« May we meet again. » The sentence echoes once again in Lexa's mind, as she turns away from Clarke's face and its looks of betrayal, as her warriors follow her and leave the girl in front of the locked door. Blood still soaks her cheeks and her heart gets heavier at every step she takes, but she goes on. Hasn't she always?
« Leave me alone. » Her voice whips the air, cold as steel. The Ya, Heda she gets as a reply doesn't even touch her, it just passes through. The men walk past her, and it takes a while before she starts walking again. Oh, Lexa, where do you go now?, she asks herself as her footsteps carry her away from the road they took before. Without totally acknowledging it, she knows where she's heading, and yet she's still asking herself why.
The clearing is small, but she knows it so well. She could describe and place every single bush, recite the name of each tree with her eyes closed. She remembers running to this place barefoot as a little child, her laugh echoing through the branches. Without even looking, she knows there's a strain in the middle, where decades ago an old oak tree stood tall. There she sits, there she closes her eyes, and there the memories flood her slowly.
The first face she remembers is Anya's. Anya, who has taught her so well for years before she was made a Commander for the Woods Clan. Anya, who had been both a mother after Lexa's parents were killed by a rival clan and a mentor that gave her a heart of steel and that wisdom she could never get out of her head, although she didn't believe it that much before. Love is weakness, Lexa. Repeat and remember. And repeat she did. As she threw a quick glance to the woman by the campfire, she asked herself if Anya ever got to love. She just seemed so strong, and so confident, that it seemed impossible that anyone ever touched her heart. But, even if she spoke that way to her young apprentice, she didn't try to take Costia away.
Costia. Her name only is enough to make Lexa's chest ache. She remembers brown eyes with glimpses of gold in it, and her mess of curly hair that smelled of running and freedom. She remembers leather clothes and short daggers, quick wits and a laugh that echoed through trees as she kissed her forehead. Just thinking about her hurts again, and the commander is tempted to push the thought away. But then her ghosts get up, both her mentor and that girl she loved - and still does somehow - seem to look at her with such disappointment that she fell on her knees.
Get smacked down, get back up! Anya's voice run through her brain again, and she bites her lips before forcing herself to stand tall again, face these silhouettes. Lexa, how could you forget me so easily? Her heart sinks in her chest as she hears Costia's voice « I…I didn't betray you! It's you staying there and haunting everything I see! It's Finn who made Clarke pull away from me! You dead people suck. » The moment she stops talking is the moment she realizes she's talking to no one but to reflections her brain made up himself. The two women are no longer there, and she's all alone in the glade of trees again. Slowly, she grabs the knife hanging off her belt. The blade shines for a second at the moonlight before she throws it in the ground, so deep only the guard remains visible. « I said I had no weaknesses. From now on I'll have none. And you two », she tellls her ghosts, « should consider it done now. » Eyes glimmering with her fierce look again, before she turns away and disappears in the trees.
What is it like, Heda Leksa, to question yourself that much?