A/N Sorry it took longer to upload, been very busy! Hope you enjoy :) - J x

When Clarke was young she had been an avid tree climber. Her small, lithe body was the perfect weight for all those spindly branches. She could shimmy up a trunk with bruised and knobbly knees or swing her weight into a crook between branches with a white-knuckled grip and a grin on her face as the other kids dared her to go higher, higher. Her climbs always resulted in purple brown bruises on her pale skin and leaf dust in her eyes and the lurch of fear in her mother's heart, but Clarke never fell. She was as assured in the trees as she was on her feet. Wells liked her climbs even less than her mother did, most times he would stand at the bottom of the trunk, his face turned up and his hands on his hips in what Clarke thought was a hilarious imitation of his father.

"You get down here, Clarke," He would call as she giggled. "What if you fall?"

"Don't be silly, Wells. I never fall," She was like a bird, high in the canopy, surrounded by blue skies and fresh greens and clean, pure air. But birds could fly, and Clarke could only climb. To fly she would have to get higher, burst through the leaves and out into the clouds. No one could ever reach her there, not her teachers who scolded her for drawing in class, nor the kids who teased her for her skinny elbows, nor her mother who told her off for being so damn difficult, Clarke. If she could fly, she could get away from it all. And wouldn't that be sweet.

But Wells's voice would always bring her back, full of worry and hurt and loneliness and she knew she couldn't leave, not without him.

"Come on then," She would grin down at him, a speck amongst the grass. "Come and climb with me," Everyday she would ask him and everyday he would uhm and ahh and decide not to. It's too dangerous, we're not allowed, my father would kill me. Until one day, he plucked up his courage and began to climb up the bark to meet her, taking a risk for the reward of Clarke's kiss. An empty promise between children, for lips pressed to a cheek or the corner of a mouth. Neither of them even knew the meaning of a true kiss, but Clarke knew how Wells wanted it, even then. And she knew how to use it in a bargain. It was fun, all a silly game, and Wells had never seen the District from Clarke's favourite, tallest tree. He was missing out. So she happily cheered him on, as she watched his hands manoeuvre across branches and bark and leaves, as he grew closer to her and her laughter-filled perch. Until his hand missed the next hold and he slipped, falling down, down toward the earth.

Time had almost slowed as Clarke watched Wells's arms flail out, searching for a hold as the gravity pulled his weight back to the ground, his back slamming into the floor with a thud and the breath rushing from his open mouth in a groan.

Clarke had scrambled down the trunk of the tree faster than she ever had but not fast enough. When she reached her friend and gripped his hand his lips were opening and closing as he struggled for air. His leg was twisted out at an odd angle and Clarke screamed and screamed for help until her mother came running and carried Wells away. Clarke couldn't follow them back home like she should've done. Instead she ran as fast as her legs would carry her, away from Wells's gasps and her mother's pinched face and the sickening feeling in her stomach as she had watched her best friend fall. It was Clarke's fault, and it gnawed at her insides for weeks.

Even when Wells had hugged her tight and asked her to paint his cast, telling her it was okay. It wasn't, it wasn't. He had always looked out for her, and Clarke had repaid him time and time again with pain, and she didn't know if she could ever put that right.

Clarke bit the inside of her cheek until she tasted blood as her eyes adjusted to the darkness. They didn't want to risk lighting a fire, for fear of other tributes, so Clarke kept the first watch in shadows. She had volunteered eagerly to take the watch; her body needed sleep the same as the others' did, but she was afraid of what she might see if she closed her eyes. Her waking life was nightmarish enough; she didn't want to see how the darkness might twist her thoughts into something even worse. What could be worse? Stupid. She kicked a log with the toe of her boot. He's dead, he's dead, he's never coming back. Voicesin her mind screamed out at her constantly and the worst of them all sneered at her from dark recesses of her brain, It's your fault.

It had been her fault when he had fallen from that tree so many years ago, and it was her fault now that he was dead. If she'd hadn't rushed ahead, if she had stayed with him – protected him. Oh god. Tears bit her cheeks and her throat burnt with sobs desperate to be released. The night turned blurry through the liquid in her eyes and a horrible, anguished sound tore its way from her lips before she could clap her hand over her mouth. Once the sob had been released, there was no stopping the cascade of tears that wet her face stinging like poison, or the animalistic moans that shook her entire body.

