Continuing Tales

A Court of Starlight and Poppies

A A Court of Thorns and Roses Story
by Turtle_Steed

Part 18 of 35

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ACOMAF: Rhys's POV

It was like a dream.

I had woken up to a cold, snowy morning in the mortal lands that had resulted in Feyre’s body hurtled on top of mine, her face a sea of rage as she hissed at me and said Velaris would never be her home.

Now, only hours later, we were sitting under the night sky at one of my favorite cafes in the city she’d rebuked, enjoying dinner and conversation with my inner circle. And Feyre seemed pleased to be present for it.

We had walked together from my townhouse - all six of us, Amren included. It took nearly an hour with all the stops we made chatting to passerby, shop owners, pausing for a brief dance through a market square playing music Mor couldn’t resist. Even Azriel seemed in high spirits.

Velaris was well alive tonight. No corner was left untouched from the magic of life and movement.

Feyre had kept quietly to herself as we made our way to the restaurant, a few casual paces behind us. Unlike our first tour together through the city, however, her silence was not a punishment or an attempt to put any of us off. It was merely contemplative, observant - maybe of all the things she had been missing for several months since Tamlin had been keeping her.

I’d done my best to give her space, let her be, but Mor caught me watching her a few times. My cousin bumped into me with a roguish grin and then skittered off to link her arm with Feyre‘s when we turned down the street where we’d be eating. Feyre didn’t pull away.

And she ate more than her fair share of food at dinner when it was laid out - trays and trays of it. None of us ordered after the owner, an old friend of ours we’d visited frequently over the years, had greeted and sat us. She knew what we liked and I was glad to see Feyre liked it too - liked it so much, that she held back her hair when the curry was set down so she could lean forward and inhale the spices with her eyes closed. And when the meats were set at the opposite end of the table dripping with juices and fixings, she asked Cassian if he could pass it so she could have the first bite. If it had been anyone else of us who’d asked him, Cassian would have told us to piss off because that plate was his . But he just looked at Feyre, a twinkle in his eye, and said, “Of course.”

Feyre took the plate and nearly scooped half of it onto her own before exchanging it with Mor, who stuck her tongue out at Cassian to taunt him for not getting the plate back. Azriel chuckled quietly next to me. Feyre didn’t notice. She simply looked down, stabbed a tender piece of chicken with her fork, and tried not to smile as she fell into that bite. Overhead, the stars seemed to rattle into brilliant existence.

Dreaming, I’d thought.

I was dreaming.

And Feyre wasn’t just eat to eat. She was eating to live.

“The traders were saying the prices might rise, High Lord,” the owner said quietly to me behind my chair, after checking that the six of us had everything we needed, “especially if rumors about Hybern awakening are correct.”

There was a deep seeded crease across the dark skin of her face. Whatever story Mor had been telling across from me, she paused.

“We’ll find a way to keep the prices from skyrocketing,” I said as casually as I could, examining my wine goblet as I did so. Amren and I would have a discussion on trade in the morning to make sure I kept my promise.

But the owner wriggled upwards on her feet a little as she replied. “Don’t trouble yourself, of course,” she said. “It’s just... so lovely to have such spices available again - now that... that things are better.”

Now that I wasn’t locked away in a prison hell pit for near on fifty years, she meant. So many people Amarantha had cursed taking me under. So many people who were well protected and far, far away, but still suffered the effects of that queen’s reign of terror.

I would fix it. I had to.

So I smiled kindly, hoping to reassure her, and let some of the starlight flutter in my gaze. “I wouldn’t be troubling myself - not when I like your cooking so much.”

She sat back on the heels of her feet and I saw the worry disappear. Mor resumed telling her story that I was only vaguely aware of as relief sank into my chest.

On a normal night, I might have perhaps allowed my mind to drift toward darker thoughts - thoughts of how many other citizens had worries and doubts left for me to qualm that made this lone fae’s appeasement seem insignificant. But... not tonight.

