Persphyni : I am Darkness

8

Murphy soon joined me after I had left Wells behind. I was still confused about how they could hear, and even more how I feel about it.

"Don't be so starstruck." I teased Murphy.

"Sorry, I just." He jogged to catch up and walk beside me. "Thank you."

"What for?" I turned my head to see an oddly vulnerable look on Murphy's face.

"For keeping me out of the darkness. For being a light to follow that led to hope." He whispered the words, clearly he had gone through some difficult times in his past.

"You shouldn't thank me." I dropped my voice to a whisper as well. "I don't deserve it." Guess I'm being vulnerable now too.

"Murphy." He stuck his hand out.

"Atlys." I eyed his hand before shaking it.

"I have to ask a question. Those stories and songs, where did you learn them from?" I pulled my eyes from the boy and towards the green forest.

"I had a lot of time to myself." Eighteen years to be exact. An orphan from day one, and a prisoner on day two. Forever locked in an unknown cage, until the door was shut behind me.

"Look, Murphy. I'm not going to spill my whole life story. It's cool that I was able to help you. But you should leave those memories happy and without knowing who that, what did you call me, Songbird was in the vents at night." I didn't raise my voice, but my firm tone left no room for argument or continuation of the conversation. And by the time he tried to talk to me I had jogged away after catching a glimpse of blonde hair.

"I've been thinking about Mount Weather. How come they didn't attack until Jasper crossed the river?" I picked up my pace to reach Finn and Clarke.

"The river's a boundary." I spoke up at I found myself on Finn's left. "Yes, hi. Don't act so surprised." I waved my dagger through the air as I talked.

"Pers, now is not the time to be playing around." Clarke gave me stern look which I answered with a raised brow.

"They waited for us to cross. When I went last night to the river," They both looked at me incredulously, "To get some water." Finn turned a bit pink as I emphasized my reason. "There was something in the trees, I had thought it was an animal. But now it makes sense."

"This means that Mount Weather is off limits." Finn voiced.

"How are we going to get those supplies? What are we going to do for food?" I looked at Clarke who I could tell was panicking just a bit.

"We make do with what we have until the Ark comes down, and to answer the sec- hey, where are you two going!" I jogged behind Clarke and Finn who had just taken off leaving Clarke to follow.

I looked to see they were staring at a waterfall I had spotted earlier as I cut across the greenery to find them.

"Guess we don't have to worry about water." Finn looked at Clarke and then back to the waterfall.

"Now is not the time for a swim!" I yelled as Finn and Clarke took off to the water. "Sorry Jasper, looks like we're taking a detour. But I promise I'm coming." I looked up as I spoke. One, because I was checking the trees for any grounders or six-legged squirrels. Two, I was speaking to the wind. Hoping that it would carry to Jasper and he would hear me.

Hope. What a funny little thing.

"Come on." I made it over to where Finn and Clarke were standing. Finn had gone in deeper than Clarke, but I had a feeling that was going to change soon.

Especially once Finn had grabbed onto Clarke's arm.

"No, no. Finn!" I smacked my forehead as Finn fell backwards bringing Clarke into the water.

"Damnit Finn!" My name means innocent my ass. I walked over to where Clarke had set her makeshift bag down expecting her to get out. Only for her to do the opposite.

"Oh, wow. Ok. Maybe just a minute." Finn encouragement to her statement made me roll my eyes.

"Hey guys, glad you're enjoying yourselves but uh. Five ten, dark brown hair, brown eyes, has these super large ridiculous goggles on his head. Have you seen him?" I faked curiosity receiving an eye roll from each of them.

I let the two be and walked around the small body of water only to find something I was very familiar with. Blood.

"Oye!" I shouted over my shoulder to the two as I knelt down next to it and wiped my hand on it.

I heard the footsteps come behind me, they were silent as they looked at the blood. I followed the trail down the rocks starting at the large handprint all the way until I found a black object wedged in between a rock.

"I think we're going to need to pick up the pace." I had pulled the object out and held a pair of goggles. To be more specific, the super large ridiculous goggles that had been on our missing boy's head.

"Jasper. He was here." Clarke's breathed as I held the goggles up for her to take. Not once looking away from the red painted rock as I rubbed the still fresh blood in between my left pointer, middle, and thumb.

"Now we just have to find where he went."

_______•*•*•*•_______

"How do we know this is the right way?" Murphy asked. We had met back up with the other three and were now currently following a trail.

Finn and I were leading, Clark one step behind us as we tracked through the forest. To Finn and Clarke's surprise I was doing a lot of it. While I had never gone to class for it like Finn, I've read books and done my share of tracking.

"We don't. Spacewalker and Shadow here think they're trackers." I rolled my eyes at Fake's nicknames for us.

"It's called "cutting sign." Fourth-year earth skills. He's good." I'm not even the slightest bit offended he didn't defend me. Okay, maybe slightly. But that's just my ego talking.

"You guys want to keep it down? Or should I paint a target on your backs and hope the Grounders go for the loud mouths." I hissed turning around. The first real words I had spoken to Bellamy and he simply smirked and shook his head. Wells mouthed out a 'sorry' allowing me to turn around to see Finn grabbing a broken twig off a small tree.

I crouched down as he let go of the twig, finding blood on a small rock. He followed and I felt Clarke hovering slightly over my back to look at it as well.

"See, you're invisible." Bellamy was seriously about to get a fist to he face if he didn't-

My thoughts were interrupted by a loud moan that I would have mistaken for a deer call had I remembered the way they were described in the books.

"What the hell was that?" I stood up from my crouch, unsheathing my dagger as I stood.

"Now would be a good time to take out that gun." How the hell did she know I had- wait. She meant the Fake. I shook my head and started walk towards the direction of the moan.

Another moan was heard, this one more of a groan as it was lower pitched and I knew exactly who it was.

I'm coming Jasper.