Continuing Tales

A Court of Starlight and Poppies

A A Court of Thorns and Roses Story
by Turtle_Steed

Part 30 of 35

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ACOMAF: Rhys's POV

We sat painfully close at dinner, to the point that no more than a needle would have separated our legs. After the afternoon in the forest, physical separation felt almost unbearable. Even walking back to the house after we’d landed out in the mud, we’d stayed close wondering if one of us might have the nerve to take the other’s hand.

But Cassian cut through me with a glance when we walked through the front door, motioning to Mor from across the kitchen. She sat the table picking at some knot in the wood grain. Wordlessly, I nodded at Cass.

Feyre was covered in a good bit of mud and snow, but she sank down across from Mor rather than the fire while I helped Cass finish up the stew he’d been working on. She shivered at the first sip.

“This soup is piping hot and the fire is delicious, but I think every bone in my body might shatter from how freezing this place is,” Feyre said, lapping up another bite.

Cassian nodded and poked around his own dish, but his eyes were quietly trained on Mor. “They pick these locations just to ensure the strongest among us survive.”

“Horrible people,” Mor said. She’d barely eaten anything. “I don’t blame Az for never wanting to come here.”

Cassian and I exchanged another look. “I take it training the girls went well.” Cassian’s answering drink of ale was answer enough.

“I got one of them to confess they hadn’t received a lesson in ten days. They’d all been too busy with ‘chores,’ apparently.” He shook his head, a scowl plastered all over him.

“No born fighters in this lot?”

“Three, actually,” and Mor looked a little brighter. “Three out of ten isn’t bad at all. The others, I’d be happy if they just learned to defend themselves. But those three... They’ve got the instinct - the claws. It’s their stupid families that want them clipped and breeding.”

Like Mor. Like her own family had wanted her. The family she’d visit tomorrow.

She stared for far too long at the bowl in front of her, pushing the spoon around and forcing down bites, that Feyre stood suddenly and took her dish to the sink. Cassian set his own spoon down and turned in his chair, clear that no one else but Mor sat in the room.

I stood, right as Cassian asked quietly, “When do you head for the Hewn City tomorrow?” Mor’s nose pinched.

“After breakfast. Before.” Her head shook softly. “I don’t know. Maybe in the afternoon, when they’re all waking up.”

Cassian moved under the table, likely taking her hand, and when Mor looked up, understanding passed between them. And I wondered if it was Cassian - Cassian who had been the one to really break her free from her shackles - that remained the only reason she had stomached coming here with us. The only reason she felt safe and loved enough to do it.

Feyre and I shuffled for the stairs, not bothering with ‘goodnights’ so as not to risk interrupting. I couldn’t bear to when Mor finally had something other than dread on her face.

For her own part, Feyre was distraction enough. From the table to the sink to the stairs, our bodies stayed close circling one another and daring to touch, but not quite closing the gap. There was fire there as my eyes trailed over her back climbing those stairs.

Fire. Today this woman had lit the world on fire for me. I wanted to light it back.

By the time we’d made it to the upstairs landing, and only two doors remained, a warmth from Feyre’s fire had made it to my core and settled nicely. Feyre stared between the two doors looking like she’d rather not choose. I pointed at the second nearest her.

“You and Mor can share tonight - just tell her to shut up if she babbles too much.”

She didn’t laugh. Just stared hard at the door. And I thought maybe she wasn’t the only one preoccupied with my cousin and what was twitching inside that beautiful head of hers downstairs. So I grabbed the knob to my own door, ready to leave her be and ignore the fire for the night, when... nothing. Absolutely nothing except Feyre standing still and quiet, and the bond... pulling taut again. Taut with - with heat .

My hand stilled on the knob. And slowly I turned. And found Feyre’s eyes trailing up my body one piece at a time, lingering here and there, her lips slightly parted.

And her eyes. They filled with that heat, curled and smoked and... considered me. It was one thing, perhaps, not to touch all through dinner. It was now entirely another to allow rooms and walls to separate us.

