Elara Bell

Elara ("Ell") Bell Zora is one of the main characters in the series The Boy from the Bunker and is portrayed by Sadie Sink in the books. She is one of the 18 people who had been living in the Bunker that was evacuated by Sol Riverly. She is the first of four children to have been born inside the Bunker.

She is the youngest child and only daughter of Martha Bell and Kane Bell. She has three older brothers: Ares Bell, Wynn Bell, and Quill Bell - who was adopted into her family before she was born. Her brother Quill is the one who named her. In the time jump between Season 7 and Season 8, she adopts a young, orphaned girl named Izzy (Isobel Kady) who is part of the small group of people living inside the Bunker with her. In Season 8, Kodiak Zora proposes to her and they become married, as well as Kodiak becoming the adoptive father of Izzy (now named Izzy Kady Zora). 4 years after returning to Basilisk from their departure of the island west of the DeadLands, Elara and Kodiak welcome their first son - Ares Zora, named after Elara's late, older brother, Ares Bell. 2 years later, they welcome their third child; a daughter - Story Zora, whose name is inspired by the endless stories Elara told Izzy when she was growing up which served as a source of strength and comfort to them both. 4 years later (10 years after they initial return to Basilisk), her and Kodiak welcome their third daughter, and final child: Hope Zora.

 Season 1 

When her Bunker is evacuated by Basilisk, Elara is one of the five people who are taken into Blood Riders' camp. She is separated from all of her brothers along with her father. Her mother, Martha, is with her at Blood Riders, but she is in favour of their practices whereas Elara does not wish to be a part of their clan. She wants to leave and join the rest of her family at Basilisk where it is much safer, but Martha refuses to let her and instead, holds Elara hostage at Blood Riders along with Fabian and Harlow who are also from her their Bunker. When her older brother Ares is brought into captivity, they work together to escape, risking their lives in the process to get back to Wynn, Quill and the rest of their people at Basilisk, suffering devastating consequences along the way.

 Season 2 

Elara follows her brothers as they return to Basilisk after having spent the past few months living in their Bunker, tying to heal from all of the losses their family have suffered. She realises she is safe at Basilisk and soon attends training classes where she develops a range of combat skills. When she learns that Sol - the Nobel Sovereign - has gone missing, her future at Basilisk as uncertain as Eryx Riverly (Sol's father) threatens to banish her and her family from camp. Knowing that without Basilisk's protection Blood Riders will come after them, her brother Wynn leads a search team to find Sol and bring her home so that she can announce them as members of Basilisk. During his search, Wynn also ends up missing and Elara joins Ares and Quill on their mission to find Wynn and Sol.

 Season 3 

Having been declared a member of Basilisk along with the rest of her family, Elara believes her future to be safe within the security of Basilisk. That is until a new clan shows up deeming themselves The City of Targo, along with her father, Kane Bell. They have traveled across the DeadLands in search for her after discovering that she is the girl prophesied in one of their clan's artefacts and have arrived to take her back to their City where she will become Commander. Not only does Elara not want to leave the home and family she has at Basilisk, but she does not want to endure The Alteration - a painful series of mental and physical trials that her father is willing to put her through in order for her to fulfil the prophecy. Despite her brothers' attempts to keep her safe from their father, Elara is captured by Kane and Rhea - the leader of The City of Targo - and forced into The Alteration where she is held at Blood Riders' labs along with Sovereign Kodiak. It becomes a fight for her her life as Elara has to find the inner strength to survive the tortures she is being put through long enough for her family to find her before The Alteration changes her for good and steals away her memory.

 Season 4 

After being rescued by Sol and her brothers, Elara is taken back to Basilisk to recover alongside Kodiak, despite the threat of her dad and The City of Targo not having been eliminated. Instead, Elara faces what seems to be her biggest challenge yet. As a result of being pulled out of The Alteration too soon, Elara is left in a state of withdrawal and suffers horrifying hallucinations and visions as a result of her dependancy on the serum (the drug used for The Alteration). However, instead of having to worry about the mental toll the visions take on her, Elara and her brothers soon realise that the most dangerous news of all is that without obtaining more of the serum soon, which only Rhea and her father have, her body will eventually go into shock and kill her.

