Chapter Text
“I sentence Belomi kom Skaikru to death.”
As soon as the words were out of Lexa’s mouth the room erupted with the deafening sound of twelve clans cheering, fighting, agreeing, disagreeing.
Clarke could see the thin line of Lexa’s lips as they settled into unwavering resolution. She could feel Octavia fall into her, only to be quickly caught by Lincoln, as he pulled her quietly into his arms. She could smell the sweat within the room. She could taste the salt of the tears she didn't even realise were making their steady path down her face. But none of it was real, none of it seemed to register. She couldn’t really hear or see or feel or smell or taste anything. All she knew was that Bellamy, Bellamy, was going to die. And just like Finn, there was nothing she could do to stop it.
“No!”
Suddenly, the room fell silent, all listening to the mighty Wanheda as she spoke. She half ran half stumbled into the middle of the room, the crowd parting for her as one, as she fell to her knees in front of Lexa’s throne. “Please. Please. There has to be another way. He didn’t do it and you know it.” She didn't know how she got the words out, her voice breaking as she knelt there, in front of the Commander who had betrayed her, begging for the life of her best friend, her partner, her...
“You know the rules. Blood must..”
“I don’t care!” she shouted, cutting her off. “Your barbaric rules are wrong and injust and I’m not just going to let you murder an innocent man. A good man. I just.. I can’t.. Please..” She couldn't continue, her mind empty of the words to make them see, to make them understand. She let her head hang with a cry of anguish that had even the Ice Nation shifting uncomfortably, trying to escape the pain they could hear in her voice.
She took a breath. And another. She steadied her trembling hands. She swallowed past whatever this feeling was taking seat in her throat, and raised her head. She looked into Lexa’s eyes, stood, back held straight, not bothering to wipe her face. “There has to be another way,” her voice strong and clear and demanding.
Titus stepped forward from his position behind the throne, bending to whisper in his Heda’s ear. A crease formed in between Lexa’s eyebrows as she listened to him, confusion in her eyes. “But the Certamen has not been used for decades,” she replied to him. Clarke heard Lincoln’s sharp intake of breath at the words and turned to look at him, but he wouldn't meet her gaze.
“What’s a certamen?” she asked, looking at Lexa, but it was the Queen of Azgeda who replied, with a smirk on her face and mockery in her voice. “The Certamen is a way to make things right. Jus drein jus daun. That has always been our law. This is a way to pay that blood.” She stalked her way across the room to stand in front of Clarke. “Twelve challenges. One from each nation. He chooses a champion to fight for his life. Win all twelve challenges, and he goes free. Simple.”
“And if one of the challenges is lost?”
Nia’s eyes glistened with unspoken rage as she uttered the words Clarke knew were coming. “Then I kill them both.”
*****
Clarke sat on the cold stone floor in the corner of the room, knees drawn up to her chest, arms wrapped around herself, eyes to the ground. She wasn’t even listening to Octavia arguing with Bellamy through the bars of his cell or Kane, the ever present mediator, trying to keep the peace. All she could hear was Lexa’s words, a broken record spinning round and round. I sentence Belomi kom Skaikru to death. She raised her eyes to where he stood. A purple bruise bloomed across his jaw, his bottom lip swollen and stained with deep red blood and his hair curled into his eyes. Her nails bit into her palms leaving tiny crescents, as she balled her hands in an effort to keep from reaching out to brush it away.
He sat on his cot, head hanging low. She knelt before him and rested her hands on his knees, slowly, as if she were trying not to frighten away a baby animal. “Bellamy,” she started, but before she could say anymore he lifted his head to look at her, and the look in his eyes stole her words, her thoughts, her breath. She’d seen him sad. She’d seen him cry. She’d seen him rage at the world. She’d seen him dripping with sweat woken by dreams of death and loss. But she’d never seen him like this. So, so.. Broken. She reached up to brush his hair out of his eyes, her fingers lingering on his cheek. He swallowed hard. He saw him drop his gaze to her lips and back up to her eyes. She took a breath as her fingers trembled against his skin, and.. She blinked away the memory.
“Bellamy, this is the only way. I can do this. Let me do this. My brother, my responsibility.”
“No, no way. O, we’ll figure something out. Something else. Something that doesn’t involve getting you killed.”
“Are you even listening to yourself right now? Do you understand what’s going to happen?” Octavia bit back, incredulous. “They’re going to murder you. Torture you. There is nothing else we can do. This is the only option.”
“Nobody else is dying because of me. I won’t allow it. Someone, talk some sense in to her.”
He looked over to where Clarke sat, knowing that he could count on her to back him up and convince O that this was a bad idea. But his eyes found an empty space. “Clarke?” Something in the tone of his voice had Lincoln, Octavia and Kane turning around. “Oh shit.”
*****