A/N: I make up words where I can.

Lonnake - Long snake.

Te - Twelve.

Ga - God.


The stars watched their long hike. Forest trees towered over them in the darkness that was parted, here and there, by glimmers of moonlight through the foliage. Lexa pushed herself up the steep hill, her footfalls light and sure as one with the nighttime peace; Clarke plodded many yards behind, leaves and twigs were crunched into the dirt, breathing heavily to keep up, and once or twice she lost her footing on the slope.

Lexa was faced with a vertical plane of the hill. She grasped onto an exposed shard of rock with familiarity, an outstretched arm high above her to pull herself up onto the peak with ease.

She broke through the woods to stand on a clearing. Cold air freshened the space. The crescent moon hung large and near among an expanse of stars, illuminating a panorama of the land below in silvery hues. The Lonnake river coursed through the eastern valley, with its distributaries and waterfalls, and into the shadowed sea on the horizon. Behind her, hidden by the canopy, lay sleeping villages spread across the territories she had sworn to protect. Her army waited in the middle distance, off to the left, their campfires flickered like fireflies in tall grass; and much farther away loomed Mount Weather.

The peak was surrounded by loose barren rocks that were near impossible to climb; there was only one way to reach the top and Clarke was struggling - Lexa smirked - making plenty of noise, when finally she hoisted herself over the edge with the clumsiness of a fledgling. Her eyes widened for a moment at Lexa standing over her: Clarke had clearly thought the Commander had gone off ahead, that she was relatively alone and not at the end of the trail with every grunt and sign of weakness heard. She straightened herself up, her expression smoothed, and said simply, "I saw you leave the camp alone."

"You were as loud as a pauna," Lexa stated. "Any Mountain Man could have killed you."

Clarke approached, closing the gap between them, with a tenseness at the matter-of-fact observation that she could have put herself and those around her in danger. "It wouldn't be the first time they tried. Why are you here? Bellamy might signal at any time. We should be planning and be ready for it back at camp."

The Commander stared at her but Clarke was unwavering. The accusation that she had run away, not for any grander purpose like in Ton DC but had been caught shirking her responsibility for even an instant, was heavy in the air… then she turned away to gaze at the landscape. "Tekru kom te gonagakru," she recited the first line of their creation lore. "The twelve clans came from twelve warrior-gods. The Stone Clan lies in the west. They make the best swords and they are enemies with the Boat People who live by the sea. Their archers aim true. I made them move to the coast to prevent further bloodshed. Luna is old, too old for the trip, and it was her luck her second came to Ton DC."

"Why are you telling me this?" Clarke interrupted.

Lexa looked at her coolly and explained, "The clans and their leaders do not trust you. You don't know our ways - not enough. Our peace is fragile, we have a common enemy for now, but the alliance may not hold after the war. If I fall in battle - "

"That won't happen," Clarke said with determination. "Bellamy will disable the acid fog. Our people - both our people - are in there and they will fight. We will win this war."

Lexa was stern and equally unflinching. "You place all of your faith in one person and every hour that goes by, more of our people die - Trigedakru and Skaikru." She glanced at the Mountain, a black eerie shape, that seemed unassailable from every front as it had been for decades. "We still haven't heard from him and the Mountain Men are advancing in their plans." She let Clarke in on what the grounders felt, "It is foolish. The clans think you are weak for trusting him."

"Bellamy will pull through." Clarke gestured at the army below them, at the thousand warriors waiting restlessly to attack. "If he can't, then the clans can do nothing. The acid fog will kill most of them first."

Clarke watched her dark eyes, naked without a mask of war paint, weigh the gravity of the lives held in her hands and in her own words: many of their people could be dead tomorrow, whether as captives in Mount Weather or soldiers on the battlefield, whether Bellamy succeed or if they were to invade with or without him. She was poised for a verbal spar to stake out her point, as had often been the case with the Commander, especially with the increasing pressure on them to act, to do something, when Lexa said in a sincerity that surprised her, "I hope you're right."

"Why did you bring me here?" she asked, her guard lowered.

"You followed me."

There might have been a trace of teasing in her tone that Clarke took a second to discern, but Lexa was severe as always in voice and expression, inscrutable; so she replied in all seriousness, "I was worried about you."

Lexa took a seat on the ground, knees up with hands clasped over them. She gazed at the world with an intensity of a leader mulling over the burden on her shoulders, attired in strong black and tough leather that protected her vulnerable areas; her hands were gloved with bits of metal studs that brooked no intimacy. "My soul will choose the next Commander when I die. We fight, but death cannot be fought. Not theirs, not mine, not yours." Clarke was pensive beside her. "I came here when I was young, when I felt my training was too much and I couldn't cry in front of my mentor. I come here even now."

"I know the feeling. I draw. It's how I escape."

Lexa turned her attention to Clarke, paused for a moment as if to consider whether the truth should be spoken; then answered her question, "You're here because I want you to know a little about me, when everything else is uncertain."

Clarke smiled; a small, sad curve of her lips. "If we were different people…" she said.

"We would have never met."

It was quiet between the pair of leaders side by side. The moon neared the horizon in the west, by Mount Weather, to give way to the first rays of the sun. The forest woke around them. Birds chirped in a wild orchestra; the leaves rustled from animal movements. All too soon, the sky was giving up the night, bathing the land in a deep shade of blue.

Lexa looked every bit human and mortal, earthly, like the young woman she was, alone, pondering the life she was in - a life she chose to share in an alliance with the Skypeople. Clarke reached over to take her hand and she was taken out of her reverie. "Thank you," she said, intertwining their fingers, "for trusting me. When this is all over, I want to show you something. Stuff I drew."

Lexa nodded. Then in meanings more expressive than words could provide, she let Clarke lay her head on her shoulder, and rested against her. They savoured what brief respite there was before they were needed back at camp.