 Season 5 

*Includes spoilers*

In a continuation from Season 4, Elara and her brothers commence the plan to kill their father along with Rhea and the rest of The City of Targo. Still battling the visions which creep up on her unexpectedly, Elara has to face the fear and leave the security of Basilisk to draw The City of Targo into the path of danger. However, in a fatal series of events, their is a miscommunication due to a water-damaged radio, and instead of the enemy facing the brutal waves of the dam that Basilisk had managed to break, it is her brother, Ares. Amidst trying to process the loss of her brother Ares, who had become a parental figure to her, Wynn and Quill after their parents abandoned them, Elara is still left with the pressure of trying to remain safe from The City of Targo. With Wynn stepping up as the protector of Elara and Quill, he and Sol devise a final plan to end the hunt for "the Heir to The City of Targo" - which is Elara. After having to betrayal some of the people they love most in the world, including Quill and Kodiak, both Wynn and Elara manage to convince Rhea and Kane that Elara is dead, believing that with no one left to fight for, The City of Targo will leave their grounds and return home. Instead, unbeknownst to her, they make a threat to massacre all of Basilisk unless they are able to leave with someone who can take her place. It is not until Elara is locked up in one of the cells at Basilisk (so that she cannot escape) that she realises her brother, Wynn, left as the sacrifice...

 Season 6 

Having spent the past 8 months healing over the loss of her brother Ares, Elara is doing well and has secured the title of Basilisk's second strongest fighter (right after Dreea Taven). The peace she has found is only challenged when she discovers her brother's plans to head into The City of Targo where Rhea and her father are - both who are still under the impression that Elara is dead. Knowing that Wynn's happiness depends on him making it to The City and bringing Sol home, Elara agrees to help, having to initiate the alliance between Basilisk and Blood Riders. She faces all of her fears on her mission to help bring Sol home, with every single reason being her brother, and as she hides on the far side of the DeadLands with her family, she must face not only the visions again, but Rhea and her father...

 Season 7 

In what seems to be Elara's hardest battle yet, she has to face the threat of Hannah Shayman - Quill's biological mother who returned with her people from The City of Targo. Not only is she trying to take Quill away from her and Wynn, but she is using Kodiak - the man Elara loves - to divide her attention. With Quill falling trap under Hannah's manipulation, it is up to Elara and Wynn to remind Quill of what makes a family, which certainly isn't blood, before it is too late. In the face of a great flood coming to make the ground uninhabitable, Elara worries that she won't end up safe with her brothers in the end, and of course, with Kodiak who has called things off in their relationship and is acting unexplainably distant towards her. After discovering that Kodiak is being controlled by an implant in the back of his head from Hannah, Elara and Wynn begin to worry that Quill is next and that they won't ever be able to save him from Hannah's deceit. In a fast-pace series of events, Elara manages to get herself safe in one of the two bunkers by the time the flood comes, but she still looses someone in the end...

