Aud
patreon
The Summer Harvest - Fic by Kendrene
🕑 Added 2019-12-02 12:01:46 +0000 UTCHi all! Kendrene liked the last Clexa pic and wrote a fic to go along with it!
If you haven't checked out their stuff, you're missing out: Patreon / AO3. They're super nice and very active in the community :)
Here's the fic, enjoy! (and if you enjoy it, let them know ;) )
----
The Summer Harvest
By Kendrene
An unnatural heat has descended over Polis.
During the day, it covers the streets like a heavy blanket, and what wind kicks up at night brings little relief.
Even Clarke has abandoned the pelts the servants piled on hers and Lexa’s bed, discarding all but the lightest sheet. Still unused to the climate, she finds the nights particularly cold, but with the heat lingering for hours after sundown, there’s no need for furs. Besides, with Lexa sleeping next to her, she doesn’t need that many blankets anyway.
The sudden drops in temperature - a passing cloud obscuring the sun is enough to have Clarke reach for her cloak - are just one of earth’s numerous quirks, she’s discovered.
Another is that darkness can be bright. It shocked the hell out of her - and frightened her to boot - the first time that she’d noticed. As it turns out, if the weather is fair and the moon shines full enough, moonlight can, and will, find a way to spill through the bedroom window to fall, with unerring precision, across your face.
It’s one such beam that wakes her, a handful of hours into her fitful sleep.
Feeling anything but rested, Clarke throws an arm over her eyes and groans, burying her face deeper into the damp pillow. The sheet she covered herself with when she’d gone to sleep is tangled at her feet and sweat slicks her skin.
With a petulant whine, Clarke turns to her side, seeking a cooler spot on which to lay. A moment later, she freezes, and her eyes, which she’d kept stubbornly shut against the light, open wide. The bed is empty.
The covers on Lexa’s side haven’t even been disturbed, a clear sign that Heda hadn’t made it back to their rooms yet at all.
All in all, it isn’t too surprising.
As tradition dictates, the clans have come together to trade and resolve their disputes before the summer harvest. For the first time since Polis was founded, thirteen Ambassadors sit in Heda’s council, and their meetings last well into the night. Their bickering, too, or so Anya reported. Not that she had needed to - their discussions can get so heated at times that their voices travel well beyond the thick doors of the throne room. When that happens - and it happens often - the rest of the Tower goes quiet and still, the stones themselves afraid to draw the wrath of the Commander.
The constant arguments aren’t surprising either, but a reflection of what’s happening outside the Tower’s walls.
The entire city is on edge and tipping ever closer to the boiling point.
The city guard does its best to keep the peace, but the prolonged absence of rain frayed tempers to breaking. Fights kindle over the smallest things, and with so many angry alphas penned in one place, it is but a matter of time before blood is actually spilled.
Should that happen, Clarke knows, there could be war.
Some say war is inevitable anyhow, if the drought persists. The crops are suffering already, and a poor harvest means famine. A few of the clans won’t even need the excuse.
This evening’s particular meeting must be going miserably, Clarke decides, as she inclines her head to listen to the night around her. Inside Heda’s rooms, it’s always quiet - a refuge from her duties as Commander - but the stillness extends past their quarters. To the entire city, perhaps.
In Polis, Clarke is surrounded by an incessant hum, but tonight, a loud sort of emptiness has taken its place. It reminds her of a pond she’d discovered deep inside the forest: its waters so even, they reflected the summer sky like a perfect mirror. When Clarke had sent a smooth pebble sailing across it, the waves left in its wake had seemed enormous by comparison. Now she sighs, and the sound almost visibly ripples through the unmoving air.
“Fuck,” Clarke says to the general ambience, deciding to see for herself how things are going.
She stands and pads barefoot to the chest in which her clothes are kept. She’d hoped the floor would be cool against the soles of her feet, but the stone is almost as warm as it had been hours before, when sunlight had streamed in from Heda’s private balcony.
It takes her a few minutes of rummaging in the dark, but finally, Clarke finds the lightest pair of trousers she owns and a sleeveless tunic to go with them. Smallclothes she doesn’t bother with, her body too overheated to bear too many layers.
