Bellamy shrugged. “I don’t really know how to live any other way. I’ve always been taking care of her. It’s like… we aren’t born for ourselves alone. You have to take care of other people.”
Wells looked up sharply. “What did you just say?” Bellamy had spoken casually, as if that were a phrase that people used all the time. But Wells had never heard anyone say it on Earth. In fact, it had been years since he heard the saying spoken aloud, but that didn’t mean he didn’t think about it every day.
There were some things you never forgot.
CHAPTER 30
Bellamy
Bellamy stared at Wells, wondering if the kid had finally cracked under the pressure. Why was Wells looking at him like that?
Bellamy shrugged. “It’s just something my mom used to say about Octavia and me. How we were lucky to have each other, and how it was my responsibility to take care of her.” He snorted as the bitter memories stirred inside of him. “My responsibility, because she sure as hell wasn’t going to do it.” He fell silent for a moment. “I think it’s something my father used to say, though he used it to explain why he was never able to see us.”
Wells seemed to pale at these words. “Hey… are you okay?” Bellamy asked, shooting a glance at Clarke to see if she’d noticed how strange Wells was behaving. But before she had time to react, Wells continued.
“Was… was your mom’s name Melinda, by any chance?”
The word landed with a thud on Bellamy’s chest. He hadn’t heard anyone say his mother’s name in years. Not since the day the guards came inside their flat and found her lying cold and still on the floor. “How—how did you know that?” Bellamy asked hoarsely, too stunned to inject a note of hostility or suspicion into his voice.
In a strangely calm voice, Wells told Bellamy about his father’s secret past, his affair with the Walden woman and his long-standing commitment to her family. “We live not for ourselves… it’s what my father always said to justify the sacrifices he had to make, like not spending enough time with me and Mom… or not marrying the woman he loved. But I never knew they had a child together.”
The world around Bellamy seemed to spin, melting into a blur of shadow and starlight as his brain reeled. The only thing that kept him tethered to the ground was the sensation of Clarke’s hand on his arm. The Chancellor—the man who’d been shot because of him—was his father? He couldn’t talk. Couldn’t breathe. But then he felt Clarke’s arm around him, and he took a deep breath. As he exhaled, his surroundings came back into focus. The dark outlines of the trees, the patches of star-filled sky, Clarke’s stunned expression, the nervous face of the kid Bellamy had once thought he hated, but now seemed to be… something else entirely. “So that makes you…”
“Your half brother.” Wells let the final word hang in the air, as if giving both of them time to examine the shape of it before they claimed it for their own. “I guess you and Octavia aren’t the only siblings in the Colony anymore.”
A laugh escaped from Bellamy’s lips before he had time to stop it. “Half brothers,” he repeated. “This is insane.” He shook his head, and with a grin, extended his arm and reached for Wells’s hand. “Brothers.”
CHAPTER 31
Clarke
“Half brothers,” Clarke said for what was probably the twenty-ninth time that night. She reached over and ran a finger along Bellamy’s cheek, as if she might find some sign she’d overlooked that he and Wells were related.
Bellamy smiled as he gently removed her hand, then brought it to his lips to kiss it. “I know it’s hard to believe. I’m just so much better looking.” But then his grin faded. “Does it weird you out?”
Clarke turned to look at Wells and Sasha, who’d returned to camp even earlier than expected. They were sitting on the other side of the campfire, a little apart from the rest of the group. Through the flickering flames, she could see Wells smiling at the Earthborn girl, who seemed to be blushing. A few people were looking at them warily, but now that Octavia was back, it’d been fairly easy to convince the group that she’d been telling the truth about the rogue Earthborns, and most had been quick to forgive Wells for letting her go.
Clarke sighed and rested her head on Bellamy’s shoulder. “The thing is, the fact that you’re related to my ex-boyfriend isn’t even the weirdest thing about you.”
Bellamy wrapped his arm around Clarke’s waist and tickled her stomach. She laughed, and reached around to retaliate, but Bellamy sat up sharp as something on the other side of the fire caught his attention.
“It’s true!” they heard Octavia cry, flipping her long dark hair over her shoulder. She’d spent the past hour regaling the group with tales of her time at Mount Weather.
“And how do we know you didn’t come back to spy on us?” a voice asked. Clarke’s muscles tensed as Graham strode over toward Octavia, the fire casting a flickering light on his smirk.
His voice was a mix of playful condescension and hostility, but Octavia didn’t let that faze her. She tilted her head to the side and gave Graham a searching look from under her dark lashes.
“You might find this hard to believe, Graham, but there are far more interesting things to see on Earth than your little spear collection. If I had to spy on you, I’d fall asleep.”
The people sitting near Octavia laughed, and to Clarke’s surprise, Graham actually smiled, though even in the darkness, she could see it didn’t extend to his eyes. “Oh, trust me, my spears are about as big as anyone can handle,” he protested. Octavia giggled.
“Should I go punch that kid in the face now, or later?” Bellamy growled.
“Later,” Clarke said. “I’m comfortable sitting here.” She’d only joined the group around the fire a few minutes earlier, having spent the past hour in the infirmary cabin, making sure Molly, Felix, and the others were well on their way to recovery as the wintershade left their systems. The look of relief on Eric’s face when Clarke helped Felix to stand for the first time since he’d gotten sick was enough to make Clarke forget that she had walked nearly twenty kilometers in one day.
Clarke shifted so she was leaning against Bellamy. He wrapped his arms around her waist and leaned back, so they were both looking up at the sky. The roar of the fire was enough to muffle the voices of everyone around them, and with their eyes tilted upward, it almost felt like they were the only two people on Earth.
She wondered if her mother and father were looking up at the same sky, feeling the same way. Earlier that day, Bellamy had told her that once Octavia had recovered from her ordeal, they’d both go with Clarke to help her look for her parents. The Griffins had nearly a year’s head start, but it didn’t matter, Bellamy promised. They wouldn’t stop until they found them.
The thought was both thrilling and terrifying, almost too much to wrap her head around. So for the moment, she contented herself with leaning against Bellamy, letting the sound of his steady heartbeat temporarily drown out the rest of her thoughts.
“Look at that,” Bellamy whispered in her ear.
“What?”
He took her hand, gently extended one of her fingers, and pointed it toward a pinpoint of light moving quickly across the sky. “Did you ever make wishes on meteors on Phoenix? Or was that just a Walden thing?” he asked, his breath warm on her skin. “You probably already had everything you wanted.”
“I definitely didn’t have everything I wanted,” Clarke murmured, snuggling against his chest. “Though I think I might be getting close at the moment.”
“So you don’t want to make a wish?”
Clarke looked up again. The speck of light was moving awfully fast, even for a meteor. She sat up a little straighter. “I don’t think that’s a falling star,” she said, unable to keep the note of anxiety out of her voice.
“What do you mean? What else could it be?” But then she felt him grow rigid behind her, a sudden realization settling into his bones. “You don’t think…” He trailed off and tightened his hold around her.