“Margo Shelby!”

My name booms over the large crowd of District 9. The audience gasps as if by one collective reflex.

I knew this had been a possibility. We all did. How many times had Niamh and I role played this exact scenario, running through a thousand pretend Hunger Games, all of which we triumphed over with the same grace and flair as Katniss Everdeen.

Granted, playing pretend is one thing. Actually getting called by a twit in a neon suit with blue hair is altogether another.

And, if I’m honest, I suppose I had always assumed that my family’s reputation would protect me. But between the District Wars and the pestilence, only Little Liam and I are left of what once were the Great Shelbys.

Liam stands next to me wringing his newsboy hat, the one that used to be our father’s, so that his knuckles are white. The veins in his throat pop out like ropes from the boxer’s ring.

I take a deep breath. I must be strong for Liam, my little brother who has endured so much these past few years.

I put my hand on his, which are still wringing the hat like a goose’s neck. He stills.

“They wouldn’t ‘a’ done this if mum and dad were still around,” he squeezes through clenched teeth.

“I know,” I respond, turning him by the shoulders of his thinning tweed jacket to face me before I face them. “One last hug for your sis, then. Come on.”

Our hug, strong and tight, says more than we do, a family of few words but much strength.

And I channel that strength now. The strength of my grandfather, Thomas Shelby, who pulled our family out of poverty after the First Great Rebellion by creating, through brute force and clever tactics, the Shelby Company Limited. My mother used to say I had his green eyes — “Smart eyes,” she used to say — as well as the gypsy instincts and skills of my great aunts.

“Dangerous combination,” she would tease.

Let’s hope she was right because I will need all of it to outwit and out-survive the 23 other Tributes.

The stadium’s spotlight has finally found me in the crowd. My face, all freckles and my grandfather’s eyes, stares back at me from the Jumbotron under my signature cloche hat. Before the red blush can creep all the way up my neck, I center my breathing and begin the walk down the stairs to the center stage.

“Here she comes now, ladies and gentlemen,” says the Games’ host, a celebrity from the Capitol who I recognize but don’t know. “Isn’t she something to behold! An emerald among the corn stalks of District 9, Margo was trained before the atrocious District Wars in trick riding.”

A video of a smiling, younger version of me takes over the Jumbotron. I’m riding Gypsy Rose, our stunning Arabian stallion, and performing tricks: a switchback, an ollie, a handstand.

“God love ya, missy,” Pastor Padrick whispers as I pass, performing the sign of the cross in my direction. “Remember who ye are, and where ye came from.”

I nod.

“Here she is!” announces the host, extending his hand to escort me up the stairs to the stage. He has those familiar, perfectly symmetrical eyes that all celebrities have. I catch the hazel color of his eyes just before the stage lights practically blind me.

“Margo, this year we’re doing things a bit differently,” the host boasts, combing his fingers through his just-so hair. “This year, we’re going to give you the opportunity to bring one treasured possession with you into the arena.”

The crowd murmurs. Most likely, they’re casting their bets in hushed voices that accumulate to a echoing roar. We District 9ers have always been the gambling type. It’s what made the Shelbys so successful.

“Settle down, settle down,” the host repeats until silence is restored. Then he returns his attention to me, “Your item may not be a weapon, of course.”

More murmurs and mumbles as the audience change their bets.

“But!” exclaims the host with practiced theatrics, “You must first answer a riddle correctly.”

The crowd practically explodes as again people amend their bets and this time I can actually see money changing hands.

A riddle? I’ve never been good with with words or jokes. I know exactly where I’d place my bet.

“Are you ready?” the host asks.

“Do I have a choice?” comes my response.

“Sassy,” states the host, eyeing me like prey. “May the odds be ever in your favor.”

Unlikely. In that I’ve been well coached in the art of bookkeeping, I’d put my odds at about 20 to 1.

“No matter how far you travel or hike, you will never find two exactly alike,” the host reads off a card. “What am I? You have two minutes, Margo.”

Fack. That could be anything: horses, people, these stupid Games… Nothing is ever really exactly alike, is it?

I look to Liam. He was always better at school than I, but he stares at me from the shadow of his hat’s brim, now firmly back on his head.

