Previously.
"I will not let this stand. Death will sweep the mountain and the ones that occupy it. It will not leave until the monster in the mountain throne has been flayed alive." She turns to her first warrior who appraises her and the terrible darkness brewing in her eyes. " How did Berdine survive? How many survived with her? How many were lost? " The first warrior visibly swallows, wiping his palms against the wool beneath his armor.
He should have know this would happen the fifth devision had been Costia's before it had been handed over to Berdine for safe keeping until Costia's spirit chose her true successor, and a strike to these people was like a strike to his Heda's heart all over again.
" All but twenty warriors survived Heda." Gustus answers as he tries to school his face into its usual calm.
The brewing darkness stills, in shock at the news"How was it possible that so few we're taken in such attack?"
"Heda. I-I think you should read Berdine's message."
Lexa regards him icily then waves him off. Gustus leaves with a bow, shutting the flap of her tent behind him.
She sits down and eyes the rolled piece of skin like a beast that can strike at any moment. The material is unlike anything that is used on the battlefield. She opens it gingerly, knowing from the finish that it has been abraded with pumice and treated with a special concoction of lime or chalk. She recognizes that it is not the ordinary parchment at all but rather, purple vellum, which is reserved for royal commissions. The writing will not fade easily from humidity or heat.
Her eyes move over the text. The calligraphy is careful and deliberate, undulating with a message that somehow, manages to silences the dragon within, and shatters the walls she has built.
After two years of warriors from all five devisions of the wood clan trying and failing, someone had completed the task Costia had left for the one whom would become her successor upon her death.
The fifth Devision had a new leader. And she was the reason they had survived the latest attack from the mountain.
Costia's spirit had finally chosen.
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I keep going to the river to pray
'Cause I need something that can wash all the pain
And at most I'm sleeping all these demons away
But your ghost, the ghost of you
It keeps me awake
Chapter 3: Ripples In The Water
Costia.
The name it echoed over and over in her head.
Aedan sighed and rubbed her hand over her eyes as memory's floated through her mind.
The sun prickled her neck, wriggled its way into the spaces of her green leather jacket. Aedan rubbed her shoulder to chase the hot, tingling fingers of exasperation.
Sweat began its ruinous path down her forehead, her temples, pooling at dark places beneath her clothing. It caused such stickiness and discomfort that any other day would have had her complaining as she blew a frustrated breath out.
But her mind focused only on , the day's revelation, on Berdine's words.
FLASHBACK
"Berdine!" Aedan calls to her and she stop's turning towards aedan with a qustioning look.
"Yes?"
"You never did tell me, What was her name? Your Last unit leader?" she Clarifies when Berdine only raises an eyebrow in response.
"Costia. " she says" Her name was Costia."
END FLASHBACK
Aedan could feel her fingers going uncharacteristically numb in light of the information she had jet to absorbed. She had known somewhere distantly in the back of her mind that it was possible there had been some truth to her vision like dreams after landing on earth and encountering grounders that spoke in the same language as the one spoken in her dreams . Yet faced with the reality of this she was more then stunned. Aedan was confounded.
FLASHBACK
Aedan blinks, dropping her hand, as the slight figure steps into the sunlight and she's able to make out the reasonably tall and lean girl with auburn hair and dark blue eyes and a sad grin. "Okay—who are you ?" she asks, taking a step back as the girl who looks so much like her only a few years younger steps in closer. Aedan glances at the girls get up in curiosity, not failing to notice that it was similar to what she has seen the worriers in her dreams of earth wear. "Where am I? Why am I here?" Aedan crosses her arms a little put out that the girl is not answering her questions. "Am I in hell? I went to hell didn't I?"
END FLASHBACK
Her mind reeled with the thought. The words were real, the language, the girl Costia, actually existed. Or had existed. She wasn't crazy; her mind had not fractured under the stress of her nightmare of a life or a head injury and created a nonexistent entity.
For a single moment she allowed herself to bask in the beauty of such a thing. Then just as suddenly the rest of the situation crashed into her mind.
