Chapter 1: Chapter 1

From the Ashes

Peeta was searching frantically for Katniss; she had disappeared with Johanna moments before. How strange he had just been on the beach with her, her lips warm and familiar on his. Something in her usual standoffish manner had changed; she had become warm and inviting, intense with life pulsing through her veins.

They were in the cave. He felt hot and angry, and her soft lips were once again on his, her manner again intense like it had been on the beach moments before.

The sound of something dripping was slowly filling his mind; the smell of blood was in his nostrils. The warm sound of heaving breathing was in his face and his blood had turned cold.

Opening his eyes he immediately focused on the dripping, it was not the rain as he had thought and he was not in the cave. The Katniss Mutt of his nightmares was dripping drool onto his bleeding stump of a leg.

The smell of the roses was over powering in the tightly enclosed sewer, Katnisssssss

The lizard mutts were after her again, they would disembowel her and he would not be able to stop them. In fact he would be helping them.

Looking down on his hands he saw them already covered in blood, warm sticky blood. Looking into the face of the body he was momentarily relieved that it was not Katniss. The relief was short lived and replaced by nausea.

Mitchell looked down at Peeta through the clouded eyes of the dead… "Capitol Mutt…" was all he whispered.

The sticky tar from the Pod held Peeta in place, keeping him frozen as he finally locked eyes on Katniss who was running through the crowd towards Prim.

Prim, her young sister, who was helping the Capitol children who had just been bombed. The second parachutes exploded into a fire ball consuming the young girl who was trying to reach the Mockingjay.

The fire consumed the woman that had been ripped from his heart replaced her with shining terror, and that uncontrollable desire to end her life. She erupted into magnificent flames blown back to him but he couldn't reach her because he himself was on fire…

"PRIM!"

The scream kept reaching his ears although his world had gone black, he was nothing. Then the realization hit him, Katniss was still screaming.

…

I am dreaming, real or not real? There being only one way of finding out, Peeta willed his eyes open and sure enough the screaming was coming from the woman beside him in the bed.

It was a choked off sound of something being tortured to death, after all he would know that sound anywhere. It was how he and Johanna had comforted themselves those long weeks in President Snow's excellent company.

Assuring himself that nothing was shimmering, he inched his way closer to her writhing body. Observing the slight sheen of moisture on her forehead, he watched as his hand extended to her tangled hair and carefully wiped a few loose strands from her scarred face.

The effect was much more immediate than he had anticipated. Her screams died down to a pitiful whimpering again resigning herself to the painful truth, her sister no longer existed.

The sound of the door creaking open made his eyes snap in that direction and in the gloom he made out the squash faced cat, which had most likely come up to see what had taken him so long to quiet the screaming woman.

"Shhh. She's fine now, I'm awake." Obviously he still had many mental issued to overcome if he was having conversations with Buttercup but they both did, especially if it concerned Prim. Always when he came home to her conversations with Buttercup he would wait them out on the porch, he knew how much she hated showing that weakness.

Seeing that all was as it should be Buttercup retreated back to the room he had shared with Prim. As the cat was the sole occupant in this new reality.

Peeta returned his attention to the sleeping woman. It was hard to shake the emotions he was still feeling from the dream. It was the realization that he needed her, just as she needed him in this moment. Curling his body more protectively towards her, feeling the heat from her fevered dream as well as the cool breeze from the open window, he continued brushing her hair from her face.

The war had ravaged her features, but whose features were left unscarred, one look in the mirror, the absence of his leg, they were all damaged Capitol goods now anyway. Katniss was so small in his arms, she had been through so much and still barely eating.

It had been a year since he had returned to plant her primroses and inhaling the breeze he noted their light scent on the air. Of course that would have triggered her nightmare, and his. Mentally he kicked himself for being the source of her pain.

"Nothing can hurt her any more, Katniss." He whispered to her inhaling her scent, running his fingers lightly on the burn scars that had missed most of her face but caught some of her neck.

The pain hit him from nowhere…it was an intense feeling of guilt, remorse…he remembered seeing her for the first time in District 13, since the second arena. His hands had closed around her neck. He hadn't even gotten to see the bruises that had formed because she had left immediately after Boggs had knocked him out. The pain of the memory threatened to overcome him, feeling her pain moments earlier as she screamed helpless against her nightmares. Cautiously he touched the scars from the last fight at the Capitol…they had turned him into a monster.

It had not occurred to him that he might be crying until his breath hitched and he felt the moisture from his eyes on her neck where he had buried his face into her hair. Holding her body tightly to his he started kissing the spots where his hands had tightened against her throat. Nothing would hurt her again; the thought could not be borne.

Tears were still leaking from his closed eyes as he rested his cheek on hers. I still love you Katniss. You love me, real or not real?