Then I catch a glimpse of someone waving. It’s Niamh. Her hands are stretched above her head and she’s wiggling her fingers. She then slowly brings them down. I cock my head in that what-the-fuck kind of way.

She does it again.

“One minute,” the host announces like this is the countdown to my death sentence.

Niamh does the wiggly finger motion again, starting above her head and bringing her fingers down.

Okay, think, Margo! Something that is not exactly alike and something to do with traveling. And wiggling fingers.

Oh, of course! It must be fingerprints. No two are exactly alike, and you need them for traveling with passports.

“Got it,” I say into the microphone. The crowd is as silent as mass when the pastor’s angry.

“Here it is, folks!” the host actually does a leap-dance move that could only be described as prancing across the stage. “No matter how far you travel or hike, you will never find two exactly alike. What am I, Margo Shelby?”

Wait. “Or hike?” Fingerprints have nothing to do with hiking. Struck, I look again to Niamh. She knows this look on my face, because she motions again and again. Then, she points up.

Of course. Of course it would somehow be related to the so-called Great History of the Hunger Games.

“Snow,” I reply.

A pregnant pause before, “Correct,” the host affirms.

Niamh claps her hands, and the crowd goes fucking nuts as people claim their winnings or bemoan their losses. Not even the celebrity host can get them back in order.

Finally, he motions for the Peace Keepers, and with a level of scary precision, lines of Peace Keepers quick march down each aisle of the stadium, pointing scoped rifles at the crowd. The District 9ers quiet, but we’re not a people to back down from a fight, so now all that can be heard are knuckles cracking. Preparing.

“Well done, Margo! Snow is correct, and it is a good reminder for us all of the altruistic efforts of the late President Snow, may he rest in peace,” says the host. “So, what would like to bring into the arena, Margo?”

Liam raises his hand, slowly. About a dozen rifle beams dot his head and heart.

“Yes, Brother?” I ask into the mic. The host, now understanding, calls off the Peace Keepers.

“Take me hat,” Liam says, taking it off his sandy blond mop of hair. “It’ll keep the sun off yer eyes,” he offers.

The audience shifts, as do I, waiting for the host to offer some clue. Just as the silence becomes uncomfortable, he speaks.

“Now why would she need a hat, dear boy, when she has this one on her pretty little head already?” the host sneers at Liam.

So he knows the reputation of the Shelbys. He knows the Peaky Blinders.

“Is it because you assume we’re foolish enough to think that your hat is just that, a hat? Do you think we don’t know? That we don’t remember?” The host’s tone has turned from an artificial gleeful pitch to one of spite and hatred. I look closer at the source of this voice. What if he had brown hair instead of blue? What if he wore white cotton instead of neon nylon?

Oh dear God… No wonder it was I who was chosen.

I try to reclaim the attention, pivoting my strategy away from my brother and playing into this ridiculous game. Anything to appease the Sabini grandson. And while Liam’s hat would have proven very useful indeed, the Shelbys used more than their blade-brimmed chapeaus to gain power.

They used fear.

And little is more terrifying than a woman who can charm the present and predict the future.

“You know what, I thank you, Brother, but our host is right,” and I shell out one of my rare smiles. “I already have a hat.” I bring my hand to my head like a model, showing off my black cloche with the burgundy flowers. But as I do, I slip the hat pin out of my hair and into my sleeve.

“A beautiful hat at that, my lady!” the host seems to have gained his composure, though I’m now unsure if the sparkle in his eye is one of admiration — lust, even — or pure vengeance.

I continue my charade of oblivious affability. “Anyway, I’m not sure I could live without a strong cuppa in the morning, so I’d like to bring a canister of tea, please.”

“Well well,” chuckles the host. “We’ve had a some interesting requests from the other Tributes, but this is the most, shall we say, adorable of them all.” Sabini’s grandson looks as if he has a flush of aces in his hands, pleased as punch.

But he doesn’t know my cards. He doesn’t know the accuracy and precision with which I can read tea leaves, though honestly any wet leaves will do. But he soon will know. They all soon will know, as well as the order in which they will die.