Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

man oh man we are back.

I. I just want to start by saying thank you to anyone who reads this story. It's one thing to read a whole fanfic, but it's another beast entirely to devote yourself to its sequel. Legitimate, published books sometimes don't even end up being lucky enough to have readers like you, so thank you.

II. Playing in the worlds of SJM is always so much fun for me and I had a blast plotting this story! (though I won't lie, I'm not exactly done). With that being said, here is your warning that this will contain spoilers for both Throne of Glass and Crescent City, and you'll certainly be seeing some familiar faces. You've been warned. Welcome to the crossover we all wished for but haven't got (yet??). This story also takes place 4 months after ACOSF and CC3, so be prepared for some reading in regard to what everyone has been up to.

III. I've heard of the AO3 curse but didn't ever truly believe in it because I was pretty smooth sailing posting consistently. I do fear, however, that I have the opposite, in which strange and outlandish setbacks begin to occur when I am not actively writing/posting... so, here I am again. Please give me peace @ ao3.

IV. On a final note and completely juxtaposed, I don't currently have a posting schedule set up for this story. While I'll try to keep it semi-consistent, I can't force myself into an intense writing regimen right now. I'm looking forward to approaching this story at a leisurely pace and enjoying the process, so there's no 40-chapter backlog like the last one, unfortunately. I'll post as I go!

Once again, I hope you enjoy reading this story as much as I've enjoyed writing it!

𓆩⟡𓆪

m o o d b o a r d 🗡

Chapter Text

Fallon

Azriel hovered in the doorway of the bedroom, one shoulder leaning up against the frame as his eyes tracked every single curve the dress she'd chosen dared to reveal.

"You look... devastating." Her mate managed, words tapering off into nothing more than a stunned whisper.

Feeling his eyes on her like this – it still made her toes curl, still filled her with that same giddy excitement he drew from her with a simple touch, even when they'd barely known one another.

Fallon peered over her shoulder into the mirror, mussing a hand through the silky straights of her hair as she did so. The fabric of the dress itself was divine: a deep navy mixed with a royal blue, and a shimmering texture that looked as if the dress itself had been dipped in starlight. A low, sweeping back framed the scars that she usually hid, but her eyes didn't focus there anyway. The dress truly clung to her like a second skin, and even in the mirror she could see, let alone feel, that the Shadowsinger couldn't take his eyes off of her.

She walked toward him, the click of her lengthy heels muted by the plush rug atop the hardwood floors of the master bedroom, and paused a handsbreadth away from his chest.

"I haven't forgotten how well you clean up," she teased, running a hand down the hybrid dress leathers adorned with his siphons. A mix of formal attire, but still functional, if not an exact match to what he'd worn to the gala in the Day Court all that time ago. Even then, her mouth had watered.

And now...

She trailed an admiring hand up his neck, gently running her nails along the tail of their bargain. How far they'd come. How far they'd grown together.

It'd be a lie if she said she hadn't wanted to rip his clothes off in that foyer at least a little that day so long ago – especially after he had taken it upon himself to strap a dagger to her thigh.

"I do alright," he replied in modest, though the hazel of his eyes had turned stormy. "And while you look as stunning as can be, I think I'd much rather see how this dress looks on our floor."

She grinned, a familiar rush of excitement warming her insides at his words. Fallon couldn't help but beam up at him, playing with the silver necklace at her throat. "Patience, Shadowsinger. The night has only begun."
Azriel watched her with a hawk's gaze, taking a step forward to eliminate whatever space still lingered between them. "You'll have to forgive me; I can't help if my patience wears thin at the thought of satisfying my beautiful mate," He brought a hand up to trace the cut of her jaw, a tease and an invitation in one.

She brought her lips dangerously close to his, so close that skin brushed skin. "Then maybe it's time we teach you some."

Fallon darted out of his reach before he could pull her in, and though her soul yearned for nothing more than to be wrapped in his arms, wrapped up in him, she'd found that teasing had not only become her favorite game as of late, but it ramped her mate up like no other. And having him frenzy and fawn and lust over her just as she did him... it was an effort not to clench her thighs together at the mere thought.

Azriel swallowed, analyzing her once more as if she were some intangible treasure. "You want to teach me patience?" He reiterated, taking a step closer. A shadow pressed against her back, forcing her in place while he tipped her chin up to face him. "I seem to remember you tearing my clothes off the last few times before we even made it through the front door, love."

He wasn't wrong. In fact, he was completely right. But she only smirked, not budging an inch, and watched as the Shadowsinger's eyes flashed in challenge.

"Patience it is, then." He muttered, and stalked to the nightstand beside the bed. A shadow tore the bottom drawer open and he collected something from inside, reappearing before her in a flash.

Two corked tubes rested in his palm. The liquid inside glinted metallic under the faelight, still sloshing from the jostle. She hadn't forgotten those bottles. Couldn't, from the way her face had burned crimson upon opening Cassian's Solstice gift, only to find two aphrodisiac potions in wait.

Fallon looked to the brews and then back to him, brows raised once more. Was he serious?
"Let's see which one of us has more control over ourselves when it comes to the other then, Fal."
Oh, he was deadly serious. Fallon pressed her lips together to keep from smiling and delicately plucked one from his scarred hand, her fingers briefly lingering on the skin – something she tried to do every time she caught him looking at himself in distaste. Even if he couldn't stomach the sight of the scars, she loved them all. Had kissed them countless times, over and over. Anything that was part of him, she'd love so deeply, so soul-achingly, until it hurt. Scars especially.

"Are you prepared to be feeling one another up at the house warming party for our High Lord and High Lady?" She posed the question, voice tilting toward doubt, as she inspected the tube in her hand.

Rhys, perhaps taking a page out of Azriel's book or vice versa, had also gifted his mate an entire damn house. The River House, they called it – and now that it was entirely built, furnished, and decorated, and the world wasn't falling apart at the seams, a small, albeit late housewarming party had been posed courtesy of Mor... and then one thing led to another, and after several glasses of wine, Mor had wound up inviting a few more of their friends to the gathering.

Fallon didn't necessarily know how much a 'few' entailed, but judging by the required fancy attire and the look on Rhys and Feyre's face when Mor told them, maybe she should've been expecting something more the speed of a gala.

Azriel huffed a humorless laugh and brought his palm up to brush against hers. "No feeling one another up," he breathed the words as if he didn't truly want to speak them. "In fact, no touching at all." He tore his hand away, and she was left with the ghost of his warmth on her skin. "First one to do so loses."

"And the repercussions?" She raised a brow, trying to stifle her growing excitement.

"Dealer's choice," his half-hooded eyes warned of danger, reminding her that she was about to enter a very dangerous game. Because as much as she was a professional at riling up her mate, Azriel, too, had proven no small amount of times that he knew exactly how to make her tick. And beg. And scream.

She popped the cork on the tube. "Can we make amendments to these rules as the night continues?" she goaded, walking two fingers up his chest.

He caught her hand, strong fingers engulfing her dainty ones as he gave them a gentle squeeze. "If necessary."

"Then deal."

She moved to down the potion, but Azriel caught her hand.

He took the tube from her and stepped inches closer, his fingers winding through the back of her hair and gently tugging back to expose her mouth to him.

"Open," he said, voice husky. She obeyed, lips parting, and the sweet silver liquid hit her tongue seconds later. She didn't dare break eye contact as he poured it down her throat, jaw clenched as he did so, until the glass had emptied.

She sucked in a much-needed long, calming breath, and took the tube from his hand.

"Kneel."

The Shadowsinger watched her with a look that could only communicate that he'd fucked up, and that this was going to be worlds harder than he anticipated, as she stepped toward his kneeling form and combed a hand through his black locks. Then, tracing a nail down his jaw, she paused at his chin and leaned forward until her lips were nearly touching his again.

"Open," she whispered. He expelled a short breath as his lips parted, hands snaking up her hips to grip the firm muscle underneath. "Now drink."

She tipped the glass, watching the silver liquid flow to his tongue, and decided that a little more evil couldn't hurt. "Just like that, Az," she said breathily, and she knew he got the gist when his eyes met hers with a dangerous glint. "That's so good."

His hands made to roam her body as he swallowed the last of the liquid, but she quickly stepped back with nothing but a teasing, "No touching," and she swore for a second something in his chest lurched, a beast chomping at the bit.

Instead, the Shadowsinger mastered himself, his face unreadable once again as he stood from his kneel and towered over her. He peered down at her, graceful and cold and unrelenting, and said, "You wicked, wicked thing," with something of approval in his eyes. "I'm going to make this night agonizing for you."

"Really?" she purred, pulling her best look of innocence. "I think this night is going to end for you the way it started, Shadowsinger."

"Oh?" He humored. "And how might that be?"

Fallon cast a devious smirk over her shoulder as she stepped toward the door. Didn't miss the gaze that lingered on her bum before he met her eyes.

"On your knees, of course."

𓆩⟡𓆪

Fallon winnowed onto the lawn of the River House at the same moment Azriel landed just feet away. The Shadowsinger gracefully tucked his wings in tight, but not before flaring them in a wide stretch that nearly sent one brushing against her arm.

Tease.

Rhys and Feyre stood on the upper porch suspended off of what she could only assume was the living room. She had yet to catch a chance to peek her head into the magical abode, but judging by the exterior... the High Lord had spared no expense.

The house itself stood at least three stories tall, sprawling out in a massive rectangle just in front of a glittering vein of the Sidra. Fallon took in the towering pillars framing the front doors and the walls of windows spanning the length of the mansion-esque home, and turned to her mate with a scowl. "I'm guessing you and Rhys swapped notes then, huh?" She asked, folding her arms across her chest.

Honestly, the thought of the two of them helping one another put together the houses they'd each gotten their mates was... downright adorable. And a testament to how absolutely insane the men of the Night Court were when it came to their counterparts.

Even if she did secretly love it.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Azriel drawled, and stuffed his hands into his pockets. He caught the eyes of the High Lord and Lady watching them from the lofted porch above.

"Lovers' quarrel?" Feyre raised a brow and sipped from the champagne in her hand. It was then, Fallon realized, how odd they must've looked.

Even when she had no idea the Shadowsinger was actually her other half in disguise, they'd found ways to be close to one another, stealing touches and body heat and any other interaction to quell the aches in their souls.

And now, standing feet apart on the lawn from one another as two separate entities as opposed to their usual united front... Yeah, it probably looked fucking weird.

But Fallon readied her mask, pulling her lips into a smirk as she cast a look at the Shadowsinger. "Of a sort," she answered Feyre. Azriel held her stare with predatory intent.

Had the aphrodisiac brew kicked in for him yet? She didn't feel any different aside from the usual feral thoughts roaming her mind. A constant she learned to deal with, though she'd be lying if she said it was as easy as it sounded.

A bout of nerves shot up her spine. Maybe the brew wasn't a good idea. They were unhinged and unruly enough around one another to begin with, and adding an escalation to the mix...

"Rethinking so soon?" The devil himself took a step toward her, hands still in his pocket as he drew his eyes from the ground to meet hers.

The glint within them nearly caught her breath in her throat. Nearly, if not for the shadow tracing a seductive trail down her bared spine thanks to the low back of the dress.

Her jaw dropped open. Oh, she was so, so fucked.

"That is so cheating," she growled, not daring to step back as he prowled even closer. "I'm still learning how to control my light."

Another shadow curled against her ear, drawing out a shiver as it teased the fragile skin. "Tough," Azriel smirked. "Perhaps you should've thought about that before agreeing."

Fallon opened her mouth to bite his head off, but a shadow flit over her lips, blocking the words entirely. "And I don't plan to amend that part of our deal."

For the second time tonight, her jaw dropped. If she couldn't change the fucking rules against his shadows, then how was she supposed to level the playing field? She should've been infuriated, and yet she couldn't decide if tearing his head from his body or tearing just the clothes from him would satisfy the craving.

Fallon indignantly crossed her arms over her chest and fixed her best glare on the conniving Shadowsinger before her. But no matter the intensity of their stare-off, she knew it would be easier making Ramiel bend to her will rather than the stubborn bastard eyeing her like she was his favorite meal.

"Fine," she spat. "But you asked for it."

Azriel broke her stare for only a moment to glance up at the balcony toward the High Lord.

The air around her began to shift, as if something was being nudged out of the way to settle into place. Fallon, too, spared a glance up at the balcony to see Rhys and Feyre's faces alight with amusement.

"Did you – did you just tell them?" Fallon gaped at her mate, torn between rage and violent embarrassment. But Azriel held that infuriating smirk and leaned in, so close that his breath tickled the shell of her ear.

"For necessary purposes," he said huskily. "Careful, Fal. Everyone else might not be able to catch your scent now, but I still can. And your desire is showing."

Her cheeks flushed a healthy red. She hadn't even considered that part – the shift in their scents. But at least that telltale ripple of a glamour now masked the heady desire rolling off of them both.

Oh, she'd become a fucking master at spotting glamours over the past months. It was the first topic she forced Rhys to train her in upon starting their sessions back up, and she'd refused to move on to other explorations until she could clock the shimmer of a glamour from a mile away.

Now, the very skill that had gotten her killed had become one of her greatest talents.

She didn't dare look back up at the High Lord nor Lady despite feeling their gazes burn into her back like a branding iron. Not when Azriel was staring her down like a wolf would a rabbit.

"After you," he nodded toward the lit porch of the manor with a satisfied smirk that made her see red. Fallon cut one last glare at her too-smug mate and started for the intricate stone steps, swishing her hips as she went. It took a bit of focus to reach into that well of power inside, endlessly flowing like some eternal spring, and weave a few tendrils of light together in just the right way–

The sharp intake of breath from behind was enough confirmation that her plan had worked. She might not have shadows, but light, however...

Sure, she couldn't hold it for long, and they might not be as invasive as the damned shadows running up her back, but she'd take any sort of defense she could get.

Fallon nearly reached for the door handle when something in her jolted. No, not jolted – but some ache, so powerful it almost felt physical, ignited within her. An ember kindling within the depths of herself. Deep down, an insurmountable yearning had begun to sear her senses raw.

Oh, fuck. This was going to be much, much more difficult than anticipated. Her skin practically itched at the thought of his hands on her, a nagging want nestling itself at home in her chest that wouldn't be satiated until he carried every part of her body both inside and out.

She felt rather than heard his approach, settling in behind her under the bright faelight illuminating the porch. Fallon kept her breaths utterly shallow, because every whiff of his arousal sent her head spinning into dangerous territory.

She would not lose. She couldn't award him that satisfaction. Even if the threat of 'dealer's choice' made her want to cave immediately, if only to be whisked into whatever wild fantasy that wicked mind of his cooked up. Maybe it would be something to do with their binding, which the pair had found to be quite the fun addition to their personal endeavors. There was just something about handing oneself over to someone wholly, to give him undeniable control over her and truly exist in his mercy, that warmed the already burning fire within up a few more degrees.

Two tendrils of shadow wound themselves around her wrists in a velvet caress, and suddenly she was facing her mate with her back to the door. Neither shadows relented.

"Consider this your one and only chance to wave a white flag," Azriel offered, the perfect picture of ease with his relaxed, loose shoulders and a shit-eating smirk on his face.

It must not have hit him yet, then. Which made sense, she supposed – she was physically smaller than him, which probably sped up the process of the brew hitting her system... and worked in her favor, now that she considered. Her moment of peril happened not seconds ago under the cover of night and porch floodlights.

But that brew would kick into his system among a party full of Gods-knew-who.

Her eyes were lingering too long, eating up too much time tracing the delectable curve of his cupid's bow. Focusing too long on the strong column of his neck and the tail end of their bargain that dutifully marked him as hers.

Oh, she wanted to leave more marks. And wanted him to leave more on her. She wanted those strong hands freed from his pockets so he could lift her from the stone steps below her feet and into capable, finely muscled arms. Press her bare back against the door and –

Fallon let out an audible groan at the force of which reality smacked her with. Her body burned, aching with an uncomfortable hotness she knew could only be quelled by the touch of his hands on her bare skin.

Dazed, she blinked the muddled, increasingly filthy thoughts out of her head and tried to force the burn of her cheeks away when he met her stare with an all-knowing one.

"Has it hit, Fallon?" He asked, though the mocking lilt in which he questioned her only confirmed those all-knowing tendencies. "Do you want me to fix it for you?" The Shadowsinger leaned in, a hand lingering just inches from where he might cup her jaw. She was a planet and he was the sun, tugging her closer and closer with some invisible, gravitational force. Six inches closer and his fingertips would brush her jaw. Seven, and she would feel the caress of his thumb over her chin. Maybe her lips. Fallon leaned in closer, captivated by stormy hazel eyes – "Just one touch, beautiful. Only one."

She blinked again, audibly swallowing this time. Fuck. She was so screwed, and yet not screwed enough. Remaining out here with him alone, with zero distractions...

Before she could think through any semblance of a thought racing through her head, Fallon ripped the door open behind her so hard she nearly tumbled backward into the foyer – and then slammed the door in his face.

Thank fuck none of the guests were lingering toward the front of the house, which allowed her the smallest amount of privacy to work the flush from her face and reorganize the long white tresses that had strayed into her line of sight from such a hustle.

And yet, she could still hear that bastard laughing just outside.

"Prick," she cursed, kicking the shining oak door for good measure. She turned on a pointed heel and wrestled her arms back to her sides from where they'd been crossed defiantly over her chest, fought the frown from her lips and furrow from her brow, and returned to something like composure before heading down the lengthy hall. It was going to be a long fucking night.

She'd only caught sight of the first two ornately framed paintings spotlighted in the grand hallway before it hit. A surge from elsewhere, a floodgate opening inside her very chest. Wave after wave of tangible memory thrust every single thought from her head, all except –

A glimpse of sweat-slickened skin under a stream of moonlight. The clap of body against body as the sensation of pure, undiluted pleasure assaulted her senses. The way he'd written his own damn name with his thumb against her clit with slow, sweeping motions before letting her tumble over the edge.

Fallon reached out and pressed a hand against the wall for support, the cool wood accents a grounding device to her otherwise disintegrating mind. She had all but forgotten about this – his talent with sending memories and emotions through the bond. She bit her lip at the feeling of slickness between her legs. All of this, and he wasn't even inside the house yet. Gods, he was a monster, and one she would never get enough of.

"There you are! I haven't seen you in – shit. Another one?" Mor's innocent blonde head popped from the end of the hallway, concern written in the furrow of her brow as she approached. When Fallon didn't answer, too stunned to conjure up words, the girl echoed a tad more quietly, "Another ah – migraine?"

This time, she managed a shake of the head. Not another headache, thank the Mother. Not this time, at least. The splitting aches in her skull often rendered her useless for at least a good few hours, but sometimes a full twenty-four. The first time one had hit a few months back, Azriel had her to Madja so fast that she barely even remembered the bat-out-of-hell flight to the healer's personal residence.

An unfazed Madja had mentioned something about 'migraines', a human term dubbed for sorts of head pains of a similar vein. Azriel hadn't taken that answer lightly – and insisted Madja do a full body scan just in case. She couldn't even blame him, because she would have done the same. Probably would've flooded him with her own healing energy, too.

That was the part she didn't tell him. That the body scan had hurt, seriously hurt, when Madja flushed her light into Fallon's veins. Felt like fire being injected into her very blood. She'd only tried once afterward to use her own magic to heal the headaches, and well... that had been the first twenty-four hour recovery of a handful.

Madja insisted that it was her powers – that a body needed to recalibrate to that amount of energy, and especially so much power. That the physical vessel would need to learn the lay of the land before everything settled. Temporary headaches for power that rivaled a High Lord's, or maybe even surpassed. She never let those words of Madja's leave the room that day.

She didn't fault Az for his hovering nor his urgency. The past few months... while they had started peacefully, certainly not all of them ended up that way.

Nobody had expected their friends, the High Lord and High Lady, to jail a hurting Nesta in the House of Wind. Fallon loved Rhys and Feyre without a doubt in her heart – they were her family, after all. But the screaming match that unfolded between herself and the leading pair after she learned of Nesta's captive status...

Some words couldn't be taken back. And while they'd moved past the foulmouthed exchange, Fallon could never quite get over the fact that they'd fought tooth and nail to keep her free of returning to a captive life, and a future of being controlled and bossed around and stripped of her free will.

And then turned around and did the same damn thing to Feyre's own flesh and blood.

She'd be lying to herself if she said the mere thought of reliving that day didn't trigger an inexplicable and violent anger within her. The situation had resulted in the blossoming relationship between the High Lady's sister and the General, sure, but also resulted in Nesta and her two friends – Gwyn and Emerie, who insisted Fallon join in on their next slumber party, much to Nesta's chagrin – being thrown into the Blood Rite. Valkyrie training or no, she'll never forget the red-hot panic upon catching wind that the three women had been stolen away in the night. When all was said and done, Azriel had sat her down on their kitchen counter and declared that they wouldn't be separating for work unless absolutely necessary. What with him having to choose between saving Eris from an insane Briallyn or making a grab for a mindless Cassian, and her position miles upon miles away keeping tabs on the Autumn Court, neither had ever felt more useless without the other.

If only that pact had lasted longer than a month before a certain High Lord insisted otherwise.

And then Nyx was born – barely, nearly resulting in the deaths of both the High Lord and High Lady thanks to that idiotic pact they'd made – and life... life settled down, much to their benefit. Maybe it would stay that way, at least for a while.

She hoped.

The otherworldly visits from Bryce Quinlan had been fun, if not slightly terrifying, but she was certain Rhys's head would explode if a portal to yet another dimension spawned open on his front lawn. Again.

She had yet to wrap her aching head around all of... that.

"Not a migraine," Fallon cleared her throat and blinked away the rest of the lust-filled daze clouding her mind. "Just an over-competitive Shadowsinger who doesn't know what's coming to him. It's good to see you, too, Mor."

"Vallahan's been running me ragged," she griped. "Speaking of, are you and Az having it out?" Mor frowned, the stem of her wine glass perched between two well-manicured fingers. "I can probably count on one hand the times I've seen you two not stuck to each other's sides. Spill, I want to hear it all."

Fallon only shook her head, too-keen hearing catching the telltale click of a door from the entryway. Slipping her arm through Mor's, she practically dragged the girl down the hall and toward the voices floating from one of the many grand rooms of the River House.

"We're fine," Fallon huffed, none too convincing. Mor's side-eye did not go unnoticed. "I swear we're fine," Gods, she couldn't tell Mor about their... bet tonight, not if she ever wanted to live it down. It was enough that Rhys and Feyre were made aware, but she could live and die happy without the rest of their friends knowing they took an aphrodesiac brew together just to make the night a little more fun – or a little more torturous. "Your hip looks pretty empty, though. Where's Emerie?"

This time, it was Mor's turn to fluster. Red lit her cheeks as brightly as the crimson on her nails, and Fallon noted how suddenly the floor became the most interesting point in the room for the blonde.

"She's running the shop," Mor waved a hand in what she assumed was an attempt at nonchalance. Fallon just barely concealed a shit-eating smirk as they wandered their way into a living room of sorts, one painstakingly crafted with elegance in mind. Pillars adorned each corner painted a charming, muted navy that let the gold trinkets and trim decorating the space steal the show.

"Running the shop," Fallon echoed, casting a look at her friend. Mor's scowl nearly sent her into a fit of giggles. "You can't blame me," she argued. "Every single one of you knew exactly who my mate was before I even did. Now I get to return the favor of sticking my nose in places it shouldn't be."

"Fair point," the blonde grumbled, looking none too happy about it. "We're just... taking things slow."

"Slow is good," Fallon nodded along, sipping from the flute of champagne she swiped from a side tray that never seemed to go depleted in the corner of the room. Perks of another enchanted house, she guessed. "We're immortal, after all. No sense in rushing yourself."

Mor blew out a sigh. "Unless you want to rush," she muttered under her breath, impatience dancing with her words.

Several other bodies warmed the space, including Cassian, along with Feyre, Rhys, and a few other vaguely familiar faces among Velaris. The only soul competing for her attention, though, was the miniature bundle perched on Feyre's lap.

Fallon barely concealed her grin as she tugged Mor toward the tiny Illyrian, allowing the blonde's prior comment to slide. She'd tease her about it all... eventually. When her and Emerie were more settled. Gods knew the drop of a hat between she and Azriel at the beginning of his courting would have sent her scattering, too.

"How's my sweet, slightly stinky nephew doing?"

Feyre cut her a no-nonsense look of exhaustion that had Fallon handing over her champagne glass in an instant. "Slightly?" The High Lady raised her brows, and with them, the flute to her lips to empty it. "He's sixteen pounds of noxious gas right now, and the entire reason why the nursery smells like manure – because someone looked away for a moment and let him get his hands on melted cheese."

