Chapter 22 – Devil in Your Eye (Mumford & Sons)

Devil in Your Eye

The healers bundled Clarke up in layers of wool and fur while Remy prepared more of the strong-smelling tea. With her help, Clarke gulped it without spilling. The bitterness choked down her throat; Clarke conceded to allow a guard to carry her to another suite. Clarke was certain she could manage a short distance on her own feet, or at least she knew they needed to figure out if she could. Yet Remy was insistent that they wait. Rest the injury every moment that she could, the healer repeated in her accented English. Regardless of resting or waiting, tonight in the courtyard she must be a willing, walking sacrifice. This they all knew, but none said.

Down the swept corridor, a set of double doors just the same as the pair they'd left, opened up to another set of several interconnected rooms. The grizzled guard strode through the entry chamber, and the second room which appeared to be a sitting room, into the largest chamber. He crossed the room towards the immense bed, which was covered only in a thin wrap, dumping his burden upon it carelessly. Curling into herself as she fell, Clarke hissed on impact with the soft bed, but remained where she'd fallen on her side. It was worth too little to kick out at him. That bit of cruelty had earned him a caustic snap from Remy along with the command to wait outside.

Pointing her toes, she inched her foot forwards, flexing her knee. The ice and snow with rest had relieved much of the swelling. There was still a tugging sensation that churned her stomach, flecked with burning, but much of the joint had eased.

In her months on Earth, Clarke had never seen a grounder wedding, in either life. She'd barely even heard of marriage on the ground at all. On a haunting night Octavia had whispered once, before their deaths, of having wanted to marry Lincoln.

Nevertheless, Clarke was sure she knew Nia well enough to guess that anything could be awaiting her. Pageantry or barbarism was equally likely. So there she lay and watched listlessly as servants filled the rooms around her. Some were carrying buckets of water and clean towels. Others built fires in each room, lit candles, and tended to the windows. Over the accented sounds of the north, Clarke could pick out words about dressing. For all of the queen's impatience, there was enough time for meaningless vanity.

38 Days Till the End

Mount Weather Sanctuary

Bellamy lay on his back in the bunk of the cell. It was looking ever more likely to be his home until after the Deathwave. It wasn't his fault. He tried. Tried to keep his temper. Tried to bite his tongue. Tried to stop knocking the patronizing, pitying mien off their faces. It was just that wretched checklist of Jackson's.

Bellamy had never made it past question number seven.

Question Number Seven was: "Do you believe you can find a way to accept the hypothetical deaths of your friends or relatives with time?".

Why they didn't just say her name he didn't know. He wasn't even sure how many questions were on the list. The crux of it all was Clarke was presumably dead by now. Thus what did it matter if Bellamy lay here for the next six months? Or held his tongue to bullshit his way out of this cell? Or bulldozed through the next trio to open the door?

It wouldn't matter. He'd failed. Again. He had failed, just as Octavia, just as Clarke, had known he would. His sister wasn't coming to Mount Weather. That Bellamy knew, but he didn't know if she was safely in the Polis bunker or outside defending it. Or if she was off trying to get herself killed in the ice nation lands out for revenge.

The twin terrors, he'd called them. He remembered them walking arm-in-arm through their camp. Their heads bent together to whisper. Would she sit in Polis while Clarke was missing in action? It wasn't like anyone was bringing him a radio into here. Or like Octavia would talk to him if they did.

The next time they came, he'd just get through those questions, and get out of here, and then... He didn't know what to do next.

So Bellamy laid on his back in the holding cell.

There was absolutely nothing he could do for either of them.

Whenever Roan was absent the healers dominated the rooms, and this one seemed to rule the lot. Hlr. Remy kom Azgeda, the woman had introduced herself. In all the days that Clarke had laid in wait, she'd never seen the ice nation healer without a scarf around her neck. She was methodical, Clarke knew that from being under her care. It reminded Clarke of her mother, as a doctor. Abby as a leader had been prone to snap judgments, but as a doctor… Methodical, Clarke approved of. Still, she'd had little chance to learn anything else about this woman.

