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alltheworldsinmyhead · 4 years ago

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ON FEYSAND’S PLOTLINE IN ACOSF

!!!!MAJOR SPOILERS FOR THE WHOLE ACOSF!!!!

Let’s be honest for a while, okay?

ACOCF had potential to be SJM’s best book, if not for any other reason then because of the sheer idea of it. Coming-of-age, healing story of the most complex and polarizing character she has ever created set in the time of peace, away from the familiar setting (according to the later changed concept which still remains in the snippet at the end of ACOFAS), development of her arguably most feisty and angsty love story... It could be her absolute trumph. Even with the change to stick to Velaris instead of exploring the Illyrian culture of the Mountains and with the added conflict of the Mortal Queens and Koshei, it still could work quite well.

It didn’t. For many, many reasons, but the most important one, in my opinion, being the feysand pregnancy plot.

Nothing about this plotline made sense. Not a single thing. From start to finish, it was an absolute disaster from the character-writing POV, from the narration POV, from every single context of it. It broke the rules of real-life logic, it broke the rules of this fantasy world setting and it completely exposed that Rhysand, while not a bad guy, is a pretty terrible partner, even worse ruler and an absolutely terrible contender for the High King title.

Let’s break this whole mess down (and expect this post to be mammoth-sized. it’s not my fault, though, write to SJM if you have any complains):

1) Feyre, 21, decides to get pregnant, even though less than a year earlier, she expresses the delight with not being forced to bear children to her new mate and told him herself she wants to wait a while and enjoy her life with him. Feyre decides she wants a baby though and Rhysand goes along with it, even though he is aware how young Feyre is and how hard her life has been up until this point. He wants a baby too much to have an honest discussion with Feyre about it, to stop and wonder what is the reason for her sudden change of heart, to reassure her that they have a lot of time ahead of them and don’t need to rush. No. She mades a sudden decision to have a baby after A YEAR OF MARRIAGE and not much more of being turned fae, JUST AFTER having her whole world put upside down, having received a completely new title and responsibilities, surviving the wat and being mated. Great.

2) Feyre decides to get pregnant and Rhys goes along with it less than a year after the end of the bloody war. It is politically a delicate time, everyone is still not sure how the balance will shift, some countries don;t want to sign the peace treaty, etc. There are a lot of enemies and a lot of turmoil remaining. But sure. Let’s have a baby. Perfect time to add yet another target, another weakness that can be use by the Mortal Queens, Beron or whatever else with malicious intent towards the Night Court.

2) Feyre gets pregnant after approximately a year of trying. I know healthy people of reproductive age for whom it takes ages more than this. Fae’s pregnancies are rare af and precious and happen once in a blue moon, but ofc SJM broke the world’s rules for her darling Feyre. And again, for Kallas and Vivianne who are also expecting the baby, even though it has been a maximum of 3 years since they’ve mated. 3 years is also not a particularly long time to try to have a baby for those who have issues with their reproductive systems like Fae women. Thank you, next.

3) Rhys has unprotected sex with Feyre in her Illyrian form when she conceives, even though he knows full well having a winged baby would kill her. He does it anyway, for shits and giggles apparently. They probably have sex in the sky above Velaris, for all we know.

4) The baby has wings. Now, the whole explanation with Illyrian wings being bony (bc they resemble bat wings) and Seraphin ones being more flexible (bc they resemble bird ones) is so insanely stupid that it takes around 3 seconds to wikipedia this shit and find out it’s exactly the opposite. But okay, the baby has wings and Feyre will die while giving birth, along with the baby. Madja forbids Feyre from turning into an Illyrian to carry the pregnancy because it MIGHT hurt the baby. Now, remember, Feyre conceived while in Illyrian form and then turned into High Fae. The baby survived it just fine. The baby MIGHT be hurt by Feyre turning .... but it will FOR SURE die if she stays High Fae and Feyre will too. Idk about you, but I would take the risk of MIGHT instead of FOR SURE. Especially when she is already in labour and dying. Cauldron or Nesta or idk who alters Feyre’s pelvis after the baby is cut out of her for no apparent reason but to allow feysand to make exactly the same mistakes later on. How convinient. And Nesta also alters her own pelvis bc god forbid she won’t be able give Cassian babies like the little useful mate she is now. She should’ve probably done it with Elain too, just in case she decides to fuck Az in the future, because fuck consequences and fuck the stakes in the story that make the readers actually CARE about characters bc they know the author may actually kill them and not save their life every fucking time.