Rhys rerouted himself almost immediately, turning on a heel and escaping the room before Feyre's glare could pin him to the spot.

"I'm not surprised he's already sticking his hands into trouble, what with knowing his parents," Fallon mused. "May I?"

Feyre cast her a light-hearted eyeroll and hastily extended the child in her direction. "Please."

Mouth-breathing it was, then. Fallon sucked in a breath and took the literal stinker into her arms, trying to distract herself from the foul smell rolling off of Nyx by focusing on the precious giggles spilling from the kid's mouth. And the tiny, dainty Illyrian wings sprouted from his back.

The grin he met her with nearly sent the contents of her heart spilling out. What a spoiled, spoiled baby he'd be.

With a beaming smile, Fallon spun on a heel to face Mor – and caught sight of her Shadowsinger leaning up against the frame of the entryway instead, eyes glued to she and the precious bundle in her arms.

The sheer joy dancing in the hazel of his eyes nearly stole the air from her chest. Fallon crossed the space between them, heels clicking against the polished wood beneath her shoes. The idle chatter of the room fell away from her ears the closer she neared, enveloping them in a little bubble of their own.

"Truce," she murmured, "For now."

Azriel's lips tugged at the corners. "Truce," he agreed, and slipped a broad hand against the bare skin of her back.

Deep, calming breaths followed, courtesy of his skin against hers. And some clenched teeth, too.

"You're sadistic," the scowl on her face was not forced. Neither was the grin on his.

"Maybe I just can't help myself," that low voice traced her skin like silk. "Someone once told me I lack patience, after all."
"That someone must've been wise. And beautiful. And is probably going to kick your ass–"

Azriel brought his hands up to cup them over Nyx's tiny ears despite the tiny Illyrian completely fixated on the shiny, glittering ring on her finger. "Language," He said with a pointed look, fighting off another smile.

At least it was a reprieve from the alluring touch on her back.

A comically small hand reached up to bat at the Shadowsinger's fingers caged around Nyx's ears, and she couldn't deny how adorable the sight of seeing the newest member of the family's hand grip only one of Azriel's fingers was, dwarfing the child completely.

"Do you ever think about having kids?" The question seemed like a bad idea the second it left her lips. But it was hard to let the lesson settle when her adorable little nephew was trying to yank the gem-encrusted bracelet from her wrist with tiny, chubby fingers.

Azriel blinked, slowly pulling his gaze from Nyx and his newly sprouted wings and down to her. An intrigue lingered in the depths of which he watched her, leaving her to wonder exactly just how much he'd thought about the possibility of that happening between them. A family.

Two strong hands eased Nyx from her arms moments later, and the infant lit up in delight as her mate ran him through sweeping motions in the air, the muscles of two newly formed wings on his back just barely fluttering beneath the membrane at the call of wind.

"I'd be happy even if it was just us for the rest of eternity," he answered, eyes drifting up to Nyx again. "But if a larger family is in the cards for us, I'd be elated, too." A carefully, carefully constructed answer, especially given the horror that nearly unfolded at the birth of the miracle currently in his arms.

And yet, part of her didn't mind the way he chose to respond. Nearly losing Feyre to a complicated childbirth had spooked them all beyond belief. Nesta's own miracle of keeping both Feyre and Nyx alive, and consequently Rhys, had saved the future of the Night Court – and primed both she and her sister's body for the possibility of another Illyrian birth.

But Fallon was... Fae? Part-God? Whatever conglomeration of heritage she bore, Illyrian certainly wasn't in the mix. And her last physical with Madja had come with a dark confirmation that, despite her powers, her physical body wasn't currently capable of surviving a childbirth with wings. Not that they had any nearing plans for conception, anyway. But with all of their friends pairing up and settling down, it was natural let her thoughts drift to the wonder of their future together.

"We've got time," Azriel soothed, easily balancing Nyx in the crook of an arm while his free hand traced her jaw. "Nothing but time."

Fallon drank in the sight of him – of Nyx grinning at her mate, snuggling into his chest as safe as can be. The sight jogged a few brilliant memories of Rosehall after Solstice, watching him throw Teddy and the others around until they were laughing and red in the face.

It was impossible to deny it: he was too good with kids.

Towering above her, Azriel bent down and pressed his lips against hers, and for a moment her body escaped her. For a moment, that touch had rendered them soul-to-soul, deleting the noise and business of the room even further. The world became an empty space where the two could exist together.

"Once you put him down," Fallon murmured against his lips. Tried not to focus on how infuriatingly soft they felt on her own, and how she wanted nothing more than to taste him again. "The truce is over."

Azriel breathed a laugh, one that skittered down the length of her neck as he moved to brush his nose against the spot just below her ear. "It's wholesome, your hope in winning tonight," the edge of his teeth grazed her skin, and it took everything in her to weather the storm. To hang onto her sanity. "However misplaced it may be."

Oh, he was going down.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

𝖼𝗈𝗆𝗆𝖾𝗇𝗍𝗌 𝖺𝗇𝖽 𝖿𝖾𝖾𝖽𝖻𝖺𝖼𝗄 𝖺𝗅𝗐𝖺𝗒𝗌 𝗐𝖾𝗅𝖼𝗈𝗆𝖾! ・°˖✧

Chapter Text

¡ mature warning !

tw: knife play, bloodless. be so real you knew this was coming.

__________________________________

It had taken the brew far longer to set in for the Shadowsinger than it had for her. But when it did... Fallon clocked it immediately. It would have been impossible not to, considering the shift in his scent nearly knocked her from her perch atop one of the armrests of the velvet chaises of the main room.

Her eyes slid to Azriel across the way, who had been dutifully listening to Cassian yap his ear off from the kitchen about some sort of sports score she swore was just a figment of his imagination – because what sports existed in Prythian? – when it happened.

Broad, strong shoulders tensed beneath the smooth leather of his attire, and a short cough sounded from his throat as a wide-eyed Azriel tried oh-so-casually to grip the edge of the kitchen countertop next to him. From where she sat, she had a perfect view of watching him squirm.

Cass's brow furrowed at his brother, who brought a fist to his mouth and cleared his throat in an effort to cover the instance as nothing more than a cough. But she could smell it – the shift in his scent, both a blessing and a curse. At least they could suffer together now, but Gods, that heady aroma sent her mind spiraling right into the gutter.

"Choking on your own spit is a new low for you," Cassian scolded. "Go ahead, then. Drink up." His brother motioned to the glass of liquor in Azriel's hand, now held in a white-knuckled grip that by some miracle had not yet shattered.

An acceptable time as any for payback to commence.

Fallon eased the thoughts into her mind, pulling from some of their nights together spent pleasuring one another, body and soul until the other saw stars. Gently coaxed the inexplicable feeling of him pushing inside of her right down the bond, carefully nudging it along. Focused on how good the feeling of his fist in her hair felt, how those extra yanks set her soul on fire with both pleasure and pain.

Azriel's eyes had already pinned her to the spot from where he stood, the feathering of the muscles in his jaw acting as his only tell of distress in his otherwise stoic features.

When Cassian shot a bewildered expression her way, she snatched up her flute of champagne and excused herself, advancing toward the pair of brothers with slow, purposeful steps. At least the brew kicking in early had given her some time to deal and manage. His, however...

Fallon leaned back against the countertop beside the two Illyrians and beamed an evil little smirk in her mate's direction. "Staring is considered rude in most cultures."

"I'd love to know what they say about teasing," Azriel muttered and tipped back what was left of the amber liquid in his glass. He blew out a sigh and faced Cass, ignoring her stare dutifully trained on the side of his head.

She barely noticed the creep of a shadow up her bare leg until it was too late.

Heart fluttering in her chest, Fallon clenched her teeth and fought like hell not to clench any other part of herself. A hiss of breath escaped her as that shadow lazily stroked the upper inside of her thigh, but she steeled herself with whatever conviction she had left. He would not win this tonight. Not by a long shot.

Even if she was beginning to want him to.

"Will Nesta be here tonight, Cass?" She dove at the chance to focus on anything other than the corners of the Shadowsinger's lips quirking upward.

"In a little while," he confirmed. "She and Gwyn are finishing up some training drills with a few priestesses at the House."

Barely six months ago, Nesta couldn't even hold a sword. Fallon had to admit, the progression of the girl's training had been more than impressive. All three of the Valkyries, really. "She finally out-train your skill level?"

Cassian raised his brows. "In combat? Not a chance," he declared, followed by a loosened breath. His eyes dropped to the ground. "In magic, though, I'd say certainly."

Fallon pursed her lips together as a memory struck her in the chest. By the cool breeze of a departing shadow from her lower half, she could only imagine that Azriel, too, had been dealt the full weight of such a statement.

It had been nearly a year to the day that the three of them stumbled upon Nesta in the midst of a full-blown meltdown. Nearly a year since that very power almost sent Cassian to high Hell, and nearly a year since the trio now dwelling in the kitchen of the River House swore to the eldest Archeron that they would help her step into her powers – and with it, not allow her powers the opportunity to overrun the woman inside.

They had walked a long, stilted road ever since then. But all roads met an end at some point. Fallon only hoped the culmination of Briallyn's treachery and Nesta's growing comfort in her powers meant they'd finally reached that end.

"You trained her well, Cass," she murmured, placing a comforting hand on the General's arm. "And if I'm allowed to walk free with this kind of power, then Nesta certainly is, too."

But that statement hung in the air like dead weight as soon as it left her lips. Sure, she might rival or even beat Nesta in terms of power, but what with the several outbursts of silver flame from Nesta in the past months, and Rhys's rising anxiety as Feyre neared her due date, it became more than clear that a double standard had been set.

Certainly, an assassin with God-power was to be feared -- but she could also be honed. Tamed, given the right circumstances. But an elder sister who feared her power for good reason was to be kept at arm's length, the risk too much around a newborn child. It still sat sour in her mouth to this day. Even after Nesta had proven herself beyond reason by saving Feyre's life, the tension between the eldest and the High Lord had begun to grow again over the past months. Some festering sickness that neither would ever grow up enough to discuss, leaving the two Illyrians, a new mother, and a volatile assassin trapped in the middle of it all.

"It'd be nice if we all saw it that way," Cassian muttered briefly, nothing more than a fleeting thought under his breath. "She'll never admit it, but she's more grateful for you two than you know."

Azriel slid his free hand into the pocket of his black pants, still nursing the minuscule remnants of amber liquid at the bottom of the crystalline glass with his other. "She'll never need to," he reassured. "She fits with us, Cass. There will always be room at our table for her."

Fallon's eyes drifted to the Shadowsinger, only to meet the confirmation of her thoughts in the hazel of his eyes. Our table. Whether that included the entirety of the Court of Dreams or not was irrelevant. Nesta would always have a friend within a Demigod, a General, and a Spymaster.

Cassian shot them both a half-smile of gratitude. "I appreciate it. I know she does too," his glass met the countertop behind him with a clink. "Speak of the devil. Something tells me she's just finished up training," an idle rub at his chest confirmed that call down the bond from the eldest Archeron. "I'll be back in a jif. Maybe address the... tension between one another while I'm gone, eh?"

She could only clamp down on her bottom lip to keep her embarrassed bout of laughter at bay.

"Maybe if you don't pretend to drop your mate out of the sky, you two can address some tension of your own," Azriel goaded with a lazy grin.

"But it's so fun," Cass called as he headed for the hall, and with a final wave goodbye, he disappeared toward the front door of the River House.

Fallon's eyes drifted back to her mate, who stared after Cassian's departure with a familiar fondness. "Maybe we're not as subtle as we thought."

"I think I was doing just fine before the sabotage kicked in," Azriel countered, his deep voice rolling over her in a smooth, sultry wave. He leaned against the counter next to her, the chatter of the adjacent room fading out as her focus was eaten up solely by the man at her side.

"Please," she snorted. "I watched the second that brew kicked in for you. I thought you were going to choke."

"No idea what you're talking about," he hummed, finishing off the last of his alcohol. "Though I vividly remember an image I'd like to recreate being shoved into my mind by a sore loser."

Fallon's eyes narrowed on instinct. "You started it," she grumbled. "And I haven't lost." A quick glance down confirmed she hadn't accidentally leaned against him, or maybe grabbed his hand, or all of the other physical affection that came as naturally as breathing by this point.

"Yet," he corrected, far too relaxed in this game for her liking.

The dramatic sigh that left her lips wasn't forced by a long shot. "If I wasn't so obsessed with you, I might find you damn annoying."

"Obsessed, huh?" The mischief lighting his eyes sent her stomach flipping.

"You didn't hear any other part of that, did you?"

He leaned in closer, minimizing the space between them to the point that the warmth of his breath met her own. "Selective hearing."

"How fortunate for you," she whispered, reaching out a hand closer and closer, his eyes tracking every single movement right down to the muscle – as she snatched the now-empty glass from his hand. She couldn't help but grin as a forceful exhale left his nose, and turned on a heel to saunter over to the assortment of liquors against the stone backsplash of the freshly painted kitchen.

His eyes burned into her backside for the entire heavy pour of cognac into the glass.

Taking a swig from the crystalline cup for good measure, she was careful to avoid any and all contact as she handed it back to him. She would not lose their little game by a simple accident. Even so, she couldn't help but dwell on the way she'd poured the brew down his throat earlier in the night, or how he looked on his knees in front of her – and sent those memories straight down the bond between them.

Azriel's chest expanded with a hefty inhale as he slung nearly all of the contents of the glass down his throat, shaking his head while the cup's base clinked against the countertop. "Cass," he abruptly cleared his throat, opting to look at the ceiling instead of down at her. Check and mate. "Cass was asking about the Daughters. They missed another council."

Fallon blinked, pushing the now-empty cup from one hand to the other. Any and all evidence of the smile she wore prior simply disintegrated from her face. "Still nothing," she muttered. "Next topic."

No, she hadn't heard from them. Not since a month ago when Dimir had decided to go radio silent on her. No warning, no reason, nothing. She could still vividly picture the wooded area just outside the wards, could still practically smell the mirthroot Echo passed her as they practiced how to read a person's energy with their respective magic, rocketing off jokes and doing everything not-so-friends should.

The next day was as if they had never discovered Dimir at all.

It didn't sit well with her. Not in the slightest. But the wards had proved themselves impenetrable, and if Dimir wanted privacy, she couldn't imagine busting through their millennia-old defenses would be taken too well – ally or not. But the Night Court couldn't keep it a secret from the Courts forever. And when the other High Lords found out...

"It's not your fault."

Her eyes met her mate's, ever-seeing and ever-comforting. But perhaps what she found herself most grateful for was that they never held any pity, either.

"We don't know that." She was their closest tie, after all. Even Oryn didn't get along with Feyre and Rhys in the way Fallon did with Echo. Granted, the Monarch had warmed to the High Lord and Lady of the Night Court particularly well over the past months, but... They hadn't heard from her, either. The wards to Dimir had been shut, sealed from the inside, with zero answers as to why.

"I know that. There are a million reasons as to why Dimir might want to seclude themselves again. The threat of being used as a commodity, for one. The anger and hostility from the Illyrians. The way every High Lord seems to think of the Daughters as nothing more than an extra arsenal. We have eyes watching. If something stirs at the wards, we'll know. But know that you are not one of those factors, Fallon."

But how can you be sure? That nagging voice within her whispered. Doubt, or whatever it was, gnawing at her wellbeing. The worst part about it was its truth. She couldn't be sure, or at least not really.

But it wasn't like the Daughters to run from something, and certainly not Echo, either. Without a way to contact, though, she was at a loss. Just another mystery surrounding the ancient city she never even got to lay eyes on.

She shot Azriel a heartfelt smile brimming with gratitude. "What do you say we just get roaring drunk and avoid the rest of the guests at this thing?" Not that any of them had bothered to approach a newly mated pair sequestering themselves in the kitchen, and certainly not with the way the two were making eyes at one another. Definitely not as subtle as she thought, then.

"I say I'd do just about anything you tell me to at this point," Azriel answered, already heading back toward the bottles of liquor with his glass in hand. "In any setting."

She opened her mouth to chastise him, or maybe to tease him a little more – but quickly found herself at a loss for words as another shadow danced its way up the bare skin of her back, caressing up, up, up against the nape of her neck in a way that made her eyes flutter shut.

A breathless sound slipped from her lips before she could pull herself together. When her eyes opened, it only took a split second to zero in on the way Azriel was white-knuckling his grip on the counter, eyes dark with desire. "Bottom's up," his voice had gone gravelly, and his other hand not clenching the counter for his life now offered her the glass of liquor in wait.

"One of my favorite positions," as soon as the quip left her mouth, she realized the critical mistake she made. The shadow near her back still lingered, snaking up her arm and jostling it in just the right way as she reached for the glass – and sent her knuckles brushing against his.

The devilish smirk upon his lips might've been both the worst and best sight she had ever bore witness to.

𓆩⟡𓆪

Azriel led the way through the maze of halls tucked under the roof of the River House. Perhaps Fallon could've found her way, but that would mean dragging her body from his own and focusing on something other than the alluring heat of his lips as they backed each other against nearly every wall they passed.

It was a good thing, then, that the party had been sequestered to the lower levels only.

"Admit it, you prick," the words came out in a mumble against his skin, and try as she might, not a single ounce of bite made it through the blinding haze of lust sweeping her into its grasp. "You only won because you cheated."

Azriel pressed his body flush against hers. The chill of the wall on her bare back might've made her shiver, if the heat rolling off of him in waves hadn't already solved that issue. A broad, scarred hand wrapped in golden skin swept up the column of her throat, claiming its territory at the base of her neck. He pulled away from their war of mouths long enough to match a heady gaze rampant with lust to her own.

Gods, he looked glorious towering over her like this. The destabilizing urge to merge body and soul with him had only upped its ante since his shady move in the kitchen. The second he laid hands on her body... All semblance of her conscience took flight from Velaris.

She needed him, and she needed him now. On the floor, on the wall, in a coat closet – wherever the hell provided easy and quick access for him to fuck the living daylights out of her.

"Shall we pause so you can count the amount of times you've known me to play fair?" Azriel questioned, his voice as rough as the stubble that had brushed against her cheek. "Especially when it comes to you."

Those words should've probably infuriated her, given that he was absolutely right. The prick had hidden their very own mating bond from her for... how long? Whether he had a good reason to or not was beside the point. But, Gods, she couldn't stoke that anger if she tried. A different flame instead roared to life in its place, one absolutely infatuated with the fact that Azriel would never jeopardize a single thing when it came to her – not her safety, not her wellbeing, and certainly not her pleasure. The thought alone had her dragging his face right back down to hers.

"Thought about it," she gasped between the brushing of tongues and sharp bites to one another's lips. "-- and I'll get back at you later. But for now," The rest of the sentence wasn't even out of her mouth before Azriel was scooping her from the ground, her legs wrapping around his waist on instinct. The vague sensation of movement began again, but she was far too entertained with the guttural moans working their way out of her mate's mouth as she kissed him to pay attention, two souls adamant on devouring the other before the night's end.

The creak of a hinge met her ears, and soon whatever voices echoing from downstairs fell muted to the world around them. Fallon cracked her eyes open and put a painful sliver of space between her and her mate – doubled by pressing her hand to his chest, the only barrier keeping the frenzied male from claiming her mouth further.

Bookshelves filled with text after text lined the walls, complimented by a simple-looking chandelier with faelights that cast a warm glow to the room. On the far side of the room, an expensive desk sat, its mahogany wood glistening against the dim ambiance.

"We are not about to have sex in Rhys's office," Fallon gaped at her mate. Azriel elicited a huff of a laugh despite her dire seriousness.

"Dealer's choice, remember?" he answered, swatting her hand from his chest so he could close the gap between her neck and his mouth. All commonsense thought threatened to flee her mind as soon as he began his barrage of sultry kisses. "Consider it payback for his assistance of splitting us up on missions again. Besides, there's a silencing ward on this room," she hadn't even noticed him moving until her rear brushed against the surface of the desk in question. "And unless you want the entire party to hear how I make you scream, you're going to need it."

Gods.

Okay, maybe they were about to fuck in their friend's office. It's not like he had to know. Or any of them. Did this make her a terrible person? Probably, but –

Her rationale disintegrated when Azriel nudged her legs open with a knee, pressing it directly against her. She sucked in a breath but couldn't halt the involuntary buck of her hips on a desperate quest to seek out some form of friction.

Fuck it, she'd bleach the desk herself later. Double fuck it, she'd make this night worthwhile for the both of them.

"Someone's cocky about their ability to pleasure a woman," Fallon raised a brow, pressing her lips together to hide the smile trying to burst over her face. Azriel met her eyes with such provocation that she felt her own widen in interest as much as regret.

Riling him was a success – and deliciously so. She adored her mate in all the versions he existed in, but she'd discovered her favorite version by far to be the one that quelled her bratty tendencies with rough sex and that foul, skilled mouth.

"I seem to remember you falling hoarse around Solstice after I had my way with you," he teased, his voice dangerously low to match the featherlight touch of his finger tracing her jaw. Sparks flew across her vision when he dipped his head down, lips brushing against the shell of her ear. "I know exactly how to make you melt, love. I know exactly how to make you beg, too," and suddenly his hands were bunching the dress on her legs up to her waist. Before she could suck down a much-needed breath, Azriel shifted forward and pressed the sizable tent of his pants up against her. "So I'm sure it goes without saying that I know exactly how to get you screaming. This?" He growled, pistoning his hips forward at her core. Fallon couldn't halt a whimpering moan from slipping past her lips. "Is mine. As are you. Would you like to keep mouthing off and playing brat, or would you like to see how I fuck what's mine?"

A bomb could've gone off and she wouldn't have been able to move from under his expectant gaze. Not that she wanted to, either. No, she wanted to live in this moment. In the drugging haze of lust between them, the kind that sent her mouth watering and stomach clenching. But despite the brew and her own emotions begging for her to give in, to be fucked stupid right there on the desk, Fallon opened her mouth again.

"But mouthing off to you is so fun," she purred, dragging the tip of her nail down his neck. "Maybe I want you to fuck me so hard I see stars. Or maybe," she smirked as his eyes hooded even further. "-- maybe I want to see just how much I can get under that skin of yours. Maybe I want this to be just as torturous for you as it is for me. Because this night has been torture. I've wanted you buried in me since we crawled from bed this morning."

Hot breath breezed against her face. Azriel's nostrils flared as he fought to reign himself in, which only sent Fallon's smirk into the realm of demonic. Suddenly his hand was at her jaw, his thumb running along her pouting bottom lip before he pressed the tip right into her mouth. Fallon didn't stutter their damning eye contact one bit as she swirled her tongue around the pad of his finger.

"That's such a good girl, telling me what you want," he praised. "So I know exactly what not to give you."

She felt her expression shift into something murderous, but the thumb in her mouth halted any retort. Azriel pressed down, hooking her jaw and dragging her mouth open while his other hand fished something from his person.

A prick of something sharp and distinct at her navel followed.

With Truth-Teller firm in his grip, Azriel traced the point of the blade carefully up her stomach. Not enough pressure to split the fabric, but enough to insight an addictive thrill of adrenaline to kickstart her breathing again.

Adrenaline, and perhaps a shameful amount of anticipation. "What are you doing?" She asked, the words coming out slightly skewed from the hold on her jaw.

The trail of Azriel's gaze from the knife to her face practically burned a path into her skin. He met her eyes with hazel ones, ones alight with danger and desire. "Whatever I want," he said the words with the certainty of someone who spent his years, days, and minutes plotting to get exactly what he was after. Bastard. Had he played her since the start? Her mind began to process out a retort, but stuttered to a complete halt when the cold hilt of the blade met the tip of her tongue. "Now suck."

Slowly, he eased the handle of his coveted knife into her awaiting mouth. Fine. If he wouldn't give her what she wanted, then she'd do her best to make this experience just as torturous for him, too.

Except she hadn't expected him to pull the hilt from her mouth after only a few passes.

Nor did she expect him to drag it lower and lower again, nudging it underneath the fabric of her dress. "What are you–?" The words died in her mouth as he smoothly flipped the blade, the sound of tearing fabric filling the room before her underwear dropped from her body in tatters.

He effortlessly flipped the hilt toward her once more, stepping forward and bringing her eyes back to his with one finger to her jaw.

"You want to be a brat?" He asked. "Brats have lessons to learn, Fallon."