If the words were real and the girl Costia had been real then...,then what of the vision Costia had shown her, the one with the tent, the girl, the kiss, had that been real too? Was the silver eyed girl somewhere out there. The thought shook Aedan's whole being with emotions she din't care to name and for a moment she forgot how to breathe.
So she pushed it away, only for her mind to be filled with another aganozing thought.
Did this also mean that the glimpses of her father had been real too. Had he survived his punishment, his drop to earth ? But this too was question Aedan could never hope to have answered. So this thought too was forcefully and painfully pushed away.
Aedan had in all this years never once considered the possibility that somewhere out there was a being who had invaded her mind. That someone had wormed their way inside her thoughts, had spoken with her, through their thoughts, their memory's. For how could such a thing be possible? ESP? Some sort of psychic link?
FLASHBACK
"You are not dying ain isera, I am. Ain gonplei ste odon." Aedan blinks at the calm deceleration from the sixteen year old in front of her, a strange unexplained feeling of pain squeezing the air out her lungs as she continued." But here, a thousand days can be but one minute across the threads and interweaved lines of fate and time. I will not keep you here long for I will soon pass on, I think you are only here because we are linked and I think I'm begging to understand why. I'm the thread, one of the many intertwined lines of fate linking you to your destiny. I don't know exactly how I know this, but, I know now that she is your destiny not mine. I was simply the bridge between your two worlds, until they become one. " Costia says with a sad look if realisation.
Aedan brow wrinkles in confusion and pain. "The line of fate linking me to my destiny? Just who are you?"
Castia smiles warmly. "I am Costia."
"I know that," Aedan snaps. "But what are you to me?"
END FLASHBACK
What had Costia been to her? How was she connected to Aedan?
In what way were they linked to each other?
Aedan honestly didn't know how to even feel about the fact that this person, this Costia, had somehow crawled inside her mind and lived there for years.
Inside the recess of her mind the Phoenix flames burned hot once more, that part of her, the monster inside her, it did not like the thought that someone had been inside their head. Had possibly, been witness to the time when they had been week and in pain. The Phoenix was outraged, how dare this girl invade her mind, force a connection to take root in her soul only to rip it out with her death?
The lonely little girl inside of her however, was grateful, because without her, and the reprieve the dreams had offers her from the nightmare that had been her life. Aedan was sure the loneliness would have swallowed her whole and given the Phoenix free reign.
Her death sure almost had. She Remembered that day clearly as surly as it had been yesterday.
Her eyes clenched closed and her hands tightened around the edges of her horses saddle so hard she felt it creak before she loosened her grip. Slowly she forced her eyes back open, staring but not seeing the path in front of her. She took a shuttering breath and then another.
The process was slow but she forced her focus back down onto the path in front of her she continued to breathe slowly. A single thought reverberating inside of her mind, a snarled loop of suspicion. Why had Berdine, who had spoken with such fondness for her deceased leader never mentioned her name to Aedan not once in the whole time she had known her? Why had there been such relecuntce, on her face to give it up when Aedan has asked for it directly. The thoughts set to the music that was the agony of her soul. Because she had come care for her second deeply, like family, trust her, like she only ever had Jasel and Bellamy. And if the woman was purposely keeping something from her, then Aedan din't think she could ever trust her in the same way again.
It would seem, she had another task to see to in her future now. Questions she needed answered.
888
Theirs was a path driven into the bed rock centuries earlier, unlit but for the few rays of sunlight came from the in between of leave and overrun weeds. The trail was barely discernable but for the way gnarled, oversized bushes bent over it like a cave of brambles.
This was the path they had chosen to take to Tondc and seven was the number Clarke of the sky people chose for her party. At Indra's insistence, Lexa rode with Gustus in the center of a protective group composed of Indra herself, two of her most capable warrior's, Clarke and her attendants with them, for they were not warriors and would be the first to fall if attacked.
This was also the reason she had chosen a more elevated, if not longer, path to Ton DC instead of a the usual shorter one that would have been more easily ambushed and ordered four of her devision warriors to remain on their horses to scout the vicinity ahead of them.
