Written for the "Behind the Mask" prompt of Week 2 of the Twelve Shots of Summer: Second Raid... and, also, I suppose for the "My Monster and Me" prompt.

After all, Tom Riddle behind the mask is very scary indeed.

It was never a choice. Not for her.

They called her sister's name in the Reaping, and Katniss stepped forward without a thought. Of course her sister couldn't survive. Not in a bloody fight to the death. And even though it means laying down her life, Katniss would become tribute instead.

She looks across and sees Peeta, the boy with the bread. She knows him, the one who had shown her mercy when she needed it most, and the irony of it twists in her stomach. She tries not to think that one of them will die. Instead she swears to her sister that she will return, for there is no point in speaking the truth.

Not even a whisper when his name is called. The crowd turns to watch the boy as he strides forward, parting the crowd as if he is a leader and not a tribute heading to the slaughter.

He has no family, no one that gasps in horror at the sound of his name. His mother, long dead, and his father, long gone - an orphan, nothing more. But everyone is unusually quiet, a strange look on their faces. Later the announcer would remember how the paper with his name had seemed to float to her fingers above the rest - perhaps a stray breath of wind. She would also note that it was odd, indeed, the intensity with which he had been regarded at that instant - especially for a poor boy with nothing to his name.

Across from the boy is a flaxen-haired girl, perhaps wily enough to survive for the first few days but not much longer.

While she bids her family farewell with shaking hands a mere hour later, the boy sits alone. He promises no one to return, nor does he shake with anticipation or fear.

When the Peacekeeper comes back to tell him that the farewells are over, that he must be on his way, she finds herself strangely unsettled. For she could have sworn - for a moment, even though it had flickered out of sight like a candle snuffed to the darkness - that he had been smiling.

Katniss looks at her mentor, the drunken Haymitch who seems to treat this whole thing like a joke, and already knows that she is fighting a losing battle. The blond boy beside her possesses an earnest smile - she'll easily lose any sponsors to his sincere words, his easygoing demeanor.

And the worst thing is, he means all of it. He's the mediator in all the sullen conversions she has with Haymitch, he's the one to reassure them that everything that everything will be all right even when his own brow is furrowed with anxiety. And he's the one waving to the crowd eagerly when the train rolls in, despite the fact that they are pigs sent to the slaughter. This is nothing but preparation before they are killed, she thinks bitterly.

Yet, he somehow can reconcile himself with this fact. He knows that he will die, and he smiles anyway.

Everything about him is so wholeheartedly nice, and sometimes she wishes she could fake that nonchalance that he seems to wear so effortlessly.

As he scans the rest of the tributes, Tom finds little of interest. They all stand in a circle, sizing each other up as the training instructor rattles off statistic after statistic about how they will most likely find themselves dead.

He easily profiles them, measuring their strengths and weaknesses to generate a prediction for each. Menacing but stupid Careers: the boy from Two looks like he will be among the last three remaining. A slightly clever girl from Five: she's observant, for sure, but not enough to save her from some misstep late in the game. A little child from Eleven: her demise will be mid-game at the hands of some much stronger tribute, and so on. It will only be a matter of time before they all kill each other. Nearly all of their strategies are painfully see-through - some blatantly avoid showing their specialty (which means Tom immediately knows what it is, given the direction of their surreptitious glances) and others make a show of their talent, hoping to scare other tributes off (not the most effective strategy, either).

He concentrates as one of the swords topples from the weapons rack onto the boy from Two, and suppresses a smirk as the wounded boy whirls in rage to find nothing but inanimate objects. Well, he's had his fun. To make sure he doesn't attract attention, he picks two mediocre skills to be good at and proceeds to prove that he's decently good at those two things and not-so-good at everything else. Right in the middle of the pack.

He notices the boy from Twelve frosting his arm so that it looks like tree bark. From his dexterity, he's most likely a chef, perhaps a baker of some sort. Tom gives him about twelve days before he is clobbered to death by the Careers.

