For the post-6x02 prompt courtesy of @lilhemmo: ‘For the prompt: WHAT IF CLARKE IS THE ONE TO PATCH UP BELLAMYS THIGH STAB WOUND AND EVERYTHING UNRAVELS AND THEY FINALLY HASH THINGS OUT but someone will interrupt of course but hey’
Thank you for letting me write this!
Every moment we spend
turning from friends to enemies
and fighting to hold on to each other,
every second we fall to the fire below,
it’s so beautiful.
The chaos that follows the arrival of the Alpha planet children is a blur to Bellamy. Abby and Raven rake their eyes over the veins that cover Murphy’s chest like wolves. Octavia eyes him warily from a distance while Clarke tries to get some information out of the kids. There are so many people, and he can feel the last of the eclipse draining from his veins, and why is Diyoza awake, and where the hell are all of the adults on this planet, and Jesus fuck his leg hurts.
“We have to get him to medical,” Abby growls from her perch next to Murphy. She turns to the kids. “Do any of you kids know where the doctors are?”
A blonde girl with frizzy curls ringed in sunlight shakes her head. “They won’t be back for another couple of hours probably.”
Raven huffs and places a hand on Murphy’s chest.
“Do you know where the doctors take people that are sick?” Abby asks, and the little girl nods. “Okay, good. Do you think you can take me there so we can help our friend?”
The girl looks at the kids around her, hesitating, and then she nods.
It takes three of them, Abby, Jordan, and Octavia, to get Murphy to his feet, though his weight rests solely on their shoulders. They cart him off hastily, following a few of the children. Bellamy stands and tries to follow, but the shift of his weight onto his injured leg makes him grunt with exertion.
“No, no, no,” Clarke says, stopping him with a hand on his chest. “Someone needs to take a look at your leg.”
“I’m fine, Clarke. Murphy—”
“Murphy isn’t going anywhere, and you can’t help him if you’re dead from blood loss.”
She glares at him, her brow quirked as if daring him to argue. He knows that look. Arguing is pointless.
“Fine,” he bites out. “Where’s Jackson?”
She stoops to grab her pack and swing it over her shoulder, then meets his gaze and gives him a soft smile, but it doesn’t quite reach her eyes.
“Still out of commission,” she says. “You’re stuck with me.” She loops his arm around her shoulder before he can respond, taking the brunt of his weight as he hobbles to a patio of a house nearby. “You um—”
He sees the flush creep up her neck. She gestures at the torn fabric of the leg of his pants that seeps with blood and swallows hard.
“Oh,” he says, and the break in his voice makes him want to beat his head against the wall next to him. “Shit, yeah okay.”
He works at the buckle of his belt with shaky fingers, and he doesn’t allow himself to wonder why a lump has appeared in his throat.
Clarke’s a medic for god’s sake, this is nothing she hasn’t seen before. A tense silence fills the air between them as he drops his pants to the ground. Clarke clears her throat and extends a hand to steady him as he gently sits on the bench. Bellamy’s struck by the warmth of her palms as she gingerly lifts his bare leg to extend to his side. She doesn’t meet his eyes, just kneels next to him and begins to prod at the open wound. He hisses when she touches a particularly painful spot.
“Sorry,” she says. He brushes it off.
She rummages through her pack until she pulls out her med kit, rifling through its contents and pulling out a suture kit. The silence that hangs between them as she preps the tools is awkward, if he’s being honest, and he finds himself desperate to fill it.
“What the hell was that?” he asks. “The veins on Murphy’s chest.”
Clarke shakes her head. “I don’t know, honestly. It looked like some sort of weird blood poisoning.” He can feel the fear that lingers between them and chills his skin. Clarke squares her shoulders and clears her throat. “I’m sure my mom will figure it out. Especially once the doctors from Alpha get back.”
He tries to pretend he doesn’t hear the doubt in her voice.
“You were right,” he tells her. “We have no idea how to survive down here.”
Her grip on his thigh tightens, and he clenches his jaw against the sting of the needle in his skin. It’s not the first time he’s been stitched up without anesthetic, and god knows it probably won’t be the last.
She clears her throat again, and as she pushes a curl behind her ear, he sees the angry purple bruises that have started to bloom beneath the skin of her neck. His stomach flips.
“Christ,” he hisses. “Clarke, I am so sorry.”