And we’d flown so close, her skin so comfortably against my neck and hands as my wings had beaten away an ancient storm behind us, that I wondered...

I drew breath to ask her - to ask if my mate would like to join me for the evening. To talk. To sleep. To love. Whatever she wanted - whatever scraps she’d give a despised half-breed of the north.

But as soon as my lips split, Feyre whirled around and disappeared inside her room. The fire inside me dulled into a depressing, needing ache to touch her all the more. Something I was sure some part of her wanted, but with a private room all her own, the option to keep pretending remained too easy to take.

So maybe tomorrow, I wouldn’t give her one. And let come what may.


The scent of rain was refreshing, the cold shower I had needed all night as I tried in vain to sleep. My mind had been too preoccupied with Feyre to bother risking the nightmares and the dreams for another night. She was simply... everywhere now.

Cassian had risen first and opened his door at about the same moment Feyre had opened hers. She must have shaken her head because Cassian’s had shoulders slumped. “When?” he had asked.

“About an hour ago,” Feyre had replied. “She told me not to bother waking you.”

Cassian had politely nodded and closed the door. From where I still laid on my bed, I could see the heaviness weighing him down even as he stared at the door. I wished Az had come. At least Mor would be back by nightfall.

I waited until breakfast was over to tell him Feyre and I wouldn’t be back until the following day. He seemed more concerned with getting out into the rings to push some of the novices around than dealing with our extended absence anyway.

And now, trailing Feyre by several feet through the forests where we’d flown miles from camp and lugging all of our equipment while she teased me with the sway of her hips, I half wished we’d stayed. She was going to drive me up the wall, that fire from the hallway wholly unabated by the rain.

Every step I took, she took another and it felt like my future was in front of me and moving further away at the same time. She kept her mental shields well up, but I could sense her overall mood was pensive, even a tad brooding.

It was only when I’d caught up to her that I realized she had stopped her hike. Her shields were beginning to crack ever so slightly as her thoughts struggled, just enough to let me feel a little more - unusual, given how superb she typically was now at maintaining them. I half wondered if it was intentional, but...

Feyre turned to look at me and I could feel the tension rolling around in her head as she took me in, her eyes trailing over my wings the same way she had last night - with questions - until she met my gaze.

Silently, I lifted an eyebrow. If she had questions, I would answer. I would answer anything for her. I could practically see the words forming in her mind and I pressed against the bond without breaking her down, revealing how desperate I was to know every inch of her. Let her see some of my fire, what she kindled in me every day now.

What I didn’t expect was the hand she held up instead and the small flicker of a smile. I caught a flash of fire in her heart - real, tangible fire from the days of Autumn - and concern for my safety. It was hard not to laugh, so I instead bowed lowed for her to go on and play, wondering if she realized the double meaning in my gesture as there was only one person on this earth I would ever bow for beyond my crown.

And for her, I was ready to do it.

Feyre turned her back on me, rolling her eyes at my bravado as she went and I felt my insides turn into a blaze. Sometimes... she could be so wicked, so playful. And I liked when she was playful. It was us seated that throne in the Court of Nightmares all over again, my fingertips brushing the inside of her thigh as she ground against me and I felt how moist she was.

I still wanted to feel that. Fuck, I wanted to taste that. I wanted to take her further into the woods and fuck her where no one else would hear the sound except the mountains and the trees.

Feyre blushed even from so many feet away as I licked along the bond between us, filing that bridge between our minds with a lazy lust. I sent the caress intently, amusement flowing with it as she tried not to let it show how much she was beginning to squirm inside. My crotch went full with heat.

She had just paused in a clearing and turned to face me, either to begin her magic or to tell me off - I hoped for the later - when it happened.

A bolt of dread went through me as I watched a group of four men dressed in colors of a court I had come to loathe surround my mate. And with them at the center standing before Feyre was Lucien.

A million decisions ran through my mind on the spot, each overriding the last and vying for position. My instinct was to winnow us away immediately, all risk of my magic being tracked be damned. But one look at Feyre and I knew I couldn’t do it. She could be my mate if she wanted to, but she hadn’t decided that yet. This decision right here, right now was hers alone and until I knew what she wanted, I would let her handle Lucien.

