Chapter Text
The air feels cold, almost too cold. It is icy in her lungs and stinging with pain when Lexa coughs back her breath. The exhale clouds around her lips in a hovering fog from the cold in the air around her, yet is soon fades out into nothingness again.
The night lies thick around, and the sky hovers above with rocks burning from millions of miles away.
Usually Lexa would have enjoyed the view, although now her vision is blurry and she still feels half-dazed from just waking up. Her head feels heavy, and pulsing with pain once she finally finds the strength to sit up.
‘’ Are you all right? ‘’
The deep husky voice echoes through her ears as she glances around, trying to find the face of who it belongs to. Still, the pounding in Lexa’s head makes her vision only more unclear.
She is not even completely sure where most of the pain comes from, she can feel it as well in her stomach as in her head. Pulsing, throbbing, hard and fast.
The ground she sits on isn’t ideal either, it soaks her pants from the rain pouring down, leaving her skin with raised hair and goosebumps all over. Her back feels painfully sore from the ground, and with a mud-covered hand she brings it up to swipe at the blood running from her forehead.
It leaves her skin dirty, mixed with mud and red blood. Yet the dirt isn’t what startles Lexa, but rather the color of the blood once she looks back down on her hand. It is red. Clear red blood that soaks into her skin in the palm of her hand.
“ Hey, can you stand? “ Lexa blinks and looks back up at the man in front of her.
His shadow hovers from above and his hair is drained with rain. The white armor he is wearing and the scars on his face are too familiar to go unnoticed.
Although, when Lexa blinks away the last bit of daze she feels and her eyes return to the warrior in front of her, his face fits right in with the husky voice. It is Roan. His face is too familiar to not recognize, yet the sight only makes Lexa’s head pound faster.
He reaches out an arm to help her up, but Lexa’s eyes are stuck on his face. Thoughts keeps her head occupied, yet Lexa has never felt like her mind has been more blank.
She doesn’t remember anything of what happened, and once Lexa glances around, all she can find is the depth of the forest. Trees surrounding her from every angle, and the more she looks the faster her head start to pulse. Yet the faster her head pulse, the blurrier her vision becomes.
It only takes a moment close to a second before the trees are sneaking in on her and the darkness appear. Just a moment of a second before her eyes roll back into nothingness and her body collapses to the ground with a thud.
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Lexa wakes moments later by the movement from underneath her body, it is rocking her awake in a half-dazed phase and she is aware of the warmth from the body pressed to her own.
Her own clothes are soaking wet from the rain and by the wind that keeps blasting at her face, Lexa soon stirs fully awake.
The horse is strong and muscular underneath her thighs and Roan’s body is cold but steady behind her. His body helps keeping her up on the back of the horse as they move in one through the forest.
The open landscape soon becomes more clear in sight from ahead, the large tents soon more visible behind the trees.
Lexa had visited many parts of the forest and thought she had every part and every clan carved to her bones, yet there was one clan and one part of the forest that Lexa had made sure to stay away from. It was the part that made her heart ache and her body tense. It was the part of the forest that Lexa found herself in now.
Their clan symbol of a hand is noticeable on every tent and on every tree she lay her eyes on.
It draws a sharp breath to her lungs and her gut to clench almost painfully hard. Even the pounding in her head and the pulsing in her stomach is almost forgotten once her eyes get stuck on the new surroundings, and on the people walking up close by their sides once they ride through the gates of Azgeda.
Every warrior seen by her side is covered with heavy armors and furs. Covered with scars on their faces or white warpaint on their cheeks. It is unusual from the black Lexa is used to. From the black warpaint used at home, used among Trikru.
A loud shout is soon heard among them once the guards inform the others of their king’s arrival.
Lexa doesn’t even have the strength to fight back once her body is thrown off the horse and into the arms of a taller warrior. Whatever they have planned to do with her, whether it is to torture her or kill her, Lexa’s body is not ready to fight back, nor is she strong enough to.
If queen Nia would have been alive, this was a moment she most definitely would not have missed. Lexa finally being taken by the Ice Nation, finally facing the faith that the queen believed she deserved under all these years.
“ She suffered a hard hit to her head, take her to Nika and then bring her back to me. “
Lexa can feel herself being carried in the arms of the strong warrior. Yet her body is too weak to resist it. All she can do is to let the Ice Nation warrior carry her lifeless body back to the large tent behind the trees while her eyes drift between reality and unconsciousness.
Most of the pain that Lexa feels isn’t in her head, but rather in her stomach and close to her chest. It is throbbing hard and pulsing with pain. Her body is shivering from the cold that her wet clothes stirs as they stick to her skin, however it is warmer in the tent once they get inside.
‘’ Nika, sis em au . ‘’ Words echoes through Lexa’s ears in daze. She can see the outline of someone standing further into the tent and as the shadow steps forward, Lexa soon feels a warm touch to her forehead.
‘’ She is freezing cold, put her on the bed. ‘’
Lexa shivers and her own body is fighting to keep her as warm and protected as possible.