Outwardly Lexa made sure she seemed more standoffish than ever, her eyes roaming the surrounding knolls and inspecting the shadows behind towering rocks or trees. She was perpetually observant, her hands ghosting over her weapon, her creaking leathers and war paint, all of it acting as a figurative suit of armour which protected her from scathing emotions and unwanted attention. It was a symbol of prowess, power and fear in the presence of her enemies. A stark reminder of just how dangerous she was despite her seemingly relaxed air and youth.
The Commander in her despite her central position and inner turmoil directed all of them wordlessly, flawlessly in a secret, universal language that had been notched into all her movements. It was expressive in an authoritative way, a learned skill composed of the crisp and concise movements she had refined during her time as a general under Anya's tutelage.
But inside...Inside she was chaos, a brewing storm of emotions that she was fighting hard to keep in check.
Gustus beside her was just as vigilant, but still the power of his concern and unease for her was pounding against Lexa's unfeeling walls like an insistent drum at the eve of a siege. The concern which was so obvious to her was concealed from all others by his seemingly constant calm and quiet nature.
"Heda?" Gustus ventures, uneasy at the Commander's brooding silence.
"It's alright, Gustus. I am fine. I am calm. I have always known the day would come."Turning to her first warrior , Lexa studied the still furred brow and asked, "Something else weighs heavily on your mind, Gustus. Speak true."
Gustus like many times before emerged flummoxed at his Heda's sharpness. "Heda? I..."
Lexa simply waited.
She followed his troubled gaze and her eyes fell on Clarke and her second Bellamy, who stalked the path that led to Ton DC with as much unmitigated grace as all warriors but with seemingly more authority.
His hold of it unlike Clarke's however was cruder, a more primal dialect that forced one to heel or to acquiesce
"I see." She said in understanding" Stop worrying, Gustus. It's like you've always told me, all alliances are risky ."
"This is not the same as uniting the twelve clans. The sky people are different, " Gustus gaze turned to the ground, as though the courage to explain could be found there. He seemed to instantly regret having started the conversation. "They're more like the Mountain Men than us . It could kill our coalition. "
" Our coalition...or me?"She raised a questioning brow in Gustus direction.
The warrior cleared his throat and looked away. "You are the coalition, Heda."
When she turns to confront Gustus, her eyes are a thick and frozen silver; her face is emotionless. "Then do you job and protect me." She said putting an end to the topic of the conversation as Behind chaotic, tightly knit web of leaves and striking colors, of yellow, red and green, she could finally make out a small clearing with trees hiding a majestic view of a hauntingly familiar river that acted as a border line for Ton DC.
The river, if one could call it that, was a roiling mass of blues and greens, in a shape concurrent to that of a breaking ocean wave when looked at sideways. It fit two persons abreast his or her horse, and like a thing alive, seemed to swallow and regurgitate the scenery surrounding it.
Lexa dismounted, prompting all but those already not on foot to do so also.
With the Commander in full control and the part of her that was Lexa barred behind unfeeling walls, she opened her arms grandly, and commanded instructions in a calm tone. "All of you cross the river one-by-one. Be weary of the current, though not to deep, it is stronger then it seems and will nock you of your feet. Quickly, now."
As instructed Indra and her two warriors went first, followed by Clarke and the rest of her sky crew. Then Lexa with Gudtus by her side, the rest of her warriors would have followed soon after behind them.
But, the moment Lexa stepped into the water; she knew that something was terribly wrong.
And seconds later she was proven right as from the cover of trees reapers emerged on both sides trapping them.
It was a band of thirty reapers against seven of lexa's warriors on one side with the rest of her warriors barred on the on the other. An all out battle ensued. One of Indra's experienced veterans –the first one to reach the other side of the river –was fighting just as vigorously as the rest despite several bleeding cuts, covering an area that otherwise would have been relegated to two men. To everyone's surprise, she was immediately dispatched in a spray of blood by-a particular vicious looking reaper.
Indra was screaming, her sword ringing against a flurry of other weapons. She was already again on her horse, slashing at reapers below her and allowing her animal to crush anyone in the way.
An old wrath crawled from the edges of Lexa's vision, oily and dark in its power.
