Disclaimer: I do not own The 100 or any of its characters.
Author's note: at the end.
WAR ON ICE
A regret.
"I could have warned them," Clarke whispered. Her voice was low and unsteady. Lexa could practically feel the pain seeping from Clarke's words.
It was the evening after the mountain men's missile struck TonDC, burning down most of the village. Clarke and Lexa were camped on the very outskirts of the woods. They heard screams and moans filter in from the distance. The light had long faded from the sky, but they could still see the smoke rising high up above them. It wasn't safe to return to the village, though. And Lexa was starting to wonder if Clarke was even ready to go back tonight at all.
Looking over at the blonde, Lexa saw her eyes shine with the beginning of tears. She'd said that over and over the last several hours: I could have warned them. She'd hesitated when fleeing the village, turning back to retrieve her mother and then almost returning to take care of the wounded. Clarke was deeply conflicted, Lexa knew. The necessity of their act had set in, but so did the regret. Because of her heart.
"You could have," Lexa began, but Clarke interrupted her.
"You don't get it!" The tears broke through, and Clarke turned to glare at Lexa. "I know it was the right decision. I don't regret the decision. But, I…" She broke off just then, looking away.
Lexa felt a softness consume her. It was something she didn't experience often, for the position of Commander required the grit and strength of steel. Love is weakness, after all. But there was something about this moment sitting here with Clarke. The girl struggled with her convictions and their shared plight of being at war. She led with her head without sacrificing the core of her heart. There was something special about her. And Lexa sympathized in a way she never had before.
As Clarke let out a quiet sob, Lexa did something unexpected: she reached out to her, placing her hand on her companion's shoulder. "I understand," she said simply. And she did. Clarke continued to sob, and Lexa tightened her grip, moving her hand to the small of Clarke's back. They were closer now. Lexa could feel her body shake with her grief and her guilt. She shifted even closer so that she was half-holding Clarke, her eyes locked on the fire in front of them.
"I want the mountain men dead," Clarke finally offered. Lexa still had her arm around her, but if Clarke minded, she didn't indicate it. "I know I keep saying that, Lexa, and I know that earlier kill didn't satisfy me. But…there are some mountain men who just need to die."
"Okay." Clarke turned to look at her, blue eyes meeting green. Lexa let go at that point, but she remained close. Their shoulders still brushed. "We'll do everything we can, Clarke. I promise."
o - o - o - o - o - o
Chapter 3
"You can't be serious, Mom," Clarke snapped, following her mother into the medical wing as they returned from a meeting with the council.
It'd been a long few days. Lexa had waltzed into their camp entirely unannounced and unwanted. Nobody knew what to do. She just strode right in, the guards said, demanding to speak to Clarke, Abby, and Kane. Clarke had wondered if she'd ever see Lexa again after she betrayed them at the mountain, and evidently she had. Barely a day later. What a pair of balls she's got.
"Clarke, drop it."
"You can't listen to her or let her stay here!" Clarke grabbed her mother's shoulders and spun her around, glaring into her eyes. "Not after all she's done!"
It was easy for Clarke to hate Lexa. Logical, really. If she hadn't made a deal with the mountain men behind their back and abandoned them there at the door, Clarke wouldn't have had to do it. She wouldn't have had to storm the property. She wouldn't have had to murder over 300 people with the touch of a button. She wouldn't have to deal with the consequences of those actions for the rest of her life.
When it came down to it, Clarke had to blame and hate Lexa for what happened.
Otherwise she'd have to blame and hate herself.
"She is the leader of an army who still very much outnumbers us," Abby continued, wiggling out of Clarke's grip and placing her herbs in a storage bin. "Kane is right. We have to see what she wants and then figure out where to go from there."
Of course that was the right thing to do. Clarke understood that. And she really wasn't one to talk. She'd barged into Lexa's camp unannounced more times than she can count doing the same exact thing: demanding to speak to the leader. She did it for what she thought were important reasons, too. She understood that, but it didn't mean she had to like Lexa popping in whenever she pleased.
"I don't care what she wants," Clarke mumbled, kicking the side of a nearby table. At Abby's questioning stare, Clarke shook her head quickly, remembering her mother did not know the grounder culture as well as Clarke did. And, Clarke realized, her mother had no idea what had happened between her and Lexa in that tent, and what had happened between them over the past several weeks. Clarke hardly had any idea what had happened, and what she felt, and what it all meant, and what Lexa even wanted from her.
"Never mind," Clarke eventually sighed, turning away. "I'll save it for someone who will actually listen to me."
o - o - o - o - o - o
Clarke didn't want to talk to Lexa, but there came a point where she had to during a meeting. It'd been several days since she arrived at the camp. The council confirmed Lexa's information on threats from the grounders beyond what Lexa could control. Contrary to what many might believe, Lexa did not rule everything and everyone. While she headed a coalition of twelve clans in the area, the Ice Nation-Azgada-in the north seemed to follow its own rules.