Clarke bit down on her thumb so hard that it hurt, but it stopped the noise and her shoulders shook silently with only her laboured breathing for sound. Crying was not an option in the games, it left you vulnerable, and in the games, you needed to be strong. I am strong, Clarke told herself, but in her thoughts, it was Wells's voice.

"What was his name?" Clarke nearly jumped out of her skin at the voice that spiked through the dark, but it was only the little girl from Twelve, Charlotte. Her skin shone pale in the moon and she seemed even tinier than she had before.

"The boy, from your District?" Charlotte nibbled at her fingernails as she pressed the question.

"Wells," The name caught in Clarke's throat and she shook her head with a slight cough. "You should be sleeping; it's not time to change the watch yet,"

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to pry, I heard you," Charlotte looked away from Clarke in embarrassment, her little shoulders hunched. "I just thought -"

"It's fine" Clarke cut her off, forcing a smile onto her face, aware that she looked more than a little unstable; her face pale and sallow in the wan light and her nose red with crying. She wondered if the cameras were focusing on her and Charlotte's exchange, she didn't want anyone to see her like this.

But why not? She bit the inside of her cheek as her eyes stung once more. Let me weep for my friend.

"You didn't kill him, you know," Clarke flinched as Charlotte's cool, stubby fingers touched her on the back of the hand. She sounded a thousand years old when she spoke, and Clarke wondered how someone so young could be so solemnly wise. It made her sad to think of the cause for Charlotte's unusual and mature demeanour, to think of how her childhood had been ripped away.

The girl had most likely grown up in severe poverty, plagued with malnourishment by the look of her. Her eyes were too big for her sunken face and her lips were chapped from cold and lack of vitamins. Starved of food and care, Clarke couldn't remember seeing any weeping family members when Charlotte's name was called, what seemed like a lifetime ago.

Clarke swallowed and turned her hand over so she could grip Charlotte's hand in return, a sudden surge of affection for the girl filling her. No one so young should face the games. No, no one should face the games, period. She thought back to Atom, and the words he had spoken. None of us deserve to die. Clarke hadn't been so sure at the time, but that was wrong. I killed you too, she thought dismally, shuddering as she pictured the mess he had become at the end of his life.

"I did," She whispered to Charlotte. "And I killed Atom, and the boy from Six. I didn't even know his name, but I killed him." She hung her head and the little girl's grip on her hand increased.

"You didn't kill your friend. You know who did," Charlotte's voice suddenly grew quiet and urgent, "You know who did, and it's not someone in this arena,"

Clarke inhaled sharply as her eyes darted around, expecting a bomb to dispose of Charlotte there and then for what she was suggesting. Clarke didn't want to think about what made a little girl become so hard and sad, what made a little girl throw out accusations against the government on live television.

"My parents told me that, before they died too." Charlotte made a sound somewhere between a sob and a moan. When she looked at Clarke again, both their eyes were wet with tears. "Bellamy's been the only family I've had in a long while,"

The two girls looked over to Bellamy's sleeping form, his huge body curled in on himself so that he looked much smaller, much younger. His eyebrows were furrowed even in sleep and every now and then his hand would twitch. He must be having a bad dream. Clarke felt an odd urge to move and comfort him, but there was no point in waking the boy yet. And the idea of reaching out and touching him was absurd. She hadn't forgotten his hostile behaviour toward her in the Capitol, and she wanted to steer clear of angering him now.

Still, she was glad she had new allies. She thought she might have gone insane, dealing with Wells's death alone. She would've run straight into the hands of the Careers, or else sat there cradling his cold body until they found her. She didn't think she would've had the strength in her to fight.

When Bellamy and Charlotte had found her, she had only gripped the knife out of instinct, if they had wanted to kill her, they had only need push her over onto her own blade. She wouldn't even have had the energy to scramble away. But instead, he had extended his hand. Not a hand of friendship, no, friendship was nigh impossible in the nightmare of the arena, but an alliance. Safety. The comfort of other human beings. For reasons unknown to her, Bellamy Blake had saved her life. And she had let him.