 Season 8 

Reeling from the sudden loss of Kodiak, Elara is still trying to come to terms with his absence 6 months later. Having been in the Bunker the entire time with Wynn, Quill, Sol and several others, she has looked for everything possible to distract her mind from the inconsolable heartache that tears through her everyday. The only thing that has managed to bring her some comfort is an 8-year old orphaned girl known as "Izzy" (Isobel Kady Zora) who ended up in the Bunker with them. Elara adopts a mother-role with the young girl, helping her to adjust to life in the very same Bunker where Elara spent her first 14 years of life, and taking care of her needs and responsibilities. She spends most of her nights recalling stories to Izzy of her "Uncle Wynn", "Nobel Sovereign Riverly" or, Izzy's favourite - "The Great Sovereign Kodiak". When discussions about the ground being habitable again being to arise, their Bunker is invaded and everyone is taken on board an old, navy ship where an organisation known as Neptunum hold them prisoner. It is during her time here where Elara discovers how fragile life is, and how strong you have to be to live it. When her brother Wynn is one of the people to go missing on board the ship, along with her daughter, Izzy, Elara suffers a mental breakdown after coming to the conclusion that they have both been killed - whilst she is still grieving Kodiak - and threatens to hurt herself unless the people working for Neptunum give her answers to her family's whereabouts. Fearing that Elara will do something dangerous without intervention, one of Neptunum's guards - Ammon - comes to her rescue and manages to sedate her before she can harm herself. The next day, Wynn is returned to rations and revealed to everyone that he is alive. However, unable to tell everyone of a plan he is carrying out, Wynn has to allow himself to be captured to undergo the trials the Neptunum are running on board the ship. When the trials prove unresponsive on him, leader of Neptunum - Athena Archelaus - decides to use Wynn's siblings on the trials and starts the process with Elara. When she is being led by Athena to the medical wing of the ship, Elara hears familiar voices coming from one of the hallways and as she stops to figure out who she can hear, Elara sees her brother, Wynn, walking alongside Kodiak who is miraculously alive and right in front of her. Dressed in a Neptunum guard uniform, Elara is in complete shock and struggling to understand if what she is seeing is real when Wynn has no choice but to pull out a MediPen from his pocket and sedate her - just as "Ammon" had done to her previously - to avoid her blowing Kodiak's cover in front of Athena. When Elara wakes up, she is being wheeled into a room by an unmasked Kodiak who seals them inside and finally comes face to face with her after 6 months apart. After an emotional reunion, Kodiak reveals that in the time between everyone making it inside of the bunkers and the flood coming, he along with Bas - who had also been presumed dead - were picked up by Neptunum and brought onto their ship. Kodiak tells her that he has been posing as a guard named Ammon Zontanós and hatching a plan to bring Basilisk out of the bunkers so they could use the ship to find dry land to return to. With the next few days consisting of their friends finding out the truth about Kodiak and secret visits to see Izzy, the two lovebirds make their way up to the ship's deck one night wearing disguises and spend a few moments together which have been long overdue. During this time, Kodiak surprises Elara by proposing to her and asking her to marry him to which, she of course says 'yes'. However, their joy is short-lived when several guards from Neptunum, including Athena, discover them on the deck and assume that "Ammon" is being taken advantage by one of the prisoners who is using him to escape. Because of this belief, Athena gives the order for one of her guards to fire a bullet that ends up shooting Elara in the stomach, killing her within seconds. With everything happening so fast, Elara's life ends as she falls back into a distraught Kodiak who is reeling in the anguish of what he has witnessed. As part of Neptunum's mission, Athena and her people manage to fix Elara's wounds and connect her to a life-support machine where they keep her body alive, despite her brain being dead. They plan to test out tubes of the combination they have produced - an impossible serum which they believe can reverse the effects of brain death and bring someone back to life, as long as their body hasn't started to decompose. When several attempts of this fail to work on her, Athena encourages "Ammon" to let Elara go and allow her to die honourably, but he refuses. When Wynn and Quill are alerted to their sister's death - mere years after losing their older brother, Ares - Wynn sacrifices himself to the trials and informs Athena of the implant in his head left behind from Hannah, which Kodiak had told him was stopping the trials from working on him. With this newfound knowledge, Athena is able to adapt the trials to reactivate Wynn's implant and successfully produce the combination however, in order to achieve this, she left Wynn on the brink of death with not enough of the combination to save him and Elara. As Kodiak uses the combination on Elara to try and revive her, she falls into a state of purgatory with Wynn - who is moments away from death - where the two siblings enter a haze in which their late brother, Ares, appears to them and urges them to fight to stay alive for the sake of their brother Quill who is about to have lost all three of them for good. Despite all the trauma and tragedies they have faced, Elara and Wynn agree to respond to the attempts of their friends who are working to bring them back, and leave their state of purgatory to return to Quill, Kodiak, Sol - and everyone else who is desperately awaiting them to survive. With her brain somehow functioning again, Kodiak is in a race against time to get Elara off of the ship and onto one of the vessel ships that are carrying his people off of the burning ship and towards dry land. In the grand finale of Season 8, Elara is revealed to be, although incredibly weak, alive and alert and courageously holding onto her life with every ounce of strength she has left.