She glanced down at his hand again, swallowing audibly as the hilt pressed against her entrance. Her body reacted on instinct, and it was a fight not to urge forward and simply take it. She eyed the cotton cloth wrapped around the blade where he gripped it, their safety net between the two individuals who had never uttered a safeword in their lives together.

Her body burned with such desperate need that she couldn't help the needy whine from escaping her if she tried.

"You're going to ride it, beautiful. You're going to ride it until you come, and know that in every dirty job I'm sent to do, I'm still thinking of this. Of you."

With one arm curled around his neck, she could only manage deep, calming breaths. Fuck, this was heaven. He was heaven, and somehow hell, and everything in between. And he was about to fuck her with his coveted blade.

"Speechless looks divine on you," he murmured, and began urging the hilt into the awaiting wetness between her legs.

The cool metal was a shock to her system at first, but the way it seemed to glide right in sent her face burning red. Gods, she was desperate for release, yearning for his touch, and the feeling of one of his most precious items pleasuring her nearly sent her head rolling off her shoulders.

"You're taking it so well," he praised. "Look." He guided her head down to witness him pull the hilt from her cunt, her muscles clenching on instinct at the lack of anything existing within, before plunging it deep within her.

"Azriel," her pleading moan filled the room, and she found herself gripping his shoulders in an attempt to hang onto sanity. He increased the rhythm, pumping into her with a steady surety that dragged the breath from her lungs in ragged gasps.

His other hand caressed her hair, drifting down to her cheek. She fell apart in his hold, fucking her hips right into the hilt like self-control was a foreign concept.

"That's it gorgeous," he urged. "Chase it. I want you to come for me." Gods, she wanted that mouth all over her. Saying filthy things and doing things even filthier.

"Kiss me," half a beg, half a demand. A cool shadow drifted up the length of her legs until it lingered dangerously close to her clit. A shiver of anticipation racked her body like a winter wind.

Azriel's lips curled in a smirk of denial. "Come for me," He demanded again. Fallon huffed in annoyance as best she could, though it came out as more of a breathy moan than anything.

The rogue shadow flicked over her clit once, then twice -- and every nerve ending in her body lit up like the starry night sky.

She dragged his face to hers using the arm around his neck, lips colliding in time for him to swallow the cry of pleasure erupting from her throat. Ecstasy coursed through every pathway, every cell, as his tongue found her own. His hand still worked the hilt into her with steady strides, only relenting when her body began to tremble in his grip.

He slowly drew Truth-Teller away until her body was once again empty, and the familiar yearning was almost too much to handle. But her eyes tracked his hand, which brought the blade up to his mouth – where he licked the glistening hilt while staring into the depths of her soul.

Her jaw fell slack.

Azriel released a patient, albeit strained breath, and spirited the blade away somewhere on his person again. He took one step forward, his hands already working to free his cock from his pants, and Gods was it not the best fucking sight she'd ever seen to watch it spring free from the fabric.

"I need you," she begged, the last of her resolve having crumbled with the way his tongue stroked his very own blade. "I need you inside of me. Right now."

Azriel flashed her a patronizing smile. "Done mouthing off so soon?" He asked, "And here I thought we were just getting started."

She heaved a breath, that ache in her core growing more and more unbearable. If he didn't fill her in the next ten seconds, she was going to turn feral. "I'll be good," she finally promised, her lips brushing against his own. "Just please, please fuck me, Azriel."

Azriel's eyes shuttered as a true smile slipped across his face – one of the rare ones, and one she often caught in these situations. She knew how much the words meant to him; to know she wanted him, craved him, in the most vulnerable of situations especially. It was a need for him that she would never mind satisfying.

"I need to feel you in me," She drew him in closer with a gentle tug. The rounded tip of his cock pressed into her folds, nearly stealing her breath away. "I need to be with you. Every part of you." She didn't stop him from drawing one of her legs up over his shoulder, the giddiness in her stomach dancing like a flock of crazed butterflies. "Show me how good you fuck what's yours."

That had been the magic sentence to send him pressing forward, filling her with every massive, intoxicating inch of himself. Fallon fought not to hold her breath as her body stretched around him, though their prior antics had left her soaked to the point that his length glided in with ease, pushing, pushing, until he struck that spot so deep within that her body crumpled forward into his grasp.

A deep moan rumbled in his chest, reverberating through her own body through the contact of their skin. Strong, sure hands worked their way up and down her waist, one coming to nest at the base of her neck while the other locked an iron grip onto her hips. He pulled her away just enough to press his forehead to hers as he drew out of her – and then plunged the entirety of himself deep inside until he bottomed out.

"You feel like a fucking dream," he practically growled, setting a slow, agonizing pace and taking her too deeply to comprehend. He was everywhere, everything, but Gods, she wanted more. Wanted him to fuck her until she couldn't walk straight, or walk at all for that matter.

"Harder," was all she could manage, too entranced by the shadows swirling around her and the feeling of fullness echoing deep within her body to string along any other begging words.

Azriel didn't hesitate to give her what she wanted. Within moments, the pace and pressure of his thrusts nearly sent her scooting back against the desk, and perhaps she would've had his hold on her hip not locked her in place. It didn't take long for her to reduce to nothing more than a mindless, panting mess, nor did she want to be anything else in that moment. Azriel murmured praises into her ear that only sent her melting into him further, clinging to him like a lifeline as he obliterated the deepest parts of her like she begged him to.

His mouth worked its way down her neck, nearing the junction of her throat and shoulder where their twin scars sat. He pressed his lips to it, eliciting sparks across her body before clamping down on it with his mouth.

Her eyes shot open at the intrusion of pain that quickly melted into pleasure, but in that moment –

"Az," she started, eyes wide and fixed on the door handle in front of her. "Az, the door," was all she could muster before a filthy cry of pleasure tore from her throat, one caused by a particularly brutal thrust that felt too good to comprehend.

Azriel pulled his forehead from hers for the briefest of moments, casting a glance to the still-struggling door before turning back to her with a gaze of mischief. "Would you prefer whoever it is to watch?"

She fought to steady any train of thought while he continued to fuck her so thoroughly. Was he serious? She opened her mouth to respond, though she didn't exactly know what was about to come out of it – was he into that? Given that she hadn't already turned it down... was she into that?

Azriel's lips curled into a vicious smirk as the door behind them began to creak open – and abruptly slammed shut thanks to a wall of her mate's shadows.

"We can explore that another time when your mind is more intact," he whispered, and then yanked her head back to meet her mouth in a vicious kiss.

It was too much. The sensation of him inside her, filling her completely, mixed with his hot mouth on her own and her thoughts still reeling from those last few moments... She'd never been down so bad for someone before in her entire existence. Azriel consumed every part of her, from her thoughts to her body to her needs and wants.

Azriel yanked her closer and rocketed his hips with a vicious sharpness, and suddenly her body was unraveling again, her mind reduced to nothing but a puddle while her body melted into the rough, sensual grip he held on her.

Not seconds later she felt the familiar pulse of him deep inside, and the Shadowsinger did not bother to muffle his cry of pleasure as he spilled into her. Despite her arms feeling nearly boneless, her legs reduced to nothing but jelly, she couldn't help but reach up and trace a finger along his wing to prolong his bliss. The mere touch sent him trembling, a hiss of lust eliciting from his mouth while his muscles went rigid.

Her forehead found his again, sharing breaths with one another as they slowly drifted back into a semblance of reality. A gentle hand caressed her side while the other still supported her head, which she thanked the Mother for. "Do you..." She began, pausing just enough to consider her words. "Do you want someone to watch us?"

A smile filled with humor spread across his face, and Azriel didn't hesitate to plant a kiss to her lips. "While having the best seat in the house is hard to beat," he pulled out of her in one swift motion for emphasis, and the remnants of the past moments coating her thighs sent her legs clenching yet again. "I'll take any chance I get to show any nosy fuck just how much we were made for one another."

It was then a smile graced her face, much to her surprise. She certainly liked the sound of that.

But before she could scrape together a coherent response, Azriel was moving again, flipping her around and onto her stomach in a second flat. The air left her lungs in a rush, eyes wide as she made to peer over her shoulder – but a soft, guiding hand pushed her cheek flush to the desk below, and Azriel's lips were at her ear again.

"Now grip the desk, Fal. I'm not going to be gentle this time."

He lined himself up to her entrance, hard and ready. Her hips shifted on instinct as she ground herself against him, desperate to feel the deliciousness of his length slipping into her once more.

Grinning and giddy, she did as she was told, clamping her hands onto the mahogany beneath her body -- and held on for dear life.

__________________________________

ngl had to get some smut in now because the rollercoaster is taking off and we are going straight to hell after this ! in like a fun but terrifying way ...? anyways, i wrote this and was like "uhhhh is this too much...." and then realized I tied their fucking souls together last book so hmmm. yeah they're gonna be kinky.

fun fact, this chapter and ch1 were originally just one 36-page long chapter because I can't shut the fuck up. 

𝗏𝗈𝗍𝖾𝗌, 𝖼𝗈𝗆𝗆𝖾𝗇𝗍𝗌, 𝖺𝗇𝖽 𝖿𝖾𝖾𝖽𝖻𝖺𝖼𝗄 𝖺𝗅𝗐𝖺𝗒𝗌 𝗐𝖾𝗅𝖼𝗈𝗆𝖾! ・°˖✧

Chapter Text

“Your focus is broken,” Fallon ground her teeth together for the umpteenth time as Madja’s reprimand scratched at her brain like an incessant cat. “Healing isn’t something you force. Let it flow.”

“I am,” perhaps it would’ve been convincing had the words not left her lips with the same force as the death grip she had on her powers. One by one she straightened her fingers until her hand hovering over the chest of a Summer Court soldier splayed wide, but the burning in her veins only flared with a violent intensity.

Madja cast the demigod a dry look accompanied by a shake of the head. “Spymaster,” the healer muttered under her breath. “I don’t know which is more obvious: your lying or the growing fear of your power.”

Fallon expelled a heavy breath and let her hand drop limply to the table. The soldier remained unmoving, still lulled into a gentle slumber by Madja’s own power. If he didn’t wake, then he certainly wouldn’t talk. Tarquin had sent brief word to the courts of an attack under investigation, issuing the courts homing the most talented healers the wounded men at any chance to wake them for information.
Something a lot like lead sunk deep within her gut; it was nearly impossible not to spiral with the lack of information. Had a Daglan truly slipped through the portal in Summer? Or had stragglers of Hybern rallied? She never thought the day would come when she found herself wishing for the latter.

Fallon’s eyes slid to the healer. “I’m not afraid of it.” There was a difference between fear and pain, after all.

“Then let the magic flow from you as we practiced. If you keep building a dam and only letting a trickle through, the most you’ll ever heal is a paper cut. Rationing might have worked before your powers awoke, but that creek of power you once wielded now flows right into an ocean. You have a nearly bottomless resource at your disposal, so use it.”

Madja was right, Fallon knew, and it was the one point that kept her mouth sealed shut: that the swelling realm of power deep inside her hadn’t quit thrashing since the battle of Ramiel. She hadn’t known a day since that it had granted her peace. Her magic wanted out.

The puddle she used to pull from had since been amassed into a neverending sea, one her body didn’t know how to contain. Like a nagging itch that grew worse and worse until there was nothing else she could possibly focus on.

Letting it out would be so, so easy– if her magic hadn’t begun to burn in her veins like wildfire every time she called upon it.

Worse than wildfire. More like a trail of smoldering embers she could never quite find a way to stomp out. Even a mere trickle of healing magic in practice with Madja flambeed her nerves like someone had taken a blowtorch to each ending. It left her mind fried, tired, and weary enough to keep herself from testing the waters with any other magic.

Fallon closed her eyes and sucked down a deep, calming breath, willing her brain to focus on anything else other than the lingering sting in her arms, her legs, her chest.

“It hurts,” she tried again. It was always the same circle of conversation, but Mother, she tried again anyway. “Every time I call on my healing magic, it feels like it’s burning me from the inside out. This didn’t happen before,” before everything.

Her hand absently drifted toward her stomach. To the scar concealed under her leathers, faded with time and natural healing, that never quite left. A jagged thing that marked its memory on her abdomen, and a reminder of the treachery of her own flesh and blood; a snake pit that had nearly taken her life and left her with a scar to match, one Madja couldn’t even seem to whisk from her skin.

Beasts from a different time, potentially immune or otherwise too powerful for a healing spell to reverse the damage. That was the healer’s theory, at least. Fallon opted to take it at face value if only to keep her own peace of mind, because the options her mind cooked up were far, far darker.

This didn’t happen before her brother betrayed her. Didn’t happen before she fought a war. Didn’t happen before she died and accidentally deleted a High Lord’s sister from reality.

Nearly a year later, she still didn’t know how the hell to fix it. Any of it.

“Your body is still adjusting to your power,” Fallon let her eyes slip shut as the same spiel she heard time and time again spilled from Madja’s lips. Your vessel is still adjusting. It will take time to become accustomed to such a level. We don’t yet know how a Fae body might handle something of your nature.

No answers. Never answers. Just theories and ideas and, most importantly, something to shut her up.

“I don’t want to fucking hear it again.”

Fallon’s eyes flew open at the same time her hand clapped over her own traitorous mouth. A slip of frustration, that’s all it had been. Nerves grinding on one another for too long. “I– Madja, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that.”

She only hoped the healer hadn’t lumped it in with all of the other times her temper had slipped in the past months. But Fallon knew, and catalogued each one with a specific variety of horror and shame.

Snapping at Feyre after she tried to teach Fallon to shoot ice.

The punch she’d thrown at Cassian months ago when he wouldn’t stop berating her about her siphons.

The nuclear meltdown Azriel had to handle when Rhys almost put a hit out on Nesta’s life after revealing Feyre's pregnancy complications to her own sister.

That one had sent her into a blackout, and it scared her to the point that she vowed never to tell a soul. Not even her mate. She still couldn’t work up the nerve to ask what she had done, what she’d said that she couldn’t remember.

But there was only so much she could omit, so much she could hide and keep to herself before the facts became glaringly obvious.

Something wasn’t right. She wasn’t right.

Fallon brought her hands up to rub at her temples as the beginnings of a headache blossomed inside her skull.

“See yourself out,” Madja ordered after a moment. She didn’t need to meet the healer’s eyes to know they were cutting a glare cold as ice into the side of her head. “Cool off.”

She didn’t bother to let the word vomit of another apology escape her before winnowing out of the medic’s facility in Windhaven.

The brisk air of a looming winter embraced her burning body, and for once she desperately wished to see the Illyrian Steppes blanketed in bitter-cold white if only so she could submerge her whole damn body in it. At least the air soothed her frantic lungs while she gulped down breath after breath. It was the only distraction keeping her from spiraling down into whatever hell awaited inside her.

Sure, they’d stopped a full-blown war, and were all worse off for it. Nearly a year had passed and she spent most nights still waking her mate from chilling nightmares – if she was able to find sleep herself. Rhys and Feyre had brought Nyx into this world, such a bundle of joy – but Fallon knew she wasn’t the only friend to clock the change within the new parents. The silent shift within Rhys did not go unnoticed, beginning with the explosion on Nesta so many months ago. A subtle departure from the High Lord they knew, and an entrance of a militant replica too reminiscent of his father, from Cassian’s account. And Cassian, who still tiptoed around the same High Lord to this day for the fact that one wrong move could potentially result in his mate’s banishment from the Court. Feyre’s focus in the past months shifted between Nyx and the wellbeing of the Court, which didn’t seem to include her sisters at all. Mor’s frequent trips to Vallahan and trips to Gods knew elsewhere had hammered a gap between the blonde and the rest of the Inner Circle, and Fallon could count on one hand the amount of time she’d seen the girl this year – the housewarming party included.

And Amren – Gods, Amren. She hadn’t gotten off of Fallon’s back about taking up Sword instead of Spymaster. Hadn’t let up on Rhys about the idea of a ‘High King’, either.

She and Azriel never breathed a word about it. Not out loud, at least. But she knew how to read her mate’s emotions down the bond well enough to know he felt the same twinge of uncertainty every time the topic reared its ugly head. There was no reason to chime their two cents in, not when it was all speculation and Amren’s far-off dream. But the evidence of the past months had been enough for Fallon to come to terms with the fact that, if there ever was a day the idea of High King became more than just some far-off dream… The discussion at hand would not be pretty.

If she was even still standing by that point. She wouldn’t be shocked if the migraines very well made her croak first.

Time was an elusive thing, something she found herself over and over again wondering if she could rewind like a clock, take the hour and minute hands and spin them back, back, back… to a segment of reality in which their little circle still felt whole. Even if that time included her life on the line, her death still impending. It had been the only time she’d ever truly felt like she’d had some semblance of family. And now… she and Azriel had their family. Their small, small family of themselves and the two Deathhounds she’d grown so damn attached to. But it was a far cry from the joyous family dinners at the House of Wind, or the drunken nights spent inside Rita’s.

Everything had changed, and not for the better.

Fallon blinked the telltale visual static and prick of tears from the corners of her eyes, focusing on the feeling of the breeze brushing against her cheeks and not the turmoil threatening to leave her unconscious in the Steppes.

The breeze burned cool. Too cool.

Her body lurched backward on instinct at the same moment two hands wrapped around her wrists.

“-- Fallon,” Azriel’s baritone voice sliced through the debilitating ache in her head, dragging her from the beginnings of what might’ve been another blackout had he shown up mere seconds later. “Look at me,” he tipped her chin up to find her eyes, to which she noted with sheer relief she could see out of perfectly once more. “Another headache?”

“Yeah,” she nodded, fighting to slow the rapid beating of her heart. “S’nothing,” but Azriel’s hardened face showed no signs of budging. His eyes seemed to search every corner of her high and low, on the hunt for everything she wasn’t telling him. “I just had a moment in the medic facility. I needed some air.”

“Tell me exactly what happened,” the scent of mist and cedar mingled with the breeze of the Steppes, the reminiscence of her home and comfort shaving the edge from the blossoming ache in her skull. She blinked once, twice, and nearly uttered a sigh of relief when the pressure in her head receded entirely.

Of course he would fix it. Even without trying, without knowing, Azriel’s mere presence was enough to right the wrongs of her life.

“I just lost it on Madja for a second,” she winced as she heard the words for herself. “I didn’t mean it. We had been working at my healing magic for a while. I just needed a break.” She exhaled another breath and said this time, quieter, “I’m better now.”

A lie that tasted like poison on the tip of her tongue. She wasn’t better, not by a long shot. But if she told him one thing, she’d have to tell it all – that the headaches weren’t just headaches anymore. That they were getting worse, agitating her temper at the most inopportune times. That they had begun to imbue her with such violent and intrusive thoughts in the thick of her episodes that it left her too horrified to even dwell on. That the burning in her veins grew worse with every passing day, her body becoming increasingly allergic to the very essence that lived within her.

Tell him all of it – and for what? To watch her mate sacrifice what little sleep found him at night in hopes of digging up a nonexistent solution? Even Madja was dead set that it simply had to run its course. Or, worry him sick again after he’d spent nearly a year in session after session with Grief Priestesses helping him work through the scars on his soul that losing his other half had put there?

“Then do you want to enlighten me as to why you look like you’re going to vomit?”

She dragged herself from her thoughts and went face to face with the sharp, calculative gaze she knew could read her to tears. “Aftermath of the headaches,” she shrugged a shoulder. Not a complete lie, at least.

“I’ve been doing this far longer than you have,” the Shadowsinger dropped her wrists, and her hands deflated back to her sides as he took a step forward, then another, with that infuriating quiet confidence that screamed I mean business. “And I have sources that tell me,” his head cocked to the side, a smoky tendril curling at his ear while it whispered its findings. “You’re holding out on me.”

Gods, when had she dug herself into a puddle of shit this deep? Lying to her mate was one thing, but trying to lie to someone whose literal job it was to detect lies…Shaking him off the trail had never worked in the past, and she had little hope it would do so now, but…

“What are you doing here?” She pivoted. “You hate Windhaven.”

“That I do. I also hate when you lie to me.” His gentle caress to the back of her head drew her in closer, the warmth of his palm cutting through the brisk air and warming her from the inside out. She tried not to let the cut from the hurt reflected in his eyes deepen further. “Tell me what’s going on with you.”

She couldn’t stand lying to him, anyway. So opting for another truth it was.

“I’ve just been overwhelmed. New job, new powers, new life, and everything with the Blood Rite and Briallyn and the Valkyries and Bryce, and now surveying Koschei…” Her shoulders slumped, curling in as the weight of her own words bore down upon her. “It's been a lot to deal with. To process. And our friends… I know everyone copes in their own ways, but they’re different too. I feel like the only ones who aren’t,” ... are us.

But that wasn’t true, either. She was certainly different, and in the worst of ways.

It killed her to see the hazel of his eyes soften, to use his emotions against him, and to remain in solitude with the war happening in her body instead of forcing out the truth.

It wasn’t right at all. She opened her mouth, a split-second decision that nearly had the words she’d been begging to tell him spill out to the mountain ridges of the Illyrian Steppes –

Don’t you dare, that quiet voice hissed within her mind. Suddenly those words sat frozen in her throat, a gag placed solely by the devil’s advocate within her head. A phantom voice of that spiraling negativity that seemed to grow day in and day out ever since… well, everything.

“I’m listening, Fal. Talk to me,” the gentleness with which he spoke those words nearly brought her to tears. But she couldn’t – not wouldn’t, but couldn’t – couldn’t get herself to vomit the words up if she tried. Some part of her always stopped herself before she could do so.

Something crumpled in her chest. “That’s it. I’m just really, really overwhelmed.”

He studied her a moment more, and in those passing seconds she found herself wishing she could simply bear her whole mind to him, let him sift through like the Daemati could, and pick her brain clean of everything she wasn’t able to speak.

But Azriel pursed his lips, a shattering expression of sorrow written across his face. “C’mere,” he murmured, drawing her to his chest until only the glowing blue light of his siphons lit the minuscule crevice between their bodies. “It’s a lot,” he agreed. “You’ve been thrown into a lot. This past year hasn’t been business as usual by any means.” His words were a balm to her sore heart, smoothing over the wrinkles and tears accrued in the past year. Past month. Past day. “I’m taking your workload. I want you to take some time to decompress –”

“No,” the word shot out of her mouth before she even had the thought to reel it back in, or even dwell on the idea of taking a few days for herself. The one thing that kept her mind occupied was work, no matter how chaotic it made things feel at the moment. Not to mention the sheer impossibility of her mate taking on both of their workloads at once. “The distraction is good for me. I think I might go stir-crazy if I’m benched right now.” Or just plain crazy.

The thoughts always grew in volume when she was left alone. They slinked out of the shadows with their tipped claws, anticipating a grand meal of mourning and misery. On the few and far in between nights Azriel didn’t come home until late, her mind seemed to take it as a signal to turn off the lights and paint her head as dark a place as it could possibly manage. It always took the initiative to dig up all of the unsavory thoughts she assumed she’d buried too deep to touch: that she killed her own flesh and blood, every last one of them. How she caused her mate a lifetime of trauma because she killed them. That she jeopardized all of Prythian just so she could chance a taste at life.

And that it was hard to feel guilty for any part of it.

Azriel let out a sigh, his fingers lacing through her hair as he said, “Then we go back to working together. On everything,” the words like it should be echoed across the gleaming soul bond in time with the beating of his heart.

As much as she would love that… “What about Rhys?”

After it became clear Cassian’s presence would be needed at the councils to oversee the incorporation of the Daughters of Dimir into the Night Court, an influx of work slammed their little espionage team. Not only had many tasks been bumped to priority after the year they’d faced (keeping tabs on Koschei, monitoring for any activity within Briallyn’s followers, and keeping an eye on the portals the Heir had burnt into every Court), but Cassian’s Windhaven monitoring duties had transferred to the pair, too – or rather Fallon, since she wouldn’t subject her mate to returning to the place he hated most on a daily basis. All of that piled on top of basic Spymaster duties… and she often found herself wondering how the hell he did it all on his own in the first place.

Despite their best efforts to handle so many assignments, the harsh quips and palpable stress from the High Lord, along with a not-so-suggestion to split themselves up among duties once more, had been the reason they’d begun to see so little of one another in the first place.

“Rhys can start scouting for a third Spymaster if he has a problem with it. You can’t do your job well if you aren’t well, Fal. This might be our Court, but you’re my world. You will always come first.” Azriel’s hands slipped to her waist, pulling her flush against his body in an innate need to be close to her. To protect her. Nothing in the world could’ve stopped her from throwing her arms around his neck and crushing him into a hug with all of her might.