She shakes her head, but she doesn’t look at him.
“It’s okay,” she says. “The eclipse—”
“God, I can’t believe I could ever do that to you. How—”
She cuts him off with a nod to the wound in his thigh.
“I think we’re even,” she says.
It shuts him up, but it doesn’t remove the guilt from his chest. He watches as she works, the way her fingers move across his skin with practiced ease. The idea that any part of him could ever want Clarke dead is—it’s unfathomable. What kind of place was this, that could turn him into a monster who could kill someone he loves?
It’s a moment before she says, “Do you ever wonder why they chose us?” She must see the confusion on his face. “Monty and Harper, I mean. Why did they wake us up first? Not Kane, not my mom, not the others. Why us?”
If he’s honest, he had thought about it, and he wanted to keep pretending he didn’t know the answer. Of course, they’d woken Bellamy and Clarke up first. The ones who managed to keep a hundred kids alive when they had no idea what the fuck they were doing. Who convinced Kane and Abby that they could survive down here. Who sacrificed their youth and their souls for their people, for each other.
Bellamy swallows hard.
“I guess at the end of the day, it’s always been you and me, huh?”
She finally meets his eye then, and the corner of her mouth tips upward. Her face turns sad for a moment before she looks back at his leg.
“I am sorry, Bellamy,” she says softly. “About leaving you in Polis, about leaving after Mount Weather.” She takes a deep breath, and he can see her shoulders shake with it. “I’m sorry for every time I’ve ever hurt you. I’ve never wanted that. Ever.”
“I know,” he says without, and honestly it surprises him when he realizes it’s the truth.
“But you were right, even back then. People do die when I’m in charge.”
Despite himself, Bellamy scoffs.
“Yeah, you’re right, Clarke. People die when you’re in charge,” he says. “But a hell of a lot more people live.” She snaps her eyes to his, soft with hope and something else he can’t bring himself to read too much into. “You’ve always been the one to make the calls others weren’t brave enough to make, but that had to be made, nonetheless. And you took that burden on willingly so that no one else had to.”
He watches her lashes flutter as she looks down at his leg, her hands working diligently and with more focus than he thinks the task probably requires.
“I’ve done so many terrible things, Bellamy.”
“Haven’t we all?” He reaches a hand out and squeezes her shoulder. “You’re not the bad guy, Clarke. You never have been. You’re just the one who makes the call others can’t bear to make, and when things go to shit and people need to point fingers at someone, for some reason that always seems to be you. But it’s never fair.” He grabs her forearm and waits for her to look at him before he continues. “You’ve saved our asses over and over again. No one would be alive without you. And that debt is so heavy on everyone’s shoulders that they don’t know what to do with it. But they know, Clarke. We all know.”
She rests a hand on his knee, and the gentle squeeze she gives it is enough to tell him he’s said the right thing. He looks at the relief in her frame, at the lines at the corners of her eyes that have finally started to soften, and for the millionth time he wishes he could take some of that burden from her. Wishes she would let him.
“I gave you my key for a reason, Clarke.” He says it so softly he can’t decide if he even meant to say it out loud. “Even after everything, we still trust each other.” She heaves a sigh. “So please, trust me enough to let me share this with you again. I know it’s been a long time, and I know things are different, but you and me…we need each other.”
When she looks at him, he can see the tears that brim below her lashes.
“I have always needed you, Clarke.”
It’s enough to make them fall to her cheeks, a quiet trail of everything he knows she’s been holding back for six years. They sit in a comfortable silence, and for once he doesn’t feel the weight of so many things unspoken between them. He lets himself revel in it.
It won’t last for long, of course. He knows any minute someone will be here with a new crisis to be solved. There will be other arguments, more politics, an entirely new fucking planet to survive on. But for right now, this tentative peace between them and the rediscovery of an understanding he thought they’d lost a long time ago—for now, it’s enough.
okay, so a few things. first, i wrote this after watching 6x01 and 6x02 when they were leaked, so i hadn’t read the 6x03 synopsis to know that the only ones going back to the ship were bellamy, octavia and echo.
also, yeah i’m well aware that there’s going to be a rave, not a ballroom dance, but in this fic, it’s a ballroom dance.
lastly, this is not in any way realistic in terms of what i really think we’ll get this season for blarke. i have hope for /something/ this season, but definitely not all of this.
oh, and one more thing! if you want to cry, listen to “happiness does not wait” by olafur arnalds on repeat while you read. hope you enjoy!
tagging @traitorwhoyoulove <3 because she wanted to be tagged!
don’t go, you’re half of me now
It took ten stitches to close up the wound on Bellamy’s leg. Clarke felt each one of them even though it wasn’t her skin being pierced.
