Music filters down from the clouds as he leads me away from the team, the table, and out onto the floor. We know only a few dances at home, the kind that go with fiddle and flute music and require a good deal of space. But Effie has shown us some that are popular in the Capitol. The music's slow and dreamlike, so Peeta pulls me into his arms and we move in a circle with practically no steps at all. You could do this dance on a pie plate. We're quiet for a while. Then Peeta speaks in a strained voice.
"You go along, thinking you can deal with it, thinking maybe they're not so bad, and then you - " He cuts himself off.
All I can think of is the emaciated bodies of the children on our kitchen table as my mother prescribes what the parents can't give. More food. Now that we're rich, she'll send some home with them. But often in the old days, there was nothing to give and the child was past saving, anyway. And here in the Capitol they're vomiting for the pleasure of filling their bellies again and again. Not from some illness of body or mind, not from spoiled food. It's what everyone does at a party. Expected. Part of the fun.
One day when I dropped by to give Hazelle the game, Vick was home sick with a bad cough. Being part of Gale's family, the kid has to eat better than ninety percent of the rest of District 12. But he still spent about fifteen minutes talking about how they'd opened a can of corn syrup from Parcel Day and each had a spoonful on bread and were going to maybe have more later in the week. How Hazelle had said he could have a bit in a cup of tea to soothe his cough, but he wouldn't feel right unless the others had some, too. If it's like that at Gale's, what's it like in the other houses?
"Peeta, they bring us here to fight to the death for their entertainment," I say. "Really, this is nothing by comparison."
"I know. I know that. It's just sometimes I can't stand it anymore. To the point where ... I'm not sure what I'll do." He pauses, then whispers, "Maybe we were wrong, Katniss."
"About what?" I ask.
"About trying to subdue things in the districts," he says.
My head turns swiftly from side to side, but no one seems to have heard. The camera crew got sidetracked at a table of shellfish, and the couples dancing around us are either too drunk or too self-involved to notice.
"Sorry," he says. He should be. This is no place to be voicing such thoughts.
"Save it for home," I tell him.
Just then Portia appears with a large man who looks vaguely familiar. She introduces him as Plutarch Heavensbee, the new Head Gamemaker. Plutarch asks Peeta if he can steal me for a dance. Peeta's recovered his camera face and good-naturedly passes me over, warning the man not to get too attached.
I don't want to dance with Plutarch Heavensbee. I don't want to feel his hands, one resting against mine, one on my hip. I'm not used to being touched, except by Peeta or my family, and I rank Gamemakers somewhere below maggots in terms of creatures I want in contact with my skin. But he seems to sense this and holds me almost at arm's length as we turn on the floor.
We chitchat about the party, about the entertainment, about the food, and then he makes a joke about avoiding punch since training. I don't get it, and then I realize he's the man who tripped backward into the punch bowl when I shot an arrow at the Gamemakers during the training session. Well, not really. I was shooting an apple out of their roast pig's mouth. But I made them jump.
"Oh, you're one who - " I laugh, remembering him splashing back into the punch bowl.
"Yes. And you'll be pleased to know I've never recovered," says Plutarch.
I want to point out that twenty-two dead tributes will never recover from the Games he helped create, either. But I only say, "Good. So, you're the Head Gamemaker this year? That must be a big honor."
"Between you and me, there weren't many takers for the job," he says. "So much responsibility as to how the Games turn out."
Yeah, the last guy's dead, I think. He must know about Seneca Crane, but he doesn't look the least bit concerned. "Are you planning the Quarter Quell Games already?" I say.
"Oh, yes. Well, they've been in the works for years, of course. Arenas aren't built in a day. But the, shall we say, flavor of the Games is being determined now. Believe it or not, I've got a strategy meeting tonight," he says.
Plutarch steps back and pulls out a gold watch on a chain from a vest pocket. He flips open the lid, sees the time, and frowns. "I'll have to be going soon." He turns the watch so I can see the face. "It starts at midnight."
"That seems late for - " I say, but then something distracts me. Plutarch has run his thumb across the crystal face of the watch and for just a moment an image appears, glowing as if lit by candlelight. It's another mockingjay. Exactly like the pin on my dress. Only this one disappears. He snaps the watch closed.
"That's very pretty," I say.
"Oh, it's more than pretty. It's one of a kind," he says. "If anyone asks about me, say I've gone home to bed. The meetings are supposed to be kept secret. But I thought it'd be safe to tell you."
"Yes. Your secret's safe with me," I say.
As we shake hands, he gives a small bow, a common gesture here in the Capitol. "Well, I'll see you next summer at the Games, Katniss. Best wishes on your engagement, and good luck with your mother."
"I'll need it," I say.
Plutarch disappears and I wander through the crowd, looking for Peeta, as strangers congratulate me. On my engagement, on my victory at the Games, on my choice of lipstick. I respond, but really I'm thinking about Plutarch showing off his pretty, one-of-a-kind watch to me. There was something strange about it. Almost clandestine. But why? Maybe he thinks someone else will steal his idea of putting a disappearing mockingjay on a watch face. Yes, he probably paid a fortune for it and now he can't show it to anyone because he's afraid someone will make a cheap, knockoff version. Only in the Capitol.
I find Peeta admiring a table of elaborately decorated cakes. Bakers have come in from the kitchen especially to talk frosting with him, and you can see them tripping over one another to answer his questions. At his request, they assemble an assortment of little cakes for him to take back to District 12, where he can examine their work in quiet.
"Effie said we have to be on the train at one. I wonder what time it is," he says, glancing around.
"Almost midnight," I reply. I pluck a chocolate flower from a cake with my fingers and nibble on it, so beyond worrying about manners.
"Time to say thank you and farewell!" trills Effie at my elbow. It's one of those moments when I just love her compulsive punctuality. We collect Cinna and Portia, and she escorts us around to say good-bye to important people, then herds us to the door.