“You and me,” she agreed, allowing the steady beat of his heart to soothe her own into a slowed, rhythmic pace. “I like the sound of that.”

“Mm,” the muffled agreement exited the Shadowsinger as he placed a kiss to the top of her head. “I prefer it with ‘forever’ attached to the end, but I’ll take what I can get.”

“You already know that’s nonnegotiable,” a poke to his abdomen sent her mate’s shadows swatting toward her hands. “What are you doing here anyway?”

He relented with a sigh. “Some of the Summer Court soldiers are finally coming to. One of them confirmed a something came through their portal the night of the attack. Likely a Daglan.”

Something in her started. “They’re certain?” She couldn’t help but cast a glance back at the medic facility where the Summer Court soldier still lay, brought to Madja herself due to the amount of psychological damage they assumed he accrued in the attack. As if whatever horror he witnessed kept him from breathing any word at all.

Azriel stayed quiet a moment more, the wind whistling through the nearby trees like a forlorn omen. “That’ll be the first. Confirmed, that is, if it's true.”

The first Daglan through one of the seven portals in Prythian. The burnt runes and etchings had remained as vacant and unmovable as the day they’d appeared in the Courts for the past year, not a single sign of life to be had. But it seemed their luck had finally run out.

“There’s a council being called between the Courts,” he continued, taking a step back and offering a hand in her direction. “It’ll be starting soon. We’re to be present.”

“How did it come in? Where is it? What did it – what did it do to the soldiers?” Too many questions swam in her head to make sense of much else.

“Tarquin’s men handled the interrogation,” with the way his jaw set, Fallon knew merely speaking on it irked him. “They’re keeping most of it under wraps. Though I imagine it would be in their best interest to share that information with the other Courts at the meeting.”

She slipped her hand in his, savoring the warmth of his skin against the chilled ache of her own, and held tight. “And to think I was beginning to believe those portals were just my idiot brother’s idea of his self-expression: useless.” 

__________________________________

Heeeere we go !

𝖼𝗈𝗆𝗆𝖾𝗇𝗍𝗌 𝖺𝗇𝖽 𝖿𝖾𝖾𝖽𝖻𝖺𝖼𝗄 𝖺𝗅𝗐𝖺𝗒𝗌 𝗐𝖾𝗅𝖼𝗈𝗆𝖾! ・°˖✧

Chapter Text

It was not the Night Court’s land that held the council. It was not Summer Court’s lands, either.

Fallon eased into the crowded space and couldn’t have been more grateful for the morning-light breeze that kissed her face, lazing its way in from many of the open archways. Perhaps the domed ceiling wasn’t the best of choices for a room filled with gossiping chatterboxes; the council hadn’t even been called to order and yet she could barely think over the dozens of voices reverberating off of the ceiling above.

Or perhaps that was its purpose: try to gossip or coerce another member, and suddenly everyone would know.

Of all locations, the Dawn Court had secured the right to hold the council in their lands for the sole fact that they were more or less the most centralized location, easing the strain of so much travel for the other High Lords and their entourages if only a little. Azriel had clued her in on the other reason as to the Dawn Court while on their way over: there was zero association with the Daglan, or at least not yet. The Summer Court had discovered the attack on their own land, and the Night Court… well, she was the reason they were in this mess, technically. Rhys hadn’t even tried to push for a meeting in Night Court territory, which likely benefitted their Court as much as it did the rest of Prythian.

Having the High Lords and their armies in the Illyrian Steppes last year felt too damn close to Velaris for comfort. Only Helion knew of the secret city, but knowing the powers of Prythian stood only miles away from a place Rhys and his ancestors had fought to keep the peace of for centuries… She didn’t blame him for not wanting boots on the ground in their Court once more.

Azriel kept a step behind her, their combined presence carving a path through the aisle scattered with both familiar and unfamiliar faces. Each guest cast their own glances at the pair with piqued interest – though perhaps it was apprehension written on their faces. Or fear.

At a point in her life, being feared had rubbed her the wrong way – because it wasn’t fear of her, not truly, but rather fear of the mask Caius forced her to wear. To live in.

Now, with Azriel walking at her side, she found she didn’t mind the higher ranks of Prythian recognizing that it would be a wise decision to tread lightly.

Separated, their respective presence already commanded a room. But together…

Fallon eased into the chair the Shadowsinger dislodged for her with a tendril of smoke, casting him a warm glance in thanks. To her surprise, he made no move to slide into the seat next to her, but rather stationed himself between herself and Feyre, who lounged in the chair to her other side.

Has the Summer Court soldier with Madja spoken yet? The voice of the High Lady chimed inside her mind, and it was an effort to conceal her jolt of shock.

No warning, no permission, and unfortunately on trend with the High Lady’s behavior over the past few months. Both her and her mate, really.

Not to my knowledge, was all Fallon offered. Brick by brick she built the guard on her mind back in place until it was with certainty that only her thoughts remained inside her head.

She trailed Feyre’s gaze toward the far corner of the room, where Rhys and Tarquin stood in silent conversation. The glow of the faelights above seemed to dance across the deep teal of the tunic the High Lord of Summer wore, a stark contrast to such brilliant white hair and dark skin. Though perhaps it was the necklace he wore that drew her attention most of all; a small, dark stone layered among several other artfully designed pieces of gold. Something about the sheer contrast of such a dark thing to such a light, cheerful person sucked her in like a vortex, a whisper of invitation to come see for herself what might make something so inky and ancient so, so alluring. Calling to something inside of her from across the room, a silent urge to know it –

“This council has been called to order on the eleventh hour,” Cassian’s gruff, baritone voice snapped her back into the present with the force of a physical blow. “And will resolve on the twelfth hour. Our efforts will be coordinated in making a final decision of how to move forward as a united front against the unwanted arrival of the Dagaln within Prythian. Any other pending issues are to be benched until a resolution concerning the Daglan is reached,” the General of Bloodshed declared, his stern glare zeroing in on Lord Devlon and company located to Rhys’s left, who had found his place next to Feyre.

Devlon met that stare head-on, arms crossed over his broad, armored chest. The Lord exhaled a snort that might as well have had the same effect of spitting at Cassian’s feet.

Something violent within her flared to life without permission.

Of course Cassian had to throw in such a reprimand for the children – Illyrians– at the table. She didn’t have to survey the room to know a certain group’s absence hadn’t gone unnoticed by those gathered in the council.

No Oryn, and no Echo. No representative for the Daughters of Dimir, and not a single letter or message as to why they’d simply vanished from the very meetings that decided the future of Prythian not a month prior.

A hand fell to her shoulder, weighted and comforting, soothing the edge of anger that spiked from the deepest parts of her psyche. It didn’t matter if Echo had decided Dimir was better off without them. It didn’t matter that she still didn’t know why. Fallon still respected the warrior for all she’d done. The Daughters had turned the tides in Prythian’s favor in the battle of Ramiel, and she would sooner drop dead than let an act so selfless be slighted by a bunch of pissy men.

Azriel’s shadows swirled around her in lazing strokes, the one thing keeping her anger from bubbling to the surface. She drew on that strength to shove it down as deep as she could manage; an outburst at a table full of Prythian’s most powerful wouldn’t do any of them any good, and certainly not herself. But Gods, biting Devlon’s head off would certainly ease the strain of tension choking her insides.

“Three days prior, the Summer Court survived an attack at the portal not far from Adriata,” Tarquin rose from his chair, Cassian having offered him the floor. Fallon cut her attention away from the High Lord of Summer before anything else could steal her attention, like that damn necklace. “No soldiers lost their lives, but several were badly injured. Medics of several Courts are still drawing conclusions as to what exactly happened to those involved in the attack. A few soldiers have woken, and those who have seem to struggle to gather their thoughts on the night of the breach. All except one.”

Tarquin’s face grew pinched, as if he were battling two sides of himself. The High Lord clasped his hands together, teal rings glinting in the faelight. “I’ve spoken at length with this soldier, and he has confirmed that a Daglan has passed through the portal; we do not know where in which it came from, whether it be from Prythian or another place entirely. Though the soldier had described the enemy as… not of our world.

“He could not recall in much detail the attack the Daglan launched upon exiting the portal, only that it wore the body of a man. Although its eyes… were wholly black.”

Was it the stilling of Azriel’s shadows that occurred first, or the subsequent halt of her beating heart?

Black eyes. Black eyes.

Her eyes back at the Cove of Sahne nearly a year ago… something in her gut lurched.

“It is currently being tracked by what little scent it left at the portal. If our hunters are correct in their pursual, it seems to be headed North. Toward the Night Court.”

Ramiel, Fallon shifted forward in her chair, one word rocketing down the bond to her mate. It had to be after Ramiel if her brother had sacrificed his own life in order to breach the sacred mountain. Perhaps whatever had occurred that day at its peak had not been fully seen through.

“If it is headed toward the Night Court,” The smooth voice of night itself drifted on a phantom wind through the room. “Then allow us to send our finest.” Rhys adjusted in his seat, one arm resting on the table before him in such a stance of ease. With the stretch of his suit, Tarquin’s gift to the High Lord so many months ago still sat gleaming on his wrist: a tasteful cuff that seemed to drink the essence of the faelight in like a man parched. A symbol of allies, unbroken and unyielding.

Or a symbol of a suck-up and a man who couldn’t resist flattery.

Though perhaps it would have looked a bit like enemies in the making had Feyre and Rhys not accepted those gifts. Its twin still adorned the High Lady’s wrist just beside her, its similar darkness fitting in so well among the black dress the Archeron had chosen. How many times had she caught herself eyeing the thing over the past months? As if it had a secret for her just waiting to be told.

Suddenly her gaze was moving, flicking to Helion, to Thesan, to Kallais and Vivianne and even Tamlin. Had they all received such a gift from the High Lord of Summer, too? Search as she might, no cuff sat at their wrists – or perhaps it had been a different offer of sorts. Jewels, maybe. And Helion did adore exotic creatures, though mostly his pegasus –

Another set of eyes met hers across the way. Amber in their depths, fiery in the way they pierced her soul. Eris had come in place of his father yet again.

Beron, who had since fallen ill after his uncovered treachery with Brialyn, not to mention his near-kidnapping at the hand of the Heir. Fallon doubted illness had anything to do with it; the prick was probably too ashamed to show his face at any of these council meetings. At least he had that much common sense.

“And your finest would be, Rhysand?” Tarquin questioned, one brow raised in the direction of the Lord of Night.

Rhys made a smooth gesture in their direction. “My Spymasters, of course. Unless there are gifted individuals of another Court that would like to argue such capability.”

As the weighted attention of the room shifted to herself and her mate, Fallon met Cassian’s eyes – recognized the glint of staunched hurt as if it were her own.

He’d certainly proven himself the last few months with heading the councils for both the Daughters and now the Daglan. He would be needed, certainly, to manage the mess if other Daglan managed to get through the portals somehow. But his heart belonged to battlefields and bloodshed, not councils and delegation. Despite the open wound she practically gaped into, Cassian held his tongue.

And not a single soul of another Court spoke up to question the pair’s newfound assignment. Judging by the stench of nearly-hidden fear lacing the breeze drifting through the room, she doubted any of them really wanted to, either. Other than a name, they had little knowledge to what monster they’d be slaying in however many days’ time.

Azriel gripped her shoulder a little tighter as he met the expectant gaze Rhys cast to him. “We accept,” her mate answered with a dip of his head. As stoic as the harsh ridges of the Illyrian Steppes in his presentation, she still didn’t miss the secondhand twinge in her chest. Whatever feelings he pressed away had not evaded the stunning illumination of their mating bond, not by a long shot.

Her mask, too, remained poised, unmoving aside from the twin dip of her head. Where was the communication? The attack had taken place three days ago, so why the hell had Rhys chosen to simply spring their new duty on them mid-meeting? In a situation in which denial might look like defiance, ‘no’ hadn’t even been an option.

One single word tore down the bond in her direction.

Later.

Hell or high water, her mate never failed to land on the same page as her. At least it was the one reprieve she could cling to among the questionable chaos unfolding before them. The grumbling darkness down the bond only answered her suspicions; Rhys’s choice in the way he’d handled this meeting hadn’t lit a fire under only her skin.

Fallon urged her heart to find its normal pace once more. “If we’re to be handling this enemy, then clearance to your respective lands will be necessary.”

A single sentence that plummeted the entire hall into a steadying silence.

Calculative stares of High Lords made their way back to her, weighing and assessing. She didn’t need to be Daemati to know what they were considering.

She had once roamed most of their lands and without permission. She had wreaked havoc and brought several burdens upon most of the Courts standing in this very room. Despite the urge to let her shoulders curl, to let her head hang in shame, Fallon drew in a slow, steady breath and kept her back rod-straight. The shadows at her back had begun to stir once more, a pacing prowl that challenged any weary onlooker.

Helion made the first move, inclining his head in their direction. “Permission granted,” two words uttered with such smooth certainty that it relieved just a tiny bit of pressure from her lungs, which she hadn’t noticed were screaming out for air until now.

The High Lord of the Day Court hadn’t relinquished his duty as a tentative friend just yet, then.

“As is permission to my lands,” Tarquin agreed from his place at the table.

From across the room, Eris straightened in his seat. “You will be welcomed in Autumn Court lands.”

Welcomed, not just tolerated. She shot the eldest Vanserra a look of gratitude, though found herself glancing away immediately with the intensity he met her with. As if he were reading through her, piecing some puzzle together.

The rest of the room fell into stifling silence.

“Need I remind the Courts,” Rhysand began, voice dripping with an ire icy enough to freeze Hell over. “That Fallon sacrificed herself to spare every life present in this room, not to mention the very subjects you seem to believe you need to protect from her.”

“And if you find it easier to bar us from your lands,” Azriel added, reminding the powers of the room just why their Courts feared him so much in the first place. “We would be happy to relinquish the issue of this enemy to you, should it enter your Court.”

“You have our permission,” Vivianne quickly supplied with only a brief nod in their direction. A nod of guilt, if Fallon had much to say on the matter.

Rhys turned his wrath to Thesan and Tamlin, and Thesan leaned back in his chair.

“Granted,” the High Lord of Dawn obliged, his face as unwelcoming as the hard glare the soldier positioned behind him cast back at Fallon.

Tamlin grunted, two fingers to his temple as he leaned an elbow on the table in the perfect image of frustration. “How kind of you to ask permission to enter my lands now,” he quipped, meeting Rhys’s glare head-on. “Granted, for the duration of your hunting.”

How long had the Lord of Spring known of their trespassing? Or had he simply put two and two together upon the resurfacing of the Daughters of Dimir?

“And when this enemy is caught,” Helion segued, and suddenly Fallon could suck in a full breath once more. “Which Court will be the lucky land to hold its jurisdiction?”

𓆩⟡𓆪

The meeting flowed into a barbed discussion between High Lords of what should and shouldn’t be done with the impending capture of the Daglan. Capture it and kill it, or capture it and drag as much information out of its sorry body as they could manage before it finally succumbed to a mortal death?

Needless to say, she would have to sharpen her shortblades upon returning home.

The final discussion on the twelfth hour ended with the decision of which Court would hold jurisdiction over the monster for the duration of its life – and watching the High Lords volley and leverage against one another in attempt to prove their Court’s capability in breaking down an enemy, the conversation finally settled with a terse agreement that she and Azriel would perform their duties among the cells of the Court of Nightmares.

To think the Courts had now fought several wars side by side now and still took every chance to bash one another into the ground if it meant a foot up in power… How charming, that this was the Prythian she’d become a martyr for.

The hour ended with an agreement between each High Lord to sic their best scholars on any libraries in their possession, and to dredge up any and all scrolls accounting for the Daglan and creatures of their nature.

They were headed into this blind, after all. Not even the attacked Summer Court soldiers could find their minds long enough to warn Azriel nor herself of what they might be up against. That alone set off warning bells inside her head.

Cassian closed off the meeting despite the restlessness stirring from Devlon’s corner of the room. The General only shot a warning glare in the brute’s direction, and the narrowing of Devlin’s eyes promised violence.

Bodies stirred as the room came alive once more, many gathering their bearing to prep for respective departures. Fallon, too, pushed away from her chair and stood, turning to face her mate. Azriel already beheld her with an unreadable, expression, though the taut muscles of his throat spoke volumes of the impressive temper he’d managed to conceal the duration of the meeting.

She offered a hand out to him, half looking to calm whatever storm brewed within him, and half for her own selfish pleasure of feeling his touch against hers, when a startling several raps of knuckles on wood demanded the attention of the room once more.

“Shame we weren’t able to address a few queries before meeting’s end,” Devlon said gruffly, voice booming across the hall. Several Illyrian Lords and generals in their own right stood at his guard, faces pinched in volatility just as they’d been the past hour. “Though it seems there’s one matter left unspoken that I reckon might concern each and every one of you.”

Fallon’s eyes narrowed on the bastard who still owed her a life debt, already anticipating the next words out of his mouth.

Azriel scooped her hand in his, pulling her close with a tight squeeze. Maybe a comfort for himself, but certainly a barrier to keep her from charging the prick now standing at the head of the room with the attention of Seven High Lords on him.

“The council’s been dismissed, Devlon, anything addressed past closure will be considered folly –” Cassian all but barked, but the Lord continued to push his luck.

“Folly, if it pertains to the godsdamned situation at hand?” Devlon retorted. “Look around you: where are our so-called newest allies among this room? I don’t think it’s much a coincidence that a new enemy breaches our lands not a month after the only society claiming to have fought them off seals their gates. It’s enough that their leadership has failed to attend even simple meetings on the grounds of their integration to our Courts,” the way he spat that word with such venom had her seeing red. “And now an age-old enemy has arisen. We do not know where Dimir stands, we do not know their allegiance, and now we do not know their whereabouts,” Devlon plowed on. Several murmurs began to echo throughout the room. “Dimir has not proven themselves as allies through any means these past months. Liabilities and threats, yes. Allies, not in the least.”

“The Daughters of Dimir came to our aid and turned the tide of the battle at Ramiel,” Helion countered from his place at the table, golden crown glinting under the glow of faelights. She’d have to kiss the fucking ground the High Lord of Day walked on once this was all over. “I wouldn’t be so quick to write off their efforts in aiding the Courts when it was most needed.”

“-- Clarify yourself, Lord,” Kallais demanded. “You mean to say no one has had any contact with Dimir for several weeks?”

Oh, shit.

Devlon turned to Cassian, the glint in the Lord’s eye monstrous. “I’ll leave that for our General to confirm.”

Fallon found herself holding Azriel’s hand in a death grip. Sure, the representatives of the Courts had been present at the council meetings in which the Daughters hadn’t appeared. But the admittance of zero contact, with no connection in or out of a newly discovered territory and peoples, and therefore no monitoring of their whereabouts or moves… she swallowed the feeling of heavy lead in her throat.

Cassian met her wide-eyed stare across the room, sorrow written in the stress lining his forehead. “As of four weeks prior, the leadership of Dimir has failed to attend integration councils for their admittance to the Night Court. Their wards have been sealed off from the inside. No communications have been able to breach the wards, and none have gone out.”

Fallon shoved the buzzing energy in her chest down and drew in a single breath. “That does not automatically paint them an enemy,” the looks of disbelief across the room, however, indicated otherwise. “The Daughters of Dimir came to our aid when it was most needed, as Helion said. They have not fully integrated. They still hold rights to their own lands, rituals, and procedures, as does every member of the Courts standing in this room. Until terms are settled upon through both respective sides, the Daughters of Dimir remain their own entity.”

“Hybern was also once its own entity,” of all people, Tarquin rose from his chair. “Did you know about this, Rhysand?”

Even the breeze halted its movement through the chamber. The silence sat heavy in her senses with the threat to choke her. At least Rhys, clever and coy, would be able to weasel a path for them out of the wreckage of the absolute bomb Devlon had detonated today.

Rhysand reluctantly inclined his head and tapped a nail to the table before him. “No, I did not.”

The breeze had stopped, yes. So had the entire world around her. A planet halted on its own axis, not even the far-off sea daring to stir its waves. Whatever air was left in her system became toxic, burning.

Liar. Liar. She’d sat adjacent Cassian a month prior as he’d filled Rhys in on the other side of the living room, a fire illuminating the walls of the House of Wind. Dancing flames that mirrored the same hope that had begun to waver in her very being.

Azriel returned the squeeze on her hand with a vice-lock of his own. He, too, had even come home after a long day and mentioned Cassian’s growing worry that his shadows had clocked after he’d filled Rhys in at the other side of his desk. That the Daughters had missed a third meeting, and the Illyrians were beginning to stir.

Why the hell was he lying?

“The Daughters are allowed the right to exist within the confines of their own walls,” Azriel’s voice shook her from the vision of red still fighting to drape itself over her eyes. “It would be wise not to jump to conclusions at a time in which another enemy has become priority. As Devlon said, they are the only society with a recorded history of defeating what we hunt now. Throwing that resource away is not a viable option to consider.”

Devlon’s lip curled as his own words were thrown back in his face. An unannounced wave of absolute admiration swept through her very being, snaking its way down the bond to the Shadowsinger. Two halves that made a whole, always careful to support the other. Gods, the warmth burrowing through her chest felt like worlds more than just love.

Devlon moved to open his giant fucking mouth again.

“Time has been called,” Cassian swept in before the Lord could manage another word. “Thesan. These are your lands. This is no longer a formal council. Jurisdiction falls to you.”

The Lord of Bloodshed didn’t so much as flinch at Rhys’s attempt to shoot daggers across the room. Part of her was proud of Cass for it; how many times had Rhys fucked his own Court over in one single meeting? Passing rulership to Thesan even eased the burning spite in her own soul, if only a little.

Thesan let out a breath, scanning the room as if he might find the answer in the mouths gaping in shock about the hall. “I move to address this issue within the next Council in one month’s time,” Devlon’s cursing echoed throughout the hall. “While they may be a resource, it is within the best interest of the Courts to tread carefully. As of now, any association with the Daughters of Dimir is to be reported to military personnel of the Courts. Monitored. If they happen to step out of bounds of their own lands without due permission of the breached Court, it will be considered an act of war.”

Turning on them. The entirety of Prythian was turning on them. Somewhere in her brain, she willed Echo and the rest of the Daughters to stay put, remain in lockdown. Or at the very least, reach her first before anyone else.

Fallon let her eyes slip shut as that simmering rage within cranked up to a full-blown boil. How could the Courts set grounds to declare an act of war if they couldn’t even get a damn message to the Daughters to tell them? Something stunk. Everything about this stunk. The abrupt disappearance of her friend. The sheer lack of communication or sign of life. Devlon’s lobbying for the demonization of their entire existence.

Oh, that fucker had played his cards well. Nothing like a little bit of stoking the flames of a fire based in fear to send an entire room of powerful leadership jumping to conclusions. No, he’d been waiting for this.

She’d make him eat his fucking words. Eat his own damn tongue, too, if she so desired. She brought him back from the brink of death – who was to say she couldn’t drop his half-dead corpse right back there again?

“--Dismissed.” She hadn’t caught a single word of Thesan’s closing statement. The ringing in her ears drowned out all else, save for the quiet voice in her head urging her forward in agreement. Devlon deserved to choke. He was a bastard anyway, and caused more problems than he had answers. But most of all, that little voice simply sought out one thing: Blood. Pain. She wanted him to hurt.

The Illyrian Lord skirted the outer edge of the hall with a broad, satisfied smile on his face, and suddenly she was moving too. Slipping out of Azriel’s hold without clocking a single word he was murmuring to her, ignoring Cassian’s warning glance shot her way, flitting past an alarmed looking Eris who seemed to have thought better than to bar an arm out in her direction.

As soon as Devlon stepped into the antechamber, she was upon him.

Devlon’s back met the hard stone wall with enough force to crunch the minor bones in his wings upon impact. Despite the height difference, Fallon drew on that simmering rage within and drove her forearm right into his godsdamned throat. Not pulling from that bright well of power sequestered somewhere inside, but… a place far darker. Far more dangerous. Unfamiliar, and yet entirely electrifying.

“I should kill you where you stand, you conniving –” he released a wheezed as she surged forward, cutting off his airway. “-- woman-hating–” At once, her other hand moved toward his heart. Hovered over it. Waited for that command in her head to tell her to pierce it. “--piece of shit.”

Do it. Do it.

“You still owe me a life debt, you raucous bastard. Maybe it’s time I fucking collect.”

Under her arm, Devlon wheezed, eyes wide as saucers that might just pop out of his head. That inner voice only grew louder with his fear, more alluring.

Do it. Kill him.