Next to him, his fellow district-member warns him of something, judging from her grave face - likely that he should avoid looking like a target. A pity, Tom thinks, that it's already been accomplished. He looks at the raw gratitude on the boy's face and immediately deduces that he's in love with her - and judging from her painfully serious expression, she has no idea.

The girl must be a fool to extend aid to a fellow tribute, but she's undoubtedly accustomed to surviving on little. She looks as if she could make it to the endgame, as well - better her than a lumbering Career.

She looks up, directly at him - and he looks away non-threateningly at her to show he means no harm. Not yet, anyway.

Katniss has found no one she particularly wants to be in an alliance with, except perhaps the quietly mischievous girl from eleven. The rest seem like more trouble than they're worth - the Careers, especially, look like they're ready to pounce. As Peeta is at work with the frosting, she catches the boy from six watching - he doesn't look particularly predatory, like the Careers, but rather bemused. She doesn't blame him - the Hunger Games is hardly a baking competition.

She notices him again, later - he seems to have an uncanny ability to make fires, even within seconds, and he's skilled with setting snares as well. Remembering the girl from eleven and her abilities to steal and move about unnoticed, Katniss' stomach leaps. If she was to form an alliance... to gather all the people with skills suited to stealth...

She pauses, thinking, and then finally decides to approach the snare-setting station. If nothing else, it can't hurt to learn a bit more about how to set traps, and she's already well-versed in making snares due to her experience back at home.

"Tom," he says, voice a charming baritone, while she's busy setting the trap. Her hands fumble a little, and she redoubles her concentration. "Tom Riddle." He almost reminds her of Peeta, she decides, but she doesn't know why - perhaps it's that inexplicable charisma, evident even in the syllable it had taken him to introduce himself.

"It's Katniss Everdeen," she says, and is quiet while she thinks of what to say.

"Good to meet you," he says, seeming friendly. He finishes yet another snare and stands to survey his handiwork. "Were you perhaps thinking of an alliance, Katniss?"

She watches him warily. "Were you?"

He merely smiles, the expression light and courteous. "I'll admit I was," he shrugs as he walks around his snare. "The Careers look like they're ready to kill, and I'd bet that boy from District 1 will be in the top three for sure."

They both go silent, watching the boy in question as he spars with a fellow tribute and disarms him within thirty seconds.

"I'll talk to Peeta - I mean, the one who's also from District 12," Katniss says carefully. "Maybe we can work something out."

Tom raises an eyebrow. "I'm pretty sure he's in love with you, you know. Best plan accordingly." There's a slight jesting tone to his words, and Katniss quickly brushes it off. There's no way this Tom could know anything about it and it's also not possible, she tells herself, and leaves it at that.

"Anyway," Tom continues, "as much as I like the idea of an alliance, I'd be very hesitant to join forces with someone else in a game centered on killing. Actually, you know what, Katniss? I think you'll go far, as long as you stay away from the others. You're good at surviving, from what I can tell, and the only way you'd die would be if you trusted someone you shouldn't, or if you took unnecessary risks." He shrugs good-naturedly, as if they're already friends and he's not talking about her possible impending death.

"And what about you?" Katniss replies, a little unnerved.

"Me?" Tom laughs. "I'm not particularly strong. And I'm not very good at surviving. I can make traps but that's about it. I'll probably last for two weeks at most," he says matter-of-factly, "and that's if I'm lucky enough to escape the Bloodbath."

She's taken aback by his self-depreciation. Could it all be an act? Perhaps, she thinks, but she finds that hard to believe.

"I think you could do it though," he says. "Really. My bet's on you, the girl from Six, the boy from Eleven, or a Career, and you should make it as long as you trust no one. Good luck then, fellow tribute," he adds with a nod.

Katniss shakes her head but says nothing, studying him as he moves to the fire-making station and proceeds to light yet another fire.

"Hm," his stylist says, giving him an appraising look. She's wearing a dark outfit of angles and sharp edges - her pale face set off only with lavender lipstick. "What angle shall we give you, District Six?" She paces around him slowly, but he does not turn to meet her gaze - his mouth is set firmly as he looks straight ahead, lost in thought.

