#daemati

Soft silks, breezy linens, warm cashmeres, skin tight leathers and sultry gossamers. “Is this really necessary?”

She barely flicks a glance your way, raising items to your form and making a face before delving back into the endless fray of choices. “Absolutely. Look good, feel good.”

A prominent piece of you yearns to admit that you haven’t felt much of anything lately but refrain in favor of being on the receiving end of yet another pitying look. Instead, you keep your mouth shut, sitting pretty on Mor’s made bed while freshly manicured nails rake through the fluffy fibers of the throw blanket beneath you.

The windows are open, a cool breeze sifting through and caressing over your bare skin, dressed in nothing but your skivvy’s as you wait for Mor to finally decide on something suitable for a night out. She’s already done your hair, spending far too much time carding through thick strands until you’re forced to linger around the house with tissue paper curls pinned to your scalp. You suppose it was worth it, bouncy ringlets now cascade down your shoulders in a way that makes you look more put together. Enhancing makeup makes your eyes pop, accentuates your cheekbones, draws attention to the pretty pout of your mouth until Mor grins with satisfaction.

Your only job is to not fuck it up.

To pass time, you peer up at the stars. Listen to the city come to life as the sun retreats so the moon can have its time to shine. “Here, put this on.”

Under entirely different circumstances, you probably would react differently to the extravagant choice. The dress she’s chose is midnight blue, a corset bodice with intricate lace and beading painting a picture of cloud-like swirls and golden stars scattered about a moody night sky. The curve of two silver half moons cup the fat under your cleavage, the tops hooking just below your collarbones. It’s sexy, eye-catching, a little dangerous but it fits like a damn glove and accentuates the dips and curves of your waist and hips unlike anything you’ve worn before. “One wrong shimmy and I just might flash all of Rita’s.”

“I doubt they’ll mind much.” Black heels with gold bottoms are slid your way, feet eased inside and strap secured around your ankle. A tube of gloss and a spritz of perfume and Mor is urging you towards the front door, past the wards and winnowed to Rita’s where everyone else is already waiting.

You easily ignore the looks you earn upon arrival, as if the crowd can feel the shift that’s taken place—a predator entering the premises with the skin of a sheep on their shoulders.

“Look who showed up!” Cassian’s clearly already a little tipsy, a pitcher of ale clutched in one heavy mitt while the other arm rests along the back of the booth.

“Prison guards finally let me off my leash.” No one comments on the truth of your statement given the fact that the entirety of the Inner Circle had been taking turns watching your every move as if waiting for the other shoe to drop. “What are we drinking?”

It’s Azriel who slides over something fruity and frozen. “Your usual.”

Peach mix and grenadine, tequila and vodka, a strawberry split in half over a sugar rim. It’s finished all too quickly but you stick to the theme, vodka shots and cranberry juice chasers. Strawberry daiquiri’s and lemon drop martinis. Soon enough it leads you to the dance floor, body moving to the beat and brain effectively turned off while you lose yourself in the music. You’re passed around from Feyre to Mor to Cassian before they’ve broken off to their own couples and you’re left alone in the thick of the crowd.

Shadows curl around your ankle a bit later, their master following close behind and carving a space free for himself. His hands are respectful at first, brushing hair from your face and evaluating your state before easing into the way you playfully tug him in closer. His grip moves down to your hips, turns you around so your back is to his front. Falling into a rhythm with him is as easy as breathing, head tilting back to rest on his chest, exposing your throat and sinking into the smell of his cologne. “I can feel you watching me, you know.”

“We’re worried about you.

“Worried about what? I haven’t done a thing wrong.”

Azriel hums in agreement, the vibrations rumbling along your spine. “No, but you aren’t yourself.”

Shoulders shrug, eyes fluttering closed in your attempts to keep this buzz. To ride this carefree wave of relaxation the liquor provides. “So? I don’t call you out when you come back untethered. I give you space to find your anchor again.”

“You’re not untethered. It’s like you don’t even exist anymore.”

“Maybe, that was just my fate. To disappear.”

You break away from the spymaster, shake off his sticky shadows and part your way through the throng of bodies until you catch sight of curled blonde hair and the drinks she has sitting before her at their booth. “Ready for another?” Mor inquires, a shot already outstretched for the taking.”

“Keep ‘em coming.”

“You think that’s smart?” Rhys worries, waiting for you to walk away again, feet wobbly in your heels. For some reason, he’s unable to shake the instinct of searching for you between the hustle and bustle of bodies. “Plying a ghost with spirits.”

Mor pretends she doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Feigns ignorance to her own version of concern towards the situation she’s born and bred. “She’ll be fine, she’s having fun.”

“Danger enjoys fun too, Mor. Are you sure her version of a good time still aligns with ours?”