I would not make the same mistake I had with Tarquin. I wouldn’t.

“We’ve been hunting for you for over two months,” Lucien said. He sounded so relieved, like he thought this was going to be easy. I prayed he was wrong, tried not to... not to panic. If as much for Feyre’s sake as mine. I had no idea how open she was to the bond just then.

“How did you find me?” Feyre asked. It was too short for me to gauge how she felt and with Lucien suddenly present, her mental shields had snapped firmly back in place.

“Someone tipped us off you’d been out here, but it was luck that we caught your scent on the wind, and-” Lucien paused as Feyre retreated from his approach and even at this distance, I could tell he was confused. I made a mental note to check in with Azriel later about who Lucien’s mystery tip had been. Suddenly, his voice was tight. “We need to get out of here. Tamlin’s been - he hasn’t been himself. I’ll take you right to-”

“No,” Feyre said.

My heart skipped a beat. Though she whispered the word, it was firm and binding. A declaration. A choice.

And Lucien didn’t want to believe it.

“Feyre,” he said carefully, his hands tensing at his side. Weapons were very much within reach, though nothing like the display Feyre herself wore. “Let’s go home.”

Home.

I wracked my brain as quickly as I could, but... Feyre had never called the Night Court her home. And much as I despised Tamlin, he had made a home for Feyre once, a home I suddenly realized she might remember with Lucien standing there and... miss. A home she never felt she had with me.

There was heat, I thought. And Starfall had been a dream. But both times we’d chosen to go our ways separately, to retreat to different spaces. And all this time I still hadn’t told her the truth.

And now here we were, surrounded by soldiers. This was the life she would have staying with me. Maybe... I swallowed, my throat suddenly dry. Maybe she wouldn’t want this life after all.

Sorrow began to overtake my heart as I saw what might happen. It would break me to see her return to the Spring Court with Lucien and even now standing there just thinking about the possibility, I felt like I would die if she chose it. But if she did, if she… left me, whatever this bond between us had become, I would find a way to be okay with it. I had to for her.

Feyre squared Lucien up and my breath hung on every word. “That stopped being my home the day you let him lock me up inside of it,” Feyre said.

And Cauldron - it was all I could do to focus as the relief flooded me. I knew in that moment, perhaps more clearly than ever before now that I could look in on her from the outside, that Feyre felt something for me, enough to choose me in some capacity. And that I wasn’t going to go back on my promise to tell her everything - and soon.

My desire to find out exactly how she would choose me weighed my feet down as I dug into the ground and prepared for Lucien’s move that would prompt me to take off.

“It was a mistake,” Lucien retorted. The poor fox looked aghast. He hadn’t come prepared for a fight. “We all made mistakes. He’s sorry - more sorry than you realize. So am I.”

Lucien tried to near Feyre once more, but again she edged away, only she was running out of room. I could sense the tension in her rising as she turned the arrow pulled in her hands directly on Lucien. His eyes widened.

“Put the arrow down,” Lucien said and the way he said it, so condescending, as if he could control her just like Tamlin did with some simple twist of words. But Feyre - my Feyre - held her ground. The bond started to hum.

“Don’t. Touch. Me.”

“You don’t understand the mess we’re in, Feyre. We - I need you home. Now.”

The next few seconds were a blur as Feyre moved, and Lucien after her. I winnowed into the air towards the spot where Feyre had been to find she was already gone on her own cloud of smoke. Lucien stumbled back and I rode around on Feyre’s trail until I found her safely out of the reach of Lucien and his sentinels.

And it was intoxicating.

Feyre’s magic hung electric in the air between us. It didn’t matter if I had been there or not to save her, she’d saved herself and she knew it. She stood proud, a fierce glare in her eyes aimed straight at Lucien as he righted himself to search for Feyre, only to find me standing by her side with power dripping off of me - off of us . I would make her my queen, this warrior at my side, if she would let me.

