kay

As Seraphina began to feel herself floating away with the tide of exhaustion, Azriel spoke, his voice a low rasp. “How long do we have this time?”

It was a familiar question, a painful one. How long would they be together before work ripped them apart again?

But this time, Seraphina’s answer was different. She opened her eyes and smiled, and though the edges were dulled by drowsiness, her relief was clear for Azriel to see.

“Forever, my love,” she whispered, “I’m home for good this time.”

Azriel’s grip tightened on her waist.

Seraphina traced the scar at his collarbone with her thumb, grounding herself before she spoke. He had received the scar in Windhaven, on the very first day they had met. She had been given leave from the High Lord to visit a then-teenage Rhys in the freezing steppes, and when she’d arrived at the training ring, looking for her smirking, violet-eyed friend, she had instead found a stranger, surrounded in writhing shadows, and fighting off a much larger, older opponent. 

She never knew what it was that had drawn her to Azriel, years before the mating bond ever snapped. But the moment their gazes collided, it was like the rest of the world disappeared. Like she was finding someone she’d known all her life, but had somehow forgotten. And then the moment had shattered, as Azriel’s opponent had taken advantage of his distraction and lunged to slice his throat open. It was instinct that had her throwing her favourite dagger to interrupt his swing, ensuring what would have been a life-ending strike merely left a cut. 

She and Azriel had been entwined ever since.

“Before you say anything,” she murmured, voice still hushed, as though raising it might wake something dangerous, “I need you to let me finish.”

His brow furrowed faintly, but he nodded.

“When the faebane hit,” she continued, swallowing, “I felt it the instant it dulled the bond. Like someone had driven ice straight through my ribs.” Her hand pressed briefly to his chest, as if to show him exactly where. “I knew something was wrong. I knew it was you.”

His fingers flexed again against her hip.

“I tried to reach you,” she said softly. “Again and again. And when I couldn’t, I nearly abandoned the whole mission right then.”

Nearly.

“But I was so close, Az,” she whispered. “Closer than I’d ever been. One more thread and the entire syndicate would unravel. Every smuggling route, every noble name hiding behind it, every bargain that had kept them untouchable for decades.”

Her eyes drifted shut for a moment, the memory sharp enough to sting. “If I’d left then, they would have scattered. Reformed under new banners. I could have saved you sooner, but I would have condemned a thousand others to become victims.”

Silence stretched between them, thick and heavy.

“So I took a risk,” she said. “The worst one I’ve ever taken.”

She looked up then, and seeing his beautiful hazel eyes, so open and adoring, made her swallow thickly.

“It physically hurt, not coming to you immediately, but I had to try. The moment the bond went dark, I stopped hiding. I moved openly, pushed every pressure point at once.”

His breath hitched slightly.

“It collapsed in three days,” she went on. “Every major player exposed. Arrested. Executed. Stripped of power so completely there’s nothing left to rebuild from.” A bitter smile curved her lips. “Years of work, finished in a blur.”

Her voice softened. “And then I came for you.”

Azriel said nothing for a long moment. His wings shifted, curling protectively around them both.

“For those days I was imprisoned—"

“I’m sorry,” she interrupted, the words dripping with guilt. “It will haunt me for the rest of my life that you were alone for even a moment of it. That I didn’t come the second I knew you to be in danger.”

Azriel hushed her gently, and he leant forward until his forehead rested against hers.

“For those five days, I prayed to every god that I could think of that you wouldn’t come at all.”

She made an unconscious sound of protest and he smiled slightly, bringing one of his hands up to cup her cheek. 

“Darling,” he sighed, “I know more than anyone how important your work over these last few years has been. I didn’t want anything distracting you from it. Let alone some silly little kidnapping attempt.”

Seraphina huffed a quiet laugh. “I don’t know if you can call it an attempt if they actually got you, Az.”

“Oh, shut up.”

She laughed again, and he wrapped his arms around her, pulling her more firmly against him.

“My point is,” he continued, “I am so incredibly proud of you. And you have nothing to apologise for.”

Her fingers curled into his shirt. “I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

Quiet fell, broken only by the wind beyond the window and their soft breathing.

“We have a new High Lady,” Seraphina finally said.

“We do.”

“And Cassian has a mate.”

Azriel hummed.

Her thumb brushed beneath his eye, tender, reverent. “I’m sick of being away from you. From our family. From this court. I don’t want updates through letters and infrequent mental check-ins with Rhys. I want to be here.” Her voice broke. “I want to come home to you.”

Something in Azriel seemed to give then. As if a long-held tension finally recognized it was no longer needed. 

He pulled her closer, burying his face in her hair, breathing her in as though committing the moment to memory. His shadows wrapped around her fully now, embracing her.

“Then stay.”

*****

Nesta was halfway through her second cup of coffee when she decided something was wrong.

Cassian sat across from her at the long dining table in the House of Wind, wings twitching, fingers drumming against his plate with barely contained energy. He’d already eaten his breakfast—inhaled was more accurate—and now seemed incapable of sitting still. He kept glancing toward the open balcony doors, jaw tight, shoulders tense, as though bracing for impact.

“You’re pacing while seated,” Nesta observed coolly. “It’s deeply irritating.”

Cassian snorted, pushing his chair back an inch, then pulling it forward again. “I’m fine.”

“You’re lying.”

He opened his mouth, closed it, rubbed a hand over the back of his neck. “Just… waiting on something.”

Her eyes narrowed. “What?”

Before he could answer, something shifted in the air. A ripple that made the House seem to draw a breath.

A shadow peeled itself from the morning light beyond the balcony and landed soundlessly on the railing.

Cassian was on his feet instantly.

Azriel stepped into view, wings flaring as he adjusted his grip on the bundle in his arms. 

No, not a bundle. He was carrying someone.

Nesta stiffened. The female in Azriel’s arms was clad in training leathers similar to her own. She was tall and lithe, with long brown hair pulled away from her face. Even through the glass doors, Nesta could see that her bright green eyes were razor-sharp. The air around her seemed to thrum with something sharp and old. Power, coiled tight beneath skin.

Azriel touched down lightly on the stone floor, reverent in the way he shifted, as if the female he carried were something infinitely precious and dangerous all at once.

Cassian’s face did something strange.

Relief flickered first. Raw and unguarded.

Then dread chased it away.

“Fuck,” he muttered.

Nesta rose slowly from her chair. “Care to explain—”

The female slid from Azriel’s arms, landing lightly on her feet. She rolled her shoulders once, testing, then lifted her chin and stalked into the room like she owned it.

Azriel smiled.

Not his usual careful, restrained curve of lips, but something brighter. Easier.

That was when Nesta knew this was not what it looked like.

The female marched straight up to Cassian.

“You,” she said, voice low and silk-smooth.

She grabbed him by the ear.

“What the—ow—Ser—!”

The strange female didn’t slow or hesitate. She just dragged him bodily toward the stairs leading up to the roof, Cassian half-laughing, half-groaning as he stumbled after her.

Nesta stared after them. “Is this an assassination attempt?”

Azriel only chuckled softly, wings folding as he followed. “Not quite.”

“That’s not reassuring.”

But he was already moving, shadowing the pair up the stairs. Something about his posture— relaxed, almost fond, made her pause.

Nesta followed cautiously.

*****

The training ring atop the House of Wind was already bathed in morning sun when they burst onto the roof.

The female shoved Cassian roughly into the center of the ring and rolled her neck again.

Cassian cracked his own, resigned. “Come on, do we really have to?”

The stranger smiled.

It was not a kind smile.

Then she hit him.

It was a brutal right hook that Cassian barely blocked in time. He staggered back, boots scraping stone as she came at him again, fists flying and knees snapping up with pure, furious momentum.

Nesta started forwards, but a scarred hand on her arm stopped her.

Azriel barely spared her a glance, his gaze fixed firmly on the fight in front of them. “Let them,” he said calmly.

That’s when Nesta realised that Cassian wasn’t striking back, not really. He defended, dodged, absorbed blows with gritted teeth and practiced ease. Every so often he muttered something under his breath, but the female didn’t slow.

Azriel leaned back against the railing, poised as ever. Except for the slight dusting of pink on his cheeks as his dark eyes tracked the female’s movement.

That was the strangest part.

In the next moment, Rhysand appeared in a shimmer of night, Feyre at his side, her eyes wide and mouth parted in what looked suspiciously like delight.

“Oh,” Feyre breathed. “I didn’t realise you were serious.”

Rhys vanished again and reappeared moments later with Mor, who clapped her hands in glee, and Amren, who took one look at the fight and bared her teeth.

“Gouge his eyes!” Amren shouted. “Use your fingernails, girl!”

Mor whooped. “That’s my Seraphina!”

Nesta’s head snapped toward them. “Your what?”

Cassian finally landed a solid block and managed to grab Seraphina’s wrist, twisting enough to halt her momentum. She slammed her forehead into his nose in response.

He reeled back with a curse, but she didn’t give him the mercy of a second to recover.

She surged forward, exploiting the half-beat of disorientation with ruthless efficiency. Her foot swept low and Cassian caught it on instinct, wings flaring wide for balance as he twisted away, but she was already inside his guard.

Her elbow drove toward his throat.

Cassian barely managed to turn his head, the blow glancing off his collarbone instead. 

He countered fast. A hooked punch toward her ribs, pulled just enough not to shatter bone, followed by a knee aimed for her center of gravity. Seraphina pivoted, catching his wrist again, twisting hard enough that his grip faltered. She used his momentum against him, yanking him forward and slamming a palm into his sternum.

Cassian skidded back several feet across the stone.

Nesta’s breath stuttered.

Not only because Cassian had been thrown, but because he’d allowed it. Because he was calculating, matching the female strike for strike, not overpowering her, but not yielding either. As though he were baiting her, wearing her out.

Seraphina stalked after him, her movements fluid, lethal. Every step was deliberate. Every strike measured. 

Beside Nesta, Azriel’s attention was like a living, breathing thing.

His shadows were drawn taut and his wings were held a fraction closer than necessary, his posture loose but coiled underneath, as though he were holding himself back.

And there was something else.

Heat.

Nesta frowned, instincts sharpening. Gods help her, she’d spent enough time around mated males to recognize the signs. The tension in his shoulders. The way his breath had gone just a little too slow, too deliberate. The unmistakable edge beneath his calm.

The realization hit her like a slap.

Nesta inhaled sharply and scent flooded her senses. Not just sweat and stone and morning air, but something deeper. Azriel’s usual thread of cedar and night-kissed power braided tightly with something bright and lethal and female.

A mating bond. 

Strong. Old.

Her gaze snapped back to the female dismantling Cassian piece by piece, then to Azriel again, and the unmistakable hunger in his features. 

Oh.

Cassian rolled to his feet as Seraphina came in again, wings snapping out to knock her off balance. She ducked beneath them, slid low, and drove her shoulder into his thigh. He grunted, staggering, and she followed with a brutal uppercut that snapped his head back.

Amren hissed in delight. “Yes. Break him.”

Cassian laughed hoarsely, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “Still fighting dirty.”

“Still whining,” Seraphina shot back.

She feinted left, then spun right, heel flashing toward his temple. Cassian caught her ankle midair, muscles locking as he twisted, only for her to jump, using his grip as leverage, flipping over him and landing behind him in the same breath.

Her forearm slammed across the back of his neck.

Cassian dropped to one knee with a sharp exhale.

Nesta’s mind raced to piece together the clues in front of her. This didn’t seem like random strikes. This was memory. Muscle and instinct and a shared language forged over centuries of fighting together.

Cassian planted his hands, surged up, and finally went on the offensive.

He went after her with everything he had. Speed, strength, wings and fists moving in terrifying harmony. Blows that would have pulped lesser beings whistled past her face as she ducked and wove, taking hits where she had to, returning them with brutal efficiency.

Stone cracked beneath their feet.

Seraphina caught a fist meant for her jaw and headbutted him again, but Cassian anticipated it this time, twisting just enough to soften the impact. He grabbed her shoulders, wings flaring as he drove her back.

And she let him.

Let him slam her into the ground.

Then she wrapped her legs around his waist and rolled, reversing their positions in a blink, her forearm pressing to his throat as her knee dug into his ribs.

Cassian froze, but she didn’t continue the attack.

They both lay there for a heartbeat, breathing hard, sweat-slicked, eyes locked.

Then Seraphina sagged.

The fury burned itself out, leaving only exhaustion and something fragile beneath it.

Cassian relaxed, one hand coming up to squeeze her forearm once, steady and grounding.

“Better?” he asked quietly.

She closed her eyes. “Better.”

She pushed herself to her feet, offering him a hand as she stood. He took it, hauling himself up with a groan and a grin.

And just like that, the tension dissolved.

They were smiling at each other now. Teasing, affectionate, relaxed.

“You’ve gotten slow,” she said lightly.

“I’m still digesting breakfast,” he replied.

She laughed and Cassian stepped forward to sweep her into a sweaty hug, lightly kissing her temple.

Nesta’s patience snapped.

“What the fuck is going on?”

Silence fell.

Seraphina turned slowly and her gaze swept over Nesta. Assessing, sharp, curious. 

Then she glanced at Azriel, who nodded once. Cassian seemed to be torn between taking flight and bracing himself for a storm.

The female stepped forward.

“I’m Seraphina,” she said, offering a hand. “And you must be Nesta Archeron.”

Nesta stared at the hand, then took it. “Care to explain why you just assaulted my mate?”

Seraphina’s grin turned wicked.

Rhys cleared his throat. “Ah. Yes. About that.”

He moved again to Feyre’s side, fingers lacing with hers. “This is… tradition.”

Cassian snorted. “Therapy, Night Court style.”

“When Azriel or Seraphina is endangered, the other… struggles,” Rhys continued smoothly. 

Seraphina tilted her head. “Violently.”

“So,” Rhys said, “we learned a long time ago that instincts need an outlet. Especially when those instincts apply to two warriors whose lives are constantly being threatened.”

Cassian gestured to himself. “I volunteer as Seraphina's outlet.”

“And Rhys does the same for Az,” Seraphina added. “It keeps us from destroying cities.”

Feyre blinked. “Like when Cassian picked a fight with you after I accepted the bond?”

Rhys brought her fingertips to his lips. “Exactly.”

Understanding flickered across Feyre’s face, and Nesta looked between them all, still reeling but trying very hard not to show it.

Seraphina seemed to read her hesitancy, and offered a kind smile. “I promise,” she said, “I’m much nicer when no one I love has been hurt.”

Azriel stepped forward then, slipping an arm around Seraphina’s waist with quiet affection and no small amount of male pride. 

*****

By the time they made it back down from the roof, Nesta’s had stopped asking questions. 

Mostly.

Cassian, still bleeding lightly from his nose and grinning like an idiot, filled in the gaps between stairs. Seraphina was Azriel’s mate. An integral part of the Court. Dangerous. Rhys’s oldest secret weapon. Cassian’s best friend. The one who vanished for months or even years at a time and always came back with the world rearranged in her wake.

Nesta absorbed it all in silence, filing the information away with the rest of the truths she pretended not to care about.

The sitting room was already warm when they entered, sunlight pouring in through tall windows and gilding the soft furnishings. The House responded to their presence instantly, with tea steaming on the low table, coffee for those who preferred it, pastries appearing as if summoned by collective hunger.

Seraphina had barely made it off the staircase before Mor eagerly caught up to her.

“Oh, thank the gods,” Mor breathed, wrapping her in a fierce embrace. “Do you have any idea how unbearable it’s been without you?”

