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Chapter Four

'Heda asks for you,' the guard came late in the evening when Clarke lay mentally preparing herself for the following day. Bellamy, lying on his bed, shot her a questioning glance,

'You ok to go?' It wasn't a strange question considering the Commander had been throwing daggers earlier.

'The Commander doesn't scare me,' Clarke shrugged. 'Though I'm not sure I want to see her.' She hadn't given him details of their argument after the dagger throwing, but she knew Bellamy and the others were intimidated by Lexa, as was the Commander's intent. Well Clarke refused to be intimidated. She stood, regardless of the fact that she'd rather stay where she was, and began to follow the obviously impatient guard from their tent.

'Princess,' Bellamy's call halted her despite the guard's loud tsk. He beckoned her closer,

'What?'

'The Commander...' Bellamy trailed off, his voice hushed, 'I think she...likes you.'

'I think you're deluded,' Clarke responded quickly because there was no way. 'She thinks you and I are in a relationship anyway.'

'She does? Why?' Bellamy frowned.

'I may have insinuated it to make her mad. The fact that we share a tent supports it.'

'And why would it make her mad?' Bellamy asked pointedly.

'Lexa likes focus...' Clarke began but Bellamy gave an amused smile,

'Yeah focussing on you.'

'This is neither the time or place for this,' Clarke huffed and turned to leave.

Clarke entered Lexa's tent without announcing her presence. Lexa was stood in Clarke's sky people clothes, excepting for a different pair of pants probably because she had a different shape. It was odd to see the leader of the twelve clan coalition in clothes that were so at odds with who she was as a person. Clarke found her eyes trailing the tall, slim figure. She looked unthreatening, like any other sky girl, pretty, gorgeous really, like someone she might meet in the mess hall of the Ark.

'Clarke,' Lexa didn't turn but was apparently aware of Clarke's presence.

'You sent for me?'

'We leave in the morning. How do I wear my hair?'

'Your hair? Anyone could have helped you with your hair,' Clarke huffed indignantly. 'Anyone other than me.'

'It is our tradition to wear braids when we go into battle, and yet I do not think Ark tradition has braids. I would like a braid in my hair concealed in a way that will not raise suspicion,' Lexa ignored Clarke's protest.

'Octavia could have helped you,' Clarke crossed her arms. 'And Octavia was not punching you only hours ago, nor being yelled at unreasonably by you, nor having a dagger thrown at her.'

'I do not care for Octavia's help,' Lexa told her as she weaved further into her tent. Bellamy's words flew through Clarke's head but she pushed them out as absurdity, following Lexa.

'Fine, I'll help you.'

'It is not just for your help that I called you here.'

'So why did you call me here. I was in bed, you know,' Clarke glared at her.

'I did not wish to interrupt your time with Bellamy,' Lexa averted her eyes, 'but nor do I wish to go into a situation tomorrow where we must rely on each other with things as they are between us. That could lead to error.'

'Well no, I suppose that is not wise,' Clarke conceded her point, uncrossing her arms in a bid to look less defensive. 'Look, I'll show you how to do your hair but I'm not sure I have the energy for your style of heart to heart,' Clarke didn't quite understand her own actions as she crossed the room apparently eager to actually do Lexa's hair for her even though she could easily describe to Lexa how to wear her hair. She pushed away thoughts of why she wanted to touch the other girls hair, and allowed herself to move closer in an attempt to mend the cavern of misunderstanding and anger between them.

'Thank you,' Lexa seemed just as surprised and stared at her as she moved to sit on her bed. Clarke hesitated, her skin flushing at her own actions but determined to see them through. However, Lexa's hair could be done sat on a chair at the war table and not in the intimate location of her sleeping area. 'I am tired,' she explained at Clarke's questioning glance over the location for doing her hair and Clarke nodded mutely. She kicked off her boots out of courtesy before climbing onto Lexa's bed behind the other girl. It was nothing she wouldn't do with Octavia or Raven, though it felt inexplicably different. This wasn't a girl from the Ark, or even a friend - this was the Commander of the twelve clans sat before her, submissive. A surge of power, a thrill, shot through Clarke as she knelt behind Lexa on soft furs.