Under the eyes of the waiting servants, Remy removed every bandage from Clarke's battered body before washing her from the neck down. Then the healer waved her hands for servants to come forward. Hands fell upon Clarke's shoulders to pin her in place. The first brush of cold metal drew a choked gasp. Laying on her stomach, as Clarke had for more days than she could count, Clarke sucked her sore, bruised lower lip to quiet herself as the delicate knife returned to her wounds to shave away the necrotic tissue.

Her belly remained tender, but the wound was closed at least. Hanging from a rail in the corner of the bedroom placed within Clarke's line of sight was the garment Nia had sent as a wedding gown. It was an unadorned slip of fabric that would be awe striking in its very simplicity. The white silk, thin, and fine, would be ruined by Nia's spite. Her back was still a crusted, oozing mess. The healers whispered of months. Months before the skin would knit itself back together again. Months before she'd know what the scar tissue would look like.

"The fresh air may help, but this… it must be covered." Remy mused, her voice low and scratchy.

If she was speaking to Clarke, she was ignored. The debridement never failed to leave Clarke sunken into a pit of chemical haziness as her body fought off the pain with endorphins and adrenaline.

With the stripes scoured fresh, Remy used deft hands to apply the glossy layer of herb-infused oil over every inch of her back. With this done, the healer called for a set of canisters of clay to be brought to the bedside. From the first, Remy drew out a handful of soft, white powder. Sprinkles drizzled across the black and red canvas she worked on.

"That will help preserve the open wounds," Remy whispered, "but this... this one will sting."

Clarke grunted acknowledgment at the warning. Until now, this would have been the moment when cloth bandages, warm from the fires of the laundry rooms, would be wrapped gently around her.

Without another word, Remy drew moist, pliable white clay from the second pot, and began covering her patient's wounds with it in a heaping layer. Clarke whimpered at the sensation of acid rain being rubbed upon the wide rows of abused flesh. Dots of black blood welled up, smearing in the white clay, and Remy grit her teeth so loud Clarke heard.

When it was done, Remy stepped away and announced her work must have time to dry. So Clarke was left alone on the bed with tears drying on her face. She kept her eyes closed and ignored the bustle around her. All this work and fuss and humiliation... just to satisfy the queen's twisted schemes. The fires were warming the rooms, and for now nothing was required of her except stillness. She must have drifted off because Clarke jerked at her title being called.

At Remy's instruction, the pair of servants stepped forwards again, this time grabbing hold of Clarke's arms, and lifting her off the bed, to her feet. There Clarke stood rigid keeping even her arms still. Unable to even contemplate the abasement of her bruised breasts bared. These bruises of eggplant and indigos she could see.

To raise her arms, or so much as twitch her shoulders... She remained stiff as she was guided away from the bed.

Sitting stiffly on the bench in front of the antique vanity, Clarke focused on her people. Forcing herself to picture Hundred Camp, and Charlotte's face, and hold the memories of her friends tight to remind herself why she would go through with this.

Anything to keep her mind off the physical chores of solemnly preparing her for sacrifice. None of the servants raised their eyes, and Clarke was comforted by the fact that none were so cruel to feign joyful anticipation. Instead, she imagined her chambers held the same grave despair of a body being readied for the pyre.

With her back now caked in clay, which gave the lashes a much older look to them, now the maids were striving to put some semblance of order into her hair. It had been cleaned along with the rest of her at some point before she'd woken after the dungeons, but the sheer amount of bleeding, of healing oils and creams, had invariably ended up polluting it again.

One of the maids was a tiny slip of a girl that Clarke had seen often during her convalescence. The girl had never spoken loudly enough, or dared come close enough to Roan's bed, for Clarke to hear. Ines, Clarke thought she might be called, for hearing Remy speak to her.

"Prisa, your hair." worried the girl as she yanked with a comb. Already exhausted by the proceedings, Clarke eyed herself in the mirror.

