Chapter Text
The wings. The boy’s Illyrian wings will get stuck in your Fae body during the labor, and it will kill you both. Your mate ordered everyone not to inform you of the truth.
Before she knew where she was going, Feyre was out the door and down the steps, her feet pounding out a desperate rhythm as she ran from Amren’s apartment.
I will die. My baby will die. Rhys will die.
And he knew. He knew.
Feyre ran silently, swiftly, but inside she was roaring with fury and desperation. Not my baby. Not my son.
She touched her hand to her belly, promising, I will find a way to save you. I’ll do whatever it takes.
Tears flowed down her face, knowing the promise was empty. Rhys would have thought of everything. With his powers, his magic, his knowledge, he would have figured something out by now. It must really be hopeless.
Rhys had been preoccupied, moody lately — now she knew why. He hid this from me. That fucking bastard, he let me think everything was fine.
But he’d told everyone else — all her friends had known. Her cheeks flushed at what a fool she’d been. They’d let her babble on about her plans for the nursery, about carriages and toys and books, as though any of that mattered.
As though her son had a future.
Would she get to hold her baby, even once? Would she feel his soft, warm skin, look into those beautiful eyes? Would they go together into the darkness, meet somewhere on the other side?
Feyre stifled a gasp as Cassian swooped down and scooped up her sister, who’d run out a few moments before — hopefully taking her to safety, far away from Rhys and his wrath. He would be angry at Nesta, of course. The one person she could count on to tell her the truth.
It was ironic that, of all the people Feyre had grown to love and think of as family, only Nesta had thought to treat her like an adult, capable of handling the truth. Nesta, who she’d locked away in the House of Wind, who understood what it was like to have no control over your life or your body. Feyre’s cheeks burned with shame as she ran, as she watched Cassian disappear over the mountains with her sister dangling in his arms.
I owe Nesta an apology and much, much more.
Feyre shook her head, dashing down a side street and emerging into a crowded marketplace. She pulled her hood over her head and pushed her sleeves down, desperate to blend in with the crowd. She’d never felt unsafe around her mate or her friends before, but if they were willing to lie to her about her own body, about her own baby, what else might they be willing to do in the name of her safety?
Feyre. Feyre darling.
No.
Feyre slammed her mental shield firmly into place — black adamant, hard, immovable.
Rhys’s talons scraped at the boundary of her mind, seeking her, begging her to let him in, to let him explain. She ignored him. Then continued to ignore him as he threw himself against her shield, desperate. Distraught. Frantic.
She considered telling him to fuck off, but he didn’t deserve even that.
She’d allowed his beautiful, seductive voice in her mind to lull her into complacency. She’d let him chip at her freedom, her autonomy, a little bit at a time, until she was more firmly controlled than she’d ever been in Tamlin’s manor.
It had started during the war, she realized — when she’d felt like she had to lie to Mor in order to slip away and find the Suriel. Why had she felt the need to do that? Once Rhys had goaded her to slip into the Weaver’s Cottage just to retrieve a fucking ring, but when she was really needed, when Hybern had the upper hand, what had Mor said?
Rhys will kill me if I leave you here.
Feyre had been too preoccupied at the time to process that. Had brushed it off. But it made no sense that she would need Mor to guard her — was she not a High Lady, capable of wielding the powers of all seven High Lords? Had she not fought in battles before?
Feyre had totally failed to notice how she was slowly being herded away from the front lines, from opportunities to make a difference, from any risk at all.
Rhys was becoming controlling, even then. And recruiting his friends — my friends — to help him.
And since she’d become pregnant, he’d only gotten worse.
He’d put a shield around her so impenetrable that her own family and friends couldn’t physically touch her.
He’d convinced her to lock up her own sister, supposedly for Nesta’s own good.
Worst of all, he’d lied to her about her own body. About her baby. About the risk to her life.
He was going to let me die without telling me. They all were.
Feyre’s tears flowed freely, for her baby and for herself. She wouldn’t let herself cry for Rhys, too — not just now, not when he’d broken her trust in such a basic way.
She fled from one street to the next, insensible of where she was going, but knowing she couldn’t go home. Couldn’t go anywhere Rhys or the others would find her. She needed to be alone, to think clearly — maybe for the first time in years.
But where could she go?
She suddenly wished they hadn’t bulldozed Nesta’s apartment in the seedy section of town. It would have been a perfect hiding place.
Feyre slowed down, clutching her belly. She’d been told that exercise was fine, that moving her body would help keep her in good condition for the labor, that the baby was healthy and strong — but now she wondered if she could trust anything Madja had told her.
She only said it was risky. She didn’t tell me I might die.
Feyre looked around at the crowd in the market — blithely going about their business, shopping or strolling or chatting — and frowned when she didn’t spot even one pregnant belly amongst the throng. She’d been told having babies was difficult, that it could take years to get pregnant, that younglings were prized and rare. But now it really hit home.
She could have cried from the loneliness alone.
Feyre didn’t know one other pregnant person, or anyone who’d been through that experience who could relate to what she was going through. She’d been the youngest of her family, so she had no memory of her mother being pregnant or giving birth. She certainly didn’t know anyone who’d had to make the sort of heart-wrenching decisions that she now faced.
Suddenly Feyre missed her mother terribly — not her actual mother, to whom she’d never been close, but the idea of having a mother, of someone loving her the way that she already loved her son.
Feyre darling, please. Please.
No. No.
She angrily shoved him away. She was too angry to even think of talking to him right now. And she certainly wasn’t going to give him a chance to spin his mental circles around her, muddying her reasoning until she was tempted to excuse his controlling behavior.
He lied. He tried to keep me sheltered, like a fucking child.
She’d left Tamlin for treating her this way — had left Rhys once, lying in the mud, for keeping her life’s secrets from her. Yet he was going to let this happen without even giving her a chance to properly say goodbye.
Feyre cast her magic out across Velaris — seeking somewhere she could go to get some space, figure things out. Rhys controlled everything and everyone in this city, would be able to find her too easily if she went to any of their homes or usual hangouts.
She sucked in a shaky breath, willing herself to be calm, to face this new challenge with courage and a clear mind, and winnowed.