"Tall, dark, and handsome - tried and true. You're certainly attractive enough to rally a decent number of sponsors," she continues. "I can already tell you're not the talkative type, though. Perhaps we can try to make you mysterious - with any luck, they'll jump behind a brooding boy with a dark, secretive past. Thoughts?"

"Oh," he says, turning around, "I don't know if I'm particularly mysterious. I do like to talk - it's just that it's kind of nerve-wracking to be here, after all. I hope you don't mind."

She raises her eyebrows, evidently surprised, but nods understandingly. "Don't worry, dear. It'll all be over soon." She completely misses the look of contempt that flashes across his face, but it is gone in half a second. "Perhaps you can be...a mix of things. Sponsors might find that interesting. The dark, mysterious boy with a heart of gold, perhaps?"

His stylist needn't have worried.

Katniss watches him effortlessly charm the crowd with an eloquence she has only seen before in Peeta. He wears a suit of dark emerald, eyes flashing with confidence and mirth. While she fidgets in her dress, wondering how she's going to sound like she can string together a coherent sentence, he seems completely at ease as he recounts a humorous story about getting lost in the endless hallways of one of the Capitol buildings.

Katniss can already see those from the Capitol leaning forward, soaking in his every word. They sigh and dab at their eyes when he mentions that he's an orphan, that he's never known his parents (but looked after the rest of his fellow orphans as if they were his own brothers and sisters) - they smile when he tells them that he's hopeful that luck will be on his side, that he'd love nothing more than to return to his district and perhaps get to know the Capitol better (because he fears he's already fallen in love with the place). How can he place every word so perfectly, know exactly what to say?

Her interview goes better than expected - and then Peeta manages to confess to the entire world that he has always loved Katniss, as if this is some stupid soap opera -

I'm pretty sure he's in love with you, you know, she remembers Tom say, and her eyes widen. So it had been true...

The night before the Games begin, he finds himself chuckling. Without a doubt, this will be interesting.

When the Bloodbath begins, he is careful to be discreet as possible in escaping the Cornucopia. He gathers enough supplies to subsist for two weeks or so, but is careful to remain on his guard. Most of it is uneventful, except for when the boy from Four leaps upon him with an axe. The unlucky fellow quickly finds that his aim has overshot so that his own weapon gathers too much momentum on the upswing, and then it's somehow lodged in his head.

A quick and merciful death, Tom thinks, and the announcers will probably attribute it to not knowing how to properly use an axe, or perhaps the dubious combination of idiots and weapons. No one notices now anyway, not in all the carnage. Tom takes a quick glance around him and counts the deaths. The girl from Two notices him and aims an arrow at his head - it lands wildly off target and then she finds herself inexplicably slipping on the mud below. She flails facefirst into the ground, just in time for the boy from Eleven to notice and charge at her with a scimitar.

"Until next time," Tom sighs, and then quietly steals into the woods.

He's no survivalist - that much is certain. But the next days pass easily - people are trying to kill him, not it particularly matters. It's when the Gamemakers decide they want deaths that things get dangerous - and that point comes when deaths start petering out.

In other words, at the two-week mark, they're going to want additional entertainment. He supposes he might as well start looking for a poisonous snake.

Katniss looks up and sees his face in the sky - he must be dead. Dark-haired and wry-featured, smiling in the darkness. It has been exactly two weeks.

I'll probably last two weeks at the most, she hears him say, and suppresses the chill that runs down her arms. Had he somehow known when he would die? There's no way, she tells herself.

And two days later, they announce that two tributes can win together, if they are from the same district. She nearly falls out of the tree with shock. So this is how they're going to spice up the game - watch her try to find Peeta so they can survive together.

Don't, says a small voice in her head. You'll go farther if you don't take unnecessary risks. Stay here and survive.

But she decides to find him anyway.

Tom chuckles, glancing at the angry red marks of a snakebite where the tracker had been buried in his arm. A good chunk of his arm is gone, but the Gamemakers now believe he is dead.

