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Tributum was in two days' time, and increasingly Coriane felt she had sunk to her neck. With the quarrel with Eddard, communication between them, once poor in itself, was now limited to only messages delivered by Momban, which made everything else difficult.
Melisandre, fortunately, did not leave her alone. The woman had far more years of experience with Tributum than she did, so her advice was always more than welcome, and Dominic pitched in whenever he could, and although, not being such a fan of planning, he did his best to help Coriane not drown in endless responsibilities.
"All the villages are already prepared and waiting," Aren told her as he reached her side.
Behind him, Krista, Jensen and Isadora were standing.
Isadora had only recently been able to rejoin the group, when both Odeya and Nyko felt it was time, she slowly began to rejoin life as Terra's companion.
It felt weird, having her back after all that time. Not to mention things between them were still... unknown, they talked, they had somehow discussed the topic, but Isa's trauma was so big, so present still, that even if she tried to act all brave, Coriane could see she was having trouble picking up the pieces of the woman that entered the Mountain, and the one who came out of it. So Coriane waited, patiently, for Isadora to say anything.
"Including Skaikru?"
"I think Jensen and Aren made it crystal clear to them," Krista laughed, looking at both boys with a sly grin.
Coriane also looked at them both but with one eyebrow raised in reproach. She already had too many problems on her plate, and honestly, the Sky People were at the bottom, furthest place of her list, she didn't want to have to solve any more conflicts with them. Not to mention that she didn't feel like seeing Bellamy again in the slightest, at least not for a while, until she understood what he meant the last time they spoke or managed to dispel her anger at the fact he had managed to leave her confused.
"We behaved, we swear," both boys spoke in unison and raised their hands in the air innocently.
Coriane thought about what "behave" fit the word for them and decided better not to ask any more questions.
"I'm hungry, can we go?" Krista complained with a growl.
"You just ate, like, ten minutes ago, are you serious?" Jensen questioned with an eyebrow raised in amusement.
"Dead serious."
Before Coriane could say anything, she was interrupted by hissing sounds approaching them. She could identify the sounds of her animals, distinguish them one of the other, and listening to the snake she knew they weren't from Naga, so whatever had happened hadn't been in the north, they weren't from Zeher either, so it hadn't happened in the south either. No, the hissing she recognized as Rezik, a beautiful male bush viper from the west, where Polis was.
"I don't know this one," said Isadora curiously, watching the beautiful reptile with rough red and black scales slither towards Coriane.
"Geva died, Rezik took her place," she explained simply, with the anticipation of news that might not please her coming closer with every hiss.
"Then it comes from Polis."
Coriane nodded and crouched down to hold out her hand for the snake to coil in and settle in to hiss his message. They all waited patiently behind her, keeping their respective distance, as Rezik was anything but friendly and passive with people other than Coriane, but attentive to what the girl would translate.
Rezik's black, venomous tongue darted out and flicked with each hiss, formulating words that only Coriane was able to understand. With each second and each of those words, Coriane tensed her jaw even more, and that was enough for the others to know that the girl was severely unhappy with the news, the final clue being that little tongue-in-mouth gesture that Coriane made whenever she was upset and the way her eyes darkened with tension.
"Thank you, pretty one, you can go now," she stroked the reptile's prickly scales one last time and then let it go, standing up in an overly calculated and tense movement, and not even turning to look at them when she mumbled her next words: "We're going back to Polis. Lexa made a deal with Roan, she's got Clarke."
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Getting off Nix, she wasted no time in doing what she usually did when she arrived in Polis and looking at all the vendors displaying in their little shops, she walked straight ahead with such a serious and stoic expression that the path opened for her like the ancient tale of the red sea. No one dared to mutter a word or move a muscle when they saw Terra, they didn't need details to know that something had put her in a very bad mood, or rather, that someone had.
Despite the poor attempt by the tower guards to stop her before she crossed the door to the Commander's Hall, Coriane passed through without much trouble, it only took a glance and a growl from her feline companion for both guards to back away as quickly as they had dared to intervene.
When she entered, the room fell absolutely silent. She had completely forgotten that the Coalition would be meeting, and Lexa, it seemed, didn't bother to remind her at all.
"Sorry I'm late, am I interrupting the party?"
Pretending to be neither offended nor surprised by the scene in front of her, she smiled with her mouth closed but her face tense and walked casually to her place in the seat near the throne. Astrid walked with the slowness and precision of a predator at her side, and Aren, Isadora, Krista and Jensen behind her.
The latter four bowed rather reluctantly to Lexa, while Coriane barely bothered to nod in her direction.
