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Summary
Chapter 28
Coriolanus silently listens as Sejanus reveals his plan to help rebels escape District 12. He’s been offered a chance to go north with them if he helps to free Lil from her imprisonment in the barracks. Sejanus explains that he will drug the guards with his mother's treats and the medicines he brought from the Capitol, use a gun to control any remaining guards, and escape through a weak spot in the fence. No one will be hurt. He explains that he’s only telling Coriolanus because he’s like a brother to him. Sejanus says he can’t bear to stay and work as a Peacekeeper. Coriolanus spots Bug—another Peacekeeper trainee—entering and quickly covers the jabberjay's cage.
Coriolanus has a horrible, sleepless night while he tries to decide whether to turn Sejanus’s confession over to the authorities. He wonders when he can speak to him about it, but feels that his hand is forced when Sejanus sneaks away at the Hob. He follows and comes upon Sejanus, Billy, Lucy, and a man called Spruce. Lucy lies and says she’s Billy’s partner, claiming that she wants to go north with the group. Mayfair then appears, having followed Billy. Concerned that she’ll reveal the plan, Billy threatens her. When she runs away, Coriolanus shoots her. Lucy makes for the door to get back on stage and secure her alibi. Billy is infuriated and tries to stop her, saying she’ll hang if he does. Spruce shoots him. They disperse, Coriolanus and Sejanus returning to the Hob. They leave and return to the base without incident, and Coriolanus swears Sejanus to secrecy. The next morning, they hear that Maude Ivory found the bodies of Mayfair and Billy, meaning that Lucy’s alibi worked. The base is on lockdown after the murders, and Coriolanus begins to hope that Sejanus will give up on leaving. When a wounded Spruce appears at the base, Coriolanus knows something has happened. The next day, military police officers arrest Sejanus. Coriolanus and his bunkmates try to defend Sejanus, but the sergeant says he’s sure the arrest is for something other than the murders at the Hob. Coriolanus believes Dr. Gaul might have received his jabberjay recording after all.
Coriolanus tries to get word to Sejanus’s father in the Capitol, and he’s just about to post the note when the announcement goes out that Sejanus is to be hanged for treason. At the hanging, he witnesses Sejanus and Lil being led to the gallows, both appearing young and terrified. Coriolanus locks eyes with Sejanus, who mouths his name. Peacekeepers position Lil and Sejanus on the trapdoors. Coriolanus, unable to watch, diverts his gaze and sees Lucy Gray in the crowd, weeping. Lil and Sejanus die.
Chapter 29
Coriolanus returns to the base after Sejanus’s execution, feeling numb and devastated. He tries to keep a straight face, refusing to show his emotions to all the curious onlookers around him. He internally agonizes over his actions and Sejanus's death, feeling responsible for betraying his friend and worrying that he’s next. Coriolanus fears he will soon be arrested for his involvement in Mayfair's murder, as the murder weapon has his DNA all over it. He is not surprised when he's called to Commander Hoff's office.
To Coriolanus's shock, instead of arresting him, Commander Hoff thanks him, telling him Dr. Gaul was very grateful for the jabberjay message. Coriolanus plays along, maintaining that he knows nothing about the murders at the Hob or Sejanus's plan to get guns. Hoff assures him that he’s safe.
Feeling a temporary sense of relief, Coriolanus joins the celebrations for Hoff's birthday, where the Covey band is performing. Lucy sings a song she has written for him, and he drunkenly decides then and there that he would do anything for her. He impulsively plans to leave with her when she tells him the mayor plans to frame her for Mayfair’s death. For a moment he feels genuinely hopeful and excited about their future. However, his plans are abruptly halted when he's summoned to the commander's office the next morning. Expecting once more to be arrested, he's instead congratulated. He passed the officer’s test, and he will have to leave District 12 the next day.
Analysis
Coriolanus is deeply conflicted about Sejanus’s betrayals. Although he knows Sejanus is mixed up in some illegal things, their longstanding friendship makes it difficult for Coriolanus to consider turning him over to the authorities. He knows all too well what the Capitol does to those who betray them; the image of Marcus, the tribute from District 2 who was tortured almost to death, is painfully clear in his mind, and he doesn’t want Sejanus to suffer a similar fate.
For a while, it's unclear whether Coriolanus is going to betray Sejanus at all. Even though he covertly records their conversation using a jabberjay, Coriolanus doesn't deliberately send the jabberjay to Dr. Gaul. He hesitates about the right course of action, agonizing over all the potential consequences. He's not sure whether it would be worse to turn a dear friend over to the Capitol or to risk that friend's actions destroying the future he's worked so hard to rebuild. However, like many of the most pivotal actions in this novel, in the end, it isn’t up to him. Despite Coriolanus's obsession with controlling his environment, he doesn't choose whether to send the message to Dr. Gaul. It turns out that she receives the jabberjay without him having sent it, so Sejanus is arrested even though Coriolanus didn't make the choice to betray him. Like dropping the handkerchief into the snake pit or pressing the button on the remote, Coriolanus stops one step short of making a decision. The way he is always one degree removed from the negative consequences of his actions mimics the way the Capitol treats the tributes and the people it wants to punish. Like the Capitol, Coriolanus is an expert at avoiding having to perform the violence or make the choices himself.
The scene of Sejanus’s execution is so much like the first hanging that Coriolanus and Sejanus had attended together that Coriolanus finds it uncanny. As he looks around, the landscape of District 12 seems even more barren and ugly to him than it did previously. Coriolanus wonders how they got to this point, especially after the life they once had in the Capitol. It seems almost ironic that the surroundings of Sejanus's death are perhaps even uglier than the war-torn landscape of the arena where Marcus was killed. It's also notable that Coriolanus is unable to look at the stage when the trap doors open underneath Marcus and Lil. Instead, his eyes are drawn to Lucy Gray in the crowd, wrapped in a black scarf, as if she's already in mourning. As he does so many other times to avoid accepting the full weight of the consequences of his actions, Coriolanus diverts his attention to Lucy.
There's a deep and painful sense of irony in the song that Lucy writes for Coriolanus. He feels guilty about the events surrounding Sejanus's execution, and yet the song “Pure as the Driven Snow” is about how trustworthy and good he is. Ironically, Coriolanus has hit a point where none of the lovely things she's singing could reasonably be said to apply. The song centers on the idea Coriolanus is the best person she has ever met. It extolls his virtues as someone who is pure and thoughtful and heroic, a person she can trust implicitly. These are all tied together under the metaphor of him being “as pure as the driven snow.” This phrase is a central refrain of the song, and it refers to snow that has been blown by the wind so that it creates a smooth, glossy, even surface. When one says that somebody is “as pure as the driven snow,” it means they're unimpeachably morally upright. As Lucy plays the song, Coriolanus listens sorrowfully. He knows—or at least he thinks he knows—that he is about to be arrested, and that his betrayal of Sejanus will soon become very public. At least, he thinks, he’ll die with Lucy believing that he is a pure, good-hearted person.