5) I don’t even want to comment on the fact Rhys hid the true danger of this pregnancy for Feyre and their family went along with it. It is absolutely disgusting. And Nesta telling her and that being condemned as the act of the ultimate cruelty which is a final straw to break her self-loathing back.... is abhorrent. It made my sick, actually, phisically sick. There is no justification for it. No at all. And the fact that they did not even consider abortion sends a message that I really don’t want to think too much about it. Feyre was 2 months along when they learned the baby is winged. 2 months. 8 weeks. It wasn’t a baby yet, let’s be honest. They could’ve at least discussed it. She - oh my god, I cannot believe SJM wrote it this way, I’m gonna be sick.

6) For the entirety of Feyre’s pregnancy, they have no plan to really help her. Labour plan? Haven’t heard if it. They have money and power and access to the healers of the whole land. And did not figure out how to stop her from bleeding out after a fucking C-section. THIS WORLD HAS MAGIC AND THEY COULDN’T STOP HER FROM BLEEDING OUT AFTER A FUCKING C-SECTION. Didn’t even ask Thesan, the High Lord of Healing, to be present. Cassian had guts hanging out of his stomach and survived. Az was fucking slashed apart in Hybern and survived. But yeah, Feyre was on a brink of death after a C-section. Great, Sarah. Keep it up. Let’s force the thought into young girls’ heads that labour is the most lethal thing ever, why not.

7) Also, for the entirety of Feyre’s pregnancy, Rhys keeps quiet about this idiotic bargain. He, as far as we know, doesn’t make any plans for the moment when him and Feyre and possibly their baby are dead. If they died and baby survived.. who would take care of it? Does Rhys have a conversation with his family about it? NAH. Doesn’t write any sort of plan how to keep the Court going, doesn’t inform even the closest of his co-workers how they should proceed to act after he’s gone and his and Feyre’s power go to god-knows-who. Their deaths would mean a sure chaos for the weakend and fragile Prythian and the Night Court especially and yet nor Rhys nor Feyre make any sort of preparations for it. Rhys doesn’t tell his brothers or Mor or HIS SECOND IN COMMAND they will all soon have to somehow manage without him. He was about to just leave them to their own devices and told them in the last. possible. moment.

And this man - this man is, according to Amren, the best candidate to handle the whole country? To unite it? This fool who makes idiotic bargains, who thinks first about his cock and his own selfish desires and considers his subjects and his responsibilities as a High Lord last and least important of all? Who has so much trust in his wife, in his High Lady, the mother of his son that he doesn’t tell her she will almost surely die on a birthing bed because it MAY UPSET HER?

This plotline was the straw that broke my back. ACOTAR, at it’s heart has always been a ya fantasy with added ‘spice’ and I was willing to bend my critical-thinking skills in many cases and forget and forgive many smaller idiotic issues in this series. But this? It is not idiotic. It is massive and stupid to the point when it becomes insulting to the reader. It was a plot straight out of a bad fanfic, not something that should be in a published book written by someone who writes for a living. You could even argue that Twilight has handled this toxic trope better. I have wasted my money on this book and thinking about it will always be painful for me. So yeah.

ACOSF could be great. Ended up quite pathetic.

#acosf #acosf spoilers #a court of silver flames #rhysand #feysand

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smalltowndetective · 4 years ago

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Heart Torn Apart

16th request! I hope you guys enjoy!

And thank you to @bigfan-fanfic for letting me use your detective! Hopefully I did Rhys justice! :D

Ao3 Link (All Requests can be found here)

Title: Heart Torn Apart

Paring: LT (Adam and Nate) and Rhys (bigfan-fanfic’s detective)

Words: 1.2k

Notes: I am still very new to writing the LT, so hopefully all it reads well!