Feyre was squirming in her seat, wiggling around to get a better look at the pretty restaurant owner who was peering down at her. “Is it to your liking?” she asked, nodding to the spread.

Feyre quickly glanced over the table, taking in the near empty plates, many of which she’d polished off herself, and told the owner with a little more pride than I’d heard from her lately, “I’ve lived in the mortal realm, and lived in other courts, but I’ve never had food like this. Food that makes me...” I might have leaned forward waiting for her answer, “feel awake.”

Awake.

Awake?

Food that makes her feel awake. As though she’d been asleep in the darkness for a long, long time. And there was no darkness here tonight.

Only happiness for Feyre. Here. With me and my family and food and drinks and the city and stars.

“Then I’ll bring you a special dessert,” the owner said, beaming at Feyre and taking off to fetch it.

Feyre had a little starlight of her own in her eyes as she maneuvered back around in her seat, and promptly caught me gawking at her like the idiot I was. Her brows went up in silent question, but I only grinned because demons and nightmares and come what may, Feyre was happy tonight in some way. Unaffected, it seemed. Like some little piece of herself had found its way home. And I couldn’t stop marveling at the thought that she’d recovered it here.

Our attention to Mor’s story was short-lived again as the owner returned with Feyre’s dessert and a very unsightly, large goblet full of dark, ruby liquid swirling about that was set in front of Amren. My Second looked up in surprise at the owner as she realized the gift she’d been brought, better than any brooch or pearl I’d ever given her.

“You didn’t have to do that,” Amren said, but her voice was anything but dismissive of the gesture.

“It’s fresh and hot, and we needed the beast for tomorrow’s roast, anyway,” was the only reply she received and was then left to either accept the treat or go home without.

Amren took a long, indulgent sip. I didn’t have to see her eyes to feel the warmth and pleasure cackling through her veins at the taste. When she lowered the goblet, all that glorious blood dripped from her teeth. Mor cringed away, but not without a good degree of amusement.

“You spiced it nicely,” Amren said, to which the owner glowed proudly.

“No one leaves my place hungry.”

I crooked at finger at her and pushed a larger bill of cash discreetly into her hand for an amount that probably paid for the meal several times over, but was no less than the lady deserved. “Oh no, I can’t High Lord-” she balked.

“Please do,” I said, pushing her hands and the money away. “Thank the wait staff and the chefs in back for us.”

“But I-”

“And thank you , for a decadently perfect evening as always.”

She inhaled sharply. “Oh - you’re going to go home with your pockets still full one of these nights.”

“But not tonight,” I said with a wink. When we left, she kissed me on the cheek in parting, same as she had when we’d arrived. Feyre looked awfully amused watching the exchange.

We made it perhaps twenty feet strolling along the Sidra before Mor danced forward in a twirl prompted by her full stomach. “I want to go dancing,” she said, overtaken with excitement and sudden energy. A true creature of the night. “I won’t be able to fall asleep when I’m this full. Rita’s is right up the street.” She pointed in the appropriate direction, face hopeful.

“I’m in,” was Azriel’s immediate reply, and I couldn’t blame Cassian when he scoffed. He was leaving in a handful of hours for the mortal lands - to see what games the queens had been up to lo these many centuries.

“I’m going back to the restaurant and then home,” Amren said with a sigh behind me, drawing my attention away as my friends sorted themselves out. “I’ll leave you brats to your own amusements, delightful as I’m sure they’ll be.”

“But nothing near as delightful as the taste of freshly slaughtered lamb, hmm?” I said, crossing my arms and giving her a knowing look. Her eyes narrowed before those thin lips curled sinfully.

“I’m not sharing, Rhysand. Get your own.”

I stifled a laugh and watched Amren disappear, turning around just in time to see Azriel meeting Cassian up the street while Mor chatted with some acquaintances under the city lanterns.

