she's not there

Peeta Mellark still remembers the first time he'd had his palm read.

He remembers the heavy weight of the coins in his hand, his older brothers snickering as they pushed him through the beaded curtain and into the dimly lit tent. You have to go in alone, they teased, ruffling his shaggy blond hair. What are you, chicken?

"I'm not chicken," he said fiercely, hoping that the shaking in his legs wouldn't betray him. He stepped haltingly to the little table, where an old woman sat with a flickering candle before her, and dumped his coins on the tabletop in front of him. One rolled off the table and he bent to pick it up, but her voice stopped him: "Leave it."

If she had a name, it had worn off the sign above the entrance to her tent years ago. Her skin was wrinkled and paper-thin, bright blue veins criss-crossing from her fingertips all the way to the crook of her elbow, where they disappeared under the dark, velvety sleeves of her blouse. To seven-year-old Peeta she was impossibly ancient, her age the only proof he needed of her magic.

Peeta sat in the chair across from her and she grasped his hand, her grip much stronger than she looked. Her yellowed nails were long and they tickled across his palm.

"Average life line," she murmured. She lifted her gaze and studied him, and Peeta stared back, frozen in place by her watery green eyes. "You know pain. Very well."

Peeta swallowed, unable to move.

"That won't end…" She traced a finger across his palm. "You love too easily."

Then the candle blew out.

In the darkness Peeta jerked back in shock, and her long fingers snapped around his wrist like the jaws of a metal trap, capturing its prey.

"Don't." Her nails dug into his skin and he cried out softly. "Do not follow her into the tent. It will bring you nothing but pain." Peeta wrenched his hand from her grasp and backed away, knocking his chair over into the dirt with a soft thud. "Don't you do it, Peeta Mellark," she continued, her voice growing louder. "Do not go into that tent! Do not go -"

Peeta fled from the tent in a panic, gasping in lungfuls of the cool night air, tears streaming down his reddened face. His brothers rushed to his side, suddenly kind and sympathetic, knowing they'd be punished if their parents found out how they'd frightened young Peeta.

"Itoldyou he's too little," hissed Brody, the middle child. Ned elbowed him away, grabbing Peeta by the arms.

"You okay, Peet? What'd she say to you?" Ned sighed, pulling his younger brother in for a hug. "She's just a crazy old lady, Peeta. Everyone knows she's crazy. When I was eleven she told me I only had a year to live, and look, I'm still here."

Peeta didn't answer, just stood there crying in the nice shirt his mother had dressed him in and the shiny shoes that pinched his feet, and that was how their parents found him a half-hour later when they tracked down the boys to take them home. Ma dragged Ned and Brody nearly all the way home by their ears, but Pa had hoisted Peeta up onto his broad shoulders and carried his youngest son home, keeping a distance behind the others. Peeta stopped crying about halfway home, but he didn't answer his father's quiet questions or laugh at his jokes.

And as he drifted off to sleep that night, snuggled under the covers beside his toy cat, he realized in the hazy recesses of his mind that he'd never actually told the old woman his name.

A young woman and her sister join up with the carnival on a Tuesday, somewhere around the New Mexico-Texas border. It's fall, but nothing about the day suggests that winter is coming - the ground is just as dry and cracked as it was in the middle of July, the trees just as dead.

The older girl looks about Peeta's age, 19 or 20, and her black hair falls in a long braid down her back. The other is three or four years younger, the physical opposite of her sister, soft blue eyes and cornsilk hair and pale, pale skin.

"I'll bet anything that's her daughter," Enobaria says knowingly, curling a finger through the coarse auburn hair of her beard. "Ain't look nothing like her sister."

Peeta rolls his eyes. "She's too young. And if she don't look like her sister, why would she look like her daughter?"

"Daddy could be someone fair," she answers, eyeing his dirty blond hair. "Someone like you."

Peeta ignores the implication, his eyes trained steadily on the older girl as she pulls a trunk up the steps into her trailer. He wonders briefly if she's the new girl they've hired to dance, and feels ashamed when his groin stirs slightly in response.

"What's her name?"

"Hell if I know," Enobaria replies coolly, exhaling from her cigarette, and walks away.