Don't release your venom, he had told the snake. Just bite here. He had sensed doubt - snakes were not apt to harm those who spoke their language - but finally it had complied at his continued insistence. Really, his abilities work wonders - and they had immediately assumed his death with the bite of one of their poisonous snakes. Within a minute, the hovercraft had been on its way to pick up his body, a cannon fired to announce his death. And once in the hovercraft - well, he easily deals with the pilot and the researcher inside. He sends a mind-wiped researcher on her way, carrying his DNA sample to create the mutation in his likeness and mistakenly believing she has disposed of his body. And the pilot inexplicably asphyxiates on nothing in particular, having provided Tom with an ID badge that gets past most security clearances.

Now he has a hovercraft all to himself!

Duping the Capitol has been easier than he had expected.

Katniss has never felt particularly comfortable with emotions. For her, dealing with feelings is always a losing battle.

That could explain why she feels in way out of her depth in this romance. They need to convince the viewers that this is real - people love emotional drama, and this is the perfect chance to win sponsors and much-needed gifts. Peeta, for his part, does his best to make things seem as natural as they can be - nothing he says feels contrived, not even to her, and he's completely at ease even though their faces are being broadcast to countless.

Peeta has always been gifted in speech, but what he possesses isn't exactly charm - it's a genuine ability to connect with others, and sometimes she feels overwhelmed by how very earnest he is. He's still eloquent and painfully sincere despite the fact that he's slowly dying of blood poisoning. And, fake love or no, she doesn't want to see him die.

A string of disappearances and odd deaths across the Capitol. A group of Peacekeepers who accidentally enter a room with a gas leak. Two Gamemakers who fall to their deaths, somehow tumbling over the edge of a building in the strong wind. President Snow's closest advisor, found choked to death on a noodle in his soup.

The uneasiness hovers in the air. The Capitol tries to betray nothing to its districts, tries to pretend that everything is all right.

Clearly, it isn't.

So she does everything the right way. Confesses her non-existent love, runs to the Cornucopia to fetch the medicine that will save Peeta, shares stories with hidden meaning that will allow people to feel as if they understand her, as if she is truly a girl in love. She wears that mask as much as she can, tries to play the part to the best of her ability.

And Peeta does it all effortlessly. When she talks with him, she could swear that this is real, that somehow they are alone, and perhaps, if she allows herself to believe it, that she loves him as well. And the more she believes it the better, isn't it? Aren't the best lies those you believe yourself?

Yet, nothing that Peeta says reeks of lies. His eyes shine with the truth when he speaks, even in the darkness, and his words are achingly sincere. Because he isn't wearing a mask, is he? None of this, for him, is show. He means every word, and the thought fills Katniss with guilt.

Orders have been sent from the Capitol. No one knows exactly what they were, except for that they resulted in mass killing of countless innocents. Massacres in eight districts, outright uprisings in three of them, and marked unrest throughout. It is a fiasco of the grandest scale, an accident that could not possibly be one.

President Snow calls together his advisors in the dead of night. He is eerily calm, studying them all evenly.

Who did this? he demands, the too-bright light cutting harsh shadows on his face. They know nothing. You will all be tortured, he says, until either you have something to say or you die.

Such a stupid man doesn't deserve to be President of Panem, Tom thinks, and watches all pretense of normalcy crumble. Just a couple of well-placed deaths, a few snakes to gnaw through the wires that would connect to video cameras, and he can sneak into Snow's mansion uninvited. And passing through all those levels of security to send the message from Snow's private mansion to the Mayors of the districts? Well, people will tell him nearly anything when their neck is millimeters away from a poisonous pair of fangs. And the look on their faces when he kills them anyway!

The finale of the games.

They are the last two remaining. And of course the Capitol has to play the cruelest joke of all - the rules have changed, and now there must be only one. Her breath hitches in her throat. She couldn't have expected anything less from the Capitol.

"Wait," Katniss says. "These berries." Her hands are trembling as she fishes them out of her pocket. "They're poison, right?" She stretches out half of them towards Peeta, and from the glint in his eyes, she knows he understands.