Feyre appeared beside me looking particularly alarmed that Amren had fled. She didn’t even seem to notice that I was still standing there. “She’s getting more blood in the back to take home with her,” I explained and chuckled when Feyre jumped about a mile high - whether from my close proximity or the truth of Amren’s charades, I didn’t know. “And then she’ll be going right to her apartment to gorge herself.”

“Why blood?” she said, her face a little pale.

“It doesn’t seem polite to ask.” And I didn’t want to know anyhow.

Feyre paused and sank into a glowering expression. “Are you going dancing?”

I wanted to laugh at the outright disapproval in her tone as she waited for my answer. I spied Mor and my brothers trotting along farther and farther away, and gave them a little wave to say we weren’t going. “I’d rather walk home,” I said. “It’s been a long day.”

A long, miserable day that had somehow righted itself by the end. It was hard to believe only a few hours prior I’d been deep underneath that plunging darkness watching Azriel carve the skin from the Attor’s bones while the horrid thing screamed. I wished I’d let him kill it instead.

Even harder to think that before that, I’d been watching Feyre nearly skin me alive with her own blades, shoving me off in the snow.

Now she stood by me considering, almost as though I were a friend.

“Shall we?” I offered, taking a single step forward. “Or are you too cold?”

Feyre mirrored my step and that was that. We set off. And enjoyed the view of the Sidra beside us as went.

The waters rippled in the wind, like diamonds falling in a cascade from the mines. Those ripples twinkled as brilliantly as the stars overhead. It was cold out, but the city was so alive, so gleaming, that it was hard to notice. Neither Feyre nor myself seemed to walk with much tightness that comes from such a harsh chill.

Feyre watched the Sidra move and snake along carefully. There was a soft reverence about the way she stared that put her face at ease. It was easy to understand why. The other half of the city beyond it - the Rainbow housing the artist’s square - looked richly enchanting under the lights that reflected back at it from the water.

Art. Song. Theater.

All the places Feyre had once wanted to be. She looked like she could almost imagine herself there again. If she did, it wasn’t a bad choice. The artists’ pocket of Velaris was by far the most teaming with dreams and vision, with life and love. All the things that made fighting to keep the cost of spices down and trade bustling in this little city worth it, I thought, as I paused to lean over the railing at the water’s edge.

“This is my favorite view in the city,” I admitted. Feyre came up to the railing and trained her gaze on the quarter of the city she’d balked at a few days ago. “It was my sister’s favorite, too. My father used to have to drag her kicking and screaming out of Velaris, she loved it so much.”

Sometimes, people still told me stories about it - the ones who knew me well enough for it not to feel intrusive when they spoke about my family. I could hardly blame them. It was hard not to when my sister had been such a comical, vibrant little thing in her youth, wailing about and peppering the city with stories that would remain sprinkled about the cobblestones years after she had died.

Feyre’s voice was low, testing. “Then why are both your houses on the other side of the river?”

Two opposing currents of water crashed below us and then calmed into a gentle peace as I thought.

“Because I wanted a quiet street - so I could visit this clamor whenever I wished and then have a home to retreat to.”

And... if I were honest, partly because the townhouse was something I didn’t have until after my family died. There were no memories of them tainting those halls, those rooms, waiting to jump out at me when I came home for the night or woke in the bright morning sun. The artists quarter was entirely too much the opposite.

“You could have just reordered the city,” Feyre suggested.

“Why the hell would I change one thing about this place?”

“Isn’t that what High Lords do? Whatever they please?”

I turned to look at her and wondered why we weren’t touching - she stood so close. Close enough that when she let out a breath and I saw it on the chill wind in front of us, I could have run my fingers through it, like children popping bubbles in the summer. Innocent and pure.

“There are a great many things that I wish to do, and don’t get to,” I said, finding Feyre’s luminous eyes watching me.

“So when you buy jewelry for Amren, is it to keep yourself in her good graces or because you’re - together?”