Her soaked clothes feels glued to her skin and only makes her breathing heavier as she tries to breathe through the thickness in her throat.
Her hair is damp and sticks to the skin on her face, getting mixed with the dirt and blood that is already covering the features in her face. However, Lexa doesn’t care.
She gasps in an attempt to get more air into her lungs, but the movement only sets a stinging ache in motion. She glances down on her own hand, seeing it painted with mud and red blood. Blood that isn’t familiar to her own, blood that must belong to someone else. Yet the throbbing ache she can feel in her stomach is far worse from the one in her head.
She tries to get her body to a sitting position from where she’s placed on the bed in the middle of the tent. However, the grunt that escapes her lips by the motion only brings the attention to her, and the woman inside the tent is soon close by Lexa’s side.
‘’ Easy, goufa . ‘’ she says. Her hands hold Lexa firmly over the shoulders to keep her from moving and with a light push, Lexa finds herself lie down on the bed again.
Her head falls back onto the warmth in the furs with a grunt, it is almost too comfortable to resist, though staying still in Azgeda territory in this condition is not ideal. She is way too vulnerable and weak to fight if necessary and from Lexa’s experience fighting often occurs in meeting with the Ice Nation.
They have never had a welcoming history, only full of war and terror and from experience, Lexa knows that they aren’t the ones to fight easy. They don’t hold back. Ice Nation warriors are brutally trained from a young age.
Although now, with the way the woman swipes a piece of wet fabric over the wound on Lexa’s forehead, it doesn’t seem like hurting her is their plan at all. With the way the woman gently cleans the wound from dirt and blood, it rather seems like she is helping her heal.
“ Is she all right? “ The taller warrior stays still in the opening of the tent, observing every move the woman makes.
“ She will be. “
“ It is only a light scratch. “
A light scratch. Yet the pain Lexa feels in every part of her body feels far from light. Is it poor judgement or is the Ice Nation just that tough?
Lexa glances up on the woman hovering above her. Her cheeks are covered with scars and her face painted white. Her blonde hair is braided down her back and her body covered in soft fur-armors. Her eyes are crystal blue as they stay locked with Lexa’s and with the notice of a lingering smile in the corner of the woman’s lips, Lexa looks away.
She needs to get back to Polis, she needs to inform her healers of her injuries and get real help from someone she trusts, from Nyko or Clarke. Clarke. Lexa’s eyes sharpen and her body fills with an energy she wasn’t aware of, completely ignoring the pain in her stomach when her body throws itself to a sitting position. She needs to find Clarke.
“ Hod op. “ the woman puts her hand back on Lexa’s shoulder to hold her still in her fast movements.
“ You are wounded, stay still. “
Lexa grunts by the stinging pain that throbs in her stomach from the sudden move. It is pulsing fast when Lexa puts her hand over it.
A part of her wants to ignore it, if it only is a light scratch then Lexa should be able to overlook it and get back to Polis, back to Clarke.
“ Is your stomach hurting? “
Lexa tilts her chin down in a nod, but doesn’t have time to protest nor react before the woman lifts her shirt to observe the wound.
Her fingers are cold as they trace Lexa’s skin, it draws a light gasp from her lips and when they linger a little too long on one specific spot, Lexa’s eyes glance down to where the woman’s hand is placed.
With a sharp intake of breath Lexa studies her skin only to find the spot clean from blood and with nothing but a large scar inches from under her breasts.
“ When did you get that? “
Lexa looks confused over the scar, she had never seen it before. It looks tolerably old and shouldn't hurt as much as it does. Her own fingers sweep over the flesh and she shivers slightly by her own cold touch.
“ I don’t know. “ The words leave Lexa’s mouth in a breath as her eyes observe the new found scar.
A scar like that should be something to remember, it should be something that she should be aware of. So why isn’t she?
The woman sighs before she pulls the shirt down over Lexa’s body again. There isn’t anything she can do about a scar that already looks relatively healed.
Lexa stares blank in front of her, with her mind running in a thousand miles per hour and with her heart speeding on the inside of her chest. Things are far from normal and she is far from home. - How did she end up here?
“ Who did this to you, Alicia? “
“ Lexa. “ she says. She isn’t even sure if she misheard it, yet a part of Lexa still felt the need to correct her.
“ What did you say? “
“ It is Lexa. “ she breathes with the last bit of strength that she has, although it only draws a light laugh in form of a puff of air to sneak out from the woman’s lips.
The sound makes Lexa shoot her gaze back at her, confused and alarming in the way the woman doesn’t seem to understand what she said.
“ Your head must have received a pretty hard hit. “
Lexa’s brows furrows as she stares back. She meets the woman’s eyes seconds later and can quickly see the changes in her face by the seriousness covering her own features.
“ Goufa, it is impossible for her to have been the one to attack you today. “
“ What do you mean? “ Lexa asks and she notices how the other woman exhales deeply.
“ The Commander died over a year ago. “
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