Her hair had been laboriously washed in a shallow tub by gentle hands while she slept upon the bed, but it remained a damp mass of snares.

"Oil it and put it up. It'll hide the knots," instructed Clarke flatly.

The girl dipped a curtsey that made Clarke flinch in reply, and obediently returned to work.

With her hair down, and Clarke helped back onto her feet, Ines stepped forward again. This time she was carrying the dress over both arms. It would be no shield from eyes nor chill, and Remy confirmed that the queen had personally ordered it from a tailor- not long after Clarke's arrival.

"There's no way to hide the fact that you are injured. Thus the queen flaunts it instead," murmured the healer in explanation, at the dubious look from Clarke.

With steadying hands to help, Clarke tentatively balanced as she stepped into the slip of a gown, and the healer cautiously pulled it upwards. A delicate pair of braided white ribbons created a thin strap to tie around her neck. It sat so low across the backside of her that it was eventually decided that no undergarment was discrete enough to wear under it. Clarke kept her eyes raised high after her first glance down at herself in the gown.

Without a pause, Remy reached under the thin gown, and slide Clarke's underwear down her legs for her to step out of. The gown was cut at mid-calf in the front, but the back fell onto the floor behind her heels. The swirled blister scars on her legs were hardly even a concern in comparison to her back. At least her breasts, bruised and aching like the rest of her, were not left bare as her backside. Though to be frank, the thin white silk gave her the scarcest coverage. This was not a gown meant for Azgeda, even in summer. With the thick, black crusted, stripes, and shockingly black-blue and purple splotches half-covered by white clay... no one was likely to pay attention to either her derriere or her scarcely covered breasts. Without a chance to examine herself in a mirror, Clarke could not know what her back truly looked like, but it felt heinous. With a harshly waved hand, Clarke refused every bit of jewelry the servants had offered

Twice Nia sent guards to be sure of the preparations, and to grunt questions at the healer too low for Clarke to overhear. The command to properly outfit Wanheda as a prisa kom azgeda, she did hear though. Ines' reply was too quick and quiet, but the harsh reply back to her was clear.

The young maid returned to the chest where the servants had pulled jewelry from to tempt Clarke. With quivering hands, Ines retrieved numerous long necklaces. Thick golds, spiral chains of bronze, and faded, intricate silvers. She clambered onto the bed to be able to lower it onto the princess's neck, just as instructed by the healer. She arranged them so that they hung backward, tight across the hollow of Clarke's throat. The chains hung down her marred back. A keening cry escaped Clarke, as her eyes burned with the tears that finally escaped. The metal, rough and sharp as broken glass to her tattered flesh, scrubbed at her wounds with every breath she took. Clarke sobbed out a thick cry, again, as she fought for her self-control.

"They will see how strong you are," hissed Remy tightly, under her breathe, as close as she could lean without risking contact with the bloody mess in front of her.

"No." whimpered Clarke. "They'll only see what I couldn't even protect myself from. How weak I am." "You are not weak, Clarke kom Skaikru. It has been me to watch you claw your way back from the void of the afterlife. When the prince brought me to you, I would have sworn on my daughters' heads that there was no life left for you. Yet here you stand, prepared to do what must be done still. Only fools could believe you to be weak," whispered Remy firmly.

The healer's faith soaked in. Clarke bolstered herself. She was ready to face her fate with her face was left scrubbed clean. Knotted and smelling of fancy oils, her hair pulled back from it. It was a blank canvas for the branding irons. "Prisa," the healer began, her voice dropping even lower. "Tonight, you will meet the queen's favorite. Ontari grew up with the royal children. There were many yet she and Roan are the last left. You must never allow yourself to be alone with Ontari. Never."

The healer guided her to turn around in slow movements.

Silver, gold, platinum chains, bearing diamond and sapphires and shining opals, none of them matched in the slightest, but resentfully, Clarke looked in the murky mirror at the vanity. To herself only, she admitted that the sheer quantity made for a rather awe-inspiring look.