Prompt: #24- “You’re trembling”

The circumstances that Rhys had found himself in now were quite literally the last thing he would ever expect to be in.

Unit Bravo’s arrival was never supposed to change his life this much, but it had anyway, and sometimes, he was not sure how he was supposed to deal with it all.

Finding out about the supernatural had been hard to take on its own, the disbelief that took a while to completely wear away, but this was different, his mind feeling as though it was at war with itself and nothing could calm it.

He had first had connected with Adam, if you could call it that. The two had then had seen to almost drawn together by their rule following, serious nature, and it had been something that had intrigued him. The common ground, what he knew, starting a sort of kinship to him.

But then there was Nate. Nate who made Rhys relax around him, as if he could tell him anything at all and he’d listen. They may have been opposites in every single way, but there was something endearing about him. As if he made him just feel normal, with a normal relationship that made him smile with no mess of complicated feelings and denial at all.

The choice that he needed to make should have been easy, right in front of him even. Chose the person that had no issues being with him, honestly and openness in their feelings, everything he could have ever wanted.

And yet, when the time had come to make that choice? He had declined Nate’s offer, at least for the moment at hand, with everything unresolved with him and Adam, it would just be unfair to him to do so.

Regardless with that being what he was telling himself, so many times that it ran on repeat in his mind, he also seemed to go back to one thing, a truth that Rhys knew but would feel way better off knowing.

You’re doing this because you don’t want to hurt him.

Even if Adam would never admit it aloud, it was not hard to see how much this all affecting him, from the pricks of sad glances and the way he would quickly turn away whenever he and Nate were next to each other, and he could only imagine it would be worse if they made it official.

Because he did feel something for him, careful, quiet feelings that he had kept to himself, knowing how he would react if he spoke too much.

But at the same time, he had those feelings for Nate as well, they were just more open, since they were allowed to be, he always seeming to be able to draw it out of Rhys without even trying.

This left him with one cold truth however, and it was becoming more then he would ever be able to handle, feeling like he was drowning in the roughest ocean, no hand ever reaching out to help him.

He had feelings for both of them.

Strong, deep feelings, more then he had ever felt for anyone else.

And he was almost disgusted with himself for it. It was like he was asking to make everything more complicated than it already was.

Rhys could feel the tension in the room, even if Nate had not seemed to have noticed it yet. It was like he was watching a friendship built on centuries bend under the pressure, and he was starting to fear that he was watching it break, all because of him.

What the hell am I supposed to do with that?

There was a part of him, a large part in fact, that was begging him to bow out of all this, let the feelings die there, never to be followed up upon.

But in maybe some sense of morbid curiosity or just needing to know the resolution, he pushed on with anyway, even if knowing that the hurt it would cause, a fact that scared him more than anything. That this would finally one day finally all make sense.

That day, however, did not seem to be anywhere in sight, at least today.

In was the same story whenever he and Adam were around each other. They may have been in the same room, but they may have been countries apart.

There was that longing in the air, the desire to reach out and figure out exactly what that was, but that was never resolved, as if just staring at each other would help show them the answers.

That had not worked so far, however. And perhaps today, he was feeling bolder, as if had sat inside him for too long and he wanted to say something.

And something he did say.

“Do you remember what you said to me after just before you passed out?”

The question had seemed to catch Adam completely off guard, and he sputtered out a cough in response to that, “What?”

“After the mission with the trappers?”, Rhys pressed, “Or did you already forget all about it?”

The words that he had told him was just another reason why he had not started a relationship with Nate, what he spent some nights up late thinking about.

“I wish… it was only me”

Perhaps getting an explanation to them would finally give him some closure, allowing him to decide which way to move forward.

Adam had seemed to have been struck speechless by that, turning his head away from him, somehow more tense than he had ever seen him, but the hint of a slump in his shoulders, slightly moving as if he could not stand in the same place for too long.

His next words had seemed to blurt out of his mouth before he could stop them.

“Are you trembling?”