Tension exists in the line of her shoulders, settles in the delicate curve of her spine. “I guess we’ll just have to wait, watch and find out.”

“Great plan. Doesn’t sound like it’ll go wrong at all.”

Your version of fun ends up meaning to get as drunk as you can manage without toppling over, muttering slurred syllables in the High Lord’s ear about finally feeling full again—not quite whole but somewhat satiated. Something about your vulnerability calls to his magic, lowered your mental shields, luring his abilities to breech the walls of your mind in attempts to glimpse at whatever happened to you to change the female he’d once known.

Too bad the caress of his claws against your lowered barriers causes more harm than good. Drunken hiccups and inebriated giggles abruptly seizes the second he crosses the threshold. You go as still as a board, breath halting and grip tightening in the fabric tailored to his shoulders.

Inside your mind is murky, foggy, a jungle of trees and humid air that makes the hair on the back of Rhys’ neck stand at attention and in the middle of it all is you. Suspended midair by unseen restraints but more alarming than that is the state of you; life is leeched from your skin, eyes half-lidded and gaze distant but a constant stream of silent tears leak from your waterline.

There, she thought to herself, finally. The last of Autumn’s yellow roses brightened up her kitchen. The kitchen, she corrected, but it felt like hers now. Elain filled the glass vase with water, a sprinkle of ground eggshells. It had grown late, and she was alone. 

Alone doesn’t feel very good, she pursed her lips. Nuala and Cerridwen were gone on Rhys’s orders. It was something to do with one of the queens. She remembered their visit to the Archeron Manor so long ago. Politeness and good manners hadn’t gotten her very far with them. Power struggles were at play, but Elain didn’t understand them. She had tried listening in, lingering at the edges while Feyre talked with Rhys and Azriel in the early hours of morning. She had nothing better to do after all, not when sleep eluded her. She let it stay blissfully far away, like a cat that had grown tired of playing with a toy. Sleep filled her mind with too many thoughts. Unhelpful thoughts. 

Elain fussed with the flowers, arranging them again and again. If she stayed idle too long, those thoughts would find her, and that couldn’t happen. Not when it scared her sisters so much. She did not remember everything that happened to her, but Feyre often expressed how pleased she was that Elain was better now, healed. Oh Elain… so worried… and Nesta, she was half-mad with fear… do you even remember… the balcony… knives out of the kitchen when Taryn… 

Little snippets. She rearranged the flowers. Perhaps the fuller ones should face the island… Yes, that was where everyone would sit. Once morning came. In nine hours. There would be no one for the next nine hours. She rearranged the flowers as her head began to split. Water, not like the icy chill of the Cauldron. Warm. Laughter. And then a staircase, one with a big looming spiral. Sparks of silver. A storm rolled in. 

She rearranged the flowers. The stems had not been de-thorned. She pushed her finger tips into the sharp little daggers and sighed as a pin-prick of blood welled up. The visions faded out like mist on the horizon. 

As she pressed her fingertip to her lips to suck the blood away, she felt a familiar presence. His shadows were warm, and she felt them brush her arm in greeting. He made sure not to startle her.

“Azriel, you’re up late.”

“I could say the same to you. Shouldn’t you be in bed?”

She smiled and let the flowers fall naturally into the vase. “Oh, I couldn’t sleep…” She brushed her fingers across the soft, butter colored petals. “I wanted to make sure these beauties were saved before the first snows hit Velaris.”

He stepped closer. So close to her. She could feel the willowy pressure of his shadows, slightly warm with his scent. Mmm, something woody. She slowed her breathing, trying not to seem… excited? Interested? It was so much easier to talk to the human boys. They couldn’t hear the fluttering of a heart. 

“Yellow?” he asked, his voice deceptively bored.

“Do you dislike yellow?” She asked. Maybe next time she would plant red.

“No, they’re very nice Elain. The River House always feels more home-like with your touches.”

Something bubbly and warm welled up in her. She didn’t think many people noticed the little changes she made. Feyre had an eye for decorating, sure, but her style was far more moody, regal. Elain preferred the subtle elegance of a brighter palate. It seemed Azriel had noticed. 

“How was training today?” she tried to sound cheerful, but weariness weaved its way through her tone. Cassian hadn’t been by the River House to update Feyre on Nesta’s progress, but Elain assumed there was none to report. Taryn was a bit more unpredictable on where she drew her lines.

His lips titled to the side, hesitant. “Her blade work has gotten stronger, she wields truth teller almost as well as you did-” Elain couldn’t keep the smile from her face. A small one. This was about Taryn, not herself. Azriel went on without noticing. “But when I left her with Tris… I suppose you and Nesta are lucky. Mental shields take a lot of work to employ for those who haven’t had them magically fortified. I wanted to tell you though-”

She turned, her face tipped up to meet his gaze. So close. Azriel paused, taking in a breath, as if he had suddenly realized the proximity between them. 