"Real," was the whisper that reached his ear, momentarily startling him as he had not realized he had spoken his pain out loud. Moving his head back to better see her face in the dim moon light, he realized that she was holding onto him as tightly as he was holding her.

His heart was hammering loudly in his ears, her slate eyes looked up at him with the intensity he had felt only in his dreams and in two real moments with her.

Peeta watched her as she inched closer to him, her eyes now focused on his mouth and he waited as she paused, her eyes flickering up to his and back to his mouth but she moved no more. In that moment he understood her hesitation and closed the distance between them immediately.

There it was. The heat, the intensity he had felt that last time on the beach. Real. Her love for him, it was real. It was also as stubborn as her daftness for understanding the feelings others had for her. Yet, it was him that she loved.

The feel of her lips set his whole being on fire. Her hands were on his face and interweaving in his hair. Their bodies were becoming more tightly interlocked and their breathing ragged almost inseparable.

Again he buried his face into the side of her neck the earlier traces of his tears now dried up and he could taste the salt of it on her soft yet damaged skin. Her mouth was kissing his face, his mouth, cheek; he felt her tears on his neck and untangled himself to look at her.

"Katniss…" he whispered her name willing her to look at him. Gently tilting her chin up and finally catching her eyes holding her in his steady gaze. "What's wrong?"

The woman's hands gripped at the shirt he slept in, balling up on his chest, she seemed almost at war with herself. Then she looked up at him, the whisper almost inaudible. "I need you." Unwrapping her hands from his shirt, she pulled his face to hers kissing his mouth with all the feeling she could put behind it repeating, "I need you, Peeta."

Her hands trailed to the bottom of his shirt and her fingers worked their way into the elastic of the pants he slept in, he was already hard and the sensation of her hands so close to his proximity made his breath catch making him hold onto her body all the harder.

Katniss worked her hands under his shirt feeling the hardness of his muscles, he no longer had the bulk that he had at the start of their first Hunger Games but he was also no longer the emaciated body of Snow's tortured mutt either.

Being together in one another's company had once more helped him out more than her. It was slow going but she was improving every day, hunting but always looking out more for others than for herself.

She worked his shirt up to his shoulders and he immediately pulled it up over his head. Peeta watched her as she moved her hands over his naked upper body, her fingers were delicately tracing the scars left from the fire; it found some of the scars from the mist at Quarter Quell, and finally the scars he had given himself with the handcuffs while they moved through the Capitol. With each new discovery his blood burned hotter as she kissed every inch of ravaged skin her probing fingers came across.

No longer content Peeta worked his hands down to the hem of her night gown as he got it over her waist, her tiny hands clamped onto his wrists, looking down he saw her expression of terror. Kissing her face softly he whispered to her, "I need you the same way, Katniss. Nothing of what they did to us can compare to the way I see you. You are not your scars, your beauty comes from a place they tried to destroy and failed…" At last she allowed the garment to be pulled over her small frame and he observed her in the early light of pre-dawn, taking in her beauty.

Looking down at her tear stained face it was obvious she thought otherwise. Peeta lowered his lips and continued doing what he had started, kissing her fire ravaged skin, while his hands moved and explored paces on her he had only ever dreamed of seeing, perhaps under other conditions.

At one time he had visualized her in white, but the Capitol had already done so much to mold and meld them together. Their union through blood, fire, and ashes could never be undone.

Her breath caught as his hands found the ugly scar left by Johanna's dissection of her tracker, how much blood had she lost, he covered the old wound in kisses. Noticing her breath quicken as his hands got further ahead of his attentions. The heat of her skin felt amazing, against his own bare skin and they both realized that he still had more clothing on than she did.

Again her hands were at the elastic of the pants, with the heat being generated from the two of them it became hard not to notice that their scents had strongly changed. There was already light moisture that had seeped from her undergarment and mixed with his own still trapped in the fabric of the pants that were straining against his hard erection.

This time it was Peeta's turn to steady her hands. "You do realize that I am…"

Her finger against his lips silenced his protests. "We all are Peeta. You said it didn't matter." Her lips found his again as her hands pushed his pants off his frame.

Peeta pulled away from Katniss, a thought had occurred to him. "Naked bodies make you uncomfortable, real or not real?"

He was met with her fierce scowl, which became more or less confused upon seeing his amused expression. "Are you mocking me Peeta Mellark? Because I am warning you…"

Figuring the conversation had moved into dangerous territory he held her body close to his and kissed her deeply cutting off any further protests for the time being. When at last he pulled away he did so with an apology. "No, I remembered our first Hunger Games when you found me in the stream bed. Thank you…for saving my life all those times. With everything that the Capitol messed with, I just wanted to make sure that I hadn't imagined that part…that sweet part that was completely you, if that makes sense?"