Season 9
After the immense trauma Elara faced both physically and mentally whilst on Neptunum, she finds herself struggling to return to her usual self as her body works on healing and overcoming everything that she endured. To make things even worse, Izzy is certain that something happened to her whilst she was on the ship and as an effort to protect her from finding out the truth, Elara shields the knowledge from her to prevent her from becoming overly paranoid and anxious. However, Izzy is determined to protect Elara just like she had done for her whilst she was in the Bunker and recovering from the loss of her father, Josiah, and decides to take matters into her own hands by leaving camp in search for answers about the island they have found themselves on. When Basilisk's temporary camp is raided by a clan known as Terra Firma Tribe, Elara is terrified when she can't find Izzy and begins to launch a search party for her after Terra Firma leave to investigate the sound of distant explosives, only for Izzy to turn up unharmed. When she reveals to Elara that she found a greenhouse and several handwritten journals, Elara, Kodiak and the other Sovereigns discover that the journals hold the secrets to a second clan that is living on the island known as West of The City Exile Allegiance (shortened to Exile Allegiance). When they realise that the clan are descendants from The City of Targo, old fears begin to resurface and force Basilisk into a dangerous position between both clans. After the journals Izzy finds prove to be vitally beneficial to Basilisk, Kodiak returns to the greenhouse in search for more answers, only to end up with more than he bargained for. Kodiak - along with Quill - reveal to Elara, Wynn, and Izzy that Quill is also an original descendant of West of The City Exile Allegiance, not The City of Targo like her family had always suspected. As well as this revelation, Elara also learns that Quill - her adopted brother - is biologically related to her adopted daughter - Izzy - as cousins. Whilst this news is over-joyous to Elara, she quickly notices the change and sudden reservation within Izzy, though she can't get her to open up about what is bothering her. When she wakes the next day, Elara is told by Kodiak that he caught Izzy trying to sneak out of camp during the night with his blade and a flashlight she had stolen from Wynn's tent. They both question Izzy again and try to understand what has caused her change in behaviour, but they are unable to get any answers from her and instead, can only promise Izzy that they will be there to listen and protect her whenever she is ready. When Elara later on decides to take a nap in her tent (it is mentioned by Kodiak that she is constantly exhausted and having to rest as a result of her recovery from what happened on Neptunum), she is woken up by Kodiak who is there to inform her that Izzy is potential in danger due to discreet markings she has which shows she is from Exile Allegiance. As this could be fatal for Izzy if Terra Firma Tribe notice the markings, Elara and Kodiak decide they need to warn Izzy of the dangers of leaving camp, only to realise that she has already snuck out... When she and Kodiak launch a search party to find Izzy, to head towards Exile Allegiance to find her, but are soon called back to the beach when they learn Wynn and Dreea rescued her from Terra Firma Tribe (with the help of Ivy). Elara immediately runs to Izzy and comforts her, but is confused when she realises Kodiak isn't joining her, and neither were Wynn or Quill with Izzy before she reached her. As she talks to Izzy and tries to get answers about what happened to her after she left camp, Elara learns that Izzy was captured by Calvin and locked up in his cells. Traumatised from her experience, Elara is the only person Izzy will allow close (not even Kodiak, Wynn or Quill or allowed too near Izzy) however, Elara quickly realises the main issue this raises: with the war between Basilisk, Exile Allegiance, and Terra Firma Tribe soon to be underway, Elara and Kodiak had planned to hide Izzy in Tobias' shelter along with Quill - both who have rights to Exile Allegiance's protection because of their blood relations. But, with Izzy too afraid to be near any man - including Quill - and with her too afraid to be without Elara, it leaves them with very few choices at staying safe during the war. As a last resort, the Sovereigns agree to keep a small group of their people on the beach whilst the fight takes place in the forest; this includes people within their clan who are elderly, injured, or people the Sovereigns want to protect (such as their siblings, partners, and immediate family members). This allows Elara to stay with Izzy when the war begins as Basilisk's guards team up with a small group of Exile Allegiance's guards to protect the group. Shortly after, strays from Terra Firma Tribe who avoided being killed in the first attack, make their way down to the group on the beach and begin to lead their own attack. After a near miss in which they are saved by Kodiak, he and Elara understand that they are unable to keep Izzy safe on the ground and have to turn back to their previous option of hiding Izzy in the shelter however, this means that Elara won't be able to stay with her. Keeping it a secret for as long as possible, Elara and Kodiak follow an Exile Allegiance guard up towards the shelter and finally, Izzy catches onto what is happening. Desperate to not be separated, Izzy pleads with Elara and tries to communicate that the trauma of not only being taken by Terra Firma Tribe is still fresh, but the death of her father, Josiah, is as well, and this feels an awful lot like when she lost him. In a final attempt for Izzy to convince Elara not to leave her, she exclaims that the pain she is feeling "is an eight". This is a significant revelation and almost enough for Elara to change her mind about putting Izzy in the shelter, but she knows she has to do it. With her "baby girl" crying and terrified, Elara and Kodiak have a tearful farewell with Izzy before allowing the guard to take her away and secure her inside the shelter. Just when they think the hardest part of the battle is over, Elara and Kodiak are approached by a blood-covered Tobias who informs them that Ivy has been killed by Calvin. In Tobias' desperation to save Ivy, he demands that they hand him over the last of the combination from Neptunum. When Kodiak explains that Sol has it and that he and Elara need to focus on finding somewhere to lay-low until the war is over, Tobias gives them an ultimatum: if they don't get him the combination, Tobias will never let Izzy out of the shelter...