Seraphina laughed, the sound bright and unguarded. “With this lot? I’m honestly surprised you haven’t killed one of the boys… or been killed yourself.”

“You have no idea,” Mor moaned. “Dealing with a pining Rhys was one thing, but a hopelessly mooning Cass?” She shuddered dramatically.

Cassian scoffed. “That is so not fair.”

“You were worse than a teenage—”

“I was not!”

Their voices overlapped, easy and familiar, and Nesta found herself pausing just inside the doorway, watching the way Seraphina fit into the space like she’d never left it. Like she hadn’t been gone for months. Years.

Rhys approached next, his smile softer than Nesta had ever seen it. It made him look younger, boyish even. He kissed Seraphina’s cheek, lingering for a heartbeat longer than politeness required. 

“You’re home,” he said simply.

Seraphina’s expression shifted, something fragile flickering beneath her composure as her eyes darted between Rhys’. Nesta couldn’t tell if they were communicating telepathically, or simply knew each other well enough to converse without speaking. “I am,” Seraphina finally said.

Through it all, Azriel hovered close, not crowding her, but never more than an arm’s length away. His shadows seemed glued to her skin, tendrils constantly caressing her arms, her hands, the nape of her neck. Nesta noticed how Azriel tracked her without seeming to: the tilt of his head, the quiet adjustments of his stance. When she reached for a cup of tea, he handed it to her before her fingers brushed porcelain. When she sat, he arranged the cushions before she even leant back. 

She didn’t thank him.

She leaned into him instead, shoulder brushing his, eyes flicking up to meet his for a heartbeat before she turned back to Mor mid-sentence. Had Nesta not been watching so closely, she may have missed the way Seraphina’s hand slid back, fingers finding Azriel’s without looking. Even as she talked animatedly with her family, Seraphina’s hand clasped his, her thumb brushing once, deliberate and grounding.

Meanwhile, Azriel watched only her, admiring unabashedly. Love shining bright in his warm gaze.

Nesta was surprised to feel a burning at her waterline. Her throat felt tight and warm, as though she’d swallowed medicine. One that tasted bitter at first, but provided relief all the same.

This wasn’t the male she knew, whom she had come to call a friend. Not the solemn shadowsinger who stood apart, watchful and restrained. This Azriel was looser, calmer, like a blade finally returned to its sheath. 

For the first time since she had met him, he looked truly happy.

Cassian dropped into a chair beside her, wings splayed behind him lazily. “Told you,” he muttered under his breath.

“Told me what?” Nesta asked flatly. She blinked rapidly, only to catch her mate’s knowing smile.

He had thought of her every day since. 

He thought of the bone-deep terror he had felt standing in that doorway, watching her prepare to take on dozens of skilled Fae soldiers alone.

Of how fiercely proud he had felt when she brought them down, one after the other, fire sparking from her fingertips. 

Of the moment she ran to Eris, unthinking and unflinching.

Of the crack in her voice when she screamed for her mother, and how it had shattered him to hold her back, the mark of his oath burning beneath his leathers.

The rest of the world didn’t care. They danced and laughed, eagerly awaiting the falling starlight.

Nesta was glowing, practically luminous in Cassian’s arms, their new mating bond still fresh.

Feyre and Rhys sat nearby, Nyx giggling between them as he waved chubby hands at the people around them.

Mor leaned against a pillar, laughing at something Emerie said, a soft blush on her cheeks that had nothing to do with the wine in her hand.

Amren and Varian were in an armchair, wrapped around each other so tightly it was difficult to tell where one ended and the other began.

Even Elain…Elain was smiling shyly up at Lucien, who looked like he was afraid of breathing too hard, even as a crooked grin lit up his freshly healed face.

They were all incandescently happy, and it only made the ache in his chest worse.

Azriel slipped away, unnoticed, his footsteps silent as he made for the nearest balcony. The cold air bit at his skin, a welcome balm to the heat inside him. He stepped out, finally exhaling.

And froze.

It was like a dream.

Adara stood with her back to him, silhouetted against the night sky and the twinkling lights of Velaris below.

Her dress was a beautiful cobalt blue, the exact shade of his Siphons, sleeveless and backless, shimmering like it had been stitched from the stars themselves. It hugged her curves like water, the hem rippling faintly in the breeze. And her back—

She hadn’t glamored them. The scars, the burns, the faint pale marks that crisscrossed her skin, were all on display. Her brilliant red hair was pinned up to further expose them. As if she were daring the world to see her.

Azriel’s breath left him in a rush. She was the most devastating thing he’d ever seen.

“Didn’t anyone ever tell you it was rude to stare, Spymaster?”

He wasn’t sure if it was his body or his shadows that moved first. But he stepped forward, silent as a breath. She hadn’t turned around, but she knew he was there. Always did. As if she could sense his presence as keenly as he sensed hers.

“I’m not sorry for staring,” he said quietly, “when you look so beautiful.”

She shifted slightly, her dress whispering against the stones, but remained stubbornly facing away. “I hope it’s okay that I’m here. Rhysand invited me.”

“I promised you once that I would show you Starfall.” Azriel swallowed the lump in his throat and stepped forward. “I didn’t think that I would get the chance to fulfill that promise. I— I thought I might never see you again.”

“Eris told me about the oath you made.” Her voice was soft. “It wasn’t fair of him to ask you to swear something like that.”

Azriel didn’t speak. He didn’t trust himself to. 

Adara finally turned, facing him fully now. Her golden eyes caught the light of the stars overhead, emphasised by the dark make-up outlining them. She looked ethereal, like a true goddess. “I don’t need anyone to protect me,” she said. 

“I know,” Azriel murmured. “But I want to anyway.”

Surprise flickered in her expression, followed by something more vulnerable.

He stepped closer, his shadows curling towards her, caressing her. “I would have protected you without the oath.”

“I know,” she whispered. 

The silence stretched, starlight falling around them in ghostly trails. Behind them, laughter and music drifted faintly from the hall. But here… it was just them. Just shadow and flame.

“That day… you just appeared in the throne room. How did you know to come?” she asked, and Azriel’s stomach flipped. He’d been hoping to delay this particular question.

“I…” He scratched the back of his neck as the instinct to deflect or lie rose within. But he didn’t want to hide the truth, not anymore. Not from her. “Ever since that night on the rooftop after you were abducted—ever since I realised you were in just as much danger under Beron’s control as Briallyn’s, I’ve instructed some of my shadows to be with you always, keeping watch.” An inky-black tendril reached out of its own volition to brush her cheek softly, as if in apology. “I didn’t mean to invade your privacy, but I couldn’t stomach the thought of something happening to you when I wasn’t there… I didn’t want to let you down.” Again. The silent word echoed between them. 

Adara nodded faintly and he almost swayed with relief. She didn’t seem angry—at least, not about that.

“When they informed me that you were in peril, I didn’t even think. I found myself standing in front of the Forest House doors before I even decided to move.” He hadn’t even told Rhys or Cass before winnowing. Something they’d been well and truly pissed about when he’d returned, bloody and burnt. “During the battle, I sent one to alert Lucien, hoping he would help me get you to safety. I didn’t think he’d be determined to join the fight.”

She glanced past his shoulder to the merry room beyond, and he followed her gaze to Lucien. 

“He’s leaving for the Day Court tomorrow,” she said quietly, “to meet Helion. Our— our father.” Her voice cracked on the word.

“He’s not staying in Autumn?”

It had been the wrong thing to say. Sorrow made Adara’s brows bunch as she looked back at him.

“No. Eris wants us both to leave Autumn.” The hurt that coloured her words made his stomach clench, even as his heart soared. What was she talking about? Eris loved Adara above all others. He would do anything for her. 

“Our brothers, Aster, Archer and Jasper, survived the battle with Beron, and he has decided to give them positions at court. Despite everything they’ve done, he wants to give them the chance to do the right thing— to become better males without Beron’s rotten influence.”

She sighed, and Azriel had to ball his hands into fists to stop from reaching out to touch her. To comfort her.

“But Eris doesn’t want me or Luce to have to live under the same roof as our tormenters. He doesn’t really want us to leave, and he said we’d always have a choice, but…” she shrugged jerkily. “I told him I wanted to stay and help him with the transition to High Lord, but he said he wants me to finally experience true freedom. Live my own life where I don’t have to report to him. Figure out who I am.”

He understood her hurt and confusion. But he also understood Eris’ motivations, and he knew one day, Adara would too. Azriel thought of his own cruel halfbrothers, who had delighted in his pain and misery for almost a decade. He tried to imagine how he would’ve felt if Rhys had given them a second chance. Tried to picture seeing them everyday, listening to them give opinions on his beloved court and watch them move with ease through his favourite city. He couldn’t. 

Eventually, Adara would see Eris’ decision for the selfless gift that it was.

Besides, the Forest House had never been Adara’s home. The same way Windhaven had never been his.

“So where will you go? Are you going to join Lucien in Day?” He asked, hoping desperately for the opposite.

“No. I want to mourn the parent I lost, before seeking the one I never knew.”

Ice spread through his veins and Azriel took another step forward. “I shouldn’t have held you back while Beron attacked your mother. I know that. You have every right to be angry. To never forgive me for it.”

Adara’s mouth parted slightly, but she didn’t interrupt. 

“I’m sorry,” he said, voice hoarse. “But I’d do it again, a thousand times over.” His throat worked as he swallowed. “Because watching you run toward Beron… knowing he could kill you and I might not get to you in time… I couldn’t—” He broke off, shaking his head. “It wasn’t just my oath to Eris that made me hold you back. It was selfishness. You mean too much to me.”

For a long moment, she just looked at him, her expression unreadable. “I know,” she said again.

He met her eyes, something settling deep in his chest. “You’re not afraid of the worst parts of me, are you? You never have been.”

“No,” she said, stepping close enough that her fingers brushed his. “Because I have those same parts in me. You would burn the world down for the people you love.”

He stared at her, his heartbeat roaring.

“I would, too,” she finished. “I already have.”

Azriel reached for her hand and laced their fingers together. She didn’t pull away.

“I forgive you,” she said, the words so soft they nearly vanished into the night. But he heard them anyway. Felt them settle in his chest like a balm.

“You shouldn’t be so quick,” he replied with a small smile. “I would’ve promised all kinds of things if you’d asked.”

Her lips twitched. “Like what?”

“Anything and everything,” he said earnestly. Her eyes flicked between each of his and he found himself holding his breath, wondering what she saw there. She had always been able to read him like no one else. “But I would like to start with the rest of my immortal life, spent devoting myself to you.”

Hope and yearning made her eyes sparkle like stars. And when she leaned in, just slightly, he met her halfway.

The kiss was gentle, tentative. The kind that made time slow to a hush. His hands cupped her jaw with reverence, thumb brushing against the soft curve of her cheekbone. Her fingers curled into the front of his shirt like a question, and he answered by deepening the kiss.

And just as he thought he’d never let go… It snapped.

A golden thread burst to life, connecting their very souls. A soft, warm glow, unfurling between them. As if it had always been there, quietly waiting for this exact moment to awaken. It hummed through his bones, sang in his blood. Lit up every shadow, every scar inside him with something bright and whole.

Azriel tore his mouth from hers with a gasp, his eyes wide, hands still cradling her face like he didn’t dare let go. Like he’d never stop touching her again.

Adara was staring at him, her own lips parted in awe, eyes shining.

“You’re my mate,” Azriel whispered, his voice filled with centuries of pent-up longing. 

Silver lined her eyes as she nodded. “Yes. And you’re mine,” she replied breathlessly.

He gaped at her. “You knew?”

“I suspected,” she corrected shakily. “The more I knew you, the more I couldn’t help feeling like we were made for each other. Equals in every way, like two sides of the same coin.” 

She leaned in to brush her lips against his again, as if she just couldn’t help it. “I trusted you even when I knew I shouldn’t, and you see me — the real me— the way no one ever has, Azriel.” 

His name poured from her lips like honey, and the way she said it… It was like he was something infinitely precious. He would give anything to hear her say his name like that again and again.

“Why didn’t you say anything?”

“Because…” she paused, leaning back to take in his face more fully, “I wanted you to choose me. Not because of the bond, not because the Mother saw fit to tie our souls together, but because… you wanted me.”

His fingers flexed where they were still holding her face inches from his own, their breath mingling in the snow-kissed night air. Slowly, he leant forward, until his forehead was resting against hers. He looked deep into her eyes, into her very soul. 

“I want you, Adara Vanserra. I have since the moment I caught you sneaking through the shadows of the Hewn City. And I have wanted you in every moment since then. In every conversation, every glance, every touch, I have wanted you.” He swiped his thumb across her cheek to wipe away the tears that were beginning to fall. “The more I knew you, the more I couldn’t help but want you. But more than that, I love you, Adara.”

He could’ve fallen to his knees at the golden warmth that flooded through the bond and filled every crack and crevice of his chest. Gloriously bright and all-consuming, it felt like her. 

“I love you too, Azriel.”

And then she was surging forward to kiss him again. This time, the kiss was not soft or hesitant. It was desperate, passionate. He reached around her waist to pull her flush against him, and the small noise she made in the back of her throat set him ablaze. He groaned at the taste of her, the feel of her. The whole world could be consumed by darkness, and Azriel thought he wouldn’t even notice as he basked in the glowing light of his mate.

She stood half-concealed in the shadows of the far wall, arms crossed over her chest as the room filled with murmuring noblemen. Some familiar faces, some not. A few of them she had once served wine to. Bowed to.

Not tonight.

Her job was simple: observe. Listen. Catalogue every twitch, every uncertain glance, every heartbeat of hesitation. If any of these males planned to betray Eris, she would know as soon as they blinked.

And she would deal with it accordingly.

Jasper was already there when she arrived — tall and broad and quiet as ever, his auburn hair tied back, his pale face drawn. The third-eldest of their siblings, he had always kept to the shadows of Beron’s court, never defying but never participating in the worst of it either. Unlike the twins, he never delighted in torturing her, and only ever caused her harm when Beron was present to demand it. But tonight, he stood by Eris’s side. That alone said everything.

Eris had changed into ceremonial red. It was not the ostentatious robes Beron preferred, but a clean, sharp-cut tunic and matching mantle that shimmered faintly like firelight when he moved. His sword rested at his hip. He was no longer just a general, he looked every inch a High Lord.

And when he stepped forward, the room fell into immediate silence.

Adara felt her throat tighten.

“You all know why we are here,” Eris said, his voice clear and steady, though not loud. He didn’t need volume. He had presence. “Our court is bleeding. Our people are starving. And our High Lord has lost his mind.”

A ripple moved through the crowd, but none interrupted. Eris continued.

“We all saw what he did to the villages below the western ridge. He claimed it was retribution. I call it what it was, a massacre. And if we do nothing, it will not be the last.”

Adara’s eyes swept the room. Most of the lords nodded grimly. A few exchanged wary glances. She noted them all.

“I am not here to ask for treason,” Eris said, pacing slowly across the stone floor. “I am asking for justice. For leadership. For a future.”

Adara's heart pounded in her chest, not with fear, but with something like awe. She had always known he would be a better High Lord than Beron. But now, watching him speak to these powerful males and watching them hang onto his every word, it became something more than a dream. 

He was fighting for their people.

He was giving them a future.

The silence that followed Eris’s declaration stretched tight as a drawn bow.

And then—

The door exploded inward in a blast of heat and smoke.

Adara was moving before the flames had even cleared the doorway, shoving a stunned noble out of her way, the scent of scorched stone already thick in her nose. Her dagger was in her hand before the body hit the floor.