Now, she sits on a chair beside his bed in the infirmary. Neither of them have spoken a word to one another since it all went down, but after a long while, Bellamy is the first to speak.
Before he thinks better of it, he reaches out to brush his fingers along the bruises that mare her neck. He swallows. “I’m so sorry, Clarke.”
Her eyes flutter shut, staying closed just a moment, even once he’s dropped his hand. “At least you weren’t in your right mind. I was when I—”
“You were trying to stop me from going after Murphy,” Bellamy cuts in, brushing her off. That isn’t something she should feel guilty for. If anything, he’s grateful she slowed him down to save Murphy. The guy hasn’t exactly been empathetic. It’s admirable that she still instinctively rescued someone who hasn’t been giving her the light of day.
But that wasn’t all that Clarke was referring to, and so she shakes her head, the guilt setting in and making her eyes water. “No,” she says, soft. “Not just that…”
Bellamy doesn’t have to ask what she means. He can still feel the contact her hand had made with his cheek weeks ago. “Clarke…”
Her bottom lip trembles. Part of Bellamy wants to reach out to steady it, and he instantly feels guilty about it.
Another traitor who you love.
“I know you said you weren’t mad at me,” she says, tears in her eyes now that make her voice waver, “but you should be.”
Bellamy sighs, shaking his head. “The only thing that I am is confused.”
“Confused?”
“You called me every day for six years, and then you left me to die in the fighting pits.”
“I’m so sorry, Bellamy.”
“I know you are. I’m not asking for an apology, Clarke.”
“Then what are you asking for?”
“An explanation, I guess. I don’t know…”
Clarke sighs. “I was just so scared.”
A muscle in Bellamy’s jaw starts working at that. “It was more than that.” He brings a hand to his cheek, where she slapped him.
Clarke’s eyes fall away from his. “You broke my heart,” she admits, not looking at him.
It’s since been mended, but he’d asked for the truth, and the least she can do is give it to him.
Raven, Echo, Murphy and Emori are my family.
Sometimes, she still fears he doesn’t see her as family too, but then she looks at him, sees his lips part, and he’s looking at her in that soft, broken way he does, and she knows.
She’s one of them. She never stopping being one of them. And though the others hate her right now, Bellamy doesn’t. He’s still here, right by her side, making sure she feels included, caring for her, looking out for her. All those things tell her she’s part of the family. And if not theirs then his.
“Clarke…”
She finds herself lost in his pained, watery gaze. “It’s okay.”
“Nothing about this is okay, Clarke.”
“Maybe not,” she amends. “But I know something now that I didn’t then.”
Bellamy’s heart nearly stops. Does she know that he—?
“When you promised me you’d keep Madi safe, you meant it.”
Bellamy releases a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. Oh.
“You kept her safe, advised her, and I know you would have done the same had I listened to you.”
Bellamy opens his mouth, closes it. “Why didn’t you?”
Clarke swallows.
“I raised Octavia pretty much all on my own, so trust me, I get feeling like you’re the only one who can protect them, Clarke. But...did you really think I hadn’t thought things through? That I wasn’t going to protect Madi with my life?”
“I didn’t know what to think, Bellamy. I wasn’t really thinking at all. I didn’t know you anymore, and it was like—” Her eyes water further, voice breaking suddenly. “It was like I couldn’t breathe.” She shakes her head. “I couldn’t breathe.”
“Clarke…”
“You had always meant safety to me, and in my panic, suddenly you didn’t, and I just couldn’t breathe.”
Bellamy reaches for her hand. Clarke’s eyes flutter closed.
“And now?” he asks softly.
She opens her eyes into his, head cocked to the side. “Now what?”
“Do you feel safe with me?”
Clarke’s lips twitch with a watery smile. “Yeah. Of course.”
“You sure?”
Clarke nods. There are a lot of things she’s not sure of, but Bellamy isn’t one of them.
“Ms. Griffin,” a voice says then, breaking them from the moment. She turns to see a nurse approaching them. “Our leader has sent for you.”