The crunch of bones, a few tortured wails, then, Lexa had enough, the restless dragon within her roared "Gustus! Rina! Daemon! Form a shield wall to the right! Cover us as long as you can! The rest of you with me now! Break their perimeter line!" Lexa commanded her warriors. Her sword squealed as it was removed from it's holsters, it's familiar heft lending all that she needed for her blood to start boiling in the pleasant temperatures of wrath.
She stepped forward blindly, her stance low as she stabbed the first reaper in the gut, the burning pain of the metal blade doubling him over. Arcing into another offensive blow, she cut the next one's head, splitting head from body. Already, the air was beginning to smell like blood.
Lexa grinned. This was something she never ceased to enjoy. This was a welcome reprieve from everything.
She stole a glance of the sky crew who had been one of the first to enter the waters and closer to reaching the other side of the river, but also unable to because of the hand of death that awaited them there.
Lexa shouted, "Indra! The sky people!" To Indra and the two warriors, she snapped, "Rally to the other side of the river ! Now !"
She proceeded to cut a circle around the sky crew, her sword singing as Indra and the two warriors followed her lead in forming a defensive perimeter of their own. Nearing Clarke and the one called Bellamy, who had stationed himself in front of her like a shield and was holding his weapon at a ready, shooting at reapers whenever he had a clear shot, Lexa kicked an oncoming assailant, sending the reaper flailing backwards into another reaper behind him. The delay she created allowed her to scoop the one called Raven from cold waters and push her within the defence perimeter where she would be safe.
Bellamy grabbed the girl, her face and knuckles ashen as she bit back her fear with pure determination the girl grabbed back, but instead of slinking behind him, she's stood at his side her pistol drawn. The sky warrior watched her take her place beside him, looking for all the world like this was all normal. Lexa admired the quality and understood why he was Clarke's second. Emotions in the midst of battle was something not many could tether.
In the ensuing chaos Lexa watched as an arrow flew from the other side striking a reaper who's sword had been seconds from piercing Lexa's heart and a flash of red followed by different shades of brown breached the reapers defensive line. She could hardly believer her eyes. Lexa instantly recognises Beridine and the star-like weapon she wielded immediately. The Fifth was here. Relief fills her inside. They had finally made it to the border of Ton Dc.
However before she can truly even register the timely save. The flash of red captures her minds eye. The same red that first breached the reapers defence line. And something else. A sword, strapped to the back of the figure with hauntingly familiar amber red hair, that haunt's Lexa nightmares like a flame in black pitch darkness.
Costia.
The air was suddenly harder to breathe as though the world around her had been compressed into a tiny space banishing even their little scene of violence.
The river. The battle. Everything winked out of existence as Lexa Commander of the ground leaned helplessly against her horse, the water rippling beneath her feet stirring from the sudden movement of them moving forewarned and then backing away unsure of what course to take. Her face was devoid of all her masks, her walls crumbled to ashes, as she tried to move forward or grasp with all her heart and mind at the ghostly illusion in front of her from whatever remained of her reserves. Lightning sparked beneath her skin, the air rattled her lungs, and the hairs on Lexa's back began to stand on end.
"Aedan" The sky warrior, Bellamy breathed out next to her, reverence in his tone and something akin to worship in his eyes. As if hearing the red head turned and the illusion vanished like smoke before Lexa's eyes as hers connected, not with deep warm blue gaze that haunted her memory's but a wild pricing emerald green that Lexa could not look away from.
It was too late when she recognized the danger coming at her from the, now exposed side , her eyes widening as the reaper approached her and with the reaper too close and too quick for her to counter with a barrier of her own, Lexa felt a short, powerful burst force of a fist like solid concrete hitting her abdomen. It knocked her of her feet and into icy waters.
Lexa fought to swallow, to breathe but it was a loosing battle.
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Aedan dispatched her opponents, leaving a heap of groaning, reapers in her wake.
"Berdine, cover me!"
Immediately, her second stepped into place as Aedan ran towards the motionless figure of the Commander.