Before Adam was forced to answer that, looking as though he wanted to, but was unsure on what to say, the door to his office opened, revealing Nate.

He glanced over the scene of the two of them, and it was then that Rhys had realized just how close he had gotten to Adam, only now inches away, and he immediately moved away from him, surprised that Adam was not the one that moved first.

The tension in the room was almost suffocating him, and there was no way that Nate did not notice it, even if he would rather act like he did not.

“Is everything alright?”, Nate finally asked, almost whispering it, as if they were not supposed to hear it. For just a second, he looked like he had seen a ghost, fear seeming to be spilling off again, but it was gone the next moment to be replaced by a gentle smile.

Rhys looked back at Adam, who looked like he wanted to be absolutely anywhere else, and decided that he would have to be the one who answered for the two of the them, “Yes, everything’s fine”

“Good”, he replied, a light chuckle on his lips, but almost seeming to be one born out of uncomfortableness then anything else, “Wouldn’t want there to be any issues between you two”

He gave Nate a half nod in response, trying to not let his brain settle on his words too much, even if they seemed to ring in his ears after he said them, and he gently pushed by him out the door, leaving the two of them in the wake of what happened, no longer able to deal with it himself.

And the more this happens, I’m not sure how much longer I can take it.

#the wayhaven chronicles #wayhaven chronicles #twc #rhys balfour #twc love triangle #adam du mortain #nate sewell #smalltowndetective's wayhaven christmas gifts 2020 #thank you for the request!#you're the best!

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lantur · 5 years ago

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if you were mine - part three

summary: Riza has been working on the unit for close to a year when she starts to wonder whether Colonel Mustang’s interest in her is more than professional.

rated: t | words: 5852

part three of four

read on ao3

Thursday feels like it drags on at work. Riza’s eyes feel unusually heavy, her shoulders ache, and there’s a familiar, dull pain in her temples and behind her eyes.

One look at her desk calendar tells her why that is, and she breathes a small sigh. She’ll be in for an unpleasant weekend.

Riza stops by the corner store after work to buy her usual supplies. Chamomile tea, chocolate, cocoa powder and milk for making hot chocolate, stew meat, and lentils. For some reason, she always craves stew at this time of the month. At the last minute, she remembers that she needs some shampoo and conditioner as well, and tosses a bottle of each into her basket. She goes through it so much faster now that her hair is so long. She still hasn’t gotten used to that.

Roy comes over a few hours after she gets home, bearing a paper grocery bag with almost identical contents to hers. There’s no shampoo and conditioner, but there is a copy of The Best Shot at Success, the recently released autobiography of Ella Schultz, the first female officer in the Amestris military. Riza hugs him tight, and they spend a relaxing night curled up on her sofa, talking quietly.

She falls asleep in his arms, but wakes up alone in her bed, neatly tucked in. Hayate lies near her feet, loyally keeping watch over her.

That morning dawns without event - a surprise. The work day is busy, with more than enough to occupy her mind. Still, as the day wears on, she grows more uneasy.

“Is everything okay, Lieutenant?” Colonel Mustang asks her, at one point. “You seem a little preoccupied today.”

“I’m just concerned about the Abitz murder, sir,” Riza replies. That is part of the truth, after all. “About the possibility you raised that it might be connected to the Bangert incident in January.”

Everyone else is in the office with them, and Breda jumps in with a theory, which thankfully distracts the Colonel.

That evening, Riza walks Hayate in the park, lost in thought. She tries to relax for the rest of the night with the book Roy had bought her, but the attempt isn’t very successful. Half an hour from midnight, she’s pacing her apartment.

“Why hasn’t it started yet?” she asks Hayate. Her faithful friend tilts his head, whining softly in the back of his throat. It’s always started on Thursday afternoon or Thursday evening. Always.

She wants to call Roy or Rebecca, the two people on this earth she can go to with anything, but she can’t. Not yet. Saying all of this to another person will make her fears real, and she isn’t ready for that yet.

“Maybe it’s just stress,” Riza says, but she doesn’t believe it, even as she says it. Even during the year she had spent in Ishval, when she had been a hollow, traumatized shell of a human being, her cycle had been as regular as clockwork.