Getting dressed at all feels like a hardship, the linen sticking to her skin. Clarke picks fastidiously at it, but it makes no difference. The clean clothes are damp with perspiration in a matter of seconds, and things will only get worse once she starts moving.
She’s extremely tempted to call it quits and crawl back into bed (even though running a cold bath is perhaps a better idea), but she can’t shake the feeling that something’s off.
Not wrong, not exactly dangerous, but electric all the same. The air she breathes is heavy with the sort of static that makes your head thump before a summer thunderstorm, and wouldn’t that be a blessing.
But the sky has been clear for weeks, cloudless and perfectly blue. After spending the majority of her life in space, Clarke had thought it’d be impossible for her to become tired of it, but the heat burned up all her patience, and - more and more often - she catches herself thinking back with fondness to the terrible first winter they’d spent on the ground.
Some of the clans have tried to appease whatever gods command the weather with sacrifice - trophies from past wars, trinkets and idols carved from wood. Everything gets tossed in the huge bonfires they erected for the purpose just outside the city limits, in the hope it will appease their deities. Other clans have consulted auguries and runes, or sent warriors to seek the counsel of the witches the stories say live deep within the forest. All to no avail.
The number of those who blame Skaikru for the prolonged lack of rain increases daily.
She sighs again, low and heavy, fingers lightly tracing the mating bite on her throat to ground herself.
That could be a problem - it already may be - but certainly not one she can solve by herself in the middle of the night.
Shrugging one shoulder in irritation, she recovers the sandals Lexa gifted her when the season had grown too warm for boots, and prepares to head outside. Her hand is already pushing the door open when her eyes land on the leash Lexa left by the door. She’d done so with Clarke’s consent, with the mutual understanding it would be used once she returned to their rooms after the day.
Following a sudden urge, Clarke grabs it and wraps it around her wrist, hiding the loose end in her fist.
It could prove useful.
She isn’t surprised to find Anya lounging right outside the Commander’s door. The older alpha’s eyes are closed, chin resting on her chest, but although some could be tricked into thinking she dozed off, Clarke knows that isn’t the case.
“It’s late,” she growls in lieu of a greeting. “Too late for wandering about.”
“It is.”
The woman’s gruff demeanor doesn’t scare her nearly as much as it used to. If anything, Clarke finds it reassuring. The weather has gone haywire, and they could soon be faced with war, but nothing in the entire world has the power to shake Anya. She’s solid as a mountain, one Clarke can safely cling to in such uncertain times.
“Is Lexa still with the Ambassadors?” At the end of the hall the doors leading into the throne room are shut. “This meeting is their longest yet.”
“They left some time ago, but she’s still in there. Doesn’t want to be disturbed.”
There’s an edge to her voice, but her tone levels before she’s finished talking. She’s slow in hiding it, however, or Clarke has finally gotten the hang of Grounder politics.
A sarcastic rebuttal forms on her lips, but she discards it. Lines of worry whiten the skin around Anya’s eyes, and her gaze, now that she’s opened her eyes, is constantly shifting. From Clarke’s face to the closed doors, to the other two guards stationed at the far end of the hall - almost like the General is suspecting an entire army can hide in the few meters separating the two of them from Lexa.
No. Tonight’s not the night to test Anya’s goodwill.
Instead, Clarke opens her mouth for a question.
“I’m sure she meant anyone,” Anya cuts in before she can get a word out. She sounds amused now. “Even her mate.”
Clarke touches the irregular scar on her neck again, cheeks prickling with heat. It’s the first time Anya acknowledges her bond to Lexa - at least where she can hear - and it doesn’t really tell her how the older woman feels about it.
Whatever reservations Anya may have had were surely expressed in private only, and even though she’d been Lexa’s mentor, she knew better than to antagonize her once Heda’s mind was set.
Mating Clarke had been the first thing Lexa requested when her Coalition and Skaikru finally sat down to discuss peace terms, and it made sense. As the only child of the Sky People’s leader, Clarke was a valuable bargaining chip, and Lexa must have had that in mind when she’d asked for her to be given over.