Beron strode into the room like a living wildfire, the crown atop his brown hair gleaming.

Aster and Archer flanked him, wicked grins splitting their faces. They wore their brutality like cologne, reveling in the panic now rippling through the nobles who had gathered. Behind them came Beron’s personal guard, his hand-picked sadists, cloaked in iron and cruelty.

“You miserable little traitor,” Beron hissed at Eris, voice echoing off the stone walls like the crack of a whip. “Plotting your pitiful little coup right under my roof.”

Adara slipped farther into the shadows, muscles taut, eyes on the guards. But a hand slammed into her back before she could react, and Archer forced her forward with cruel delight. Aster caught her other arm, twisting it until pain lanced up her shoulder.

She bit down on a cry, refusing to give them the satisfaction.

Beron didn’t even look at her.

He was too focused on Eris, who had not drawn his sword. Who stood tall in the middle of the carnage, refusing to flinch as his father approached.

“You always were too soft,” Beron snarled. “Too clever for your own good. Do you think you’ll rule this court with speeches and diplomacy?” He spat the word like venom. “You’ll never rule. You’ll die in chains.”

Several nobles surged toward the exits, panic overtaking their loyalty. Flame swept out in a wave from Beron’s palm, consuming five of them in a blink. Their screams echoed even as their bodies turned to ash. The rest scrambled backwards, Jasper hidden among them.

“Cowards,” Beron sneered. “Every last one of you. I should burn this entire hall and start anew.”

Adara thrashed in Archer’s grip, but he only laughed, tightening his hold. She caught Eris’s eye across the chaos. A silent message passed between them. This is it. This ends tonight.

Beron lifted a hand and with a simple flick, a glowing rope of fire unfurled into existence, lashing forward with a crack and wrapping tight around Eris’s throat.

Adara lunged, only to be yanked back by the twins. “Don’t worry, little sister,” Aster murmured in her ear, his voice dripping with mockery, “we wouldn’t want you to miss the show.”

Beron turned on his heel, dragging Eris along the stones by his neck like a prize animal, the whip of fire tightening with every step. “To the throne room,” he barked. “If my son wishes to challenge me for my crown, let it be a public execution.”

Archer and Aster began hauling Adara behind them, half-dragging, half-shoving her as she struggled against their unforgiving grip.

The stone halls swirled with smoke and screams, the scent of ash following her all the way to the main level.

The doors to the throne room slammed shut behind them with a finality that made Adara’s skin crawl.

Beron stalked toward his gilded throne like a lion on a hunt, dragging Eris behind him with a lazy flick of the fire-whip clutched in one hand. The other was tucked behind his back, casual and composed, as if he hadn’t just burned half of his own nobility. As if this were a performance.

His personal guards lined the room in tense silence. Watching. Waiting. None dared move.

Adara was shoved to her knees at the foot of the dais, Aster and Archer close behind her, like wolves guarding a meal. Their hands gripped her shoulders like talons, but her focus stayed locked on Eris.

Her brother had already shot to his feet, though blood trickled down his forearms and the skin of his neck was blistered and angry. Still, he met Beron’s fury with steady defiance.

“You will kneel,” Beron yelled from where he now stood in front of his throne, jerking the rope of fire to pull Eris down in the centre of the grand room.

Eris dropped to one knee, but raised his chin. “Not in respect,” he panted. “Only to make it easier to kill you.”

Beron hissed and flew down the dias steps until he stood in front of Eris, backhanding him with a flame-wrapped hand. Eris’s head snapped sideways with the impact, blood flying from his mouth and splattering across the shimmering floor.

Adara’s vision went red.

But Aster laughed, actually laughed, leaning down beside her ear. “He always did have a mouth on him,” he drawled, brushing her hair back like a lover. Bile rose in her throat. “Think Beron’ll burn that off next?”

Archer crouched beside her, fingers tapping a dagger at his belt. “Think she’ll cry? I think she will. Little tears like our pathetic little mother.”

Adara stilled.

Her muscles went taut, her own powers heating her skin. Not yet. She had to pick her moment.

Beron lifted Eris by the collar and threw him into the marble pillar beside the dais. The crack that followed might have been his shoulder or a rib, but Eris gritted his teeth and pushed himself up again.

“Still alive?” Beron spat. “Maybe I’ll have to carve the traitor out of you instead.”

The guards along the walls remained frozen like statues. The twins just laughed with cruel delight.

Adara let her head bow, let her body go slack just enough that Archer’s grip loosened.

Just a little more—

A flick of Beron’s wrist sent a fresh lash of flame across Eris’s chest, but he blocked it with a shield of his own power at the same time that Adara surged into motion.

She pivoted hard, smashing her elbow into Archer’s nose with a satisfying crunch. He stumbled back with a howl of pain, and she used his momentum to twist and slam her boot into Aster’s knee. The pop of bone dislocating was drowned by his shout of rage as he went down.

Adara didn’t stop.

She launched herself at Archer, slamming the heel of her palm into his throat before following it up with a strike to his temple that sent him crumpling to the floor, unconscious. She turned in time to catch Aster lunging for her, knife drawn, and she dropped low, sweeping his legs from under him with a spinning kick. He hit the ground with a snarl, but her fist came down hard and fast — once, twice — until his eyes rolled back and he went still.

Silence rippled through the room. She chanced a glance to the side, her heart clenching painfully as she watched Eris dodge brutal attacks from Beron.

Then—

“Seize her!” one of the guards bellowed.

Several began to charge forward, swords drawn.

Adara straightened, blood dripping from her knuckles, her chest heaving with breath. She turned to face them, spine straight, chin lifted.

She would not go down begging.

Adara braced herself for the first guard, drawing her sword and letting fire dance along her skin in hot, pulsing waves. She forced her breathing to steady. She didn’t know how long she could last, how many of them she could cut down before the next one got close enough to—

Snap.

Snap.

The two guards closest to her crumpled to the stone floor mid-sprint, necks twisted at unnatural angles. Shadows slithered away from their corpses, melting back toward the doorway.

Azriel stood there, framed by flame and blood and smoke.

He looked like vengeance made flesh. His wings were flared, all seven Siphons blazing cobalt, his shadows whipping around him with lethal purpose. His expression was carved from stone, cold and merciless.

He met her eyes across the throne room. And then he moved.

But before she could breathe a sigh of relief, before she could say thank the gods—

Another guard was on her.

Adara ducked beneath the swing of a halberd, parried a second blade with the narrow edge of her own, and sent a whip of fire spiraling outward in a ring. It caught two more, sending them reeling backward, but she didn’t hesitate. She lunged after them, cutting one across the thigh, and then spun to drive her blade into the other’s side.

The next guard knocked her sword from her hand with brutal precision.

She lashed out with her flames, molten-hot and roaring from her palms. The brute howled as fire engulfed him, but more were coming.

Too many.

From the corner of her eye, she saw Azriel carving his way through them like a dark tornado, his blades flashing, Siphons erupting in controlled bursts of power. He was fighting through the guards between them. Fighting to reach her.

But Beron’s elite didn’t break easily. These were the monsters who had trained in silence and blood since boyhood, raised in the image of their High Lord: brutal, efficient, merciless. They closed in again.

Adara kicked off one and slammed her elbow into another, grabbed her fallen sword from the ground and rose, only to catch a blow across her ribs that sent her crashing back to the floor.

Pain exploded through her back. Her lungs stuttered.

A boot caught her shoulder, trying to pin her. Another hand yanked at her hair.

She fought anyway, snarling. Fire roared from her body in an uncontrolled burst, driving them back for half a heartbeat.

She rose again. Prepared herself for another onslaught.

And then—

A roar of flame erupted behind her. Not her own.

The soldiers in front of her faltered. Even Azriel paused, shadows flickering as he looked past her shoulder.

Adara turned—

And her mother stood at the edge of the dais, arms outstretched, fire blooming from her hands like a phoenix reborn.

The light of it threw the throne room into searing relief. Beron’s snarling face as he met Eris’ sword with his own, the stunned expressions of the few remaining soldiers, Azriel’s hazel eyes as they fixed on her.

The Lady of Autumn stepped forward, fire licking down her arms like snakes.

Adara’s heart stopped.

Lady Angelica Vanserra, who had never once raised her voice, never once fought back, not even when Beron had hurt her children in front of her, surveyed the room with the gaze of a warrior-queen. Of a High Lady. 

Her mother lifted her hand, and a spear of flame shot across the room, stabbing through three of Beron’s guards in a single breath. 

Adara could only gape.

She hadn’t even known her mother still had power.

Certainly not enough to turn the tide of a losing battle.

But she was here. And gods help anyone who tried to touch her daughter again.

*****

Neither Beron nor Eris noticed the arrival of Lady Autumn.

They were locked together in a war of fire and fury at the far end of the throne room. Twin infernos clashing like gods of old, flame against flame, will against will. Neither could afford to look away even for a heartbeat.

Their magic cracked and roared, setting the air alight with heat that shimmered across the broken floor. The gilded throne stood behind them, scorched and cracked, but neither male seemed to care.

Eris bled from a cut along his brow, fire dancing along his forearms as he met his father blow for blow, never backing down. And Beron was grinning like a beast unchained, incandescent with rage, hurling blasts of magic that shook the very walls.

Adara could spare them only a glance before her mother stepped to her side.

Without a word, Lady Autumn extended a hand, elegant and scarred, burning with a white-hot flame Adara hadn’t seen in centuries. A flame Adara had never even imagined she still possessed. Her mother had always been silent and distant, a ghost in her own skin, unresponsive even when her children suffered. But now, fire crowned her like a halo, and for the first time, Adara thought she looked powerful. Beautiful.

Adara straightened beside her, shoulders squared, her own fire flaring bright and eager, and together they faced the guards remaining.

There were fewer now. A handful of Beron’s most loyal soldiers, who had so far kept out of the fray as they waited near their High Lord, ready for orders. They were the most dangerous of all.

Azriel fought on the far end of the fray, a whirlwind of shadows and steel. She saw him drive a blade through one soldier’s back, duck another’s strike, then vanish into a mist of shadow to reappear across the room, inching closer to her with each heartbeat.

But the next wave of guards was already descending on her and her mother.

They moved as one.

Fire coiled from Adara’s palms and erupted toward the nearest guards, catching two square in the chest. The blaze slammed them back, their weapons clattering to the floor.

Her mother’s flame surged alongside hers, cool and clean and devastating. A controlled burn that wrapped around their enemies without touching her daughter.

Adara launched forward, slicing through a distracted soldier with brutal efficiency. Another came at her, only to be consumed by a wall of white fire as her mother stepped in behind her.

They didn’t speak. They didn’t need to.

For the first time in Adara’s life, her mother fought for her. Fought with her. Shoulder to shoulder, flame to flame, they scorched a path through the final remnants of Beron’s guard.

And still Beron and Eris dueled behind them, fire raging, locked in a battle that could only end in death.

But Adara had no time to worry for her brother yet, because one more soldier lunged for her—

And this time, Azriel was there.

His shadows burst forward in a wave, dragging the male into darkness. Azriel’s Siphons pulsed once, then the soldier collapsed, dead at his feet.

Azriel’s breath was ragged. Blood streaked his leathers. But when he met Adara’s eyes, something fierce and steady burned behind them. Something that made her heart swell. There was still so much left unsaid between them—so much pain and guilt—but she couldn’t bring herself to care.

He reached for her, his mouth opening to speak, but a terrible scream tore through the air.

Both of them whirled.

Eris was on his knees, flames licking up his body. His shield, a wall of pale gold fire, was buckling under the onslaught of Beron’s relentless inferno. His scream cut off in a choking gasp as he threw all that he had into keeping his shield from crumbling.

“No,” Adara breathed.

But her mother was already moving.

With a bellow of fury, Angelica Vanserra raced across the scorched floor, her own flames flaring bright and uncontrolled behind her. It was the first time Adara had ever heard her mother raise her voice, let alone roar like a beast.

Beron turned at the sound. He faltered for just a heartbeat. Shock flared across his face as he took in her fire, her fury, the sheer presence of the female he had dismissed for centuries.

“Angelica?” he snarled, voice thick with disbelief. Then rage overtook him. “You dare?”

With a casual, brutal gesture, Beron released a burst of power.

Eris was flung back like a broken rag doll, crashing into the stone wall with a sound that made Adara’s stomach turn. She cried out and sprinted to him, Azriel at her side in an instant.

Eris was alive, but only barely. His chest rose and fell in shallow, uneven breaths. Blood seeped from a wound at his temple, and his skin was blistered and scorched. He’d nearly drained his magic completely.

Adara’s hands trembled as she reached for him. “Stay with me”

“You should have died years ago,” Beron snarled somewhere behind her.

She looked up just in time to see him step toward his wife, who stood tall despite her age, despite her centuries of cowering from him.

“I should have ended your pitiful existence long before now,” he spat. “Whore.”

His eyes snapped to Adara, gleaming with hatred. “Like mother, like daughter, I suppose.”

Angelica launched a blast of fire, her magic a white-hot stream of anguish and rage, but Beron was ready. He swept a hand through the air and snuffed it out, his own power dwarfing hers like the sun eclipsing a single star.

Then, with a flick of his wrist, a lasso of fire snaked through the air and wrapped around her neck.

She gasped, clutching at the blaze, her knees buckling.

“Mother!” Adara shouted, leaping to her feet.

She didn’t even make it a step before Beron raised his other hand.

Another lasso of fire shot forward and looped around Azriel’s neck.

He stumbled, catching himself on one knee, but didn’t cry out. His shadows surged wildly around him, trying to smother the fire, but they had no impact on the magic flames.

Adara froze.

Beron’s cruel smile widened. “Now what, little girl?” he purred, fire crackling in both hands. “Go on. Make a move. Let’s see who dies first.”

Adara’s chest heaved, her hands clenched at her sides, nails biting into her palms. 

She couldn’t move. 

Everyone she loved was in this room, and they were all going to die.

Beron’s gaze didn’t waver. “Did you know,” he said softly, almost conversationally, “that when I was young and freshly married, what I wanted most in this world was a daughter?”

The world stopped turning. Eris, Azriel, her mother — they all faded as those dark eyes bore into her. 

“I knew I needed a strong son,” Beron went on, voice calm despite his ragged breathing. “An heir. Someone to learn war and politics. But I craved a daughter.”

The fire that looped around Lady Autumn’s throat began to shift, drawn toward his other hand, curling and merging with the flames already binding Azriel. He was consolidating his grip, as if preparing for the final blow.

“I imagined a little girl with my own brown eyes,” he murmured, stepping toward Adara. “And her mother’s vivid hair.”

Even as he approached, she couldn’t bring her legs to move. Not with so much at stake. Beron reached her, and carefully rested a hand against the side of her head. His thumb smoothed over her hair almost tenderly. “When you were born, it was the happiest day of my life,” he whispered. “I planned to spoil you rotten.” 

She wasn’t sure she was breathing. His hand slid backwards, threading through her hair until—

He tightened his fingers into a fist and yanked, vicious and sudden. She couldn’t stop her yelp at the sudden flash of pain. Beron’s eyes were hard granite as he leant closer, his voice low as he spat, “and then I saw you.” 

She knew what he had seen. Her golden eyes, her darker skin, her round face. All features she inherited from neither Beron nor her mother, but from Helion. Her father.

Tears slipped free before she could stop them, burning hot and silent. Beron was not her father, and yet even after she had discovered her true parentage, she had spent years trying and failing to prove herself to him. Trying and failing to impress him, in the hopes he might one day come to love her as a daughter. 