"You don't suppose they're going to go through with it, do you?" Seneca Crane murmurs, leaning forward in his chair. "We do have to have a victor. And they're clearly in love..."

His hand wavers, and then he reaches decisively. "If they're actually going to eat the berries, we have to stop this-"

"Wait," says one of the Gamemakers beside him. "Look at her eyes." They both watch her intently. "That's not the look of a girl in love." He raises a hand, and Seneca waits, an eyebrow raised.

"I think we might just have our next Victor."

You should make it, a quiet voice says, which sounds eerily like the dead Tom, as long as you don't trust anyone.

It's true. She has made it this far, and it is only because there are two of them left that they must die this way. Love, honor, trust: this had been why she found Peeta, and this will be her undoing. She will fall before the Capitol in death, a false symbol of everything she desperately she tried to make herself believe, and they will continue their reign forever.

The Capitol is merciless.

And both of them will be dead.

Already she is beginning to question herself, question dying just because she can just because she wants to make some final meaningless stand to the Capitol. Peeta stands beside her, contemplating his berries.

Death. How terrible to die this way, to come so close and fall by her own hand. Perhaps she is scared of death, perhaps it is the prospect of facing the unknown, of leaving this world forever...

No. She is terrified, but it isn't for herself. Suddenly it becomes very real, and as she raises the berries to her lips, the image of Prim flashes to her mind. Golden hair shining in the sun, making Katniss swear that she will return. Her mother, a mere wisp clinging to life. Hasn't she fought for Prim all along? Prim must be watching at this minute, eyes wide, heart beating fast. Praying that her big sister won't make this choice. In that moment, nothing else matters. How would Prim feel, watching her sister come so close and then-

One by one, like stones, the berries fall from her hand.

"Peeta-" she begins, but the sounds of death have begun. She turns, a terrible coldness settling in her heart, as if this is all a dream, and sees that he has already fallen to the ground. His eyes are only on her. Her mouth opens and closes, but she can't speak. She kneels beside him, horrified but feeling she owes him this, at least, and then he smiles.

"Katniss," he says, and then gasps for breath as he reaches for her hand. His eyes are as clear as the sky above. "You didn't have to do this, you know." He fights for air, and she finds herself stricken by his gaze. "I would have died for you anyway."

Love. Trust. Honor. None of it was a mask. He had loved her, even when the final dignity of his death had been stripped away, even when his is no longer a stand against the Capitol, even when she had-

The cannon fires.

Katniss is staring at him, staring at his lifeless face.

"Congratulations-" a voice begins from the sky. But she cannot hear it - her hand slides over her mouth, and she feels the wetness on her cheeks as she tries to suppress the scream rising in her chest.

In the aftermath, she can only piece together one thought.

I am despicable.

"So," Tom murmurs to himself, watching the screen. "We have a new Victor. Perhaps you were a little less stupid than I thought."

The interview is a lavish affair, held with appropriate pomp. Her dress drapes over her body with shimmering indigo and violet fabric, its neckline uncomfortably low. Her eyes are drawn in smoldering charcoal, hair pulled up and adorned with sparkling black ornaments. She looks at herself in the mirror and sees a temptress, bold and alluring. She has pretended to be in love and then easily disposed of the object of her so-called affection - a master manipulator unafraid to use others to reach her ends.

This is what they will show her as.

She looks up at the deadly, gorgeous creature in the mirror, swallows her hatred into a white-hot ball, and walks out onto the stage. If that is what they want, that is what she will be - for there is nothing of her left.

At least, she thinks, struggling with herself, at least Prim will be safe.

Katniss looks as if her part of her soul has been destroyed in those Games. Well, Tom notes duly, weeks of starvation and killing tend to do that to a person. And upon emerging from that whirlpool of death, she will find that she must live with what she has done.

Meanwhile, Snow finds himself surrounded by chaos. People are fleeing from his administration, convinced that they will fall prey to these mysterious accidents. But Tom has great plans for Snow - after all, they do need someone to symbolize the fall of the old regime. It is only a matter of time before the districts rise up and take him down.