'Do you have a brush?' she asked and Lexa hesitated as if she seemed to be translating the word.

'Sha,' she handed Clarke something that resembled a comb and Clarke hesitated for a moment before she began combing the knots from dark tresses, her hands sure but gentle. 'I am sorry,' Lexa stated at length and Clarke ceased her movements. 'For earlier. I feared for you and I behaved badly.'

'You're apologizing again?' Clarke paused, uncertain what this meant. The Commander was not a person who had to apologize for her actions and yet this was the second time Clarke had been on the receiving end of her apologies.

'Yes,' she said simply a soft sigh escaping her. Clarke liked the sound and because that felt odd, she resumed her brushing,

'Why?'

'I was angry,' Lexa admitted, reaching back a hand and stilling Clarke's hand with her own for a moment, 'I feared that your concern for Bellamy may lead to an avoidable mistake, one that results in harm.'

'I assure you I would do nothing to risk him, or you, or any of the people that fight for us.'

'But Clarke, at times you do risk yourself. I have seen it many times,' Lexa's voice was soft, honest. 'And I do not wish for you to come to harm.'

'Right,' Clarke had no response because Lexa was right about her risking herself.

'I fear that for his safety you may risk yourself as you did for the boy Finn.'

'I would give my life for Bellamy's,' Clarke stated and Lexa turned to face her, her expression one of pure rage, her hands balled into angry fists.

'Then you risk us all.'

'Wait Lexa,' Clarke reached out and caught a balled up fist, 'I would give my life for you too. It is who I am to sacrifice myself for others, right or wrong, but on our mission tomorrow I'll have in my head everything that matters. I will only ever do what it necessary for the success of our mission.'

'I saw with Finn that when you love someone you will do more than what is necessary,' Lexa stated.

'Lexa, Bellamy and I are just friends. We share our tent as friends. Our relationship is the same as my relationship with Octavia, though we are perhaps a little closer. We lead our people together. I'm not in love with him,' she watched a myriad of expressions cross Lexa's usually unreadable face, before the mask was back in place,

'Oh,' Lexa held her chin high as if she were trying to portray her strength and disinterest in such revelations. Clarke shrugged,

'I'm only telling you because it seems like it matters?'

'Only in relation to your focus,' Lexa stated coolly.

'Then be assured that my focus is good and sit still,' Clarke tugged her back down to the bed by the balled up fist she still held in her hand. Lexa sat, her back facing Clarke. In a silence that was heated for reasons Clarke didn't understand she braided Lexa's soft hair, a braid stating at the right side of her forehead and curling around her skull. Lexa handed her a piece of leather and Clarke tied the braid at the bottom. 'You look like a sky girl now,' she smiled. Lexa stood and stared in the mirror she had beside a basin of water.

'This is how you wear braids?' she returned to the bed and sat beside Clarke.

'Yes, one instead of many, though younger girls sometimes wear two - one on either side of their heads.'

'Only our warriors wear braids,' Lexa told her and she smiled,

'I know.'

'Will you do my hair tomorrow before battle?' Lexa asked and the question felt loaded though Clarke didn't know why.

'If you would like me to,' she nodded. 'I should go.'

'Stay a while,' Lexa demanded but it came across needier than was usual and so Clarke crossed her legs as she decided to stay.

'Ok, but I am not responsible if I fall asleep - I'm very tired.'

'I do not mind if you fall asleep,' Lexa shrugged, shifting on the bed until she was leaning against the headboard set at one end, significantly closer to Clarke than she was, so close Clarke felt her skin tingle and heat up where their bodies touched.

'I'm still mad you threw a dagger at me,' Clarke announced into the silence.

