the knave & the queen of hearts ; b&l

Maybe, she considered, the reason some careers were so keen on killing other tributes was because no one ever left them alone. The knowledge that kids from Districts One, Two, and Four receive special training for the Hunger Games was not meant to be a secret- her grandmother told her once while brushing her hair that the entire concept was created to keep the districts at odds with each other. "To us," she explained, golden Le Roux eyes gleaming in the firelight, "the Capitol did not favor us, it rewarded our obedience. Our forced submission. To the other districts-"

"It was seen as favoritism," Larissa guessed. Because, though she was only thirteen, she'd learned already that things almost never worked out they way one would hope, or at all. Not without shedding some blood, sweat, tears, or enough cash to pay someone else to. "Not 'seen,'" Her grandmother chided her. "Presented. The Capitol wanted them to hate us."

Larissa recalled next, standing abruptly and furrowing her brow. She understood the order of things well enough- she knew that when she was outside in the world, she was meant to present herself in certain ways to avoid suspicion. And she played the part diligently and well, when needed. But inside their dens, the lions honored the fact that they were all allowed to be entirely themselves. And as far as Larissa knew, she and her family were not a part of any 'we' her grandmother could have possibly been referring to.

"You keep saying it like we were careers too."

Her grandmother had reached a hand up to cup Larissa's cheek.

"To them, Dear, that's all we'll ever be regardless."

And, besides, they did technically receive the same career training as other children, but there called in the question: were careers inherently bad, then? Or were they only bad when misused, labeled as careers? People didn't think survival experts were bad, kids who grew up camping and hiking and canoeing, or kids who knew how to forage and grow their own foods. If Larissa herself had been born in any place other than where she was, she would've been taught the same values and instilled with the same voracious appetite for vengeance. Would that, then, have still qualified her as a career? If she'd been so bloodthirsty that from the moment that gong rang she made it her mission to end life, but she was from somewhere else- what was that called?

Bravery?

Only for her to come here and find all of them crawling around like absolute children, unable to accomplish even the most minute tasks. Little boys who hadn't heard of twitch-up snares and girls who needed crash courses in media persona- there were people getting paid to teach this information at this very center. To her dismay and severe annoyance, a lot of them were evidently bad at their jobs. Which meant showing kids how to make twitch-up snares and telling people to cross their ankles and never fully face the camera, like she was some middle-aged joyless old nanny teaching the alphabet to her bratty charges.

Every single time she sat down for a meal, it seemed, she was met with someone else who needed to know how to do something in the contest that she also meant to survive if she could fucking help it. What was she supposed to do? Say no? Didn't that make her the ruthless bitch they all expected her to be? Wouldn't that affirm the status they all so willingly assigned to her in the first place?

But still. Even saints had their limits- and Larissa wasn't even so much as a prayer. She was roughly at capacity for good deeds until the foreseeable future, the way she saw it as she noticed a new boy marching over. He'd held out longer than some, she supposed, so she gave him that much credit. He was tall, with a heart-shaped face and warm brown eyes, long dark curly hair which was neatly styled though in desperate need of a trim. Bellamy, she recalled. A volunteer. This was his first strike. Coming up to her now was his second. One more, and he was out.

"Is this seat reserved?" he closed his hands around the back of the chair neatly, "Doesn't seem right to me; to see a lioness without a pride of her own."

She feigned a smile, folding her fingers together.

"Prefer it that way, actually. Unless your reason for coming over was anything other than needing advice."