Chapter 8 Chapter VIII Whipping

"No!" I yelled, rushing forward.It was too late to catch his falling arm, and I didn't have that much strength.I flung myself on top of Gail, spreading my arms as best I could to cover his battered body.The whip hit me hard left cheek. A burst of heart-piercing pain passed over my body, and I immediately saw stars and fell to my knees.I covered my face with one hand and propped the other on the ground.I felt the place where I was beaten swell up immediately, and I couldn't even open my eyes.The stone under me was already stained with Gail's blood, and there was a strong smell of blood in the air. "Stop it! You'll kill him!" I screamed at the top of my lungs.

I saw the face of the assailant. His expression was ferocious, his face was full of flesh, his hair was shaved short to the root, his eyes were black, almost completely occupied by black pupils, and his long straight nose was red with cold.He looked at me and raised his thick arms again.I unconsciously raised my hands to my shoulders, how I longed to have a bow and arrow in my hand at this time, but my bow and arrow were hidden in the tree hole.I gritted my teeth and waited for the whip to come down again. "Stop!" a voice yelled.Haymitch emerges, but trips over a vigilante lying on the ground.It was Darius, fainted but alive with a big purple bump on his forehead.What happened?Did he want to help Gale before I got here?

Haymitch ignored Darius, who jerked me to my feet. "Oh, look at what you've done." He put his hand on my chin. "She's taking wedding photos next week. What do you want me to tell her designer?" The guy with the whip seemed to recognize me.Because of the cold weather I was dressed thickly, I didn't wear any makeup on my face, my braids were tucked into my coat, and half of my face was swollen, it was not easy to recognize me as the winner of the Hunger Games .But Haymitch is a regular on TV, and his face is hard to forget. The man stood there with a whip in his hand and his hips akimbo. "I was punishing criminals, but she came in."

The man spoke in a commanding tone with a strange accent, and his presence was a potential red flag.Where is he from?District 11?Third District?Or straight from the Capitol? "I don't care if she blows up the courthouse! Look at her face! Can she be photographed after a week like this?" Haymitch growled. "That's none of my business." Although the guy's tone was still cold, it could be seen that he was a little uncertain. "None of your business, ha, then you'll see, my friend. The first thing I'll do when I get home is call the Capitol," Haymitch said. "I'll see who authorized you to Her face is ruined!"

"He goes poaching, what does that have to do with her?" said the man. "He's her cousin." Peeta came up and held my other arm carefully. "She's also my fiancée. If you want to punish him, you have to go through us first." Maybe this is the case. In District 12, only the three of us can resist injustice, although this resistance may be temporary, and it is hard to predict what the outcome will be.But now all I care about is keeping Gale alive.The sheriff scanned the vigilante squad behind him.Fortunately, they are all familiar faces, old friends from Hob's black market, I couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief.It can be seen from their expressions that they are not happy to see what happened.

A woman named Purnia, who also used to drink soup at Gracie Se's stand, straightened up, took a step forward, and said, "Sir, I think the whipping he received on his first charge Enough is enough, unless he is sentenced to death, which shall be carried out by the Musketeers." "Is that the rule here?" asked the sheriff. "Yes, sir," said Purnia, and several others nodded in agreement.I'm sure none of them knew that at Hopper's Black Market, when you see wild turkeys, the usual rule is to scramble to bargain for the price of the turkey legs. "Very well, then, girl, get your cousin away quickly. When he wakes up, tell him that if he dares to poach in the woods again, I will personally call the Musketeers." The sheriff said, using He stroked the whip with his hand, and the blood splashed all over us. Then he coiled up the whip and walked away in square steps.

More than half of the security police at the scene formed a square line and followed him awkwardly, while the others hurriedly carried Darius away by his arms and legs.I met Purnia's eyes, and before she went, I said "thank you" silently with my lips. She didn't respond, but I knew she understood me. "Gail," I yelled, turning around as I hurriedly untied the ropes that bound his wrists.A knife is offered, and Peeta cuts his rope.Gail collapsed to the ground. "Better take him to your mother," Haymitch said. But no stretcher.The old woman who sold the cloth sold us her counter boards and said, "Don't tell me where you got that." Then she hurried to clean up what was left.The square is almost deserted, fear trumps sympathy, and I don't want to blame anyone for what happened.

