"YONGON, YOUR HEAD," Lincoln said in a hush tone. My head? What's wrong with my head? I furrowed my eyebrows, unsure of what he meant. "Hide your blood." He said quickly before turning around.
Shoot, I forgot about my blood. I snatched Clarke's bag and luckily she had an alcohol-soaked piece of cloth. I quickly wiped the cut on my head and hoped I got all of the blood off.
I could hear the distant clicks, clacks and thumps of the Grounder's arrival from the forest on the other side of the bridge.
The Grounders arrived at the bridge. Riding horses. My mouth dropped in awe of the stunning creatures. I had always wanted to see a horse. I had read about them in stories, always the trusty companions who get the protagonist wherever they need to go.
Before us were three Grounders. The middle one was a woman, mounted on a brown stallion. There were two larger Grounders on either side of her, sitting on black horses. I could just tell the woman was the leader. The way she held herself made it obvious.
The Grounders had weapons which they weren't supposed to. Technically I was breaking the rule too but I only had a knife, these guys had spears and bows and swords.
"Hey, we said no weapons!" Finn argued, jogging up to us.
"I was told there wouldn't be," Said Lincoln.
"It's too late now," Clarke sighed.
Clarke began walking up to Anya, hand in hand with Finn. Lincoln grabbed Finn's shoulder before they could go any further.
"She goes alone."
Finn gave Clarke a concerned look. Clarke reassured him she would be okay. With Clarke's words, Finn reluctantly let her go.
The woman Grounder dismounted her horse, her eyes landing on me for a short moment before facing Clarke an meeting her at the center of the bridge.
I couldn't hear their conversation but after a few minutes of them talking, Clarke quickly jogged up to us.
"She wants to talk to Tahlia," She said with uncertainty in her voice. I froze in my place. Was she gonna kill me? Everyone else seemed to tense up as well.
"Why?" Octavia asked. Clarke shrugged, her face filled with worry. Lincoln looked to Anya, who was glaring at me before turning back to me. He looked at my face before muttering something under his breath.
"Guys, Grounder Princess is getting impatient." Octavia urged. "What do we do?"
"She has to go. Anya will kill you all if she doesn't get her way," Lincoln said, fear and guilt filling his voice. He looked to me. "Be careful, young one," He whispered.
I was on the verge of tears, I was so scared. I shook my thoughts, took a deep breath and put on my bravest face, even if it was face. Clarke grabbed my hand and we walked to the middle of the bridge where the Grounder lady stood with her head held high.
I gulped as we approached her.
"Your name is Tahlia?" The woman said more as a statement rather than a question. I nervously nodded, avoiding all eye contact with the Grounder. She swiftly snatched my arm and whipped out her knife. I'm gonna die.
She didn't kill me. Actually, she didn't even hurt me. "Clarke! Tahlia! Run! Run!" Jasper emerged from the bushes below us, along with Raven and Bellamy, taking Anya's attention away from me. They started shooting at the Grounders and the Grounders started shooting arrows and spears at us.
"Clarke, get down!" Finn yelled and started running up to us. I didn't waste any time and sprinted over to the others, waiting for Clarke and Finn to catch up with us so we could all get the hell out of there.
"You okay?" Lincoln frantically asked. I swiftly nodded, my breathing heavy and uneven. An arrow came towards me, it would have hit me if it weren't for Lincoln who took the arrow in the shoulder for me, saving my life. He grunted as the stick went through his skin.
"Lincoln!" I shouted.
"Oh my God, Lincoln. You've been hit," Octavia said concernedly. Well spotted, Sherlock.
"It's just a scratch." Lincoln grunted as he snapped the arrow. "Okay. Run!" He ordered. "Don't stop until you get behind your walls! Go, take her!" He practically shoved Octavia at the others.
And we ran. Bellamy, Clarke, Raven, Jasper, Octavia and I all ran as fast as we could to the safety of our walls.
I didn't even know I could run so fast. It hurt really bad to run since my stitches were still in but I still sprinted my butt off.
"Go, go go!" Jasper yelled as his legs carried him as fast as he could go.
We finally made it back to camp, all of us sweaty and out of breath. Once we all caught our breath, Bellamy spoke up.
"You got something to say?" He dared Finn.
"Yeah, I told you no guns," Finn directed toward Clarke.
"I told you we couldn't trust the Grounders," Clarke snapped. "I was right."
"Why didn't you tell me what you were up to?" Raven said to Finn, betrayal in her voice.