All at once, she found herself succumbing to the black abyss stirring within.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

this scene was very fun to write. I never thought to enjoy writing politics much, but when it is politics and potential murder.... yes

𝖼𝗈𝗆𝗆𝖾𝗇𝗍𝗌 𝖺𝗇𝖽 𝖿𝖾𝖾𝖽𝖻𝖺𝖼𝗄 𝖺𝗅𝗐𝖺𝗒𝗌 𝗐𝖾𝗅𝖼𝗈𝗆𝖾! ・°˖✧

Chapter Text

Azriel

At this point in his life, there were few things left he hadn’t imagined himself doing some day. But dragging his bloodthirsty mate from Lord Devlon’s throat and consequently saving the bastard’s life was certainly not one of them.

Shields up, focus consistent – Gods, he’d trained Fallon well. Punching through the barrier of power dividing Devlon’s guardsmen and herself felt akin to punching through a cement wall. But the impact of his siphons had broken her focus enough to loosen the vice-like pressure she held to the brute’s throat. Enough for Azriel to lay a hand on her shoulder, to jog her concentration.

What he hadn’t expected was the violent flinch and recoil from his touch.

It knocked him into silence, too. Not even in the first weeks they met had she reacted with such… disgust. It dug the metaphorical knife in his chest deeper than any physical weapon could ever reach.

She blinked once, twice, as if coming to, golden eyes taking in the Illyrian she still held pressed to the wall, and the gathering of onlookers that consequently gathered from the ruckus.

“Keep your mouth shut unless you’d rather I sew it,” the threat fell from her lips easily, and then his mate pulled herself from what might’ve been a killing blow, disengaging her hand from over Devlon's heart and stepping back in one fell swoop.

...And walked away.

Before he could even consider, Azriel had closed the gap between them and spun her around. She flinched back again like she’d been struck, and his own body nearly mirrored the movement. Pure shock coursed through his system – at her reactions, yes, but also–

Her eyes met his. Gold, beautiful, but… cold. Glazed, her body present while her soul danced somewhere far off. He gripped that bond inside, felt along it, only to be met with a dim murmur relaying the same concern.

Every muscle in his body locked up taut. Every worst case scenario came spiraling through his mind all at once. Those were her eyes – but it wasn’t her . He knew his mate down to every last atom, every single facet of her soul. Whatever stared back at him wasn’t a part of her in the slightest.

Fallon blinked hard, stark hair swishing around her as she shook her head. That bond he sent a vicious yank to suddenly sprung to life once more, and with it, the gold of her eyes cleared like a storm giving way to a sunny day. But his heart still thudded in his chest with a violence that threatened to halt his pulse entirely. 

She wasn’t telling him things. She wasn’t being honest. The headaches had come first, and with it, his incessant worry. But she had been different, too. Moments of spacing out that she couldn’t seem to recall. The increasing struggle with harnessing her magic. That hot temper had always existed within her, something he valued unconditionally, but it had always partnered with her apt control. Now, he’d watched it slip day by day, sometimes even with him, and now in a public space with every High Lord present to witness. 

“What?” she blinked up at him, taking his hand in hers. Azriel remained as motionless as stone, still assessing, shadows running circles around her. “What’s wrong?”

As if she didn’t remember nearly ending Devlon’s life mere seconds ago.

“Keep your bitch on a leash,” Lord Devlon spat, still hunched along the wall. Those six words met his ears too little too late. The day had turned into one giant monstrosity and the sun hadn’t even begun its descent. Finding his mate in a crippling state among the wilderness of the Illyrian Steppes had nearly done him in, but to listen to Rhys pitch himself and Fallon as monster hunters for something every Court was underprepared for – and the way he’d thrown Cassian to the godsdamned wolves, lying to the Courts to save his own face… Devlon was about to be on the unfortunate end of hours of pent-up wrath.

Azriel found Cassian weaving his way among the room and sent a simple nod in Fallon’s direction. Watch her .

 With a nod of the General’s own, Azriel started for the fucker still blotting at a wound through his armor – where blood had leaked just above his heart. He cast a single glance back to Fallon, who stared down at blood-coated fingertips, mouth agape in something like horror. 

Fuck. She truly almost executed the man where he stood. 

“She might have spared you,” Azriel grunted, easily dodging a fist and fitting his fingers around the width of Devlon’s throat with ease. “No promises I will.”

And with that, he spirited himself and the bastard away from the prying eyes of any witnesses.

𓆩⟡𓆪

Azriel’s shadows tracked the rest of the Inner Circle to the House of Wind by the time he finished beating Devlon senseless. The busted skin of his knuckles felt more like a sore reward after a workout than a violent wound, though he could’ve done with a little more blood. 

Or a lot more blood.

If Devlon ever dared speak about his mate like that again, he’d bleed the fucker until the godsdamned Sidra ran red.

The Lord had stopped his moaning at about the same moment his jaw cracked against Azriel's knuckles for a third time, his silence a blessing from the bullshit he’d spewed prior. T hen he’d crushed his skull against a tree and left the son of a bitch to wake in the wilderness of the Steppes.

Azriel knew damn well something wasn’t right with his mate. But it didn’t give grounds for anyone, anyone , to make those assumptions about her themselves.

His boots his the tiled veranda with a force hard enough to announce his arrival, wings snapping shut before he let himself into the main room of the House of Wind –

And into a near-screaming match between Rhys, Feyre, Cassian, and Nesta.

But he breezed over their existence, searching for the other half of himself, and found her hunched at the edge of one of the chaises of the room with her fingers pressed to her temples, brows drawn together with tension. Azriel skirted the argument and met her side in a few long strides.

“Headache,” a grunt of pain accompanied the single-word explanation she offered. A headache earlier, and a headache now. Their frequency had certainly picked up over the past months, and with the way her jaw clenched, the pain had too.

He couldn’t help but reach up and cup her face, draw her eyes up to his. He yearned for that skin on skin contact, but most of all, needed to ensure her eyes were… hers.  Familiar gold peered up at him with a sadness that shook him to the core. “I didn’t know I did that,” she barely whispered. “The blood – I didn’t know that I hurt him.”

Mother above. He kept his face neutral despite the horror crawling its way up his spine. Willed his shadows to continue business as usual, and not to hunker down upon his shoulders like they begged to. 

Another blackout. Fallon had only experienced one other to his knowledge, and it had been perhaps the most terrifying night of his fucking life. The way she’d stood in the house, their house , like she never stepped a foot inside before. Grim and Reaper had sensed it too, had growled at the very woman they’d known to be their savior. 

Because it might’ve been her body, but it hadn’t been Fallon. Something else had taken over her the night Rhys threatened to end Nesta’s life. The night Cassian had to fly his mate to far off mountains to ensure their brother didn’t lash out and end her existence. At least neither blackout seemed to last long. One look in the mirror had seemed to snap herself out of it then, and now one look at him seemed to do the same.

He couldn’t tell if he was more relieved or haunted by that little fact.

“Devlon... Is he–?” She asked with a swallow. Azriel shook his head, pulling her body flush to his in a much-needed hug. The feeling of her body melting into his, accepting the very touch she flinched away from back in that chamber, shaved at least the tip off the iceberg of stress that had built in him today.

“He’s fine. He’s a bit roughed up, might need to see a healer courtesy of his running mouth,” fucking prick. “But he’s fine.”

Rhys’s voice boomed across the span of the lower level of the house, and Fallon’s arms pulled tighter around his waist, huddling into him as if she were trying to hide away.

Azriel ground his teeth together and gently freed himself from her grip despite every part of himself detesting such an action. H e stalked to the four pointing fingers in one another’s faces, Nesta’s mouth primed to let loose another yell in the direction of High Lord and High Lady, and made use of the darkness brewing within himself.

“The next person to raise their godsdamned voice in this house will find themselves punted from the rooftop,” he growled, so low and so quiet that the crack of the blazing fireplace behind them still remained audible. 

Cassian murmured an apology, his eyes darting to Fallon at the other end of the room. Fallon sat in slumped relief, which only boiled his blood further. As much as he loved his family, they could be a handful of oblivious fucking idiots at the worst of times.

Azriel let out a much needed breath and found himself at her side once more, pulling her to his front. Just holding her. It was enough of a distraction to keep him from going for the High Lord’s throat.

The group pivoted, Cassian and Nesta moving further into the room. Feyre and Rhys remained at one another’s sides, a couch and what felt like a million miles dividing the group in two.

“Apologies,” Rhys offered quietly, sliding a hand into his pocket. Feyre murmured one of her own.

“S’fine,” Fallon shrugged.

But it wasn’t fine. Nothing about today had been fine.

And to add to that heap, his shadows clocked Amren slinking into the room from down the hall.

“What you did today was a breach of trust,” Cassian growled at Rhys. “My trust, and the trust of every other Court.”

Nesta’s lip curled in disgust. “You tarnished his credibility in front of every single High Lord,” she spat, a razor-blade’s edge riding her words. Azriel was content to let her slice Rhys up like the solstice ham at this point. “You were well aware that Dimir had ceased contact. Even I was well aware of it.”

“He lied to protect the face and standing of this Court,” Feyre shot back. “Do you think the Night Court would have any place at the upcoming Councils had he said otherwise? The councils that will determine the very fate of Dimir? Losing the say in how their future is handled could very well damn them all.”

“Don’t beat around the bush. Say what it is at its most basic, Feyre. He lied to save face,” Nesta snapped. “And used my mate as a scapegoat in the process.”

Both the High Lord and Lady fell silent. A black hole of disgust spawned in Azriel’s very stomach, sucking in all else. “Five hundred years of trust,” he scoffed. “The Illyrians have been enough of a pain as of late. Do you think they’re going to line up and bend to your will after witnessing you undermine your own brother?”

Rhys clicked his tongue. “If I make them.”

Azriel stilled, Fallon’s body locking up alongside his. The High Lord’s gaze flicked from each of them like a predator zeroing in on prey. The urge to throw his mate behind himself nearly overpowered every other emotion running rampant through his body.

“You cannot root through all of their minds without their consent,” Horror crept into Cassian’s voice. “You know that. You’ve stood against that for years.”

“Then maybe it’s time for things to change,” Feyre concluded, clamping the hand of the High Lord in her own. A queen and king, two unstoppable forces. Two major threats.

Azriel risked a glance down at Fallon. It wasn’t like her to stay silent, and not on a topic that hit so close. He’d clocked the surge of fury down the bond in that chamber well and good. Hell, it had nearly ignited his own. But she only leaned against him, blinking as her eyes skirted the room.

The Lord and Lady shared a look, a silent conversation passing between them. “We’ll do what we must for the sake and peace of this Court,” Rhys finalized. “We would hope in the interest of the many, you eventually see it that way, too.”

“You’re not pandering to a fucking crowd of delegates,” Nesta seethed. “You’ve known half of this room for centuries. Start acting like it.”

“He’s right.”

Fallon slunk from his arms, a coldness lingering where her body warmed his. “It’s unfortunate. But the Night Court can’t risk losing the respect of the Courts. Not right now.”

He took in his mate, who stepped toward Rhys and Feyre with a nod of her head. Agreeing. Siding with them. 

Something in him snapped.

“If you’re in her head, I swear to the Gods I’ll rip your throat out where you stand.” Azriel snarled, one hand already moving to the hilt of Truth-Teller. They wouldn’t dare. He’d thought that once upon a time. 

But Fallon’s words from the Steppes played on repeat inside his head. Something had changed within all of their friends – Rhys and Feyre the most. A quiet confirmation to what he’d been observing in secret over the past year. What he set his shadows on Rhys and Feyre for many months ago. 

Something was off. Wrong. And now he was feeling the same sick churning in his gut about Fallon.

“They’re not in my head,” She held out her hands in surrender. “They’re right. With the Daglan beginning to move, the Court will be left vulnerable if we lose the trust of Prythian.”

“You’re okay with this?” Azriel turned his blazing glare to her. Met those eyes of gold, though nothing familiar stared back. “You’re okay with Rhys delegating us to hunt an enemy we know nothing about without ever approaching us about it beforehand? You’re okay with Cassian potentially losing his foothold as General because of the good of the Court ,” No, that wasn’t his mate staring so vacantly back at him. Azriel cut his glare to the High Lord and Lady. “That good will be compromised if Devlon and the Illyrians see it within their rights to take over Cassian’s position. The same Illyrians that still clip the wings of females. Still treat them as lesser. If they have it their way, the Daughters will be hunted . Nothing about this is okay.”

“You what ?” Nesta’s head whipped back to Rhys, a finger flung in his direction for good measure. “There’s a word for delegation without communication: manipulation , you fucking bastard.”

“Nes,” Cass eased, a hand steady on her shoulder. The temperature of the room stuttered, guttering despite the roaring flames warming the hearth. Even the faelights above wavered, sensing the wave of power stirring within the eldest Archeron. 

For a moment, he swore he caught a flash of fear across Rhys’s face. But with a blink, the High Lord was glaring at her once again. “Get your mate under control,” he ordered. “What’s done is done. We’d be happy to oblige you with our reasoning after you’ve all… cooled off. Glad you’re feeling better, Fallon.”

“Much,” she agreed, no sign of a headache to be found. No brilliant glow of the mating bond within, either. Just a dim, stifled thing. Azriel shoved that rising panic down as far as he could possibly push it.

“Well revisit this another time,” Cassian bit, but he’d begun leading Nesta toward the stairs in effort to put some distance between his mate and a murderous looking High Lord.

“Gladly,” Feyre said through thin lips. “Goodnight.” 

Azriel gawked as the pair exited to the veranda and spirited off into the night without so much as a glance back.

What the fuck had he just lived through?

A tug at his hand drew his attention, a touch gone as quick as it came. “We should go, too.” Fallon said, already starting for the door.

“We should check on Cassian and Nesta.” 

Her footsteps faltered slightly. “I’m sure they’re fine. We should give them their space.” 

“Turn around and look at me.”

Reluctantly, Fallon spun on a heel, looking anywhere at him but his eyes. Azriel drew in a breath if only to tamp down the mix of horror and fury burning within him.

“Look at me, Fallon.” An order. “Look me in my eyes.”

Jaw set, she finally met his awaiting gaze as if she were weathering a winter storm. Cold, harsh, unbearable. She tore her eyes away once more.

Even knowing something was horribly wrong, he couldn’t help but feel the cutting edge of rejection slice into his chest, and slice deep. “You were furious during the Council. I could feel you. What changed?”

Her shoulders rose and fell in nonchalance, eyeing the vacant corner where Amren once stood. “I came to my senses, I guess.” 

Azriel couldn’t hold back the scoff of detest. “You nearly killed a man tonight on a whim in front of every single High Lord. High Lords already hesitant to grant us access to their lands.”

Something in her darkened. “He had it coming.”

“So you remember now.”

She crossed her arms over her chest. “I just had a momentary memory lapse,” she backtracked. “I remembered what I did a few moments after. The adrenaline got to me. No need to make a big deal out of nothing.”

Fallon, who had asked him upon entering the House of Wind if Devlon was okay. The same girl who had crafted a cloak for a Suriel as a solstice gift. And now she stood before him fighting to justify a murder in cold blood that nearly every Court witnessed.

“You’re right,” he said. “Cass and Nes will be fine. I’m sorry for blowing it out of proportion. We should head home.” If whatever the hell was staring back at him through her eyes wanted to play a game, then chess it was - a nd he would always remain three moves ahead.

Even so, the beaming smile that lit her face nearly twisted his stomach into knots. It just wasn’t… her. No radiant joy. No affectionate love reflecting back at him. Something wore her skin.

He soundlessly sent a shadow off to Cassian to relay a quick apology and an urgency to meet in private the next time they could swing it. Sent another few shadows to monitor the River House, or moreso its occupants. Another to keep watch of Amren, who had come and gone without a word. 

The rest stayed on Fallon, cloaking themselves invisible in the night as they stepped out onto the veranda.

He made to reach for her. She took a step back. “I can meet you there,” she said, waving him off.

Azriel clenched his jaw and stared her down as he might any unfamiliar face. “You know there are wards around this house that prevent winnowing.”

“Right. Forgot,” she mumbled, and reluctantly took his outstretched hand in hers.

He flew through the night and toward home with a godsdamned stranger at his chest.

𓆩⟡𓆪

Upon returning home, Azriel abruptly let out a curt whistle for the Deathhounds roaming the property.

“Let’s let them enjoy the freedom a little longer,” Fallon urged, stepping through the threshold of the house. It chilled him to the core to see the wards accept her as if she was the same woman exiting just this morning. 

Azriel followed her in, making for the kitchen without a glance back. “It’s their feeding time, remember?” He got to work pulling their bowls from the floor and the raw meats from the fridge.

“Of course I do. I just thought it’d be nice to give them a little more time outside.” 

He dumped the raw contents evenly into both dishes. “Can’t find the pumpkin,” he lied. “You fed them this morning. Can you grab it for me?” Azriel made a point of searching through the cupboards, waiting for the footsteps of an approach he should’ve heard by now.

But no footsteps down the short corridor came. 

Perhaps it remembered, then. It hadn’t forgotten that the only thing to jog her from the first blackout so many months ago had been the glance at her own reflection in that very mirror sitting in the hall. Like something about seeing her face had startled it into hiding.

“It’s probably in the fridge,” she called out. “I’m feeling tired. Headache again. I’m gonna go lay down for a while.” 

Azriel pressed his hands to the countertop with such force the rock beneath began to groan.

Fallon wasn’t herself. Rhys wasn’t himself. Feyre wasn’t herself. Azriel’s head spun, fighting to draw any semblance of a conclusion from the incidents of the past twleve hours. Rhys and Feyre hadn’t reported headaches, but Fallon was plagued with them. And yet when he looked into Rhys and Feyre’s eyes, their… humanity still lingered. Staring into Fallon’s eyes was like staring into a void. No familiar glint. No hint of the girl he’d fallen in love with inside. 

Tarquin had said the soldiers of the Summer Court hadn’t been able to remember the attack the Daglan launched upon exiting the portal. That they were still gathering their minds. Azriel drummed his fingers against the counter. Could the attack be reminiscent of one of her blackouts? But it didn’t make sense. The first reported Daglan had only come through three days ago. Her first blackout had occurred months ago.

But that had been the only Daglan reported. Was it possible others had come through without the knowledge of the Courts?

Even so, all he had was a fucking name and pieces of a tale that they’d only once existed here. No information to validate the horrific theory being built brick by brick in his head, no sound answers.

The only people who might have those answers had shut their wards a month ago. Like they knew something was coming. Or that something was already here.

The charge of talons on wood dragged him from his thoughts, but instead of skidding to a stop at his legs, the Deathhounds streaked into the house from the back door and bolted for the stairs with urgency.

Eyes wide, Azriel let out another curt whistle. Grim and Reaper halted at the steps, Grim snarling like madmen. 

So they knew, too. Just like the prior blackout, they could sense a stranger in the house. 

Maybe he wasn’t going crazy after all.

“Eat,” he ordered, setting both bowls down with finality. The hounds challenged him with twin glares, but in the end, couldn’t resist the call of their meal.

Azriel stalked into the adjacent hall and assessed the hanging mirror. He’d force her to stare into it if he had to. Making to pull the thing from its hook in the wall, he only paused with two hands on the frame as a shadow snaked toward his ear. 

Gone , it whispered. She left .

The mirror jolted against the wall as he dropped it, clanging against the decorative wooden moulding. Pacing his breaths in, out, and in, Azriel fought to quell the already insurmountable panic threatening to take over. He needed to speak to Cassian, and fucking soon. Nesta, too, if only to warn them.

But for now, if his mate had disappeared into the dark of night outside... then he would follow.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

ugh. many apologies for the long hiatus. i definitely need to start my ACOTAR reread soon to get excited about this story again. the plot eats, but writing ....... is hard. or at least feels that way. if you're still reading, thank you <3 

𝖼𝗈𝗆𝗆𝖾𝗇𝗍𝗌 𝖺𝗇𝖽 𝖿𝖾𝖾𝖽𝖻𝖺𝖼𝗄 𝖺𝗅𝗐𝖺𝗒𝗌 𝗐𝖾𝗅𝖼𝗈𝗆𝖾! ・°˖✧

Chapter Text

Fallon

Flashback – Night Court

“Get Nesta out of this city. Right now.” Rhys’s power rumbled in the room like a rising storm. “Before I fucking kill her.”

“You won’t lay a hand on her,” Fallon prowled across the room with startling surety, crossing her arms over her chest in eerie calm. “You will not touch her. Threatening to harm your own sister-in-law,” she scoffed, the tang of disgust heavy in her throat. “She’s your family, Rhys. She’s Cassian’s mate. If you want someone to be furious with, take a look in the fucking mirror.”

Azriel stepped to her side, a hand of warning falling to her shoulder. Because Rhys, too, stalked forward, so close that the tendrils of dark trailing him swamped their feet like snakes. “You would be wise to stay the hell out of this,” the High Lord snarled. “Nesta had no right –”

“She had every right, Rhys.” Going nose to nose with someone as powerful as Rhys never felt good, but in this instance, she couldn’t give a damn that even the atmosphere of the room seemed to buckle under the powers stirring under their skin. “To keep that from Feyre is just as dangerous, if not more. It’s her body on the line. Yours, too, with that idiotic suicide pact. Or have you forgotten?” Fallon only leaned in closer. “That’s her sister. Her sister . You had one once, too, Rhys.”

“Fallon,” Azriel’s hand still weighed heavy on her, urging her to fall back, but something in her wouldn’t allow it. Some deep, sick part of herself wanted this fight. Wanted her to hand over control. The breath she sucked in felt like inhaling smoke. Was it possible to suffocate from rage alone? It stifled every part of her rational mind, every part of her that cared for Rhys as more than a High Lord, and more than the bastard that stood before her. She wanted him to hurt. 

She wanted him to ache.

“I was the last to see her before she disappeared,” the office had descended into a deadly silence, her voice lingering no more than a pleasant octave above it. “Do you want to know what she said to me?”

Rhys clenched his jaw, but the lack of response opened the metaphorical floodgates.

“She told me to tell you she loved you, and that you are everything your father wasn’t. But I don’t believe that’s true. She loved you, sure. But the cold, callous monster standing in front of me couldn’t fall any closer to the tree from which his father fell, too. I may not have met him, but I heard enough. I watched him stalk through the Hewn City while I was chained and beaten, and he turned a blind eye. And you continue to do the same – with the women of Illyria, and now with Feyre. You’re just as much of a beast as he was. Nesta had every right to reveal a secret that could have killed her familial blood –”

A wall of black met her face. 

The back of Azriel’s leathers, to be exact, and the hum of a glowing blue shield that held a thrashing darkness at bay. Fallon blinked, fighting to regain herself, but reeling her wits back in was akin to scooping water. She couldn’t hold it for long.

“Not my mate,” the Shadowsinger spoke the words with a quiet, terrifying fury. “Don’t you dare, Rhys.”

But Rhys was boiling. A pot threatening to blow its lid, if he hadn’t already. Before she knew it, two strong arms had scooped her up with lightning speed, and Azriel whisked her toward the front door of the River House. 

“I’m not finished with him,” Fallon thrashed in his arms, an unbridled rage taking root in her very bones. Feyre had every right to know that the baby might kill her. That her body wasn’t fit to birth a child with wings. And yet he’d kept it from her, fearful of the stress . Fallon could only imagine the amount of stress Feyre would’ve undergone had she birthed the baby months later to find absolutely everything going to hell in a handbasket.

Men were fucking stupid, and Rhys perhaps the dumbest of them all.

“We’re going home,” Azriel answered vehemently. The cool kiss of night touched her skin as the Illyrian restraining her launched into the air. “I know you’re pissed. I am too. But Rhys is a mated male with a pregnant mate in the room. He’s not thinking rationally. He’s not thinking at all.”

“ And apparently hasn’t for the last months ,” Fallon shouted, as if the motherfucker might hear her from the very skies overhead. Gods, she wanted to kill him.

She wanted to kill him.

That rage underneath her skin only built and built.

“What you said…” Her mate let out some mix of a sigh and a growl. “You were over the line, Fallon.” But she didn’t care. Could not find any shred within herself to. Was she still herself ? She could only feel something like a dark emptiness where something bright like a soul once sat.

By the time Azriel struck the ground outside of their house and forced her through the front door, everything in sight had bled red. She could no longer see past her anger, past the vicious rage claiming every part of her mind. The more she entertained it, the more it fueled the fire. 

She wanted to strip the skin from the High Lord’s bones bit by fucking bit.

Panting like she’d run a mile, Fallon stumbled forward and gripped the decorative table against the wall as everything went black. 

