The Mountain
Two months, one week, three days, five hours, ten minutes, seventeen seconds. Eighteen. Nineteen. Twenty.
They'd been inside the too-white halls of the Mountain for that long, and even Nyx, who had long since mastered the art of hiding her emotions, was growing uncomfortable. The air here was too sterile, too crisp. It lacked the richness and depth that was offered by the forest, or even the sharp tang of cold mountain air. It was unnatural, and quite unnerving.
At least she had Nico.
After a week of silently sitting in wire cages, Dante Wallace had walked in to inspect his prisoners, taken one look at the twins, and turned all shades of purple.
“Those are the heda’s siblings,” he had hissed angrily to a guard, “to kill them would direct the commander’s full wrath upon us. We have to keep them hidden, but unharmed.”
Thus, how Nyx and Nico were confined to solitary in a too sterilized, too white room, typically meant for the wounded, bored senseless.
But that was when the maunon started bringing in Skaikru.
Nyx had craned her neck to see them, and she recognized a few. Wanheda, of course, who looked small and feeble being carried by a man in a radiation suit, and Monti, and Jaspa, and a few others.
Now was the time to act.
The boy placed in the room opposite to them just so happened to be Jaspa, and Nyx knew she could get his attention. From what'd she'd gathered from her visions, he was curious, and easily attracted to pretty things, and Nyx knew she was pretty, even if she wasn't quite interested in boys.
“Sis.” She turned to look at Nico, who was observing her with amusement. It was nice to finally be able to be in the company of her brother for longer than a day. “Your bait is awake again, and looking for you.”
Nyx peeked out of the window and, sure enough, Jaspa was staring at her curiously, blinking owlishly. She mouthed one word over and over again “help” and by his widened eyes, assumed he understood, before ducking down when a guard passed, likely to let him out, because he'd recovered, and Nyx knew Dante would try to lull the Skaikru into a false sense of security.
But Jaspa would be back. Oh yes. He'd be back.
The only person that Nyx interacted with on a regular basis outside of her brother was a kind maunon girl named Maya, who brought them food three times a day. The soft-spoken girl walked in and walked out, but sometimes she paused to ask the twins what they were doing, as she usually walked in on them doing exercises - pushups, squats, jogging around the room, and boxing with one another - in order to keep in shape.
“Why do you always do that?” she asked them one day, setting down their lunch trays gently. “I don’t think you’re going to be let out anytime soon, so why keep training?” Nico had looked at her like she was stupid, muttering branwada under his breath, making a tsking noise and shaking his head.
“Immobility dulls the mind,” he repeated dutifully, “to be unprepared is to be dead.” He made brief eye contact with Nyx. “And we cannot afford such a luxury.”
“Alrighty then,” Maya drew out somewhat nervously, eyes shifting, “you two are even more uptight than the blonde.” A small frown marred her face. “She attacked me! The nerve! I was just doing my job, trying to help her, and suddenly I’m being wrestled to the ground.” She shook her head. “Always suspicious, that one.”
Maya had kind eyes, Nyx thought. She’d be sad when the girl died.
Nyx woke up like a shot, the tremors of her vision still shaking her. Nico was sitting on the edge of her bed, one hand tiredly rubbing at his eyes while the other brushed through her hair soothingly. An alarm was going off, and he smiled languidly at her.
“Wanheda has escaped,” he informed her dutifully, “our days in this room are numbered.”
“Indeed.”
Within the week, Nyx and Nico were moved back into the cramped cages. Dante was slowly becoming more paranoid, and his son, Cage, was beginning to creep his influence into every aspect of the Mountain. When they’d been situated in cages next to one another, Nyx was surprised to see a member of the Skaikru in the cage to her other side. Monti.
“What are you doing in here, sky boy?” she asked, and he jerked in his cage, as if spooked, regarding her with wide eyes.
“I dug my nose where it didn’t belong,” he admitted somewhat sheepishly, “but my friends will find me soon… I hope…” He trailed off for a moment, before turning his neck so he could look at Nyx more clearly. “Why are you here?”
“We were locked up in one of the sterile white rooms,” Nico inputted from behind Nyx, “but heda kom Skaikru’s escape made our captors much less trusting.”
“Head come Skykru?”
“Heda kom Skaikru,” Nyx corrected gently, “commander of the Sky People. That is what the girl is, correct?”
“Well, not technically, I mean, she is the chancellor’s daughter, but I don’t know if Ark law applies to the ground yet, the political schematics are pretty messed up-” he cut himself off at Nyx’s puzzled look, shrugging, “but, yeah, I guess she kinda is.” Their conversation was interrupted by a commotion as two people stormed into the grounder holding room, Maya and Jasper. The brown haired boy looked around frantically before finally finding his friend and running over to him.
Nyx smiled softly as the taller boy gently scooped Monty out of his cage, helping him down gingerly.
“Your Skaiheda will return,” Nyx informed them once their reunion had lulled.
“Who is this chick?”
“I am Nyx kom Trikru,” it felt good to say Trikru after many years of being forced to say Azgedakru, “the next chosen seyah, and this is my brother, Nico.” He nodded when he heard his name, though awkwardly, as the cage restricted his movement.
