Octavia stared at him, her mind frantically trying to bridge the gap between the brutal, metallic reality she had known her entire life and the impossible, ancient truth standing right in front of her.
"You are a sorcerer," Octavia muttered in awe, the words tasting foreign on her tongue. "Or a wizard."
Aleksander raised a hand, his fingers moving in a subtle, fluid motion. A faint ripple distorted the air around them, and suddenly, the distant crackle of the campfires and the soft hum of the dropship entirely vanished, sealed out by a localized privacy charm.
He offered a smooth, enigmatic smile. "Something like that."
Taking a slow breath, Aleksander rolled his shoulders. The fabric of his jacket seemed to shadow and blur for a fraction of a second. With a deep, resonant rustle that sounded like a heavy wind sweeping through a canyon, two massive, magnificent wings unfurled from his back. They were breathtaking—pitch-black, iridescent feathers that seemed to drink in the ambient light, stretching out wide and casting an imposing, god-like silhouette against the glowing forest.
Octavia gasped, stepping back in pure shock. Her eyes tracked the incredible wingspan, entirely mesmerized by the sheer, primal beauty of it.
Drawn by a curiosity she couldn't suppress, Octavia slowly walked around to stand behind him. Her hand trembled as she reached out, her fingertips gently brushing against the soft, midnight-dark feathers.
"They look amazing," Octavia whispered, her voice laced with absolute wonder.
Aleksander folded his wings slightly, letting them rest comfortably against his back, though he kept them manifested in the cool night air.
"My parents believe I am Fey," Aleksander explained quietly, his voice carrying the weight of centuries of forgotten history.
"Specifically, the Tuatha Dé Danann. They were a mythological race of deities and magic-wielders in ancient Irish folklore. According to the old world, we ruled the earth long before mankind built their cities of iron and glass."
Octavia slowly walked back around to face him, her mind spinning with the implications. She looked at his wings, and then up into his dark, calculating eyes.
"If you have this kind of power..." Octavia questioned, her brow furrowing in confusion. "If you can heal the dying and move like a ghost, why not use your powers before? You could have stopped the exiles easily. You could have stopped the mob tonight before it even started."
Aleksander's smile faded, replaced by the cold, tactical pragmatism of an apex predator.
"Because it is too risky," Aleksander answered, his tone hardening. "Everyone in this camp is already existing in a state of pure chaos and trauma. If I reveal what I truly am to the hundred, human nature will take over. They will either fear me as a monster and try to kill me in my sleep, or they will worship me as a god and expect me to solve every problem they face. Both are incredibly dangerous, non-ideal situations for a pack that desperately needs to learn how to survive on its own."
He looked up at the sky, his eyes narrowing as he stared at the faint, distant twinkle of the Ark in orbit.
"And then there are the people still up there," Aleksander continued, his voice dropping to a lethal murmur. "Eventually, the Ark will come down. The Chancellor and the Council will arrive. If the guard finds out I am walking around with ancient magic and a pair of wings, I don't get to be a leader. I become a heavily armed lab rat. Or a threat they decide they need to execute."
He looked back down at Octavia, trusting her with the most dangerous secret on the planet. "My power is a last resort, Octavia. Until the pack is strong enough to handle the truth, the magic stays hidden."
Octavia absorbed the cold, hard logic of his words. It made perfect sense. On the Ark, being different got you locked up or floated. Down here, revealing that kind of unnatural power to a group of terrified, traumatized teenagers could tear the fragile pack apart.
"I understand," Octavia swore quietly, looking him dead in the eye with absolute loyalty. "Your secret is safe with me."
Aleksander gave a slow, appreciative nod. He rolled his shoulders backward. The massive, iridescent black wings folded inward, blurring into shadows for a fraction of a second before seamlessly dissolving into the cool night air, leaving no trace they had ever been there.
Together, they walked back through the quiet camp. Octavia slipped inside the dropship to finally get some desperately needed rest. Aleksander did not follow her. Instead, he took up a position on a heavy wooden crate just outside the hydraulic doors, his sharp, predatory eyes scanning the bioluminescent treeline as he took the first watch.
A few minutes later, the heavy metal doors groaned quietly.
Clarke stepped out into the cool air. She looked entirely exhausted, stripped of her usual authoritative armor. She walked over slowly, hesitating for a moment before she sat down on the crate beside him, pulling her knees to her chest.
For a long time, neither of them spoke. They just listened to the distant hum of the forest.
"I'm sorry," Clarke finally whispered into the dark, her voice trembling slightly. "About earlier. About the knife. You were right... I let my anger take over, and I almost got Murphy killed."
Aleksander didn't look at her, keeping his eyes fixed on the perimeter. But the cold, lethal edge from earlier was gone.
"I was disappointed, Clarke," Aleksander replied, his tone even and measured. "But I am not devoid of empathy. I know you were overwhelmed by your emotions. Grief and panic make us blind to logic. It is a human flaw. I only expect that you learn from it, and that you never let it control you like that again."
Clarke gave a slow, shaky nod, deeply relieved that he wasn't going to hold the mistake over her head.
Silence settled between them again, but this time, it was heavy with a different kind of tension. Clarke stared at the dirt, her mind racing. The violent events of the night had forced her to re-evaluate everything—including the boy lying in a coma just a few feet away.
"Aleksander," Clarke started, her voice barely a whisper. "Before we came down here... you knew things. You hacked the Council's mainframe. You knew the political secrets."
She swallowed hard, forcing herself to ask the question that had been eating her alive since they landed. "Was it her? Was it my mother who told Chancellor Jaha what my dad was going to do?"
Aleksander finally turned his head to look at her. He didn't try to sugarcoat it or soften the blow. He simply gave a single, definitive nod.
"Yes," Aleksander confirmed quietly. "It was Abby."
Clarke let out a shattered breath, dropping her forehead against her knees as tears immediately spilled down her cheeks. The reality was crushing. She had spent the last year of her life rotting in solitary confinement, holding onto the belief that her mother was a victim in all of it. She didn't want to believe that her father's death was her own mother's fault.
And then, the horrific realization of what that meant hit her like a physical blow.
"Wells," Clarke choked out, a sob wracking her chest. "This whole time... I hated him. I blamed him for my father's death. I treated him like garbage... and he just let me believe it was him."
Aleksander watched her cry, his expression softening just a fraction.
"He knew the truth would destroy you, Clarke," Aleksander explained, his voice low and steady in the dark. "Wells didn't want you to lose your relationship with your mother over it. You had already lost your father; he couldn't let you lose your only remaining parent."
Clarke looked up, wiping her eyes as the profound, heartbreaking weight of Wells' sacrifice washed over her.
"He took the decision," Aleksander finished softly. "He took the blame, and he sacrificed your friendship, entirely to protect your family."