#chicleeblair

“I am. Clarke, of House Griffin. And you are—“

He swallows, pulls himself together. If she’s lying, he’ll find out soon, and in the meantime, there’s no harm in being polite. Eddis won’t fault him for that, even if he’s being deceived.

“Bellamy. I’ll be your personal guard while you’re in the court here. Unless you have objections.”

“Do all ambassadors have personal guards in Eddis?”

“They do. I also served your predecessor.”

To his surprise, she snorts, a soft, unladylike sound that she doesn’t seem to have meant to let out. “You have my condolences.”

He smiles too. “Appreciated. May I show you to your room?”

“Please,” she says. “Thank you.”

It’s not much to go on, but Bellamy still can’t hoping she really is the new ambassador. She seems much better than the last one.

*

“So, how’s the new ambassador?” Raven asks, when he gets to the tavern that night.

“A woman,” he says.

She blinks. “A woman?”

“It makes sense, I suppose,” he says. He’s been thinking it over. “Why wouldn’t a queen send a woman to another queen? If we’re going to have women ruling, we should have other women in positions of political power.”

Gina passes him a cup of wine. “What did Eddis say?”

“Nothing. I assume she knew and didn’t tell me. I assume she had someone reporting back to her so she’d be able to imagine the expression on my face.”

“That sounds like her,” Raven agrees. She isn’t as closely related to the queen as Bellamy is, but she’s still part of the court. They’re all cousins, more or less, one way or another. And Raven’s brilliant; Eddis knows better than to waste a mind so useful as hers. “How is she aside from being a woman?”

“Nothing wrong with her so far. Polite to me and to the queen, no muttered asides about how uncivilized our mountain is, so an improvement over the last one.” He shrugs. “Still an Attolian, so I guess we’ll find out.”

“Still,” says Gina, with a smile. “To being better than the last one.”

It’s a good hope to drink to. “To being better than the last one.”

*

Guarding Clarke is very much like guarding Thelonious was, at least in broad strokes. He’s with her throughout the day, some strange combination of protector and assistant. Not that she doesn’t have an actual assistant, a quiet, somewhat sarcastic Attolian named Monty, but they’re still learning their way around the palace, and sometimes it’s simpler for Bellamy to do errands than it is to try to explain to Monty how to do them himself. And Monty always comes with him, learns for next time, so Bellamy doesn’t mind.

The biggest difference is that Bellamy’s counterpart, the one who guards Clarke’s rooms on the night shift, is no longer Miller, but Octavia, a nod to the impropriety of having a man guard a woman as intimately as he used to guard the ambassador. That rule has always been a bit odd to Bellamy–the only difference between his guarding Clarke and Eddis is how many rooms they have between where he stands and where the women sleep, to say nothing of the incorrect assumption that he couldn’t have inappropriate interest in a man he was guarding–but in this case, he’s grateful for it. His sister would have joined the army in a second if she was a boy, and she’s giddy to finally have a role as a combatant. For that alone, he’d like Clarke.

But that’s far from the only reason. Because that’s the real biggest difference, the one that worries him. He likes Clarke. Not just for an Attolian, not for someone he’s being made to spend time with, but without qualifications. She’s sharp and quick, smiles at his muttered comments, seems to value his opinions when she asks for them. It’s hard for him to really feel as if he trusts her–she’s a diplomat, and a foreign diplomat at that–but he’s coming dangerously close.

Which is why, when she says, “Isn’t there anything fun to do in Eddis?” he doesn’t immediately bristle.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” he asks instead.

She huffs. “I’ve been here for two months, and so far all I’ve done is read, attend meetings, and be glared at and flirted with at state dinners. Is there something else I could be doing?”

“I’m not sure I’m the best person to ask, I’m just a guard.”

“You are not,” she says, rolling her eyes. “You and the queen are cousins.”

“That’s nothing special in Eddis. And I hate the court. I’m much happier being a soldier than a noble.”