Meanwhile, Tom muses, he needs a group with huge power status on his side - that will further destabilize the Capitol. The Victors should do it; a group of deadly fighters forced to kneel before the Capitol could hardly be better for forming his army.

Katniss is welcomed into President Snow's mansion for the second time. After her victory, there had been her first meeting with President Snow. The ultimatum had been clear. Prim had never been in more danger, and the realization pounds relentlessly at her careful mask of calm. Because there is absolutely nothing else she can do besides submit.

She climbs the stairs and finds herself at a sunlit table adorned with roses, the room spacious and tastefully decorated in various shades of white and gold. The floor shimmers with the heat of the sun. And there sits a too-familiar boy with dark hair and charming features, a thick green serpent wrapped around his chair arm. Suddenly, the scene of utter beauty becomes inexplicably cold.

"Hello, Katniss," he says, speaking her name as if he has utter control over it.

She blinks.

"Tom?!"

He's dead, hadn't he died in the arena with the rest of them-

"You're dead," she says aloud. "President Snow, I know you're watching. You don't have to play games with me." She takes a deep breath. "I'd do anything for my sister-"

"No," Tom says, with the air of one who is correcting a child. His face is unreadable, emotionless. "I'm not dead. And there's no point in calling for Snow."

Katniss's brow furrows. "Wait. Why-" She looks around, at a loss for words.

"Haven't you noticed?" Tom says. His features are hard, a line of cold malice upon them that she has never seen before. He's so different from the warm, talkative tribute she had met earlier. Had that boy never existed? Had it all been a ruse? She's not sure what to believe anymore. "There's been a series of mysterious disappearances lately. Too many killings. I wouldn't be surprised if the Capitol lost power. Snow didn't really have what it took to run a country."

She doesn't miss the use of past tense. And neither does she miss the fact that he clearly at ease, as if this is his domain.

"How did you survive?"

He gives her a pointed look that tells her to keep her question to herself, but then a trace of charm dances over his face. "Oh, the usual," he says lightly. "Sneaking around with snakes, leaving all sorts of unfortunate accidents in my wake, assassinating key figures in various webs of power. This is the beginning of a new era." His smile is edged with steel.

She watches him, then, and can only think one thing: this boy is the exact opposite of Peeta, and she can't believe one had ever reminded her of the other. Perhaps, she thinks, that is the power of a well-placed mask.

"So you're planning a takeover?" The question rips from her lips, too abrupt.

"After war has broken out," Tom says dismissively, waving his hand. "I've made the Capitol weak enough, hated enough, for the Districts to have a fighting chance. Now, we watch as they take each other down." He shrugs, as if this is nothing in particular. "And then we wait for the ashes to settle."

Katniss merely stares. "We?"

"And if you value your life, your family, or your sanity you'll do what I ask," Tom says matter-of-factly. Katniss takes in a sharp breath, still stunned. This is nothing other than blackmail. "Just a couple small requests, really."

She shakes her head. This is all happening too fast.

"You're another Snow," she says.

He raises an eyebrow. "I know what he asked you to do. To save your sister, wasn't it?"

Silence hovers in the air.

"I do not ask that much," he says, charisma glowing on his face. Now he's nearly another person altogether. "Don't you agree that this Capitol is too corrupt? But we cannot reform from the inside. We must tear it down and rebuild anew. And instead of serving yourself on a silver platter to Capitol elite, you will be part of the greatest movement the world has ever known. Your family will be safe, which is more than what Snow ever promised. I will give you a path to glory, to change the world for the better. Do you agree?"

She looks at him, and on her tongue are more questions than answers she suspects he can give. But she sees everything she needs to know in his cold smile, his eyes like a snake's. She reads lies in his words and deceit in his heart. But she is hardwired to survive, to protect the few she loves. She has failed to protect Peeta, but now...

...at least Prim will be safe. And even if she found a slim glimmer of that hope, Katniss will follow it to the bitter end.

"What is it that you want me to do?" she says, still wary.

But it was never a choice. Not for her.

