Chapter 38
"Clarke maybe you should slow down?" Riley offered gingerly, after spending some time in his door room the studying was broken up by a dorm party.
"Chug Chug!" Everyone chanted around her as Clarke chugged from a funnel, she didn't even like bear but this was a college party. Cheep beer was a must.
Clarke waved her hand to let the guy pouring the beer know she was done, when the funnel was clear Clarke pulled back and hooted with delight. Riley on the other hand reached out to steady her and almost took them both down having just tasted beer though a funnel himself.
"I see jello shots." Riley said, his eyes connecting with a table across the room.
"Yummy!" Clarke laughed following her friend though the crowd.
It was only after hours of drinking and pushing away her feelings that Clarke's fluid gates opened. Riley had disappeared with some girl after making sure Clarke was okay, now she was on her own in a sea of people.
"Can I borrow your phone?" Clarke asked the guy she kinds recognized from one of her classes.
Going up and down the halls Clarke finally found her way to a quiet stairwell. After a couple of misdials she finally successfully entered in Bellamy's number.
"Hello?" Octavia answered.
"Why do you have Bellamy's phone?" Clarke asked, trying not to slur.
"Clarke! I've been trying to get in touch with everyone to find you, you disappeared hours ago. Wait, were you trying to call my brother?"
"Yes." Clarke breathed uneasy, "But you picked up."
"Clarke this is my phone, you called me. Look my brother is an idiot sometimes but he didn't mean what he said to you early to sound like the worlds lamest break up speech. He loves you Clarke."
The blonde shed some silent tears.
"Why don't you tell me where you are and I'll send Bellamy over for you, and keep this phone with you, I'll give the number to Bell so he can call you."
Clarke closed her eyes and rested her forehead against the cool concrete riddling off the address, after a couple seconds she heard Octavia hand up and Clarke locked the phone placing it on the stairs beside her, but not too long after she set it down did it start buzzing.
"Hello?"
"Princess I'll be there in 10 minutes." The roar of Bellamy's car could be heard over the line.
"Only 19 hours left to decided."
"There is no choice Clarke, I choose you every time. It's your choice that scares me."
"What?" Clarke asked suddenly confused.
"Come outside, I'll meet you there, we shouldn't be talking like this over the phone."
Clarke hung up and stumbled her way back into the hall way crowed with party goers.
"Clarke!" Bellamy called to her from somewhere in the sea of college students. He's waited outside for 20 minutes, when she hadn't come out he figured she was drunker than she sounded over the phone.
The blondes eyes welled with tears at the sight of him, he looked so worried about her and all he wanted to do was take her into the protection of his arms.
"I don't want to have to leave." Bellamy thought she meant the party, "I already lost Raven, Sean, everyone I don't want to lose you guys too."
Bellamy pulled her into his embrace, "That will never happen Princess, not if I can help it. Let's go home.
.
The next morning Clarke didn't remember much about the party, but she clearly remembered Bellamy taking her to the car, the way her held her tightly and whispered to her as she cried.
"How do you feel?"
"Like I drank 12 power aids before I went to sleep, I assume I have you to thank for my lack of a hang over this morning?"
"We had a couple left over from when you Jasper and Monty made juice pops."
Clarke nodded softly, her eyes never fully meeting his in embarrassment.
"I want you Princess, I want you to be as mine as possible-" He said in front of her on the bed. "I want to be bound to you in front of my pack, yours and the elders. For me loving you was never a choice Clarke, but we need to have a serious talk. The full moon is tomorrow night, if you agree to be change and become part of my pack it-"
"Done, I told you-"
"Clarke, there is a chance that your body won't accept the bite, you either shift or die."
"But if I say no I have to live without you anyway."
"And if you say yes and you body rejects then I have to live without you, knowing that I'm the reason you never get to graduate and-"
Clarke moved forward connecting her lips to his. "Or I shift and we are bound forever, we both know walking away was never an option, not after that day in Raven's kitchen."
Bellamy rest his forehead against hers, his nose running back and forth over hers.
"Octavia called Wells, your pack will be here by early tomorrow morning, in time for the bounding ceremony. That's the other half to this, we are alone for the shift but once you shift back there is a bounding ceremony, we will meet on holy to us ground, where an elder will swear us to each other, its werewolf equivalence to a marriage."
Bellamy seemed nervous, Clarke smiled at this, "Are you asking me to marry you?"
"Yes."
"Okay then, what are we supposed to do until the moon rises."
"I prepare you the best I can."
.
"Wells you knew this was coming man, when she was a Druid Bellamy couldn't change her, Clarke's blood wouldn't have allowed it, now that she's human there is nothing standing in their way." Jared said from the passenger seat.
"I thought she'd be older." Wells grumbled.
"You should be happy, she could be marrying me."
"Jared!"
"I'm serious, Clarke is strong and she was brought up with both of us looking after her, she'll shift."
"It's just her and Bellamy allowed in the temple, we can't protect her down there."
.
"Clarke you can't wear that to your wedding!"
"It's a bounding ceremony."
"Same thing! Now I know the way you and Bellamy have been going at it your dress should be anything but white, however it is tradition no matter the girls virginity status."
The blonde rolled her eyes at her friend and tossed a pillow at her.
"Why do I need two dresses?"
Octavia pulled Clarke's hair into a mermaid braid, putting teal flowers among the blond strands.
"One is for you to wear while you're in the temple with Bell," Octavia held up a teal blue dress that matched the flowers she'd slid into Clarke's hair. "before you come out you'll be in wolf form, this will be waiting for you before you come out." She said holding up the white lacy dress from Clarke to see. Both looked like something you'd wear on a nice summer day to the beach.
"I'm nervous."
Octavia smiled softly, she knew this choice was dangerous and if Clarke didn't shift her brother would be devastated but she had to think positive.
"I'd be worried if you weren't, but you'll do great, we will all be out there waiting for you."
"No pressure."
What do you guys thing? Will she shift?