'It wouldn't have hit you,' Lexa told her dismissive of her anger.

'You were angry,' Clarke began.

'As I have admitted. We have discussed why...'

'No, I meant that when we are angry we aren't always in control.'

'My accuracy is not affected by my emotions. And maybe...maybe I was jealous rather than angry?' Lexa posed the thought as if it were merely a musing.

'Jealous? Of what?' Clarke turned to stare at Lexa's perfect profile.

'Maybe I would like you to whisper in my ear?' Lexa arched an eyebrow, her expression amused. She actually laughed at the way Clarke visibly flustered, brushing her hair form her face and shifting on the bed so she was leaning fully against the same headboard as Lexa, a little more space between their bodies as she tucked her hands into her sleeves.

'You're teasing me,' she accused.

'Maybe I don't want the betrayal that you feel between us any longer. Maybe I wish to be close as we were before the battle of Mount Weather,' again Lexa looked needier than Clarke had ever seen her.

'We'll get there,' Clarke pursed her brow. 'We are getting there. But perhaps you should stop throwing daggers when you get cross...or jealous.'

'And perhaps you should stop punching me in the face, sha?' Lexa gave her a pointed look, a hint of amusement, and Clarke found her eyes appraising the perfect, smooth skin of Lexa's face for damage. There was a small cut on her cheekbone, and little swelling.

'It doesn't seem to have hurt you much,' she shrugged.

'No, it didn't. I feel you need some training,' Lexa smirked.

'I managed to beat Anya,' Clarke pointed out, put out by Lexa's amusement.

'You bested her in a physical fight?' the Commander clearly didn't believe it and Clarke felt more offended.

'Yes. After I helped her escape Mount Weather. We worked together, then she left me, then helped me, only to take me prisoner, but I used one of the Maumon's darts on her and dragged her to the drop ship where she attacked me again. We had a fight and I won. Obviously before we made peace.'

'Ok,' Lexa hid her amusement behind her hand.

'What? What's so amusing to you?' Clarke glared.

'Well she had been kept in a cage? You escaped a mountain, jumped off a dam, you gave her a tranquilizer...you best her in a fight but not a fair one.'

'Any fight with an enemy is a fair fight,' Clarke felt her cheeks burn.

'Clarke, don't be embarrassed,' a cool hand touched her cheek and Lexa's eyes softened, 'Anya was a fierce warrior, feared by our enemies, to best her in any fight, fair or not, is something to be proud of.'

'We made our peace so I care not if I won only by luck, it still remains the only fight I've won.'

'As you say luck is inconsequential, if you won, you won. And you also won against the mountain Clarke.'

'Yes,' Clarke nodded, now able to talk of the mountain and not think only of death but also the life she gave back to so many, 'and now I have to win against the mountain again. It doesn't seem fair.'

'Much of life on earth doesn't seem fair,' for a moment Lexa's eyes clouded over and for a few moments there was silence.

'I should go,' Clarke began to move from the bed, realizing how weird it was to be sat there with the Heda, but Lexa's hand caught her arm,

'Ste,' she looked at Clarke with clear green eyes, 'beja,' and something twisted inside the sky leader, a strange feeling of disquiet and desperation that she didn't understand.

'So you do not wish to die alone, if the missiles come?' she teased softly and loved the pink that rose to Lexa's cheeks.

'I do not wish for you to go,' she answered instead. 'Friends can be close, sha? Like you and Bellamy.'

'I can sleep here if you wish,' Clarke offered and Lexa nodded.

'Beja.'

Clarke was tired and Lexa's bed was comfy and warm, and though it was a weird thought, the thought of sleeping next to the fearsome girl wasn't an awful thought. She peeled off her thicker top and her pants leaving her in her tank and underwear. She felt a little vulnerable but she wasn't sleeping in uncomfortable clothing, not on the eve of a battle when sleep was important. She looked at Lexa who was staring at her, eyes wide as they roved over her body, heating the skin they caressed. 'Is this ok? You asked me to stay, and if I'm to sleep I need to be comfortable?' she mumbled, nervous.