That was how she felt about it at any rate
In time, the impression of being a prisoner had faded, and the mark has become a source of joy for Clarke rather than one of fear.
People’s perception of her has shifted, too - she now has friends among the Grounders - but part of her still thinks Anya tolerates her only for Lexa’s sake. Or because Lexa ordered her to.
Even so, Clarke has no reason to doubt her words. She’s experienced first hand how much of a toll leadership takes on mind and body, and lately, Lexa looks worn to the bone.
It’s for that exact reason she decides to risk her anger.
“If she doesn’t want to see me, she can tell me herself,” she retorts, taking a step toward the throne room. “I’d like to think my company is more pleasing than that of the Ambassadors.”
Anya grabs her wrist before she can take another, her eyes widening a fraction when her fingers brush the coarse leather of the leash. Thankfully she says nothing about that.
“I don’t particularly like you, and normally, I’d let you go and get your due. But-” She pauses, and it’s the most impassioned Clarke ever remembers seeing her. “But she’s in a bad way tonight. Don’t go.”
Clarke wants to ask Anya exactly what she means, but it’s already too late. Whatever emotion compromised the impassivity of the alpha’s features is gone. There’s only a trace of tightness around her eyes and mouth now, making her look decades older than she is.
Then that’s gone, too.
She lets her gaze drop, pointedly, to Anya’s hand around her arm.
The alpha lets her go.
“Your hide, not mine.”
When she crosses her arms over her chest and shrugs, uncaringly, Clarke almost exhales her relief. The concerned version of Anya is… unsettling.
Leaving the infuriating woman behind, Clarke forces herself to walk at a steady pace down the hall and to the throne room doors. But her brain doesn’t shut up about what Anya said, and the alpha’s piercing eyes are on her the entire way.
**************
Inside the throne room, it’s pitch black.
At least that’s the way it feels to Clarke until her eyes adjust to the change of light. The warrior at the entrance opened the door just enough for her to wiggle through, and the sliver of torchlight that followed in her wake was shut outside when he closed it, right on her heels.
Afraid that if he didn’t, Heda’s fury could spill out.
Long moments go by, but finally, details begin to emerge from the murkiness.
For starters, it’s not as dark as Clarke had thought. Moonlight pushes partly inside the throne room, and even though the space is too big for the stray rays to reach far, a silver glow outlines the wooden throne at the far end.
The seat is occupied.
“I thought I had been clear, Anya.” Lexa’s voice is low, but pitched to carry. “Or have you chosen to test my patience, too?”
It takes a few seconds for Clarke to reply.
Even across the room, she can see Lexa’s eyes, burning with green fire. They watched her much the same way from beneath the shadow of the trees that had surrounded their camp when their section of the Ark crash-landed.
(Before winter killed so many of them, before their war with Anya and the peace talks.)
At the time, they didn’t know there were people on the ground besides them - they had not suspected and how could they? - but Clarke had felt a pair of eyes track her nearly constantly as she moved around camp. They flared, greener than the brush surrounding them, and were gone so fast she had convinced herself she had imagined them. And then one night the Grounders had come - a small sortie to test their defences - and one of them made it as far as where she slept, jolting her awake.
Months have passed, but Clarke’s memory of that night is fractured still.
(Dissociative amnesia, her mother called it afterward, and assured her that, in time, she would remember everything - she’s not sure she wants to.)
But she does remember the man dragging her outside of her tent by the ankles, and the hilt of her knife sticking from his chest.
The pure murder that had supplanted wary curiosity inside the watcher’s eyes - the spy that, Clarke now knew, was all too real.
She sees the same kind of anger catch, like a spark to tinder, and it stops her in her tracks.
“It’s Clarke,” she manages after a while, and hates how hoarse she sounds. “Not Anya.”
“Klark.” Maybe she’s made some kind of movement - a flinch? Whatever it is, Lexa’s register has softened. “It’s late. You should be asleep. Not out in the halls-”
Lexa draws short, but Clarke can hear the word she’d meant to say as if she shouted it. Alone.
