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“You can’t be serious.”
Lexa bites back a sigh. “Clarke- “
“How are you just telling me this now? After everything?” Clarke paces the room, hands tugging at the fabric of her shirt from agitation. “You thought, what, I wouldn’t want to know that you’ve had traitors trying to assassinate you?”
“They are being dealt with accordingly,” Lexa says. She avoids meeting Clarke’s hurt stare and pushes on. “And they are only a small group.” Lexa voice lowers. “I didn’t want you to worry.”
“See how well that worked out.”
Lexa steps closer. “You know me.” She took the other girl’s hands to still their nervous movements. “You know I can handle myself, so just come to bed before your pacing wears a hole in my floor.”
Clarke allows herself to be led, but doesn’t release Lexa’s hand when she sinks into the bed. She places a hand on her girlfriend’s face and looks into her eyes. “I can’t lose you. Please don’t make me mourn you too.”
***
Dusk comes all too soon. As the sunlight fades, covering Polis in shadow, Lexa turns away from the window.
Her hands come up, and she runs her fingers through her hair, undoing the braids holding it back. She sighs with relief, dropping onto the bed and scattering the bands onto the floor when she’s done. Clarke is going to kill her when she comes back to find them everywhere, but for the moment Lexa is too exhausted to care.
She lays back onto the pillows and closes her eyes.
The door opens, and Lexa squints at the newcomer.
“You’d think the Commander would have more discipline, instead of dropping her hair ties everywhere. The table is right there,” Clarke says, tapping Lexa’s nose. She slides in beside her girlfriend and presses her cold toes against Lexa’s ankles, earning an indignant yelp from the latter. Clarke rolls her eyes. “There’s Heda, the strong warrior,” she clicked her tongue.
Lexa grumbles, but leans closer. “Hush and go to sleep. So much has happened in the past few days.”
She fell asleep with Clarke in her arms.
Lexa’s eyes snap open, and flick around. She’s awake, but unsure why. The candles are long extinguished, with only the faint brush of moonlight illuminating the chamber. Her hand goes to the dagger beneath her pillow, and she slips her other arm from Clarke’s slack grasp to sit up.
Her gaze finds the door, hanging slightly ajar. The quiet creak of hinges must have woken her.
Lexa’s slides from the bed and coils into a defensive stance, listening, watching.
There’s a swish of fabric and she ducks, the thud of a dagger striking wood, and objects clattering to the floor meets her ears as she rolls back into her stance to meet the cloaked intruder. They draw another dagger from the cloak, and lunge.
“Would you stop trying to assassinate my girlfriend while I’m trying to sleep,” Clarke calls from the bed, and from Lexa’s peripheral she sees Clarke pull a knife from beneath the mattress. “Get them, Lexa!”
“False Commander,” the assassin hisses, blocking her strike and forcing her back a step. “You’ve become weak, all of Polis can see it.” They swing, and she sidesteps, but another dagger appears in their hand, plunging into her shoulder. The assassin leans in. “Heda is no more.”
Lexa spits in their face, grasping the hilt of her dagger with a sneer. “Are you so sure? Because I think-” She rams the blade into their heart.
Clarke’s voice finishes: “-Heda is forever.” Her own dagger protrudes from the assassins back, and their lifeless body slumps to the floor.
Lexa wipes her blade on the fallen enemy’s cloak, then calmly moves to sit on the bed. She grasps the handle of the knife embedded in her shoulder, sucks in a breath, and yanks.
Clarke materializes with a box of medical supplies. “You should have left it in.” She takes the knife out of her girlfriend’s hand; ignoring her protests of admiring her prize and setting it on the table.
“Clarke- “Lexa began, wincing as fabric presses onto her wound to stop the bleeding. She takes Clarke’s hands and looks up at her. “You need to know, you’ll never lose me.”
Clarke opens her mouth, but Lexa cuts her off. “My decision to not tell you about the assassination attempts was a mistake. One I won’t make again. I’m sorry.” She presses her lips into the Clarke’s palm.
Clarke doesn’t respond for a moment, face unreadable. She finally looks up at the ceiling and huffs out a laugh. “Only you. Only you would apologize after being stabbed.” She kneels, mirroring Lexa when she’d sworn fealty, and tilts her head up to capture Lexa’s lips with hers.
After a few moments, Clarke breaks away.
“I love you, idiot,” she says fondly.