We put Gale face down on the board, and the only people left to help lift him were Haymitch, Peeta, and two or three miners who were working with Gale on the same team.A girl named Livi who lived a few doors down from us in the Seam held my arm.Last year her younger brother had measles and his mother revived him. "Need help taking you home?" Her gray eyes were terrified, but determined. "No, can you go to Hazel? Get her here," I asked. "Yes." After Li Wei finished speaking, she turned and left. "Livi!" I said, "don't let her bring the baby."

"Okay, I'll stay with them," she said. "Thanks." I grabbed Gale's jacket and walked briskly after the others. "Put some snow on it," Haymitch said, turning to me.I grabbed a handful of snow and pressed it on my face, which relieved the pain a little.My left eye couldn't stop crying, my vision was blurred, and I followed the person in front of me. Gale's miners, Bristow and Thom, spoke intermittently as we walked on.Gale must have gone to Clay, as before, because he knew Clay would always pay a good price for a turkey.But he met the new sheriff, a man said to be Romulus Stride.Everyone didn't know what was going on with Clay. He was still buying alcohol on the black market in Hope this morning, and he was obviously in charge of the security police in the area, but he couldn't be found anywhere now.Stride immediately arrested Gale, who was unable to defend himself as he had the turkey in his hand.Word soon spread of him in the district, and he was taken to the square, forced to confess his crime, and sentenced to flogging.They said he had been beaten with at least forty lashes when I showed up.At thirty lashes, he passed out.

"Fortunately, he was only carrying turkeys," Bristol said. "If he had the same amount of game as usual, it would have been worse." "He told Stride that he saw the turkey hanging out on the edge of the Seam, and that the turkey went over the fence, and he killed it with a stick. But he was convicted anyway. If the gang knew he took A weapon hunting in the woods would have killed him for sure," Som said. "What's up with Darius?" Peeta asked. "Twenty lashes later, he stood up and said enough was enough. Only he wasn't as clever as Purnia, if only he had been told it was the rule. He grabbed Stride's arm and Strider used the handle of the whip Hit him on the head. I'm afraid nothing good is waiting for him," Bristol said.

