第72章

  i struggle again to remember that moment over
  glimmer’s body, when he burst through the trees. but just the
  fact that he was sparkling leads me to doubt everything that
  happened.
  i must have been moving very slowly yesterday because i
  reach the shallow stretch where i took my bath in just a few
  hours. i stop to replenish my water and add a layer of mud to
  my backpack. it seems bent on reverting to orange no matter
  how many times i cover it.
  my proximity to the careers’ camp sharpens my senses,
  and the closer i get to them, the more guarded i am, pausing
  frequently to listen for unnatural sounds, an arrow already fit-
  ted into the string of my bow. i don’t see any other tributes,
  but i do notice some of the things rue has mentioned. patches
  of the sweet berries. a bush with the leaves that healed my
  stings. clusters of tracker jacker nests in the vicinity of the
  tree i was trapped in. and here and there, the black-and-white
  flash of a mockingjay wing in the branches high over my head.
  when i reach the tree with the abandoned nest at the foot, i
  pause a moment, to gather my courage. rue has given specific
  instructions on how to reach the best spying place near the
  lake from this point. remember, i tell myself. you’re the hunter
  now, not them. i get a firmer grasp on my bow and go on. i
  make it to the copse rue has told me about and again have to
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  admire her cleverness. it’s right at the edge of the wood, but
  the bushy foliage is so thick down low i can easily observe the
  career camp without being spotted. between us lies the flat
  expanse where the games began.
  there are four tributes. the boy from district 1, cato and
  the girl from district 2, and a scrawny, ashen-skinned boy
  who must be from district 3. he made almost no impression
  on me at all during our time in the capitol. i can remember
  almost nothing about him, not his costume, not his training
  score, not his interview. even now, as he sits there fiddling
  with some kind of plastic box, he’s easily ignored in the pres-
  ence of his large and domineering companions. but he must
  be of some value or they wouldn’t have bothered to let him
  live. still, seeing him only adds to my sense of unease over
  why the careers would possibly leave him as a guard, why
  they have allowed him to live at all.
  all four tributes seem to still be recovering from the track-
  er jacker attack. even from here, i can see the large swollen
  lumps on their bodies. they must not have had the sense to
  remove the stingers, or if they did, not known about the leaves
  that healed them. apparently, whatever medicines they found
  in the cornucopia have been ineffective.
  the cornucopia sits in its original position, but its insides
  have been picked clean. most of the supplies, held in crates,
  burlap sacks, and plastic bins, are piled neatly in a pyramid in
  what seems a questionable distance from the camp. others
  are sprinkled around the perimeter of the pyramid, almost
  mimicking the layout of supplies around the cornucopia at the
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  onset of the games. a canopy of netting that, aside from dis-
  couraging birds, seems to be useless shelters the pyramid it-
  self.
  the whole setup is completely perplexing. the distance, the
  netting, and the presence of the boy from district 3. one
  thing’s for sure, destroying those supplies is not going to be as
  simple as it looks. some other factor is at play here, and i’d
  better stay put until i figure out what it is. my guess is the py-
  ramid is booby-trapped in some manner. i think of concealed
  pits, descending nets, a thread that when broken sends a poi-
  sonous dart into your heart. really, the possibilities are end-
  less.
  while i am mulling over my options, i hear cato shout out.
  he’s pointing up to the woods, far beyond me, and without
  turning i know that rue must have set the first campfire. we’d
  made sure to gather enough green wood to make the smoke
  noticeable. the careers begin to arm themselves at once.
  an argument breaks out. it’s loud enough for me to hear
  that it concerns whether or not the boy from district 3 should
  stay or accompany them.
  “he’s coming. we need him in the woods, and his job’s done
  here anyway. no one can touch those supplies,” says cato.
  “what about lover boy?”