Riza sits on the sofa, trying to think through the situation with the calm logic that is second nature to her. She is twenty-seven; far too young for her cycle to stop or change. Rebecca once mentioned that her mother had gone through menopause early, in her late thirties, but that’s a decade away yet.

She’s heard that women can miss their periods if they’ve lost weight, or are very active. She’s no more or less active than she has always been, and her clothes fit the same as they always have - not any looser. But they’re not any tighter, either, which should rule out the fear she can’t even verbalize in the privacy of her own mind.

Still, it takes her hours to fall asleep.

Riza spends Saturday with Rebecca, and manages to act normally enough that Rebecca doesn’t seem suspicious of anything amiss.

She wakes up late on Sunday morning, a leaden feeling in her stomach. Even without having to go to the bathroom, she knows that her period hasn’t started yet.

“Fuck,” Riza says softly, staring at the ceiling.

She can’t bring herself to eat breakfast. Her stomach rebels at the thought - god, her stomach actually rebels at the thought. Riza sobs once, standing in front of the stove, and immediately presses her hand to her mouth, as if she could stuff the sound back inside her. Now isn’t the time for panic or for her emotions to take over. Now is the time for calm detachment and action.

She tilts her head back and breathes deeply, in and out, until her composure returns and she’s able to take Hayate for a walk.

After coming home to drop Hayate off, Riza sits on the sofa for several minutes, resting her palms against her knees, trying to ground herself. Then, she rises and walks to the pay phone on the far east side of Trettach Park. This particular pay phone and the area around it are almost always deserted.

She enters the booth, drops the coins in, picks up the phone, and dials a number with a Central area code.

The line is picked up after the fifth ring. “Hello?”

The gruff voice is immediately recognizable. “Hello, Madame Christmas,” Riza says. “It’s Elizabeth. How are you?”

“Ah, Elizabeth.” She can hear the smile in Chris Mustang’s voice. “How many times do I have to tell you that you should call me Chris?”

“At least one more, Madame.”

“Stubborn girl. Well, that’s why you suit Rhys so well. Birds of a feather.” Chris sighs. “How’s he doing? Staying out of trouble, I hope?”

The mention of Roy makes Riza swallow over her suddenly dry throat. “Yes, for now.”

“And you?”

Riza winds the cord of the phone around her finger. “Actually, that’s why I called,” she says. “I haven’t been feeling well lately.”

There’s a brief pause on the other end, and Riza knows that Chris has understood her meaning.

“I see,” Chris says carefully. “What’s wrong?”

“Headaches, back pain, fatigue. And I’m late, which never happens.” Riza looks down at the floor. “I had a little nausea this morning. Though that could have been from nerves.”

There’s another, longer pause. “Those are all early signs,” Chris says. Her voice is softer, sympathetic.

Her stomach plummets, and Riza rests her hand against the wall to steady herself. “But how?” she asks. “How could this have happened? I’ve been as reliable with my tea as I always have. I’ve never missed a day.”

Chris sighs. “There can be inconsistencies, from batch to batch,” she says. “Issues with quality control. Some of the people who source it will mix in powdered aster to add bulk. It’s indistinguishable from Queen Anne’s Lace in color, odor, and taste. And even pure Queen Anne’s grows stale, over time, and loses effectiveness. Some apothecaries aren’t reliable at taking older batches off the shelves when they should.”

Riza closes her eyes, fighting the wave of dizziness that washes over her, and the panic. “Chris,” she says hoarsely. She wants to sink to the ground. “What am I going to do? I can’t - we can’t--”

“Breathe, Elizabeth,” Chris instructs. “Take four deep breaths. Stay with me.”

Riza breathes in, out, in, out, shakily. Her hands are trembling so hard she can barely hold onto the phone. “Okay,” she says. She trusts Chris. Chris has guided probably a hundred other women through what she is going through now. “I’m here.”

“The one good thing about this is that you caught it early,” Chris says. “And that is a very good thing. There’s no need for any back alley operations that will put you in danger.”