 Significant kills: 


 * Rhea Forrest

 Debts: 

A.B - Elara's first debt is for her brother Ares as he is the reason she was able to escape from Blood Riders and reunite with the rest of their family. She also wanted it because Ares took up their parents' responsibilities at raising and protecting her after they arrived on the ground. Although Basilisk's policy is that the first debt someone receives is that of one of their Sovereigns, Elara refused until she go Ares' initials tattooed on her as he "was the one who saved {her} first."

W.B - Elara's second debt is for her brother Wynn because of what he risked by breaking out of Basilisk and helping her to escape from Blood Riders. It becomes more fundamental to her after Season 5 when Wynn resumes Ares' role of providing for and protecting their siblings after Ares is killed. It is again emphasised in Season 8 when Wynn saves Elara's life on Neptunum by sacrificing himself to Athena so that he can get Elara the combination.

Q.B - Elara's third debt is for her brother, Quill, who was also involved in helping Wynn to get her out of Blood Riders. She also has it as a way to acknowledge the hope Quill brings her as he is always able to make her feel calm and less anxious about the circumstances of their world. She believes that if she didn't have him around, she wouldn't have had the strength to face half the battles she has.

K.Z - The fourth debt Elara received was for Sovereign Kodiak Zora as he was involved in helping her and her family escape from Blood Riders. This debt becomes particularly significant to her when Kodiak sacrifices himself to follow her to the labs when she is taken hostage by The City of Targo to ensure that she doesn't face anything alone. It is also extremely meaningful to her as in Season 8, Kodiak helps to bring her back to life with the combination and after they escape Neptunum, he becomes her husband.

J.K - Elara chose to get a debt for Josiah Kady whilst she was in the Bunker as she recognises that if it wasn't for him, she never would have had the opportunity to know and love her adoptive daughter, Isobel.

S.R - Elara received the debt for Sol after she announced her as a part of Basilisk and gave her a home within her people and a safe place to live. Sol is also responsible for helping to save her from The City of Targo's capture in Season 3 and helping to convince Rhea and Kane that she (Elara) is dead in Season 5 which saves her from being taken away from Basilisk. At the end of Season 5, Sol sacrifices herself and allows The City of Targo to take her in place of Elara and Wynn.

D.T - Elara has Dreea's debt tattooed on her to credit her for being part of the team that helped rescue her from Blood Riders. Elara is also one of the few people in Basilisk to receive private training classes from Dreea after Sovereign Kodiak Zora asked her to train Elara.