I burst out laughing, no idea where the question had come from. The sound was so startling, it moved those shimmering, coursing waters beside us into action. “When I was young and stupid, I once invited her to my bed,” I told Feyre, who seemed genuinely unsure about Amren’s place in my court. “She laughed herself hoarse. The jewelry is just because I enjoy buying it for a friend who works hard for me, and has my back when I need it. Staying in her good graces is an added bonus.”

Feyre looked oddly relieved. “And you didn’t marry anyone?”

My stomach tightened as I slumped down a fraction on the railing. “So many questions tonight,” I said, trying to deflect from a fragile confession when the one person I would have wanted to share a life with was standing right next to me without the faintest idea. I sighed when she wouldn’t drop her stare and forced my stomach to loosen the knots inside.

“Marrying me means a life with a target on your back - and if there were offspring, then a life of knowing they’d be hunted from the moment they were conceived. Everyone knows what happened to my family - and my people know that beyond our borders, we are hated.”

Feyre’s expression darkened.

It was the truth. A pure and simple one, and she would have to consider it if she ever... felt something for me. Mate, though she may have been, being with me would mean hardship and running and fighting like hell, skirting death at every turn.

Part of me didn’t want that life for Feyre. I’d probably spend some part of every day wondering if staying in her life was a mistake or not, if only that didn’t take the choice away from her. We’d left Velaris to the mortal lands for a mere day and already she’d been attacked. How much worse would the hunt for Feyre’s life be if she tied herself to me explicitly for the remainder of her years?

“Why?” Feyre asked. “Why are you hated? Why keep the truth of this place secret?” Her eyes turned kind, gentle, as if she could see the pain riddled inside me - for her and my court both. “It’s a shame no one knows about it - what good you do here.”

“There was a time when the Night Court was a Court of Nightmares and was ruled from the Hewn City. Long ago.” It had been a terrible time. I didn’t need to be alive to know, to feel that history creeping about the walls of that awful city waiting to spring out and curse me for trying to change those horrors. “But an ancient High Lord had a different vision, and rather than allowing the world to see his territory vulnerable at a time of change, he sealed the borders and staged a coup, eliminating the worst of the courtiers and predators, building Velaris for the dreamers, establishing trade and peace.”

Feyre’s hand tightened on the railing as she listened with rapt attention. And I felt as though maybe she was beginning to understand, to finally see the city and its secrecy, why we’d done what we had to keep it safe these past fifty years.

“To preserve it,” I continued, “he kept it a secret, and so did his offspring, and their offspring. There are many spells on the city itself - laid by him, and his Heirs, that make those who trade here unable to spill our secrets, and grant them adept skills at lying in order to keep the origin of their goods, their ships, hidden from the rest of the world. Rumor has it that ancient High Lord cast his very life’s blood upon the stones and river to keep that spell eternal.

“But along the way, despite his best intentions, darkness grew again - not as bad as it had once been... But bad enough that there is a permanent divide within my court. We allow the world to see the other half, to fear them - so that they might never guess this place thrives here. And we allow the Court of Nightmares to continue, blind to Velaris’s existence, because we know that without them, there are some courts and kingdoms that might strike us. And invade our borders to discover the many, many secrets we’ve kept from the other High Lords and courts these millennia.”

Feyre studied the water churning below, as if she could see the very blood and spells that High Lord had laid to put the spells around Velaris in place. Maybe even feel them. Sometimes when I flew circles around the city, even so high up in the air, I thought I could feel them too, keeping me from harm.

“So truly none of the others know?” she asked. “In the other courts?”

“Not a soul. You will not find it on a single map, or mentioned in any book beyond those written here. Perhaps it is our loss to be so contained and isolated, but....” It was worth it. Looking out at the vibrancy and music and lights surrounding us, the city was teaming with victory at every corner. I showed it all to Feyre, laid it at her feet like sand upon the shores of a mighty, endless beach. “My people do not seem to be suffering much for it.”

Silently, Feyre agreed. I wondered if she would ever question the city’s safeguards or my decisions surrounding them again. I had a feeling she wouldn’t.