"Cat...Catherine?" Delly guesses. "Something like that."

"Hey. I know that girl," Gale says, coming up beside them. "I swear I know that girl."

Peeta looks at him in disbelief. "How?"

"Back home in West Virginia. Our mothers were friends, until they moved away. Must've been ten, eleven years ago at least." Gale whistles low under his breath. "Sure has grown up since then."

"Oh, Gale," Delly whispers rapturously, clasping her hands together beneath her dimpled chin. "Maybe it's a sign. Here we are, thousands of miles away, and you run into a childhood friend. Maybe you're meant to be together!"

"Yeah, maybe," Gale jokes, grinning at Peeta. Peeta smiles back, but the knot in his stomach disagrees. Gale's a magician, clever and roguish and devastatingly handsome in the black suit he wears at night on the stage. Girls swoon for him.

"So, what's her name?" Peeta asks again.

"Katniss."

"Katniss," Peeta repeats, liking the way it rolls off his tongue in a hiss. He's never heard of anyone named Katniss; but then a lot of people say that about the name Peeta, too.

Gale brushes the dust off his trousers the best he can and runs a hand through his thick, dark hair. "I'm gonna go say hi," he says, and sets off for Katniss' trailer. Peeta watches him go, clouds of dirt and dust kicking up in his wake.

Katniss Everdeen is a knife thrower, it turns out, and her younger sister Primrose is her assistant. (Sister, Peeta mouths triumphantly at Enobaria.) They keep to themselves that first day, eating their supper on the steps of their trailer, though Peeta notices Primrose's longing looks towards the big picnic tables in the mess tent where most of the crew gathers at mealtime.

He thinks about walking over and introducing himself, but before he can summon the courage, Gale joins them on the steps. The first time Peeta sees Katniss smile it's as Gale leans back and whispers something in her ear, long legs stretched out before him. It's radiant, and the pang he feels in his chest is sharp and real.

Gone, Peeta thinks. I'm gone.

The carnival stops to set up shop two days later, on the edge of a sleepy little town called Clayton. Some of the crew grumble - fuckin' middle of fuckin' nowhere, sumbitch's lost his mind down the neck of a bottle these days - but Haymitch stands his ground, and Peeta sets the rousties to work pitching the tents.

It's a hot day, unnaturally so, and those who aren't slinging trunks and pitching tents are slouched and silent among the trailers, clothes unbuttoned, damp cloths heavy around their necks. Johanna and Cashmere lean against one of the trucks, their slips damp and see-through with sweat, leering at the workers who trundle past. In the mess tent Gale flicks through a tattered deck of cards, playing a game of solitaire. Mags reclines in a folding chair, her wrinkled feet submerged in a pot of water, her snake wrapped lazily around her calf. Finnick's draped over the steps of the trailer he shares with Annie, muscled and tan in the tight sea green swim shorts he wears in his tank; she's perched at his feet, reading tarot cards in the dust, unaware of the longing looks Enobaria shoots from across the way.

Peeta sees them all, this band of twisted, fucked up freaks who exist for these sleepy little towns only as long as their tracks are still visible in the dirt. But the one he's looking for is Katniss.

He finds her, alone, practicing in one of the empty tents in the northeast corner of the grounds. There's a wooden wheel set up in the tent, painted red and black like a checkerboard, and the knives sink into it one by one, each with a satisfying thud. Peeta could go in, finally introduce himself, maybe tell a joke. But something stops him, and instead he watches her from behind a tent flap that rustles gently in the breeze, unheard and unseen.

Until a knife rips through the fabric a hair's breadth from his head and lodges into the wooden pole beyond it, that is.

He stumbles back, nearly tripping over his own feet, heart pounding in his ears. Katniss is staring at him from the center of the tent, fist clenched around another knife. Slowly, mockingly, she takes a bow.

"Good aim," Peeta manages to sputter.

"Not good enough," she replies, turning back to the practice target. The next knife sinks into the outer edge of the canvas, and Peeta realizes that she's not throwing the blades randomly - she's creating a perfect, five-point star shape on the target.