Riza presses a hand to her mouth. “Really?”

“Yes. It’s a matter of two herbal tinctures, one of crocus sativus and one of mesua ferrea.”

“Hold on,” Riza says faintly, bending down and searching for the notebook that she always keeps in her shoulder bag. “I need to…”

“Don’t worry about writing these down,” Chris says at once. “After what happened with the Queen Anne’s, I’m not trusting any apothecary in East City to handle this. I’ll brew some myself and I’ll send one of my couriers over. She’ll bring my written instructions on how to take them, as well as detailed notes of exactly what you can expect after you do. She’ll arrive tomorrow morning by eight.”

“Thank you,” Riza whispers, her eyes stinging. “Thank you so much.”

“Don’t thank me. You’re family, and I look out for family.” Chris heaves a long sigh. “I’m sorry,” she says. “That it has to be this way.”

Riza thinks back to their last visit to Central, to Chris’s teasing Roy about when they would get married and give her a grandchild to spoil, because she wasn’t getting any younger, you know. She nods mutely, and then remembers Chris can’t see her. “I am, too,” she says, and her voice cracks.

“Have you told Rhys?”

“Not yet,” Riza says. The thought brings back the feeling of wanting to throw up.

“Tell him,” Chris advises. “I know how strong you are, but this is too much of a burden for even you to shoulder alone.”

“I will.” Riza wipes her eyes. “Thank you.”

“Stay strong, Elizabeth. Take care. I’ll call you to check in after a few days.”

Riza walks home, feeling dazed. Hayate greets her at the door, and she sinks to her knees and wraps her arms around his neck, burying her face in his fur.

She isn’t sure how long she stays like that. She doesn’t want it to - she wants to keep it at a safe distance, removed - but it sinks in, slowly, inexorably.

She is pregnant, and tomorrow, she won’t be.

The strain of the morning exhausts her. Riza sleeps on the sofa for an hour, wakes, forces herself to choke down some buttered toast. She makes the second of the three phone calls she has to make today, and manages to avoid breaking down into tears on the phone.

Then she makes the third call. She reaches Roy on his office line, because Sundays are his designated day to finish as much work as he needs to, while having the privacy of East City Command entirely to himself. On Sundays, there’s no need to maintain any of the farce of incompetence and lazy, lackadaisical attitude that has been his mainstay for so many years.

“Hello, Colonel,” Riza says, when he picks up. To her relief, her voice is calm and even. “I’m sorry to bother you at work.”

She hears the rustle of paperwork being set down. “It’s never a bother to hear from you, Lieutenant,” Roy says. “What’s going on?”

“I have an idea about the recent murders of former State Alchemists that I’d prefer not to share over the phone. Would you mind stopping by after you’re finished?”

“I’ll be there in an hour,” Roy says at once. “Would you like me to bring any of the evidence files?”

“That won’t be necessary, sir. Thank you. I’ll see you soon.”

Cleaning her guns has always been a calming ritual. Gathering the supplies - cleaning solvent, gun oil, bore brush, patch holder and patches, cleaning rod, flashlight, cleaning brush, soft cloths for polishing. Unloading, disassembling, scrubbing and lubricating the barrel and the action, putting it all back together again, polishing the metal until it gleams lovely, subtle gray and burnished silver.

Riza cleans three of her guns and she’s just finished with putting her supplies away when she hears the key turn in the lock. Roy steps inside, and his smile at seeing her almost instantly fades into an expression of concern. “Riza,” he says, crossing over to the sofa and taking her into his arms. “What’s wrong?”

She bites back the instinctive response, to deny that anything is wrong; to claim that everything is fine. It is her job to protect Roy, and for an instant, Riza debates lying, telling him that there’s nothing amiss or just that she’s sick, and sending him away. She can bear this burden on her own, and protect him from it. Why should both of them suffer?

But something inside her warns her that she’ll regret that if she does, and Riza takes a deep breath, trying to steady herself. She glances at him for a second, and her gaze slides away. She can’t look at him. She can’t. She stares at the potted plant on the coffee table instead. “I’m pregnant,” she says.