“Are you worried about Az going to the mortal lands tomorrow?” Another spike of her marvelous curiosity. And one that struck upon something deeply dark and complicated as my fingers played along the railing that rose midway up my stomach.

Somewhere close by, I hoped Azriel was dancing.

“Of course I am,” I said. “But Azriel has infiltrated places far more harrowing than a few mortal courts. He’d find my worrying insulting.”

“Does he mind what he does? Not the spying, I mean. What he did to the Attor today.” We each looked away.

Not the spying - indeed. Azriel’s most dangerous moments weren’t the ones spent outside the Night Court, but the ones spent within. When he was deep within that mountain carrying someone’s life blood underneath his blade, Cassian and I at his back wondering if it wasn’t Azriel’s own lifeblood he saw pooling against the metal.

But he’d never once said ‘no’ or asked for a different job. Sometimes he even seemed to relish the terrible moments if only briefly, even if he let Mor spend a good deal of time soothing him afterward.

“It’s hard to tell with him,” I said, fighting back a tinge of disappointment, “and he’d never tell me. I’ve witnessed Cassian rip apart opponents and then puke his guts up once the carnage stopped, sometimes even mourn them. But Azriel...” Night and day - my brothers. “Cassian tries, I try - but I think the only person who ever gets him to admit to any sort of feeling is Mor. And that’s only when she’s pestered him to the point where even his infinite patience has run out.”

Feyre’s eyes lit up at that. She was so close to a smile, one that teased and pushed and prodded merrily along at the promise of possibility. “But he and Mor - they never...?”

Ah - that again.

“That’s between them - and Cassian. I’m not stupid or arrogant enough to get in the middle of it.” Feyre’s near -smile fell reluctantly in defeat and I suddenly wished I had told her something more of what she maybe wanted to hear of my two dizzying friends, just to get that look back from her. I pushed off the rail in an offer to continue walking and Feyre accepted.

Her steps were a little heavier the further we went on, the muscles of her legs and mind beginning to finally slack after a hard day’s work. Even the days off were full of questions and dilemmas and puzzles to piece together, it seemed.

How long would she go on like this? It hadn’t been quite a week even. She seemed brighter, a little more relaxed, a little more open. And with each knot that unraveled in her day by day, my chest eased mercifully.

But I knew the weight in her heart - could hear it in the way she spoke or see it in the way she looked. One moment she would flirt and hiss and rave at me - whatever made her forget the pain long enough to remember what living felt like - and the next, she seemed to sink back into those cells Amarantha had locked her in, no hope of getting out.

I wanted that hope for her. She was allowed to be broken, but I hated to think that she would feel broken forever. I wanted every night to be like this instead.

My thoughts bubbled and spat so furiously over the prospect, I almost didn’t realize Feyre had slowed her pace. When I turned around to face her, she’d gone utterly still, her gaze fixed on a small group of musicians playing a lilting melody across the street from us.

And my heart suddenly stopped.

I recognized that music. And I swore that it hadn’t caught me sooner. Feyre knew that melody too. I swallowed, my throat gone dry. I’d sent it to her to keep her alive during the trials when she had seemed on the verge of collapse.

Images of that night flooded back to me. I had to shove my hands in my pockets to keep from shaking as I remembered with Feyre whose face was now drawn very tightly.

If I inhaled deeply enough, closed my eyes and listened only to the music, I could still feel the pain from that final night as clearly as if it were happening today.

I couldn’t go to her. Couldn’t risk seeing her. I knew I’d have one last chance to see her alone before Amarantha threw her final dagger and I wouldn’t waste it until it became necessary.

But I knew she was rotting away in that cell, dying. I could feel it pulsing through the bond we’d made to save her life - a bond that might not matter in a handful of hours. All of Feyre’s fears were crashing in on her to the point of suffocation. It had hardly felt like force offering her the goblet of wine to drink from night after night, her hands had so greedily fought for it after the second trial. For the first time, I began to doubt that I was doing the right thing keeping her drunk when her mind was full to bursting with grief anyway.