A flash of silver streaked across the room.

Beron snarled, jerking back just as the dagger buried itself deep into his arm, the same hand tangled in Adara’s hair. He released her with a hiss, his face twisting as he yanked the blade free, his blood sizzling where it dripped to the marble floor.

Adara staggered backwards, turning to where the blade had come from. “Lucien,” she gasped.

He stood tall and proud next to Eris, one arm wrapped around their eldest brother, supporting his weight. Eris was swaying, his eyes bleary but burning. Pale and drained, but upright. 

Beron whirled on them.

“Well, well,” he growled, his eyes fixed on Lucien. “The other pathetic bastard.”

Adara backed toward her older brothers, and Azriel rose to stand at her side, the fire that had held him disappearing as Beron focused his full attention on Lucien. In the background, her mother gasped in a ragged breath, her hands clutching at her own released throat as she sunk to her knees.

“What are you doing here, boy?” There was nothing but disgust on Beron's face. “Last I heard, you were hiding among dirty humans like the coward you are.”

Lucien’s metallic eye caught the light as he lifted his chin, staring unflinchingly at the male who had once murdered his lover. 

“Let them go,” Lucien said, voice steady despite the heat rippling in the air between them. “Adara. Eris. Our mother. The Shadowsinger. Fight me instead.”

Beron laughed, cold and cruel. “Touching. The little stray pretending to be a hero.” His gaze swept over Lucien, mocking. “I don’t remember you being so brave when I slit that farm girl’s throat. What was her name? Jasmine?”

Lucien didn’t flinch, but his jaw tightened.

Adara’s heart hammered, breath shallow. Every twitch of Beron’s muscles, every coil of flame, she tracked with unblinking precision. She felt rough, scarred fingers slip between her own, and gripped Azriel’s hand back tightly.

“Ah that’s right. Jesminda,” Beron sneered. “You couldn't even fight for her. Just ran away to Spring with your tail between your legs.”

Lucien’s voice was steady. “I'm not running now.”

The room seemed to hold its breath.

Then, with the terrifying speed of a High Lord, Beron hurled the blood-slicked dagger clutched in his hand, straight at Lucien’s remaining eye.

Adara’s gasp caught in her throat as she stretched a useless hand out, but before the dagger could strike, Eris shoved Lucien aside. The blade sang past, grazing Lucien’s temple, and clattered against the far wall.

Eris didn’t stop moving. Using the shove as momentum, he launched himself at Beron in a burst of flame and fury.

Beron surged forward to meet him, but as they collided, Eris’ fire sputtered in his palms like dying embers.

He was spent.

And Beron knew it.

With a frenzied roar, Beron sent a column of flame barreling toward his eldest son. It hit Eris square in the chest, and he flew back, landing with a sickening thud against the base of the throne.

He didn’t rise. 

“Eris!” Adara screamed. He didn’t even stir, even as Beron advanced, murder etched into his cruel smirk.

She bolted toward him, but strong arms wrapped around her from behind, anchoring her in place.

“No!” she thrashed against Azriel’s hold, kicked and shoved, claws of fire curling in her fists. “Let me go!”

But he didn’t. His grip was unyielding iron, even as she twisted and screamed. “Azriel—he’s going to kill him! Let me go!”

Her mother was already running, faster than she’d ever seen her move. Straight toward the inferno Beron summoned, his arm rearing back for the killing blow.

“No!” her mother shrieked.

And she flung herself between Beron and Eris, her arms spread wide.

The fire struck her full in the chest.

Adara went still in Azriel’s arms. Her breath caught in her throat. “Mama—”

Her mother’s scream echoed off the vaulted ceiling. Flame engulfed her, searing flesh and silk, the scent of burning filling the air. But she endured it, shielding Eris with her own body, even as her skin blistered and blackened.

Adara sobbed, lunging again. “Azriel, let me go. Please—please—he’s killing her—let me go—”

“I can’t,” he whispered against her temple, voice ragged, broken. “I’m sorry. I can’t.”

“I’ll never forgive you,” she spat, thrashing harder. “I’ll never—”

“I know.”

And it wasn’t until she felt the hiss, the burn under her skin, that she realized her power was surging uncontrolled, flames pouring from her. She was burning Azriel. Her fire lashed across his hands, his forearms, his chest where he held her tight, but he didn’t let go. Didn’t even flinch, save for the way his jaw clenched and trembled against her shoulder.

She felt another drop strike her skin and she looked down as his tears hit her shoulder and turned to steam.

Still, he held her.

And still, her mother screamed.

Adara sobbed, the sound ripped from somewhere deep and raw, her body trembling as she fought Azriel’s grip, as she looked up through blurred tears…

A blur of movement behind Beron. A gasp. A wet, gurgling cough.

Beron staggered, flames sputtering out midair, and Adara’s breath returned in a rush.

Azriel’s grip on her slackened in surprise. 

She tore from his arms, sprinting forward just as Beron dropped to one knee, twisting to see what had pierced him. Behind him stood Lucien, his eyes wide with shock, hands shaking around the hilt of the dagger he had driven between Beron’s ribs. He looked equal parts triumphant and horrified, like he couldn’t quite believe what he’d done.

Beron made to strike at him, but Adara was already there.

Her blade sang as she drew it. And In one clean, sure movement, she drove it through Beron’s heart.

His body arched, then stilled.

For a beat, everything stopped, and she was left in deafening silence.

Adara stood over him, chest heaving, her blade buried to the hilt in the male she had feared above any other. The High Lord who had burned and bruised and broken her. Who had stolen her childhood, crushed her spirit, tried to erase her flame.

And now he was nothing but a corpse at her feet.

She yanked the blade free. It clattered to the floor with a ringing finality.

Only then did she turn. And the world shattered anew.

There was no body. Just ash.

A pile of it, grey and fine, dusted across the floor where her mother had kneeled, shielding Eris. The heat had consumed her completely, leaving no shape, no sign, only the faint shimmer of scorched air.

Adara collapsed beside it, her breath shattering from her lungs. Her shaking fingers reached for something solid, something to cling to… but there was nothing. Just the faintest scent of sun-warmed apples and rose perfume, already fading.

A sob broke from her throat.

She crumpled to the ground, curled around the memory of a body that was no longer there, tears falling freely, mixing with the soot that streaked her arms. She didn’t even hear Lucien kneel beside her. Didn’t feel his hand on her back.

She barely remembered checking Eris, barely registered the slow, steady pulse beneath her palm.

All she could see was the ash.

All she could hear was her own voice, whispering prayers that came too late.

She didn’t know how long they stayed like that. A moment. A lifetime.

It was Lucien who finally roused her, his voice hoarse. “Adara…”

She lifted her head, and her breath caught.

Eris was glowing.

A soft, amber light pulsed from his chest, like fire held just beneath the skin. A wind stirred in the throne room, gentle but powerful, and the scent of crisp leaves swept through the space.

She reached for his hand as he gasped awake, his honey-brown eyes flickering open.

Beron Vanserra was dead, and the power of the Autumn Court had chosen.

Eris sat up slowly, groaning as the magic settled over him like a blanket. He looked first to Adara, then to the scattering of ash beside him.

His expression broke.

They huddled there, the three siblings, around what was left of the woman who had once been their greatest mystery, and who had saved them in the end.

Adara didn’t notice Azriel was gone until much later.

No sound. No goodbye.

Only the faintest trace of shadow in the doorway, already fading into the wind.

next chapter

Instead, he’d done nothing. He’d let Nyx distract him, the babe a perfect excuse to be busy. To keep his hands occupied and his guilt contained. Nyx’s wings were tiny and delicate, and his eyes were already a piercing violet to match his fathers. Azriel had accompanied Rhys and Feyre on their walks through Velaris as they introduced their subjects to the new heir. And he’d offered to watch Nyx so they could have time to rest, cradling the dark-haired infant close, content just to watch that tiny miracle breathe. 

He’d even spent time with Elain.

She had smiled at him, soft and lovely and warm as spring sunshine. She’d told him about the seeds she was going to plant, and the roses she’d coaxed into bloom despite the cold. But the entire time, he had barely paid attention. All he could think about was her.

Adara.

Not just the way she laughed like wildfire. But what she had said about not loving someone you couldn’t be your true self with. Because he found himself tucking his wings in close to seem smaller, and asking Elain about her baking so as to desperately avoid any conversation about himself. Found himself terrified of accidentally talking about blades and blood and carnage. Even his shadows disappeared around her. 

His shadows had always loved Adara. Day and night, they swirled around him, their urgent whispers begging him to go to her. Her absence felt like a physical pain, deep and sharp in his chest. But he couldn’t seek her out, couldn’t be selfish. He wanted to see her more than anything in this world— but he didn’t deserve to. Not when he had failed her so terribly.

Cassian’s voice interrupted his spiraling thoughts. “You should reach out.”

Azriel’s head lifted, brows narrowing. “Why?”

Cassian leaned against the hearth, arms crossed loosely and wings half-furled, casual but not careless. He was too happy, too steady these days, to be anything but intentional. “Because when I met with him, Eris was careful not to say much when I asked about her. Said she was still recovering, but didn’t elaborate.”

Azriel’s stomach roiled. “Recovering from what?”

Cassian’s easy tone faded. “I think Beron punished them both. Badly. Maybe worse than Eris let on. The bastard danced around it, but…” He shook his head. “There was something in his voice when he said her name.”

Cassian let the silence stretch, then added quietly, “I know you’re feeling like shit about what happened. But you’re not the only one. And if she’s hurting… she shouldn’t have to go through that alone.”

Azriel set Truth-Teller down beside him, blade flat and clean against the polished table.

But the guilt pressing into his chest did not ease.

*****

Azriel knew he couldn’t winnow straight to the Forest House.

He appeared instead on the rooftop of the watchtower she’d once shown him, hidden just out of sight from the estate’s prying eyes. The stars blinked overhead, scattered across the black sky, and a soft wind stirred his hair. He remembered the first time she’d brought him here, the wistful way she’d looked at the distant farmhouse lights.

His shadows curled around him, restless. He sent one slipping down the hidden tunnels beneath the Forest House, slithering through cracks and narrow passageways, until it reached her. It passed her the hastily-scrawed message, just as he’d told it to: I’m at the watchtower. If you’re able, please come.

Then he waited.

Minutes passed. Then half an hour. Then nearly an hour.

Azriel didn’t pace or fidget, but something in his chest tightened with each tick of time. Maybe she wouldn’t come. Maybe she couldn’t. His jaw clenched as he imagined her locked away in some wing of the estate, still broken from Beron’s wrath. Maybe she was still clawing her way back to herself after Briallyn’s mind control. Maybe she was hiding, afraid to be seen. His shadows stirred in agitation. He reached for patience and found it lacking.

He was about to send a second shadow to check on her when the rooftop trapdoor creaked open. And Adara climbed into the moonlight.

She wore simple, brown servant’s clothes that fit her like a second skin, but Azriel’s trained eye didn’t miss the way her movements were just slightly stiff. The guarded way she held her ribs. No obvious injuries, no limp, no visible bruises, but pain still rippled beneath her skin. She moved like someone carrying weight no one else could see.

And perhaps more striking than her movements was her silence.

She didn’t grin or roll her eyes, didn’t offer some sarcastic jab like he expected. She didn’t even snap an insult or yell with outrage. She didn’t don any mask at all. There was a wariness in her golden eyes, a heaviness in the set of her shoulders. As though whatever walls she’d once erected between them had crumbled from exhaustion, leaving her too tired to build them back up. Or perhaps she knew they were simply past performances by now.

She stopped a few paces away, folding her arms, not in defiance, but as though bracing herself. “Thank you,” she said softly, voice rasped but steady. “For saving Eris and me.”

Her gaze didn’t meet his. She stared instead at his shadows as they brushed gently against her arms.

“I know you didn’t come for us,” she added, a brittle edge sharpening the softness. “But… you still got us out. So thank you.”

Her throat bobbed as she swallowed. “I also heard about Cassian and Feyre. I’m glad he’s all right. And that the baby is healthy.” A pause. “Please extend my congratulations.”

The words were sincere but the polite formality in her voice stung. It was like they were strangers. Like none of it had ever mattered.

He took a step closer. “Is this how it’s going to be now?”

She finally met his eyes. “What do you mean?”

“This,” he said roughly. “Like we were nothing.”

A flicker of emotion passed over her face. Hurt, maybe. Frustration. “I don’t know what we were, Azriel.”

He flinched at the sound of his name. He’d wanted to hear her say it again, more than he’d realised, but not like this. Not like it was a knife.

“I trusted you,” she said simply, the words cutting deeper for the flat, resigned way she spoke them. “With everything. And when I needed you to trust me…”

He exhaled sharply, scrubbing a hand through his hair. “I know, gods, I know. I didn’t want to believe it.” He shook his head. “But I always assume the worst in people. It’s what’s kept me alive for centuries. It’s what keeps the people I care about alive.”

A long silence passed between them. His shadows kept stroking the bare skin of her arms, her hands, her jaw. Everywhere he wished he could touch.

“Then you didn’t trust me at all,” she said at last, softly. “Not really.”

“I was scared,” he admitted. “Terrified. Because if you had turned on us… on me…” His voice broke, and he had to force it steady. “I am so sorry.”

"I know." She looked away again, arms wrapping tighter around herself, and he hated the distance, the fracture. How badly he wanted to cross the space between them, to drop to his knees and beg forgiveness. But something in her still hadn’t thawed.

They stood there like that, alone under the stars, the silence between them filled with everything they hadn’t said. 

“I should go,” she whispered. “Eris barely lets me leave his side these days.”

She was gone before he could reply.

*****

Azriel remained on the watchtower, rooted to the stone floor, willing Adara to return. As if there was something he could say now, too late, that would undo everything that lay broken between them.

He should have told her more. About how it had gutted him to see her with the enemy. How the moment he’d realised she wasn’t truly her, something inside him had shattered. How even now, with her standing across from him, alive and healing, he still didn’t feel whole. As though his insides had been carved out, leaving him dark and hollow.

But he had never been one for expressive poetry like Rhysand, or bold grand gestures like Cassian. The words he wanted so desperately to say lodged in his throat and stayed there, choking him.

His hands curled at his sides, shadows twitching restlessly.

He was about to winnow away when a voice drawled behind him, smooth as oiled steel. “Bit far from home, Shadowsinger.”

Eris Vanserra leaned against the low stone wall above the trapdoor, his red-gold hair shining in the starlight, his fine clothes immaculate despite the hour. He looked like a portrait of princely arrogance and ease, utterly composed and utterly untouched.

So unlike Adara, who had stood there moments ago, heavy with exhaustion and hurt.

Azriel’s voice was flat. “What do you want?”

Eris pushed off the wall, strolling forward like they were old friends meeting by chance. “You think I didn’t know this is where my sister escapes whenever she can? Imagine my surprise in finding you here instead.” His lips curved in a knowing, feline smile. “Or maybe I’m not surprised at all.”

Azriel didn’t answer. His posture remained loose, but he watched Eris’s every movement like a blade waiting to be drawn.

“She told me about this place once,” Eris continued, as if the silence didn’t bother him. “Said it was the only spot in the entire Forest House where she felt at peace.” His amber gaze swept over the rooftop, then returned to Azriel. “ I wonder…was she at peace when she was with you tonight?”

Azriel’s jaw tightened.

“Too close to the truth, is it?” Eris chuckled. 

Azriel didn’t rise to the bait. “What are you doing here, Eris?”