Clarke nods again. Before leaving, she turns back to Bellamy. “I’ll see you in a bit.”
“Be careful.”
Clarke smiles at him, a closed-lip one that has his eyes softening. “I will,” she says, and before she loses her nerve, she leans in to press a kiss to his cheek; a silent apology, a promise of never again, and an I’ll see you later all in one gesture.
She means to move away the moment her lips leave his cheek, but she lingers. His eyes have fluttered closed, and he’s making no move to pull away. She means to. She really does.
But then his nose brushes hers and her forehead presses to his own, and she just gets lost in his warmth. In him.
And she swears she hears him whisper her name, soft and just for her, before someone clears their throat from behind them, and Clarke instantly pulls back.
It’s Raven. She’s got her arms crossed over her chest and an angry glare in her eyes that has Clarke needing to get the hell out of there.
“I’m um—” Clarke fumbles with what to say, flustered as she backs out of the room. “I’m gonna go.”
And then she does.
Bellamy just swallows, and when he finally finds the courage to look at Raven, he winces.
“What the hell did I just walk in on?”
“She just,” he brings a hand to the back of his neck, nervous, “came by to check up on me.”
“So have I, and I’m not planning on kissing you.”
Bellamy sighs. “Raven—”
“I’m gonna go check on Murphy. Echo’s on her way to see you now.” Raven heads for the door, stops a moment to look back at him. “You know, your girlfriend.”
Bellamy averts his eyes, a muscle ticking in his jaw. When he looks back, she’s gone, and as he waits for Echo, he knows he’s screwed.
Burying his feelings isn’t something he can do anymore. Even when he’d tried in the past, he knows he must have been so obvious—the boy who unapologetically wore his heart on his sleeve. Though that part of him has been missing these last six years, there was a day he felt a faint glimmer of who he used to be return to him. Uncoincidentally the very same day that Clarke returned to him. He remembers feeling like he could finally breathe again, like his heart was beating for the first time since he lost her—since he left it behind with her on Earth.
And maybe he should known what that meant, but he didn’t. Not until now. Not until a few moments earlier when he’d been breaths away from kissing her, knowing without a doubt, that she loved him too.
He tries (fails) to ignore how cold he feels in Clarke’s absence. How his heart doesn’t beat quite as easily. How it feels weaker.
Clarke Griffin isn’t just another traitor who he loves.
She’s the woman he loves more.
…
Bellamy doesn’t want to go.
When he hears that they have to attend a goddamn ballroom dance, he just does not want to go.
“They’re trying to get us to let our guard down,” he tells Miller as he adjusts his tie in the mirror. Yes, you heard that right. A tie.
Thirty years of his life Bellamy went without wearing one, but here he is. It’s one of the many things he’s doing and already regretting. Bellamy could (should) have stayed with Echo, but Miller had wanted to make up for lost time, and Bellamy didn’t want to turn down the opportunity, but part of him knows this is also because he needs space to think about...things, and he is decidedly not acknowledging that for the time being.
Miller arches an eyebrow at him. “They’re not the Mountain Men, Bell.”
“No,” Bellamy agrees, running a hand through his hair. “But they remind me of them.”
“Just try to relax.”
Bellamy sighs. He can’t.
When Clarke came back from meeting with Russel, their leader, she’d had more questions than answers. He hasn’t had the chance to really talk to her about it alone, neither of them sure how to be around each other after what almost happened, but he knows her, and when she’d said the people here are happy, between the look on her face and the way in which she said it, he gathered she had only been trying to convince herself of that.
He gets it. Monty found this place for them, and she wants so badly for this to turn out to be everything he thought it would. That they can live the life he wanted for them. Bellamy wants that too, more than anything.
But he just can’t shake the feeling. There’s something off about these people. More than the eclipse-induced psychosis they’ve been subjected to. Even just wearing their clothes has him on edge. The party is meant to make them feel safe, and that’s exactly why he doesn’t.
“You ready to head out?” Miller asks.
With one last look in the mirror, Bellamy runs another hand through his hair, feeling guilty that the nerves in his stomach have nothing to do with his girlfriend and everything to do with his best friend.
“Yeah,” Bellamy nods. “Let’s just get this over with.”
…
The first time Bellamy sees Clarke in a dress quite literally steals his breath away, and he swears for just one moment, he really does forget how to breathe.