F.J - Elara is in debt to Fenn after he helped her survive the consequences of being pulled out of The Alteration before it was complete and the lingering effects of the Serum. He was also involved in the failed plan to wipe out The City of Targo, but still risked his life nonetheless, in an effort to protect her.

A.I - Aeryn is someone Elara is in debt to as she, along with Fenn, aided Elara in surviving The Alteration, seizures, and visions that followed as a consequence of using the serum.

C.J - Elara is in debt to Chessca because of her involvement in handing Basilisk enough of the serum to keep Elara alive and wean her dependance off of the drug. She also risked her own life and betrayed Rhea and Kane on multiple occasions to prevent them from capturing Elara and erasing her memories with The Alteration. In Season 6, Chessca managed to keep Elara alive during a process in which she connected her mind to Sol's in a last-bid attempt to restore Sol's memories.

I.K.Z - Elara got the initials of Izzy tattooed on her as a way of crediting her for being her reason to stay alive when she was in the Bunker after believing that Kodiak was dead. She knows that if it wasn't for Izzy teaching her how to love again and needing her around to protect and nurture her, she might not have survived her time in the Bunker.

I.E - Elara decided to get a debt for Ivy Ellis is recognition of not only how she allowed Basilisk to secure an alliance with Exile Allegiance (which allowed them safety on the island), but most importantly, because she risked her own life to get Izzy out of Terra Firma Tribe and reunite her with Basilisk.

 Trivia: 

Elara was the first of four children to be born inside of the Bunker.

She is the Heir (next in line) to the Commander of The City of Targo, as is revealed in Season 3, due to her mother - Martha - also having been in line to the Commander of The City prior to moving into the Bunkers. After Martha died and The City of Targo learned about Elara (via Kane), they began a pursuit to find her and declare leadership upon her.

She is very skilled at braiding hair as she used to braid Hayzel's hair every morning in the Bunker after learning from Valarie.

Initially, Elara's bond with Izzy was similar to that of which she had with Hayzel inside the Bunker when she was younger. However, due to their circumstances, their bond quickly deepened and Elara became the adoptive mother of Izzy.

Elara was diagnosed with epilepsy shortly after being rescued from Blood Riders' Labs as a result of her withdrawals and aftereffects from the serum and The Alteration. She experiences seizures in the following seasons however, Aeryn and Fenn manage to stabilise her condition shortly after Ares' death, and she has not experienced a seizure since (though she still has the condition).

Ares was the person who taught her to walk and witnessed her first steps. The first comprehensible name she ever said was "Res" (A/res).

After their return to the Bunker in Season 7, Elara became the guardian of Harlow Blackwood following what they believed to be Bas' death after he failed to make it into a bunker, and she became the primary caregiver of him and Izzy.

Her older brother, Quill, was the one who named her. He picked out her name from the main character of a book that Ares used to read to him every night when he first moved into the Bunker.

She named her son after her late, older brother Ares, who was her primary guardian after arriving on the ground. She wanted to honour her brother and maintain her belief that a part of him would be with her for the rest of her life and felt that giving her son his name would remind her that (he) was always close.

Despite the way Josiah Kady (Izzy's biological father) hurt Elara's family deeply - primarily by trying to take Quill away from her and Wynn - Elara, Kodiak, and her brothers agreed not to ever tell Izzy of their encounters with her father or his intentions with them in order to preserve Izzy's fond memories of him and not interfere with her healing or coming-to-peace with his death. Elara was the one who suggested this to her family.

She (and Kodiak) are the only people to explicitly become married and have children (Izzy and Ares) in the series. Everyone else's partners and children are revealed in the epilogue, but the moment they consummate their relationship or welcome a child is not directly shown.

Elara was determined to become the mother to Izzy that she, herself, had never had. This played a significant factor in Elara's decision to put Izzy in the shelter in Season 9 to protect her, rather than following her own desires at keeping Izzy nearby (contrasting to when Martha kept Elara captive at Blood Riders so she didn't lose her to Basilisk, rather than letting her leave with her brothers to join the rest of their family in an environment that was much safer for her).

__INDEX__