#*nyx

honestly i don’t think so, at least from what we know in canon about mating bonds. they’re sacred! they’re transcendental! rhysand’s high fae father took on a lesser fae illyrian bride because she was his mate, ordained by the mother. i think mating bonds are literally the way around everything, for good and for bad. a faerie could supersede social strata if mated to a faerie of higher status. a faerie could monopolize control over a well-positioned faerie because of their bond. i imagine it sort of like an arranged marriage except random and unable to control, specially because of the fact that faeries are told or believe or are truthfully matched to other faeries of equivalent power/impact.

i do—and i think that nyx himself is probably the biggest advocate for it. he grows up surrounded by illyrian warriors and valkyries who are either carynthian or oristian, both of which are pretty mythologized on multiple levels. he has illyrian blood in him and thus that sort of pent-up pressure to illyrian power that rhysand describes, which he would need to be taught how to manage so that it doesn't drive him up the wall. not to mention that training and physical defense are also huge aspects to the culture of the inner circle. even if he wasn't intentionally informed to have these ideals, his exposure to them through his family would instill in him those same aspirations.

then we have rhysand who canonically views his own training as a net positive despite the conditions he was exposed to. he was able to attune to an aspect of his personhood that he otherwise would have been barred from as half-high fae and half-illyrian, he met two of the closest people to him through his training, and he values physical fortitude enough to teach it to tamlin, then feyre as well. he would absolutely want his son to have that training. what i could see is rhysand and feyre maybe advocating that his training just be handled by themselves, azriel, cassian, and the valkyries, since nyx already has access to the best of the best. no need for him to be exposed to the rough and tumble ways they look down on.

but i don't think nyx would stand for that. i think he would want the full, genuine experience of being an illyrian warrior, and i think he would resent what he would see as coddling him and giving him preferential treatment because he's the heir. honestly could be what finally gets rhysand to actually effect change amongst the illyrians. or could be what sort of radicalizes nyx and brings him to effect that change after seeing that his family doesn't want him around his own people but aren't doing the most they can to improve illyrian conditions.

ohhhh i think safety and personal well-being is always the very first priority for members of the inner circle, especially when it comes to nyx! but i don’t think it would ever be a true you’re never allowed to persue this deal breaker to a mating bond—even if it should be. like they’re going to be fully involved in it. they’re going to be managing it from the shadows regardless of his feelings on the matter. they’re going to insert their opinions and intervene multiple times in attempts to mitigate the threat of this bond and be genuine overbearing nuisances. but at the end of the day, they all have expressed very reverent, often fatalistic views about a mating bond. these bonds their parents had which resulted in tragedy and abuse—and yet there was no way to prevent them because the mother chose them for each other, so to each other they went, and with each other to their downfall. i think the inner circle’s priority would thus never be withholding a bond permanently from anyone—temporarily, sure, until the time is right—but instead to ensure that when it’s accepted, the mate they had concerns about is no longer a threat. just like you mentioned we see them do with nesta, whose only “““threat””” to any of them was hurting cassian’s feelings/not freely contributing her powers to their causes.

so if it were a hewn city rebel or a hostile faerie in hybern or even the daughter of someone they truly despised, i think for them it would be a matter of figuring out how to deprogram that faerie from what they perceive as incorrect bias/prejudice/what have you that makes them a threat to nyx. or even save them from it! like they consistently tend to see hostility towards them as a matter of not understanding the goodness or moral rightness of their intent. so i think first they would try to make this faerie see the truth and the way and the light. if the faerie acknowledged their stance and remained hostile, that’s when they would become more defensive and hostile in return—like we see in canon with nesta, and also even in my mind palace with nyx and ophelia. at first it’s, they just don’t understand us yet; if they do, they’ll come around. then once they realize the mate does understand them and refuses their line of thinking, it’s, they need to be made to come around. which is very narratively fun and crunchy to make play out >:)

Azriel would have charged at Milo himself but he can do nothing but be mad about it now that it's Ophelia, that's so funny.

Speaking of Milo, does he catch on and figure out that there is something suspicious about what his sister just did?

i think when it comes to a situation like this where it's a public setting, he's been abruptly embarrassed and deeply insulted, and the slight came from a female of relatively equal status to him in her home court, nyx probably leans outwardly more towards rhysand cool than feyre combative. there's fs a spike of his emotions the way we see feyre have during the high lord's meeting, but he keeps his composure—and cassian or azriel's probably immediately at his side to easy now him + Big Boy intimidate the snickering faeries around them. (this sort of mockery is pretty par for the course for illyrians, but it would feel uniquely bad for them to see nyx be treated that way over their heritage. if it's azriel, he winds up honing more in on why ophelia, who he knows to operate similarly to eris even in a non-azris timeline, would be so openly hostile—because a snobbish look would have been just as effective if she just wanted to make nyx feel bad for being illyrian.) i could see nyx with a glass of whiskey in him approaching her later during the rite in more of a feyre what's your fucking problem way as his indignation grows.

milo absoluuutely clocks that something's up—just probably not what. he'd know ophelia isn't so overhanded with her disdain. that, between them, he's the one more likely to cause spectacle, which means something must have happened to make ophelia act that way. he wouldn't assume a bond was in place, but he would almost definitely suspect that nyx had done something to ophelia to upset her, probably something untoward. eris cultivates a very family above everything dynamic amongst his children so i could see milo immediately trying to go post up with nyx without making any effort at clarifying with ophelia about whether something happened first because that's what's Right To Do for his sister + his father hates the night court, which means to him they are unequivocally Bad Actors. (i love milo and his black and white sense of morality when he's young being eris's greek punishment.) ophelia would have to steer milo away from nyx with a massive ! above her head. meanwhile nyx is just standing there like🧍‍♂️hello????

the way it would seem like a meet cute to nyx until ophelia opened her mouth. he’s offended that someone would yank a plate from his hold, but as soon as he looks up to the face to match the hand, he’s got stars in his eyes. she’s so ethereally beautiful—like a moth of flame pinned behind glass, flickering but not wavering, impossible to truly pin down. (free her free her free her.) he’s never seen another faerie of the like. such molten, flowing eyes. such definition to her, as though all of the world bends for her presence, as though she is the center of all things. her shapely, nightshade mouth parts, and his heart skips a beat.