I think this one will always be one of my favorite chapters I wrote for this story.  

Clarke departed the following day. A storm was coming that she needed to get ahead of, or go around completely which would delay her arrival a few more days. She'd mulled over the information Luna had given her, of an automatic ceasefire and possibly, Luna had added, an all-out surrender. Clarke wanted the details, to know every seemingly insignificant bit she could divulge, but Luna's stories, though helpful, were vague on those points.

But at least now, Clarke had a plan. She'd thought of targeting the Queen anyway but knew without a grain of doubt, that she would be protected. Which Clarke saw as a good thing; her level of protection would mirror the truth of Luna's words and that inevitably gave Clarke somewhere to aim.

She'd attempted to convince Luna to join them, but the Boat Woman was content to remain in her small lean-to, to await the news of the war and whether her people would ever make it out or not.

"I have my own debt to pay them," Clarke had told Luna "I'll do what I can."

"I hope that's true, for your sake," she'd responded, a bit cryptic, but Clarke had understood the innuendo. "The Boat People are not proponents of war or execution, but if you fail in your attempt, I expect your answerability."

The burden fell on her as she left the woman behind, the weight of it settling across from that she felt for the Grounders and her own people. Just over a month ago, Clarke had despaired at the idea of being responsible for any other lives beyond her own. Now she was offering it, and she understood that if she were to fail, that weight would be permanent, engraved more deeply than the wounds on her back.

But this was the price of war, and someone had to bear it.

********

By the end of the first week, Bellamy's hope was beginning to wane. Its presence had, in the least, offered him meager solace, and had given him more reason to push his bleeding body forward rather than rest in the snow like he was aching to do. But as his hope faded, the loss of it was greater than its comfort had been, with every day that passed that held no sign of Clarke in it.

Lincoln took notice too, but remained much more stoic and composed than Bellamy felt. His entire being hurt on the outside and on the in, not just from the broken rib, but also from their losses.

One evening, as they'd set camp, Bellamy had asked Lincoln of Tyrell. "Did he have a family?" he asked. Did he have someone he needed to apologize to or thank? The concept seemed insufficient, but he wasn't about to do nothing.

Lincoln took a drink from the skin clad canteen. "His woman, or wife, died in a raid a few years ago," he said. "They have a four-year-old son."

The words stabbed at Bellamy's chest and he looked away from Lincoln. Bellamy understood the obvious void felt, growing up without a father. There was always a tangible vacancy, in the place besides his mother, but now that boy didn't even have the luxury of one parent.

"What's his name?" he asked.

Lincoln stoked their small fire. "Ronin."

Bellamy said nothing else, silently matching the name to a boy without a face. He couldn't do much in honor of the man who had traded a life with his son for Bellamy's, but he could try and keep the boy safe. As safe as was possible, in the middle of a war.

And if he failed, then their broken family would simply be reunited.

******

Days passed them by; days that steadily grew into weeks as they descended the mountain and the air became less chilled and the frost on the plants melted off.

When Bellamy finally got a poultice on his wounds, he couldn't help but feel somewhat surprised that he actually survived this far. Without Ice Scouts coming after them, without hypothermia claiming him, without his body giving up the fight. He was more bullheaded than he thought.

Lincoln and him spoke little throughout the decline, instead keeping their attention alert on everything around them. But they were coming into the dry, forested terrain, the lingering remnants of snow disappearing under their feet.

Bellamy still needed medical attention and would undoubtedly receive some of it from Mount Weather, but as the herbs took effect, the pain was dulling to a tolerable nag. Whatever it was, it had counteracted some of the acid's work. It still burned to the touch, but Bellamy suspected that if he survived this long, he'd made it out of the woods.

Literally.

A few miles later, Tondc came into view, first with its moss-covered ravine, and then the statue, jutting up like some formidable being, guarding the entrance.

Bellamy started walking, faster than what he should've been, but he managed and where he stumbled, Lincoln offered a hand.

The doors opened and he was beckoned underneath the entryway and through it, into a village that still held unnatural silence. But it was still here, full of living breathing people.

Someone shouted something in Triangesleng, and attention fell on them, eyes meeting Bellamy's and Lincoln's. But the majority were trailed on his covered chest, spots of blood still peeking through.

Then someone was running to him, cutting through the growing throng.

Bellamy felt his first smile in weeks tug on his face just as Octavia plowed into him. The force of it hurt and his chest burned, meriting a flinch, but he returned it as best he could, hid relief putting out some of the fire.

Octavia pulled back, her eyes meeting his, shining with unshed tears. "You're an idiot," she said, as she surveyed his condition. "Who probably needs to sit down."