Lexa was standing at the edge of the balcony, out of sheer curiosity, Coriane climbed the steps of the throne and went over to see why. It wasn't until she leaned out a little to see from the height the small body of Azgeda's ambassador —or, rather, what was left of him—, to get an idea of what had happened.
"I always wanted to do that," she spoke with a hint of reproach in her voice.
Her eyes and Lexa's met for a few seconds. It was brief, so that no one else besides them could see or even feel the tension that pulsed between them. But it was there, burned like flames from an angry fire, like betrayal and distrust seeping from beneath their skins.
They swallowed hard and raised their heads and shoulders in postures of superiority, both wanting to look as imposing as the other, to show the other who was who. Neither was going to give in, it was not in their nature, and Coriane knew that if Lexa could not reach her using her Command out of respect for the Spirit and God of the Forest, she was going to do it discreetly, slowly, without submerging herself to the hard, cold and penetrating gaze of Coriane's brown eyes.
Because Lexa would not admit her mistake, and Coriane would not forgive her if she did not.
"Shall we get on with it, Commander?" Coriane raised a defiant eyebrow.
"After you, Terra."
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Clarke paced back and forth within the four walls in which she was confined, unable to sit still, let alone concentrate her thoughts. Too many options, too many variants; they were now tormenting her head.
A knock on the door diverted her attention from everything going on the inside to the outside, she waited a few seconds for the door to open and for Lexa or Roan to enter, but when it was Coriane who did, her expression changed from one of dismay to one of pleasant surprise.
"Wow, you do look bad," the brunette laughed as soon as she entered.
As she closed the door, Clarke caught a quick glimpse of the cream-coloured fur and huge feline body that always accompanied Terra and four human figures, one, by the hair and stature, she guessed to be Aren, who, like Astrid, was always with the woman, which left the other taller brown haired being Jensen, the other was easy to recognise as Krista by her deep red hair, and the other, though it took her a few more seconds after the door closed to identify, she managed to see a glimpse in her memory of brown hair and bronzed skin, from the night Lexa betrayed her. That had been the girl Coriane had also walked out on. Isadora, if she remembered correctly.
The blonde smiled slightly at Coriane's words. They had never gotten along particularly well, but they now didn't get along badly either. Coriane was simply someone who was too... intense, someone who didn't take sides, who made her own and stood there, not allowing anyone to cross that fine line and intimidating anyone who thought they were brave enough to even try.
But that night, she had been willing to help them despite what Lexa had done, had stood up to her Commander and friend when she also believed what Lexa had done had been wrong, and had only bent over backwards for someone extremely important. Clarke had understood that, and had appreciated the good fortune Terra had wished them on the mission they were letting them venture out on their own.
Coriane was not to blame for anything that happened, only for having —as Clarke had also done— trusted Lexa.
"Yeah well, I don't know how you manage to look so radiant living in the wild, not all of us have that talent."
"I am the wild, Clarke," she winked playfully and descended to the blond with small steps. When they were closer, her confident expression faded in an instant, and was replaced instead by a hint more shamed-stricken. "I'm sorry about... this," Coriane sighed, looking around.
"Sooner or later I knew it was going to happen, if it wasn't Lexa, it would be my own people," the blonde lowered her head without being able to look directly at her, shifting her feet a little anxiously.
"And which one of them is worse?"
"I don't know yet."
Both their mouths stretched slightly to the side, and not another word was uttered for an uncomfortable length of time.
Clarke wanted to ask Coriane for help with the decision that had been gnawing at her head all this time. Clarke knew that of all the tower, of all the city, Coriane would be the only one capable of speaking to her with the one and only truth, with no thought of personal gain. But she wasn't really sure. They were not friends, far from it, they were simply two women who had been betrayed by the same person, who had priorities and duties that no one else could understand, who had to stand stronger than anyone else because if they let themselves fall for even a single moment, everyone else around them would fall with them. They were not friends, but they came to understand each other.
"What are you going to do?" Asked Coriane at last, breaking the horrible silence.
"I was going to ask you just what you thought I should do," she snorted with an unfunny laugh, rubbing her eyes with her fingers and lowering her head.
"Clarke, I can't tell you what to do, I'm not the one who-"
"Yes, but if you were in my place, if the difference between life and death, between peace and war, was kneeling?" Ahe asked more intensely, desperate.
Taking pity on Clarke's bewildered expression, Coriane sighed and thought for a moment.
"The only thing I can tell you, Clarke, is that no matter what, you still have a significant advantage over Lexa."