“I’ll be gone for a few days. Rhys is sending Tristan and I east, to Montesere,” another pause, “Taryn will be accompanying us to speak with their court about preparations for another war.”

“Taryn?” Elain’s brow furrowed. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?”

Azriel shrugged, but his gaze turned interested, as if he sensed Elain knew something that he didn’t, “Why wouldn’t it be?”

“She dislikes high society. When we were girls there was a lot of… pressure on her and Nesta.” Elain had missed her debut. The year she had come of age was the year they lost their fortune. Sometimes she was jealous of the attention her sisters, mostly Nesta, had garnered for the family. Most of the time, she was thankful that the weight of expectation had avoided her shoulders in those formative years. Nesta was their mother’s little queen. She was the oldest, after all. Taryn had come a few minutes after her. But there was a unique kind of pressure there too, one Taryn could never live up to. If Nesta were to fail at securing an advantageous match, Taryn was essentially the spare heir. She was coached just as rigorously, waiting in the trenches to see if she’d be needed. 

“Feyre seems to think she’ll do well,” Azriel said, bracing his hands on the kitchen counter. His gaze drifted through the window, out, she imagined, toward the House of Wind. 

Elain pursed her lips. It didn’t really matter what she thought, the decisions Feyre made were always final. “I’m sure it will all go as planned.” 

That splitting feeling returned. Now was not the time. She looked around, suddenly antsy. Her trimmed fingernails found their way to the little cut on her finger. It had stopped bleeding after she let go of the thorns. She dug the crescent of her nail into the wound, pressing until the feeling banked into nothing. 

Azriel’s eyes widened. “Elain, I didn’t know you were bleeding.” His nose flared at the sudden tang in the air.

“It’s nothing, the roses got me earlier.”

He took her by the wrist, forcing her to show him the wound. He hummed, reaching for the weapon belt around his hips. There was a small roll of gauze tucked into it, and he unrolled a piece, ripping it off with his teeth.

She didn't realize she was trembling until he gripped her hand again, holding it still as he wrapped it with an almost painful gentleness.

He noticed her trembling. “Are you afraid of blood?”

Her throat tightened. “Yes,” she lied.

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Get out Get out Get out Get out, she screamed at him. Oh he would have it coming to him after this. 

Tristan’s voice, calm and steady despite it being hour three of training, washed across her mind. Every time Taryn thought she had managed to push him out, she would hear his deep, rumbling echo. It was like a riptide, the kind of surge that dragged you back and back, further out to sea no matter how desperately you paddled toward shore.

You need to relax, Taryn. You’re not focused.

She growled, then flinched at the sound of her own voice. She had been forced silent this whole time. She was finally getting somewhere. 

“Get- out,” the words came out choked and garbled, and then she was under again. A man was dancing with her, spinning her around the dance floor. She couldn’t keep up. She tripped, fell past his arms and to the floor. But there was no floor. Only water. Deep and cold, endless water. She reached out for someone, for something, but there was nothing. Her hands were empty… and then they weren’t. There was a knife in her hands. The image of the knife was warbled through the icy water, but the piercing metal was aimed for herself. She forced her eyes further open, fighting the weight of the water. Gone again. The village boys surfaced. Tomas and Isaac, Grayson and Wendell. Wendell, the butcher’s boy… Tomas’s voice echoed in her head. He doesn’t mind a little meat on the bones. She shivered, wrenching her gown closer to her body. It was soaked through with cold. Let me go, she yelled, but no sound came out.

I said focus, Taryn, you were so close. She tried to hold onto the sound, as if those words were a tether that would lead her back out.

Hands were wrenching her away, pulling her from the Cauldron with a roar. Nesta? Her mother looked down at her. Those hands tightened, pulling her away from another failed Gala. You are useless, a burden on your sister, her mother said. Do not speak to her again, I don't want her seen with you.

Let me go, she choked again, swallowing mouthfulls of cold air. She could see Nesta’s small face in the window, watching her as she curled up in the chilly brambles outside. Her body trembled, and she could not tell if it was real or just memory.

The patience and calm in Tristan’s voice was turning sour, I can’t. Not until you can push me out.

He was mad at her. Nesta was mad at her, mad at Taryn for ignoring her all night, her small fists clenched. Her mother was mad at her, angry that she could be so careless as to ruin the future of all of her sisters. She was mad. So mad at herself. And confused. She stared at herself, at her broken body reforged, the white nightgown sticking to every violated inch of her. 

Something fluttered inside her, clicking and whirring like an automaton. Light flared beneath her skin, arcing like lightning through the darkness. She saw threads of shadow, weary now, as if they too wanted to leave this place in her mind. 

Taryn extended her hand. It seemed her body knew what to do, even if her mind did not. The blue of her veins turned fluorescent, glimmering violet as pure power sluggishly swam from her heart to her fingertips. It sparked. It struck. 