The grizzled, bear of a guard which Remy had called Alistair, Clarke kept her face as blank as she could. She remembered him from the cells. Him, and the younger boy, his second. He was Nia's chief guard, according to Remy. It was him that was culpable for more than one of the wounds upon her body. After a fleeting glance at Clarke, Remy shook her head and called forth the other guard, a younger man Clarke found familiar but could not place. Alistair frowned heavily but did not object.

"Carry her. With the respect Wanheda is due. To the great doors. From there, you must keep her on her feet. Do not let her fall," instructed Remy curtly. The guard bowed so low that Clarke worried he'd go headfirst into the floor. The healer draped a thin white wrap around her shoulders, shrouding her back, pulling the chains tighter against the wounds.

He approached her slowly, as if wary, and held out his arms in placation until Clarke nodded her acquiescence of this belittling arrangement.

He swooped her up with ease, even as Remy hissed a reminder to be careful. The lashes of her back burned in a threat of tearing back open though she went limp trying to ease the movement. At least the pain washed over her in a quick wave, and then she could push through to the other side. Her head lolled on his shoulder, and she barely heard his whisper as she blinked away the pain. "Keep the faith prisa," the words reverberated in her memory, yet she could not place them. With eyes closed, Clarke evened her breathing. She floated above everything. The long walk to the groaning, jerking elevator seemed to take no time at all. As if she had slept away her last moments.

Never had she dreamed of a wedding.

On the Ark, her sole ambition had to become a doctor.

On Earth, her sole ambition was to keep her people alive.

There had been Finn, then Lexa, but there had never been time to dream of a future beyond immediate survival with either. Marriage had never been a consideration. Perhaps she would have married Wells, on the Ark. They would have been just another doctor/engineer couple living on Alpha and producing their one allotted child in time. That possibility seemed a lifetime away. Where was Wells now? How many days had passed since last she saw him? Clarke could only hope all of her people were within the sanctuaries.

Only when Remy warned the guards again to be careful with their prisa did Clarke realize the healer was not letting her go to the altar alone.

Once they reached the stately doors, Clarke was placed carefully upon her feet. From here she'd be on show. Remy delicately removed the wrap, winching at the black streaked white clay that stained it. With her unveiled, one of the guards returned, for Clarke to grasp his arm in a parody of support.

Just within the open doors, Echo stood, stripped of her warrior's garb, cloaked in plain-woven wear as she was just another citizen. Yet the spy eyed Clarke with a sneer that belied the modest attire.

"You will follow through upon the deal, or your people will suffer the consequences of your betrayal," warned Echo.

Clarke kept her face averted from the spy to focus on taking the first step forwards. No threat nor reminder was needed. Ever since she'd taken her first steps on Earth, she had known her duty.

Faced with the whole of the capital, feeling abruptly her eighteen few years, with slow, precise, aching steps, ahead of the guards, knowing they'd drag her if she faltered.

This was Nia's introduction for Wanheda to the ice nation. Swathed in the precious white gown that bared her black crusted, weeping back from her neck down, only covering her butt, dipping too low to wear anything beneath. Glittering chains, thin, and sharp, silvers, and golds, draped down across the open wounds- scratching and stinging with every breathe she struggled to take.

Clarke couldn't help leaning on the guard beside her, and the knowledge that Echo stood at her back did nothing to relax her.

Her oil-slicked hair bound upon her head, wearing the white gown to show allegiance now not to Skaikru but Azgeda, Clarke felt that she was marching towards the gallows rather than her wedding.

Her white feet were only protected against the frozen stone floor by scanty cloth slippers, and her golden hair oiled and bound on her head in one gleaming mass.

Standing in the massive entrance, fingers digging into the bare arm of the guard whose name she had not caught, Clarke took in the walled courtyard.

She had never seen so many Azgeda outside of war.

The crowd went rigid at her arrival.

They were packed in, with only a path left from the grand doorway to the dais.

The sun was setting fast over them. Just the dimmest of pink and purple remaining in the west. All the rest of the sky was deepening into navy, with stars sparkling and the moon near-full. It was a beautiful night to be so miserable.