"Is there a reason you're spying on me?" Her back is still facing him, and it takes Peeta just a second too long to realize she's actually addressing him. His mouth is dry, and she continues before he can respond. "I know. You think I should be up on stage in my drawers, dancing the cooch, right?"

"No." His voice is firm but he stays where he is, hovering on the edge of the tent. "I think you're exactly where you ought to be. I've never seen anyone handle a knife the way you do." Peeta swallows. "Where'd you learn to throw like that?"

Katniss pauses for a long moment, her hand frozen above the little stand where her remaining knives rest, all shiny in a row. "None of your business."

The next knife hits the target hard, dead center, and then the next, and the next; she shows no sign of stopping. Peeta takes it as his cue to leave, and heads back out to check on the rousties, pulse still racing with adrenaline.

For five years, Peeta has operated the ferris wheel. He can tell when it's someone's first time, when they feel light and free like they're flying, and he lets it spin round and round for what feels like forever; he stops it short when he senses a child's terror or a drunk man's dinner coming back up. And when a young couple slides into their seat, hands tangled together, eyes dewy with lust, he stops them at the very top, closer to the moon than even love could ever bring them.

But that night, he tasks Thom with the giant metal beast, telling him he's got to go make sure everything's working properly for the new act. Thom smiles and drawls "Okay, Peet," and Peeta doesn't care, because he's got butterflies in his stomach like he hasn't felt in years, or maybe ever.

And when Peeta slips into that tent at the northeast corner of the grounds, he learns that Katniss Everdeen doesn't just throw knives - she throws them on fire.

At her sister.

He watches from the back of the crowded tent, invisible in the shadows, and feels himself carried away in the awe of the audience. Primrose is strapped tight to a wooden wheel that rotates steadily in place, her long blonde hair in a series of braids that snake away from her head, pinned to the backboard - like a young, beautiful Medusa.

And Katniss...Katniss is a vision: her long black hair in its own braids, twisted intricately around her head like a crown; a black velvet corset, cinched tight around her waist; the light of her knives dancing over the soft curves of her small breasts. Her skirt is long and full, a swirl of colors like Peeta's never seen on fabric before - black and gray and orange and red - and in the flickering firelight it looks like she's made of embers and flame. A girl on fire, he thinks.

When she takes a bow the spectators clap politely and file out into the warm night air. Peeta waits, watches as she steps up to the spinning wheel and gently unpins her sister's hair from the board.

He can see the moment she senses his presence; her shoulders tense, but she doesn't turn around.

"That was incredible," he says, climbing up onto the stage. His leg makes it difficult to do without a cane, and he's glad her back is turned.

"Thank you," she answers. Primrose smiles at him with big blue eyes, waiting patiently for Katniss to loosen the straps around her torso and limbs.

"You're awful brave, letting her throw those knives at you," he tells the younger girl, and her smile grows even wider. She shakes her head.

"Katniss'd never hurt me. She's got the best aim either side of the Mississippi."

"I don't doubt it." Peeta glances at Katniss from the corner of his eye, and his heart thrills to see the soft smile on her face, the pink glow in her cheeks.

Katniss helps Primrose down from the wheel, smoothing her hand over her sister's hair. "I'll take care of this. You go wash up."

"You sure?"

Katniss nods, and Primrose leaves the tent, her long, skinny legs wobbling just a little underneath her. Peeta watches as Katniss pulls the knives from the wooden wheel, placing them carefully in a velvet-lined case that she retrieves from behind the curtain at the back of the stage.

He clears his throat and moves closer. "I think we got off to a rough start." He extends his hand. "Peeta Mellark."

Her gray eyes are unreadable as she takes his hand. "Katniss Everdeen." Her skin is cool and smooth and soft, and he almost feels ashamed of his own, rough and chapped and dry. It's rare to see someone living this life who's so...unblemished.

"I'd like to apologize for earlier this afternoon."

She stares at him for a long moment, before turning back to her knives. "No need," she says simply.

Peeta realizes quickly that she isn't going to fill the silence herself. "It wasn't very gentlemanly of me, spying on you like that."

Katniss doesn't respond, just glances at him for a second. "What exactly do you do around here?"