The mask appeared easily. Lucien had clearly not been prepared for such a sight. His entire body seized as he took me in, myself now dressed formally in sleekest black, without my wings or the fighting armor. Dressed to kill. Not even the rain pelting my face and soaking my clothes felt cold.

“Little Lucien,” I said with wicked amusement. “Didn’t the Lady of the Autumn Court ever tell you that when a woman says no, she means it?”

“Prick,” Lucien spat and I was almost happy until he added on, “You filthy, whoring prick.” The word unleashed a snarl from deep within my chest. “What have you done, Feyre?” Lucien asked her, horrified at what he was seeing.

“Don’t come looking for me again,” Feyre breathed.

“He’ll never stop looking for you; never stop waiting for you to come home.”

Home.

There was that word again. I admitted a small trace of fear to myself as Feyre paused. Lucien snatched at his chance.

He’ll never stop looking... waiting... A lifetime of high lords and assassins chasing you...

“What did he do to you? Did he take your mind and-”

“Enough,” I said with more grace than I felt. But I had to be convincing. “Feyre and I are busy. Go back to your lands before I send your heads as a reminder to my old friend about what happens when Spring Court flunkies set foot in my territory.”

But Lucien didn’t budge.

“You made your point, Feyre - now come home.”

“I’m not a child playing games,” Feyre replied and I knew he’d finally overstepped with her. Feyre didn’t need to be locked up. It was why she left the Spring Court in the first place. Out here in the wild, she was her own person and Lucien had no idea how dangerous that could be for him if he forced her back towards her former self.

“Careful, Lucien,” I said with delight. “Or Feyre darling will send you back in pieces, too.”

He looked ready to tear himself in two, to fall on bended knee and unravel all those thick red braids until she gave in. “We are not your enemies, Feyre. Things got bad, Ianthe got out of hand, but it doesn’t mean you give up-”

“You gave up,” Feyre whispered. Time seemed to stop on those three little words, quiet but full of endless pain... and remembrance. In a way, it broke my heart all over again. But the strength that followed ensured both our hearts stayed in tact. “ You gave up on me,” she continued. “You were my friend. And you picked him - picked obeying him, even when you saw what his orders and his rules did to me. Even when you saw me wasting away day by day.”

“You have no idea how volatile those first few months were,” Lucien snapped. He was angry, probably from shock, at how difficult Feyre was being. He had thought this would be easy. “We needed to present a unified, obedient front, and I was supposed to be the example to which all others in our court were held.”

“You saw what was happening to me. But you were too afraid of him to truly do anything about it. I begged you. I begged you so many times to help me, to get me out of the house, even for an hour. And you left me alone, or shoved me into a room with Ianthe, or told me to stick it out.”

With a steely edge to his low voice cut sharp like the finest sword, Lucien dared his final resort. “And I suppose the Night Court is so much better?” he asked, setting my soul ablaze with rage. Always the whore. Always the villain. No chance for truth to see the light of day. If Lucien did not quit after this, I was going to tear him limb from limb, past histories be damned, and let Tamlin see how that stood for a response. We’d go to war shortly anyway.

But I didn’t have to tear him apart. All of my doubts about the Night Court not being Feyre’s home started dissipating in my mind like tiny bubbles floating away on the wind as I felt Feyre shift beside me. The entire clearing seemed to kneel in the presence of her unfolding power. Her anger matched mine. Her desire to protect was my own and cauldron damn us, it raged so strong. I dared to slide my eyes away from their careful watch over Lucien to look at her and beamed with joy as she even physically mirrored me, talons appearing at her hands and wings - Illyrian wings! - slipping out from between her shoulder blades on her exposed back.

And when Feyre spoke, it was thickest, blackest Night made manifest.

“When you spend so long trapped in the darkness, Lucien, you find that the darkness begins to stare back,” she spat. I could feel Amren next to me, nodding her approval. She was playing a part just as I had always done, keeping everyone safe - my friends, Velaris, even me - when she didn’t have to and I adored her for it.

Oh no, there was no doubt now where Feyre’s home was if ever there was any before.