"I'm afraid there's nothing good for us," said Haymitch. It started to snow, and the flying snowflakes were wet and cold, making my vision even more blurred.I stumbled home after the others, telling the way by sound rather than sight.The door opened, releasing a golden light, and my mother appeared in the doorway.I didn't know where I went all day, and my mother was waiting anxiously. "Here's a new head," Haymitch said, giving her a slight nod, as if any other explanations were superfluous. At this time, my mother, from a woman who even asked me to beat a spider, has become a fearless doctor, and I respect her in awe.I felt that whenever the sick or dying were brought in, that was the only time when Mom was most sure of her identity.Soon, the dining room table was cleared, a sterile white cloth was spread over it, and Gail was carried to the table.As she poured the boiling water from the jug onto the plate, Mom asked Prim to fetch her the medicine kit, which contained dried herbs, tinctures, and bottles of medicine from the pharmacy.I watched her keep busy, with her slender fingers grinding herbs for a while, and dripping medicinal liquid into the basin for a while.She dipped a cloth into the very hot potion and instructed Prim to prepare a second concoction. Mom turned to me and said, "Did you hurt your eyes?" "No, it's just too swollen to open it," I said. "Add more snow," she said to me.But mom obviously doesn't care about me right now. "Can you revive him?" I asked my mother.She didn't care to talk, wrung out the cloth, and then opened it to cool it down a little. "Don't worry," said Haymitch, "before Clay was sheriff there were a lot of people who were whipped, and we used to bring 'em to your mother." I don't remember anything before Clay was sheriff, and sheriffs were whipping people at will.At that time, my mother must have been as old as I was, and she was still in the pharmacy of my mother's family. At that time, she could heal people's injuries. She began to carefully clean the open skin on Gale's back.I'm really worried, but it's no use worrying me.Snow water dripped from my gloves to the ground.Peeta sat me in a chair and wrapped a cloth with fresh snow and applied it to the wound. Haymitch told Bristol and Thom to go home first, and I saw him slip coins into their hands. "I don't know what will happen to the workers in your class," he said.They nodded and left. Then Hazel came running in, panting and flushed, his head covered with freshly fallen snow.Without saying a word, she sat down on a stool by the table and took Gale's hand and held it to her mouth.Mom doesn't even realize she's coming, she's slipped into a state of consciousness where it's just herself and the patient, and maybe occasionally Prim.The rest of us are anxiously waiting. Although my mother is very familiar with cleaning the wound, it took a long time. She took care of the damaged skin slowly, applied ointment, and gently put on a bandage.When the blood on Gail's skin was cleaned up, I could clearly see the traces of each whip fall. I seemed to feel that he was suffering from the same pain as the scar on his face. I tried to imagine my own wounds. What it feels like after two, three, forty lashes, I wish Gale didn't wake up.Of course, this is an unreasonable idea.A soft moan escaped his lips as the bandage was finally applied.Hazel gently stroked his hair and whispered in his ear.Mom and Prim were prescribing what little painkillers he had left, the kinds of painkillers usually only prescribed by doctors, expensive and hard to come by, always in short supply.Mom should save the strongest painkillers for when he hurts the most.But when is the most painful time?For me, now is the most painful time of all time.If I were a doctor, I would run out of medicine in a day, because the last thing I want is to see other people suffer.In the past, my mother always tried to save medicines for those who were dying, so as to relieve their pain before they passed away. Gail is slowly regaining consciousness, so she's going to give him some oral medicine. "That medicine is not enough, not enough, I know what it feels like to take that medicine, it can't even cure a headache." I said. "Well, we'll take it with sleeping syrup, Katniss, he'll get through it. Those herbs are mostly for inflammation—" Mom said quietly. "Give him medicine!" I yelled at her, "Give him medicine! Who are you, how do you know how much pain he can bear!" Gail heard my voice and tried to move, and he reached out to me.But when he moved, blood flowed out, soaking the bandages, and he couldn't stop moaning. "Take her out," Mom said.Haymitch and Peeta kicked me out and I kept swearing.They pinned me down on a bed until I stopped struggling. I lay in bed with tears streaming from the swollen slits under my eyes.That's when I hear Peeta talking to Haymitch about President Snow and the District 8 riots. "She wants us all to escape," he said.But no matter what Haymitch thought, he didn't express his opinion immediately. After a while, my mother came into the house to treat my wound.Then she took my hand and rubbed my arm.Haymitch told her about Gale. "So it started again? Like before?" she said. "Apparently," he answered, "who would have thought we would be so reluctant to see old Clay go." Clay used to walk around in the 12th district in his police uniform, so he was never popular, but the real reason for his infamy was that he always used money to lure starving girls into bed.When the times are bad, hungry girls rush to the door at night to sell their bodies in order to earn a few copper coins so that their families will not be starved to death.If I had been old enough when Dad died, maybe I would have been one of these girls.However, I learned how to hunt at that time. I don't know what Mom means when she says "it's starting again," but I'm so sore and angry that I don't bother to ask.But I was prepared for the worst, so when the doorbell rang, I jumped out of bed.It's late at