Katniss studied his face; he seemed lost in that memory, with his arm propped up on the pillow his hand buried in his golden locks. The morning dawn was giving him a glowing halo. "Real…but it wasn't the idea of you being naked, you just didn't care if you were naked or not. You were bleeding it was so ghastly." She turned away from his face.

Working her hand down his leg to where Cato had stabbed him, there was nothing left. The Capitol had banished all but the very slightest trace of the horrible wound she had drained and cleaned. Past his knee there was nothing, the Capitol had taken the leg she had failed to save.

For some odd reason the realization that she had failed him in saving his leg as well as her treatment of him after he had been hijacked forced such a strong wave of remorse on her she began to cry once again.

"Katniss…I'm sorry I didn't mean to bring it up." Peeta brushed away her tears and held her body tightly to his.

There was a profound sense of how right his body fit next to hers, yet he was pressed tightly against her last garment, the early rays of sunlight were starting to stream into the room and a part of him felt that maybe the moment had been lost.

They lay there, Peeta stroking her hair, as her sobs quieted his lips pressed against her forehead, and it was enough for him. After all he would always be there for her. Nothing would take her from him.

"No, Peeta, I'm sorry. I have no idea what I'm doing and everything makes me cry now. I have no idea what you must think." She kissed his chest gripping his body tightly and wrapped her legs around him. "I still need you…I want you…I want this…"

He needed no second invitation he was already holding her tightly and now his hands moved down her back removing the last piece of clothing separating them. Her scent washed over him and he kissed her neck hungrily, eliciting a soft moan from her lips that re-lit his fire faster than he himself thought possible.

As that part of him finally encountered the soft skin and moisture between her legs they both gasped. Her hands gripped his hair tightly and their mouths met, tongues tentatively exploring one another tasting the joy and sadness of the other.

Peeta gripped her tightly around her waist and twisted her up off her side setting her gently on his hips, his erection was now trapped between his lower abdomen and her hips, and her moisture was working its way all around him. He had never felt anything quite like what he was feeling.

He watched her expression carefully, he knew she felt a little more than exposed, and then it changed. She was blushing but she was again the girl on fire, the epitome of a victor before the madness of the world had changed so much in them both.

The confidence he now saw in her demeanor was the confidence of love, the blush made her breathtaking, and he smiled up at his Mockingjay. "You still have no idea the effect that you have on people."

Katniss shook her head as she leaned over to kiss him. Gasping as she felt the tip of him slide into the edge of her opening. She slid her hand down between them holding him steady and pushed herself onto him, his hands were already clamped on her hips, his hissing intake of breath mixed with her small cry of pain as she felt herself tear for the first time.

The only good thing from their exposure to so much pain and torture was that this pain was the shortest lived and possibly the most pleasurable they had both endured in their tortured lives.

Her body shuddered uncontrollably as she savored the feeling of having him inside of her in the most intimate of ways, they were one. They kissed one another ravenously, her hands running over his strong arms and shoulders, inhaling the scent of him, kissing him.

Peeta gripped her legs, her hips, her waist pulling her more tightly against him. Before either of them knew it their bodies were moving in a rhythm of their own. Each one taking and giving, the powerful need between them growing ever stronger, like the waves in District 4.

The full morning sunlight was now streaming through the window. He observed her in the sunlight taking in her movements and kissing her. Glad for the light that he was able to see something he had waited for, for so long.

"Will you stay with me?" Her choked whisper came at the crest of their emotional build up. Tears were streaming down her face as she kissed his neck gripping his body tightly to hers.

"Always." His reply came at the moment of their release. "Always" he kept whispering as they held each other tightly their bodies shuddering.

…

Peeta watched over Katniss as she slept the rest of the morning. The Capitol had done so much to damage to them, but here and now, they were slowly starting to find their way back to one another. He understood that things would never be simple or even easy between them.

The sunlight streaming into their room illuminated her once more, he recalled something he had said to her while in District 13, and shook his head at how petty he had been. The beauty that Katniss held was the beauty of hope. That was what all of Panem had been drawn to, her strength and the idea that there would be a better tomorrow.

A truth he knew beyond words that he loved her, but he wanted to hear one word from her. Leaning over he brushed her hair from her forehead. "You love me, real or not real?"

A very small smile played on her lips as she curled in closer to his embrace whispering a sleepy, "Real."

a/n: As I re-read the whole series and particularly Mockingjay. I was struck at just how much physical an emotional damage these two are put through. Plus Ms. Collins just leaves most of Mockingjay in a cliff hanger when it comes to their relationship. I just wanted to explore their relationship a bit and maybe work my way to their children.