June 1864
Lexa rode into Clarke's farm, intent on convincing Clarke to join her today. She was required to carry a message from the fort to a village of her people. She led a second horse, Clarke had her own, but Lexa didn't want to remove it from the farm if they needed it. She had borrowed the horse from the stable of the fort with permission.
Clarke worked the fields with Raven nearby. She wiped at her head, sweat pooling at her pulled back blonde curls. Lexa admired the view from the back of her horse, enthralled by Clarke's curves. She had found herself quite the lovely woman.
Clarke caught sight of her and straightened, a small smile quirking her lips.
"You just going to watch me?" She teased Lexa. Lexa gave her a dark look and Clarke could have sworn she would have said yes if not for Raven nearby.
"If you two are going to be all over each other, I'm going to melt into the ground." Raven informed the two of them.
Clarke glared at her.
"I was actually, wondering if you were up for a ride." Lexa spoke up at last. She tilted her head at the second horse.
Clarke eyed her curiously. She noticed Lexa's clothing. She didn't wear her usual fort scout uniform with mixtures of her people's garb mixed in. She was in full regalia, folded blanket wrapped around her waist, leggings, moccasins, her torso wrapped in a buckskin tunic and feathers threaded through her braided hair.
"Where to?" Clarke asked.
"I must deliver a message to my village." Lexa answered.
"My mother has been asking after you."
Clarke gave her a surprised look.
"She has?"
Lexa nodded.
Raven, listening in on the exchange, spoke up at last, "Go on. Meet the family!"
Clarke gave Raven a look.
"Are you sure?" Clarke looked concerned.
Raven laughed. "Don't worry I can take care of this place alone. I've got Indra here."
Clarke turned to Lexa. "How long?"
"A day's ride, we'll stay the night, maybe a day, then ride back." Lexa replied. Clarke raised an eyebrow at Raven. Raven shrugged.
"Go." Raven insisted.
"Then, yes." She turned away to put away her tools and ran into the house to grab whatever she might need for the ride. She returned, with a pack and a water skin in hand.
"In case I'm inspired." She told Lexa at her questioning look. Lexa hid her smile. Clarke never went anywhere without a sketch journal. Even on market days, Lexa had found Clarke with the book sketching something or someone. It was her second one, her first filled with page after page of sketches. Lexa had brought her paper, sketches, hides and even paints from her people as gifts from time to time. She loved to see what Clarke would create.
Clarke climbed onto the horse's back gracelessly. Lexa had the horse saddled for Clarke. While Lexa rode bareback, she knew Clarke was not trained to do so. Perhaps Lexa could teach her later.
"Ready?" Lexa asked her. Clarke nodded and they began their ride.
"I noticed you're growing more wheat this year." Lexa mentioned as she led Clarke northward.
Clarke nodded. "The Murphy family is raising profits on the crop. We'll sell them what we grow and maybe be able to buy another horse after this season."
They rode on in companionable silence for a time. They had spent what free moments during spring they could together. Lexa even helped prepare the ground for planting at Clarke's farm. It was not uncommon for them to fall into happy silences, content to enjoy the peace they shared with one another.
"Lexa?" Clarke spoke after some time.
"Hmm?" Lexa had been musing, thinking of her family left in her village.
"Tell me about your people?" Clarke asked softly.
Lexa thought for a moment before answering.
"My mother, I told you she raised me, calling me Lexa. She's a white woman taken in by the tribe. My father died not long after I received my name. He died of sickness." Lexa began.
"My mother should remarry, but she is a white woman, so no one presses her to move on. She works with my father's brother, the Medicine Man of the tribe, gathering whatever he asks. He is a good man and has a wife and children of his own." Lexa explained.
"The women run much of the political structure, the men, war and hunting. My relatives all live in one great earth lodge together."
"Earth lodge?" Clarke asked, intrigued.
"You'll have to see it to understand." Lexa told her.
Clarke hummed. She began to sing as they rode along.