The prince’s smirk faded slightly. “She snuck away. I wanted to make sure she got back safely.” His voice lowered. “Make sure she wasn’t meeting anyone dangerous.”

Azriel’s wings shifted slightly, a warning. “You think I would hurt her?”

“No,” Eris said, simply. “But I think you could. And she’s already had enough of that from the people who are supposed to care about her.”

Azriel blinked, startled by his candor.

Eris looked out across the dark forest beyond the tower. “She hates when I meddle. Always has. But after Koschei…” He trailed off, his jaw flexing, and for a moment, Azriel saw the facade slip. He looked simply like an older brother, guilty and scared for his little sister. “She doesn’t care that our capture was all my fault. She would gladly die for me.”

Azriel studied him carefully. “And that terrifies you.”

“Because she shouldn’t.” Eris turned to him fully, voice low and sharp now. “And I need someone else to make sure she never does.”

Azriel’s breath quickened and his shadows curled closer around his shoulders, guarding.

“Don’t look so surprised,” Eris said with a faint, bitter smile. “I don’t like you. I still think you’re reckless and self-righteous and far too comfortable in your shadows. And I hate your… familiarity with my sister. But I’m not blind. I saw the way she looked at you by the death-god’s lake. And the way you looked at her.”

Azriel didn’t deny it. Couldn’t.

Eris stepped closer. “Beron’s watching me more closely than ever, and after Adara’s involvement in Briallyn’s failed plan, he’s watching her too. If he begins to suspect my intent to depose him, or her true loyalties, he’ll destroy us both. So here’s what I want from you: A promise that you’ll protect her, above all else. Even if it means letting me fall.”

“I already would,” Azriel said quietly.

Eris blinked, clearly not expecting such an immediate answer.

Azriel stepped forward, his shadows shifting with him like a cloak. “I can’t go against my oaths to my court, but I can swear to protect her.”

He held out a scarred hand.

Eris stared at it. Then, after a moment, clasped it. A jolt of magic passed between them as the vow sealed itself.

Azriel spoke the words, each one precise and resolute. “I swear to do everything in my power to protect Adara Vanserra. Even at the cost of all others but my own family. Even at the cost of my life.”

As they released each other’s grip, a burning pain bloomed beneath his skin, sudden and sharp. He yanked aside the neck of his leathers, revealing a red brand seared into the skin over his heart, disfiguring the swirling tattoo beneath. A flame, curled like a sleeping fox, resting on the hilt of a dagger.

He jerked his gaze up to find Eris touching his own chest in the same place. He didn’t look surprised, regarding the mark on Azriel’s chest with cool amusement. “Autumn Court oaths are much like your own. But instead of tattoos, ours form brands.”

Azriel swallowed his retort and gave a grim nod. And then he was gone, his shadows sweeping him into the night.

Leaving Eris alone, standing guard on a rooftop built for solitude. 

And somewhere below, a golden-eyed female who dreamt of the stars.

next chapter

She had known they were there. Briallyn had counted on Azriel and Cassian following them, and the moment Adara had glimpsed their shadows in the sky, her heart had nearly broken with relief. She’d felt them watching, trailing silently overhead. For three days, she had ridden beneath their unseen eyes, hope clutched like a lifeline in her chest. Every morning, as the Crown manipulated her body like a puppet, she had told herself, today he will realise something is wrong, today Azriel will come for me. But as the days bled together and no rescue came, that hope had begun to rot. It had curdled into sorrow, then hardened into cold fury. And when Azriel had finally appeared in the woods, shadows coiled around him like armor, she had wanted to scream, You were supposed to save me! But he’d just looked at her like a stranger. Worse, like an enemy. 

And even though her body was not her own, even though she had fought the Crown with everything she had, nothing had prepared her for the agony of his doubt. He, who she had trusted in a way she had never trusted anyone. Who had seen her raw and unguarded. That he had looked at her and believed the worst, that he had not known her, was a wound deeper than any Briallyn or Koschei could have dealt.

She should have expected it. Of course he thought her a traitor. Of course he believed what he saw. 

I trust you, he had said, weeks ago. She should have known it wasn’t true.

Even Cassian, with whom she had sparred and joked and teased, had looked at her with nothing but hatred in that clearing, until they had both realised the truth of her enslavement.

She shivered, despite the heat of the fire.

Beron’s punishment had come swiftly. He had been furious in a way she had not seen in years. Not only had she and Eris embarrassed him by allowing themselves to be captured, but they had dared jeopardize his alliance with Briallyn and Koschei. He had become incoherent with rage when word had come hours later that Briallyn had been killed, Unmade by the eldest Archeron with silver flames. 

Adara didn’t know how many lashes Eris had endured before Beron had turned his attention on her. She only remembered the heat of his fire, the way her screams had echoed in the hall, and the scent of burning flesh.

Eris had tried to take the brunt of it, but there had been too much rage in Beron. Still, she knew her brother carried the weight of how it had all begun.

That morning in the Gylden Wood, when the missing soldiers had appeared, she’d warned Eris. Their sudden presence made no sense, and something about them felt off. But Eris had been too relieved to see them, too hopeful that they had returned unharmed. He hadn’t listened to her, just ridden straight up to them, and so she’d followed, unwilling to let him go alone. The soldiers had surrounded them almost instantly, and then they were gone, winnowed into Briallyn’s prison.

He hadn’t forgiven himself. She could see it in every shadowed glance, every too-gentle touch. He believed he had dragged her into it. That his trust, his moment of weakness, had cost them both everything. She had tried to tell him it wasn’t his fault. Hope could make fools of even the sharpest minds. But Eris, always so sure of himself, could not seem to forgive this one mistake. Not when it had ended with his sister ensnared by the Crown and then branded by their father’s fire.

Still, even under Beron’s torture, they had managed to remain consistent in their cover story. They told carefully chosen half-truths about being kidnapped by Briallyn and rescued by two overeager Night Court soldiers, who surely wouldn’t have bothered had they known it was her and Eris they were saving. The alliance with the Night Court was still a secret. Azriel’s name hadn’t even been mentioned.

Not once had she heard from him.

It was Eris who had finally delivered the news from the Night Court: that Nesta had survived the Rite, and Cassian was alive and whole. Feyre had given birth to a healthy baby boy.

Adara had said all the right things. Nodded and smiled faintly. Hadn’t let herself ask about Azriel. Then retreated here, where it smelt of her mother’s rose perfume and there was no one to perform for. She hadn’t even responded to Lucien’s message asking her to meet, the parchment snuck into the Forest House by a servant who still held a soft spot for him.

She told herself that Azriel was busy dealing with the fallout, tending to his High Lady and Lord, watching over his family. He had more important things to do than check in on the girl who nearly killed him.

And what perhaps stung most of all was that she and Eris had been taken as nothing more or less than bait. Not to gain information or to sever an alliance, but simply to lure in Azriel and Cassian, both of whom had despised them until recently. Who still despised her brother. Even after everything she had done for the Night Court, every mission she had risked, every moment spent side-by-side with those males, their first assumption had been betrayal. They had reverted to the old, simple belief that the Autumn Court was rotten through and through. That Eris couldn’t be trusted, and that she was no better.

Her ribs ached as she shifted, trying to find a more comfortable position. Her skin was marked with fresh burns, even though Eris had forced a healer to tend to her immediately after Beron’s fury abated. She would carry those scars for the rest of her immortal life, like all the others. But they weren’t the ones that throbbed the most.

“I will not entrust my sister to someone who thought her a traitor. Someone who would’ve killed her…”

Eris’ words had carved themselves deep into her. Because they had been true. And because, gods help her, Azriel hadn’t argued.

And yet…

She remembered the feel of his arms around her, moments after the enchantment broke. The way he’d held her. Cradled her. As though she was the most precious thing in the world. 

She tucked her head beneath the crook of her arm, curling in tighter. The fire popped again, throwing sparks into the air. 

The shadows in the room shifted. But none of them were his.

She was alone.

His Autumn Court informant had notified him that Eris had been kidnapped on his hunt at dawn, the female with him, too. Azriel had gone himself to confirm it. He’d slipped into the Forest House the same way Adara had once led him, through the secret tunnel beneath the watchtower. But his shadows found no trace of her. Not even the lingering warmth of her scent.

And then, as if the world hadn’t already splintered, he returned to the Night Court to find Nesta, Emerie, and Gwyn gone. Thrown into the Blood Rite. Taken to the sacred, cursed wilds of Ramiel.

There had been no choice. Feyre had barely issued the order before Azriel was gone again, Cassian at his side, each of their seven Siphons gleaming.

So now, for four long days, they had watched and waited on the Continent. The impenetrable wards Adara and him had tested days ago were still firmly in place. So they had no choice but to stand sentry, observing the movements of guards, mapping every doorway, every change in routine. 

Cassian paced, a storm barely leashed, but Azriel just sat. Unmoving. Listening.

Part of him thought that if he let out even a fraction of the desperation eating away at his insides, he would become more monster than male. He would raze every human village, every Fae court, and he wouldn't be able to stop until he found Adara. And with every moment that passed without a flicker of her power, without the echo of her voice, something inside him shrank and curled and withered.

The part of him that had spent centuries cultivating silence and detachment still knew how to lie in wait like this, patient and focused. But that part had never cared about someone like this before.

It made his shadows edgier, sharper, as if they too shared his unease. They didn’t cling to him like they usually did. They stretched and wandered, reaching for a thread of gold fire that never came.

He hadn’t told Cassian how bad the pain in his chest had become. Or how every time he closed his eyes, he saw her locked in a dungeon. Bleeding. Burning. Begging. 

Instead, he said nothing. Watched the sun set and rise again. Catalogued guard rotations. Counted breathing patterns. Comforted Cassian when the weight of Nesta’s absence dragged him to his knees.

A motion drew Azriel's attention as Cassian shot to his feet. "Someone's leaving the castle."

The two of them wordlessly launched into the skies, entering the cloud cover within moments. The wind bit, harsh and wild. Between the breaks in mist and cloud, Azriel glimpsed the ground below.

A small caravan had left the eastern city gates, departing down the bare road that led through the hills.

"I don't see a prison wagon," Cassian said over the wind.

Azriel's gaze remained on the earth below. "They don't need one," he said with quiet venom. Because riding atop a white horse at the front of the party, side by side with a hunched, small figure, was Eris. And behind him, golden hair catching the fading sunlight like a flame—

Adara.

Azriel’s blood turned to ice.

"Briallyn snared them with the Crown," Cass snarled.

"No," Azriel rasped. He couldn’t breathe through the stabbing pain in his chest. "Look at his left. He still has Nesta’s Made dagger at his side. If he was in her thrall, he'd have already handed it over."

There was a pause as Cassian took in his words and their meaning. "Traitors," he spat. 

Azriel flinched, even as his own fists curled at his sides. 

Adara hadn’t been taken.

She was riding with them.

Azriel's voice cut through the howling wind, low and cold. "We follow them. Capture Eris now and we might not get anything out of him. At least not quickly. We trail them and learn just how far this betrayal goes. See who they're meeting with. It has to be important, for them to leave the safety of the castle." He couldn’t bring himself to say her name.

*****

The small caravan rode eastward for three days, and Azriel barely breathed the entire time.

They tracked them from the clouds, he and Cassian trading shifts of silent aerial surveillance. Azriel’s shadows drifted ahead and behind, but still, there was no sign of Adara’s power. No flicker of firelight. No whisper of heat.

But she was there.

He saw her each morning as the group broke camp. Saw her ride behind Briallyn, silent and unsmiling. She was never chained. Never restrained. Just there, at her brother’s side, a golden flame dulled to embers.

The roaring in Azriel’s head never quieted. He couldn’t stop thinking. Couldn’t stop remembering.

Adara, laughing on the roof of the Town House, sweaty from sparring, her eyes lit with that spark that made his chest feel too tight. 

Adara, stretched out on the green bedspread in the Forest House guest bedroom, unguarded and teasing.

Adara, sitting on the other side of his desk, distracting him with idle chatter and charming smiles.

And now this.

Betrayal, Cassian called it. Azriel couldn’t bring himself to put that word to her face. But it gnawed at him, wore his thoughts thin. His body moved on instinct alone as he ate and slept, while his soul warred within itself.

When they finally approached a forest low and damp with moss and ancient trees, Azriel felt a strange pressure in the air. His shadows didn’t like it either.

“I’ve never been here before,” Azriel said over the wind as they glided overhead. “It feels like an old place. Reminds me of the Middle.”

Cassian didn’t respond. He hadn’t said much in hours. Azriel knew his brother was too focused on Nesta and the Rite and the fact that he could do nothing to help her. He knew the feeling well.

They followed the party down through the forest until it halted on the shore of a small, dark lake. Koschei’s lake.

The moment Briallyn dismounted, Azriel and Cassian landed in the trees beyond, trailing silently on foot until they were close enough to hear the murmurs of conversation. Twenty figures, all fae or human nobility, soldiers, and—

His shadows twitched violently.

Adara stood with Briallyn at the center of the gathering, her face unreadable. Her hands hidden beneath her cloak. No chains. No bindings. No glow of the Crown on Briallyn’s head. 

Not a prisoner. A traitor.

The shadows whispered again. Danger, movement.

“Over here, Cassian,” Eris crooned.

Azriel’s stomach clenched and he turned, just as Eris stepped from behind Cassian, Nesta’s dagger gleaming in his hand, already angled toward his brother’s ribs.

Cassian froze.

“I knew you were a lying bastard,” Cassian growled through his teeth.

Azriel stepped forward, but halted just as quickly as Eris angled the blade deeper. He could smell the searing heat from here. Nesta’s magic, twisting through it.

"Honestly, I'm disappointed in Rhysand," Eris went on, sounding almost bored. "He's become so bland these days. He didn't even try to look into my mind."

"You can't win this," Azriel said coldly, voice like cut obsidian. His Siphons throbbed with restrained power. “You’re a dead male walking, Eris. Have been for a long time.”

Eris smiled faintly. “Yes, yes, all that old business with The Morrigan. How boring of you to cling to it so.”

Azriel’s heart stuttered and he saw Cassian tense.

The Morrigan.

Eris never called her that.

In his hesitation, he missed his shadows warning, but then—

Adara was there, right in front of Azriel, her blade drawn and pressed to his throat before he could blink. She stood perfectly still, her golden eyes emotionless as they fixed on his.  

“Adara,” he said quietly, slowly raising his hands. Her blade pressed harder to his throat, but her hand was no longer steady, her breathing shallow. Her lips parted as if trying to speak, but no sound came.

They had been wrong. So, so wrong.

“Adara,” he said again. Her eyes flared wide, panic momentarily breaking through the fog in her gaze. Her body trembled, taut as a bowstring. The blade shook where it kissed his skin, but didn’t bite. Not even a nick. Not even now.

“It’s okay,” he said gently, his heart beating hard enough to shake his ribs. “You can fight this.”

She blinked once. And then again, harder, as if trying to clear her vision. Her mouth opened and closed again. But her dagger stayed at his throat.

“Let them go, Briallyn,” Cassian snarled from behind her. “Come play with us instead.”

Adara stepped back, her face again blank, as a reedy voice answered from nearby, cold and gnarled. “I’m already playing with you, Lord of Bastards.”

*****

Azriel and Cassian had no choice but to follow the hunched, cloaked figure to the lake, not with Eris and Adara silent and stiff beside her.

"Out with it, then," Cassian barked when they finally stopped by the lake's rocky edge.

Azriel tensed as Briallyn drew back the hood of her cloak.

