It is not the reunion either of them dreamed of, but at least it is a reunion.

Bellamy looks beaten in a way Clarke has only seen once before, a way that has little to do with the blood smeared into his cheek, his cracked and bruised lower lip, or the deep scratch extending from the collar of his shirt to just behind his ear. He just seems… deflated somehow. It hurts her to gaze into those dead eyes and so she avoids it. Not him, of course; avoiding him is pointless and detrimental to their cause. Just the haunted darkness in his expression.

Clarke, on the other hand, is terrifying. Bellamy always knew she was strong, even stubborn when she disagreed with him… but now something in her has turned fierce. He wonders and is afraid to ask, because the idea of knowing exactly what she did to get back to him is too much. His imagination has already filled in most of the blanks with nightmares, anyway. So now, surrounded by their people - no, fuck that, their friends - Bellamy asks a question.

It is not exactly the question he wants to ask, but it is close enough.

"You okay?"

"Yeah. You?" He just nods in response so she dismisses him and turns back to the others, because if he is going to lie to her then she feels no need to justify herself either. Clarke knows they are not okay, not even close. She knows it in the way Bellamy lets his limp show, as if he no longer cares that revealing his injuries might affect morale. She knows it in the way she herself gazes around without seeing individual people, instead running a point-by-point risk assessment: asset; ally; liability; threat; Murphy.

The survivors return to Abby's new base of operations. It is tucked into the forest near a small stream. No one dares return to Camp Jaha, and the Dropship is under guard, an equally dangerous destination. Darkness falls, and Clarke finds herself drawn to the little space Bellamy has carved out for himself, a black corner away from the others but still safe beneath the dense prickly boughs of the pine trees.

Four words. A total of four words have passed between them since meeting and yet, Clarke decides, it is enough. What more, really, could they have to say? Because if they try for more, try to get past those five soft syllables, they will end up so much more lost and alone than either of them wants to be ever again.

She refuses to look into his eyes when she kisses him, and calls herself a coward for it. He kisses back, selfish, angry at her for abandoning him. Bellamy's fury pulls at Clarke's own resentment; she nips at his swollen, tender lip. How dare he leave her, how dare he let her believe him dead. He groans in pain but refuses to end the kiss - and something in Clarke smiles cruelly, something else cringes, but all of her glows with the first sparks of a need she has suppressed for far too long. Bellamy grabs the back of her head to keep her mouth against his, his fingers scraping painfully along a bruise at the base of her skull. Clarke winces. She feels, rather than sees, him grin against her teeth. She should know he has suffered too. He presses his body into hers. She should have stopped Kane, and been there for Raven. He is not the only one who needed her; friends have suffered in her absence.

Clarke pushes his shirt up to reveal a once-perfect torso, now painted in so many dark purple and green bruises he blends with the night. She gasps: an apology. She did not realize... He grips her hands, begging her not to shy from him. He places them firmly over the damage. It doesn't matter anymore. She is back. He can find his way now; he doesn't feel so lost when she is there to navigate.

Bellamy bends toward her lips once more, asking forgiveness from her. He tried, always, to get to her. But... No. No excuses, he fucked it all up. Clarke is right to be angry.

She sighs and her warm breath drifts into his mouth, escaping at one corner to tickle his cheek. She understands; after all, they have both made so many mistakes. She is ready to move on now; ready to let him help her with all the things she finally realizes she cannot fix on her own.

Damaged or not, scarred and sore and battered as they are, this still remains their sanctuary: the other. They will always return to these private moments because who but Bellamy can be trusted not to trust? Who but Clarke will never back down, no matter the challenge?

…So Clarke hisses through the pain of the stitches on her arm when Bellamy tugs her shirt off. And Bellamy bites his lip to stifle a groan when Clarke pulls at his belt, dragging it over a gash on his hip. With fingers and lips and tongues and rueful tears they read the stories written into each other's naked bodies. Eventually Clarke, impatient, begs for Bellamy – and he gives in to her, calling her "Princess" for the first time in a very, very long time as he fills her, and she gasps a mixture of pleasure and alarm and her body clings to him, pulling him closer and deeper. It is the first time she can admit how much she ached to hear that nickname again.

It should mean nothing, but it turns out it means everything.

Clarke has protected her heart for so long – there were times she wondered if it was all she would be left with in the end - and with that one word Bellamy Blake has stolen it for himself. It's not fair.

She risks a glance into his eyes. Gone is the deep black broken grief that had sucked the air from her lungs earlier today. Bellamy is in there, warm and protective and sure, freely offering Clarke his own heart in exchange for hers.

It is not the beginning, but it is how they will help each other heal.

**This has not been Beta'd, so I hope it meets with your approval. Let me know!**

**Happy birthday hellamybellamy/troubledpancakes!**