“And what do soldiers do for fun?”

He thinks that over. “Two things.”

“Just two?” she teases. “How are you not bored?”

“Two things I think you’d want to do. And that aren’t reading,” he adds. “I read a lot.”

“Of course you do. What are the other two?”

“Exploring and drinking.”

“Those sound perfect,” says Clarke. “When can we start?”

He grabs Octavia, just for appearances’ sake, so it won’t be him and Clarke alone, and while his sister grumbles a little about losing her day, he knows she doesn’t really mind. Lincoln’s one of the queen’s guards, and he’ll be spending the day with Eddis; Octavia likes having things to do. She’s never been as interested in history as Bellamy has, preferring myth and legend to fact, but Bellamy learned the stories of Eddis from the thief’s mother, and once Clarke finds out he knows about the old gods and where the temples were supposed to come from, she wants to hear those stories too.

He manages to keep her amused with those trips for another month, and then she says, “What about drinking?”

“I was under the impression you drank at dinner. Better wine that I get, I’m sure.”

“Bellamy.”

“You want to come to a tavern in the city with me?”

“Why wouldn’t I?”

He’d say he assumed she didn’t like it, but he remembers the Thief smuggling his cousin who is Eddis but wasn’t back then out of the palace so she could have a break from court intrigue and in-fighting.

Everyone needs a break sometimes.

“Stay here,” he tells her. “I’ll ask Octavia.”

It seems like the kind of thing his sister will be thrilled about; dinner is usually the start of her shift, and she complains of how boring it is staying in Clarke’s antechamber until the night shift begins and the palace guard takes over patrolling. He assumed she’d jump at the chance to get out.

Instead, she looks him up and down like she’s trying to find flaws.

“What?”

“You’re taking her out?”

“I take her out all the time.”

“To a tavern.”

“She wanted to come with me. If you’ve got something to say, just say it,” he adds, and Octavia huffs.

“Are you interested in her? Romantically.”

He should have expected the question, but of course it stops him short. It’s so easy for him to not let himself think about these things, to turn his mind away from the curve of her smile and the sound of her laugh.

“Fuck,” he mutters, and his sister snorts.

“Wow. You didn’t know?”

“She’s an ambassador!”

“You’re the queen of Eddis’s cousin.”

“We’re all cousins on the mountain,” he says, but the old joke doesn’t feel that funny. “I’m not taking her out to—woo her,” he says, with a vague gesture. “We’re friends. It’s not anything. She might not even be ambassador for that long. Some of the nobles from Sounis are trying to complain it’s improper.”

“And?”

“And I’m just taking her out so she can get a drink, it’s nothing to worry about. Are you coming?”

“Not if you paid me. The last thing I want to see is your inept flirting. Besides, if we’re both there, everyone will realize she must be the ambassador. If you just send her with Raven you can pretend she’s an old friend from the country.”

She’s not wrong. It’s hard to say how bad it would really be for someone to identify Clarke, but now that the former thief is starting to wield power on his new country’s behalf, the Eddisians seem to feel less as if they pulled off a coup and more as if the Thief betrayed them.

All in all, Bellamy would rather she was just a friend from the country.

“Thanks for the advice,” he says. “Next time you think I’m in love with someone, don’t tell me. I’m going to go talk to Raven.”

“Thanks for giving me the night off!” O says, and he glares at her, for good measure.

Raven and Clarke have met a few times, in passing, but Raven doesn’t like actual politics, and prefers to spend her time in her study, doing her own work.

Not that Bellamy blames her; if he had a study where he could do nothing but read and work on his own projects all the time, he wouldn’t leave it much either.

“Octavia says I’m in love with Clarke, so I need you to bring her over to the tavern today.”

Raven considers this. “Octavia had to tell you? Fuck, I thought you knew or I would have told you.”