“Why are you back in the cages?” Maya asked fretfully, “you were in solitary because you can’t be bled, your blood isn’t compatible with anyone else here.” None of the maunon were natblidas, after all.
“The details are unimportant,” Nyx said, growing frustrated at the questions, “I need you to listen to me. Soon, your floppy haired boy Bellomi, will come in hopes to turn off the acid fog. Heda and Skaiheda will storm the mountain, and will require your help from the inside. When the fighting breaks out, send one of your own to retrieve Nico and I. We will aid you.”
The three non-grounders looked at each other for a moment.
“How can we trust you?” asked Jasper.
“Because I am seyah,” Nyx responded evenly, “I see all that has come to pass and is yet to come, Jaspa kom Skaikru, and I know if you do not hurry and leave, we will have much bigger problems on our hands.”
After several weeks with minimum food or water, the twins were beginning to grow impatient. So when the boy with the curly dark hair entered the room with a set of keys, their relief was almost palpable. He reached them soon, and by the recognition in his eyes at the sight of them, Jasper and Monty must have informed him on the situation.
“Go,” he instructed, “they’re waiting.”
It was a bloodbath.
Nyx had quickly found the locked room with the stolen grounders’ weapons, and the feeling of her double bladed staff in her hands was warm and welcoming. She’d missed its familiar weight. Nico looked equally thrilled to be reunited with his two lean swords, grinning like a madman, and for a moment looking their age of fifteen.
The maunon were everywhere, and the two twins unleashed upon them all their pent up fury. These men wouldn’t be getting away with the slaughter of hundreds, if not thousands, of their people.
Though chaos reigned besides them, the two twins were in perfect synchronization, letting the screaming lull them into an almost trance-like state, showing the mountain men why they were considered to be some of the best warriors of their age. To those observing them, the way they moved was like a deadly dance. Nyx used her smaller size to sweep low, skirting around bullets as though they were butterflies, while Nico barrelled into all of his opponents, fast and deadly, neither of them leaving any room for error. They were born for this.
But then, the fighting stopped.
Echo found the two twins, surrounded by thirty mountain men, and informed them of the commander’s deal. That they were to stand down and leave the Sky people to their own devices.
“That’s dishonorable,” Nico ground out, refusing to relax his stance, “the Skaikru are helpless on their own. What is she thinking?” At this point, the guards were getting rather antsy, as the two still showed no signs of stepping down.
“Please,” Echo pleaded, a blanket thrown over her back, “just stand down, leave the branwadas to fend for themselves.” Nyx saw the guard move before her brother did, and twisted her body in front of his, gasping as the small piece of metal shot clean through her side, allowing her eyes to flutter shut as her brother began screaming.
Lexa could see nothing but the wide, angry, confused, and betrayed look Clarke had given her as she explained the deal she’d been offered. She held her head high as her army retreated, berating herself for letting herself feel for the other girl. She hadn’t felt anything this strong for anyone since-
“Heda!” the voice was urgent, and she cast an annoyed look at a warrior, who was bowing respectfully in her direction.
“What is it?” she snapped.
“Come quickly, Nyko is tending to a wounded girl, you will want to see-”
“Why would I be interested in a single soldier?” Lexa growled, “Plenty have been injured, that doesn’t mean…” she trailed off when she looked beyond the soldier in front of her, where a boy was being restrained by a much larger soldier, torn clothing letting Lexa know that he’d been amongst those freed from the mountain.
“Let me go!” he was yelling. “I need to see my sis! Unhand me! NYX!”
At the name that tore itself from the boy’s throat, Lexa felt her heart seize in her chest. She hadn’t heard that name in many years, not since the day that all of her loved ones had been taken from her at once. Her nomon and nontu, killed by the Ice Nation, and her beloved Costia and her bro and sis captured. She’d thought them dead.
Before she could even register what she was doing, Lexa’s legs were carrying her down the hill and to the struggling boy, and she reached out and touched his shoulder, and when mismatched eyes snapped around to meet her own, it took all of her self control to not sob in relief. Her hands took his shaking face, and she stared at him, drinking in the eyes that she hadn’t seen in so long.
“Nico,” she whispered, a thumb brushing over his cheek softly, where tear-tracks were evident. He’d grown so much. Of course he had, it’d been six years since she’d last seen them. The familiar scarification of the Ice Nation made her blood boil, but for now all that was important that she was here, with her little brother, and he was alive.
“Lexa,” he whispered back, just as reverently, blinking a few tears from his eyes, before gazing helplessly as the quickly erected healer’s tent. “Nyx.” She lead him into the tent, glaring at he soldier who’d been restraining him, and saw Nyko’s steady hands pressing a dark, black stained cloth (she’d had suspicions that her siblings would be nightbloods, like her, but the blood usually didn’t change until ten years, Lexa being a rare exception, and this confirmed them), the girl looking so small in the wide cot. For a moment, Lexa remembered the little girl that she’d been able to throw over her shoulder and toss into the air, and found herself sorely missing that little girl in the current moment. The bullet wound had passed all the way through, but Nyko had no way of knowing the full extent of the internal damage yet, so it was going to be a rocky week or so for the writhing girl.
Lexa hoped that her sister recovered, or she’d force her army to march all the way back, deal with the maunon or not.