Chapter 24

"You aren't questioning why I want to speak with Raven," Lexa stated as they entered her tent.

"No."

"Why not?"

"Because there is nothing that she can tell you that will help you defeat me."

"And, I want to defeat you?" Lexa asked.

"No, you don't. We intrigue you. You aren't scared of us, but you are afraid of what we can do. You want to know what she'll be able to do if you give her tech, and honestly, the answers are endless. I know that she wanted to get solar panels into Polis at one point so that your elevator didn't need manpower to move. But, that was another lifetime. She doesn't have the memories like Octavia and I do. She isn't a true night blood, Lexa. She won't be able to help you find dirt on me."

"I don't understand that phrase. Why would I need her to look for dirt on you? I would be able to spot it myself," Lexa replied.

"It's a saying. It means that she will not be able to give you any secrets to use against me. She doesn't know that well."

"Why not?"

"We didn't actually know each other until she got to Earth. We were from two different sections on the Ark, like villages very far apart. We didn't socialize too much up there in the stars. She came here because my mother sent her and to return to the one person she had left, but he's betrayed her. We've become friends, like sisters, but she isn't as close to me as Octavia is. She doesn't understand want to understand that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. It is a lesson that she hasn't had to learn yet and I hope that she never does."

"But, you will still charge her with helping you defeat the Mountain," Lexa wondered.

"I will, but I won't make her do the actually killing. That is the crown that I bear. She'll do the programming and walk away. My people will need someone to blame and I will take it. During that time, I need you to support Octavia and help her lead them through it. Some will turn from me, calling me a monster, and maybe I've become one over the many lifetimes that I've lived this life. I would spare her that pain, but I know that I can't."

"Why not?"

"She is too valuable to me. I can keep her close and protect her as much as I can, but I can't keep the battle from her. I can't keep her hands bloodless, but I can take the strike from her. I will bear it so they don't have to, just as I know you do," Clarke answered.

"You speak of things like you know me well," Lexa stated.

Clarke moved into her space. There was only a breath between them. She could feel the heat coming from Clarke's body even through all her black leather and the Heda cloak. She could see the piercing determination in Clarke's eyes. She was fascinated by the blonde's passion and fury, but for the moment, she was glad that it wasn't aimed at her but the Mountain in full force. Just listening to the Skaiprisa, Lexa could feel for those that dared to cross her. Lexa's mind raced with all the reasons that she thought that Clarke would be close enough to her to know things that Lexa just didn't tell anyone.

"I do."

"What happened between us?" Lexa asked her quietly.

Clarke was still in her space. Her eyes softened. There wasn't the tempest in the ocean storms of gray-blue that raged when she thought of the Mountain. Instead, they flared into a brilliant cobalt fire that Lexa found she could easily get lost in if she let herself. She felt Clarke searching her own eyes for an answer that only Clarke knew the question to. She tried not to back up, stand her ground, but Clarke's intensity made her surrender just a little as she took a contemplative step backwards. But, Clarke didn't back down. She advanced with every retreat that Lexa made, never giving her an inch to breathe. Finally, Clarke turned her head to the left just a tick as she brought her hand up to Lexa's face and held her cheek.

"If you only knew," Clarke whispered.

Lexa swallowed deeply as she continued to search Clarke's eyes. She said nothing else. Lexa watched as her eyes flicked from her own eyes down to her mouth and back again several times. Clarke didn't move. Instead, she stood incredibly still, almost as if she was afraid that she would spook Lexa. And, like a corner animal, Lexa's fight or flight response was starting to kick in. She wasn't sure how much more of the blonde's closeness she would be able to take before she reacted. She still held Lexa's cheek, but it was her touch that almost undid Lexa completely. It was like Clarke thought she was the most precious thing that Clarke had ever had in her life, and Lexa couldn't understand that between them. What had happened between them that Clarke would react to her like that when they were alone?"

"Klark, chit..." Lexa started to ask her. (Clarke, what...)