The sight of the woman in her merchant's red cloak and dark leather falling made Aedan want to retch. The Commander till now was someone she had envisioned to be someone similar to Diana Sydney in almost every way. It had taken one accidental meeting of the silver eyes in the mids of battle, to rid her of the notion. The storm cloud eyes that had met Aedan's own had been full of emotion. The gaze of the commander belonged to a soul as haunted and tortured as Aedan's own.
That was not to say that there had been no darkness to those eyes, because there had. Aedan had seen that too. When Aedan had turned and the sunlight revealed the commanders eyes, they lanced through Aedan with the clarity and intensity of a hot summer day.
Many would have considered that glance benevolent. Aedan had known her father behold such a gaze and had caused his cadets more then once to splutter the truth because of it and she dint doubt the commanders gaze was something that forced many enemy's to trip all over themselves to appease it. Clan leaders and warriors were indebted to it. Aedan herself had felt for a second captive of it.
But so unlike the blue-eyed gaze of her father, the efficacy of The Commander's glare came from a distinct artifice.
Underneath the calm diplomacy was the mantle of cruelty and decisiveness often worn by a leader who declared war and did not delegate the task lightly to her generals. Instead, she carried out the sentence of death herself. Aedan had experienced that mantle as one of Diana Sydney's victims and understood that it made its owner unhesitant and relentless in her pursuits.
For the The Commander, the quality was a pitiless foundation that buttressed a beautiful, kind face. A face which had been hers by birth-right and which no doubt served the purpose of keeping everyone unarmed for and unaware of her arsenal.
It fooled everyone but Aedan.
The story's told by Berdine had been right. The people of the ark would have trembled and fallen dead one by one before this Commander if the truce had not been called. If Aedan alone without her devision by her side had chosen to apose her- and she would have, she would have surely died in the attempt. Maybe by the Commanders hand herself.
The grim chariots of war rode on her shoulders and she carried them not like one would a burden but like a squall that could be unleashed when the situation called for it. There was wrath there like that which fuelled a Fire not very different to Aedan's own but it was not short-lived as a Aedan had come to be. Rather, her fury was an undercurrent that had been meticulously tamed over the years.
It was the staple of a tyrant, Aedan thought unkindly. But all the information Aedan had been gathering about her so far suggested that unlike a tyrant, The Commander owned a rare restraint. She knew her own strengths and understood the destruction they could yield. There would be no igniting them even when riled. It was evidence of a righteous pragmatism that may have been hers long before she become leader to her people.
For reason that Aedan could not explain the thought of this girl dying was-
It was unthinkable. It was terrifying.
So here she was, running in a half-panic, already feeling the long, cold tendrils of fear crawl up her spine as she saw no sign of life from a body only a few feet from her.
Aedan could now see the man next to the commander fighting to protect her from the reapers and instantly recognised him to be Bellamy. Her friend was alive! Joy and relief crushed into her within her with such force that it almost knocked her of her feet. But, she dint have much time to dwell on the feeling before panicked seized her when she saw him lose the battle with the reaper and said reaper raise his sword to behead Bellamy.
"Bellamy, watch out!"
Aedan shifted her body weight as she moved, mustering strength from the ground and her legs. Then she lunged forward and ran into the reaper. She slammed one Her daggers between his ribs, the other hitting his thigh. In one, smooth movement she swung the man to the ground, using her blades as anchoring points.
Aedan's then empty outstretched hands wrapped instantly around the reaper's head as the reaper was straining to release himself from her daggers and snapped his neck. Finally free of her dangerous opponent Aedan instantly and little frantically grasped for the fallen Commander, and in what felt like forever, Aedan managed to pull the unconscious female warrior back to dry land. When she turned to check on the ongoing battle and Bellamy, Aedan was proud to see the boys assessing gaze, to watch as he took in his surrounding, eyes wary as the last of the reapers fell at the end of Indra's and Berdine's swords, before they brightened and his handsome face was lit with a blinding grin when he finally looked at Aedan again.
"Aedan."Bellamy breathed out her name, as he hesitated for a brief moment before springing forward, long legs eating up the ground between them. He stopped only when he was directly in front of Aedan and then only so he could wrap his arms around her petite waist and bury his face in her hair.