Something terrible must have passed between Heda and the Ambassadors. Something to do with her. Nothing short of a threat could have Lexa on such an edge.
“I will have one of the warriors escort you back,” Lexa resumes, pushing to her feet. Clarke can barely glimpse the curve of her jaw, but recognizes the stubbornness behind the words.
“Don’t be ridiculous.” Clarke shakes her head, her tone matching Lexa’s previous softness. “Our rooms are just down the corridor, and there’s enough guards between here and there to fend off plenty of assassins.”
She moves away from the door as she speaks, and deeper into the room. She wouldn’t put it past Lexa to try and bodily remove her from her presence.
“This isn’t a joke, Klark. I worry about-”
“Me? I know.”
(She wants to ask who worries for Lexa - beside herself of course - but doesn’t.)
The answer is written in the way Lexa holds herself.
She is exhausted.
It’s not obvious, but Clarke has spent enough time alone with her to get to know the signs. Not in the beginning - not while the mating bite was healing and they didn’t fully trust each other - but after diffidence melted away into routine.
The rigidity of Lexa’s spine and the near incessant grind of her teeth, the clouded, distant look inside her eyes as if it’s easy to push through whatever hardship as long as she’s several degrees removed from it. Clarke knows what it looks like when Lexa is walking the divide between focus and full collapse - and this is it.
She’s several steps into the room when she shrugs out of her tunic and lets it fall in a heap on the floor.
“Klark?” Lexa moves back, and one of her heels catches on the dais, tripping her. Only the throne behind her saves her from an undignified tumble. “What are you doing?”
Instead of replying, Clarke kicks away her sandals and shimmies out of her trousers, eyes never leaving Lexa’s face.
The back of her neck prickles (what if someone walked in on them?), but she ignores her better judgment and strides forward with purpose, until Lexa is forced to sit back down on her throne.
Following the moon’s progress across the sky, the light has grown, and Clarke can clearly see her face now. The alpha’s eyes are rounded in shock, and while she’s clinging to what’s left of her composure with everything she has, no amount of war paint can obscure the aching, vulnerable humanity on Lexa’s face.
Clarke secures the leash around her neck then kneels as gracefully as she knows how and offers the other end to Lexa.
Part of her wants to know which clan threatened her well being, and who she should be weary of going forward, but much like her concerns about war, it can wait until the morning.
She shutters everything away, along with the discomfort of the irregular flagstone digging into her knees.
“Klark?”
Lexa’s eyes are still round, but their vibrant green has all but disappeared, swallowed by pupil. The shock has worn off, and her face is all hunger.
What Clarke is offering is clear, and it’s just as clear that Lexa wants it. Still, the part of her that puts her duty first resists, and she shoots an agonized look over Clarke’s head. To the closed doors and the Tower behind.
“Just a few hours,” Clarke whispers next to her thigh. Muscles twitch against her cheek and Lexa’s fingers graze the end of the leash, uncertain. “You can deal with the rest in the morning, whatever it is. And I’ll help.” She raises her eyes pleadingly. “Even if all you want me to do is remain under guard inside our rooms.”
That’s probably a statement Clarke will come to regret, but she’s known for quite some time now that she’d do anything for Lexa. Even things she doesn’t like.
There’s a long, heavy pause - so long Clarke starts to think that Lexa turned to stone - then the alpha’s fingers ghost over hers again. This time, Lexa takes the leash from her, a signal Clarke interprets as permission.
When the idea had first taken root inside her mind, Clarke expected Lexa’s body would take some… coaxing to become aroused after so much time spent listening to people hashing the same tired points over and over.
Instead, she finds Lexa already hard. Ready. Adrenaline born of anger and fear can have unforeseen effects, Clarke supposes, wincing internally when the thought is voiced in her mother’s lecturing tone of all things.
As she’d quickly discovered after the initial distress of their mating, feeling Lexa stiffen into her hand, knowing it’s for her, arouses her in turn.
Sometimes, when they are like this, Clarke can feel Lexa’s heart beat along her womanhood. It echoes between her own legs, until the rhythms match, until she doesn’t know where to draw the confines of their bodies anymore.