She wondered how long it would last.

"He cares about you a lot," Clarke eventually replied, "I can tell," And she could, Bellamy had seemed abrupt and stand offish every time she had seen him, but with Charlotte he had yielded, letting her in, protecting her. Clarke envied them and her heart ached for Wells.

Wells had loved Clarke as much as Bellamy loved Charlotte. Unconditionally. It had only been a day, but it felt like years since he had left her alone, and Clarke missed him terribly. It was though a great chunk of her had been ripped away, and she was left bleeding out.

Bellamy and Charlotte's outstretched hands had tried to patch up her wounds, but some wounds were too deep to recover from. Like the one in Wells's stomach, or the boy from District Six's. Or the one in Clarke's heart. The same one she had seen in her Mother. It had been so long since she had seen her Mother, and now she might never again. Better not to think about it.

"He cares about you too," Charlotte surprised her with her reply. "I don't know why he approached you, but I don't think it was tactical. I think," Charlotte's forehead creased. "He didn't want you to be alone," The words burrowed into Clarke's chest and settled there, thawing some of her ice with unexpected warmth. But it couldn't be true, Bellamy detested her, or at the very least disliked her, she had seen it.

"He hated me," Clarke's voice was a low murmur, "He hated me when he met me, for where I came from, for my allies, he hated me and he didn't even know me," Clarke didn't know why the thought made her so upset, but it was just so unfair that someone could have such a great dislike for her without knowing anything about her.

"Things are different now," Charlotte mused, "We're a team now,"

"Yeah," Clarke watched Bellamy's chest rise and fall in sleepy breaths, felt Charlotte's fingers grow warm in her grasp. She thought of the boy from District Six and his family crying for him back home, of Monty and Atom whose deaths would never leave her brain.

Of Wells, who had loved her, all of her. Wells who was the best friend she had ever had, Wells who had died in her arms with her name on his lips. Poor, sweet Wells who was all the good things she wasn't.

"Yeah, a team," She repeated lamely. And then she leant her head back against the trunk of a tree, catching sight of the stars through the canopy above, and tried to forget.

Later, when Charlotte had fallen into slumber at her side and Clarke's eyelids were drooping, she roused Bellamy with a wary hand on his shoulder. His skin was warm and she was worried he might have a fever, but when she touched him his eyes snapped open and his fingers caught her wrist in an iron grip.

For a moment his dark eyes didn't seem to recognise her, but scanned her face with a wild desperation, and then his hand dropped hers as if it had burnt him and he sat up.

"You've should've woken me earlier, you look terrible," Was all he said, and it made Clarke's cheeks flare hot with anger. She had been through hell and he had the audacity to comment on how she looked?

"Well, you're not looking too sharp yourself!" She snapped, tired, in pain and downright irritated.

And then, Bellamy laughed.

It was a worn-out, half-hearted laugh but it was there, and the tiniest display of happiness almost brought Clarke to tears. It had been so long since she had smiled a genuine smile, or shared a moment of laughter with another person, or experienced an emotion that wasn't exhaustingly painful. The sound was so magical that she joined in, letting the giggle slide from her lips before she thought better of it.

Bellamy looked confused for an instant, but then his lips curved into a wry smile of their own. He looked handsome even in the dark, with his face scabbed and dirty and his hair and clothes unwashed. Clarke thought he would probably look handsome anywhere. His dark eyes were warm when he looked at her, and his was the first true smile she had seen in days if not weeks.

Her cheeks hurt from the manic grin she was pulling, but it felt good, like a weight had been lifted from her chest and she had only now realised it had been there. It was like tiny fragments of her were pulled back to fill the gaping wound left by loss. It was a small thing, but it was something, and to Clarke that felt like a small wonder.

Bellamy looked as though he might ask her something, but then he shook his head, deciding against it. Instead, he reached out and clapped a huge hand to her shoulder.

"Get some sleep, Princess,"

And Clarke did as she was told. The ground was a mean, hard bed, but she was so exhausted that she fell asleep almost instantly, despite the unforgiving terrain. When she dreamt, it was of dark eyes, and happier times.