Before Lexa could finish her question, Clarke let go of her cheek. She felt the warmth from her touch start to cool, and Lexa didn't know why she hated that. She felt this pull towards Clarke that she couldn't explain. Just in those few seconds, she knew that her body was addicted to the blonde, and Keyron help her if she ever touched Clarke in a manner more than necessary for their treaty and war. Clarke backed up just a hair and stared into her eyes again. Seconds, mere seconds past, before the blonde dropped to her knee and bowed her head to Lexa.

The gesture alone scared Lexa and her eyes went wide. She quickly looked around the tent, hoping that someone else was there to see this woman bow before her again with such intensity that it baffled Lexa completely. But, it was the words that she heard coming from Clarke's mouth next that absolutely sent her over the edge and made her heart swell and break at the same time. She could feel every buried emotion coming not just from Clarke but from herself as Clarke told her in perfect Trig.

"I swear fealty to you, Lexa kom Trikru. I vow to treat your needs as my own and your people as my people. I will fight to save us all as many times as I am allowed by Keyron. I might be Wanheda, but I will never leave you, ai Tombon, ai Niron. And one day, I hope that I will be able to actually have you as you are and call you my houman. Maybe one day we will actually have our some day, with no wars or threats, assassination attempts or coups, but until then, I will always be yours to use as you see fit, for you are and always will be ai Heda, Lexa. I swear it," Clarke told her.

Lexa was dumbfounded. Clarke loved her. This was not something that she saw coming from the strong woman before her. She didn't need to see the truth in Clarke's eyes. She heard it in her voice. She saw it in the way her body was betraying her feelings. There was a longing there between them that Lexa hadn't felt in years, and there was no way that she could explain it, to herself or anyone else in that moment. All she could say was that it seemed Keyron wanted them together, and as such, Clarke was punished for their love.

Lexa nodded slightly, but she knew that it was enough for Clarke to read it for what it was. She could also tell that Clarke wasn't going to push her. She knew that Clarke was breaking at seeing her. She saw the turmoil in raging seas of her eyes. It was a demanding tempest that Clarke was fighting. She was losing, but she wasn't pushing Lexa either. She was offering companionship, someone to share her burdens with, and someone who would fight for her no matter the cause if Lexa only demanded it. She knew what such a pledge meant to her people and, she knew why Clarke did it in private first. She was, and always would it seemed, giving Lexa a way out if she wanted it. Problem was, Lexa wasn't sure that she wanted to let her go now that she had her.

Finally her brain caught up with the situation before her and Lexa reacted. She started to reach out to help Clarke back up from her knees when the tent flap to her personal tent opened and Raven and Anya walked in. Raven quirked an eyebrow at her as Anya just stopped in her tracks, not knowing what to say or do at the sight before her. Lexa's hand was still perched out towards Clarke, and the blonde didn't waste any more time in taking it. She used the leverage that Lexa afforded her to stand, gracefully.

"Already, Clarkey? I thought you'd wait longer to offer a BJ. You got that note for me?" Raven quipped, hoping to break the tension between them all.

"Soon," Clarke answered without even looking at her.

"We could just use the radio and let them know what's going on, but I'm not sure that they would like that too much if the Grounders just showed up, you know," Raven added hoping to snap Clarke out of whatever funk she seemed to be in.

Raven's words did the trick. Clarke cocked her head to the right and then righted her entire body. There was calm that passed over her that only Lexa had seen from other hedas. She watched as Clarke squared her shoulders and bore the weight of all she was again. Raising her eyes to meet Raven's, she asked as she crossed the room to be at Raven's side, "Are the rest ready to leave? Where's Bellamy? Never mind that, where's O?"

As she stepped away from Lexa, once again, she missed the blonde's warmth. But, there was more to it than that. She watched as the blonde steeled herself back into the leader that she was. She'd allowed herself to break in front of Lexa, but she could tell that Raven was teasing her, even if she didn't understand it. But, there was more to the movement that Clarke made. Lexa watched as she left the tent. Clarke didn't walk like a child from the stars, like the rest of her people. No, she walked like Trikru, like a warrior and scout that had been on many missions and fought in many battles. Lexa was sure that if she demanded to see her back, she would see scars, lots and lots of scars. Or, like those with the heda title, did Clarke bear every death she'd caused, inflicted or mandated on her heart with scar to back up the count because she was the fabled and mighty Wanheda?

