increasing hate for her weapon of choice and also her clearly fake affections towards the seemingly sweet and sincere Peeta, but I respect her for this. For making Rue's death as peaceful as possible in a murder arena and giving her an almost proper 'funeral' instead of her just being lifted straight from the ground carelessly.

She looks at the camera and lifts three fingers to her mouth then the sky, District 12's gesture of farewell.

Unknown to Rosalie, some of the citizens of district eleven back home have a small uprising to avenge Rue whilst she sits in the Capitol's mentor viewing room.

I would leave if I could but I can't, not until both my tributes are gone. And Thresh is still out there.

'Attention, Tributes. Attention. The regulations requiring a single victor have been suspended. From now on, two victors may be crowned, if both originate from the same district. This will be the only announcement.'

I'm shocked to my very core, but I know better than to believe it. It's a trick, the Gamemaker must have a plan as Snow would never allow two children to exit the arena unless he was completely and utterly desperate. And, even then, i'm sure he'd be reluctant to not let us all die.

I snap out of my thoughts when I see Katniss approaching the pack table.

Katniss goes to retrieve District 12's specific pack but is stopped when a knife comes flying at her, she moves and it grazes her forehead. Clove manages to pin her down,

"Where's lover boy? Oh, I see, you were gonna help him right?" she teases. "Well, that's sweet.  You know, it's too bad you couldn't help your little friend. That little girl? What was her name again? Rue? Yeah, well, we killed her. And now we're gonna kill you."

My heart breaks further as a new anger rises in my chest at her words, my fists balled and jaw clenched as she talks so tormentedly about my innocent Rue.

She pulls out a smaller, more precise, knife but is stopped when she's pulled from the ground by a pair of strong arms and shoved against the cornucopia.

"You kill her?" Thresh asks, anger lacing his voice. The girl tries to deny it. "I heard you!" Clove yells out for Cato. "You said her name!"

He smashed her skull against the wall twice before letting her limp body fall to the ground. Out of the compassion in his heart for Rue, he lets Katniss go. For Rue.

Thresh is killed graphically and painfully by a mutant wolf.  As much as the site pains me to see, especially after seeing his fondness for little Rue, at least his death has enabled me to leave that room.

I don't hesitate to leave and am soon approached by Johanna who says nothing as she pulls me into a tight hug, glaring at anyone walking by who dares to stare. I finally let myself cry for Rue, and partially for Thresh who had proved himself a decent person, who had lost their lives in this years games.

Finnick comes out moments later, "last two. Cato was mauled by mutts til Katniss put him out of his misery," he caught us up as we make our way back in to sit back on the couch. When we take our seats, Johanna still has an arm wrapped round my shoulders in a protective manner.

'Attention. Attention, tributes. There has been a slight rule change. The previous revision, allowing for two victors from the same district, has been revoked. Only one victor may be crowned. Good luck. And may the odds be ever in your favour.'

There it is: the cruel twist that would've inevitably found it's way to the so called star crossed lovers.

Peeta tells Katniss to shoot him with her bow and arrow, saying how the Capitol need their victor. Katniss pulled out a handful of berries, poisonous berries. The pair count to three and are about to eat the berries when Claudius yells,

'Stop! Stop! Ladies and gentlemen, may I present the winners of the 74th Annual Hunger Games.'

The two embrace each other.

This isn't gonna be good, I think. They showed them up. They don't take these things lightly. Katniss Everdeen doesn't even know the full extent of what her actions have just caused. The effect she has had and will continue to have. I'm sure she will soon realise the consequence of her actions and, just like the rest of the victors, she'll soon wish she had died in that arena.

The question is: will the effect be good or bad in the long run?