(Okay, maybe it’s not the first time. He has seen her in a dress before, but that was different. Then, she appeared before him as a grounder. As someone he couldn’t recognize. Now, she’s just Clarke.)
And she looks beautiful.
It’s not so much the dress—a simple navy blue halter—as it is her, with her strikingly blue eyes and the way her blonde waves frame her face. He’s never seen her look so herself. So Clarke Griffin that it has his heart thumping against his ribs.
Just then, she catches his gaze from across the room, and Bellamy knows she already caught him staring at her, slack-jawed, so there’s really no point in trying to pretend he hadn’t been.
But he does anyway.
That’s when Echo appears before him, and he feels another pang of guilt at the smile she sends him. His heart is still beating furiously, but it’s from Clarke and not her.
“Hey,” he sighs, knowing what he has to do. “Could we go somewhere and talk?”
Before she can answer him, they’re swept up in the first dance of the night.
After, he tells himself. Just get through the dance.
Only that proves to be quite difficult when they switch partners midway through the song, and suddenly, Clarke is in his arms.
From the look on her face, he guesses she hadn’t expected that he was the face she’d be met with either.
“Hey, princess,” he manages after a moment.
Princess. Clarke ducks her head in a laugh. “You calling me that because of the dress?”
He gives her a look that says you know why I’m calling you princess, amusement in his eyes that make her heart beat a little faster, her chest a little warmer, but that isn’t what he says, and the words are out of his mouth before he can stop them.
“You look perfect.”
Clarke’s lips part at that, and his do too when his brain catches up to his heart, realizes what he just said.
It doesn’t help that with his leg still injured, he’s not the best on his feet, and they’re far closer than they should be, so she can keep him steady, but now she’s too close. Too warm.
Everything about him is so fucking warm. His gaze, his hands, his breath.
And she just wants to be warmer, but he can’t be the one to do that. He’s not hers to have like this. Before she knows it, her eyes are watering. His brow furrows in concern instantly and that really doesn’t help either, so she runs, flees the room.
But of course he follows because he’s Bellamy, and it just upsets her further.
“Clarke,” he calls after her. It’s just the two of them, out in the hallway.
She turns to face him, exasperated as she shakes her head. “What?”
Bellamy’s chest rises and falls with a breath.
The six years he spent without her he’d learned to use his head, but she’s back now. She’s back now and he’s realizing more and more that she brings out who he used to be: the man who acted on impulse, with his heart.
He opens his mouth, closes it.
It has her eyes watering and his heart breaks. He reaches out to her, against his better judgement—because it’s Clarke and he just really can’t fucking think when he’s around her, never learned how—and she pulls away from him.
Don’t.
She doesn’t say it, but it’s clear in her watery gaze, how her bottom lip trembles, and she walks off before he can say anything. His heart screams at him to go after her, but this time he doesn’t follow, just watches her go, hands in his hair.
…
Clarke doesn’t say goodbye to Bellamy when he and the others head back to the Eligius III ship, but she does watch him go—long enough to see him turn back to look at her.
(And it just breaks her heart further.)
…
Bellamy breaks up with Echo that same night when they stop to set up camp for the night.
“You said nothing would change.”
“I’m sorry.”
“What changed, Bellamy?” she presses. He swallows, and Echo just nods. “You never told me.” At Bellamy’s furrowed brow, she explains. “That you were in love with her six years ago.”
“Because I didn’t want to be,” he admits, voice thick with the memories. “Losing her almost killed me. I didn’t want to talk about it.”
“You thought she was dead for six years, Bellamy.”
“Time did nothing to ease the pain.”
Echo doesn’t often cry, but he swears he sees the firelight glinting in her watery eyes. “I thought I did.”
You were just a distraction. He doesn’t say it—would never say something so cruel—but it’s the truth, and they both know it. They were over before they began.
The fire is warm, but Bellamy has never felt colder.
…
When Bellamy returns to Sanctum, he can hardly get to Clarke fast enough.
He was told she was in the art studio, and that’s where he’s headed now, practically sprinting through the halls—well, as close to sprinting as his leg will allow him—but when he reaches the door, suddenly it dawns on him what he’s come to do, and the nerves set in. It takes him a solid few minutes to gather the courage to knock.
“Clarke,” he says when he does.