"What?" The girl frowned and stepped back a little, waiting dumbfounded for an explanation to those crazy words.
Lexa was the one who had her locked up, Lexa was the one who commanded 12 Clans, Lexa was the one with the sword that pinned her against the wall, how could she have any advantage at all?
"Feelings, curiosity, attraction. Those are your advantages."
Clarke couldn't react, she didn't know how, inside her she was still trying to connect the wires that would make sense of those words, but she seemed incapable of it. When she took longer than she would have liked to respond, Coriane simply gave her a faint smile and turned around, then walked out of the room without Clarke being able to help it, leaving her with her head even more tangled than before.
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The sunset had always been one of her favorite things in the world, the one point in the day when she felt truly at peace. She connected with everything around her. Every animal and every tree stretching out to catch any last glimpse of sun, those nocturnal ones waking from their slumber ready to take over the darkness of the night, every branch, every leaf, everything in nature seemed to change, waiting for Tekara to give them another day on Earth tomorrow.
She closed her eyes and let the last rays of sunlight caress her skin, the wind blew a little colder with the arrival of darkness, the forest fell into a total and deep silence, admiring with the tricoloured beauty on the horizon.
The sudden movement behind her did not make her flinch, she could feel Astrid's presence, her huge paws hitting the ground as if it were her own skin. It was also in these moments of deep quiet that she felt everything. Coriane ceased to be connected to the earth beneath her feet and became one with it. She felt every caress of the wind on the leaves of the trees, every tread of animals on the earth, every trembling of the fallen leaves for it, every heart that beat loudly in the chest of all this fauna and flora, and even every heart that beat with its last breaths of it.
She felt everything, she was everything. She was power, She was love, She was tranquillity, she was Terra.
"Am I interrupting something?" Aren's voice came closer, positioning himself to one side of her.
Coriane opened her eyes extremely slowly, as if just waking from a deep, pleasant sleep.
"Just my peace of mind," she spoke with a teasing hint, looking sideways at him with a half-moon smile.
The chestnut smiled too and lowered his head as if in mock apology. Astrid positioned herself on Coriane's other side, admiring the sunset with her mistress, yawning like a lazy bimbo. She looked over her shoulder but didn't see Isadora nearby, turning to now look at Aren, who smiled reassuringly before answering the silent question.
"She and Krista downstairs, you know how those two get when there are wholesale sales, Jensen stayed with them to make sure they don't get too out of control," Coriane her head slightly, looking ahead, at the tents and campaigns in Polis that looked small from there, at the people milling about the streets, some were already packing up their businesses and calling their children to go and take shelter in the coolness of home.
"Oh, holy Tekara," she sighed, laughing too.
The silence that ensued was not uncomfortable at all. With Aren, silence was never uncomfortable. It was a respite, a preparation for her to select those subjects on which she should unburden herself, those things she should say without compunction. Aren would listen, nod, ask a question or two, but in the end, he would go along with her, as he always had.
"I suppose we'll stay for the ceremony."
Ah, the ceremony.
Clarke had decided to kneel before Lexa and let Skaikru become part of the Coalition, crowned as the thirteenth clan.
"We've got to, Dominic and Melisandre are on their way. More than Skaiheda, this event merits the presence of Terra."
"Terra, Ignis, Aqua... but not Caeli," it was not a question, not even a mere assumption. Aren was stating what she had not done aloud.
"No... not Caeli," Coriane sighed, still unable to tear her gaze away from the horizon, Aren already had his eyes on her, analyzing her every feature, every possible reaction in her expressions.
"Do you know what you're going to do about it?"
"Whatever Tekara wants me to do. That's what I'll do," she said without the slightest hesitation.
"What if Tekara wants you to kill him?"
Another silence, one of thought, one in which Coriane crinkled her eyes slightly and licked her lip, thinking, considering those words, that possibility.
"Eddard is about to cross a dangerous line. Joining Nia, fighting not only Lexa and the Coalition, but me and the Union... I think he's hoping that somehow, if the Ice Nation were to win this war and take the Commandery, he could do what his ancestors could not; become leader of the Elementa. Who knows, he may even be planning to confront me and hope that by killing me, he will be revived as Magno."
"Calion may be my least favourite spirit, but I don't think he's going to let the table run over with elemental blood. Besides, I don't think any of the other spirits would be willing to grant him that power."
"That's why if Tekara asks me to run a sword through his chest or poison his blood with the fangs of a Taipan, that's just what I'll do," Coriane breathed and exhaled deeply, her chest contracting into a strange knot of uncertainty.
"I thought the spirits were never wrong."
"They aren't. We are."