I've seen forest bright green gold
I've seen wonders be untold
Nothins got a hold on me
Like that girl with eyes of forest green
Lexa eyed Clarke from her own horse knowing that this was an original song sung just for her. She bit her lip and listened, warmth filling her, amazed and soothed by the sound of Clarke's sweet voice filling the warming summer air.
Yes sometimes I can't believe
That this girl was made for me
She runs swiftly like the wind
By sight of her I have sinned
Lexa laughed at that line and felt her face redden.
"Clarke!" She admonished.
Clarke only grinned at her and continued to sing with her lilt.
Her hair wild and so free
And she was made for me
Her eyes bright like green gold
With love like hers I am bold
Yes sometimes I can't believe
That this girl was made for me
Clarke finished. Lexa moved her horse close enough to Clarke's that she leaned and reached over at once, drawing Clarke into a hard, deep kiss.
They both pulled away, breathless.
Clarke's blue eyes held Lexa's own green.
"What was that for?" Clarke questioned with raised brows.
"Being you." Lexa laughed after she got her breath back.
Clarke smiled.
"I should sing more often if that's going to be the response!" She replied. She noted a stream ahead.
"Race you?" She pointed at the stream. Lexa quirked a small smile.
"If you think you can take me." With that, she was off, the horse beneath her thighs responding to a the squeeze she gave with her muscles. Lexa charged forward. She reached the stream long before Clarke.
She hopped off the horse gracefully and led him over to drink. Clarke arrived shortly.
"That was so not fair!" Clarke called to her as she clamored off her own ride's back. Lexa laughed at her as she led her own horse to drink. Lexa splashed water onto her face to cool down. Clarke refilled her water skin. They soon began a game of splashing one another until Lexa grasped Clarke around the waist. Clarke's eyes widened.
"Lexa!" She warned.
Lexa threw them both sideways into the shallow stream, drenching them with cool water. Clarke spluttered. She splashed Lexa in the face as she huffed, her blonde curls free from their tail and sticking to her face.
"Lexa!" Clarke whined, but was soon cut off by wet lips. She moaned as she noticed the wet skin she could feel beneath wet cloth against her own.
Lexa pulled away and began to pull off her clothing.
"We should take time to dry, Clarke." Lexa taunted. She left the stream to hang up her clothing on a tree branch as she removed the rest of what she wore. Clarke followed her, feeling her skin heat, despite the cool stream she had just been dunked into. She removed her own clothing as well, draping all she wore over a branch and pulling Lexa toward her, sliding her tongue into her mouth.
They both moaned at the feeling as they edged to the stream. Lexa pulled Clarke to a slick rock she had seen as they played and pushed her to sit on the edge of it, grasping Clarke's knees and sliding between them. Clarke squirmed as Lexa slipped her tongue into her mouth again and made her way down her jaw, licking, sucking and pressing her lips down the centerline of Clarke's taunting body. She held her face between Clarke's breasts, sucking at the center between them, swirling her tongue and leaving a mark.
She moved lower as Clarke gasped and moaned clutching at her head. When she reached her center Lexa licked her lips. Clarke was already glistening not just from the stream but her own juices. Lexa slid her tongue along Clarke's slit and felt Clarke shudder above her, Clarke's fingers tightening in her hair.
"L-Lexa." Clarke groaned.
Lexa began to work at her, licking upward, dipping and swirling, licking again, just barely contacting Clarke's nub until she felt Clarke's hips moving in earnest, a sign she was reaching her peak. Lexa latched onto her nub just as she felt Clarke was getting to the top and sucked, her tongue flicking and swirling and Clarke arched and pulled at her hair. Lexa could hear her moans as she gave in, arching and shuddering and bucking against her mouth. Clarke slumped forward as she came down. Lexa kissed her way up, pressed a soft, slow kiss to Clarke's mouth.
They held eyes for several long moments before Lexa pulled away.
"Think those clothes are dry enough?" Lexa teased. "Or do you think we have time for more?"
