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The blood of Mount Weather’s ‘innocents’ stained Clarke’s fingers. It seeped between the folds of her gloves, coating the inside and the outside of the fabric, to colour Clarke’s skin pink and black. The blood burned hot against her skin. Fiery tendrils of pain sparked up the nerves of the woman’s arm to radiate throughout her body acting as a constant reminder of her actions. The blood soaked through her skin into Clarke’s soul, staining her spirit, and corrupting her thoughts.
Clarke pictured the people of Mount Weather as they laid in their concrete prison, still and silent, amongst the destruction of the only world they ever knew. Their bodies decayed slowly, the noxious air seeped into their bloodstreams and burned their cells, blackening their flesh.
The woman stepped away from the electric fence of the Sky People’s compound. Her eyes caught the sign stood proudly over the gate, and she wondered for half a second, what her best friend might have thought of her then.
Clarke turned away from Camp Jaha holstering the gun that rested in the palm of her hand. She walked away from the celebrations. She ignored the sounds of the camp at her back, the thankful exclamations of parents and children alike, the loud jubilant cries of her people as they reconciled with each other healing the sins of the past. Clarke walked quickly over the field of untouched earth, following the small compacted trail to the edge of the forest, to slide between the thick trunks into the darkness of the landscape.
She walked to avoid the sound of her people.
She walked to avoid the throbbing of regret in her heart.
She walked to avoid the pain that thrummed through her veins.
She walked because she could not change the past, and she wasn’t sure if she would want to change it.
Clarke followed her feet to the entrance of Mount Weather. Her eyes gazed up at the thick metal doorway that stood locked tight to keep the decaying bodies free of animal discretion. Clarke dipped her head and placed her fingers against the solid metal, her lips parting as her voice rose to utter a handful of words, “In peace may you leave the shore. In love may you find the next, safe passage on your travels until our final journey to the ground, may we meet again.”
It took Clarke three days and three nights to dig the graves of the ‘innocents’ of the Mountain. Her hands bled raw, fingers calloused and cracked, blood dripping freely into the earth as she dug and scraped at the soil. On the fourth day, Clarke climbed into the concrete prison and pulled each body out of the darkness, pushing each into the soft earth. Clarke cradled Maya’s body in her arms and laid the woman to rest in a single grave furthest away from the doors of Mount Weather.
“Sleep in peace,” Clarke murmured as she covered Maya’s body. “I hope you find the surface as beautiful in your afterlife as you found it in your life.”
Clarke pushed a lone grave mark into the ground at the head of Maya’s grave, scrawling the woman’s name into the wood with the edge of her dagger, “Maya Vie, an innocent soul.”
The blonde haired woman took a backpack from one of the many storage rooms of the Mountain, tucked her armour into the depths of the bag with a handful of magazines of spare ammunition, and a change of clothes. Clarke took a spear and a sword from the armoury, strapping the sword to her hip, before taking a medical kit from the infirmary. Clarke locked the mountain leaving the bodies of Cage and Dante Wallace trapped within the concrete prison to fester with their sins.
Five months and eighteen days later Clarke arrived at the edge of Polis, her skin tanned by the spring sunlight, her body hardened from the winter snow. The blonde haired woman stepped through the gate of the capitol and met Lexa with a small smile and three simple words, “I forgive you.”