Rebellion (The 100 #4)(34)

There she was… Glass, walking with Soren along the outer road, wearing a new white dress, her blond hair clean and loose around her shoulders, her head tilted upward to listen as Soren spoke. She was smiling. She looked, inexplicably, at peace.

Wells felt the ground dropping around him, the walls rising higher, the stomp of feet surrounding him growing louder.

She’s just pretending, he told himself. She’s following the plan.

Glass glanced up, spotting him. Wells blinked at her twice, in signal, then turned and walked away, wondering why his hopeful excitement had suddenly turned to dread.





CHAPTER 17


Clarke


When Clarke woke up in the early morning, Bellamy was pacing restlessly. He looked so frantic and exhausted it was almost too painful for her to look at him. All she wanted was to wrap her arms around him, to tell him that everything was going to be okay, but this was not the Bellamy she could comfort. She’d learned long ago what to do when he had that feral gleam in his eye, when his muscles twitched with coiled energy.

He and Felix had found something on their scouting mission, and had waited for everyone to wake up to fill them in. Bellamy waited for Vale to stagger over, sleepily rubbing her eyes, then launched in without preamble.

“We’ve found a back door into these people’s entire stash of weapons,” he said. His eyes shone with a manic intensity that made Clarke shiver.

Felix stood a few feet behind him, arms crossed tight. “And they have no idea it’s there,” he added. “We might not have long before they discover the hole.”

No, Clarke thought desperately. That’s not the way to do this. They were vastly outnumbered. Weapons weren’t going to help them here. They had to try diplomacy, offer some kind of trade. There had to be something these people wanted, or else they wouldn’t have attacked their camp.

Clarke glanced at Paul, who had an unusually grave look on his face. He and Clarke had discussed this last night with the others, while Felix and Bellamy had gone off on their own. He’d back her up.

“The walls look unbreakable, but only from a distance,” Bellamy went on. Clarke noticed that his hands were shaking. “There are windows, cracked foundations, places we could plant these explosives and blow the whole thing down around them.”

“You know this how, exactly?” Paul asked, smiling tightly. “Did you become an engineer in the past two days, on top of everything else?”

Instinctively, Clarke started to rise to Bellamy’s defense, but Bellamy’s eyes lit up, smirk back in place.

“No, I’m not an engineer,” he said calmly. “But he is.”

He nodded to Luke, who was sitting on a log, his forehead creasing as he listened.

“What do you think, Luke?” Bellamy asked. “Is this viable?”

“I’d have to see it for myself,” he said, scratching his curly hair. “Help figure out where to position the explosives.”

Bellamy nodded. “That was going to be my next suggestion. We can risk one more recon trip, maybe tonight…”

Clarke stood.

“Then we’ll loot the armory and—”

“And blow up part of the building,” Clarke finished for him. “With our friends inside.”

Bellamy fell silent, turning to look at her.

She tried to ignore the look on his face, a mixture of pain and frustration. “This is reckless and this is wrong.”

“Thank you,” Paul said, standing up beside her with a huff. “I was sitting here listening to this, wondering if I was the only one who—”

Clarke cut him off, her eyes never leaving Bellamy’s. “We have to try diplomacy first, Bel. We have no idea where our friends are inside this… this structure, fortress, whatever you want to call it. For all we know, they could be in exactly the places you’re planning to bomb.”

Bellamy stiffened. “I thought about that,” he said through clenched teeth. “Those walls are just a defense. If we can knock them down, we can get to the heart of the structure without putting our friends at risk.”

Clarke took a deep breath. She knew Bellamy wouldn’t like it, but she had to speak. “Why do we have to attack at all?” she asked, turning to face the others. “Shouldn’t we explore every option available to us?”

Bellamy let out a short, bitter laugh. “You really think talking to these monsters is an option?”

Clarke blinked hard, trying to avoid the scorn in his face. “Paul and I talked about this last night. We think there’s a way to make a tactical and peaceful approach that will allow our loved ones to come home safely. We will listen to the demands of these… raiders.”

“These murderers,” Bellamy shot back.

“And we will offer a counterproposal, keeping the lines of communication open as long as we can in the hopes of a peaceful solution. Meanwhile, we can use that time to come up with a plan B that might be a little less…” She turned away from Bellamy, bracing herself for his reaction. “Rash. More strategically viable.”

Even without looking, she could feel the anger radiating from him. “And if our friends are killed in the meantime?” Bellamy asked, striding toward her. “My brother. My little sister? Are you really prepared to gamble with their lives?”