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Rhysand stared at me for long enough that I faced him.
"Be glad of your human heart, Feyre. Pity those who don't feel anything at all.
There are those who seek me a lifetime but never we meet,
And those I kiss but who trample me beneath ungrateful feet.
At times I seem to favor the clever and the fair,
But I bless all those who are brave enough to dare.
By large, my ministrations are soft-handed and sweet,
But scorned, I become a difficult beast to defeat.
For though each of my strikes lands a powerful blow,
When I kill, I do it slow...
Well, good-bye for now," he said, rolling his neck as if we hadn't been talking about anything important at all. He bowed at the waist, those wings vanishing entirely, and had begun to fade into the nearest shadow when he went rigid.
His eyes locked on mine wide and wild, and his nostrils flared. Shock—pure shock flashed across his features at whatever he saw on my face, and he stumbled back a step. Actually stumbled.
"What is—" I began.
He disappeared—simply disappeared, not a shadow in sight—into the crisp air.
I was as unburdened as a piece of dandelion fluff, and he was the wind that stirred me about the world.
When you healed my arm...You didn't need to bargain with me. You could have demanded every single week of the year." My brows knit together as he turned, already half-consumed by the dark. "Every single week, and I would have said yes." It wasn't entirely a question, but I needed the answer.
A half smile appeared on his sensuous lips. "I know," he said, and vanished.
Do you ever stop being so serious and dull?"
"Do you ever stop being such a prick?" I snapped back.
Dead—really, truly, I should have been dead for that.
But Lucien grinned at me. "Much better.
He brought his lips to my ear. "I would have been gentle with you, though." I shuddered as I closed my eyes. Every inch of my body went taut as his words echoed through me. "I would have had you moaning my name throughout it all. And I would have taken a very, very long time, Feyre.
Because all the monsters have been let out of their cages tonight, no matter what court they belong to. So I may roam wherever I wish until the dawn.
Everything I love has always had a tendency to be taken from me. I tell very few about the wings. Or the flying.
I stepped out of the shelter of my savior’s arm and turned to thank him. Standing before me was the most beautiful man I’d ever seen.
Because I wouldn't want to die alone," I said, and my voice wobbled as I looked at Tamlin again, forcing myself to meet his stare. "Because I'd want someone to hold my hand until the end, and awhile after that.
That's something everyone deserves, human or faerie.
Because your human joy fascinates me—the way you experience things, in your life span, so wildly and deeply and all at once, is … entrancing. I’m drawn to it, even when I know I shouldn’t be, even when I try not to be.
It took me a long while to realize that Rhysand, whether he knew it or not, had effectively kept me from shattering completely.
Rhysand yelled my name again - yelled it as though he cared. I blacked out, but she brought me back, ensuring that I felt everything ensuring that I screamed every time a bone broke.
I was loosened, a top whirling around and around, and I didn't know who I danced with or what they looked like, only that I had become the music and the fire and the night, and there was nothing that could slow me down.
Regardless of his motives or his methods, Rhysand was keeping me alive. And had done so even before I set foot Under the Mountain.
We moved together, unending and wild and burning, and when I went over the edge the next time, he roared and went with me.
My priority would be to protect my family -- and I would have picked whatever side could keep them safest. I hadn't thought of it as a weakness until now.
What have you done to me?"
Rhysand stood, running a hand through his short, dark hair. It's custom in my court for bargains to be permanently marked upon flesh."
I rubbed my left forearm and hand, the entirety of which was now covered in swirls and whorls of black ink. Even my fingers weren't spared, and a large eye was tattooed in the center of my palm. It was feline, and its slitted pupil stared right back me.
"Make it go away," I said, and he laughed.
"You humans are truly grateful creatures, aren't you?.
Blood filled my mouth, warm as it dribbled out between my lips. I gazed at Tamlin's masked face one last time.
"Love," I breathed, the world crumbling into a blackness with no end. A pause in Amarantha's magic. "The answer to the riddle...," I got out, chocking on my own blood, "is... love."
Tamlin's eyes went wide before something forever cracked in my spine.
What happened to Tomas Mandray?" I asked, the words strangled.
"I realized he wouldn't have gone with me to save you from Prythian.
Well," Lucien said, his remaining russet eye fixed on me, "you don't look half as bad now. A relief, I suppose, since you're to live with us. Though the tunic isn't as pretty as a dress."
Wolves ready to pounce - that's what they were, just like their friend. I was all to aware of my diction, of the very breath I took as I said, "I'd prefer not to wear that dress"
"And why not?" Lucien crooned.
It was Tamlin who answered for me. "Because killing us is easier in pants.
As I lifted the ash dagger, something inside me fractured so completely that there would be no hope of ever repairing it.
I don't know why I feel so tremendously ashamed of myself for leaving them. Why it feels so selfish and horrible to paint. I shouldn't--shouldn't feel that way, should I? I know I shouldn't, but I can't help it."
The rose hung limply from my fingers. "All those years, what I did for them . . . And they didn't try to stop you from taking me.
He chuckled. Even as he said my most private thoughts, even as I burned with outrage and shame, I trembled at the grip still on my mind. Rhysand turned to the High Lord. "I'm curious: Why did she wonder if it would feel good to have you bite her breast the way you bit her neck?"