"I'm Haymitch's right-hand man," he says, not without a hint of pride. It's not an easy job, keeping an entire carnival running when your boss spends half the circuit raving drunk in his trailer. "I keep the rousties in line, keep things running smooth. Keep Haymitch in line," he adds with a grin.

"That could be a whole job right there," she says, tugging hard at a knife that's sunk nearly to the hilt.

"And sometimes it is." He steps forward hesitantly. "You want some help with that?"

"No," she says shortly, but the metal is stubborn, fit snug in the wood. He watches her struggle for a moment, then covers her hands with his, easing the knife out with a sharp tug.

"Thanks," she mutters, avoiding his eyes as she packs the last knife away into her case.

"Sure thing."

Katniss snaps her case shut and looks up at him. "Well, it was nice meeting you, Peeta Mellark."

He knows that he's being dismissed. "You too, Katniss Everdeen."

He can't help himself; he takes one look back just as the tent flaps flutter shut behind him. She's standing by the target, shoulders slumped, head bowed. One arm stretches out, her fingertips resting on the wood.

The midday sun is unrelenting in New Mexico. An entire field of wild carrots dies overnight, right next to the grounds, and worried whispers follow for days: no one's seen it this bad before.

But Peeta bears the hot sunshine with a grin, because after three days it finally drives the Everdeen sisters into the shade of the mess tent at lunchtime.

The women sit together at a small table in the corner and Peeta ambles over casually, his cap pushed back on his forehead. "Mind if I sit?"

Katniss says nothing, but Prim says "Not at all!" and scoots over so he can drag over a fold-up chair.

"How are you ladies enjoying the company?" He addresses Prim, but he can't stop his eyes from flicking back to Katniss, to the lone bead of sweat dripping slowly down the slope of her tanned neck.

"Very much," Prim says enthusiastically. "The food's much better than we're used to."

Peeta laughs. "You won't be sayin' that a few weeks from now."

"We're not choosy," Katniss says, no hint of humor in her voice. Peeta's smile falters a little.

"I'll eat anything," Prim agrees, but she catches Peeta's eye and he can tell she's trying to lighten the mood. "Thanks to years of Katniss' cooking."

Katniss rolls her eyes, but he glimpses that same smile he saw the week before, the one she can't hold back from her sister.

"I gotta run," Prim says abruptly, letting her spoon fall onto her plate. "Annie's s'posed to read my cards."

"Don't believe a word of it," Katniss mutters, but Prim doesn't seem to hear her, skipping off into the sun.

Quiet settles over them then, the soft scrapes of their spoons against the tin bowls the only sound.

"So what brings you here?" he finally asks, breaking the silence. "To Abernathy's, not to lunch." Katniss looks down at her hands, like she's unsure if she wants to answer him.

"We were with an outfit in Texas," is all she says.

"Hotter'n hell down there. I gotcha," he says after a pause.

A smile flickers over her face, but it's gone before he can catch it, commit it to his memory. "Our manager started taking an interest in Prim, now she's a little more grown up." Her brow creases into a frown. "He somehow got it in his head we weren't bringing in as much money as we used to, and he wanted Prim to...'make up for it,' is what he called it."

"That's terrible," he says softly.

Her eyes meet his, squinting in the sunlight. "What about you?"

Peeta hesitates, then raps his knuckles against the metal brace strapped tightly to his leg.

"My ma went a little too far with the rolling pin one day," he says, absently running his fingers over the leather straps. "Knocked me down the stairs. Soon as it healed up...I ran away with the circus."

Katniss tilts her head in question. "The rolling pin?"

"We owned a bakery," he explains. "Lived above it. I suppose they still do. Haven't been back in years, so I can't really say."

Her eyes flick back to his leg before meeting his gaze. "Does it hurt?"

"Sometimes." Peeta pulls at one of the straps on his brace. "This thing's a real pain, but I can barely walk without it."

"Your ma," she repeats, so quietly he's not sure that she meant him to hear it. "Your pa run off?"

Peeta looks down at his hands, rubbing at a callous self-consciously. "Nah, he was around." That had almost been worse, growing up; that his father was around, and didn't care enough to stop it.

Katniss breathes in sharply then, as though she's about to speak, but she lets the silence hang between them. Peeta glances at her, unsure. "So you and G-"

"My pa's dead," she says suddenly.

