On my knees

Twenty two years had passed since her birth. Which meant that it was about six years ago that she became Commander. Eight years ago that the Conclave had forced her to take the life of her friends. With her six years as Commander, she had passed the average time one was in Command. Which, in a way, meant that death was probably already lurking around the corner. With over seventy commanders, only a few had managed to reach seven years of reign. She didn’t expect to do the same, which would mean that hers would end within what? Eight months? A terrifying thought, but at least it helped her to live in the present. She had no time to postpone, no time to think about the future. She needed to do what was best for her people, herself, right now. Because the present was all she had.

Saggitarius was not a cat. Lexa frowned. “He’s a whole lot of cat,” she corrected him. She had never truly thought of what was her favorite animal before that, but Saggitarius had definitely caused her love for cats to grow. Big cats especially, but small ones now held a special place in her heart too. “Doesn’t that mean I’m technically older? More developed brain and all?” she asked with a grin, when he said he was older than she was. It was strange to think that his body had been the exact same four years ago. Interesting, but definitely a bit strange. Even more so when you thought about the fact that it was going to be the exact same in a hundred years too.

“Any odd talents?”

He told her that the brain stopped developing around the age of twenty. The fact that he told her this right after apologizing to her cat for insulting him, did not really help. She laughed, shaking her head lightly. “That’s good,” she laughed, placing her hands on her lap and looking at them for a second. Another thing she didn’t need to worry about. In most cases in a vampire-human relationship, there was the thought of one growing old, while the other was forever young. They knew from the start that she would die before her first wrinkle, so at least that was something that didn’t have to be discussed. She wouldn’t live to the age where she could feel her body slowly taking steps back, like she could see happen to West now. He was still young, not even fourty, but he still… wasn’t as fit as he had once been. As if life didn’t want anyone with that much experience to still be at his top performance in battle, giving the younger ones an advantage.

He didn’t have a talent, but he broke his nose once. Lexa couldn’t help but raise a brow as she listened to him talk about how he didn’t feel anything there. “How did you manage to do that?” she decided to ask. While she had managed to break a bone or six before, at least that was to be expected. She had broken her arm once by falling off a horse, for example. All things you could expect to happen from someone raised in Vanaheim.

Age is just a number. She couldn’t help but smile at these words. “It feels like forever ago,” she whispered, shaking her head as she stared at her hands. “Being fourteen,” she explained softly. Eight years ago, she had been a different person. After that one day, she had changed completely. The look in the eyes of… With a soft shake of her head, she tried to get rid of the image that popped up. Not something she wanted to think about right now. But, it did confirm what he said. That one day had felt like it changed her more than any year before that had. Just like how every year as Commander had so much more impact on her personality than most years in a normal life would. She had gone through so much for someone her age. And perhaps that was the way it was supposed to be. She rushed her life, because she didn’t have much time to live it in full. Her childhood had been short, forced into adulthood so young. With Mort, they had skipped so many steps in between, feeling like they had been together forever at this point already. Rushed. Because every day was a gift and she did not have the luxury to take things slow.

Mort told how he had broken his nose and she chuckled. “Of course,” she sighed dramatically, “you didn’t pick a fight, but got into one by protecting someone.” He truly was purely good, wasn’t he? It was quite interesting, somewhere caused her to wonder what it was about him that she was missing. There was no soul on this earth that was purely good, so was he hiding something? Or was it simply his naivety that caused it?

In a way, she was happy that she had never lived a normal life. Like she said earlier, it meant that she did not know what she was missing. Before she became Commander, she had trained to become one. No family, just hard work. No love, no comfort of home. It had always been her working towards the Conclave. So when it happened, her life before that would have ended no matter what. She won, after killing those she cared for, which meant that she was the only one standing. It had been the only way for her to survive. And if she hadn’t done it, they would have been killed by someone else. And who knew who would have sat on the throne today if she hadn’t.

Mort’s words caused another smile on her face and she nodded softly. “It’s fine,” she said, slowly placing her hand on his as he rubbed her arm. “For me, it is a part of the past,” she tried to explain, frowning again. “What is worse is that I can not keep it from happening again.” No matter what. Because she could try to guide her people onto a new path, she couldn’t… force them into it. There was no way. The Conclave needed to happen and sooner, rather than later. She just couldn’t. No matter how often she told herself she could, it was too much. As soon as she stood on that mountain again, everything came rushing to the surface and she broke.