I was alone in my room about to go insane from my inability to save her. Amarantha could sleep with a cold bed this last night. I didn’t know what to do, so I simply did. I latched on to the first sensory memory I could retrieve that wouldn’t cause too much risk and I hurled it at Feyre. Down the vents into her cell, across the bond between our broken hands, came music.

The melody was gripping, haunting, but also hopeful. It was the sound of hard-fought victory, of love and all the things that make life beautiful. It was the sound of home. My home. My sister and my mother. And a great and mighty people.

Velaris.

The melody quaked and rose, rising and breaking in great, sweeping swells that were meant to move and devour the soul.

I could practically feel Feyre’s heart as the blood pried her center apart and restitched it, until the emotions pumped in and out of those valves with every beat. I could taste the salt as it stung her lips from crying. I could feel the warmth in her skin as she clung to the feel of her body.

Tears were all I had left to give, so I let them fall urging her on, hoping she would find something in the melody to inspire her, whether it was her sisters, Tamlin, Lucien, her art - anything to make her want to live. To prove that this wasn’t costing her more unnecessary grief than it did to soothe her soul.

I shuddered as the stunning vision of Velaris met my opening eyes and matched the allure of itself in the music haunting us in the winter air.

“You.” Feyre breathed the word out of her, her quiet, shocked voice dragging me out of the memory I would not soon forget. She was still staring at the musicians as their chorus played on. “You sent the music into my cell. Why?”

I stood next to her, not daring to see if her face was hurt, if I’d failed her again. “Because you were breaking,” I said shakily. “And I couldn’t find another way to save you.”

“I saw the Night Court,” she said, as if it had been a haven, a foretelling. A glimpse into where she would one day stand and hear the sweet song again.

That took me by surprise, enough that I finally looked at her from the corners of my eyes. And Cauldron’s mercy, she looked somewhat restful. “I didn’t send those images to you.” Even if I’d certainly felt them.

“Thank you,” she breathed. “For everything - for what you did. Then…” and the music slowed, winding down to its beautiful end, “…and now.”

The music stopped entirely and we were left with only the here and now - as Feyre had said. Perhaps the music had been a gift from the Cauldron or the Mother or some unseen force pushing us together - I didn’t know. But it felt like the music had come to remind us briefly of our past purely so it could leave us with this peace between us that was a new beginning of sorts.

“Even after the Weaver?” I chanced asking. Even - “After this morning with my trap for the Attor?”

A little huff of annoyance escaped Feyre as her nostrils flared. “You ruin everything,” she said, but I could have sworn she meant the opposite. And it thrilled me.

I’d drawn close to her as we’d listened to that music, enough that I could smell the pine and grass and sun in her heart again - all these lovely notes that only seemed to bloom when she wasn’t so bothered. Feyre’s body had angled, leaning toward me enough that when her head drooped, it fell against my chest. Her fingers clutched my jacket.

I grabbed her, scooping her up into my arms, cradling her tired body close as we shot into the sky, and was rewarded when she leaned her head willingly against me, something like peace thrumming between us.

And even though I’d dashed that smile from her lips earlier on, it felt like it was there as we flew to the townhouse all the same.


I stared at the paper and pen sitting on my nightstand for over an hour. On my bed, I sat with my arms crossed, legs resting over one another at the ankles stretched out in front of me. The white ceiling above might as well have been a rainbow of color, it seemed so full of thoughts and wishes and doubts as I debated that page beside me.

Feyre was still awake.

But she was tired.

Though we were - starting over? She’d forgiven me. That much was clear. Which made this all suddenly very new and very exciting. I couldn’t stop thinking about her. Not her head on my chest or the softness of her face as we’d flown.

She might go to bed at any moment, and curse me if I sent her anything that disrupted that fragile new peace she gave us tonight.

