There is no true commander without the flame. All have borne it since Becca Primheda when she came from above. Her story is on the walls of the temple beneath my tower. [Lexa shrugged.] They cannot just decide I am not Heda without first killing me.

Dead Heda's don't walk, or talk, after all.

[And death will always be the only way out for Lexa. She would always be the Commander of the thirteen clans as long as she drew breath. If only Titus hadn't made that so much harder than it needed to be.]

You would have to carve the flame out of my neck to compare it to a chip. I didn't see it up close before my ascension.