Flames to Embers

42- Lion

Ha! I bet you weren't expecting a two chapter day!

Hahahaaha except after this one y'all are going to beg me to never post two in one day again.

Seriously you're going to hate me.

Thanks to @Blakey1014 and @unicornpeachgamer345 for commenting (in like the six hours since I posted the last chapter) and @Nightcat222 @unicornpeachgamer345 and @13Oboe for voting!!

Deep in the meadow, under the willow

A bed of grass, a soft green pillow.

I laid August down in his cradle, rocking it back and forth as I continued to sing. Is eyes were closed, lips parted slightly, one hand clenched loosely around a small stuffed lion. Peeta had given it to him, though I wasn't sure where he got it from. My brother had refused to go back to District 12, and I didn't blame him for it, so he must have found it somewhere in District 13. There wasn't much color in the underground bunker we had been forced into, so it was an even bigger mystery.

I stopped singing when August's muscles relaxed and his tummy expanded and contracted a fraction of an inch with each breath. I laid down in my own bed next to my baby's, pulling the covers tight around me. It was lonely without Prim here, but I couldn't wait to share this apartment with someone else.

Not that August wasn't worth the relative isolation I was subjected to here. I would give up human contact forever if I was allowed to still have him. I remembered talking about marriage, telling my then-fiance how terrified I was to have kids. I could never risk them dying in the Games. It wasn't fair to send them off to the reaping every year. I began to understand why other parents had made the selfish decision to have kids anyway.

Peeta had taken to calling the baby "Gus" which I found endearing. He would sit him in the kitchen with him as he baked, speaking to him is soft tones that August always smiled at, showing a wide, toothless grin.

Caspian had stepped up as I imagined he would, always offering to babysit when I had to shoot propos or attend meetings, or even if he just had some time off.

Prim would spend every free second in my apartment, mothering August almost more than I did. She fawned over him day and night and even while she was working, she would stop by for a quick check-up, pretending to be on official business.

But even with the extra help I was exhausted. I loved my baby more than anything, but he wasn't sleeping much and therefore I wasn't either. I had always heard how hard it was to raise a baby with two parents, but doing it on my own was twice as difficult. So naturally, I was asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow, I knew intense nightmares were going to plague me until August started crying again, but I was so exhausted that I couldn't stay awake a second longer, even if it kept the nightmares away.

...

"Katniss! Help me!"

I started running, my feet crashing through the foliage that the sound of Savannah's screams. "Katniss!"

"Katniss!" I stopped. That wasn't Savannah. That was Prim. I swerved left as the voices overlapped, drawing me in from two different directions. I ran towards Prim.

There's nothing you can do for Savannah, I told myself. There's nothing you can do.

I could see Savannah in my mind, pulling the spear out of her stomach, reminding me of the truth in that statement. My throat ran dry.

I ran faster. "I'm coming Prim!"

The scream was coming from right in front of me, but as I looked around the clearing, my sister was nowhere to be found.