Just Surviving (#Clexa)

Haven

Lexa POV

I make love to Clarke twice, and time no longer seems to matter. It drips away like wax from a burning candle, and we slip under the sheets so that we can cuddle in each other's arms.

Cuddling isn't new to me, but it's been a while.

Battle is usually the only thing that can heighten my senses beyond imaginable, but now I've learned that the Skaiprisa can do the exact same thing. I still feel tingly all over as I lay with Clarke pressed up behind me, her arm flung possessively over my waist and her legs tangled with my own. Falling asleep wouldn't do either of us any good, but I fear I'm close. Here, with her, my duties as a Commander and to my people no longer matter. All that matters is us.

I try to memorize her kisses, and the warmth and softness of her skin, and the scent of her hair, all the while feeling a deep fear nestling in my bones. The only other time I've felt such an all-consuming desire for someone was when I had Costia in my bed. The fact that this is even more powerful than that is worrying. I'm scared I might actually be in love with Clarke. And if I lose her... well, it can't happen.

The mattress shifts as Clarke pushes herself up on one elbow, and I can sense her gazing down at me. In fact, I can even imagine her affectionate expression - the way her lips curl up at the corners and her eyebrows furrow in the middle, eyelashes flickering against the tops of her cheekbones. I know her face so well now, and it's hard to come to terms with the fact that I might not see it for months.

Maybe ever, if things don't go as planned.

Clarke begins tracing her fingertips slowly up and down my arm, following the bold lines of my tattoo, and I shiver at the sensation. After I betrayed Clarke at Mount Weather, I had added another band to it. Each band implies a harsh choice I've had to make as Commander: the first was when I killed all the other Nightbloods - children I'd grown up with and considered as siblings - at the conclave. The second, when I lost Costia to the Ice Queen.

I'm hoping I won't have to add a fourth too soon.

Clarke murmurs, 'If Octavia and I are gonna get behind the blockade by dawn...'

'Shhh...' I interrupt, eyes still closed.

Clarke pauses, and I know she's smiling widely. Her fingers move from my shoulder to my back, outlining my spine from nape to tailbone. My back tattoo was the most painful out of all of the ones I'd had done, but I'd thought it a fitting tribute to my fellow Nightbloods.

'It's beautiful,' Clarke whispers.

I open my eyes sleepily. 'I got it on my Ascension Day. A circle for every Natblida that died, when the Commander chose me.'

'Seven circles,' she mutters. 'I thought you said there were nine novitiates in your conclave?'

'There were.'

'What happened to number eight?'

There she goes again, interrogating me as if she's her mother - a chancellor. Looking for answers where she'll find none.

Number eight could never have been tattooed on my back; Luna deserted her cause during the Conclave and never returned. To Titus and to anyone important at the time, she'd committed a deadly sin. So, when I got the tattoo, I made sure to leave her out of it.

And yet... had she not fled, I doubt I would be Commander today. Luna had always been a better fighter than me, and we'd both known it. But she was too obsessed with peace to have ever taken the throne. Now, I may be embracing the idea, but before I brought about the Coalition and united all the clans, the bloodshed had been even worse, and peace was nothing more than a silly dream.

Sighing, I roll onto my back to look into Clarke's face. 'Can we talk about something else?'

The other girl smiles, head propped up on her hand, and points out, 'We don't have to talk at all.'

The suggestive husk in her voice has me instantly warm again, and I smile at her before pushing myself up and straddling her, slipping my knee between her legs. As I cover her in kisses, I try to forget that this may be the last time I can touch her in this way.

This is my real goodbye.