The group dragged themselves away from the riverbank, shivering and dripping wet as the adrenaline finally crashed. They stopped in a small clearing surrounded by heavy pines to dry off, letting Clarke dig through her meager medical supplies to tightly bandage the mangled flesh on Octavia's thigh.
Aleksander didn't give them a moment to breathe.
"What were you thinking?" His voice cracked like a whip through the quiet clearing, instantly silencing the group. He glared down at Octavia, his dark eyes furious. "You jumped blindly into a heavily irradiated, untested body of water without a single thought. You almost died for a laugh."
Octavia flinched, looking away.
Aleksander turned his lethal gaze on Finn, Jasper, and Monty. "And you three. You stood there and cheered her on. Not one of you had the sense to stop her or check the perimeter. If I hadn't been there, she wouldn't have just drowned—she would have been torn to pieces, and you would have watched it happen. You want to survive Earth? Start using your heads, or you'll all be dead by the end of the week."
None of them answered. Jasper stared at his boots, Monty swallowed hard, and even Finn had the sense to keep his mouth shut.
Aleksander had made sure to use a bit of mental manipulation to make sure no one was focused on karambit. He had already placed them back in expansion charmed pocket.
Night began to set in rapidly, the temperature plummeting as the sun dipped behind the jagged ridges.
Aleksander turned away from them, crouching over a pile of dry kindling he had kicked together. He blocked their line of sight with his broad shoulders, going through the physical motions of striking a piece of scavenged flint against steel. But in reality, he just let a tiny, concentrated spark of Phoenix fire dance from his fingertip, catching the dry moss instantly. Within seconds, a warm, crackling campfire illuminated the clearing.
The others immediately huddled around the flames, holding their damp clothes out to dry.
But Octavia had distanced herself. She sat several yards away, leaning heavily against the rough bark of a massive tree, hidden in the shadows. She was shivering violently—partly from the freezing river water, and partly from the lingering shock and the snake's venom—but she was stubbornly trying to hide it.
Aleksander watched her from across the fire. His hyper-analytical mind knew that securing her trust was the smartest tactical move he could make to keep Bellamy on a leash. But as his Dark Fey empathy brushed against her aura, the cold strategy gave way to genuine pity. Octavia wasn't just a pawn. She was a girl who had spent sixteen years locked beneath a metal floorboard, completely starved of the world, only to nearly be ripped apart the moment she tried to embrace it. He could feel the residual, icy terror rattling her bones. If his parents hadn't successfully hidden his magic, the Ark would have kept him in a cage just like hers.
He unzipped his heavy jacket, walking quietly over to the shadows. Without asking, he draped the thick material over Octavia's trembling shoulders. The sheer, unnatural warmth radiating from the coat—and from the Phoenix blood running through the boy who wore it—made her let out an involuntary sigh of relief.
She quickly caught herself, pulling the coat tighter but throwing him a sarcastic glare. "I don't need a babysitter, Alex. I'm fine."
Aleksander knelt in the dirt beside her, entirely ignoring her defensiveness. "You were just dragged underwater by a mutated sea serpent. You're allowed to not be fine for a minute, Octavia."
He didn't look at her with the horrified, awkward expressions the others had been giving her. He looked at her with a steady, grounding calm. His eyes dropped to the crude bandage Clarke had wrapped around her thigh. It was already soaked through with a dark spot of blood, and her leg was trembling uncontrollably from the sharp, pulsing pain of the venom.
"May I?" Aleksander asked quietly.
Octavia hesitated, her pride warring with the agony in her leg, before she gave a stiff, short nod.
Aleksander gently placed his bare hands over the damp bandage. This was where his Dark Fey nature and the immortal fire beneath his skin came into play. He didn't chant, and he kept his magic tightly suppressed so there was no telltale emerald glow. Instead, he simply channeled his innate, regenerative heat deep into his palms.
The moment his hands pressed firmly against her leg, a rush of intense, soothing heat radiated directly through her skin, sinking straight into the torn muscle.
Octavia gasped softly, her eyes fluttering shut as the sharp, throbbing agony in her leg vanished almost instantly, replaced by a deep, heavy, numbing warmth.
She opened her eyes, looking at him in utter confusion. "Your hands... they're so warm. The pain just... stopped."
Aleksander kept his eyes fixed on the bandage, ensuring his glamour remained flawless. "My mother taught me some pressure points to block nerve pain. Just relax."
He slowly moved his thumbs, massaging the edges of the wound with deliberate, calculated pressure. He was subtly drawing out the residual neurotoxin, stimulating her cellular regeneration with his magic. The touch was intimate and deliberate, but driven by a quiet, protective instinct. Octavia stared at him. While Finn and the others had cheered and gawked at her when she stripped down, treating her like a sideshow, Aleksander was the only one actually taking care of her now that the fun was over.
Her bravado completely crumbled. Her voice dropped to a fragile whisper. "I was terrified. Under the water... I thought I was going to die before I even got to live."
Aleksander stopped moving his hands. He looked up, his dark, intense gaze meeting hers.
"But you didn't panic," Aleksander told her softly, recognizing the survivor in her. "You fought back. You're stronger than you think, Octavia. You just need to learn that this world isn't a game."
He slowly trailed one hand up from her bandaged leg, reaching up to lightly brush a damp, stray curl behind her ear. The contrast between the freezing night air and the fiery, impossible heat of his touch made her breath hitch.
"You belong out here," Aleksander murmured. "You just have to learn how to survive it. And I'll teach you... if you let me."
Octavia looked at him, the lingering fear from the river completely wiped out by a breathless kind of tension. She leaned slightly into the warm hand resting near her jaw, her dark eyes locked onto his.
"Okay," she whispered. "Teach me."
Across the clearing, bathed in the flickering orange light of the campfire, Clarke was watching them. She was supposed to be resting, but her eyes were fixed on the shadows near the tree. Seeing the quiet, intimate way Aleksander brushed the hair from Octavia's face, and the way Octavia leaned into his touch, caused a sharp, sudden twist in Clarke's chest.
She looked down, aggressively poking at the fire with a stick, trying to ignore the sudden, bitter sting of jealousy burning in her throat.