There is something beautiful in sadness, he decides as he stares into the flames. Something lovely in destruction, in the golden-red of fire as it eats into the ground against a night sky. And this world is so painfully easy to destroy.

He will tell his followers - for Katniss had led them to him, her eyes dead and gray with everything she has borne for her sister - that he intends to create a world bright and new, that first that they must destroy in order to build again. He can become anything he wishes - the righteous revolutionary is a mask all too easy to wear, for the rebels of the Districts will gladly follow anyone who isn't Snow. His rhetoric is top notch, his charm unparalleled, and his powers mean that the odds will always be in his favor.

A cold madness has grown in his heart, and he finds that he is drawn to despair of others, that somehow this makes him happy. As he watches the Capitol burn by his command in the night, tortured screams echoing into the darkness above, he finds himself smiling.

How beautiful.

Perhaps there is no need to rebuild after all.

And after that fire, the Capitol crumbles easily.

Katniss watches Tom as he is revered by the rebels - he has claimed to rise from the dead to lead them, that he is a messiah meant to rule them all. He has taken a new name now, the title of a Lord.

Lord Voldemort.

Ssomehow they believe him, and it is difficult not to when he is so charismatic. When he talks, it is as if the world stands still and anyone who speaks against him is wrong.

But Katniss does not forget.

It is too late to stop him now - once she had, out of folly and desperation, led the other Victors to him...all of their fates had been sealed. He manipulates them all into joining him, his tongue fast and eloquent and deadly, and she grits her teeth as she watches.

"You never wanted riches, or fame, or power."

Her face is stone cold as she listens.

"No," he continues, and the darkness settles around them like the shadows in her heart. "Everyone," he says quietly, "wants something. And that is why I rose to the top, unstoppable; I could offer my followers everything they ever desired."

He pauses, on his lips a strange smile. "But all you ever wanted - all I ever had to give you - was your sister. The feeling that you were protecting something precious to you."

She does not acknowledge it, that he has somehow understood her so intimately, read her innermost desires as if they were written on her skin. But after watching him operate, she knows him too - for despite his exterior, the mask has to come off sometime.

And the wish etched into your soul, she thinks, is the power to destroy.

She will be his most trusted servant - he trusts no one, but if he had trust he would place it in her - his avenging angel upon the battlefield. She completes the tasks he would do himself, and by her hand the existing power structure falls completely. She is the first of the Victors to join his army, his vengeful army - and it takes surprisingly little effort to eradicate what is left of this oppressive regime.

He easily topples the Capitol, and the Districts too - with the help of little tasks from her and the other Victors - a well placed fire in a District about to join the rebellion, a murder here and a sabotage there, the usual - until there is nothing left but soot, until she feels as if there are only the stones that crack beneath her boots and the blood on her hands.

Ashes to ashes, he says. Look at what we have created. Everything to nothing. And now we will rule what is left. He has changed, his face leaner and cheekbones sharper. The mask is shedding to reveal the monster beneath, and his eyes glint like a snake's.

She tries to make herself feel, tries to make herself believe in goodness and beauty and strength, tries to convince herself that they will rebuild anew, that there is something left after this destruction, that she has fought for something - at least, that is what she promises her sister when she finally returns. It has been five years, their mother is dead, and Prim has scarcely managed to keep herself alive.

And Prim doesn't listen to her anymore, preferring to stay far from this stranger who smells of smoke and blood.

All for you, Katniss says under her breath as she watches Prim's blonde braid disappear from her sight. Everything, Prim. Everything I have ever done-

But that never mattered, did it? It never mattered why. It only mattered what. After becoming someone else for an eternity - after killing to keep her sanity intact, she realizes that she is slipping. The blood has seeped through her skin, and when she looks into the mirror she sees an evil stained with the souls of those she has slain.

One day she realizes that he has remained true to his promise - they have created a world anew.

A world of nothing, ashes to ashes. Drenched in misery and despair, wrapped in the coils of a poisonous snake. A war-charred wasteland fallen to smoke and dust, and in the gold-black of the fires in the night he stands, laughing.

Fin