But there was nothing beneath it. It fell to the stones with a soundless whisper, and Adara didn’t even blink. She just stood there, as hollow as the illusion had been. 

"Just an animated kernel of magic," a slithering voice spoke from the lake.

Thirty feet from shore, hovering atop the surface, floated a shadow. It shifted and warped, its edges fluttering, but it had the vague shape of a tall male.

"Who are you?" Azriel demanded. Cold fear settled in his stomach like a stone.

But it was Cassian who answered, his voice barely above a whisper. “Koschei.”

"Where is Briallyn?" he demanded, flaring his Siphons to distract as he sent some of his shadows skittering around the edges of the lake to investigate.

"I spend so many months preparing for you," Koschei crooned, "and you don't even wish to speak to me?"

Next to him, Cassian crossed his arms. "Let Adara and Eris go, and then we'll talk." 

Yes, yes, let them go. Azriel knew Cassian was worried about the Made dagger that Eris had again sheathed at his side, but all he could think about was Adara. She still stood, cold and empty, next to her brother. Halfway between himself and the lake’s edge. She wasn’t even looking at him.

"You fell for it rather easily," Koschei went on, "though you took your time making contact. I thought you'd rush in for the kill, brute that you are. Or perhaps for the heroic rescue," he added, now looking directly at Azriel. 

They could make out nothing of him beyond the shadows of his form. But as Koschei laughed, Azriel stiffened, his shadows warning making his every muscle lock. 

Power, so much power. Cannot fight, cannot hide. Run.

Azriel’s Siphons flared again. "Run," he repeated to Cassian, lunging towards Adara and grabbing her around the waist. 

He didn’t think. Didn’t ask Cassian if he was ready. Didn’t even consider going for Eris.

He only thought of her, as his wings stretched and he launched into the sky.

But when he turned to look, Cassian hadn’t moved. His feet were still firmly rooted to the ground, and his horror mounted as his brother’s red Siphons spluttered, then went dark.

“Cassian!” He shouted, the name a command and a plea. In his arms, Adara was still stiff, as though removed from everything around them. Cassian didn’t even look up. 

Azriel was still beating his wings, still begging his brother to just move, when a small, hunched figure emerged from behind the trees. Even from their distance, he could make out the glint of the golden crown perched atop her head. Briallyn.

Azriel soared back toward the ground, his Siphons creating a blue orb of power encircling him and Adara, but Briallyn had already reached the unmoving Cassian.

The Crown glowed like molten iron. Koschei pointed a long-fingered hand at Briallyn and Cassian. Flicked his fingers once.

Gone.

*****

Azriel barely remembered how they got out.

One moment, Cassian was there, frozen in place, his eyes blank and Siphons dim. Then, gone. Briallyn vanished with him, the Crown glowing golden atop her head. 

The moment the Crown vanished, the enchantment shattered like glass, and Adara collapsed against him with a choking, broken sound.

He caught her instinctively, arms cradling her shaking body to his chest, as though he could shield her from what had already happened. She trembled so hard her teeth clicked, breathing fast and panicked. He hadn’t realised how muted her scent had been until it returned, spiced and smoky and burning with fear.

Eris dropped too, falling to his knees a few paces away, one hand fisted in the dirt, the other pressed to his head as if to push out the lingering feeling of someone else’s control.

But Azriel couldn’t look at him. Couldn’t move, not when Adara’s eyes fluttered open, wide and dazed. Haunted.

“Azriel—” Her voice cracked, splintered like the rest of her. “I couldn’t stop it.”

“I know,” Azriel said quietly. “I know.” He cupped her jaw, gently tilting her face toward him. “It wasn’t you.”

Her lip quivered. “I tried. I wanted to say something—warn you. I couldn’t—”

“You did,” he said, his voice like gravel. “You did.”

She clutched weakly at his chest. Her head lolled toward the trees. “Cassian—”

“I know.” He was already gathering his shadows, already reaching for the magic to winnow them all to safety. 

Behind them, the lake rippled and Azriel’s shadows hissed. Koschei had not disappeared with Briallyn. The shadowy, long-limbed figure still lingered above the dark lake like a mirage. Watching carefully.

Azriel felt the weight of that attention settle on him. On Adara.

Pressure like gravity pressed against his bones, his Siphons flaring in automatic defense.

They needed to go. Now.

Azriel eased Adara to her feet, one arm still wrapped tight around her. He could winnow her to Velaris. He’d push his power until his wings snapped from exhaustion, until his bones shattered, he didn’t care.

But a flash of red cut between them.

Eris.

The male had risen to his feet, steadier than he should be, his jaw set and gaze sharp. He stepped directly between Azriel and Adara.

“No.”

Azriel froze. 

“She’s not going anywhere with you,” Eris snapped, his voice low, hoarse. “She needs to be somewhere safe.”

Azriel’s power surged, shadows rising around him like a cloak. “Exactly. That’s why she’s coming with me.”

Though his gaze was sharp, Eris’ hands were gentle as he pulled Adara closer, allowing her to lean on him. “I will not entrust my sister to someone who thought her a traitor. Someone who would’ve killed her, if Briallyn’s control had not slipped.”

Azriel felt the words like a physical blow, and rocked back a step. It wasn’t fair, but… wasn’t that exactly what he’d thought? Hadn’t he spent the last three days thinking she’d betrayed him? 

And if she hadn’t fought the Crown’s enchantment and fought the dagger in her own hand? If it hadn’t been for the slip of someone else’s tongue in Eris’ mouth saying The Morrigan? Would he have turned Truth-Teller on her?

Eris nodded grimly, as though he read every thought on Azriel’s face. And as he winnowed them away in a rush of flame, Adara met his eyes, and the sorrow there nearly brought him to his knees.

Azriel stood in the silence that followed, the wind howling off the lake behind him. His heartbeat thudded in his ears, sharp as a drumbeat. Guilt rose like a tide in his throat, threatening to drown him.

Adara. Cassian. He had failed them both.

He arched a brow. “Fun,” he repeated flatly.

“Yes,” she drawled, leaning back against the window frame. “You know, mischief, chaos, maybe the occasional prank?”

When he didn’t answer, she narrowed her eyes. “You do use them for fun. Don’t you?”

Azriel gave a half-shrug, then lifted two fingers in a casual gesture.

Half of his shadows peeled away from the room in a ripple of movement, slithering around the doorway and into the hall.

Adara turned to watch them disappear, already suspicious. “Where are they going?”

He held up a hand, tilting his head slightly. A pause. Then—

A thud, a crash, followed by a string of very creative swearing.

Her eyes went wide. “Was that—”

Cassian.

A moment later, he stormed into the room, scowling and rubbing his shoulder. His hair was slightly askew, wings flared with irritation.

“Did you do that?” he growled at his brother.

Azriel didn’t even glance up from the parchment on his desk. “Do what?”

“You. Know. What.”

Adara, biting her tongue to suppress her laughter, turned to Cassian with wide, innocent eyes. “Did you hear that noise just before, Cass? Sounded like… a stampede of cattle.”

Azriel’s hazel eyes met hers across the room, sparkling. “Could’ve been a quake,” he added mildly.

Cassian narrowed his eyes at both of them. “I think I liked it better when you two hated each other.”

He turned, muttering to himself, only for Adara to send a small flick of flame to nip at his leather-clad ass. The resulting yelp was undignified at best, and Cassian fled from the room as though expecting a further attack.

Adara, clutching her side, collapsed into the nearest chair, wheezing at the sight, and Azriel huffed a rare, warm laugh.

“Still don’t think they’re for playing?” she asked, breathless.

Azriel just leaned back in his chair, shadows curling around his shoulders like smug cats. “Maybe,” he said, “when used responsibly.”

She grinned. “My teasing used to really annoy you.”

He leveled an exasperated look at her, though it was dulled by what she could only describe as fondness. “You still annoy me plenty.”

*****

Adara leaned against a stone pillar just outside the training ring, arms crossed loosely as she watched Azriel work. She hadn’t believed him when he first told her about his daily training sessions with the priestesses of the Night Court. But now, she couldn’t remember why.

He was firm and exact as he taught the small group, but undeniably patient. Not in the sickly sweet way that some males softened their tone when teaching females, or the condescending kind that suggested disbelief in their potential. No, Azriel’s patience was steady and earnest.

He stood beside one of the younger priestesses now, using only his words to guide her through the series of strikes he’d just demonstrated with a thin wooden staff. His shadows hovered at his shoulders like watchful sentries, but his hands remained carefully to himself. Adara had noticed that about him when she’d first arrived to watch. He never touched any of them without clear, enthusiastic permission. Not even to adjust a stance or correct a grip. Instead, he mirrored their movements, explained again if needed, and gave space when it was asked for.

His gentle care and quiet respect were admirable.

Cassian, meanwhile, was training a smaller group of more advanced females on the other side of the rooftop with the same focus, but in a much more cheeky manner. She recognised Nesta, but not the dark-haired Illyrian female with the wicked aim or the beautiful, agile redhead.

Once the lesson began wrapping up, the females scattering to stretch, she stepped out from the doorway, shifting the slim, cloth-wrapped bundle under her arm and clearing her throat. Azriel’s head lifted instantly, sharp eyes landing on her.

“You’re here early,” he said, voice low and a little hoarse from calling out instructions all morning.

“Unfortunately,” she replied, letting the wind tug at her braid as she stepped forward and held out the bundle.

He looked at it as if it might explode. “Is it cursed?”

“Not this time.”

His mouth twitched with amusement as he unwrapped the cloth, revealing the small stack of finely inked scrolls. Each one had custom diagrams and written techniques for teaching different body types, accompanied by clear annotations. They were the same ones Eris had used when he first taught her basic skills in combat, and many of the annotations were her own. While she knew Azriel didn’t need them, most likely having taught hundreds of Illyrian warriors, Adara had found them in her dresser last night and thought he might like them nonetheless. 

Azriel went still. He scanned the scrolls, and something in his face shifted. “This is…” he said roughly, then cleared his throat. “This is thoughtful.”

She shrugged, a little awkwardly. “It’s what you do for friends.”

“Friends?” he echoed, a teasing lilt sneaking into his usually even tone.

She narrowed her eyes, instantly regretting her choice of words. “What are we, children? Yes, friends,” she said, “it seems you’ve grown on me, like some sort of horrible disease.” 

That earned a bark of genuine laughter from the notoriously stoic male. The sound startled a few nearby priestesses, who glanced over in surprise before quickly returning to their stretches. Adara blinked and her heart turned over, momentarily stunned herself. Gods, she liked that sound.

“Thanks,” he said after a moment, lifting the scrolls slightly. His voice was still warm, softer than she was used to. “Seriously.”

She waved a hand, trying to school her expression before she started smiling like an idiot. “Just don’t go soft on them.”

“Never,” he promised, and even as she turned to leave, she could feel him watching her go.

*****

Adara bounced lightly on the balls of her feet, warming her muscles while Azriel tightened the straps on his vambraces across from her. The sparring ring on the Town House rooftop was smaller than the one at the House of Wind, but it felt less exposed. More private.

This had been a long time coming. She’d sparred with Cassian a dozen times now, had demonstrated her fire techniques for Rhys, even taken Elain through a few basic defensive stances when the female had asked a few days ago. But not him.

She’d seen him fight, of course. She’d watched him move like smoke during missions, efficiently cutting down enemies. And he’d seen her too. But until now, they’d never faced each other. 

He finished adjusting his armour and glanced up, shadows curling lazily around his shoulders. “Ready?”

Adara nodded, though her throat felt dry. “Try not to cry when I win.”

A faint smirk curved his lips. “You couldn’t land a hit if I stood still.”

She launched herself at him.

They collided mid-ring, and the match began in earnest. For the first few minutes, they just tested each other, their movements fast, fluid and clean. He was graceful in a way that few warriors could be, especially of his size. All tight muscle and smooth steps, Azriel had the deadly elegance of someone who didn’t waste motion.

Their strikes clashed and slipped. She darted in low; he blocked and sliced high as she lunged again.

He knocked her blade aside with a short twist of his wrist, fast and efficient. “Your stance is too open.”

“Your mouth is too open,” she shot back.

He huffed something between a laugh and a scoff, just distracted enough that she used her momentum to sweep under his arm, driving her foot toward the back of his knee. He stumbled, caught himself with an elegant roll, and popped to his feet with a glare that said well played.

Azriel was stronger. But Adara was quicker.

He drove toward her, slashing for the spot she had left unguarded at her middle, but she pivoted neatly, ducking his elbow.

“Nice try,” he said, spinning to deflect the small dagger she had whipped toward his side.

She huffed and narrowed her eyes. She didn’t mean to notice the way his leathers clung to the line of his waist or how the tousled ends of his hair curled slightly against the sweat on his brow. But she did.

They reset, blades up, breath ragged.

“Come on then, Spym—” she started, then paused mid-word, grinning.

He cocked his head.

“Come on then, Azriel,” she amended, her voice low and sweet as honey. 

He blinked. Just for a second. 

It was all the opening she needed.

She surged forward, feinting a swipe at his neck while sweeping his leg out from under him. He hit the padded floor with a muffled thud, and she straddled him in a flash, dagger pressed lightly to his throat.

Azriel stared up at her, winded.

“I thought using your first name might throw you off balance,” Adara said with a smug smile. “I was right.” 

Except for the night she had dragged him from a nightmare on the Continent, she had only ever called him Spymaster or Shadowsinger, sometimes a teasing insult like idiot. She had been saving it up, partly out of fear that he would object to the level of familiarity that a first name basis suggested. But now, seeing his pupils blown wide and feeling the rapid rise and fall of his chest beneath her, she wished she’d done it sooner.

“You cheated,” he said, eyes narrowed, voice rough.

She leaned down slightly, close enough for the addicting scent of cedar and salt to envelop her. “I improvised.”

He looked away, but she caught the faint blush at his ears. Victory had never tasted so sweet. Or at least it had. Until he moved.

In a sudden, fluid shift, Azriel twisted beneath her, one arm hooking around her waist as he rolled them effortlessly. The world tilted, and the next thing she knew, her back was against the mat.

One of his hands cupped the back of her head, cushioning it as it hit the floor, while the other braced beside her neck, holding the bulk of his weight above her. His chest pressed flush against her, one leg wedged between hers, the other hooked around her thigh. She was thoroughly, inescapably pinned.

She froze, her breath caught somewhere between her throat and her lungs.

He was close enough that she could see every fleck of gold in his hazel eyes, every freckle dusting the bridge of his nose. His body radiated heat like a forge, and she became painfully aware of every point where they touched— her stomach to his, her thighs trapped beneath his hips, his breath fanning softly across her cheek.

Azriel smiled, cocky and unbearably pleased with himself.

“I win,” he murmured, his voice a low rumble that she could feel more than hear.

She tried to form a response, something clever and sharp, something that would wipe that grin right off his unfairly beautiful face. But her mind had short-circuited, lost between the weight of his body and the impossible gentleness of his hand still cradling her head.

Azriel cocked his head to the side, appraising her with amusement. “What’s wrong, princess?” he crooned, and gods-damn her if she didn’t shiver at the seductive rasp of his voice. “Cat got your tongue?” 

Her hands were pinned beneath his body but she pushed against him until he relented, rising to his feet with infuriating grace. He offered her a hand, the shadow of a grin still tugging at the corner of his mouth.

Fuck.

*****

The shower helped. Freezing cold water. Deep breaths. Closed eyes.

But still, the ghost of Azriel’s body hovered over hers, the phantom weight of him pressing her to the mat, the velvet rasp of his voice declaring victory still curling through her chest. Princess.

