IN MY HEAD¹ ━━ Bellamy Blake

𝐗𝐗𝐗𝐈𝐕: Lyra Makes New Friends

┍━━━━ ⋆｡˚☽˚｡⋆ ━━━━┑

LYRA MAKES NEW FRIENDS

(THE GROUNDERS!)

┕━━━━ ⋆｡˚☽˚｡⋆ ━━━━┙

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

          WEIRDLY ENOUGH, getting tortured hurt less than Lyra thought it would.

     Of course, that's probably because they didn't get very far. Like, it was probably around twenty minutes? She's not sure, it wasn't like she had a timer or anything. That would've been super weird, if she did have one. Like, Hey, could you guys restart? I actually forgot to record that!

But, anyways.

     Plus, she hasn't forgotten the Commander's last words to her, right before they left Clarke there to deal with the war council: Remember this — you might want to think twice before you try to use a man's conscience against him. It may turn out he doesn't have one.

Remembering them now makes Lyra shiver. The Commander is terrifying.

Of course, there's also the whole thing with her dad kind of, like, yelling at her right now about how she's reckless and irresponsible. . .

"Words hurt," Lyra says to him.

Noah, whose been pacing back and forth ever since she got back from Tondc, looks at her incredulously. "Are you seriously telling me words hurt? In this middle of this, while I'm lecturing you? After you look like you got tortured?"

"I already told you, it wasn't torture," says Lyra, moving the damp rag over her black eye as she shifts. "I was just poked."

"With what? A sword?"

Lyra wonders if she should tell him. Then she thinks, Nah, probably not. She'd like to be allowed to leave his sight once this is all over.

      Knuckles suddenly rap on the room entrance, and the poor girl nearly erupts out of her skin. Hauling herself to her feet from the lumpy bed in the small, steel-box of a room, she walks very slowly and very stiffly towards the door. She's been careful to keep her jacket on so that her dad would only see the tip of the fourth cut peeking just above her collar bone; he hasn't seen the two gashes on her arms or the one going down her stomach, and she'd like to keep it that way.

     The slab of metal slides apart before she can reach it, revealing a sheepish Kane.

     "The Grounders are here," he announces.

     "Funny. I don't remember asking, nor do I remember caring," says Noah rudely. He glances at Lyra. "Do you remember asking or caring?"

     "Um. . . " says Lyra stupidly.

     "See?" Noah says. "She said no."

     "I said um," says Lyra.

     "I heard," says Kane dryly. "I've been here the whole time. I'm not deaf."