𓆩⟡𓆪

In her body, but not. Her vessel, her domain, but viewing from a keyhole in a door locked tight. Fallon stared and stared, numb despite the icy chill of adamant before her, and watched the world pass by through a tiny peephole.

So strange. She was – she was watching herself. But not her . It wasn’t her consciousness manning the body any longer. No, that had been locked away somewhere deep inside.

“Fallon?” Azriel asked, still half-guarding the door like she might bolt. Not-Fallon glanced around the house, eyes taking in everything around her in a new light. The decorative throw on the couch in the parallel living room. The short hall that led to the kitchen, where the bunch of wildflowers Azriel had picked while passing through the Spring Court sat in full bloom. The glowing faelights above, their shadows flickering and dancing on the hardwood floor below her feet.

Whatever it was… whatever had taken claim of her, it felt happy. Pleased. Like it had been waiting for this.

“Hm?” She said, still taking in the nooks and crannies of the space like it could memorize every detail.

Azriel took a tentative step into the house. “What do you mean, ‘hm?’” 

She turned to the Shadowsinger, and Fallon watched as Not-Fallon took one look at her mate and abruptly glanced away. “Sorry,” she muttered. “I blanked.”

Azriel took another step forward, the hardwood below creaking under his boot. But Not-Fallon wandered further, walking down the little hall with guarded interest and stepping on two feet like she hadn’t walked in millennia. 

“That’s not me,” Fallon reached for the door handle next to the peephole she peered through, so icy cold that it may as well have bitten her. “That’s not me. Azriel ,” 

Quiet, a voice hissed. A jarring force slammed into the door, threatening to launch her backward into an awaiting murky abyss behind her. She drew in a shaky breath and watched her mate pursue that thing down the hall.

“Fallon, please. Talk me through this,” He urged, reaching for her wrist. At the touch, Not-Fallon’s body jolted like she’d been stung. Her stomach curdled as she watched it shake him off and stagger away like she’d been dealt a physical blow. 

“Don’t,” she said, “Don’t touch me–” but she spun, meeting her own gaze in the mirror attached to the wall in the tiny corridor. Horror and dread crashed into the tiny room sequestering her true consciousness away like a flash flood, panicked murmurs following suit.  Something about her eyes, her eyes – 

In a flash, she yet again stood in the short corridor illuminated with the warm glow of faelight, gaping at herself with wide eyes in a mirror she’d looked into every single day for the past year. 

Like a dream, only bits and pieces of her memory floated by. Something about a door, or maybe darkness?. She stared into the mirror and blinked, wondering if maybe it had all been some episode. 

Just an episode. A blackout.

That’s all it was.

So why, then, did a tiny voice inside her mind linger, whispering and hissing poison as her eyes met Azriel’s shocked gaze once more?

Tell him, it said. And I’ll kill him .

Tell him and he dies .

𓆩⟡𓆪

Present day

Back in the chalet, Fallon awoke with a start. What she assumed to be darkness or grabbing hands quickly turned into her hair strewn over her own face and the plushness of the dark loveseat smushing against her cheek.

The room blinked into vision as her blurry eyes cleared. First the bookshelves, lined with text after text her mate had hand-selected for her. Then the fireplace, unlit and pristine despite the minor chill of the air.

Right. Azriel had suggested they spend the rest of the night at the chalet after she awoke from falling asleep at the House of Wind. Something about a way to escape the chaos that had unfolded in the council chamber earlier. 

Gods, she didn’t even want to think about it.

Fallon crawled from the plushy seat and slipped her feet into a pair of warm, awaiting slippers, making for the matches sat next to the fireplace. 

Nimble fingers ripped one from the jar, her hand drawing back to strike the flame–

“No fires,” a broad, familiar hand closed over her own, halting the motions. “Warming you up is my sole responsibility tonight.. C’mere,” Azriel took the matches from her hand and dragged her flush against his body, awakening the butterflies he stirred in her stomach just about every day of her life.

With a laugh, she allowed him to whisk her back to the loveseat, settling them both into the cushion once more. He dragged a blanket over them as he asked, “What were you dreaming about?”

What had she been dreaming about? The scene escaped her now. Probably something mundane, like cooking dinner or playing with the hounds.

“I don’t even recall,” she shrugged. He nodded, seeming pleased with the answer.

“Well I hope it was something peaceful.” His lips met her temple with a softness that sent her body melting into his. 

Gods, she loved nights like this. Just the two of them, sequestered away where the world couldn’t reach. It never failed to dawn on her that there were times a year ago in which she didn’t know she’d ever have this. Didn’t know if she’d have him, or even be at his side.

So they cherished it. They spent the dark hours of the night chatting about nothing and everything, dozing and waking and stealing kisses where they could. Enjoying one another’s presence. 

Her mate. Her Shadowsinger.

Fallon cracked a groggy eye open hours later, reveling in the caress of a hand gently toying with her hair. She glanced around with a heavy yawn, finding the wall of windows across the room that always captured a perfect view of the Sidra. Except all that met her was the dark of night. 

That couldn’t be right.

“How long have I been asleep?” She frowned, stretching her legs from where they’d been curled up.

Azriel gave a half-shrug, still weaving his fingers through her hair. “A little while.”

The cold of the room drew a shiver to the surface of her skin. Freezing, bone-chilling cold. “We should call the hounds in,” she voiced, shifting forward to head for the door. If they’d been out all night, they were probably freezing, too, not to mention hungry –

The hand in her hair tightened, keeping her in place.

“The hounds are fine,” Azriel said in that same soothing voice. But the grip of steel his fist held set off warning bells in her head.

Her mate would never touch her like that. Not without warning, not without buildup. Somewhere far away, a ringing met her ears. 

Come to think of it, she couldn’t recall falling asleep at the House of Wind at all. One minute she was fighting off a migraine, and the next… a complete blackout.

“Lay back down. Sleep, you’ve had a long day.” Not a request but a demand, disguised in the same silky voice that threatened to lull her away on a cloud.

Fallon made to move again. “We should really call the hounds,” but that hand tugged, yanking her back to his chest with little effort. A vice-like arm encircled her waist.

“The hounds are fine. Like I said.”
Her head remained silent for the next several seconds, sitting in both shock and confusion.

And then she clamped her hands around the thing holding her and sent a brilliant blast of healing light right into its skin.

A blast that hadn’t burned her at all. Didn’t sear her veins, didn’t send her running. But the impersonator let out a wretched howl, its grip on her fumbling. She was up and moving so fast that the room around her spun into a blur.

No – the room around her was blurring. Unfocused, a dream shattering piece by piece. Or a mirage.

Her hand met the door handle and sent another jarring flash through her head; a vision of a door of adamant, icy and menacing, and a peephole –

Fallon raised on her tiptoes and peeked through the square window of the door. Familiar walls with wood moulding came into view, flickering faelights above casting shadows down on the hardwood floors. She stared back at herself, the other her now frozen, her face contorted as if she were fighting something from the inside out.

Behind her,, the thing in the chalet let out a blood-curdling roar, one that shook the crumbling world beneath her feet. 

She didn’t hesitate to rip the door before her open and thrust herself into the awaiting black.

𓆩⟡𓆪

Azriel

At least his shadows never lied.

Upon barging into their shared master bedroom, the bed lay vacant, untouched by any hand. Shuttering doors clacked against the greystone lining the balcony, wide open with a breeze sweeping inside. 

His mate had disappeared somewhere into the night, so he did, too.

Whatever that thing was hadn’t been around long, at least. Not long enough to put meaning to the bargain that sat inked from her arm to her neck, its twin pulsing under his leathers as he flew. When the pulsing faded, Azriel cut directions, keeping in the clouds to keep concealed from any night owls. When it pulsed stronger, he kept on.

Well out into the countryside, the bargain began its pivot. Pulsing in bursts, then slowing, sending him retracing his flight pattern a time or two over. Then, the ink on his right arm pulsed steady, a humming in his bones that let him know he’d reached the clandestine destination. 

Shadows swarmed his limbs in a black cloud, mirroring the darkness and shifting movements of the surrounding tree branches until he touched down on silent feet.

Woodland critters scurried about in the night, their movements concealing any possible noise made as he started forward. With the moonlight jetting through the holes of the canopy above, he could just barely make out the bright of her hair, the familiar curve of her body as she leaned against a tree trunk. In front of her, a larger figure stood.

She – it – had come to meet with someone.

A leaden brick of dread hollowed out his stomach to its depths. Perhaps his prior guess that more than one Daglan roamed Prythian wasn’t so far off the mark after all, if that’s what truly lived within her. 

By command, shadows wound their way forward through the thick of the trees and placed themselves in hearing range of the conversation passing between the pair. Azriel held his breath as he listened, eyes darting over the rolling hills just beyond them. Someone’s property, if he had to guess. Perhaps belonging to the figure still concealed in the darkness. Behind the pair, an unfamiliar estate claimed the head of the land, where several bouts of rolling fog decorated the greenery between the tree line and the home. 

“-- The Illyrian is becoming a problem,” his mate relayed. Shadows swarmed his ear as she continued on. “And so is she.”

The figure shook his head. “She won’t be for much longer. She can’t hold out forever, and neither can this one. Though he does like to pick his fights.”

Fallon snorted. “I’m trying something new with her. Seems to subdue her pretty well. All it took was some digging through her memories.”

The figure agreed with a grunt. “ He has enough self-loathing stowed away to drown in it. Its made my job quite easy.”

“I’m sure I’d have an easier time if her mate acted as a host, too,” she snapped. That feeling of dread crept its way up his spine once more. “He’s an issue and a way out for her. All it takes is a simple touch–” Fallon leaned off the tree and started forward at the figure, who staggered backward into a line of moonlight.

“Are you mad? Get back to the dark,” he growled. “And keep away from reflections.”

But the moonlight filtering down through the branches had struck him just right, enough to illuminate the familiar head of dark hair and the outline of wings he’d flown beside for over five hundred years. The near-violet eyes glaring ahead at whatever occupied his mate.

Rhys.

Azriel pressed a hand to the nearest tree trunk to brace himself, willing his knees not to buckle. Something lived inside both of them. And if what Fallon said was true…

Feyre, too. All three of them. 

He had to get to Nyx, fast. But stealing a child of a High Lord and Lady would take time. Planning. Probably allies, which seemed easier said than done. If there were truly Daglan occupying the bodies of three of his closest friends, how many more were out there? How many more walked beside him each day without him knowing?

Some fucking Spymaster.

“Do you have confirmation about the drop?” Fallon asked, leaning back against the tree once more.

Rhys let out an irritated breath. “It’ll be there. Bring it right back. We’ll need to remove you before she takes root.”

“I’m fine with getting the job done then and there,” she drawled. “Would be quicker, anyway.”

“He has more plans for you and I. Our goal was to procure the strongest vessels available, but our work isn’t done. You do what you’re told.”

Fallon let out a huff. “Understood. Does he have any more of those?” She gestured to something on his person.

“Not at the moment,” Rhys quipped. “Though more are on their way. I’m sure we’ll have one for your Illyrian in time.” 

“Thank Mantyx.”

His mind reeled, fighting to piece together tidbit after tidbit of information, each with a giant, gaping hole in its wake. One thing, though, he knew with certainty: those were not his friends. That was not his mate.

A flash of movement under the moonlight in the woods drew his attention. Several feet back, drifting deeper into the shadows –

He was upon it before the owl above could finish its call into the dark.

“Breathe a word and I’ll slit your throat,” Azriel said, low enough that the garble of the woods swallowed his words. The figure didn’t move, frozen in his grip with his hand pressed to their mouth, their back to his front. Truth Teller sat waiting and ready at the center of their neck.

Ahead, Rhys relayed a brief departure and took off into the night, his mate disappearing on the wind of a winnow after him.

“Let me go, you foul, stinking brute,” tiny hands shoved his arms away hard enough to send him stumbling back a few paces, though the true shock lay in the familiarity of her voice.

Silver eyes peered back at him from the dark. “Touch me like that again and I’ll sneak into your house and cut your fucking wings off.”

Before him, Amren nearly shook with rage.

“What the hell are you doing out here?” Truth Teller remained at the ready in his grip. Had she, too, been infiltrated? His shadows hadn’t picked up any odd activity on her end, but then again, they hadn’t on Rhys, either.

“Besides being attacked?” She groused. “What do you think I’m doing, Spymaster?”

Azriel didn’t move, didn’t breathe, didn’t speak. She still looked like Amren, talked like Amren, still held the same hostility as Amren. But the real Amren lay fast asleep in her tiny lofted apartment. His shadows reported so nearly every night.

“I’ve been spying on Rhys for months. Doing your job. You’re welcome.”

Azriel raised a brow. “My shadows never reported anything. No unusual behavior. No nightly trips.” 

The tiny spitfire let out a snort. “I’m ancient, boy. There are ways to trick your shadows that even you don’t know about.”

Amren rolled up her sleeve and rubbed at something traced with what looked like soot. Runes, or maybe symbols.

Empty , shadows hissed and swirled around his shoulders. Apartment is empty . 

Son of a bitch.

“Why?”

“Same reason you held your knife to my throat,” Amren rolled her eyes. Unfortunately, definitely Amren. “I didn’t know who I could trust, so I took no chances. But I figure you’re probably a safe bet since you look like you’ve seen a ghost.” Another pause. “I warded the River House the same. I’ll remove them tomorrow.”

Azriel pinned her with a dry look of disbelief. 

“Like I said: no chances.”

Slowly, he lowered Truth Teller to his side. Not away, but not ready to stab her heart out, either. “How long have you been tracking him? How long,” His voice fell hoarse. How long had she known?

A flash of sorrow blazed within the silver of her eyes, gone as quick as it came. “I started noticing things were strange with Rhys around the time they agreed to lock Nesta away in the House. I didn’t think much of it, wrote it off as the panic of two mates preparing for their first newborn. But I started keeping my tabs,” she sucked in a breath, a grimace curving her lips. Perhaps the most emotion he’d ever seen Amren show. “His choices have become increasingly ludicrous. Feyre’s too. I started seriously tracking him after he threatened to kill Nesta.”

The same night as Fallon’s first blackout. Azriel squeezed his eyes shut, the world around him threatening to collapse. 

“He’s evaded me a few times. I can’t winnow or fly, but I have my ways. Caught a few meetups in the dead of night between himself and others, but they keep their faces hidden. No face, no proof. I heard the fight in the House tonight,” she said, her lips thinning. “Until there is some solid proof, we can’t act on this. Whatever it is might not be Rhys, but it knows how to be a High Lord. It will shred our credibility like it did Cassian’s before anyone even has a chance to consider what we say is true.”

Azriel thrust a hand through his hair and dragged it down his face. “That thing mentioned there was more of something on their way. That they’d have one for me, like a device or something.”

“He’s mentioned them a few times,” Amren nodded. “I think it’s something they wear. Whatever it is acts like a conduit for the Daglan to enter the body.”

All of the breath exited his lungs in one harsh exhale. “Daglan,” he echoed. Two minds that had drawn the same conclusion.

“Fallon’s brother opened the portals,” Amren murmured. “We all knew the threat. It was bound to come at some point.”

“We need to find out what it is that does the transfer of Daglan into the body,” He rerouted. “She also mentioned something about a drop, to bring whatever it is back to Rhys.”

Amren folded her arms, hands rubbing her skin in an effort to keep the chill of the night at bay. “I think it’s meant for something bigger. Rhys reports to someone – I don’t know who. But whatever she’s been sent after sounds a lot like it’s meant to live in her. And if Rhys is the other strongest vessel,” Amren hesitated. “Then whoever he currently serves is likely looking for a change of residence some time soon.”

He could hardly wrap his head around it. Could hardly even believe the fact that such a conversation was taking place – and between he and Amren, no less.

“We have to keep her from getting whatever the hell she’s after,” by any means necessary. Even if it meant spiriting her away to fucking Vallahan. Vallahan…Azriel’s mind had yet to halt its circles. ”Where the hell is Mor in all of this?”

“As if I know,” Amren shrugged. “I haven’t seen her in weeks. But considering this property is under her name, I’d say it doesn’t bode well.”

He reeled in the urge to gape at the tiny woman before him. Maybe Amren should take up a position as their third Spymaster after their lives finally stopped imploding. “Cassian? Nesta?”

“I think they’re safe. For now, at least.” She let out a huff of a breath, one that condensated into the night. “I’m worried, Azriel. It sounds like Rhys and Fallon are fighting it, but you heard him. They might not have much longer.”
Worried. A word he’d never heard from her mouth before. Not once in his damn life.

“I know,” he sighed. But if he dwelled on it, his mind would drag him under to the deepest pit of despair. He couldn’t lose Fallon again. He wouldn't. “We’ll figure this out. We always do. For now, we bring in Cassian. Nesta too, once we’re sure of them. We’ll need help.” She only nodded, the unfamiliar furrow of her brow nearly striking him to silence. He could count on one hand the amount of times he’d seen Amren truly stressed. “That’s why you’ve been pushing Fallon to take Sword,” he breathed. “Why you stayed silent in the House tonight.”

“Playing pet to stay on its good side,” she grunted none too happily. “But it works. For now, at least. Rhys doesn’t suspect I know a thing.”

Azriel slipped the hilt of Truth Teller flush with its scabbard. Whether he’d admit it or not, they were so monumentally fucked. 

“Keep it that way if you can,” he nodded. “Now let’s get you home. It’s freezing out here.”

𓆩⟡𓆪

Fallon

Fighting. Grappling with herself – or rather something that wore her skin. Her face. Something dark and something light going straight for one another’s throats. 

You’re never going to get out of here.

A hiss that sluiced down her back with a chill so strong she nearly succumbed.

Stop fighting.

She wouldn’t. Couldn’t. Whatever it was, whatever had trapped her, she’d knocked it off kilter. Shocked it with her healing light long enough to escape wherever the hell it had locked her away. Now, it fought tooth and nail to drag her back under. 

But she wouldn’t let it. Darkness spiraled downward, thrashing and wretching and threatening to surge with enough power to suck her back in. But upward… a light at the end of the tunnel sat, bright and brilliant, and she begged with all her might that it wasn’t the fucking entrance to the Passing Point as she hurdled toward that tiny speck of salvation. 

One thing was certain: the darkness would not take her again.

Pursuit tracked hot and fast on her heels, so close that humid breath brushed against her neck, only pushing her faster. She didn’t dare look back out of fear she’d stumble, or maybe freeze in horror at whatever charged after her with its talons outstretched to snare her for good.

The glowing light ahead grew closer. Closer and closer. She’d make it, just a few more steps.

Whatever lay behind her hurdled forward with a force that struck her back. Fallon went down.

She’d fucking crawl to freedom before she let whatever the hell had taken up residence inside her get the best of her.

One knee in front of the other, that blinding light so close that she reached out to touch it, bathed her fingers in its brilliance –

Her legs hit the solid surface of a hardwood floor below.

Panting breaths condensated against the paneling, and it was all Fallon could do to press her palms to the cold floor that broke the fall and pray the wood grain at her fingertips wasn’t just another figment of her imagination too.

𓆩⟡𓆪

Azriel

Azriel slipped through the still-billowing doors of the master bedroom’s balcony just in time to hear the thump from down below.

Hands at his sides, he forced them into his pockets to conceal any lingering trembles. Visceral shaking, all brought on by the realization that his mate was not his mate, and his brother was not his brother, and his High Lady was not his High Lady.

No, something far more sinister lurked beneath each of their skin. 

One foot in front of the other, he forced his wavering breaths to mellow into ones of calm reassurance as he descended the staircase toward the main room. What would he find just around the corner? His mate, cold and confused and as scared as he’d ever seen her, gawking at her own blood-tipped fingers in the middle of the council chamber? Or would it be something else staring back at him with a soulless gleam in its eye that set off warning bells even within the protected, impenetrable fortress he called a mind.

With more hesitation than he was happy to admit, Azriel rounded the end of the staircase and forced his shoulders down from his ears.

And met the eyes of the beauty on the floor staring back at him.

The breath of relief that soared from his lungs nearly left him deflated. If a chest could fall concave, surely a crater would have remained in its wake.

Azriel blinked, the lag between his eyes and his mind finally leveling out. He took a tentative step forward, then another, brows drawing together at her hunched form. “Fal,” he eased another step toward where her hands pressed into the floor like a lifeline, white hair strewn to and fro as she watched him with a broken frown. “Where have you been?”

The pleading in the gold of her eyes nearly cracked any resolve that lingered in his blood. So when her bottom lip began to tremble, he knew better than to fight the part of himself that immediately let his knees meet the floor below. He swept a gentle thumb across her cheek as he cupped her jaw, her skin still chilled from the bite of the night air. Her body shook beneath his touch, tears threatening to spill from the corners of brilliant eyes.

Gods, whatever it was, whatever he had to face… It wouldn’t survive the encounter. She had been through too damn much to have to face something so sinister and demonic. How long had it been going on? How much had he simply brushed off, or missed entirely?

“Az,” The crack in her voice mirrored the one fracturing his heart. She sniffed, one hand coming up to grip at his wrist with dainty, shaking fingers as her lips curled in anguish. “I think something’s wrong with me,” she said. “ Really wrong.”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

𝖼𝗈𝗆𝗆𝖾𝗇𝗍𝗌 𝖺𝗇𝖽 𝖿𝖾𝖾𝖽𝖻𝖺𝖼𝗄 𝖺𝗅𝗐𝖺𝗒𝗌 𝗐𝖾𝗅𝖼𝗈𝗆𝖾! ・°˖✧

Chapter Text

“Make it relatively quick, I’m quite busy.”

Fallon gave Azriel’s hand clenched around hers a tight squeeze with the hopes that it would be enough for him to allow such a snipe to roll off. Her mate was a master of hiding his emotions, and quite the expert at keeping secrets – but the one talent she’d never relinquish was the keen ability to read his mannerisms like a book. And from where she stood, the clench of his jaw told her he was ready to beat Rhys senseless whether the High Lord knew it or not.

Cassian slid into the room behind them, taking up a spot against one of the bookcases lining the wall. “What’s got you so tied up?” despite his relaxed lean, the downward curve in his shoulders still mirrored the heavy weight placed on him after his brother’s betrayal in the council not days ago.

Fallon gulped a breath of air down that felt entirely too thick to be comfortable, though maybe it had something to do with the size of the egos inflating the room.

Rhys snapped his gaze to her, one so sharp and prying that she double-checked the barrier on her mind Azriel insisted she keep up twenty-four-seven nowadays. Still intact, and still standing strong – even to the phantom scratch of talons drifting idly over its surface.

Someone, or something, wanted inside.

“Reassuring the Courts that they didn’t grant two killers permission into their lands. Wouldn’t want to follow in my father’s footsteps, after all.” The words rolled off of his tongue with such ease that Fallon didn’t catch the blow until moments later.

But when it landed, it struck like a gut punch.

She almost killed Devlon in the middle of the council chamber – of course that would send the Courts on high alert. Of course they’d assume instability. Of course she caused more fucking problems than she did solutions. And the words she’d thrown right in his face that night in the House of Wind when he threatened Nesta… She still hadn’t found a way to apologize, to explain that it hadn’t been her – 

“I am a killer,” Azriel’s smooth voice broke her from the spiral beginning to take place. “And the opinion of the other Courts has never concerned you before. But I’m sure you’ve got it handled.” He paused, eyes darting back and forth as a shadow curled at his ear. “We plan to bring Cassian with us while we hunt the Daglan.”

Rhys gave a non-committal grunt, one hand snatching up a pen from the desk he sat at. “Cassian will be needed in Illyria,” he said, scanning the papers spread before him as if his own brothers weren’t trying to hold a conversation with him. “To mend things with Devlon.”

“There’s nothing left to be mended, Rhys,” The hollow ache in Cassian’s voice shot a pang through her heart. “The Ilyrians spoke their part. You chose your path out. I no longer hold sway in Windhaven because of it. Not when the High Lord contested my own credibility.”

Gods, this entire entire situation was so fucked up – and that stupid voice inside her mind continued to chant her fault, her fault, all her fault . Maybe she should just tell Rhys. About the headaches, about everything going on with her, and then maybe she could plead fucking insanity and wrangle that blame from Cassian’s shoulders – 

Don’t .

Fallon snapped her mouth shut as that single word rocketed down the bond. Not just a word, but a command. Azriel stood in quiet stillness beside her, though the energy radiating from his form remained anything but peaceful.

Why? Why not tell Rhys? Maybe somehow she could fix the disaster this had all become. But the words wouldn’t come out, not even if she tried. He’d taken that autonomy away from her – the one sliver of power they held over each other, promised only to be used in life in death… and here he was, weaponizing it against their own family.

