Unexpected Company | Para One
Standing so close to the edge, one might think she was debating a leap into the unknown. If you knew her; truly knew her, then you’d know how desperate she was for the wind. To feel some sense of freedom in a place much like a prison would be glorious, but she never paused to hope. Tempest never pried for false dreams. She’d been taught not to fill her head with stories. Instead of heroes and villains there was the Capitol and a rumor of rebels. Lies, maybe. But truth? Near impossible.
Her stylists had somehow found it wise to dress her in something skin tight. It was a glossy, crystal speckled, black-leathery mess that ended about mid thigh. She recalled one of her Stylists mentioning something about her legs and how the dress did them justice. It was all bullshit, because she’d still been drug to a party with insistently nosy Sponsors. To make matters worse, Tempest had been swatted at by her damned escort each time she’d went to pull down the damned garment. Her high heels had made ‘accidental’ flight the moment she had stood upon the roof, and now she waited for a breeze that wouldn’t come.
The pins fell from her head one by one until dark hair tumbled past her shoulders. It fell just past her chest, and she'd nearly beheaded her Stylist when he'd suggested cutting it. It may have seemed stupid, but the Capitol had taken nearly everything else; hell if they could have her hair, too. The thick waves were tossed over one shoulder as she walked the ledge with perfect balance, bright eyes cast down under heavy-lidded makeup. They'd called her striking, but wait till they watched her in the arena.