He chuckled.

Octavia threw her arms around Lincoln next, a bit more forcefully and to Bellamy's slight dismay, they kissed openly in front of him. He wasn't about to stop it, though. Not after their travel and everything leading up to.

Octavia cast her gaze to him. "No complaints, Big Brother?"

Bellamy smirked, and shared a glance between her and Lincoln. "Not this time. I would've died without him," he said, gesturing with a hand in Lincoln's direction. The atmosphere turned serious. "Honestly, O, I don't think you could've found yourself a better man."

His sister smiled. "Who would've thought, near-death experience making you all sentimental. I expected it sooner, what, with how much you almost die."

His smirk deepened but Octavia's eyes suddenly turned a shade darker. "Where's Clarke? And Tyrell?"

Bellamy's relief evaporated, and was instantly replaced with cold, relentless dread. This had been his last hope, before facing the likeliest probability.

"She's not back?" he asked.

Octavia met his eyes, now downcast in fear. "No. She never came back."

Bellamy shook his head, as if trying to understand, to make sense of it or deny it completely. Octavia was asking him what had happened but he couldn't find it in him to answer her. He didn't know what had happened, or what was happening to him now, for that matter. It was a similar feeling he'd had whenever Bellamy found that his sister was in danger, or what he imagined himself to feel to assume her as dead. It was similar in the sense that if felt as if something vital had been stripped from him, something long cemented into a foundation torn out from beneath.

But it was also different, in many ways. Clarke wasn't his blood, but she was his family, produced after months of shared disagreements, a slow-rising friendship, formed in the crucible of war and sacrifice and mutual responsibility. Octavia knew him, but Clarke understood him.

And though he knew what it was like without having her around, had had half a year of it, that didn't equate to this. Because in that time, there was always a promise of return. And now, there wasn't one.

"Bellamy?" Octavia asked, and he met her gaze. She must've seen it in his eyes, whatever this thing was he couldn't explain and regardless of his wounds, she gently wrapped her arms around him.

Bellamy embraced her tightly, his mind swimming as something broke inside him, close to his ribs but worse than his fractured one. It was one of those rare occasions that Bellamy had no idea what to do. Usually, this was when he'd go and ask Clarke her ideas, but the pain doubled when he understood he couldn't do that. And this, to his confusion, set in panic.

He extracted himself from Octavia and held up a hand. "I need a second," he told her, before walking away. She made a comment on his wounds and his safety, but Bellamy couldn't manage to care as he stumbled back out of the entryway, and passed that imposing statue.

He stopped when he was beyond it and closed his eyes.

None of this felt real. It was too distant, too disbelieving.

He bit out a curse. "I was supposed to take the risks, Clarke," he hissed. But he should've known better. He'd assume she would have weighed the chance of getting to him too small to act upon, but she'd found another reason on top of it, to justify her going to the Ice Nation. The armory was down. Their soldiers were in disarray. Clarke had given them their optimum time for war. And yet, Bellamy couldn't fake gratitude. There was pride, but it was murky and weak.

What he really felt couldn't be put into words. There was rage, and grief. There was fear, at the prospect of her not coming back, a prospect that was steadily transforming into a reality that Bellamy wanted nothing more than to push against. Guilt. Regret. And there was that panic he didn't understand. It wasn't the screaming kind that instilled the urge to run inside him. It was the confusing kind of panic, the kind that made him have to question what he'd do without her. What he was without her.

Was he still the man he wished to be, or had it been Clarke, always challenging him to it that made him that way? She'd taught him compassion, what it meant to give someone a second chance.

If she really was gone, had she taken that part of him with her? And worse of all; what sort of man would he become without her?

His hands fisted at his sides as understanding dawned on him, the realization of just how much he'd relied on Clarke throughout their time here, hitting him squarely in the chest. But it was beyond the loss of a friend. This went deeper and Bellamy didn't recognize the void that appeared there inside, screaming not just guilt at him, but regret. And it steadily became louder than the guilt until it was too deafening to distinguish what it was Bellamy regretted.

He just knew that he did.

*******

The storm delayed Clarke, as she'd anticipated, and she was forced to extend her journey by another few days that quickly turned to a week. It was a practical blizzard she was forced to take cover from, and she took shelter under a tree that offered a small burrow with the snow.

Opposed to the first time she had trekked down this mountain, greatly numb and wounded, her current solitude was starting to become a dangerous thing. The silence made her turn to questions, and wonderments of the others, whether or not they were still alive. The Baneberry seemed to gain weight as the thought flashed through her mind. Would she be forced to tell Indra that Tyrell had died? Or Octavia, that not just Bellamy, but both him and the man she loved-?