"Leksa?" Anya asked as soon as they were alone.

Lexa flipped her eyes to her general, but she didn't answer. She didn't know what to say. She was affected by her, but she couldn't say or name why. She knew that she'd been quiet, unusually so, but she couldn't help the want and the need to talk to Clarke.

"Leksa, what is wrong with you?"

"Onya, Keyron, them self, sent her to us," Lexa answered.

"You don't believe in any of that, Leksa."

"I never had reason to before her, Onya."

"Wake up, sekkon. She proposes wars and mergers, and you are standing here like a lovesick teenager. You are heda. Act like it."

"I know: 'Love is weakness'."

"No, that is Titus' teachings. He wants you to have no connection to any clan, even your own. You can't show favoritism and you don't. Jok, Leksa."

"Chit?" (What?)

"She is a gada from the stars," Anya stated.

"I know that, Anya."

"Then, what just happened? What did she say to you? What caused this?"

"She told me that she loved me," Lexa answered quietly.

Octavia came in, quietly and moved around the tent like she owned it. She walked over to Lexa's desk, pushed around some papers and grabbed some clean sheets. When she was done with that she looked around until she found some stick of writing charcoal. She nodded to Lexa and Anya like it meant nothing to barge into heda's tent without asking and take what was needed. She left, but came back a few minutes later with nothing in her hands.

"Can I speak with you, Heda?" Octavia asked.

Lexa just nodded. She didn't know what more to say. She waved Anya off and bid her to her duties.

"I know that you wish for me to speak with you and Denea about us moving here. I am sure that she is a good woman and will do what you ask, but I don't want to force ourselves on your people. I ask that we settle just outside of Belle, but we will still be part of the village if you wish. We will help them and they will help us. This will also give our people time to adjust to your ways of life."

"I do not mean to make you Trikru, Oktevia. I just want to protect your people from the Mountain. Belle is far enough away that they won't come looking for you, but still close enough to mount and attack and have the backing on TonDC and Polis if needed. It is also far enough away from the acid fog."

"I'm sorry to have questioned you, Heda. You have to understand that this is the first time that either Clarke or I have been the village of Belle or learned of its existence. We believe that we may have burned it to the ground in a misguided, unplanned and unprovoked manner as we tried to let those still in the stars to know that we were alive and that they could live here. We didn't know about your people at that time."

"Clarke bears this burden, too?"

"She and Reivon, both. Reivon built the rockets that we used. They were like large fiery arrows, like missiles and bombs but with no explosion. The only problem was that they burn very hot and for a long time. We fired three together, so it wouldn't look like a natural thing to those above. We had no idea the destruction that we could cause. This was is why Clarke was so hellbent on getting to the radio first and letting them know that we were alive. It wasn't just to save your people, but three hundred plus in the stars," Octavia explained in perfect Trig.

"Neither of you want me to talk to Raven alone, why?" Lexa asked as she realized that once again, she was being derailed from her quest.

"It isn't that we don't want you talk to her. You can, but she will not give you the answers that you seek. She does tech, not war. She can shoot a gun and is a pretty good shot, but she's never on the front lines. Raven fights using her mind, devising traps, building bombs, mines, grenades. She outwits her opponents, and she's damned good at it, too."

"Why are you telling me this?"

"Do you remember Clarke's tale of how she killed three hundred of your warriors before she was captured by the Mountain?"

"Sha," Lexa answered.

"Raven gave her the idea on how to burn them in a ring of fire. She was injured and couldn't move, so Clarke and another had to work together to make our drop ship into a weapon. There was and is still enough fuel in it to do one burn. Clarke ignited the thrusters, the rockets that would push us back off the ground and back into the stars, had we enough fuel. We knew we didn't. We had enough for a long, very hot, and singular burn. We would only get one chance. Raven told her how, instructed her on what to do to make it happen, and then passed out from the pain she was in. Clarke made it happen, gave the order for the burn, and held Anya back as your men were basically roasted alive just outside the door of our metal shelter. When the door opened, Clarke and Anya fought down the ramp and into the ashes of your men. Then the red smoke came and they were taken. Anya never forgave her for that, but you did."