The moment she undoes the leather laces holding Lexa’s trousers closed, her cock springs out, fully hard and curving slightly toward the alpha’s navel.
It glistens with pre-come in the moonlight, and as Clarke watches, more of it dribbles down her length from the divot at the tip. The musky scent of it is overpowering, and there is no need for Lexa to tug at the leash for Clarke to lean forward and trace the heated flesh with her tongue from base to tip.
Above her, the alpha lets out a gargled gasp, and her free hand falls on top of Clarke’s head, encouraging.
Lexa’s taste is salty-sweet, and Clarke has had it coat her tongue before, but getting used to the sharpness of it is a different story.
(Getting tired of it - now that will never happen.)
It’s addictive, and when it hits the back of her throat, Clarke moans, burrowing her tongue deeper in the small slit at the tip to draw out more.
With a hand curled around one of the throne armrests for balance, Clarke wraps the other around Lexa’s base, where the knot is already swelling. She squeezes it, fist pumping upward, and another jet of pre-cum floods her tongue.
Lexa grunts again, but her body quivers in self-restraint, and that will never do.
Without warning, Clarke lets her head fall forward, the muscles of her throat clenching against the intrusion and choking her momentarily before she brings her gag reflex under control.
After, it’s easier to slide down Lexa’s cock and take in as much of her as she can hold, tongue lashing at the tip while she does so.
She doesn’t know whether it’s the motion that breaks Lexa’s resolve or the sudden feel of Clarke’s damp heat around her, but the alpha’s hips jerk up, matching the pace of Clarke’s bobbing head, and the next thing she knows, Lexa is rutting into her mouth, fingers tangled in her hair like it’s a lifeline.
All too soon, her groans rise, faster and higher-pitched. Her hips buck, hard enough to almost throw Clarke back, but she resists, drawing even, shallow breaths.
The Commander’s frustration has gathered over them like a stormcloud, and the desperate noises ripping from her mouth crash loudly around Clarke’s ears.
She pulls back, concentrating her attention on the swollen tip, and uses both of her hands to milk Lexa’s length, alternating soft strokes with hard squeezes.
Lexa’s hips stutter violently one last time, and a hot jet fills Clarke mouth, followed by more. An entire river of salt streams down her throat, and while she swallows everything she can, it’s too much to be contained.
Some of it trickles past the corners of her mouth, splashing on her collarbone.
Lexa slumps back into the throne, chest heaving, eyes lidded and dark. The leash goes slack, snaking down Lexa’s thigh to coil on the ground at her feet. Hands thus freed, the alpha spends several minutes stroking through Clarke’s hair before cupping her face to tilt it upward.
With an indecipherable expression, Lexa thumbs the soft skin underneath her eyes and Clarke flushes crimson. She knows how puffy her face must be from lack of sleep.
“Thank you.”
The soft, genuine smile on Lexa’s lips makes it all worth it.
Sure her voice would betray the tears she feels itching behind her eyes, Clarke gives a minute shrug, climbing to her feet.
She can’t help but feel more than a bit coy. Then, her cunt pounds, and she has to bite back a needy whimper.
Throwing one leg over Lexa’s, she straddles her hips. The alpha is already hard again.
“Now,” Clarke grinds down, stifling a moan when Lexa’s cock brushes against her folds. “I’d like you to put a baby in me.”
Lexa’s eyes burn, impossibly green. Full of want.
When she speaks, her voice is soft.
“It would make you a target,” she murmurs against Clarke’s cheek, hands curled around her hips to still her movements. “More than you already are.” She sounds strained, and all the things they haven’t yet talked about - the threats and the possible war - are an almost palpable presence between them now, weighting the air.
“I know.” Resting their foreheads together, Clarke allows her eyes to close. It is no use - even in the dark, all she can see is green. “I don’t care. I want you to make me pregnant, Lexa.”
Her only answer is the fullness that comes when Lexa’s hips cant forward.
THE END
-------
Again, check out Kendrene's work if you havent! Super big shout out to them for collabing :D