Mister good guy said he would do it again. “See, you’re lucky,” she told him, smiling again. “Because I would have floored him before you would get the chance to interfere.” If any guy would ever truly make her feel uncomfortable, she would make sure to drag his ego down as his back hit the floor. While she didn’t want to be like some other Commanders had been, respect was very important to her. She had been through a lot to get to the position she had now, and for that, she demanded respect. Those who refused, would be shown how exactly she had reached that throne. Often enough, a little display of power did the trick.

That was all she could do. Hope that yesterday and today were going to affect the future. That in the end, this all would not have been for nothing. There were so many things that could change the future still. If the next Commander disagreed with her ways, it would all be in vein. All she could do was hope. Try to live long enough, to stall the damn Conclave until she had trained her Second to the point where he just had to win. Only then would this all stand a chance. She hated leaving it up to luck, but there was very little she could do about it. “I hope so,” she told him. “All I can do is hope.”

“Luckily,” she started, shifting her position a bit so she would lean against him more, “I am not easily provoked.” Which might be hard to believe for the man, as he had seen her when she tried to kill Kaz. But, other than that… It was quite rare for her to truly lose her temper. Yes, she had killed people. But most of them weren’t because of her temper. They were to keep her rank, to force respect out of those who watched what went down. In general, she just didn’t allow emotions to get the best of her. Just like she was never truly sad, or angry, she was never truly happy either. Only Mort had ever made her feel close, but even with him she seemed to miss a part of herself. Perhaps it was replaced by the Commander, thrown away to never be found again.

Kaz had done everything to get under her skin. Not only had he betrayed her for nothing more than stupid gold, he had also turned her punishment into some kind of joke. He hadn’t shown any respect, any remorse… It was for that reason that she had gotten mad. Fight for your life, but know where to stop. He did neither. He didn’t fight back, but he didn’t give up either. He just… tried to get under her skin, as if annoying her was worth ending his life over. It was miserable enough for her to decide that he did not deserve to live on. Until Mort came along, that was. The only reason she regretted it, was because it had hurt him. She would never like his brother. And the same probably went for Kaz. A difficult situation for Mort, but that was something she could no longer do anything about.

“I can’t imagine you angry either,” she admitted, before yawning and closing her eyes for a moment, leaning her head against his shoulder. Today had been an awfully tiring day, even if she hadn’t done much. The aftermath of the day before, something that she would probably feel for the next few days still. Which was exactly why she really wanted to stay up and enjoy this moment of peace for a while longer, even though she probably needed to take some rest soon. “It’s good to have control,” she told him softly. “Most seem to lose it as soon as they get a taste of alcohol.”

For her, it wasn’t actually about control either. It was like that more extreme part of her had just… stopped existing. Perhaps she subconsciously pushed it away when it tried to show itself, switching to her more controlled Commander side so it would never get the chance. Or maybe it was lost forever. Something she would never find the answer to, as she would be Commander until the end. Not that it mattered. Being overwhelmed by emotions was something terrifying, a feeling she would rather never experience. Even happiness, when too much, would scare her. Because the more you had, the more you could lose. Even just being here with him, reminded her of that. Though he was immortal and the chance that she would die before the day she would actually lose him was much bigger, the fear was still there.

While she wanted to respond to his talk about anger, the exhaustion caused her to forget as soon as the conversation switched to alcohol. “I rarely drink,” she admitted, smiling softly when she thought back to the one time she had drank a bit too much, “I actually had a bit too much to drink the day before we met.” Even when tired as she was right now, she could feel the corners of her mouth pull up further as she thought back of that day she had spent with Romeo on his ship. “Though I just lost my filter rather than doing anything stupid.” Telling Romeo that Arawn needed to get laid, for example.

“I had encountered someone I met in Vanaheim once before,” she explained, sounding tired, yet clearly enjoying the memory of it all. Even though she hated to admit it, she missed Romeo and would love to see him again. Perhaps she needed to arrange that soon. The two had a lot of catching up to do, she was sure. Last time he had told her that Kaz would betray her. He would be amused to hear he was right. Perhaps even more amused to hear she had kept up her end of the promise, which had been that she would end him if he did. He would be the one person in this world with who she could talk about that stuff and that was something she could truly use. “He is a bit of an ass, really,” she explained, chuckling as she thought back. “But we sat on his ship and talked for ages, about so much.” It had been a nice change of pace for once.

“And then I met you.” Those had truly been good days. “I don’t know what it was…” she went on, clearly thinking back. “But you seemed so… helpless.” If she had been smart, she would have ran the moment he told her he was a vampire, craving blood. Instead, she had helped him out. “I’m glad I trusted you.” And with that, she closed her eyes again. If she hadn’t trusted him that day, she wouldn’t be sitting here with him right now. A strange thought. How her being in a slightly worse mood that day could have changed everything.