'That's fine,' Lexa averted her eyes abruptly and peeled off Clarke's jacket, her pants and top until she was stood in bindings and her underwear. Her body was phenomenal and Clarke bit back a mixture of jealousy and the desire to touch. Every muscle screamed of strength and agility, and looked breathtaking under tan skin. Yet again she was mesmerized by the lines of black ink across smooth battle scarred skin. After a second Lexa pulled on thin short pants and began to unbind her chest. Clarke couldn't seem to tear her eyes from Lexa, from the slow unwinding of the material.

'Is it comfortable?' she asked and Lexa turned her head, a frown on her features. 'The binding?' Clarke clarified her eyes fixated on the movement of Lexa's hands.

'More so than your sky bindings,' Lexa tsked, her eyes taking in Clarke's appraisal of her.

'We call them bras,' Clarke couldn't help the small laugh, but her laugh died when the bindings dropped and she was staring at smooth skin, plump and round with darkened nipples. She sucked in a breath and tried, but failed, to drag her eyes from Lexa wondering what was wrong with her that she couldn't stop staring and wanting to touch skin so soft it contrasted wildly with the harsh Commander. Lexa arched an eyebrow at Clarke, who flushed wildly and looked away at the realization that she'd been caught staring, ' I should go,' she mumbled, flustered but Lexa dropped to the bed, still topless and tilted her head to one side as she appraised the flushed Skaiprisa. Clarke tried to stare at Lexa's face but her eyes dropped once more, and she blamed the other girls proximity, her powerful presence.

'I can help you try our bindings if you wish,' she offered and Clarke squeezed her eyes shut, 'Clarke?'

'You're very naked,' Clarke offered uncertainly and sensed Lexa lay back on the bed,

'Does that bother you?' Lexa asked. 'At night I like to lie free of clothes because I spend so much time tightly bound.'

'I'm not used to it,' Clarke muttered.

'You sky people seem to find stress in simple things,' Lexa mused, watching as Clarke's eyes opened.

'This feels more intimate than friendship,' she admitted, her eyes once again dropping to defined abs, smooth skin and God, that chest. She ripped them up to Lexa's face, her skin feeling hotter than ever.

'I shall put on a shirt,' Lexa stated, 'you seem so nervous it is fun to tease you,' Clarke watched Lexa pull on a soft tank, covering all that she wished she could still see, then the Commander was laying back down beside her.

'So you don't normally sleep unclothed?' Clarke was cross in her embarrassment.

'Actually I do - when I am intimate with a girl,' Lexa lay down and stared up at Clarke who remained seated, her expression fixed.

'But we are friends?' Clarke didn't even know why she was asking when clearly they were not intimate.

'Yes,' Lexa agreed, 'Come and sleep,' she encouraged and Clarke slumped down in the bed, a bed far superior to any bed she'd slept in since arriving on earth or even in the sky. Her muscles relaxed into the soft warmth and she didn't protest when Lexa's legs tangled with hers, even though it made her heart race which in turn made sleep impossible. Clarke stared at the the darkened tent, then turned her head and stared at the Commander. Her dark hair was still in its braid, her face clear of war paint and decoration. She looked young and beautiful, so effortlessly perfect with her arched cheekbones, her small nose and those lips, God her lips were beautiful, perfectly plump and they called to Clarke though she didn't understand why. Lexa's eyes opened, looking shiny in the darkness, not their usual emerald green. 'Close your eyes Clarke, so we can be ready for battle.'

'I find it hard...to relax in your bed,' she mumbled.

'You do?' Lexa seemed oddly pleased and Clarke frowned,

'It's very hot and...' she didn't know how to describe her racing heart and clammy palms.

'Do you wish to return to Bellamy?' Lexa seemed to edge closer.