"Let. Her. Go." Tamlin's face was twisted with such feral rage that it struck a different, deeper chord of terror in me.
"If it's any consolation," Rhysand confided to him, "she would have been the one for you - and you might have gotten away with it. A bit late, though. She's more stubborn than you are.
If he hadn’t been kissing me, if he hadn’t shown up and interrupted us, I would have gone out into that throne room covered in smudged paint. And everyone—especially Amarantha—would have known what I’d been up to. It wouldn’t have taken much to figure out whom I’d been with, especially not once they saw the paint on Tamlin. I didn’t want to consider what the punishment might have been.
Regardless of his motives or his methods, Rhysand was keeping me alive. And had done so even before I set foot Under the Mountain.
More—I wanted the hardness of his body crushing against mine; I wanted his mouth and teeth and tongue on my bare skin, on my breasts, between my legs. Everywhere—I wanted him everywhere. I was drowning in that need.
There are those who seek me a lifetime but never we meet,
And those i kiss but who trample me beneath ungrateful feet.
At times i seem to favor the clever and the fair,
But i bless all those who are brave enough to dare.
By large, my ministrations are soft-handed and sweet,
But scorned, i become a difficult beast to defeat.
For though my strikes lands a powerful blow,
When i kill, I do it slow....
Well, good-bye for now," he said, rolling his neck as if we hadn't been talking about anything important at all. He bowed at the waist, those wings vanishing entirely, and had begun to fade into the nearest shadow when he went rigid.
His eyes locked on mine, wide and wild, and his nostrils flared. Shock - pure shock flashed across his features at whatever he saw on my face, and he stumbled back a step. Actually stumbled.
"What is -" I began.
He disappeared - simply disappeared, not a shadow in sight - into the crisp air.
Rhys casually released me with a flick of his tongue over my bottom lip as a crowd of High Fae appeared behind Amarantha and chimed in with her laughter. Rhysand gave them a lazy, self-indulgent grin and bowed. But something sparked in the queen's eyes as she looked at Rhysand. Amarantha's whore, they'd called him.
We had contests to see who could write the dirtiest limericks while I was living with my father’s war-band by the border. I don’t particularly enjoy losing, so I took it upon myself to become good at them.
What's it doing?" the green-faced faerie whined again.
A deep, elegant voice replied this time. "She's building a trap." Rhysand.
"But the Middengard—"
"Relies on its scent to see," Rhysand answered, and I gave a special glower for him as I glanced at the rim of the trench and found him smiling at me. "And Feyre just became invisible."
His violet eyes twinkled. I made an obscene gesture before I broke into a run, heading straight for the worm.
We also dance with the spirits under the full moon and snatch human babes from their cradles to replace them with changelings–.
If it's any consolation," Rhysand confided to him, "she would have been the one for you - and you might have gotten away with it. A bit late, though. She's more stubborn than you are.
I'm serious," Lucien said as I lifted the glass to my lips, my brows raised. "Remember the last time you ignored my warning?" He poked me in the neck, and I batted his hand away.
"I also remember you telling me how witchberries were harmless, and the next thing I knew, I was half-delirious and falling all over myself," I said, recalling the afternoon from a few weeks ago. I'd had hallucinations for hours afterwards, and Lucien had laughed himself sick-enough so that Tamlin had chucked him into the reflection pool.
His short black hair gleamed like a raven's feathers, off-setting his pale skin and blue eyes so deep they were violet, even in the firelight.
It told a story...the story of Prythian. It began with a cauldron. A mighty black cauldron held by glowing, slender female hands in a starry, endless night. Those hands tipped it over, and, from it, golden sparkling liquid poured out over the lip. No -- not sparkling, but...effervescent with small symbols, perhaps some ancient faerie language.
I'd forgotten that human minds are easy to shatter as eggshells," Rhysand said, and ran a finger across the base of my throat. I shuddered, my eyes burning. "Look at how delightful she is - look how she's trying not to cry out in terror. It would be quick, I promise.
Because," he went on, his eyes locked with mine, "I didn't want you to fight alone. Or die alone."
And for a moment, I remembered that faerie who had died in our foyer, and how I'd told Tamlin the same thing. "Thank you," I said, my throat tight.
You dare glamour me?" he growled, his violet eyes burning as they bore into my own. Lucien just pressed me harder into the wall.
Lucien studied the wine in his goblet. "You don’t hold on to power by being everyone’s friend. And among the faeries, lesser and High Fae alike, a firm hand is needed. We’re too powerful, and too bored with immortality, to be checked by anything else.
Against slavery, against tyranny, I would gladly go to my death, no matter whose freedom I was defending.
Oh, you should have been born with my abilities, if only to have felt the rage that seeped from him."
I didn't want to think much about his abilities. "Who's to say he won't splatter you as well?"
"Perhaps he'll try- but I have a feeling he'll kill Amarantha first.
Cauldron save you.
Mother hold you.
Pass through the gates, and smell that immortal land of milk and honey.
Fear no evil.
Feel no pain.
Go, and enter eternity.