She’d claimed she needed to clean up before heading back to the Forest House, and it wasn’t a complete lie. Her braid had come loose, her clothes were damp with sweat, and her face was flushed in a way that had little to do with exercise.

But mostly, she needed time and space to get her damn mind under control.

By the time she padded into the Town House’s sitting room, her hair was damp and loose down her back, and she’d traded her sparring gear for a dark tunic and pants borrowed from a drawer stocked for guests. She expected to find Azriel gone or pacing by the fireplace like he sometimes did.

Instead, he was half-lying on the far end of the sofa, his long legs stretched out in front of him. Gone were his fighting leathers and endless weapons. He wore a simple black sweater and loose trousers, his damp hair curling slightly where it brushed his temples. One of his shadows twined lazily around his wrist, and the whole picture of him was... disarming. Soft. Dangerous.

She faltered in the doorway, but his eyes lifted at once.

“Freshened up?” he asked casually, as if he hadn’t just scrambled her brain so completely she felt light-headed.

“Something like that,” she said faintly, forcing herself to walk further into the room. “I should head back before I’m missed.”

He nodded, rising in one smooth movement. “Let me walk you out.”

She shook her head dismissively, already moving for the hallway. “No need to escort me like some delicate princess, Spymaster.”

He followed her anyway, his hands in his pockets, his broad shoulders framed by the low light spilling from the sconces. “Alright then,” he said as she pulled open the front door. “Goodnight, Adara.” 

She wasn’t sure if it was the quiet tenderness in his tone or the way her name sounded coming from him for the first time, but something inside her melted. She gave him a crooked smile that felt far more fragile than she liked. “Goodnight, Azriel.”

And as she slipped into the night, she knew that sleep would not be coming easily.

He remembered the venomous words spat by Orlen and Thorne in the Hewn City dungeon. And worse still, the things she’d said herself about being ignored and treated as invisible.

And yet, he still hadn’t expected this.

She didn’t shrink when Archer, one of her sadistic twin brothers, knocked her shoulder as he passed, nearly knocking her sideways. She simply stepped out of the way without a sound, not breaking stride. When the other twin, Aster, reached out to pinch her side, she twisted ever so slightly to avoid it without reacting at all.

Azriel’s blood simmered. His hand twitched toward one of the daggers strapped under his cloak. In the chair beside him, Rhys kept his expression mild and indifferent, but he saw Cassian’s jaw clench on his other side.

Beron didn’t acknowledge her once.

Even Eris, lounging in his chair like a bored cat, didn’t so much as glance her way. He didn’t even seem to notice as Adara set a dish near the center of the table and moved past one of her other brothers, who clearly tried to trip her. Azriel tensed, but Adara didn’t even look back.

The male relented, disappointed by her lack of reaction, and returned his attention to the conversation. But Azriel didn't. He was still watching when one of the twins snatched her wrist as she passed and summoned a flash of flame. The stench of charred flesh hit Azriel’s senses and his vision went red.

He had mastered the art of stillness, of keeping his face a mask and his voice calm even as violence brewed beneath his skin. But Azriel didn’t think he’d ever fought so hard to hold his composure. Not even at the meeting of the High Lords before the war, when he’d lunged for Eris across the small pond, had his rage burned this white-hot. Only two things kept him from launching across the room now: the invisible leash of Rhysand’s magic, binding his boots to the floor like they were fused to stone, and the quiet brush of his High Lord’s voice in his mind, cool and steady as ever. 

Not here. Not yet.

And then there was Adara’s gaze, locked on his in the span of a heartbeat, and the almost imperceptible shake of her head. Don’t.

To his relief, Eris finally intervened. “Leave the useless serving girl alone,” he drawled lazily, not even looking up from where he traced the rim of his wine goblet. “I would prefer her able to scrub my floors later.”

The twins chuckled. The flame vanished. Azriel’s nails drew blood from where they dug into his own palms.

But Adara… she hadn’t so much as winced. She looked instead at Eris with a smoldering glare Azriel had never seen her direct at her eldest brother. Eris met her gaze once, indifferent as ever, but something like a warning passed between them. 

Later, Beron reached for his goblet too suddenly, and Azriel caught the twitch of her body, the half-step back, the way her entire being recoiled before she snapped herself still again.

She had flinched.

That Beron could make the courageous and unshrinking Adara flinch, made something roar in his chest. She was all edges and wit and fire, and yet here, in this place, they had cut her down to ash.

Azriel watched her retreat again to the corner, quiet and near-invisible, and thought he might just burn this court to the ground himself.

*****

The Forest House was made of cold stone and colder silences, each hall lined with paintings too gaudy to be beautiful and tapestries that stifled the air. The guest wing, despite its polished wood and velvet trimmings, felt like a cage to Azriel.

They were being watched. That much was clear.

Rhysand had accepted Beron’s offer to stay the night with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. Azriel could practically hear the calculations ticking in his High Lord’s mind. Any chance to learn more about Beron’s game, or to keep an eye on Adara, was worth the discomfort.

Still, Azriel's entire body was wound tight with apprehension as he paced across the rug at the end of his bed. Until a soft knock pulled him from his thoughts. 

He turned, every sense alert. His shadows had already peeled away toward the hallway before his feet moved. But he didn’t need them to tell him who was on the other side. He felt her presence like a shift in the wind. Still, when he opened the door, the sight of her nearly made him cringe.

Adara stood with her gaze fixed on the floor, her golden-red hair pulled into a tight braid, her hands folded neatly before her. There was no smirk on her mouth, no mischief in her eyes. Just a careful, practiced blankness. And when she bowed low, the movement stiff and rehearsed, something cold settled in his stomach.

“Good evening,” she said, in a voice that sounded nothing like her. “I am here to serve you, sir.”

His jaw tightened as his shadows darted down the corridor behind her, reporting the presence of a male lurking just out of sight, his cruel amusement wafting down the hall. One of the twins, no doubt. Laughing to himself as he listened.

Azriel stepped aside without a word.

She entered quickly, silently, her spine too straight. He closed the door and didn’t hesitate before casting a soundproofing shield around the room. Magic shimmered faintly in the air as silence wrapped around them like a second skin.

Only then did she lift her head, loosening an audible breath as she turned to face him. “Sorry about that,” she said softly. “Aster thought it would be torturous for me to be alone with the fearsome Night Court Spymaster.” 

He wanted to ask about her behaviour at dinner, and about the flinch. Wanted to hear that it was all an act, and the fear that had coated her scent in the presence of her family had been fabricated. Just another one of her clever disguises. But she looked almost nervous standing in the centre of his room, subtly shifting her weight from foot to foot as though she knew every question running through his mind… and was desperate to run away from the answers. 

So instead, he smirked. “Are you saying it isn’t torturous to be alone with me?”

Relief flashed across her face, subtle but unmistakable. He didn’t need his shadows to tell him that her posture had eased, her shoulders sinking a fraction. “Damn,” she replied, a real smile tugging at her lips. “Your already overinflated ego will be even worse now.”

*****

They talked for a while. Nothing of consequence, just easy conversation, drifting between wry observations and dry wit. Azriel noticed the way she gradually relaxed, the tension easing from her shoulders, the sharpness softening into her particular brand of teasing charm.

He liked her like this. Unguarded and open. And it struck him sharply, how rare a thing it was. How much of a privilege it was to see her like this. He doubted many ever had.

She eventually flopped down on his bed with a dramatic sigh, clearly unbothered by the fact that it wasn’t hers. She stretched out on her stomach and, without asking, helped herself to a chocolate from the decorative bowl on his nightstand. Azriel watched as she popped it into her mouth with a pleased hum, then made no move to get up again.

“You’re making yourself at home,” he said dryly, watching her sprawl across his blanket like she owned the place.

She rolled her eyes. “This is my home, idiot.”

One of his shadows darted forward at his silent command, curling through the air and flicking her lightly on the nose. She wrinkled it and stuck out her tongue at him in retaliation, then settled more comfortably into the bed as if to stake her claim.

A comfortable silence settled between them, before he found himself saying “It’s hard to imagine that this is your home.”

She raised her head slightly, pushing herself into a half-seated position and arching an eyebrow. She didn’t speak, but the question was clear in her gaze.

It was something he’d been thinking since he first arrived in the Forest House earlier in the evening. How the muted browns and greens didn’t seem to suit her vibrant nature. How she seemed out of place, the way she blazed bright in the dull hallways. Perhaps it was only because he had grown to know her so well, because she was certainly adept at blending into her surroundings like a chameleon to avoid the attention of Beron and her brothers. He doubted whether anyone else even saw the radiance she fought to stifle in this place. But after seeing her in Velaris, bathed in sunlight, laughing at Cassian’s jokes and breathing fire for Mor’s delight, it was hard to reconcile this place with the female he’d come to know. 

But he didn’t know how to say any of that without sounding like he pitied her. So instead, he shifted gears. “If Eris becomes High Lord,” he asked quietly, “would you stay here? In Autumn?”

She blinked, turning to gaze out the window. Pale moonlight cut across her face, softening her features into something ethereal. 

“I’ve never really thought about it before,” she admitted. “I only ever let myself dream as far ahead as Beron’s death and Eris’ ascension.” She turned back to face him, her expression bright and fierce. “When Eris becomes High Lord, I’ll stay to support him. My loyalty is to him first. Always.”

The hollow feeling in his chest had nothing to do with his dislike for Eris.

“Do you like it here?” 

Azriel cursed himself internally as the words tumbled out unbidden, knowing she would read the disbelief in his tone. She was a servant in this house, suffering under Beron and enduring her brothers’ torment. Of course she wouldn’t like it here. 

But she didn’t bristle or scoff. In fact, she smiled knowingly, as though she could see straight through to the self-reprimand he tried so carefully to shield.

“It’s not that bad, you know,” she chided. When he didn’t respond she tilted her head at him as though debating something. Then, without warning, she stood. “Come on,” she said, “I want to show you something.”

She paused by the door and glanced over her shoulder. “Can you… shadow yourself? Just for a bit?”

Azriel nodded once and let the darkness slide over him, his body dissolving into wraithlike tendrils. Her eyes scanned the space where he had just stood, and though she could no longer see him, he knew she could feel him.

She slipped back into the hallway, walking with practiced ease. He followed, travelling between pockets of shadow along the ceiling and walls, watching as she navigated stairwells and hidden corridors.

They passed only a few others, mostly servants or guards. None of them spared her more than a cursory glance or a stiff nod. Not one met her eyes. Their faces remained carefully blank, their shoulders slightly hunched, as though they had been trained not to truly see her at all.

How lonely, he thought, like a ghost in her own home. Perhaps it was no wonder she enjoyed easy banter with barmaids and travellers on the continent so much.

Eventually, they entered a quieter wing of the estate where the torches burned lower, the walls narrower. Azriel had begun considering pulling his shadows back when a flicker of movement registered just ahead. 

Before he could react, a hand shot out from an alcove and yanked Adara into a broad male chest.

Azriel nearly materialised on instinct, his dagger already clasped in his hand, but he paused a breath short of stepping from the shadows when he recognised the familiar flame-red hair and tall frame. Eris.

His shadows stirred restlessly, whispering at him to intervene, to protect, but he held them at bay. Because Adara, instead of fighting, simply slumped in exaggerated exasperation and smacked Eris’s arm. “What the hell was that for, you bastard?” she hissed, though the insult was clearly affectionate.

Eris just smirked down at her, and it wasn’t the sharp, serpentine one he usually wore, edged with his usual courtiers’ cruelty. No, this was genuine and teasing, the curl of his lips tinged with real amusement. Azriel blinked. He’d never seen it before. Never seen the heir to Autumn look so… casual.

“And where are you going this late?” Eris asked, tugging idly at the braid that hung over Adara’s shoulder.

She rolled her eyes. “None of your business.”

He didn’t push, just arched one brow and waited. Azriel saw the moment her gaze flicked toward the place where he still lingered, cloaked in shadow. 

“I’m just going for a walk,” she said at last, sighing. “Needed to clear my mind.”

Eris’s smirk faded, concern threading through his expression like a crack in polished glass. “I’m sorry about tonight,” he murmured, voice low and unguarded in a way Azriel had never heard. “I shouldn’t have let them—”

“You shouldn’t have tried to stop them,” Adara cut in, sharp but not cruel. “You know what the twins would do if they thought you cared.” Azriel watched her as she spoke, firm and rehearsed. Like the words were second nature. Like this was a conversation the siblings had regularly. “You can’t give them that kind of weapon,” she added.

Eris’s jaw tightened. “I hate watching them hurt you.”

“Then don’t watch,” she said flatly. His scowl deepened, but it didn’t stop her. “I can take it, Eris.”

“You shouldn’t have to,” he snapped, barely above a whisper.

For the first time, Azriel truly saw how alike they were. Not just in their red-gold hair or the proud line of their jaw, but in the stubbornness that radiated from both of them like twin flares of heat. Born of the same fire. Shaped by the same ruin.

“I think the Spymaster wanted to tear me limb from limb when I didn’t stop Aster.” Eris finally said, his tone light, as though their disagreement hadn’t happened. “Do you think he has come to care for you?”

Only centuries of training kept Azriel’s control of his shadows from slipping at the casual question. He didn’t dare breathe as he waited for Adara’s response.

“Don’t be absurd, brother,” she said coolly. “We are… friends, I would like to think.” Warmth flowed through Azriels’ chest at her simple words.

“High praise from you, little sister. I didn’t think you trusted anyone enough to be friends,  least of all the Night Court.”

“Yes, well, it would seem I was wrong about them.” Another glance in Azriel’s direction, and even though he knew she couldn’t see him through the darkness, it felt as though her golden eyes locked onto his. “They are… good.”

“Be careful.” Eris said simply, tapping her affectionately under her chin before sauntering away down the corridor.

Azriel didn’t move as Eris’s footsteps faded into silence, disappearing back the way they had come. That single word, friends, echoing loudly behind him.

Once they were sure Eris had left, Azriel again followed silently as Adara led him through the narrow, sloping stone corridor, his shadows whispering of tree roots and damp earth above. They were underground, he realised, in old tunnels carved beneath the Forest House itself. She moved with the ease of someone who had walked these halls a thousand times, her steps careful but sure, always avoiding the loose stones and the spots where the ceiling dipped low. He suspected she could make the journey in complete darkness, unaided by light or shadow.

Eventually, a rusted spiral staircase appeared ahead, curling upward into gloom. They ascended in silence, and when she finally pushed open a rusted iron hatch at the top, cool night air spilled in like a balm.

Azriel emerged behind her, rising onto the rooftop of an old stone watchtower. It was tucked far enough into the eastern wood that the glow of the Forest House no longer reached them, hidden by the thick canopy of ancient trees. The scent of moss and pine hung in the air, and beyond the craggy stone ledge, the vast wilderness of the Autumn Court unfurled. Dark forests and golden fields, and in the far distance, tiny clusters of warm light. Farmhouses, Azriel realised. Hearths still lit against the cold night.

“I come here to breathe,” Adara said softly beside him.

He turned to find her standing near the edge, her face tipped up to the stars, her hair catching silver moonlight. There was a softness to her expression he didn’t often see, the fierce edges dulled.

“All the fancy estates and manor houses are on the other side of the Forest House,” she said, answering the question he hadn’t asked. “The marble pillars and golden gates that Beron likes people to see. But this—” she gestured out toward the dark hills and the flickering lights. “This is the part I like best.”