Aedan's hands rose of their own accord to bury themselves in her best friends unruly curls. She was still so very unaccustomed to touch that she herself did not initiate but she would not deny comfort to one of the only few people she had called her own. Comfort that was desperately needed if the tear drop she could feel on her neck was anything to go by. Gently she grasped Bellamy by the face and lifted his head so that she could look into his eyes. Softly she thumbed away the one tear that rained down from copper colored orbs and with that macabre twist of her lips that was solely her she smiled.
"I'm here." Her declaration was soft and yet it carried such power within it.
Bellamy breathed shakily, his shoulders shuddering with effort as words began to spill from his lips, something very close to hysteria in every syllable, relief in every phrase as he struggled to speak through his guilt and very apparent self blame . "I didn't think….I searched, but I didn't think. I waited but you never came. I thought you were dead and I knew it was all my fault. I'm sorry so sorry…..so sorry Aedan….I"
Aedan shushed him, "listen to me Bellamy! What happened was in no way your fault. It was my choice to come with you. You dint force me!" her voice a low uncompromising caress as she tried to ease the other boy's guilt. Her feet and eyes already turning once again towards the still unconscious Commander.
Aedan cleaned her bloodied blades with a cloth, sheathing and setting it aside as she bent over to study the Commander. Hesitantly, and inexplicable afraid. Her fingers delicately explored the skin around the Commander's neck and brought her hands to a pulse point just under The Commanders jaw and for a few moments, Aedan stared transfixed.
Soon Berdine and a dark skind female warrior were beside them and both gazed disparagingly at the Commander.
Her second studied the Commander, taking in her stillness, then turned to Aedan with a pained look in her eyes" Is she dead?"
Aedan shook her head, put a hand on the Commander's chin. Turned her head to the side, allowing any water to drain from her mouth and nose. Then turned her head back to the center. "No. I think she just swallowed to much water. We need to get the water out of her lungs."
Aedan shifted closer so that she towered over the commander and pinched her nose.
Turning to Aedan, the dark warrior beside Berdine demanded, "What are you doing to her?"
Not paying any attention to the the threatening way in which the dark warriors hand moved to his blade or the in which Berdine instantly moved to stand between Aedan and the warrior and leaned down and strongly breathed four times into the mouth of the injured girls to help air get past any of the water clogging the breathing passageways and the lungs of the Commander.
After four strong breaths, Aedan puts her ear near the commanders mouth and watch her chest for any breathing movement.
Check the pulse for signs of life.
Repeat the cycle over and over again.
Until finally.
The Commanders chest –which gave no discernable movements before –expanded greedily. She sucked in several portions of air as though she had been holding her breath and for a few, terrifying seconds, she shivered violently, choked and murmured several words that made no sense. The words subsided into a few broken phrases before a healthy, pinkish hue returned to her lips and cheeks. Sweat broke across her brow and her hands remained balled into fists. She seemed troubled, her face in a grimace, as she struggled with something unseen.
Aedan just going try and breathe herself now, cause that was a freaky experience, and then the commander is staring at her in surprise, and regotnition ?
"Costia," she says.
Aedan blinked, because, okay…what? "Sorry ?" And then Aedan finds herself once again on the other end of the most intense and concentrated stare. That gaze is so dark and warm; it makes her heart thrum in curiosity, which, um, that's something new. They shine with such longing and seem to see beyond her and why did those eyes seem familiar?
Aedan inches away, despite the fact that something in her disagrees and wants the opposite. What the hell? Stupid libido; it was really no respecter of persons. "I'm sorry I think you are mistaking me for someone else."And she's off like a bullet before the commander can form a proper response.
She feels those silver stormy eyes burn into her back as she scurries away.
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AN:So? What did you all think? Please let me know! I agonised for three weeks on this chapter and it still feels like my poor writing skills are letting me down when it comes to " the meeting" scene.
So please please review I want your opinions not only on this but what you think Berdine has been keeping from Aedan about herself and her relation to Costia. And I also want you to let me know if you want me to kill Gustus like in the series or if you want him to live. I'm a little torn myself.
Oh and if any of you are interested on seeing a visual representation of this chapter I recomend looking at AvalonParry DeviantArt, the fan art, was created by my causin.