Hot tears welled at the edges of her eyes, threatening to spill down her cheeks with a blink. He promised her. He promised . He –

Trust me . The plea echoed through her mind which had long gone silent from shock. Cassian grumbled something into the room, but her reeling mind wouldn’t allow the words to process. Trust him. Well, he better have a damn fucking good reason – 

“My answer is final,” Rhys quipped. “Fallon?”

She blinked struggling to collect herself and hating the fact that she had to lean into Azriel’s side to draw strength from the one person she was furious with. 

She looked to Rhys, avoiding the same stark, watchful eyes that seemed to search her, instead focusing on the edge of a dark cuff or bracelet just barely peeking from the form-fitting jacket he wore. Tasteful and simple, and yet somehow alluring. Something about it just begged to be touched, to step forward and run her finger along the band, feel its call up close and personal –

“Stay a moment. I have a gift for you.” 

Fallon blinked again, snapping out of whatever stupor that left her with a throbbing head. “For what?” She couldn’t stop the words from blurting out. For nearly killing Devlon? For putting heaps more work on his plate with the Courts? 

But Rhys only watched her, nodding toward the door as he did. “You two can leave us.”

The air in the room seemed to shift on its own, or perhaps it was the Shadowsinger bristling at her side. Something in herself seemed to stir, too – two sides of the same coin; one that cooed to stay, to listen to her High Lord… and another whispering in quiet warning that something wasn’t right .

Before she could even begin to process the internal war brewing within, Azriel nudged her toward the door and blocked her body with his own. “You can give whatever it is to her when we return. I’d hate to waste any more of your time.”

With Cassian at their heels, the trio exited the office and shut the door not seconds before the awaiting darkness sucked the light from the office completely.

𓆩⟡𓆪

It was a strange and foreign discomfort to look at her mate and know without a doubt he wasn’t telling her the whole truth.

First herself, fibbing about the severity of the headaches that plagued her to the point of disassociation, or… whatever it was. Then Rhys in the Council, lying at Cassian’s expense. Now Azriel was keeping secrets, too. 

When he’d found her awake on the entryway floor from whatever nightmare she narrowly escaped from, she told him everything. Everything she could remember, that is. 

That the headaches were getting worse. That they were making her want to… do things. Violent and horrible things, so persistent in its taste for blood and strife that she wasn’t sure how long her resolve could hold. She wasn’t sure how long it would be until the sinister voice inside her mind began sounding exactly like her own.

She told him about the blackouts, and how she couldn’t remember how she got from one side of the chamber to the other the day of the council, nor how her fingertips had become coated in blood that day – though Devlon gripping his chest eventually put the pieces together for her. The nightmare, though, was perhaps the hardest to convey.

She didn’t remember coming home. She barely remembered her time at the House of Wind – and what she did remember was just a whirlwind of yelling voices and a headache devastating enough to send her over the edge of whatever darkness claimed her. The next thing she knew, she’d awoken in the chalet next to her mate… or Not-Mate, given it certainly wasn’t her Shadowsinger. 

That’s when she’d seen it. The tightening of Azriel’s jaw as she recounted the attack in the chalet, and how she’d fought her way out at the edge of what felt like life and death. The tautness of his muscles, the familiar calculative glint in his sharp eyes – he wasn’t telling her everything. 

Even worse, he had the gall to lie to her face when she asked where she’d been the last few hours, what she’d done. 

But he only said that he didn’t know. That he had no idea she’d left the house. Fallon wanted to lay into him, to speak over the sounds of her cracking heart and tell him she knew he was lying , that her Spymaster mate never let her out of his sight, and that she was sick of everyone telling anything but the fucking truth, herself included. He went and used the one thing they’d labeled a last resort: the bind. He’d taken her autonomy, silenced her with a command she could not usurp right in front of Rhys –but  then he wrapped her in his arms with a promise that they’d figure it out. Together.

It was the dwelling of sour fear and hopelessness among the bond that kept her mouth shut. The tell-all connection that her mate might be lying, but perhaps a reason existed behind it. Whatever fear he was feeling, he wasn’t conveying it for her sake. And isn’t that what he’d done since the day they met? Protect her? Put her first despite himself? Azriel had never once made a call or decision that landed her in harm’s way, and some tiny, hopeful voice within her begged her to carry that trust onward, to ignore the deeper, darker voice insisting she challenge him. They’d promised one another up and down to only use the binding without any other option. Life or death. But that conversation in the office hadn’t felt ery much like life or death at all.

Unless there was more to it than her Shadowsinger was letting on.

He would protect her, always. Even if it meant lying to keep her safe. If there was one individual in Prythian she could trust, it was the man standing before her, suited up and adjusting the siphon on the back of his hand.

“No Cassian, then?” She double-checked. The following days had been spent preparing to hunt the escaped Daglan, but for all of the monsters she’d faced… the uncertainty surrounding whatever they were about to encounter sat on her chest like a rock.

At least she hadn’t blacked out in the past seventy-two hours. No headaches, either. The only win in what felt like a long list of losses for Fallon.

“He can’t usurp Rhys’s… direction. Not if it’ll land him in more trouble.” though the way her Shadowsinger grumbled the word, she knew the entire situation still weighed heavy on his shoulders.

She laid a hand to his, pausing the work on the swirling siphon. “We can still tell Rhys if you’re worried,” she offered. “I wouldn’t be offended if you didn’t feel confident going into this with just me. If a headache comes on, there’s no telling…” Gods, no telling what? If she’d wake back up? If she’d slaughter an entire Court? He still hadn’t told her what she’d done after the explosive fight at the House of Wind. Fallon opened her mouth to say something, to beg him to tell her some semblance of the truth, but Azriel beat her to the punch.

“I’m not worried about doing this with you by my side,” the surety in his voice somehow mended the ache in her heart with every word. “Leaving the Night Court right now just feels like the wrong move.” 

“I can get why Rhys wants this thing captured so quickly,” she murmured. “We don’t even know what the hell it's out there doing. Though a little more support from the High Lord and Lady would’ve been nice.”

Rhys and Feyre had become nearly unrecognizable in their decisions as of late. Sure, they’d been acting strange for months – everyone had, herself included, but even the brief meeting with herself, Cass, Az and Rhys just days prior had felt… entirely foreign. Unsteady. \

Taking Cassian along had made sense. They didn’t know what they were up against, didn’t know how strong these things really were. The roaming Daglan had taken on several Summer Court soldiers at once and left them incapacitated, barely able to recall a memory of the attack. And now their High Lord was denying herself and her mate aid because he believed Cassian would be more useful monitoring Illyria than saving their asses should they need it.

‘Conversation’ was a generous term for what unfolded in the quarters of Rhys’s office. Powertrip felt far more fitting. Maybe Cass would be needed in Illyria, sure, but… she and Azriel had been left out to dry in the process.

The stare Rhys had fixed on her still shot chills down her spine. A violating, piercing stare, like he’d been searching for something, waiting. She still hadn’t told Azriel about the scratch of talons he’d executed down her mind’s barrier, one she worked on rebuilding day and night since waking up on the foyer floor.

It wouldn’t do any good to stoke the burning fire of anger and resentment she could sense rolling from her mate. Maybe in time, but not when they were about to embark on a possible suicide mission. 

“Some rational thinking would’ve been nice, too,” Azriel said under his breath, finalizing the buckles on his armor. He stepped forward, the tension of his shoulders releasing ever so slightly as he took her in. “We’ll be alright, Fal. I’ve got you.”

“And I’ve got you,” she promised, and hoped with all her heart it was the truth. “Let’s kick some Daglan ass.”

𓆩⟡𓆪

Azriel

Every lie that too easily floated past his lips made sure to stoke the burning shame within him on the way out.

He hated lying to her. The thought alone felt grotesque, filthy. But if it kept her safe, and kept him at an advantage to help her… he’d stomach the shame until it tore him to pieces.

His shadows tracked the Daglan all the way to the outskirts of the Winter Court. Tracking was a loose term; they’d followed the gossip of a strange man with black eyes appearing and disappearing throughout rural towns on the northern end, dangerously close to the Middle. No reports of death or ruckus, save for some stolen supplies. It was traveling, then, which begged the question: where was it headed?

His present mind juggled their current mission while his subconscious wrestled to organize the piles of slowly-stacking guilt. 

At least he hadn’t completely lied to Fallon; it did feel wrong to leave the Night Court, especially knowing what he knew. And he had wanted Cassian to come with them. Nesta, too. He still did. It didn’t feel safe to leave any of them at the mercy of whatever the hell wore Rhys and Feyre’s skin, especially after what he was about to do.

Hunched over the creaky tavern table in the corner, he finally felt some semblance of brief normality, if he could ever call this normal. Fallon’s attempt at cloaking had spirited away his wings, and damn if it didn’t feel unnatural not to carry their weight even in the stool he sat in.

Hood up, ale in hand, he watched with a hawk’s gaze as his mate traversed the room in a getup similar to the rest of the dingy tavern’s patrons; heavily furred cloaks to stave off the biting chill of the air outside. Blending into the Winter Court had been the easiest part.

He tracked her through the room from where he sat, taking sips of stale, piss-poor ale to maintain the facade more than anything. But he remained far more focused on her; the way her cloak swished as she squeezed between two patrons, the gentle curl of a white wisp that escaped her hood. Azriel released a deep, burdensome breath.

He hadn’t told her anything. Couldn’t. That thing had paid enough attention, pawed through her mind enough to remember where the damn mirrors were in their own house. It was learning their world and how to behave like her among it – albeit sloppily with its lack of knowledge demonstrated about the House of Wind. But they hadn’t spent time at the House of Wind much in the past year, either. Their own home, however, it knew well enough to recreate it within her very own mind, and detail it enough to make her believe the nightmare it created with the chalet was simply reality. That was a dangerous line to cross.

Keeping her in the dark fed his own suspicions that he might be the worst monster of them all. But if she didn’t know what he knew, then that thing wouldn’t either. The discovery of the meetup between her and Rhys had given him perhaps the only leg up on the situation he was going to get: that they were after something, that more of them were coming, and that he was running out of time.

If this leg up was his one and only chance to save her from whatever stowed itself away inside his mate, so be it. If he caved, that thing would surely tell Rhys. Watching her bend to support the High Lord’s backward stance on slandering Cassian in the House of Wind had nearly struck him dumb that night. The second that thing came back within her, whenever it did… If she knew, he’d be locked up in chains under the Court of Nightmares by the hands of his own ruling brother. And what the fuck kind of help could he be from there?

Her lithe form settled onto a stool next to another hooded patron, hunched over at the bar cradling a mug of ale between his knobby hands. Azriel fought the urge to stiffen as the stranger bumped elbows with her; controlled breathing would be the vehicle getting him through this night. Controlled breathing, and the fact that she was far, far away from the Night Court right now.

 Rhys’s push for them to go on this mission didn’t sit well with him in the slightest, and holding Cassian back only added to the anxiety gripping his lungs. He hadn’t told Cassian yet. Was going to, until Cassian was firmly directed to stay in Illyria. Whatever Rhys was up to, Cassian was safer off going about business without the horror that his brother was possessed gnawing at the back of his brain – especially since Rhys took it upon himself to announce he  no longer found digging through minds without consent an invasion of privacy.

Amren had agreed to keep an eye on everything while they handled the mission, perhaps his one saving grace among this mess. Words he never thought he’d have to say.

Something was stirring, though. He could feel it. Pushing the mission so quickly, negating Cassian’s leave… there was no doubt he’d have to follow through with what he had planned. He couldn’t let Fallon go back there, and especially if whatever was in her was a part of that plan. Whatever gift Rhys had planned would simply never make it to her.

She might never forgive him, but if it kept her out of the High Lord’s grasp… then abducting his own mate would simply be a charge he’d have to live with.

𓆩⟡𓆪

Fallon

Deep, paced breaths. That’s what would get her through this night. That, and the grimy mug of ale in her other hand. 

“This seat taken?” She purred to the cloaked figure to her side, and took it upon herself to slide into the stool anyway. “What brings you around here? Certainly not our ale,” she snorted, playing her part of a regular townie – which, to her benefit, at least her hair made her look the part.

But the man at the bar didn’t budge. Didn’t even turn in her direction at a simple elbow bump. Thing’s not a talker, then.

Fallon cleared her throat and settled in fully at the bar, the weighted gaze of her mate bearing down her back as the steadying force she needed.

Gods, her eyelids ached for rest. And the alcohol was making her head spin, for the few shitty sips she endured.

If the thing didn’t talk to her, how the hell was she supposed to lure it from a public setting so they could detain the damn thing? 

The few silent minutes that passed between her and the hooded figure at her side were dense enough to choke on. Think .

Maybe she could’ve come up with a better plan had the thing looked at her, or had the ale not tamped her senses down. But the mug on the bar only had a few sips missing, surely not enough to inebriate her on the job.

Unless something else was causing it.

Fear threatened to catapult her heart into overdrive. This couldn’t be happening here, and certainly not now. Not next to this… thing. Not when Azriel was counting on her to usher it out of the eye of the public. 

But the stars blanketing her vision only grew more intense by the minute. The blooming ache at the base of her skull upped its intensity with every breath she took. 

Fallon pressed one arm atop the bar and leaned in toward the hooded figure. “You have ten seconds,” she said through gritted teeth. “Walk through the door up to the inn suites or I kill you where you stand.”

She wasn’t sure if she expected the thing to heed her warning, though she certainly hadn’t expected it to finally turn to face her, either. 

Nor was she anticipating the horrific twist of a smile that curled its lips, or the black eyes that seemed to pierce her very soul and stir something within. Human lips. Human eyes – all features that once belonged to a man who existed inside of his body no longer.

Just like how something inside of her began clawing its way to the surface of her humanity, too.

The thing blinked – once, twice, stumbling back a step as it eased off of the stool it perched on. She barely had the mind to consider what startled it, not when she was fighting for control of her own body with the darkness inside.

With too much effort, Fallon tore herself from the stool and straightened her spine. She tore through the tavern without a glance back, slowly fading vision locked on a creaky wooden door that the inn guests had swung through all night long.

No footsteps trailed her as she barged through the threshold of the hall, but its looming presence never left her back once. Struggling to keep upright, she shouldered into the first door the hallway presented. Splintering wood echoed through the hall as the lock gave way, dumping her into a thankfully vacant, if not shabby bedroom made up for one. The stained, crinkled sheets and billowing curtains were the last of her worries.

Azriel would be right behind her. In fact, he was probably tailing her through the tavern this very moment. Just a few more seconds . 

“Something wrong?” A velvet voice behind her drawled.

Fallon whirled, stars dotting her barely-there vision like a harrowing night sky. But through that slowly growing darkness, she could make out the sharp features of the man’s face; his dark, depthless eyes, and the cruel smirk he wore as he assessed a girl in shambles.

But what caught her attention lay just beyond the man-turned-monster. The door she splintered must have been sealed in the few moments she took to keep control of her body, and now stood with a curtain of whirling darkness draped over itself. A barrier –one made of darkness and gods knew what else. One that looked as if it might snap her own limb off should she be foolish enough to reach for it.

“Look at me.”

Slowly, she turned her gaze back to what was left of the man before her.

His recoil was instant, like she physically lashed him with a simple look. A sneer curled at his cracked lips. “Eyes of the masters,” he crooned. “You’ve chosen nicely.”

“Shut the fuck up and get against the wall.”

The man snorted, his ill-fitting cloak swishing as he shuffled toward the edge of the room. Fallon braced one hand on the bedpost for support and forced her limbs to cooporate long enough to latch onto a shortblade at her side.

“I’ll tell you how this is going to work,” she fought to get the words out. “You’re going to surrender. You’re going to let me put these cuffs on you, and then you will go willingly wherever I tell you to. Clear?” 

“It must be hard,” the man drawled, eyes picking over her body like a bird of prey. “Fighting against it. This one didn’t fight me. Not much, at least.”

The hand holding her blade paused at her side, and a slow, icy drop of dread descended the length of her spine. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said. But somewhere, in some dark, decrepit corner of her mind, tucked away from reality… some part of her did know. And it also knew she couldn’t stomach the harsh truth of reality.

“I know you feel it. I assume you’ve suspected, even.” it said, taking a step toward her. Fallon’s eyes flicked back to the door, still blocked by a writhing curtain of black. Aside from the window, no other access point in the room existed. She was on her own. The shortblade nearly slipped from her hand from clamminess. “Having a few headaches lately, Fallon? Maybe a few slip ups, too. Some rage here and there. A craving for violence and fear. This land has so many… types, for us to choose from. Some of you are easier to take than others. But some of you put up a fight. The ones that fight tend to be our favorites. They seem to understand our desires even if they convince themselves otherwise. That’s what you’ve done, haven’t you? Convinced yourself you’re something other than what you truly are.”

The room around her waned in and out as her vision threatened to slip. Gods, she couldn’t do this. There was no possibility of taking this thing alive, and if she didn’t kill it in the next ten seconds then it might very well kill her –

The man shot a hand toward his pocket, and in that moment she forced herself forward with the shortblade poised for his heart. But a wreath of darkness met her where she lunged, freezing her in place like she was little more than a nuisance to this man-turned monster.

His hand slipped from his pocket once more, and in it… a necklace. A silver chain adorned with chunks of stone, smooth and alluring, that called out to her in a voice as gentle as the breath of universes. She couldn’t help but gape at it, and if she could move her body, she might’ve even reached for it.

The man holding it produced a wicked smile.

“Now go play,” he cooed. “The adults are speaking.” 

Fallon could barely process the meaning of his words before he brushed the stone necklace to her face, and with it, locked her away within the dark recesses of her mind

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

𝖼𝗈𝗆𝗆𝖾𝗇𝗍𝗌 𝖺𝗇𝖽 𝖿𝖾𝖾𝖽𝖻𝖺𝖼𝗄 𝖺𝗅𝗐𝖺𝗒𝗌 𝗐𝖾𝗅𝖼𝗈𝗆𝖾! ・°˖✧

Chapter Text

Somewhere in a dream

 “It took him long enough to figure it out,” Cassian quipped, sinking down into one of the many plush armchairs in the House of Wind. “Eris looks like a ghost standing next to him, for fuck’s sake.”

Azriel coughed into his glass of liquor, settling down on the chaise beside Fallon. As naturally as breathing, she found herself moving closer to his side, tucked into the warmth and safety of his arm around her shoulders. “They did lie to him his entire life, Cass,” her mate reasoned, his eyes sliding to her in what could only be read as a ‘help me out’ look.

Fallon fought to suppress a smile. “I also can’t imagine Lucien’s had much free time to dwell on if his father was really his father,” she tacked on. Cass raised a brow. “Well, Autumn Court is the closest thing to a hell Prythian has, with all of the fire and whatnot. And it has Beron, so there. He’s practically the devil’s right-hand man. Dealing with all of that doesn’t leave you much time to think.”

Cassian leaned back in his seat, wings rustling over the back as he did so, but didn’t press further. Fallon’s lips pulled taut in a grimace; she hadn’t meant to dump so much emotion into the mix. Sure, her time in the Autumn Court had certainly been akin to hell, but she was finished reliving those days. The past couldn’t hurt her anymore. Not if she didn’t let it.

Azriel leaned forward, brows furrowing as he assessed Cassian across the way. “What is it?” the shadows on his shoulders piqued at his tone, slowly dancing between the pair until they found a perch along her arms. A nervous habit, she noticed, one developed over the course of the past months. A simple shift in the atmosphere could send his shadows reeling in her direction. A metaphorical and physical safety blanket in case things went awry.

“It’s not about Lucien – fuck,” Cass growled. He rubbed at his chest, eyes searching the ground as if the answer to whatever was happening lay within the fine woodgrain of the House of Wind.

“Are you feeling alright–” she began to ask, though her mouth snapped shut when Cassian shot to his feet. Eyes wide, wings flared, she could count the number of times on one hand she’d witnessed her friend truly panic – and added a tally to the list.

“It’s Nesta,” his voice went gruff with fear. “Something isn’t right.”

And then he was gone, footsteps thundering up the staircase faster than she could manage a blink. She and Azriel shared all of one frantic look before they were moving, tearing down the halls after him en route to the eldest Archeron’s bedroom.

By the time they cleared the threshold of the sitting room leading to Nesta’s suite, Cassian had already done away with the door – hanging on for dear life by its broken hinges, which glimmered with an icy sheen underneath the flickering faelight. The gasp that tore from Fallon’s throat painted itself in the air with a murky cloud of condensation.

“Nes,” Cassian called out, easing forward into the room step by step. Silver flames jaunted and danced over the floors, upon the bedskirt, some even climbing the walls. But for as vicious and deadly a force as they were… some seemed to consider the presence of the Lord of Bloodshed in the room, lingering before shrinking back, a primordial guard granting access.

She reached to her side, blindly grasping for the comfort she knew would always be there. Azriel met her halfway and caught her fingers in his, both of their hands trembling from the bite of cold coursing through the eldest Archeron’s room.

“It’s just us, Nes. It’s okay. You’re okay.” Cassian tried again, and for every step he took closer to the flames, Fallon felt her heart shoot into her throat. She could barely make out the figure crumpled into the bedsheets from behind the wall of flickering silver; a shoulder here, some askew, golden-brown hair there. Nesta’s shaking frame seemed to worsen with every step her mate took.

“Nothing can hurt you here, Nesta,” Azriel eased the words out in a smooth, even tone, his eyes never leaving the silver flames slowly creeping toward their feet. “You’re in the House of Wind with us. You’re safe.”

“It wants out,” the words were garbled, as if it had taken all of the girl’s focus to string a sentence together. A pained moan echoed through the room, and Fallon stared ahead in horror as two hands wreathed in flames dug into the shadowy figure’s hair like claws to slice.

She had been there before, too. The day Oryn had decided to make her a pawn in a millennia-old feud. Azriel had to tear her hands from her face in the bedroom back in the Frente Antiga so she didn’t rip her skin clean off her body.

“I can’t keep it in,” Nesta gasped, back arching much like a cat’s. “Something’s setting it off. It wants out.” her hands flew from her head to the lump of duvet, clawing into it for some sort of reprieve.

“Then let it out, Nes,” the gentleness in which Cassian spoke those words shocked her to silence. “Let it out, and we will be here to catch you.”

“I cant,” Nesta heaved, followed by a cry of agony, or maybe terror, as the flames adorning the walls of the suite climbed higher and higher until they threatened to engulf the room in full. “It will destroy everything. It will destroy me.”

Sudden pressure on her hand had her turning to face Azriel, whose face had become stricken with grief for the girl shattering before them. The Shadowsinger glanced down at their entwined fingers, and her eyes followed the descent to see a nest of shadows slowly forming an orbiting circle around their hands. Fallon swallowed and gave a silent nod of confirmation despite the anxiety stirring in her gut.

The control she held over her powers stood no match for the control of which Azriel wielded his shadows with – but if the fear of hurting someone or something was what kept Nesta in agony, then the least she could do for another not-so-friend was try and mitigate the pain eating at her bit by bit.

“Your power will never destroy you, Nes,” Cassian coaxed, taking another step toward the bed with his hands outstretched. The glass windowpane on the other side of the bed groaned, a vocal threat that the descending temperatures that could very well send glass shattering into the girl on the bed at any moment. “It is there to protect you. Let it.”

And with those words Fallon dove deep into herself, clinging to them in hopes they would ring true for more than just one soul in the room as she descended into her power. She reached down, down, down, until light engulfed her like an old friend. Weaving strand by strand, Fallon cracked an eye open and peered down at her hand still intertwined with Azriel’s – where threads of light had begun to mingle with his shadows, swimming languidly among one another in the comfort of each other’s presence.

Azriel’s lips twitched in a small smile, and on his nod, she followed the lead of the shadows and cast her light in the direction of Nesta’s silver-engulfed figure.

Shadows and light slunk through the fortress of flame nipping at the toes of Cassian’s boots, falling into a dance among each other with such grace that she couldn’t help but wonder if it mimicked the very connection she shared with the force of nature standing beside her. Two halves connecting to make a whole.

Glowing threads transformed into blinding streams, coursing through the mass of darkness cocooning over Nesta. And the flames, sensing the presence so close to their master, began their retreat into the bubble they sequestered her into.

There, she saw it. Soul and Shadow, opposites at their very core that couldn’t help but be infatuated with the simple existence of one another, began linking itself bit by bit to form an impenetrable barrier of bright and dark. Beginnings and endings. Nothing, and yet somehow, everything.