night, who will come at this time?The answer is yes, security police. "Can't let them take Gale away," I said. "Maybe they're looking for you," Haymitch reminded me. "Or you." I said. "It's not my house," Haymitch pointed out, "I'll go and answer the door." "No, I'll go." Mom said calmly. As we spoke, we went to open the door together, and the doorbell kept ringing.Mom opened the door and instead of a line of vigilantes, she saw a snow-covered figure, March.She held a small box wet with snow and handed it to me. "Give these to your friends," she said.I opened the lid and saw six vials of clear liquid inside. "This is my mother's. She said I can give it to you. Use it, please." Before we could stop her, she had disappeared into the snow. "Crazy, kid." Mom and I twisted into the room as Haymitch muttered. I was right that whatever medicine Momma gave Gale, it didn't do much.His teeth chattered from the pain and he was sweating.Mom used a syringe to draw a vial of liquid medicine and slapped him on the arm.Soon, the muscles on his face relaxed. "What's this?" Peeta asked. "From the Capitol, it's called morphine," Mom answered. "March knows Gale, which I didn't know before," Peeta said. "We used to sell her strawberries," I said gruffly.But what am I so upset about?He must not be mad at her for bringing the medicine. "Then she must have eaten a lot of strawberries," said Haymitch. See, that's what annoys me.It sounds like there's something going on between Gail and March, which I don't like. "She's my friend." I said sadly. Gail took painkillers and drifted off to sleep, and we were all a little relieved.Prim made us some stew and bread, and we each ate a little.We gave Hazel a room just for her to live in, but she said she had to go back and take care of the kids.Both Haymitch and Peeta would like to stay, but Mom insists they both go back.Mom knew it was futile to persuade me to go to bed, so she left me to take care of Gail while she and Prim went to rest. It was just me and Gail in the dining room now, and I sat on the stool Hazel had just sat on, holding Gail's hand.After a while, I couldn't help raising my hand, caressing his cheeks, stroking the parts I never had the chance to touch before, his bushy black eyebrows, well-defined cheeks, his nose, the dimple at the base of his neck. The nest, his slightly stubbly chin, and finally the lips.Although a little cracked, it was still soft and full, and the hot air from his nose warmed my cold fingers. Doesn't everyone look younger in their sleep?Now Gale looks like the man I met in the woods all those years ago, the one who scolded me for stealing his game.What a similar couple we were - fatherless, both terrified, but very responsible, both desperate to provide for their families.We were all desperate, but since that day we are no longer alone because we have each other.We spent countless hours in the woods, spending leisurely afternoons fishing together, sometimes I taught him to swim, and he sent me home when I hurt my knee.We lean on each other, we warn each other, we encourage each other, and we make each other brave and strong. For the first time, I switched the positions of the two in my heart.I pictured Gail volunteering instead of Rory at the Harvest Festival ceremony, watching him drop out of my life to survive being the boyfriend of a strange girl, coming home with her, living next to her , promised to marry her. Thinking of this, I felt hatred for him and that imaginary girl, as if everything was actually happening around me, and this feeling suffocated me.Gail belongs to me and I belong to him.Any other possibility does not exist.But why did I only see this when he was flogged and nearly killed? Because I am selfish.I am a coward.I was the kind of girl who, if she could, ran away by herself to survive, and left those who were unable to escape to suffer and die.Gail had just seen that girl in the woods this morning. No wonder I won the race, no one above board would do it. You saved Peeta.I tried to justify myself in my mind. But now, I doubt even that.I knew full well that if I let that boy die, it would be unthinkable for me to return to District 12. I put my head on the edge of the table, my disdain for myself beyond words, wishing I had died in the arena, wishing I had been lifting the berries - as President Snow said, like Seneca Clint was torn to shreds. Those berries.I realized that the answer to the question "Who am I" was hidden in that poisonous berry.If I were to give Peeta the poison berry out of fear of being coldly received when I returned to District 12, then my motives were despicable.If I gave him the berries because I loved him, I was selfish, though I could be forgiven.If I give pita berries because I despise the Capitol, then what I do is worthwhile.The problem is, I don't know exactly what was going on inside of me at the time. Or, are the perceptions of the jurisdictions correct?Is it an act of defiance, albeit unconscious?Because deep down in my heart, I know that I can't keep myself, my family, or my friends alive by running away.Even if I survived by luck, it is impossible to solve all problems.People will still get hurt, like what happened to Gail today, and I can't stop it. Life in District 12 isn't too different from your arena days.At some point, you can't just run for your life, but turn around and deal with the person who wants to kill you.The hardest thing is to find the courage to face the enemy.Well, it wasn't difficult for Gail.He was born with a rebellious character.And I'm an escapist. "I'm sorry." I muttered to myself.I leaned forward and kissed Gale. His eyelashes flickered, and he opened his hazy eyes and looked at me: "Hey, catnip." "Hey Gail," I said. "Thought you had gone away," he said. The choice before me was simple, either die in the woods like a hunted animal, or die beside Gale. "I'm not going anywhere, I'll just stay here and keep messing with you." "Me too," Gail said.He forced a smile and fell asleep again.