'No,' she hadn't meant to be so immediate with her response, but again Lexa seemed pleased.

'Relax,' she reached out a hand and tucked a strand of Clarke's golden hair behind her ear, running her hand gently over her head a couple of times. Clarke's heart raced harder and faster at the soothing gesture.

'I can't,' Clarke admitted.

'Do you fear for the morning?' Lexa's voice was so soft, so warm and caring which was simply not how she usually was. Clarke felt a yearning for the girl beside her when she spoke like this, a desire to melt into her and soak up everything she had to offer. She felt enraptured by the girl who could rule so many, who could be harsh and fierce, who made grown men quake in fear, and yet could speak with such care to her.

'I don't know,' she stuttered. 'I feel our plan is good but I'm hot, and my heart races and my palms sweat and I just...'

'Take deep breaths,' Lexa told her, and Clarke gasped as her cool palm was placed beside her breast and over her heart. 'Shall I remove some furs?' she was so close and her palm, despite its cool temperature, burned into her skin.

'No,' her voice rasped and God she needed something but just couldn't say what it was. She didn't want Lexa to move but thought she might combust if Lexa stayed as close as she was. It was heady and intoxicating and something she couldn't understand at all. Lexa spread her fingers and the strong, thin digits brushed up against the swell of Clarke breast and a strangled noise escaped her throat, a gasp, a sigh, a sound swallowed into the heat around her.

'It will be ok,' Lexa soothed her hand running up Clarke's body, to cup her neck, fingers pushing into the hair at the nape. They were so close, so close that Clarke could see shiny eyes and feel warm breath, and smell the fresh scent that seemed to come off of Lexa, that seemed to wrap around her and intoxicate her. Clarke wanted to shout that this wasn't nerves over the battle they would rage on the morrow, but she wasn't sure what it was, what was happening to her that would make her mind cloud and her body tremble, a heady need within her for what she wasn't even sure, just that being near Lexa both fulfilled the need and exasperated it. She stared at the Commander, soft and warm and so unlike the Commander that everyone else saw and found her hand moving to rest in her sculptured jaw, her thumb tracing over one arched cheekbone.

'Sorry,' she whispered suddenly aware of the intimate caress, snatching her hand from Lexa's face, shocked at herself.

'Do not be sorry,' Lexa also whispered, as if loud voices would break the intimacy and it was intimate, more intimate than any moment Clarke had experienced in her life before then. 'I like you touching me.'

'You do?' Clarke asked with surprise which was probably misplaced because Lexa was indeed tactile with her.

'I like to touch you too,' Lexa smiled, an expression Clarke could only just make out in the darkness.

'What does that mean?' the question came out far more loaded than she intended so she was surprised by Lexa's small laugh,

'It means that I like to touch you,' to emphasize her point her hand slid to Clarke's waist beneath the covers, and sought bare skin under her top, her slim fingers grazing warmth, brushing up and across her ribs where it was splayed, soldering the silk of pale skin.

'I still feel angry with you,' Clarke breathed the words into charged air, the fear of impending battle, the power of the girl beside her, her loneliness and regrets all serving to increase the electric buzz in the air between them. But it was more than that. Clarke couldn't deny that Lexa intrigued her, everything from her brutality to her compassion, her beauty to the way she'd look at Clarke, eyes wide and gentler somehow than when she looked at others.

'You may feel angry,' Lexa permitted as she swirled her fingers in a caress across ribs. Clarke felt her heart stutter and her body reel physically from the sensation. It felt divine, heat surging, her stomach flipping and the pulse between her legs beating strongly.

'This is not how friends behave,' she offered weakly as Lexa's fingers continued their soft caress brushing erratically against the underside of her breast. 'Lexa,' the Commanders name was more of a breathy sigh, and it only encouraged the movements of her fingers, until her whole warm palm was cupping her breast, squeezing gently. 'Lexa,' the name was a plea and Clarke had no idea whether she wanted Lexa to stop whatever she'd started or continue.