“You can let go, Nes. I swear to you, we’ve got you.”

Cassian’s words seemed to trigger the crack in a dam long threatening to burst. With a chilling wail, Nesta curled in on herself on the bed, barely visible between the light and shadow surging around her.

A wail, and sonic boom that shook the very foundations of the House below them.

Azriel recoiled at the same moment she felt it; a force so powerful that the blow echoed all the way to the bottom of her gut. Nesta’s power had slammed the barrier with such strength that she felt it reverberate within their very souls.

But the silver engulfing her had begun to lose steam against the barrier, waning in its movements until the blazing fire inside dwindled to nothing more than a flicker. Tousled brown hair and a stricken expression was left in its wake, until finally, the flames reluctantly dispersed altogether.

With a breath of relief, Fallon finally dropped the leash on her magic connecting to her mate’s. Shadows and light faded in and out of sight, slinking off into darkness or vanishing into nothing. And what was left…

Cassian started forward to collect the broken woman before him.

“You did good, Nes. You did just fine.” He collected her into his arms, and watching her form sag onto him nearly fractured the rapidly beating heart in Fallon’s chest. How many times had Azriel been left to pick up the broken parts of her? To mend and sew every cracked, sullied version of the person she was today?

She burrowed into his chest without so much as a second thought, soothed by the comfort of his strong arms wrapping her up in the safety of her Shadowsinger.

“You were phenomenal, Fal,” he murmured, pressing a kiss to the top of her head. But she couldn’t find it in herself to pull away, not yet. Maybe not ever.

“It was a good idea. I didn’t know that we could… do that,” Combine power like that. It might’ve had a name once, but the word escaped her.

Azriel’s hand wound into her hair, stroking the lengths in soothing motions. “Whatever we’re capable of, I’m eager to discover it all with you.”

Fallon detangled herself from her mate with a small smile, and finally braved a glance over her shoulder at the pair on the bed. Cassian had released Nesta, too, who still sat with her head in her hands and the world on her shoulders.

Fallon’s feet met the floor in soft, slow steps, only halting a few feet away from the bed. Smothering Nesta after the nightmare she had just endured would not be added to her list of fuck-ups today.

“We’ll help you,” she finally offered, sparing a glance at the Shadowsinger beside her. “I don’t know much about control, but I’ll teach you what I can. You’re not alone in this. Sometimes I fear my power too. Sometimes it feels like I’m more magic than I am me. We can learn how to befriend it. Together.”

Cassian cast her a sorrowful smile. “We’ll train,” he agreed, rubbing circles into Nesta’s curving back. “And we’ll do so until you’re comfortable. Whatever it takes.”

“You are not a monster for the power you wield,” Azriel said, his voice draping over the otherwise silent room like velvet. “That power has saved lives. Saved your family. You are worth saving too, Nesta.”

And hearing those words – Nesta finally looked up. Pulled her head from her hands to reveal red, watering eyes with tears spilling down pale, gaunt cheeks. Once neatly-plaited hair had come undone, with several strands sticking to her forehead with dried sweat. But on her face… a small, pained smile bloomed. A warmth akin to the first sunshine of Spring.

“I’d like that, I think,” she managed on shaky breaths, wiping her cheeks with the back of her hands. She cast a look of gratitude to them all, her eyes finally settling on Fallon.

She remembered this. It wasn’t like she could ever forget the night that forged such a bond between the four. Sure, the months ahead were rocky and slow-going, but she wouldn’t trade it for anything. A memory she cherished as much as her friends.

With a smile of her own, she stepped forward with arms outstretched in a hug she knew was coming – until Nesta’s face crumpled in some mix of horror and rage, one finger flinging out in accusation.

“You,” she hissed, scrambling backward on the bed. “It’s you,” Fallon staggered backward, blinking like that could keep the shock at bay. This wasn’t how the night had went, not at all. They had hugged it out, spent the rest of the night dogpiled on Nesta’s bed reading smutty books while the boys made fun of them and secretly enjoyed every minute of it.

Fallon made to open her mouth, to ask what the hell Nesta meant by her, but a cruel smile curved her lips instead.

Her body was no longer her own. Her words were not, either.

“Took you long enough,” the thing within her said. She felt her own hand reach for the shortblade at her side, one that hadn’t been there moments before. Suddenly she was moving, her limbs taken over by some unknown force as she rammed Azriel up against the dark wood encasing the suite. Screams pierced the room behind her, as muffled as they might sound cutting through water. Every shred of herself tried to echo those screams, to call out for help – but her own body wouldn’t listen. Whatever wore her skin tossed a glance over her shoulder to a struggling Nesta, kept at bay in Cassian’s arms as he observed from the bed.

She turned back to Azriel, who gaped down at her. The shortblade at his throat pressed hard enough to draw blood.

“Remember this, and remember it well. Because this is exactly what will happen, Fallon, if you disobey me.”

Her own soul recoiled as the blade swept from his throat and cut down his torso. With one clean, forceful thrust of her arm, a resounding squelch announced its entry into flesh. Red pooled at the hilt where the blade sat buried deep within the gut of her mate. Above her, Azriel sputtered a cough, fighting to move his hands that had become restrained with some invisible force.

“The next chance I give you, you will run back to the Night Court. You will find the one you know as Rhysand. And if you choose not to…”

Her arm tore backward, taking the blade with it. Crimson blossomed onto the fabric of his shirt without hesitation, the metallic pang of blood lighting up her senses to the point of nausea.

Her arm thrust forward again. Squelch. Pulled back.

And forward again.

She stared on in horror, unable to do anything else while whatever had taken over slowly bled the life from her reason for existing. Dying at her hand. Somewhere deep inside, whatever resolve was left began to chip away little by little, nothing more than aged brick weathering a monsoon.

The thing wearing her skin smiled. It was breaking her, and it knew. It had launched her into her own memory as some benign distraction and then cornered her like a rat in a cage. And if she wasn’t in control in the waking world…

Then it was.

“I will kill him, and I will make you watch as the light leaves his eyes. Are you understanding yet? You can’t fight forever. And if you choose to, this practice round will become reality. I don’t think you’re prepared for that, are you?”

Her voice, her demeanor, but not her. She was trapped inside herself, faced with an impossible ultimatum. Whatever strength she thought she had diminished little by little, leeching away from a corporeal form tucked away in her inner world.

Breaking her, taking everything from her. If she fought, Azriel would die. It was a future she couldn’t bear to live through. So she said the only words she knew would appease the thing carving the tip of her shortblade into her mate’s chest like he was nothing more than a carcass already.

I understand.

An intangible door slammed shut before her, one without windows, without a handle. Maybe she’d been collared yet again, leashed like a mutt to do bidding. But whatever fate awaited the soul locked away inside didn’t matter.

She would listen.

She couldn’t bear what would happen if she didn’t.

“Soul and shadow,” it drawled, tracing the blade up the pale skin of her mate’s pulseless neck. “We’re going to have fun exploring that. I think you’re exactly what we’ve been searching for, Fallon.”

𓆩⟡𓆪

Azriel, present day

It had taken him less than five seconds to disperse from his seat in the tavern and cut through the still-ajar door leading to the resting rooms of the Inn.

And somehow in those scraps of time, a force as hard as any stone or granite had cast itself upon the door in question. He didn’t need to test his fate by attempting to blow the door to shreds; the way his shadows recoiled at the darkness licking and nipping from just under the seam clued him in well enough to its intentions.

Meant to block, sure. And also meant to kill any who tried to interrupt. He peered down at the tendrils of black coursing just underneath the sheet of wood like a live wire and swore.

The Daglan could play mind games. Could somehow infiltrate a host with some sort of mechanism and take over the body after a certain amount of time had passed. They were powerful, but just how much power did they wield that his own shadows wouldn’t dare brave the roiling mass leeching out of the room he stood before?

The cold, assessing mask dropped from his face, replaced with a grimace at the thought of what he was about to do.

Circling back to find another entry point like a window might’ve worked, had his wings not been spirited away to blend in.

With any luck, it wasn’t powerful enough to ward the entire room. Time was a precious resource, and Fallon was counting on him. Safety measures and pleasantries had no foothold in the sea of panic he desperately tried to tamp down as he prepared to winnow.

Azriel sucked in a breath, held onto it for dear life, and begged the Mother that he didn’t end up in two pieces instead of one.

Familiar nothingness swathed him like a blanket, tossing and turning every which way until solid ground met his feet once more.

Azriel grasped at his fighting leathers, a brief confirmation that no mortal wound had been struck by some unseen force –

His hands fell to his sides immediately, grasping Truth-Teller at the sight of a shaking Fallon backed against the wall by the man before him.

Crimson flooded his vision. Sheer, unbridled fury decimated every rational thought in his mind. She had been counting on him, and the seconds he wasted deducing a way in had cost her.

No thoughts passed through his mind as his body moved. No thoughts about his orders of taking the Daglan alive, not about the repercussions he might face for disobeying all seven High Lords, and not the terrifying notion that a simple blade might not be enough to take down a monster as powerful as this one seemed to be.

But as he learned in his line of work, few creatures – no matter how powerful – could survive a beheading.

The lethal edge of the blade greeted flesh like an old friend, slicing through tendon and sinew down to the bare bone as it had been honed to, trained to.

He barely registered the hot blood that spattered his face in the process. The body before him went rigid, clinging to a lasting, final emotion before its skull toppled to the floor below with little more than a thump.

A gaping mouth with words caught on its tongue sang an everlasting, silent song. Wide eyes peered into unseeing cosmos. The body, once a lethal and imposing threat, collapsed into a heap next to his feet.

And in its wake – there she was.

Mouth agape, he stood in the middle of a moment frozen in time watching her golden eyes track the now lifeless form at their feet. A line of red beaded around her throat, a shallow slice from the blade the bastard had held to her.

The dark violence within him flared like gas to a flame. He’d fucking incincerate the thing, ensure it never witnessed a shred of life in this realm or the next again. But the alluring call of revenge didn’t stamp out reality: he still couldn’t shake the beast of guilt gnawing at his chest. He’d nearly been too late. Seconds too late.

Azriel reached out a hand toward her, unsure of what he was searching for. To make sure she was alright, certainly. To beg forgiveness, possibly. To know she was truly there, and not some creature that had found its way in.

The recoil was instant. Her body went rigid, pressing flush to the wall behind her now decorated in a starry night sky of blood. Brows pulled toegther, she finally met his waiting eyes.

And in them, all he found was horror.

Perhaps horror for him, and for what he’d done. For disobeying orders, or for beheading a man without a second thought. Maybe horror at the fact that he had let her down. He pressed into the mating bond like a lifeline, a hand still extended between them as he fought the urge to drag her to his chest.

He could give her time to process, even if it killed him. All he needed to know was that she was okay –

A flash of sorrow overtook her angelic features, full lips quivering with the threat of a sob that his heart cried out to quell. “Azriel…”

Hearing a broken whisper of his name scared the shit out of him.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” he pleaded, taking a step closer on instinct. But Fallon recoiled again, stumbling sideways and out of arm's reach. “I saw him on you and I panicked. I’m sorry. We’ll make this right – I’ll make this right,”

But the horror was still there, gleaming plain as day in bright eyes that threatened to spill tears. At that moment, something in his chest splintered apart. In return, an echo down the bond struck him square in the chest.

Heartache, he realized. But not his own.

Something wasn’t right.

“What happened?” Azriel demanded, daring another step closer. He sheathed Truth-Teller for good measure and placed himself between his mate and the crumpled corpse below. “Tell me what went on before I got here, Fal.”

But she wouldn’t meet his eyes any longer. Fallon cringed into the wall behind her, head shaking from side to side in a way that sent the long white hair framing her face swaying in the wake. She stumbled again, this time toward the middle of the room, her hand reaching out just in time to catch the bedpost.

And when she finally looked at him… regret. Crumpled, stinging regret, paired with the pursed lips of resignation, greeted him. The heart in his chest beat at a gallop; he knew what came next. He’d lived a moment too similar in the Illyrian Steppes with her, the two words ringing out clear as day in the foreboding silence a Suriel had left behind –

“I’m sorry.”

He struck, lurching forward without hesitation in an effort to grab her before she could winnow away. His hands only found the stale, heavy air blanketing the room around him. And just like that day, his legs gave out from beneath him. But there was no calvary behind him to aid with the hunt, no Rhys to lay a hand on his shoulder. No Feyre to provide rationale.

Just himself and the world of troubles on his shoulders to brave the living nightmare ahead.

Somehow he knew. Some intuitive tug in his chest, or maybe a gift from the Mother, but he knew. His plan to hide her away in safety had blown up in his face, and Fallon was headed right back into the mouth of the monster that awaited in the Night Court.

𓆩⟡𓆪

Azriel never once questioned just how deep his power reserves ran. He’d come close to discovering his limit during the wars he’d weathered, and perhaps again when the King of Hybern had driven a bolt through his chest, or maybe when he overcame a Demigod’s barrier to save the very woman he was now chasing after.

All of those instances and he never struck bottom. Came close, sure, but never exhausted the very reserves that kept him sharp, kept him moving. But those reserves were waning fast – he could feel it in the way his internal world resisted the pull of every winnow, and the sheer effort it took to keep his body upright as he made yet another long distance jump. Without his wings, it was the only option he was left with.

By the time he struck Night Court territory, Azriel paused only to heave into the grass beneath his feet. Winnowing the length of two Courts and the Middle would’ve struck him as impossible only days ago – and with the way the very fabric of his soul withered in his chest, he wondered if maybe he’d defied some stale law of the universe. But Fallon had done it, and had done it much faster than him to boot. The bargain running along his neck pulsed, leading him every step of the way back to the very woman who fled him.

Resting was not an option. Not until his heart gave out, until the life left his body. Something wicked had unfolded in the seconds of time between Fallon and that thing. His mind reeled as he readied for another winnow, fixated on the truth that had come to light: it hadn’t been fear of him she felt… but fear for him.

And the thought alone ignited enough icy rage to garner a final jump.

With one last spit of blood into the grass, the Shadowsinger steeled himself for a final time – and winnowed to the desolate, haunting gates of the Hewn City.

𓆩⟡𓆪

Making sure nothing snuck out of the city buried inside of a mountain was one thing. Sneaking into the impenetrable city, however, grated on his fucking patience.

Azriel fought to level his breath as he stripped the last of the wards from a long-abandoned and sealed aeration chamber – decommissioned courtesy of a young Azriel, Rhys, and Cassian. The passage had been one of many that allowed fresh air to flow in from outside, though quickly became something else entirely as soon as the three discovered three nearly-grown teens could squeeze through the passage unscathed.

Azriel steeled his nerves and tucked his wings in as neatly as he could. Dark, tight spaces were no friend of his. But his options were about as exhausted as he was; walking through the gates of the Hewn City would only alert Rhys and Feyre of his presence in the Night Court, and the last thing he needed was whatever wore his brother’s and mate’s skins getting in the way of taking Fallon someplace that could help her.

So Azriel sucked in one last breath of fresh air and began the process of creeping through the passage bit by miserable bit. His mind fought to busy itself, desperate to focus on anything else other than the impending darkness leering like a predator before him. No siphons to light the way, either; there was no energy left in his body to expend it on something so wasteful.

So he went over his plan for the hundredth time: find Fallon, ensure she was alright. Ensure she was herself. Get word to Cassian and Nesta somehow, either by shadow or seeking them out, and warn them to get the Hell out of the Night Court with baby Nyx in tow. Stealing the infant of a High Lord and Lady would probably mark their entire vigilante group for death, but the thought of leaving his nephew with parents that weren’t his parents soured the already-stale ale sloshing about in his gut.

Perhaps his least favorite part of the plan, though, involved figuring out where they would head to. Dimir was an obvious first choice, had the wards not been sealed shut from the inside. And to his knowledge, no courts would provide refuge to kidnappers and thieves, or even listen long enough to hear them out.

All except for one.

One with an interim High Lord that just so happened to harbor romantic feelings for his mate. One that declared that his mate would always be welcome in his court – words he was betting on ringing true.

Asking Eris Vanserra for help would perhaps slay any ounce of pride left in his body, but Azriel was too exhausted to care. He was prepared to grovel on his fucking hands and knees if it meant getting her to safety, even if the thought of Eris laying eyes on her sent his blood boiling. He pitied the eldest Vanserra once upon a time, and perhaps still did in some way, but asking a snake that pined after the one thing he held dear in this world for help felt as rocky and unkempt a plan as any.

Snakes bit, and snakes held venom. Luckily, Azriel considered himself versed in taming them.

The dreary passageway finally fanned out into a sad excuse for a corridor, and it took everything in him not to heave a sigh of relief. With some shifting of stones here and there, cracks of light began to pour through the barricaded entrance, and soon enough he was looking both ways before stepping into the belly of the Hewn City as casually as he could manage. It was an effort to force his shoulders from his ears, to not reflect on the fact that his mate had run back to the very territory he was trying desperately to save her from. The pulse running up his arm in the fashion of their bargain directed him left and right, slowly but surely winding a path down into the bowels of the mountain.

One thought wouldn’t stop nagging his reeling mind no matter how hard he fought to silence it: why the Hewn City? Fallon could have run anywhere in the Night Court, and yet the bargain continued to lead him deeper and deeper into the dungeon levels the mountain reserved for monsters, both fae and beast. It set his fucking teeth on edge.

She had been herself, at least in the final few moments up to her abrupt departure. Perhaps not before, but he knew what he saw – and he’d seen his mate. The girl he fell head over heels for in the span of weeks, staring back at him with such horror painted in her golden eyes that he might never forget the sight. But it still begged the question… what had spooked her enough to come here?

Footsteps echoed off the vaulted ceilings and drew his attention to the bend in the corridor. Shadows hissed near his ears, curt whispers telling him to hide, hide now.

Because at the other end of the corridor, Rhysand approached with the confidence of a king in his castle.

What the hell was Rhys doing inside the Hewn City? It couldn’t be a coincidence that Fallon had sequestered herself away, and suddenly, his brother decided to pay a visit to Kier’s domain.

Hide, now, his shadows pestered. But he couldn’t. No power thrummed through his veins, spent from the several winnows into the Night Court. Without his wings, he knew this would’ve happened eventually. And yet nothing in himself seemed to care. He would burn this entire city to the ground if it meant getting Fallon out and getting her to safety. He only hoped it wouldn’t come to incinerating a millennia-old mountain with thousands inside.

He tried not to dwell on the fact that this was the exact situation he had stuck himself through a blacked-out crevice in the wall to avoid. How much did Rhys know? Had Fallon found him? Did she tell him everything? Or had someone simply reported her appearance inside the City? Going into this blind felt like an amateur’s move, but he was out of options. So play along it was.

Azriel shook out his fists, readied his focus, and slipped into the frigid, familiar persona of the Shadowsinger as he rounded the corner to meet Rhys.

The High Lord blinked, like he was drinking in the apparition of a ghost before him, before his features shifted to match the stoicism of his own.

“Rhys.”

“Azriel.”

Azriel studied the familiar violet eyes of the High Lord, eyes he could vividly picture peeking out of snow drifts amid a snowball fight, eyes he searched countless battlefields for.

Now all he searched for was the demon lurking within. Rhys or Not-Rhys?

“You’re back early,” his brother said, raising a brow.

Azriel fought the urge to hesitate. “Job was easier than we thought,” he shrugged a shoulder. “You were right. Cassian wasn’t needed.”

A cold, mirthful smile twisted on his lips. Definitely Not-Rhys. The confirmation turned the blood in his veins to ice.

His rationale warred against itself; helping Rhys was critical, but he didn’t fucking know how. Leaving his brother like this only confirmed every horrific, mocking thought in his mind. That he was a failure, and that, once again, he would flee in the face of duress. Not good enough. Never good enough. Rhys was a non-negotiable, but so was his mate.

A burst of panic down the mating bond sent his thoughts spiraling away all at once. They would come back for Rhys. But right now, his mate needed him.

“I do love to say I told you so,” said Rhys, starting forward again down the corridor. Azriel nearly loosed a breath, though it caught in his throat as his brother halted right beside him. “It’s quite unique, don’t you think?”

It took every scrap of training he ever received to keep his face vacant, indifferent. “You’ll have to elaborate.”

Rhys dug a hand into the pocket of his pleated pants. Azriel stiffened, waiting for the telltale hiss of a blade unsheathing –

A necklace dangled in his grip instead, an antique chain with chunks of opaque black stone that sucked in what little light existed in the already dim corridor. Azriel couldn’t fight the instinctual flinch, nor the recoil as his shadows practically yanked him a step away from whatever the hell his brother held. Something about it shifted his senses into overdrive, like a threat had been unearthed and reborn right before him.

Rhys watched him with a predator’s gaze. “I thought about collaring her with it, but the others wouldn’t have taken too kindly to that idea.”

Something in him fractured with such a ferocity that for a moment, only silence existed within Azriel’s head.

And then the thoughts flowed like a dam had shattered.

The drop.

It’ll be there. Rhys had said. Bring it right back. We’ll need to remove you before he takes root.

The drop. Whatever Rhys was after hadn’t been the Daglan they hunted, but something acquired in that shitstorm of a brawl Fallon barely made it out of—a necklace to plant another Daglan into the body of his mate.

He knew it was a goad. Knew that the thing wearing Rhys’s skin was waiting for this moment. But Azriel was done pulling his punches, so he sent one flying right for his brother’s nose.

Too busy spiriting the necklace away, the High Lord had no time to dodge a fist to the face that sent him stumbling backward. Azriel only saw red as he descended upon him, yanking his brother by the pristine lapels of his jacket and driving his back into the wall so hard that chunks of rock crumbled beneath. “Lay a hand on her, and I don’t care whose skin you wear. I will slice it off layer by layer until you are nothing more than a heap of screaming tendon and failing organs. Will you still enjoy thieving bodies then?”

A dark crimson poured from Rhys’s now-crooked nose. The grin that split his lips ran red when he bared his teeth. “So easy to rile, Shadowsinger,” it hissed. “I see why she does it often.”

Azriel slammed his brother’s head into the wall once more, but that wicked smile on his face only grew, like it was enjoying the suffering, drinking in the pain. His knuckles went white as he gripped his brother’s jacket.

“Do you ever wonder why I sent her to the Autumn Court to spy so many months ago, Azriel?” Hearing it utter his name sent his stomach churning. A monster wore his brother’s face, one with no plans to give it up. “Rhysand stows away an awful lot of information. It turns out there’s a fellow in the leadership of that Court that harbors… let’s call it, unrequited feelings for her. Eris, was it?”

Azriel ground his teeth together. Rhysand’s grin turned feral. “Yes, Eris. Spying is a lonely feat, as I’m sure you know. I can only imagine there are so many things to do to… occupy oneself before they start to miss having company. I’ve heard those two play quite well together. You know what they say: Autumn Court males have fire in their blood, and they fuck like it too.”

Despite his exhaustion, shadows wreathed his iron grip on Rhys. Azriel slammed him into the wall yet again, this time smashing the side of Rhys’s face into stone. “Why would I believe a single word out of your mouth?”

A mixture of laughter and blood spewed from his lips. “What reason do I have to lie? Is it so shocking that your precious little mate might not be loyal to only you?”

“Do not,” Azriel growled, getting in his brother’s face. “Do not speak of her. It will be the last thing you do.”

But Rhysand cocked his head to the side, studying him with the manic expression. “Oh, I wasn’t talking about her. I was speaking of… how did you put it? The thing wearing her skin.”

Horror sluiced through him like a riptide, and for a moment, Azriel felt the mechanics of his breathing give out. It couldn’t be true. It couldn’t be true, because he couldn’t fathom what that meant.

That his mate once again had the one thing she fought so hard to keep stripped from her yet again. That her autonomy had been thieved away right under his fucking nose in the worst of ways. That he had failed at protecting the very thing that had already been stolen from her once before. It couldn’t be true, because he couldn’t live with himself if it were.

Rhys sucked in a long, heavy breath, his face the perfect picture of peace. “Delicious,” was the single word he uttered – and Azriel could barely comprehend how his feet had left the ground before his back was eating wall.

Dazed, the Shadowsinger blinked spots from his vision as he fought to rise – and took in the sight of Rhysand standing before him, A king to his subject, flanked by two waves of curling darkness.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

𝖼𝗈𝗆𝗆𝖾𝗇𝗍𝗌 𝖺𝗇𝖽 𝖿𝖾𝖾𝖽𝖻𝖺𝖼𝗄 𝖺𝗅𝗐𝖺𝗒𝗌 𝗐𝖾𝗅𝖼𝗈𝗆𝖾! ・°˖✧