I sent rapturous, wicked joy down the bond, praising her, delighting in this beautiful, bold woman before me with these wings so fierce and perfect at her back, a symbol that she would fight. The rain slid down the membranes smoothly and I wondered that they didn’t quite shiver. I hoped she knew in that moment not just how much I approved of her actions then and there, but also just how much I admired her too.

Lucien’s mouth hung open agape. “What did you do to yourself?” he breathed - horrified for her - for his one time friend. Finally, he sounded defeated. The razor thin smile Feyre gave in reply, so feral and animalistic, was a final knife to the heart.

“The human you knew died Under the Mountain. I have no interest in spending immortality as a High Lord’s pet.”

“Feyre-”

“Tell Tamlin,” Feyre pressed on, “if he sends anyone else into these lands, I will hunt each and every one of you down. And I will demonstrate exactly what the darkness taught me.”

For what it was worth, Lucien did look momentarily broken. He snapped back into his cold and calculating persona immediately, but for half a second, I saw the grief written in his eyes and was struck by the sudden thought that this was costing him personally to leave here without her. That maybe just as Tamlin and I had once been friends destroyed by war and feuding, so too had Lucien and Feyre.

And then his eyes crawled over to me through the wings and knives banded at her waist and mud caking her boots, disgust filling up the features on his face. My sympathy died. “You’re dead,” he said venomously. “You, and your entire cursed court.” For once, I didn’t even care.

Before I could retaliate, he had winnowed, the sentries with him. And Feyre was left staring miles into the distance, a hard threatening look burned into her face determined not to believe he was really gone. Her wings and talons still hung around her, tensing in the air not knowing the threat was gone. I dared run a finger along the veining in her wings and she shuddered, the spell broken. Relief ran through me at the same time I was so overwhelmed just to touch her again.

Out of sight, I shook my head to the side once incredulous. Wings. My mate had made herself wings. I had never seen anything more attractive or beautiful in all my life than my mate with Illyrian wings.

“How?” I gasped, stepping in front of her. We were inches apart.

“Shape-shifting,” she said, still a little rigid. But then her eyes found mine and in the next few precious moments that passed between us, she softened. It was as if she was seeing something in me as I stared at her, trying to send all the love I felt for her through our bond, and it melted her. The wings, the talons, the tension - it all disappeared, no trace of it left in sight where my beautiful Feyre stood so close to me. I needed to touch her again. Her scent, her magic - it was everywhere.

I recalled my own wings, my leathers, casting aside the High Lord for the Illyrian.

“That was a very convincing performance,” I said, melting a little bit myself.

“I gave him what he wanted to see. We should find another spot.”

It was as if she had read my mind. Gladly, I picked her up, ready to fly her away anywhere she wanted. But even as I held her, I could feel the thoughts swarming around inside her head. It wasn’t Lucien anymore, but…

“Are you all right?” I finally asked, fear lacing my question before it was met with the soothing feeling of Feyre pressing herself firmly into my chest, cradled as close as she could nest herself.

Home .

“The fact that it was so easy, that I felt so little, upsets me more than the encounter itself,” she explained.

And all at once, we were flying and I was angry again. Angry at Lucien and Tamlin and that entire damned court for betraying Feyre so cruelly, Feyre who I now stared at as we flew further into the skies.

“I knew things were bad,” I said over the wind and rain. “But I thought Lucien, at least, would have stepped in.”

“I thought so, too,” Feyre said. She sounded so tiny and disappointed, as if realizing just how far she had come from her first days in Prythian where Tamlin was concerned. I gave her a gentle squeeze and she looked up at me back into my eyes and I couldn’t stop myself. I sincerely hoped that maybe one day her and Lucien could reconcile - somehow.

“You look good with wings,” I said, kissing her brow. I was tired of fearing open affection for her that wasn’t a joke or a tool to pull her out of something.

And it seemed to work. Feyre’s chest warmed as she nuzzled ever closer against me and together, we flew and flew and flew.

A Court of Starlight and Poppies

A A Court of Thorns and Roses Story
by Turtle_Steed

Part 30 of 35

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