“Thanks.” He sighs. “She wants to come out drinking. I figure if she comes with you, maybe no one will realize she’s the ambassador.”

“What about the in love with her part?”

He shrugs. “I’m pretty sure it’s been going on for a while, so I can just–keep doing what I was doing.”

“That seems like a good solution to a non-problem.”

That’s not a statement he’s sure he wants to try to interpret, so he just rolls his eyes. “Listen, will you come walk Clarke over or not?”

“Obviously. Can’t wait to see you drinking with her. That’s going to be great.”

Clarke’s clearly expecting Octavia, not that Bellamy can blame her, and he’s not sure what to make of her change of expression at the sight of Raven, but he’s also having this minor problem where he doesn’t know how to look at her or think about her because he doesn’t want to consider what his being in love with her would actually involve.

It’s either a good or bad thing that he’s about to be drinking.

“O pointed out that if you showed up with both of us looking like guards, it would blow your cover. So you and Raven can head over first and I’ll meet you there. It’s safer.”

“And Octavia isn’t coming?”

“Taking advantage of my watching you for the night to spend time with her husband,” he says. “Sorry.”

“We’ve got you,” says Raven. “Don’t worry.”

Clarke’s smile is a little wary, but all she says is, “So, so, so,” and she leaves without further complaint.

So it’s probably fine.

And she does seem to be in good spirits when he arrives at the tavern. She lights up a the sight of him, brilliant like the sun rising, and he has to swallow back his own smile.

“Looks like you started without me,” he says, taking the seat next to hers.

“I was meeting Gina!” she says, as if this is the high point of her month.

“Glad to hear it. How are you, Gina?”

Gina’s smile is a little more knowing than he’s really comfortable with. Raven probably told him that he didn’t know he was in love with Clarke, and now they’re both overly amused about it. “I’m excellent. It’s good to finally meet your–old friend.”

“Of course it is. I’m not regretting this at all,” he grumbles, and to his surprise, Clarke puts her arm through his.

“Of course not,” she says, and he somehow finds it’s true.

It’s not until they’re walking back to the palace, Clarke still leaning on him, the two of them looking like nothing so much as a pair of lovers, that she says, “I really was happy to meet Gina.”

“I had no idea you’d been wanting to.”

“I hadn’t! I didn’t know she existed. All I ever heard was rumors about you and Raven and how your engagement was going to be announced any day. I even asked–the secretary who tracks those things if the two of you were too closely related to marry. Apparently you’re not.”

It’s not an unknown rumor to Bellamy, of course. He and Raven have been friends for a long time, and that’s always a convenient story for people to tell themselves. Wouldn’t it be sweet, if the two of them married? And even he’d thought they might, for a while. They got along well, and they do love each other.

But she’s happy with Gina, and he’s–

Honestly, he’s not sure what’s happening with Clarke, but he suspects it’s going to go well for him.

“I did know I could have married her, yes.” He clears his throat. “I forgot you’d hear those. The rumors. I mostly forget they’re still going around, but it’s–”

“Convenient,” Clarke supplies. “For Raven and Gina.”

“I didn’t mind. I wasn’t looking to marry.”

“You weren’t?” she asks, careful, and he has to smile.

“I wasn’t looking, no.” He clears his throat, offers a smile. “My sister had to tell me how I felt about you. Today. I don’t always notice.”

She laughs. “No?”

“I never fell in love with any of the other Attolian ambassadors, how was I supposed to know I’d start now?”

“Well, once your Thief stole our queen and her throne, anything seemed possible,” she teases.

“Maybe he had the right idea after all.”

Clarke slides her hand into his and squeezes. “I think my guard is off duty tonight,” she says, with a wicked smirk. “If you’d like to come home with me.”

It’s a bad idea, but not a terrible one. He can’t imagine Eddis will object to the match. And even if Attolia and her new king do, he can still get tonight.

As many nights as he can manage.

“I’d love to,” he says, and Clarke smiles, and yes.