"Oh." He swallows. "I'm sorry to hear that."

"He taught me to throw the knives," she says, staring blankly past his shoulder. "Wasn't nothing but a hobby to him. But he died and…our ma went numb. And it was the only thing I had going for us."

He waits, but it's all she says. "I'm sorry," he says again.

Katniss frowns. "Got nothin' to do with you." Before he can answer, she walks away.

Peeta's certain he's lost his shot – not that he had one to begin with – but that night as he's offloading the last few stragglers from the Ferris wheel, he feels a sudden warmth at his side.

"I've never been on one of these," Katniss says, staring up at the metal contraption. "Is it safe?" Her corset's been replaced with a simple shift dress, and her hair hangs down her back in a simple braid, but her makeup from the show is untouched, black and gold and gray swirls still encircling her eyes.

He wants her, badly; it pulls at him low in his belly, like embers that can't be snuffed out.

He says, "It's safe," and holds the safety bar out for her and fastens it securely once she's seated. "I won't let it go too fast," he promises, but he can see the flicker of fear in her curt nod.

Her fingers clench around the bar as the wheel lurches into motion, knuckles pale in the moonlight. He keeps it slow, controlled, one, two, three times around, until finally he stops her right at the top. Even from the ground he can see her chin lift as she tips her head back to admire the sky, and he wishes he was beside her, holding her hand, kissing her under the stars.

A shuffling gait to his left announces Haymitch, and the older man waves a hand in greeting when Peeta finally breaks his gaze away from the girl in the sky. "Who's still up there?" he demands. "We're about to close the gates."

"It's just Katniss," Peeta says, letting his eyes flicker back to her profile for just a moment. "You can close 'em. I'll bring her down soon."

He can feel Haymitch's eyes on him as he jerks the lever, the wheel groaning back into motion. "You're sweet on her," Haymitch says.

Peeta tries to hide his smile. "Nah, just doin' her a favor."

"You be careful with that one," Haymitch says gruffly. "She's got secrets."

"We've all got secrets," Peeta says distractedly, watching the way her feet kick out delicately before her as she lands back on the ground. He locks the lever back into place and hustles to let her out. "What do you think? Safe?" He holds out his hand to help her down.

Katniss takes it. "Safe," she agrees, and he's almost positive he's not imagining the half-smile on her lips as she turns and walks away, disappearing into the darkness.

They stay three more nights in Clayton, and then four in a barely-there place called Logan, and Katniss appears by his side at closing time on each one of them. She's reserved, and he makes terrible jokes, and the first time he makes her laugh it's like a swarm of moths let loose in his belly, crashing into one another, clumsy with giddiness. She's funny, too, in a quiet way he didn't expect.

But the way he falls – no, crashes – into love: he expected that. He expected that from the moment he saw her.

"You're my best customer," he teases one night, locking the safety bar before her.

"No I'm not," she says. "I never pay."

"Tell you what." He leans against the bar, trying hard to ignore how close she is, how he could lean in and kiss her if she just scooted forward a little on the seat. "Let me watch you practice tomorrow. Then we're even."

She bites her lip, then nods. "Deal."

Katniss lets him watch. She even puts on a little show, curtsying at the start and finish, throwing a few knives backwards, over her shoulder.

"I don't do that with Prim," she says, "too dangerous," though every single blade sticks its landing.

If the Ferris wheel is their evening routine, the tent becomes their daytime. She practices obsessively, knife after knife after knife, then starts it all over again, for hours on end. He understands: it's her sister at the other end of the blade. But her aim is never anything but perfect.

"You ever take a break?" he asks her one afternoon, wiping the sweat from his forehead. "I'm exhausted just watching you."

"No," she says shortly.

"Maybe I can persuade you," he teases. "Maybe some nice cool lemonade –"

"I said no," she snaps, sinking a knife into the target on her last word. She throws four more and then spins on her heel to look at him. "And I don't need any more distractions."

Peeta wets his lips, pulling himself to his feet. "You're right," he says. "I'm sorry. I'll let you be."

He walks away hoping he'll feel a soft hand on his shoulder, fingers tugging gently at the back of his shirt, but there's only the breeze.