She doesn’t answer the door, but he hears her call his name in question from somewhere inside. “Bellamy?”
“Yeah, it’s me.” He runs a hand through his hair. “Hey, um, there’s something I need to talk to you about. Can I come in?” A beat, but she doesn’t say anything. “Clarke,” he says, the excitement building in his chest now starting to fade into worry.
“I’m working on something at the moment. Can it wait?”
“I…” Bellamy falters. “I guess, but Clarke—”
“What do you want from me, Bellamy?” she asks suddenly, exasperated.
“You,” he says, without hesitation.
“I—what?”
“I broke up with her, Clarke.”
He can practically hear her heart pounding. “Why?”
Bellamy huffs out an incredulous breath at that. “Because I want you...” he sighs, leans his head against the door and allows his eyes to flutter close, “Only you.”
There’s a long pause before her words break his heart. She sniffles and he knows she’s crying, but what he doesn’t know is that she has her forehead pressed against the wall too, eyes closed. “It’s too late.”
“Clarke,” he says, voice breaking on her name.
“Please just go.”
She’s begging now, further breaking his heart, but he does what she asks and goes.
…
Clarke didn’t mean it.
Telling Bellamy it was too late had been one of the hardest decisions she ever had to make, and she didn’t mean it, but she had to.
She knows now that love isn’t weakness but a strength. That he makes her strong. She knows she’ll always be safe with him, but she fears that he won’t be with her. Leaving him to die is easily her biggest regret, and she of course doesn’t intend on doing it ever again—because she knows now that he cares about her too—but she knows, and has known for some time, that she can’t always save the people she loves.
She couldn’t save her dad, or Finn, or Lexa. All of them are gone, partly because of her. The best thing for Bellamy right now is to let her go before he gets too close and it gets him killed. She doesn’t think she could take that.
So, she told him it was too late for them when everything in her—her heart—screamed at her to just let him in. She told him it was too late for them, so he would let her go.
But Octavia is certainly not helping with that. As soon as the word spread about Bellamy’s breakup with Echo, she just couldn’t help herself.
They’re all seated around the fire now. Murphy and Emori are cuddling against a log, Clarke beside him (aside from Echo, he’s the only one that has let up on verbally attacking her), and Madi at Clarke’s side. Across from them are Bellamy and Raven, and much to Bellamy’s annoyance, his sister, who (to Bellamy’s further annoyance) is wasted.
Bellamy has only had two or three. He’s slightly buzzed, and it’s certainly not enough to take the edge off.
“I mean, we all saw this coming, did we not? He let me send the woman off on a suicide mission.”
That does it, and Bellamy rises to his feet, storming away. He’s not just going to sit here and listen to this.
“Where are you going, big brother?” she calls after him, the nickname stopping him in his tracks. His shoulders tense up.
He exhales sharply through his nose, eyes closed. “Anywhere but where you are.”
“I was just about to tell a story,” she goes on, and Bellamy knows that she’s smirking without looking at her. “Starring you and me.”
He turns and glares at her. He was right. The corners of her mouth have settled into a smirk, eyes taunting him. “Octavia,” he warns.
She turns her attention away from him, gaze landing on a certain blonde. “And featuring one Clarke Griffin.”
Bellamy’s eyes widen. “O—”
“Did Bellamy ever tell any of you the real reason why he poisoned me?”
“Octavia, please.”
“Actually, Bell,” Murphy cuts in, “I’d like to hear this story.”
Bellamy rubs a hand over his face.
“Anyways,” Octavia slurs, and Bellamy shuts his eyes. “There were a lot of things I did to piss Bell off. First it was the fighting pits. Then it was marching my people into sand storms with razor blade winds. Obika. Banishing the devil—or wait, sorry,” Octavia laughs, shaking her head. “Bellamy’s ex girlfriend. I get the two mixed up sometimes.” Madi snorts at that and Clarke sends her a look that has her covering her mouth. “Anyways, where was I…?”
“Echo’s banishment,” Emori fills in, reluctant.
“Right.” Octavia sits down her cup. “Executing the defectors. The worms—”
“Can you please just get to the goddamn point?” Raven cuts in.
“I was about to, but I really do appreciate the enthusiasm. We’re about to get to the good part.”
At that Bellamy’s eyes find Clarke’s, and he swallows, but he can’t look away. Neither can she, even once Octavia goes on.