'Friends can behave this way Clarke,' Lexa whispered, her breath floating across Clarke's face as she leaned closer, ever closer and Clarke wanted it, yearned for the press of beautiful plump lips against hers and she wasn't disappointed because the second the connected with hers, it was as though the world suddenly shifted into focus, as if suddenly Clarke could sense the whole earth within the kiss between her and the Commander. She found a soft moan rise unbidden from within her, Lexa meeting the sound with one of her own, a hum as she rolled her body half onto Clarke, a strong thigh slipping between the sky girls legs, pressing as she kissed Clarke harder, the kiss deepening with her tongue seeking Clarke's, tangling them together as she then rocked into the girl beneath her. Clarke was a mess, a needy, desire driven mess and her hands clawed at Lexa, trying to tug her closer, legs wrapping around her to pull her more tightly into her, to encourage her to rock again and build on the delectable feeling the movement created. But instead of yielding to Clarke's need, Lexa slowed the kiss, and she didn't acquiesce to her desperate need to have her rock against her again. She pulled her lips from Clarke's despite the Sky girls hands in her hair and clear desire to keep kissing.

'We must sleep,' she whispered and rolled off of Clarke and onto her back pulling the other girl against her, allowing her head to rest on her chest. 'Are you more calm?'

'Uh, no...' Clarke rolled from her arms, pushing away from Lexa despite her desire to stay and staring at her with extreme frustration.

'Have I offended you?' Lexa seemed honestly at a loss, and if anything slightly miffed that Clarke had put distance between them.

'You kissed me,' she stated and Lexa nodded,

'Indeed.'

'And touched me...'

'We established that I like to touch you and it seemed to me that you like me touching you too,' Lexa had rolled onto her side and with her hair pulled from its braid by Clarke's eager hands, looking like some silken halo, she appeared to be a goddess not unlike those in the myths Bellamy had told her.

'But why?' Clarke growled out in exasperation wanting nothing more than to roll her body on top of Lexa's and kiss her forever. It didn't make any sense. This girl had betrayed her, left her to what should have been a certain death and yet somehow Clarke remained in awe of her, enthralled by her steel and her softness. She should hate this girl, she had committed to hating her, to despising her and yet they had a common goal, an enemy for them to unite against once more and everything that had captivated her in the run up to their fight against the mountain, captivated her once more. Lexa intrigued her and it seemed that she intrigued Lexa, but why? And what did it mean? Did it mean anything? Was Clarke a warm body with which Lexa could let off steam on the eve of battle? Was that what Lexa was to her? Or were they just friends who flirted with the boundaries.

'Well I can only answer for me,' Lexa mocked softly, 'I like to touch you because you have golden hair and eyes like the sky on a warm sunny day. Your skin is soft and warm and appealing and I like how your mouth looks when you are set on an idea or course of action. Your face holds beauty I haven't before seen and your lips beg for my kiss. You have a chest that's luscious and calls for me me to touch it, to rest my face against it. I long to touch your legs, your stomach, between your legs because those parts of you are perfect to me.'

'Right,' Clarke answered shortly. Just a warm body then. Lexa frowned, apparently able to read Clarke's irritation.

'I've displeased you?'

'No, I just made a mistake,' she rose from the bed and reached for her pants pulling them on, before pushing her feet into her boots and reaching for her top and jacket, Lexa's eyes fixed on her.

'What mistake have you made?' she asked and Clarke sighed.

'I should hate you, but I don't. I feel good when I'm with you because God, there aren't many people who understand the things I've done, who know what it's like to be responsible for the lives of others, and you do. I just...god Lexa...I guess I'm just not a casual sex person ok?'

'Clarke...' Lexa stood from the bed as if to stop her but Clarke held up a hand, backing to the tent entrance.

'It's ok, we're good. I'm ok for tomorrow and you're ok for tomorrow. It's all good.'

'Clarke...'

'Goodnight.'