It takes them four days to reach Tucumcari, to the south. He doesn't see much of Katniss during those days, no more than the dark flash of her braid or the glint of a knife when he passes her practice tent.

He starts to sit with Delly at lunchtime again, and while she prattles on about one of the pregnant ewes in her petting zoo he watches Gale approach the little card table where Katniss and Prim sit together, folding his long legs beneath the tabletop as he settles into a chair.

Delly elbows him in the side. "You haven't heard a word I've said."

Peeta offers her a sheepish smile. "I'm sorry. Didn't get much sleep last night."

"You don't have to lie to me. I've seen the way you watch her." Delly grins as she stands, brushing biscuit crumbs off the front of her dress. "I think she likes you better."

He decides maybe Delly is right – because she comes to him out of the darkness their first night in town, like always, waiting patiently for her ride. And when Katniss steps down from her car that night, she doesn't let go of his hand. "Let's look at the stars," she says, and when she squeezes his hand he knows it's an apology.

They lay side by side in the bed of one of the baggage trucks, feet dangling over the edge. The full moon is one of the brightest Peeta's seen, and Katniss looks magnificent in its silver beams of light, like she's glowing. It's a perfect moment, one he could live in forever. He rolls onto his side, touches her cheek. He kisses her.

She kisses him back, and opens her mouth beneath his, deepening the kiss. But when his hands come to rest on her waist she pulls back, turning her head away from his. "We shouldn't do this."

Peeta shifts onto his back, staring up at the sky. The night is gorgeous, but he can only feel disappointment aching in his bones. It's his leg; his goddamn useless excuse for a leg. No woman in her right mind wants to saddle herself with a cripple. "Okay," he says quietly.

Katniss is silent for a long moment. Her voice is hesitant when she asks, "You're not going to ask why?"

"No," he sighs, "I'm not."

They stay in Tucumcari another four nights, and Peeta shuts down the Ferris wheel early on each of them. Business is better here – they're in an actual town, for once – and the night before they're set to pack up and leave, Haymitch agrees to a booze can for the whole group.

Katniss isn't there, as far as Peeta can tell, and it's just as well, because he doesn't know if he's ready to face her yet. They had laid there in that truck bed together for hours, in silence, but she hadn't touched him again, not even a brush of hands. Sometimes he thinks it was a dream, anyway; a sad dream, the kind that leaves you lost and hazy for days.

So Peeta drinks, and arm wrestles with Finnick, and dances with Annie, and listens to Enobaria complain about the heat. In this tent, on this night, the girl on fire doesn't exist.

Halfway through his fourth beer, Gale Hawthorne claps him on the back, clinking the neck of his bottle against Peeta's.

"Hey," Peeta says. He gets along fine with Gale – with everyone, really – but they don't typically seek one another out.

"Hey. So you and Katniss Everdeen," Gale says, getting straight to the point. "You two been spendin' a lot of time together."

Peeta swallows down the sick feeling in his stomach. "We were," he says. "Not anymore."

"No?" Gale takes a long sip of his drink. "So you won't be sore if I…"

Peeta chugs what's left of his beer, dropping the empty bottle at his feet. "Go for it," he says dully, grabbing another.

But the next morning, what hurts even worse than the piercing headache and the sour stomach is the thought of Gale and Katniss: of Gale kissing her, touching her, loving her.

Peeta makes it through the morning in a clouded, hungover haze. He has to see her. Has to talk to her – convince her – that they could be good. There are still things he could do with a busted leg. They could open up a bakery somewhere, when the rain comes back and things are looking up, and she'll never have to throw knives at the person she loves just to survive.

He knows she'll be practicing. He knows she doesn't want distractions. But he can't wait.

The knife leaves her fingers just as he bursts through the tent flaps.

He doesn't know that she's practicing with Prim.

A shriek, then a wail. Peeta stops dead in his tracks. There's blood – so much of it – and Prim is pale as a ghost, except for where the blood is, bright bright red dripping to the ground –

"Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck." He runs his hands through his hair, wild-eyed with panic. "I'm so – I'll run for Doc Aurelius –"

"NO!" Katniss screams the word, her voice so raw that Peeta falls completely still. Her hands are red and wet. "Close the tent," she orders, and he does it, tying the flaps shut tight with shaking hands. It feels like hours pass before he's finished.