At the center of the courtyard was a wood dais that from the doors reminded Clarke too greatly of a mass pyre. The walls of the courtyard held torches every few feet, and metal barrels of fire circled the dais. The main gates, twice as tall as any man, and wide enough for six horses to ride abreast through, stood open.

They walked stiffly, and slowly across the courtyard.

Dubiously, she eyed Roan in the distance. He was the greatest peril for now, this enemy she must feign... some semblance of union with. Except the scorned, displaced Ontari perhaps, Clarke reconsidered. The very girl whom Clarke could not find among the assembled. Before, Nia had rarely been seen without her little dark shadow. This lifetime, Clarke had never seen her even as a captive in Ontari's home, but there had been plenty whispers on the servants' lips of the sharp-tongued queen's favorite.

In the cold of the swiftly approaching night, Clarke's hands trembled. For her people, she will endure even this humiliation. .

"Wanheda, Prisa kom Skai, Mountain Slayer!" cried out a palace servant as Clarke haltingly made her way into the courtyard.

Beside a venerable old man with a curling white beard, Roan waited. The elder was dressed in a dark robe similar to Titus' attire. Clarke could not say she missed the flame-keeper, but even he would have been a welcome face for the sheer familiarity.

The queen lolled on her throne. Her arms she threw open wide in a parody of welcome.

"Today Wanheda becomes Azgeda." announced the queen.

Clarke was urged to her knees by a sharp squeeze and tug of Echo's hand curled around her arm, yet she faltered, remembering every time she'd ever done so. Never mind the burning, tug of the ligaments yet unhealed.

Before Echo could test her resolve, Roan caught Clarke by the opposite arm, stepping closer to hold her upright.

A heavy stare passed between him and the spy that Clarke could not discern. Whatever it was, Roan won, as Echo removed her grip, and stepped back. The prince remained still; his grasp tight. As if Clarke was a toy to fight over. Fury welled up, and silently she swore, in this life or the next. She would show them how the commander of death repaid their abuse.

Instead, the spy called for a stool to be brought forth, and there onto it Roan maneuvered her. Behind Clarke, Echo bore down upon her shoulders, scraping the chains, in a mockery of support.

Biting her lip harshly, black blood trickled down Clarke's chin, yet silent she remained as the brands iron meet her face. Nia smirked in smug pleasure at the murmurs that rose in volume as the people took in the sight. Everyone in the palace and capital had heard of Wanheda's nightblood... but now the whispers had confirmation.

The irons were held still, pressed deep, for long agonizing breaths.

As they were pulled back, Clarke felt bits of her skin tear with them, and lost her ability to hold herself up beneath Echo's pressure. Just as she slid, Roan stepped back into her space, forcing the spy away, and caught her around her upper arms, bending in low towards her, as if to examine the fresh, scarlet brands.

The scars would match Roan's own. Slighter, more delicate, yet the exact shape. The scars branded her like cattle. Did they want the commander of death? She'd make them regret that. There was not even a hint of reluctance nor guilt in his manner.

Steeling herself, she allowed the macabre affair to continue impassively. The priest waited, at an angle in front of Nia so that she could see both Clarke and Roan once he lifted her up onto her feet. A morbid bride's maid, Echo and Alistair took up positions standing behind them. The rites were long-winded, and arcane. The prose too thick and sweeping to decipher. She let it wash over her, nodding curtly whenever her name intoned. Here in Azgeda, the words sounded different. The syllables flattened out into longer, drawling phrases. When the priest drew an ornate dagger, Roan accepted it. With a practiced motion, the prince sliced open his palm.

Extending both hands, one bloody, the other offering the bloody dagger, towards his grim bride.

Clarke took hold of it in turn, looking down at Roan's hands to see the gash he'd created, and taking a deep breath. They had done this before. Looking away from his blood, she eyed the ulnar artery of her wrist in contemplation.

Fighting was not the only way to end this war.

Releasing her centering inhale of breath, Clarke steadied her hands and steeled her nerves.