"You will fail to save what matters most in the end."
Lexa replayed Venus's words in her head over and over.
"You will find yourself at a crossroads. And you will be forced to choose. Death spares no one, least of all you. No matter what you choose, death will chase you."
Lexa chuckled bitterly to herself. Of course.
The thing was, Lexa wasn't scared of death. She'd faced it more times than she could count in her short life span, stared in its cold blue eyes and fought it off with a stubbornness few possessed. After what she'd seen and what she'd been through, death didn't scare her anymore. She'd accepted hers long ago.
She was only seven when she came home with marker stained fingers and mud caked sneakers, excited to share the drawing she made of her and her mom, the single most important person in her entire world, only to walk in on a scene she would never forget for the rest of her life.
Blood splattered from wall to wall. Her mother, an unrecognizable mess on the ground.
When the harpies picked up on her scent and set their beady little black eyes on her tiny form, she thought for sure she would die then. So young and frightened. Alone and helpless against all that the world offered.
She turned and she ran.
And she ran, and ran, and ran. Until her legs could carry her no farther. Then, she collapsed. And as the cold rain beat down upon her, mixing with the tears streaming down her cheeks, she pressed her face into the cold pavement and she wished for death to take her.
It did not.
Wolves found her. They nursed her back to life, or something resembling it. They told her about the gods, about the power that resided in her blood. They gave her a purpose, a purpose Lexa didn't understand yet at that age. They taught her how to fight, how to wield a sword and a spear with deadly precision.
Most of all, they taught her how to survive.
And Lexa, who was so small and young and had already lost so much in life, gripped onto the only thing that made sense at the time. So she trained and trained and trained. It didn't matter how much pain her body was in. It didn't matter how many bruises she got or how much she bled. The wolves were harsh – Lupa was harsh - but at least she wasn't alone. At night, she'd cry for her mother and for her old life, for the pain to go away. At day, she would fight the wolves one on one, then two on one, then three, until she could take them all.
All at only seven years old.
Days turned into weeks which turned into months and Lexa grew stronger. She got faster. She became comfortable around the wolves. She started to see Lupa as her new mother, even though Lupa was everything her mother was not. And just when she thought she'd found a sense of self, they left.
They told her of New Rome, of Camp Polis and the Twelfth Legion. They told her to go there. They would be her new family. That was where she belonged.
Lexa didn't want to go. When the time came, she wanted to fight and cry and scream. But Lupa had beat it all out of her.
"The weak have no place in Rome."
So Lexa kept her sorrow and her fears to herself, close at heart. She slept and when the moon rose to the sky, she woke and found herself alone, abandoned once again.
She trekked for Camp Polis.
It took her a week. She lived off the forest as Lupa had taught her, and stole when necessary. By the time she arrived, she was dehydrated, malnourished, underweight, and completely exhausted. She fainted on the banks of Little Tiber. Voices drifted in and out of her consciousness as she fell to the ground.
Home, she thought to herself. This was to be her new home, these people her new family. She'd finally made it.
Home, Lexa came to find, was a difficult word. She didn't like her new home. The others did not take to her with open arms. They stayed away from her, even more so when she showed everyone what she could do with a simple sword and shield. How did a girl so young become something like this, so desperate for life? Her eyes were too wild for them, her strikes too hungry for blood. They didn't understand.
But she had a bed at night, a place to be and she was not alone. It was home, as home could ever be for someone like her.
Only Anya, who was a few years older, would spar with her. It wasn't friendship, not yet, but it was something.
Then, she was claimed by Jupiter and everything changed.
Not only was she no longer ostracized, people started to look to her. They began to expect things from her, things Lexa didn't understand at the time. Apparently there was a greatness bestowed upon her at birth that separated her from everyone else, that placed her on a pedestal above everyone else. She was blessed by the gods, they claimed.
And so they made her into a god.
Or a mortal equivalent at least. Their stares grew heavier and heavier with each passing day and Lexa felt the burden slowly settle on her tiny shoulders. She wouldn't buckle on its weight though. Lupa had taught her to be strong, so she bore it.
She bore it all.
At night, when everyone else retired to their bunk beds, Lexa would sneak out under the light of the moon goddess and practice her strikes and her stances until they were perfect, until they became second nature. Her nights were filled with sweat as the others slept. She didn't see the excellence in herself that others spoke so fondly of, but if there was even an ounce of truth in their words, and she at that young age desperately hoped there was, then she would pull it out with everything she had.
She grew stronger and she grew faster. People talked to her. They congratulated her. They patted her on the back during training. They fought to have her on their teams. They spoke of her future and the great things she would do for them, for the Legion, for Rome. For the first time in a long time, she belonged.
And no one would ever know. No one would ever know of the nights she labored away at practice dummies, obliterating one by one as silent tears streamed down her cheeks until her hands bled and blistered.
She didn't know it then, but underneath the lonely glow of the moon, she had killed off the old Lexa. Instead, she became what everyone else wanted her to be, what they needed her to be.
They raised her to Praetor when she was only fourteen years old. With wide smiles and victorious faces, they sang of the future glory she would bring to the Legion. To golden days, she would lead them all.
"The gods have blessed the Twelfth!" they declared.
And as she received the Praetor mantle, she looked out upon the hundreds of faces that stared back and she made a promise. A promise to herself and to these people whom she had come to owe everything.
"For my people."
Then came Costia. And her definition of home changed. Costia was warm and safe, everything a home should be. Costia was the gentle embrace she'd return to every night, no longer lonely under the moonlight.
She would face death a hundred times afterwards. Against the Amazons. Against the Titans. But fueled with the love of a family, for her Legion, her people, for Costia, she was unstoppable.
But she should've known better. How many times had she heard the tale of Achilles, the god-like warrior that was supposedly untouchable? She should've known her invincibility was only an illusion.
Because Costia died. And she was without a home again. She ripped Mt. Othrys apart in her rage, stone by stone, until nothing was left but a broken girl. Surely, she died then too.
So no, Lexa was not scared of death. Not her own.
The Legion was all she had left. She would do anything to keep them safe. She owed it to all the children out there that were like her, lost and lonely, to give them a place to call home.
If her life was the ultimate sacrifice to taking down the Mountain and saving her people, she would give it willingly.
But alas, Venus would not let her go easily.