By the time he turns back around, she is untying Prim from the board. "What can I do," he gasps, stumbling towards them, his knee screaming in pain.

"I'm okay," Prim says, though her voice sounds unsteady. "Look."

She extends her skinny arm, and –

She's okay. There's blood smeared on her arm, but – impossibly – her skin is whole, unmarked. Perfect. "It's okay," she repeats. "Just a scratch."

Peeta stares down at her arm, then her face, which is drawn and pinched. Prim's lips are pursed together tightly. "But I saw you," he says weakly.

"Peeta, go to your trailer," Katniss says, stepping to Prim's side, unnaturally calm. "I'll be there. Just wait for me. Please," she adds, touching his hand gently with her fingertips.

So Peeta leaves, nearly tripping over a dead bird on the ground just outside the tent. He weaves around the tents, avoiding anyone who might try to draw him into a conversation, and stumbles up the steps into his one-room trailer. When he faces the mirror, running a hand down his cheek, he sees the spots of dried blood on the back of his hand where she'd touched him.

As promised, there's a knock on his door before sunset.

"Yeah," he says hoarsely.

Katniss steps inside, closing the door quietly behind her. She doesn't come any nearer, and for a long moment he simply watches her, hoping for a smile, laughter. It was all a joke. A prank.

"I'm sorry," he says.

"It's alright." She frowns, looking down at her hands. They're clean, he notices. "I shouldn't be practicing with her out like that. I should have closed the tent."

She meets his eyes then, her own dark and serious in the dim light, and he knows it isn't a joke. It's something far, far worse than a joke. "You healed her," he whispers.

Katniss moves, finally, sitting beside him on the edge of the lumpy cot he calls a bed. She reaches slowly for his hand, tracing her fingertips delicately over his dry, cracked knuckles.

He swallows hard; even now, her touch sets him alight. "How?"

Her mouth curls up in a half-smile. "I wish I could tell you," she says quietly, her eyes still trained on his hands, her fingers still moving lightly against his skin. "Did you see the bird?"

He doesn't know what she means, at first, and then he remembers: the dead one. "Yeah."

"That's the price," she says. "If you give, you've got to take it from somewhere."

"A bird for a sister," he says with a shaky laugh. "Not a bad deal."

"That was just a cut," she says. "You give more, you take more."

"More?"

"It could be anyone," Katniss says. She pulls the curtain back from the window behind them with one finger, a thin beam of light streaming through from the outside, flickering into shadow as people pass by. "It could be a horse or a donkey. But it could also be Delly or Gale or Finnick or Enobaria. It could be you."

A shiver rolls down his spine.

"You can't tell anyone. Ever," she murmurs. "You know that, right?"

He nods, swallows thickly. "Yes."

She pauses, staring down at her own hands. "Prim always has to come first. I can't let someone else confuse that."

He knows; he knew the second he saw Prim's arm, smooth and whole and smeared with her own blood. But it doesn't make it any less painful.

Desperation suddenly clutches at him. "I wouldn't expect you to –" He grabs her hand, holding it against his chest. "I swear, I wouldn't."

Katniss finally looks at him then, her eyes shining with tears. "It doesn't matter," she says. "You aren't the one who chooses."

"Please," he says quietly, cupping her jaw in his hand, his thumb running over her cheek. She leans into the touch, closing her eyes. "I'm not ready to give you up."

Her eyes flutter open, and in the fleeting moment before she kisses him, he sees something unidentifiable there: soft but determined; hungry, but tinged with sorrow.

But then there are her lips and her tongue and her slim, warm body pressing up against him, into him, invading his senses, clouding his mind. Her hands run up his chest, over his cheeks, into his hair, and he breathes in deep as she crawls into his lap.

It happens so fast. He undresses her first, working the straps of her dress over her shoulders, slipping the fabric down over her hips. Her breasts are small and firm, and when he runs his tongue over the peak of her nipple her breath escapes in a sigh, her fingers tightening in his hair.