“All those things made Bellamy angry, but he didn’t do anything that would risk my life. So, what would you all guess changed his mind?”
“The war,” Murphy says. “He had to take you out so it’d be safe enough for Madi to come into power.”
“He didn’t do it for me,” Madi says. “Indra was initially supposed to be the leader in Octavia’s place. Not me.”
“We’re getting off track here,” Octavia says. “Poisoning me had nothing to do with the war. Not really. Of course, I’m sure that was part of the reason. To save you guys,” she motions drunkenly in Raven, Murphy and Emori’s direction. “But he never would have poisoned me if it hadn’t been for something else.”
Everyone just stares at her blankly, brows furrowed, except for Bellamy and Clarke who are still looking at one another. Bellamy because he knows and Clarke because she just can’t figure out what the hell is going on.
Hey, I know this is hard, she had said to him, but she was willing to destroy the last survivable land on Earth just to win a war. Not to mention kill the people we love.
And he had nodded, agreeing with her.
He lied.
Bellamy lied.
“Or rather, someone else.”
Bellamy swallows again.
“I planned on sending the eggs of the worms into the valley to take out Eligius, and Bellamy and Clarke thought they could stop me. Only they thought I was sending the worms, not their eggs. So, when I found Cooper dead in the room where we kept the worms, I knew it was Bellamy and Clarke that got her killed, planning on framing her for letting the worms out accidentally, but when I found them, I only had Clarke arrested and sentenced to die, thinking I could use it as leverage to get my way. If I had power over her life, Bellamy would never stand against me again, but I underestimated him. Because that’s exactly what he did.”
Clarke’s lips part at that, eyes watering.
Octavia turns her attention to Clarke, and it draws Clarke’s eyes to her. “For you.”
Clarke’s chest rises and falls with a breath. If only she’d known. She’d have known sooner how much he cared. She’d have never left him.
“Not just another traitor who my brother loves, as I’d said to him,” Octavia goes on and Clarke’s eyes widen, “but the traitor he loves more.”
Bellamy runs a hand through his hair. Clarke feels like her heart is about to burst from her chest when she finds the courage to look at him again and he’s still looking at her.
She hesitates a moment, then rises to her feet and slowly makes her way over to him, gradually picking up the pace with each step until she’s right in front of him. She opens her mouth, closes it. A watery breath of air escapes her—one that sounds a lot like a sob and nearly a laugh at the same time—and then she’s taking his face in her hands and kissing him, soft but sure, and a little desperate too, but she doesn’t care. Not when he kisses her back instantly, just as desperately, bringing his own hands up to cradle her cheeks.
Clarke pulls away all too soon. “I want you, too,” she breathes, for just him to hear, and she’s close enough to feel his breath hitch. She presses her forehead to his, voice nearly cracking when she says, “It’s always been you.”
Bellamy sniffles. “But you said—”
“I lied.” Her lips twitch with a watery smile. “We’re even now.”
Bellamy’s responding weak laugh has something warm swelling in her chest. Something that she hasn’t felt for some time now. Hope.
And she realizes in that moment that he’s never letting her go, but maybe, just maybe, that’s okay.
Because she’s never letting him go either.
“Technically, you’ve lied more than once,” Bellamy reminds her.
“Well, I never lost faith that you’d come back to me,” Clarke says with a smile, brushing her nose against his and leaning in to kiss him again. “So, hopefully that makes up for it.”
“It does,” he murmurs, just before meeting her halfway.
Clarke’s heart beats with those three words. She thinks back six years ago, when she’d told him to hurry instead of how she felt. She thinks back to each day he was gone. Each day she regretted never having told him.
“I love you,” she says.
Bellamy pulls back to look at her, and he has that closed-lip smile on his face, the one he reserves just for her, when he says it back. “I love you.” The adoration in his eyes has a smile breaking out on her face. “I love you so much,” he says again, softer this time.
Clarke is about to kiss him again when Octavia’s voice interrupts the moment. “My work here,” she slurs, swaying on her feet as everyone laughs and watches her start back towards the capital, “is done.”
Clarke leans her forehead into Bellamy’s chest, laughing, and he wraps his arms around her, pressing a kiss into her hair.
Somehow, no matter what is going on with Sanctum, he knows that with Clarke in his arms, solid and warm and his, everything is gonna be just fine.