She felt a low hiss thunder through her mind, but the voice gritted out, Good, again.

The hollow space between her breasts flickered and surged, churning like a storm. She made herself the eye. That whirling storm grew thick and heavy. Like a shield around her. A shield. She put all her energy into reinforcing it. The Cauldron had boiled when its icy heart was torn out. She pulled clouds from its heat, coiling mist around herself. She felt the shadowy threads again as they brushed up against the raging hurricane inside her, and each time, her lightning found its mark. 

The darkness retreated. Taryn was back in Windhaven, though she had never really left. She felt dizzy. Strong, rough hands gripped her before she hit the forest floor.

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Nesta ate in a silence that Cassian seemed determined to keep breaking.

“I already told you, I will not train in that miserable village.”

She watched him huff a breath, shovel more of the bland porridge into his mouth angrily. He was an animal, and so were all those other Illyrian brutes in Windhaven. Dawn crinkled the clouds, turning them iridescent and rosy. It was too early for this.

“Why can’t you be more like Taryn. Azriel tells me she’s doing well. So well, she’s been promoted,” Cassian said.

“Azriel,” she gritted her teeth, “must be a better teacher.” Not to mention, Taryn didn’t have a hundred pairs of eyes on her, calculating how weak she was at every interval. Nesta chanced another bite. She was starving, but she didn’t want Cassian to know that. 

“There are things, Nes, that you’d learn in lessons with me. You would be a hell of a lot more impressive if you could back all of your threats up.”

Tch- Nes. She eyed her fork, wondering how hard it would be to stab him with it.

“You could do that, too,” he said, reading the direction of her stare. “I could teach you how to turn anything into a weapon. Even a fork.”

She ignored him, taking another delicate bite of the fruit she had been mercifully provided. It made the sloppy porridge bearable. At the height of their poverty, the Archerons hadn’t been able to afford delicacies like strawberries. They couldn’t even afford salt.

Nesta chewed quietly. Suddenly, something clicked in her head. ‘So well, she’s been promoted.’ “What do you mean?” she demanded.

“Huh?” Cassian looked at her funny, and her jaw tightened.

“What do you mean Taryn has ‘been promoted’?” Something clawed at her insides, threatening to escape.

“No one told you? Taryn is going with Az and Tris out to Montesere for the week. Something about needing her as a statement piece for good intentions.”

“Who else would have fucking told me, Cassian. You’re the only one here. Feyre hasn’t visited, Elain-” she swallowed hard. “When does she leave?” This had Rhysand written all over it, and Feyre? Why would she let him put Taryn up to this?

Cassian glanced at the clock. “They left before dawn. It’s a long flight out there, and they’ll need breaks for their wings.”

Nesta tamped down a growl of anger. Why hadn’t Taryn said anything? She could have found Nesta, explained. That anger paused. Nesta still hadn’t spoken to her since… well, since their last fight. The Prison, The Hewn City. Everything the Inner Circle had planned to put Nesta through still pinched at her mind. Silence was not what she owed Taryn, but she couldn’t bring herself to say thank you just yet. The wound still pulsed, bleeding her out each time it reopened with her thoughts. 

“A week,” Nesta asked, drowning out the silent roaring in her mind.

Cassian nodded. He stuck another spoonful of porridge into his mouth, swallowing it down. “Why does it even matter to you, you haven’t been speaking to her.”

Nesta hadn’t realized they noticed. She had only imagined the tension to be between her and her sister. It wasn’t supposed to be a visible rift, only a quiet, temporary thing. “Why didn’t they ask me to do it? I could’ve-”

“Are you fucking kidding Nesta? You haven’t participated in anything we’ve asked of you for months. You won’t even pick up a training sword.” 

Nesta’s eyes narrowed. “Because I shouldn’t have to involve myself in your schemes at all.”

“Well, there’s your answer. No one wants to touch you with a ten foot pole. They trusted Taryn,” he added quietly, under his breath, “for some reason.”

She wanted to yell. She wanted to march upstairs and find Taryn. They could figure something out. She was gone. Nesta was stuck here, with Cassian, without even Azriel as a buffer, useless as he was in her arguments with Cassian. They were long gone. She needed a drink, a fuck, something. What if she got hurt, what if something went wrong? Nesta didn’t trust Tristan, not even Azriel. They were still Rhysand’s court, no matter how much they played nice. Taryn wasn’t cut out for this.

She felt her lungs seize, and she held a breath. The rapid beating of her heart rose with her panic. She needed a distraction. The door to the ten thousand steps was already open, the faelights in the hall dimmed to near darkness. Her boots scuffed on the stones as she approached, glancing behind her to make sure Cassian was staying put. This was her business. 

She began the descent.