Katniss pulls back slightly, making quick work of the buttons on his shirt, but when she turns her nimble fingers to the clasp of his pants he stops her. "I'm – um –"

"Oh," she breathes, and she shifts off of his lap, her dress pooling around her feet on the floor as she bends to remove his brace. She struggles a little with the leather strap, but eventually it falls to the ground with a thud, and his heart thuds painfully in his chest as she kneels between his legs, unbuttoning his trousers.

Peeta shakes his head, covering her hands clumsily with her own. He doesn't want her to see. "I don't – don't," he falters, and he can't stop his gaze from flicking to his knee. He's been stupid. He'll never own that bakery.

Katniss' eyes soften, and she looks back up at him, twining her fingers briefly through his before she tugs at his pants, firmer this time. "Let me," she says softly, and he squeezes his eyes shut and lifts his hips, letting her pull them away.

There is silence for a moment, and then a sound from the back of Katniss' throat, and then something wet and warm on his knee – the bad one – and he opens his eyes. Her lips are pressed against it, his misshapen, scar-crossed knee, and his breath catches painfully in his throat.

"Am I hurting you?" she whispers, pulling away slightly, and when he shakes his head she kisses it again: top, bottom, left, right. She shifts on her knees and presses kisses up his thigh, to the edge of his drawers. Her breath is hot against his skin and when she leans on his good leg for balance he wraps his arms around her, pulling her up against his chest, kissing her fiercely.

They kiss and they sigh and they touch and they kiss more; and then he is flat on his back, Katniss straddling his hips, the warm, wet heat of her almost unbearably good against the sensitive skin of his cock. She takes him in her hand and guides him to her center, sinking down onto him with a shuddering intensity.

His fingers dig into her hips as she moves, slowly at first, then with a steady, rocking motion. She leans forward and brushes her lips against his jaw. "Tell me when you're gonna come," she says.

Peeta moans in response, thrusting up into her. He's never been this deep before; never had a woman on top of him, riding him, her perfect breasts swaying with the motion. Her eyes flutter shut and she arches her back as she slides up and down his length, and he would die for this, he really would.

He manages to warn her just in time, and she slips off of him as he lets go. He cleans her off with a rag and then lays her down, sliding down between her legs to finish her with his mouth. She comes hard under his tongue, shaking beneath him.

"I'm sorry it can't be different," she murmurs later, laying half on top of him in the tiny bed.

"Me too," he whispers.

But he'll pretend for as long as he can, and he sleeps deeply that night, Katniss curled up against his chest.

Peeta dreams of warm rain and mud; of running through puddles and climbing trees, and a hand twined through his, never letting go.

She's gone in the morning.

Her scent still lingers, and Peeta lays there with his eyes closed before he finally forces himself to start the day. He feels better than he thought he would; physically, at least.

He knew she'd be gone from his bed. But as soon as he steps foot outside he hears the whispers: she's gone gone, her sister too, their sparse belongings with them. Peeta wanders into the mess tent for breakfast and feels like he's stumbled upon a crime scene: Haymitch cursing up a storm by the big vat of oatmeal; Delly sobbing alone at an empty table; Enobaria spreading gossip in a corner.

He sits with Delly, falling into a chair almost absently, overwhelmed by the night behind him, by the day before him. "What's wrong?"

"Lulu, my sheep – the pregnant one – she's dead," Delly gasps, a fresh wave of tears overcoming her. "Just…just dropped dead."

"I'm so sorry," he murmurs, but all he can think about is Katniss; her skin under his tongue, her heartbeat under his palm. Where she is right now. Where she'll be. How many birds lay dead along the desert path forged by the Everdeen sisters.

Delly sniffs loudly, wiping at her eyes with a handkerchief. "Oh, it'll be alright," she says unconvincingly, voice trembling. "It's just, the baby lamb, and –"

She stops, staring down at Peeta's lap in confusion. He glances down. "What?"

Delly shakes her head slightly. "It's – I'm sorry. It's just, Peeta. Did you forget to wear your brace?"

Written for Day 3, Queen Anne's Lace, of the Prompts in Panem March 2014 challenge. :)

Based on concepts from the HBO series Carnivàle, which was awesome and cancelled too soon.