They were a ruthless bunch, conquered and controlled by Queen Nia of the North. The smaller villages learned very quickly after the bombs that they needed to join forces in order to survive, but when she came into power, Nia wanted more and more villages to fall under her command. She was horrible. Savage. Wicked. Merciless. Clarke learned that it was she who cut off the head of Lexa's lover and sent it back to Lexa as a ruse, knowing very well the effect it would have on the Commander. But Lexa still allowed her to join their coalition. She did what was right for her people-for all people-and held her head high the entire time. As Lexa shared that, her voice low yet strong, Clarke finally understood what Lexa meant when she said love was weakness and caring about others only put them in danger.
She understood, but she didn't necessarily care. Some would say it was probably karma catching up with her.
It all seemed to be for naught, though, since Queen Nia recently moved her troops closer to the border with Trikru among whispers of a siege after the fall of the mountain. The mountain was the key to it all, Clarke had learned. The twelve clans formed their alliance to combat the threats of the mountain men and their technology. Individually they had no chance; together they could actually survive and fight back.
Until Clarke killed all the mountain men and the threat, of course.
At the moment they were awaiting representatives from the rest of the clans to respond to the escalating situation with the Ice Nation. Lexa sent word back to her people to gather the councilmen together nearby, just outside Arkadia. They were to first agree on a treaty between Skaikru and the twelve clans before they discussed their next move. And they were to do it there, recognizing Skaikru as having property of their own. Lexa very much wanted peace among their people, she insisted, despite what her actions at the mountain might indicate instead. But Clarke didn't want to get into that again.
As everyone left and went their separate ways (with Kane and the council retreating to their own private meeting), it eventually emptied out to just Lexa and Clarke in the meeting room. Lexa was looking at Clarke without really looking at her. She was facing her, and her eyes were in her general direction, but she wasn't staring in the way she normally stared. Clarke noticed that Lexa had been avoiding her the past few days…not that she was complaining.
"Do you, uh, know your way back to your room?" Clarke finally asked, breaking the silence. She knew that Lexa had moved rooms a couple times, due to threats from some less-than-content parents of the children Lexa had left to die at Mount Weather.
"No," said Lexa quietly. "They told me I'd be staying in the 'unity room' next, but I don't know where it is."
"Oh."
Clarke didn't know either, to be honest. Her mother and the others had made plenty of changes while she was away with the grounders, but she still knew the building better than Lexa did. Clarke nodded and then led the way out of the room. It was strange, because Lexa wasn't a prisoner yet wasn't trusted by anyone in the entire camp. As they walked to the lodging quadrant of the building, people paused in the hallway, casting dirty looks at the Commander as she strode by. It made Clarke both uncomfortable and satisfied.
"Do you know where we are going, Clarke?"
It was a simple question, but Clarke hesitated, biting her lip.
"Actually, I…don't." Clarke grinned, looking over at Lexa. It was a ridiculous situation, lost in one's own camp. The brunette gazed back at her with amusement tucked in her green eyes, but then she dipped her head and looked in front of her.
When they finally reached the end of the hall, Clarke regained her bearings and then gestured toward to the left hand side. "Here you are. The unity room." There's also a series of locks, Clarke thought in her head, surveying the door and thinking back to how many hostile stares Lexa had gotten and how she didn't have any guards with her this entire time.
Lexa nodded, about to enter the room, but Clarke stopped her. She reached out her hand and touched her arm. Lexa froze at the contact, slowly looking down at Clarke's hand before turning to look at her face.
"Why are you really here, Lexa?" Clarke asked, pulling her hand away.
She really wondered. What would make the Commander herself travel all alone to the heart of enemy territory? Especially an enemy she had just betrayed? The guards could have killed her on sight. No one had ordered it, but it would have been in their right. Yet Lexa came anyway-unarmed and unopposed. All in the name of peace. Why? And why now, after she'd thwarted whatever peace they'd previously established between their two people?
Clarke was still angry at the brunette for leaving her there at Mount Weather, she'd admit. It happened so soon ago and the reveal was so raw and fresh, like ripping a badge off a festering wound. And she didn't know if it'd ever go away. Part of Clarke still wanted to kill Lexa for what she'd done. She broke a promise and unraveled weeks of careful and calculated planning. But Lexa's presence at Arkadia meant something, proved something. And Clarke wanted to know what.
Lexa searched Clarke's eyes for a moment before blinking and nodding curtly. "To discuss the looming threat of the Ice Nation, as we covered during our meeting."
"Is that…all?"
Clarke don't know what made her say it. Especially like that. Lexa seemed surprised, too. A hint of feeling entered her stoic gaze before she nodded yet again. "Yes. Good night, Clarke. Thank you for your hospitality."
Author's note:
Thanks so much for reading! What do you think? Reviews are welcome :) Chapter 4 is currently in progress!