But tonight she had eaten. Tonight she had lived. She had walked and wondered and enjoyed . She had almost smiled. Not for me, but near enough for me to catch the effects of it.

The effects that might utterly disappear if I pushed too far. A life of death and danger was what awaited her if I put the invitation out there. If we stared to -

She had liked the flying. More than liked it, I had thought. I might have imagined it, but I could have sworn that at one point after hearing that music, as we’d flown to the townhouse and she’d nuzzled just a tad into my chest, that her shields had dropped and she’d realized she felt something good up there in the air with me. I hadn’t stopped thinking about it since the moment I’d set her down and said goodnight.

But she might-

Fuck it.

I grabbed the paper and willed myself to slow down enough to neatly scrawl:

I might be a shameless flirt, but at least I don’t have a horrible temper. You should come tend to my wounds from our squabble in the snow. I’m bruised all over thanks to you.

The paper disappeared, followed by the pen, and both came shivering back with lightning speed a few heartbeats later.

Go lick your wounds and leave me be .

My lips sucked themselves inward.

Not entirely accepting, but not hateful either. No - definitely not hateful. And there was a... curiously intrigued sense of waiting on the other end of the bond.

I left the paper on the bed and opened my door as quietly as I could, peeking down the hall to where Feyre’s room was. Her door was firmly shut, but through the cracks around it, there was still a light glowing from inside.

Still awake.

I smirked and retreated back inside my room, leaving the door ajar just a hair. After far too much thinking for how sober I actually was, I finally sent her my reply and hoped very much she would squirm.

I’d much rather you licked my wounds for me.

The paper disappeared. This time a flicker of excitement trickled down the bond between us. The reply was every bit as good as I had hoped for: Lick you where, exactly?

My lips.

My neck.

My chest.

My fingers in her hair as she trailed lower, her own grazing over my thighs. My stomach would rise and fall in great beats as she reached my navel and one of us undid the ties on my pants.

And knowing Feyre, she would pause and look up at me from over my stomach with a wicked gleam in her eye, would probably tease me because Cauldron knows if the day ever came that I got to play with her, she’d be taunted to death and this was justice served right back to me.

And then those fingers could slide below, hooking into the fabric and sliding it down as her hair falls around her face, her head lowering to lick the smooth muscle at my hips, at my hard, waiting c-

I ran a hand over my face and through my rumpled hair, and wrote.

Wherever you want to lick me, Feyre. I’d like to start with “Everywhere,” but I can choose, if necessary.

The paper was back in a flash.

Let’s hope my licking is better than yours. I remember how horrible you were at it Under the Mountain.

Her own challenge of sorts. I chuckled darkly.

I could flip her. She wouldn’t have any pants or skirts to remove, I decided. No - if I were to have my mate, I wanted her naked and exposed and spread wide for me to gaze at.

Kisses along her calves. Luxurious, slow ones up her thighs. My fingers stroking along the skin to soothe and to play. Feyre’s hips rising as that delicious scent of hers drifted toward me the closer I got.

One lick - just one lick along her...

I was under duress. If you want, I’d be more than happy to prove you wrong. I’ve been told I’m very, very good at licking.

Feyre took her longest pause getting back to me yet. And when she did deign to give me a reply, it was short and to the point: Goodnight.

And I was still shameless and increasingly horny.

Try not to moan too loudly when you dream about me. I need my beauty rest .

The note did not return. Instead, I felt heat and flame dance between us as Feyre destroyed it and fizzled out the magic. A vulgar gesture flashed between us, intended for me to see or not, I wasn’t sure.

I laughed, winking out the light in the room and tucking myself between the sheets for the night.

The best part about it was how fun it felt to fall asleep and know that, regardless of what happened for Feyre and I, loving someone - maybe even sharing a bed with someone - could be enjoyable for me again one day.

A Court of Starlight and Poppies

A A Court of Thorns and Roses Story
by Turtle_Steed

Part 18 of 35

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