Chapter Text
“What assurance do I have that Skaikru won’t seek retribution for the acts that my mother has committed against them?” Roan questioned.
“I give you my word,” Pike assured him. Roan looked at the man skeptically. The meeting took place in a forest clearing not far from Arkadia. Lexa, Roan, Clarke, and the ambassadors from the other nations were trying to work out an arrangement for peace with Pike after the massacre and subsequent pardon.
“I want Wanheda,” Roan demanded. His eyes fixed on Lexa with a challenge.
“No,” Lexa spat before anyone could respond. “That tradition died generations ago.”
“What exactly are you suggesting?” Pike asked. Pike looked between the girl who used to be his student and the man he knew to be his enemy.
“King Roan wishes to unite himself with Wanheda so that Skaikru and Azgeda will be connected by blood,” Titus explained. “If Skaikru were to attack Azgeda then-“
“No, we aren’t going to do any of these grounder traditions,” Pike told them. “We aren’t like you people.”
“You certainly proved that when you killed an army sent to protect you,” Indra sniped. She looked like she would kill Pike if it wasn’t for the fact that she was leaning on Octavia so heavily.
“This will be a mutually beneficial relationship,” Roan explained. “You do not want to be a part of the twelve clans, but you are still surrounded by enemies. Wanheda will have power over the Azgeda’s army if you were ever to find yourself in trouble.”
Pike seemed to consider this looking between Roan and Indra. “I can see how this could help us, but the fact remains-“
“We agree.” Everyone’s heads snap towards Clarke. She had been standing to Lexa’s right, silent throughout the whole meeting.
“Clarke, this is not necessary,” Lexa told her. And then lower so that only Clarke could her, “My promise to you still stands.”
“Thank you, Lexa, but I can’t depend on your charity forever,” Clarke told her.
Lexa was trying to remain her usual stoic self, but Clarke could see all the thoughts running through her head as clear as day. She liked Clarke, but she was probably trying to reassure herself that love was weakness.
“Are you sure about this, Clarke?” Pike asked.
“This is what is best for my people,” Clarke responded but it sounded more like a self-assurance.
** ** ** **
“What do you mean ‘Clarke is getting married’?” Bellamy practically shouted at Pike. He had stormed into his office when Pike got back from the meeting demanding to know what happened.
He wanted to go to the meeting to prevent anything bad from happening, but Lexa had said that if Pike wanted to bring a gun he would have to go alone. Bellamy imagined the worst scenario to be Pike being killed, but this was way worse.
“Listen, son,” Pike started sitting down on the edge of his desk. “Clarke agreed to this and thinks that it is the right thing to do. I trust her judgement.”
“She agreed to marry a guy that kidnapped her and you trust her judgement? The guy who stabbed me in the leg when I tried to rescue her. The man whose mother who- who… she was responsible for blowing up Mount Weather.” Bellamy was pacing around the small office practically steaming with fury. “Do you not see anything wrong with that? You can still stop this can’t you?”
Pike placed his hands on Bellamy’s shoulders to stop his pacing. “It’s going to be alright. Clarke can handle herself. I trust the girl.”
“Clarke can handle… Clarke can handle herself?” Bellamy stormed out of the room with a muttered, “You have got to be kidding me.”
He found Octavia outside loading a bag onto Helios. “Where are you going?”
“Azgeda,” she responded tersely without looking at him. “For my friend’s wedding.”
“That looks like a lot of stuff for just a wedding,” Bellamy observed looking at the large pack Octavia was strapping to Helios.
“I never said I was coming back,” she told him. Then she spun around to face him with determination in her eyes. “I know you hate Clarke for leaving after Mount Weather, but at least she tries to make things right instead of going off and murdering an army sent to protect us.”
** ** **
Clarke leaves in the morning accompanied by her mother, Kane, Octavia, and Lincoln. She knows that her mother and Kane will have to return to Arkadia, but she is glad that she will have Octavia by her side through this huge change.
An entourage of Azgeda warriors waits for them outside the walls. They supply Abby and Kane with horses, but no horse is brought for Clarke. Instead the riders part and Roan comes galloping in. Clarke raises her hand to wave to him and he takes advantage to this by grabbing her outstretched arm and swinging her onto the horse behind him as he passes.
“Show off,” Clarke mutters.
“Just doing what seems fit for Wanheda,” he responds.
Clarke wraps her arms around his waist to steady herself and relishes in the way she can feel his muscles rippling as he rides even through the many layers he wears.
When they arrive at Val-d’Or, the capital of Azgeda, they are greeted warmly but Clarke is immediately swept away to prepare her for the ceremony. They bathe her in warm water and soap that smells like lavender. She almost falls asleep in the tub when the attendant starts to massage the soap into her scalp.
After that she is dressed in luxurious white furs, which she was told that King Roan had killed. The attendant puts the makeup on her. It is just as thick as the makeup she wore in Polis, but the white paint they placed on her face was the exact opposite of the dark charcoal Lexa wore around her eyes.
For a moment she wonders if she will have to scar her face like Roan and Nia. Was that some symbol of royalty? Would she deserve it? Would it hurt?
It is when her mother comes to collect her that the reality of the situation starts to sink in. She is marrying a man that she barely knows. She is marrying a man that kidnapped her. Was she going crazy?
“I’m doing this for the good of my people,” she muttered under her breath.
“Clarke, you look beautiful.” Her mother assessed her outfit and looked on the verge of tears. She had imagined Clarke’s wedding day many times in her daughter’s life, but she never expected it to be in these circumstances. “Are you ready, honey?” her mother asked.
“Yes.” It frightened her a little bit knowing that she wasn’t lying, not completely.