He scanned the rooftop and spotted a lone lounge chair, old but well-cared for, tucked against the curve of the watchtower wall. A small, soft blanket was draped neatly over one arm. Had Adara carried it up here herself? Had she spent countless nights on that chair, alone with only the stars?

She crossed the rooftop and collapsed onto the chair with a sigh, stretching out and lacing her fingers behind her head. “Sit if you want. I won’t bite.”

He leaned against the stone ledge instead, content to keep his shadows close, to stay watchful as always. 

“I like to find the constellations,” she murmured, scanning the sky. “The same ones every time. It helps me remember that the world is bigger than this place. Than me.”

Azriel followed her gaze upward. The stars blinked and shimmered in the black sky, unbothered by their petty concerns.

“I used to think these were the most beautiful stars I’d ever seen,” she added, her voice barely above a whisper. “Until I saw Velaris at night.”

A smile tugged at his mouth. “You should see it at Starfall,” he said softly. 

She turned her head toward him, the moon catching in her lashes. “Starfall?”

He nodded once, eyes still fixed on the sky. “Once a year, spirits migrate across the night sky in the Night Court. Streams of twirling light shine in the darkness, like they’re dancing.”

He heard her breath catch, and didn’t dare look at her, afraid of what he might see on her face. Hope? Longing?

“You’d like it,” he added, more quietly now. “It makes the world feel... infinite.”

She didn’t respond for a long while. And when she did, her voice was quiet, thoughtful.

“Promise you’ll show me the next one?”

He turned his head toward her, meeting her gaze. She looked nothing like the version of herself he’d seen at dinner. And everything like the one he was coming to care for far too deeply.

“I promise.”

Satisfied, Adara returned to her old friends, the stars, letting the night air fill the space between them. But he couldn’t stop looking at her. At the way her chest rose and fell steadily. At the way her head rested on her intertwined, calloused fingers. At the faint crease between her brows, even now. She was always on alert. Even at peace, some part of her braced for the worst.

“If Eris is as good a male as you say he is,” he murmured, “wouldn’t he offer you the choice to stay or leave if he becomes High Lord?”

She let out a soft chuckle, but didn’t turn to face him. “When he becomes High Lord,” she corrected him for the second time that night. Then, finally looking at him sidelong, she added, “Why do you care so much about this?”

Why did he care so much about this? About where she would go? It was none of his business, not really. And it wouldn’t affect him either way. Would it?

“I meant what I said before, about not being able to imagine this as your home.” He could feel the weight of her eyes on him as he stared up at the stars. Still, the words kept coming. “You just don’t seem like… you here. It was like a different person was in that dining room, scraping and bowing, serving the High Lord and his guests, trying to blend in with the wallpaper.”

“But with Eris as High Lord—”

“I don’t really think you’d enjoy being an ornamental princess on a decorative throne either.”

She was silent, and he finally mustered the courage to turn and meet her stare. “I don’t think it would suit you any more than it suits your mother.” He said gently. The Lady of Autumn had been at dinner as well, pale and blank-faced. She had sat beside her husband, and stared silently at her plate for the entire meal, not talking to her family or her guests. It was as if she was nothing more than shadow, and hadn't even seemed to notice her own daughter serving her.

Adara’s eyes flared wide at his words, but she didn’t seem angry. She just looked back at the stars and whispered into the hush of the autumn night, “No. No I don’t think it would either.”

Poor little princess. Still desperate for someone to tell her she matters. I watched you beg for Beron’s attention like a dog for scraps. Jealous, are you? Wish there was someone capable of loving you?”

She gulped the rest of the tea in one go, shaking her head to clear the lingering words.

Then there were the things she had said to them. Talking to Thorne about his mate. To Orlen about his children. She should’ve kept it clinical. Cold. Impersonal. That was what she was trained to do. Don’t give your enemies a soul, Eris had once told her. Don’t give them a face. And yet, she had humanised them. She wondered if it had bothered Azriel, hearing about the soldiers’ families. He had tortured them before she got there. Had it hurt him, to reveal the softness behind the face of the enemy? 

They had worked together for weeks now, and she knew Azriel wasn’t a sadist. He didn’t take pleasure in pain and death. Didn’t relish the act of torture or interrogation. He simply bore it stoically, accepting it as a necessary task—a burden that he must take on, if only to spare his beloved family from having to do it. Adara felt the same way, after all. Her role as a spymaster, though sometimes thrilling and gratifying, often required her to do things others would consider unconscionable. Occasionally it left her feeling dirty, as though it left a stain on her soul. But that was a stain she would gladly bare to help Eris. 

Perhaps that was why she hadn’t tried to push Azriel, to shame him, for killing the soldiers that he did. Even though her gut had twisted at the sight of so many familiar faces and her heart clenched painfully at the thought of their families, she hadn’t felt like reproaching him. He had seen enough death and caused enough pain to understand the cost of those lives. Besides, it had been the right thing, in the end. The soldiers she knew were gone. Warped into creatures of hatred that simply wore their faces. It was why she had executed Orlen and Thorne herself. 

Across the room, the fire cracked, the sound eerily similar to that of burning flesh. She closed her eyes and tried to focus on anything else.

Eris had said little when she’d delivered her report. But she’d felt the grief in him, and even his cool facade hadn’t hidden the droop of his shoulders. Every soldier she’d named was one he had chosen, trusted. They had been his. And now they were gone. Though she’d glimpsed the desperate hope, too, when she had said that some of his missing soldiers were still unaccounted for. Only twenty-four of the thirty had been in the Hewn City dungeons.

He’d dismissed her with a tight nod and a flick of his fingers, as though anything more might let the sorrow escape. And then he’d left quickly, insisting that he could handle the burden of making death notifications to the soldiers’ familiars alone.

So she’d returned here, where the silence pressed heavy around her, and let the quiet gnaw at her.

It was Feyre’s face that finally pulled her from her spiral. That brief moment in Rhysand’s office, when the High Lord had casually mentioned that Helion had consulted on the soldiers’ enchantments.

Adara had felt Feyre’s gaze immediately. Sharp and curious. A flicker too calculating to be entirely innocent.

And when she’d dared glance up, Adara had seen it confirmed. Feyre knew who her true father was. Or at least suspected. There had been no dramatic declaration, no gasp of revelation. Just the quiet, studious narrowing of her eyes. That was what gave her away.

And Adara had almost laughed. For all her observation and cunning, Feyre still hadn’t mastered the careful blankness that her own mate wielded like a weapon. Rhys had betrayed nothing. But if Feyre had guessed… she’d no doubt told him.

To her surprise, Adara found it didn’t bother her much. She had lived too long wrapped in secrets to fear their unraveling now. And perhaps it was time for the truth to rise like smoke and ash and settle where it may.

She wondered, though, if Feyre had told Lucien.

That thought soured the tea on her tongue. It wasn’t that she didn’t want him to know. But she’d always imagined telling him herself, offering that truth gently, in her own words, in her own time. If she ever told him at all.

With a sigh, she stood and moved to the hearth, tugging the iron poker from its holder and shifting the logs to release the heat. She watched the fire glow, flaring into brightness for a moment before dimming again. Behind her, Ember whined softly.

*****

The sun was beginning to dip toward the horizon, casting gold and rose across the rooftop of the Town House, where the sounds of sparring echoed sharp and steady.

Adara rolled her shoulder, sweat slicking her neck as she circled Cassian. The General was grinning like a wolf.

“You’ve been dodging me for weeks,” he panted, spinning the blade in his hand with absurd casualness. “And now I know why. You didn’t want me to see that footwork.”

She bared her teeth, not bothering to answer as she brought her shortsword downwards in a swift arc that had him lunging wide to avoid it.

He let out a huff, pivoting fast and coming in low, but she jumped and twisted just in time, letting her momentum carry her over his hip and drop back lightly to the ground behind him. She heard his laugh even as he spun to face her again.

Azriel stood at the edge of the roof, arms crossed, only a single tendril of shadow slipping over his shoulder. Adara didn’t acknowledge him, but she was aware of him in the way she was aware of her own breath. He’d been like this since she arrived— tense, quiet and watching. 

Cassian’s sword came at her again and she blocked it with the flat of her own blade, shifting smoothly back into a grounded stance, her breathing deep and steady.

“You sure you know Sythari technique?” Cassian asked between hits. “I thought it was more of a mind game. Breath before blade, patience before power and all that.”

“I trained with a former Sythari monk,” she replied, voice calm despite the clash of steel. “He lived in exile in the Autumn Court. Eris found him and convinced him to teach me.”

Cassian’s brows rose in surprise. “I am unbelievably jealous.”

They danced again, fast and brutal, until after a well-placed feint that caused her to leave her right side open, Cassian stepped into her space and brought the flat of his blade up beneath her chin, pressing just enough to let her feel the edge without drawing blood.

He grinned. “Yield?”

Adara’s eyes narrowed. Her chest rose and fell with exertion, and a single drop of sweat slid down her spine. Her gaze darted around his face, assessing, before she deliberately pushed forward, a trickle of blood running down her throat as her skin split against the blade. As the scent of her blood permeated the air, she saw Azriel tense from the corner of her eye, but she didn’t look away from Cassian, whose own eyes widened as he pulled back slightly. 

But she followed, taking an entire step forward, forcing him to remove the blade completely so as to avoid slitting her throat. 

“What the hell are you playing at?” Cassian asked, his blade now hanging by his side. 

She felt the cooling touch of one of Azriel’s shadows ghost across the shallow cut on her neck before darting away. A moment later he stepped into the ring, angling his body between her and Cassian and fixing her with an unreadable expression. 

“Why did you do that?” Azriel growled. 

She smirked in the way she knew set his teeth on edge. “First lesson of the Sythari method,” she said, “is to know your enemy.” 

She smiled wider at their matching blank faces. Despite not being related by blood, at times like these she could almost see their centuries of brotherhood. 

“Based on everything I have learnt of you, Cassian, I knew that during friendly practice like this, you would avoid hurting me. So, I put you in a position where you were forced to choose between doing so, or yielding, thus giving me the upper hand.” 

Understanding began to bloom across Cassian’s features, and she continued, jabbing her thumb in Azriel’s direction, “I also knew that even if I underestimated your bloodthirstiness, he would intervene if you tried to truly hurt me.” 

Azriel’s brow raised as he stared down at her, utterly unimpressed. “Would I?” 

He may still regard her with suspicion, but Azriel had proven himself to be a male of honour. There was not a doubt in her mind that he would stop Cassian from slicing her throat open, and she had seen enough of his abilities to know that even if had been standing on the other side of the rooftop, he would’ve been at her side in an instant were her life in danger.

“Yup,” she replied, popping the ‘p’ obnoxiously.

His expression didn’t shift, but a small smile now played about Cassian’s mouth. “Know your enemy,” he said, resuming a fighting stance.

“Know your enemy,” she echoed, sidestepping Azriel and going on the attack.

*****

It was late. The fire in Azriel’s office had burned low, casting flickering shadows across the walls. Adara lounged in the armchair opposite him, her legs hooked over one armrest, boot halfway unlaced, her head tilted back and eyes closed. She was too tired to do any more work, but wanted to delay her return to the Forest House as long as possible.

She had grown used to the unspoken truce that had settled between them lately. It felt like mutual trust and respect.

For a long while, Azriel’s quill scratching softly against parchment was the only sound in the room. Until he broke it, his voice low and rough with something that might have been caution.

“What did you mean the other day, when you said not to fall for someone you can’t be your true self with?”

Adara’s eyes opened, blinking once as they adjusted to the firelight. She didn’t speak right away. Just watched the flames for a few long moments, then sat up slowly and braced her elbows on her knees, her fingers twisting in the loose hem of her tunic.

She hadn’t expected him to ask. Had half-expected him to forget the words she had hurled at him in her anger. But she should’ve known better, known that Azriel didn’t let things go easily.

The truth was… difficult. But maybe explaining what she’d meant might soften how she’d said it. 

“When Beron made me a servant,” she began, her voice quiet but steady, “everyone in the Forest House knew who I was—who I had been. But they were forbidden from acknowledging it. Forbidden from looking at me, speaking to me, even using my name.”

Azriel didn’t interrupt. She wasn’t sure if that made it easier or harder.

“For the first year, they’d just… leave the room whenever I entered. Pretend I didn’t exist. I used to wonder if it was worse than punishment, to be invisible.”

She could feel his shadows now, like breath on the back of her neck, listening.

“Then a new stable boy arrived. He was young and gentle. Handsome, of course,” she added with a tight smile. “He was from the farmlands, and had no idea who I was. To him, I was just a girl, just a servant. And I… I loved it.” She felt her smile turn wistful. “The anonymity, the simplicity. I didn’t have to be anything except quiet and small. He loved that girl.”

She shifted in her seat, gaze dropping to the space between them.

“I stopped speaking to Eris. Ignored every lesson he tried to give me. I didn’t want to be strong or dangerous or powerful. I just wanted to be a normal girl in love. I thought if I was soft, that would be enough.”

Her chest tightened, but she forced the words out anyway. 

“But I was always afraid he’d find out who I really was. That he’d be scared of me like everyone else.”

She remembered so clearly how the guilt of keeping it from him had battled constantly with the fear of what would happen when she finally told him. Adara looked up to find Azriel watching her, eyes like shadowed stone, unreadable. But she could feel him listening, like his attention was a physical thing.

“In the end, someone else told him. I don’t know who.” She swallowed. 

Azriel’s voice was barely audible. “What happened?”

“He said it didn’t matter. That he still loved me.” Her hands curled in her lap. “And I believed him.”

She let silence fall between them again. Let it stretch.

“But after a while he began… changing. He grew resentful and jealous, said I was an entitled, wellborn brat, and that I was using him just like I used the guard who took my maidenhood, all as a cry for attention.”

Azriel’s shadows stilled. She felt the shift in the air, though his expression didn’t change.

“So I tried harder to be the girl he’d first met. He didn’t like when I talked to other males—guards, cooks, anyone. He didn’t like when I stood too tall. I spoke less and stopped making jokes. Wore dresses instead of pants. Played dumb. I made myself small just so he could feel big. Until one day I looked in the mirror and realised I didn’t recognise myself, and I hated the girl I saw. She looked… weak.”

There was a lump in her throat now, but she pressed past it. “So I swore that I would find the woman I was meant to be. I could pretend to be a timid girl to fly under the radar, but underneath I would be bold and unapologetic and fearless. And I would never let anyone stifle my flame again.”

She didn’t realise how tense she’d grown until she forced herself to lean back again, exhaling. “And I learned my most important lesson.”

Azriel said nothing.

“Love,” she said, voice low and flat, “is just a foolish weakness.”

Silence. And then, so softly she almost missed it: “It doesn’t have to be.”

She glanced at him, surprised. There was no trace of pity or disgust in his hazel eyes, just his usual cool steel. It felt like a balm, countering her flushed cheeks and racing heartbeat.

She glanced at him, arching one brow. “Of course you would say that. You’re surrounded by nothing but lovesick idiots in the Night Court. They should rename it the Court of Hopeless Romantics.”

The corner of Azriel’s mouth lifted into a crooked smile. Maybe that’s what prompted her to say what came next.

“I meant what I said,” she continued, voice gentler now. “Falling for someone you can’t be your true self with never ends well.”

His jaw flexed. But he didn’t deny it.

“But I hope for your sake that I’m wrong,” she whispered.

He didn’t say anything, but she felt his eyes follow her as she rose from her chair and left the room, felt the weight of everything unsaid like a second skin she couldn’t quite shrug off.