Clarke pulled her to her mouth again.
It was nearing sundown before Lexa and Clarke arrived to Lexa's village. Lexa was greeted happily by some and ignored by others. Clarke found the mixed reaction interesting. She would ask Lexa about it later.
Lexa led the way to one of several large earth lodges. Clarke was in awe of the structures. They seemed to be great round houses built into the earth itself. Grass and thatch covered the sides of many, with wood bracing the doorways. She noted the animal skins rolled or tied off to the side of the entries. It was probably warm with the summer heat.
She followed Lexa into the lodge she had led them to after they had settled their horses. Clarke eyed the inside of the earth lodge in wonder yet again. It was far more spacious within. A second, lower level could be seen from the entry where several people sat, chatting. She noted what looked to be wooden posts and animal skins used to create barriers around the inside to make rooms.
Someone called to them in the Pawnee language. Clarke looked to see an older woman, her hair a light brown, her face pale and her eyes the same shade of green as Lexa's headed toward them.
Lexa embraced her as the woman reached them.
"Clarke, I would like you to meet my mother." The woman eyed Clarke and stepped forward. She pulled Clarke into a hug.
"I have long waited to meet the one that has so caught my Lexa's spirit." The older woman whispered into her ear.
Clarke, feeling awkward at being hugged by a motherly figure at first, began to melt into the embrace.
"She has caught my own as well." Clarke admitted.
"Good. Come, eat. Lexa can go deliver her message." Lexa's mother pulled Clarke along toward the center of the lodge and Clarke threw Lexa one last look before Lexa gave her an encouraging nod and turned away to do as she had come to do.
Clarke was filled to the brim with food and leaning back, relaxing and listening to the women gossip around her. She couldn't understand a word that was being said but was gleaning from their tones that they were chatting about local village occurrences. They nagged at the children as they stumbled in their horseplay and laughed, giving sly grins as they joked around.
"The men are either hunting or scouting for the fort." Lexa's mother had returned. She had been called away to settle a feud between two younger mothers within the lodge.
Clarke nodded. She had noticed the lack of men. There were a few older ones and boys milling about but none of the fit, healthy men were anywhere to be seen.
"Lexa reports to the chief and my late husband's brother. They'll make a decision on what to do as far as supplying the fort with scouts and warriors goes." She was informed.
"Be warned child, there is the sound of war drums in the distance. The Pawnee make war on their own kind. I do not yet know if this will fare well in the outcome for them."
Clarke frowned. "You speak as if you know."
Lexa's mother watched the people around her.
"I might not have been born one of them, but I have lived amongst them for a long time. I have learned their ways, though I still have some of my old thoughts. At times those conflict. Settlers want these people to fit in with them, but these people? Why should they have to when their way has shown them they are right to live it as they do?" She was questioned. Clarke did not have an answer.
Why should these people have to try to fit into her ways? They seemed to be surviving, laughing, smiling, scolding, all the things she did just slightly differently.
"I don't know." Clarke watched as Lexa entered the lodge. Lexa's eyes held her own. She did know one way in which these people were better than her own.
Lexa's mother squeezed Clarke's knee.
"Amongst the Pawnee, the two of you are accepted. You would be welcome with open arms and be joined together. Amongst the white men you are seen as deviants, something to be corrected or gotten rid of." She was told. "Just remember that here, you are welcome."
Clarke nodded silently, letting the words sink in. She stood and crossed to join Lexa, embracing her. Lexa grinned and glanced around the inside of the lodge before planting a kiss on her lips.
Clarke heard whoops and calls from behind her and blushed.
"My mother will stay with my aunt for the night. You and I will have our own room to ourselves." Lexa whispered into her ear. Clarke ignored the racing of her heart as Lexa pulled Clarke to one of the portioned off areas of the lodge and pulled aside an animal skin, ushering Clarke through first.
They stripped and curled up together. Lexa covering them with a woven blanket. Clarke fell asleep her head tucked under Lexa's chin.