"I did?"

"She said it was something about war and casualties, but she never forgave herself. It didn't matter. You said it was a misfortune of war and battle, but she still can't let them go. She carries the weight of every death that she ever caused on her heart and soul like a kill mark upon her back, Heda. But, none of them have been as strong and deep as yours," Octavia tried to explain.

"I don't understand."

"But, you do, by Keyron, you do," Octavia told her. "How do you think that she learned Trig? You. How do you think that she learned to compartmentalize everything that she faced? You. How do you think that she became the leader that she was always meant to be? You. But, who is it that breaks her heart every time? You. Who does she hold dying because her love is the reason they are killed? You. Who would she lay down her titles and everything for if she didn't have to fight for her people? You. She would walk away from all of us and be just with you if she could, but she knows that our people need her to lead them. They can't survive here without her, and she barely survives without you. Oh, she's tried to move on, but I believe that you are her keryon teina. Like I am for Lincoln, and possibly Raven for Anya or Luna. We haven't quiet narrowed that one down yet. Bellamy and Echo are together in every life, too. But, Clarke is destroyed every time she loses you, Lexa. She never moves on, but she raises one hell of a goufa who becomes heda."

"Why are you telling me this?" Lexa questioned.

"Because she won't tell you any of it. She bears it so you don't have to. She knows that the title of heda comes with a price and that price is your life. She will not push you. She will not pursue you. She can't, but it isn't because she doesn't love you for who you are, Lexa. It is because she isn't sure that she can survive your death," Octavia stated. "If you love her, love her well. But, if you can't, let her suffer in her own silence. I do not think that I can bury her again so soon after you. She is like a sister to me now. We share blood, literally. I will follow here into Hell if need be and even forsake Lincoln if I thought that it would save more people. Don't try her, Lexa. She is more ruthless than a mother bear waking in the spring trying to feed her cubs. She will literally lay waste to any that cross her, you included, and will scorch the world should someone touch her daughter."

"Her daughter?"

"Well, your daughter, too, by adoption, I believe at some point. There is a child in Shallow Valley that escaped Praimfaya in one of our lives. Her parents hid her from all the Flaimkepas, but Clarke finds her, raises her. They keep each other sane as they are the only people on the ground for six years following the Death Wave. When the rest of us come forth from the bunkers, we found the Earth scorched and burned. There wasn't much wildlife to speak of, but Clarke had a daughter, a night blood, the last of the natural born and heir to your throne by default. Those in power, including me I'm ashamed to say, used the child against Clarke and we paid the price for it," Octavia answered.

"How?" Lexa asked, unsure that she really wanted the answer.

"She did what she does best as Wanheda. She destroyed the world and watched it burn all to save her daughter. And, until I had my own children, and had been a leader making the types of decisions that you both have to make for the betterment of our people, I didn't understand. Now, I do. And, I say this because I am not pursuing Lincoln. I'm letting him come to me, naturally, as if I didn't know that we were meant to be together. But, I am also saying this because I will destroy you and everything that you hold dear if I have to in order to protect Clarke's heart from breaking again. So be gentle with her, and let her save us all. Because Keyron help you if you don't. It won't just be Wanheda you have to fear, but Skairipa as well," Octavia said. "I'll see you with Denea at dinner. I'm sure that will give you enough time to settle whatever it is that you need to settle."

"Sha."

"Good," Octavia replied and left the tent without being dismissed or caring that Lexa could call for her head.

Lexa was amazed at the two leaders. They were scared of her or her title. They would question her to her face and in front of others, but at least they knew when to push her hard. They understood more than Lexa knew, and she was afraid that she was already lost in the fury that would be Clarke's love. Oddly enough, she also didn't care. She was intrigued and wanted to know more about the fiery blonde from the heavens. But, first, she have to find her.