Raven avoided Lexa's gaze for the most part, but she was sure the Commander was doing her best to pay attention to Sinclair as he went through the technology she little understood. Sinclair was giving all the right reassurances, as they stood in engineering in possibly the most unusual group of three that the room had ever held - and Wick had made this place a home at one time.
There were vows to use the rovers only in certain sectors and promises regarding the development of weapons. Lexa was thorough in trying to make a lasting peace but the absence of Clarke could not be ignored. It was talked around, but Raven was starting to think Lexa was more concerned than anyone. Lexa could have sent anyone to hear these messages and promises. She could have summoned them all to Polis if she did want to speak in person. She didn't need to be here but she was taking special care to discuss everything and anything that might be worth mentioning in Arkadia, and she had put off returning to the capital for several days. The visit kept being extended and there were more than a few disgruntled muttering a questioning when she would return home.
'I've worked with Raven before. She can talk me through the rest.' Lexa finally said, drawing Raven's gaze.
Sinclair nodded and shut the door to engineering behind him, leaving them alone but Raven did not allow the silence to linger.
'You tied me to a tree and tortured me.' Raven reminded her angrily.
'I didn't trust you.' Lexa said simply.
'So why would you want to talk to me?' Raven questioned quickly, folding her arms across her chest.
'Because Clarke trusts you.'
Raven instinctively dropped her arms from her chest. Lexa had been remarkably direct about the one person who could bring out tears of joy and relief or bitter anger at just the mere mention.
So that name had finally been uttered, Raven thought. The name that had haunted Arkadia. Abbey hadn't slept in weeks, Bellamy was restless and lost, Octavia was still seething over the missile and Jasper was in agony and with nobody to vent to. Clarke's absence had somehow pulled them all apart from each other.
Raven's eyes studied Lexa. She looked no less intimidating without her war paint, but Raven was sure she saw a glint of urgency behind her eyes.
'Do you know where she might be?' Lexa pressed, when Raven did not respond.
Raven snorted.
'How the hell would I? She just walked off.'
'Raven, she is in great danger.' Lexa warned. 'After the Mountain, she will be a target.'
'We're not stupid.' Raven retorted, defensive. 'We've always been a target.'
Lexa's hands went behind her back and she stood as though ready to weather any words that Raven may throw at her.
'You know what I don't get;' Raven drawled, slowly working through the puzzle, 'we came up with the plan together to burn three hundred people alive - and she was fine. She was good. She just wanted to save us.'
'Clarke,' Lexa said the name softly but her strength soon returned, 'she always wants to protect her people.'
'Not anymore.' Raven pointed out bitterly. 'She left but why leave now? She already was a mass murderer. Why this time?'
Raven watched as Lexa's eyes flicked over her, as though trying to analyse a particularly difficult problem but Raven had found her own answers.
'It was because you left.' Raven concluded slowly. 'That's what was different.'
Lexa's eyes widened for a second an she jerked her head but in an instant she had returned to the same rigid position.
'Well,' Raven said, her voice failing, 'she moved on quickly.'
Her own distant scream echoed in her ears as her memories tried to pull her to the moment Clarke stepped away from Finn, no doubt having whispered to him a thousand different comforts.
'She didn't.'
Lexa had spoken so quietly that Raven looked up at her curiously, convinced she had imagined it.
'She wasn't ready.' Lexa said, more loudly this time.
Raven nodded, blinking rapidly to try to stop her falling tears which was only partly successful. She took a sharp breath in, angry at her pain. Finn was gone. It didn't matter. It shouldn't matter.
'I didn't want her to go.' Raven confessed. 'I know the others are angry at her - but she saved us. They tied me down and drilled into me and Clarke was the only one who would have done anything for us.'
She hadn't even had the chance to speak to Clarke. She had been in so much pain and Wick had just wanted to get her down the mountain. She'd already spent hours in medical before she woke up and asked where Clarke was, and was met with silence from Abbey.
'I think she still would.'
Raven smiled bitterly.
'Yeah, that's probably why she left too.' Raven said. 'She's damn good at running away from her pain.'
She knew that well enough; she'd watched Clarke try to avoid Finn and deny her feelings for him time and again. She'd also seen Clarke try to hate her mother as much as she could, and that had failed spectacularly. She wondered whether it had been the same with Lexa and whether she had tried to deny it at every turn. Abbey had been furious at how close they had grown; everyone had seen how much Clarke needed Lexa but they all just thought it was part of Clarke's obsession with stopping the Mountain Men. The hundred, those who were free to fight, had lived and breathed that mission. Raven had dismissed Abbey as paranoid and not really as dedicated to saving the others as the hundred were but clearly she'd miscalculated.
'She won't come back.' Raven muttered.
'No,' Lexa sighed in agreement, and for the first time Raven could see someone other than a leader; she looked exhausted and her eyes were red rimmed, 'but we will find her.'
'She'll be pissed.' Raven muttered, with a small smile.
'It's better than her being killed.' Lexa dismissed.
Lexa turned to leave and Raven was taken aback by the roar of guilt in her stomach. She squirmed before relenting as Lexa reached for the handle of the door.
'Lexa, wait...'
Lexa consented to turn around. Her large green eyes seemed defeated. Raven was starting to think the price of peace had been far greater than if Lexa had just decided to wage war against the Mountain Men all those weeks ago.
'The more she runs, the harder she loves.'
Lexa blinked slowly but Raven did not find a trace of relief in her features at those words.
'Thank you, Raven,' Lexa said sadly, 'but that just means she hurts even more.'
Raven's heart dropped at the thought but she had no chance to think of anything else to offer Lexa before she was wrenching open the door and walking back through Arkadia, with two of her guards behind her. Raven was left with one certainty: even if Lexa had stayed there was nothing to say. They just wanted Clarke and without her, all they could do was wonder where she was.