No, Clarke shoved that thought away, and sealed it into a box she'd only open if it were proven true. Both Bellamy and Lincoln would die fighting, and they'd fight with everything they had to make it back to Octavia and simply put, Clarke had faith in them.

That didn't, however, mean that she could stop each thread of fear that wove its way through her thoughts, tethering words like torture and Bellamy together. If he were alive, then he wasn't in his best condition and that knowledge put Clarke's mind on another hazardous path, recalling Mount Weather and what was done to him there. But this was the Ice Nation, and she knew forms of torture could vary. It wasn't just a necessity to them, it was a form of entertainment. And Clarke knew they wanted answers, which meant the torture wouldn't have been drawn out. It would've been brutal, worse enough to maim him, but not enough to kill him. And that was only if Lincoln had succeeded in at least getting him out.

Clarke dropped the thought as fast as she could, switching to ones that brought hope instead of fear. She'd blown up the armory. And now she had a possible way of destroying the Ice Nation, which only added to the benefit of her going after Bellamy. If she could convince herself it wasn't done completely in vain, then there was justice in her actions. And if there was justice, there was a means of forgiveness from those involved.

But that did little to counteract her mounting apprehension as the blizzard cleared and she resumed her trek. Clarke knew that if she returned and neither Lincoln nor Bellamy were back, then it meant they were probably dead. And that bore more weight than the Grounders and Boat People combined.

*********

Two weeks passed in a blur of snowfall steadily turning to rain. Clarke moved silently through the trees, feeling as the ice gave way to ground the farther she descended, until she no longer needed her extra jacket and was content with her lighter one. Only once had she nearly run into Ice Scouts, but she'd managed to get away before they'd caught sight of her, and that had been during her first week on the mountain.

But she wasn't up there anymore, and Clarke allowed this small relief to enter, however marginal it was. But the closer she came to Tondc, her fear grew, until it became a throbbing pain in her chest.

Please let them be there, she silently begged, trying to breathe around the lump of emotion that made it difficult to breathe. Please.

Already, her instincts were taking over, switching to tactics of what she would do if the worst-case scenario came to pass. But Clarke couldn't focus on that. She wouldn't try and form pitiful words sufficient enough to convey condolences to Octavia. Couldn't even muster up the desire to, because if they were dead, Clarke's grip on this war would slip. Maybe she'd still manage, but it would be a detrimental blow, equal to before the battle as it would be after it. And though this had always been a possibility faced, every day since they'd landed on the ground, Clarke was never more afraid by it than she was now, when Tondc materialized into view.

Her pace slowed but she kept moving, her breathing turning to spurts as the statue neared, until she was standing before it. She met his stony eyes once before passing him, into the entryway and to the doors.

Words of Triangesleng were shouted beyond them and the doors parted, ushering her inside. The village surfaced around her, a welcomed sight after weeks of isolation. Heads dipped to her and many of them stopped, but Clarke was already looking through the growing cluster of Grounders.

Seconds passed and when a familiar face did not appear in the crowd, panic set inside Clarke, as untamable as fire. Her breathing stopped altogether and though she dimly noticed Indra, gazing at her with a look of surprise, she kept looking.

Maybe they really hadn't gotten out. Maybe the hiccup with the bomb had cost them. Or maybe both Tyrell and Lincoln were dead while Bellamy still rotted away in that chamber.

Tears sprung to her eyes and her knees suddenly became shaky as she looked into every face, every face that wasn't his or Lincoln's. No, she thought, as she turned in a slow circle. No, no, no,-

"Clarke?"

She whirled around, her heart beating out of her chest as her gaze met a familiar dark one. He looked awful; cheeks sallow with shadows underneath his eyes. His curly hair now fell limp, but it was still Bellamy. And he was alive.

His eyes stared back at her in shock, lips slightly parted in surprise as he took a cautious step forward.

The shaking of her legs grew worse as a torrent of relief crashed over her, but Clarke pushed herself forward, faster until she was running. His arms went around her waist as hers wrapped behind his neck and without even thinking, without even considering the consequences or the reason, Clarke crushed her lips to his.

Bellamy stilled for a moment, just for a single breath. And Clarke thought he was about to pull away, when instead he returned it, with an unrelenting ferocity she hadn't expected. And suddenly, everything around them fell away as they molded together. His hand reached up to cup her cheek and Clarke marveled at the newness of this strange feeling, foreign in its intimacy, yet completely and irrevocably him.