"I tried, but you were too busy making bullets for your gun," Finn argued, spitting distaste in his words.
"You're lucky she brought that!" Bellamy snarled. "They came there to kill you. Actually no, they came there to kill her," He said angrily, looking to me. "All their weapons were aimed on the two of you."
"Why the hell were you even there, Spark?" Raven's tone matched Bellamy's. I kept my mouth shut and held my cross expression. If Jasper didn't fire the first shot, we wouldn't be in this stupid mess and we might have actually been able to make peace with the Grounders.
Instead, we just bought ourselves a ticket to war with the Grounders.
"You ruined everything." Octavia said to Jasper before marching off. I followed closely behind her.
"I saved you!" We heard Jasper call after us.
Octavia seemed frustrated so I decided to just leave her alone for a while. I went to my tent and found Jess and Harper, lying in their cots and talking.
"Hey, kid. Long time, no see," Jess smiled.
"You saw me yesterday," I laughed.
"Like I said, long time," She smirked.
The other teen in the tent patted the spot next to her as she lied on her cot inviting me to lay down with her. I smiled at accepted her offer, scrunching up my face a little when I felt the strain on my stitches.
I fell asleep really quickly, even though I tried to stay awake and join in on Harper and Jess' conversation.
The next morning, Clarke, Bellamy, Finn, Raven and a few others went out to the wreckage of the Exodus ship that apparently crashed last night. I slept straight through it. I was worried though. What if Sinclair was on that ship?
Sinclair was like a second father to me back on the Ark. He taught me a lot about mechanics and never failed to make me laugh. He only came to visit me a few times when I was locked up but I couldn't complain. He was one of the most important mechanics on the Ark, he was always busy.
I was sitting with Monty, looking outside the gate. Jasper was behind us, bragging about what happened at the bridge. Harper was following him around like he was a king.
Monty was looking out to see if Bellamy and the others were back yet.
"Hey, no sign of your brother or the others yet," Monty said as Octavia walked up to us.
"Hey, I don't care," She muttered, ignoring him.
She looked focused on something outside the wall. I inched closer and finally spotted what she was looking at. Tucked into a tree was a little white flower, similar to the ones on the way to Lincoln's cave.
"Lincoln?" I whispered to her. She nodded.
"Jasper, tell us again, how'd you stay so calm? I would've been terrified," Harper said in awe.
"Fear is only a problem if you let it stop you, right?" Jasper gloated. Finn was the one who came up with that, not Jasper.
"That's not even his line. Finn said that," I voiced my thoughts.
"I saw the Grounders in the trees. It was like nothing I ever felt. You know, pure animal instinct took over. One pull of the trigger, two Grounders dead," He continued bragging and completely twisting the story to make himself sound like the hero.
If he didn't shoot first, who knows what would have happened. Maybe we would be at peace with the Grounders right now. But there's no way to know because Jasper just had to let his 'pure animal instinct' take over.
"'Pure animal instinct?'" Octavia scoffed. "More like pure pants-wetting panic." I snorted at her words.
He continued his irritating and completely incorrect storytelling and Octavia had enough.
"Come on, let us have this," Monty pleaded before Octavia could go up to the lying boy and knock some sense into him.
"Us?"
"Look at him. My boy's a folk hero. They even gave us a bigger tent," Monty said excitedly.
I rolled my eyes and before I could say anything, clattering was heard just outside the wall.
"Someone hit the trip wire!" Connor announced.
"Was it a Grounder?"
"I don't see anything."
"Are you sure it was the trip wire?"
Octavia and I had rushed up to the gate, scared it might have been Lincoln.
"I got nothing." Derek said as he looked through the scope of his rifle. "Connor?"
"Nothing."
Then something moved outside the gate, a small chorus of gasps and murmurs left the crowd.
"There! There! There!" Derek shouted, shooting his gun at it a few times. What if he just killed Lincoln? Octavia and I bolted out the gate, Connor and Derek behind us.
I was in front of the group, Octavia right behind me and the two older boys a few feet away.
"Guys, be careful." Connor said.
Behind a tree, covered in dirt, dried blood, bruises and wounds was a body. It was much too small to be Lincoln, so that was a relief.
I reached out to put a hand on the figure, only to have it scurry back. I could see it's face more clearly now. Murphy.
I put the fact that he held me hostage and put a knife to my throat behind me and threw my arms around his neck. He wasn't dead. I never thought I would see him again. "Oh my God," I laugh-cried in disbelief. Murphy was shocked but reluctantly returned the hug.
"Murphy?"