The words fall, heavy, between them.

Roy blinks, looking stunned, like she had just struck him. Riza sees the panic begin to dawn in his eyes, then, the horror, the realization of what this means for them. It makes her stomach turn. Nobody ever wants to see panic and horror in the person they love’s eyes, and know they are the cause of it.

“I’m not keeping it, of course,” she continues. Her voice is remote, calm, unrecognizable even to herself. “I called your aunt from a pay phone this morning. She’s sending a couple of tinctures for me to take, and they should get here by tomorrow morning. It’s early enough that there’s no need for a surgical procedure.”

The expression of relief that flits across his face is gone in an instant, replaced by genuine concern, but it’s enough to gut her.

“Riza,” Roy says, reaching out to her, taking her hands. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

She doesn’t reply. She has no strength to speak.

Roy draws her into his arms, holds her close and so tightly it almost hurts, strokes her hair. Riza can feel his ragged breaths against her body, and she screws her eyes shut. She hasn’t wanted to break down so badly in years.

“It has to be done,” she says, her voice muffled by his shoulder, and she is proud that her voice remains steady. “Our careers - your ambition… We have to do this.”

Roy strokes her cheek. He is silent for a long while. It is a wild, ridiculous thought, but Riza imagines him saying Don’t, and her heart breaks.

“Thank you,” he whispers, at last. His voice cracks.

Riza bites the inside of her cheek and nods.

“If you wait to take the tinctures until tomorrow evening, I can be here with you,” Roy says, pulling back and looking into her eyes. “I don’t want you to be alone.”

“I won’t be.” Riza wraps her arms around herself. “I called Rebecca earlier. She’s taking the next train over from her parents’ place. And don’t worry - she doesn’t know anything except for the fact that my friend Elizabeth has fallen ill, but will make a full recovery after a course of some antibiotics.”

She hadn’t meant the words to sound bitter, genuinely wanting to assuage the question on his mind, but Roy slumps, rubbing the back of his neck. He takes it for a rebuke, and takes it without a word of denial. “Thank you,” he says again, quietly. “And I’m sorry.”

“It’s the right decision,” Riza repeats. “I know that.” And if she says it out loud enough, maybe that will lessen the knot in her chest, relieve the pit in her stomach and the weight pressing down on her shoulders.

Roy looks at her, concerned, and he opens his mouth to speak, but at that moment there’s nothing Riza wants more than to be alone. Far away from here. No, just far away from him. She’s never felt that way before.

“You should go,” she says, standing up.

He stays put. “I don’t want you to be by yourself,” he repeats.

There’s so much guilt written on him. She hasn’t seen him like this since Ishval. Even now, Riza worries for him, and makes herself smile a small smile. “I’m not alone,” she says, gesturing to Hayate, who rises from his spot near the window and trots to her side. “Besides, the last thing you want is for Rebecca to walk in on you here.”

“Oh. Right.” Roy finally stands, a little unsteady on his feet. “I’ll come over tomorrow after work, to check in.”

She doesn’t particularly want that; can’t imagine how she will face him, but Riza inclines her head anyway.

Roy steps close and cups her face in his hands, kisses her brow with such tenderness. Riza’s hand closes in the fabric of his shirt, holding on for a moment. There’s so much she wants to say, but she can’t.

She lets go, like she will tomorrow.

Roy leaves, looking back over his shoulder worriedly the whole time, as if he’s afraid she will combust.

Riza sinks back into her sofa and holds her arms out to Hayate. He bounds up beside her immediately, curling in her lap, and she strokes his soft, warm fur, numb.

She must have drifted off again, weary from this hellish day. When she wakes, she immediately realizes that she and Hayate aren’t alone on the sofa anymore. Rebecca is sitting beside her, a book open on her lap, two cups of tea on the coffee table in front of them. She smiles softly. “Hey, Ri.”

Riza leans into her, wrapping her arms around her friend in a rare moment of expressiveness. “Thanks for coming,” she murmurs. “I owe you.”

Rebecca strokes her hair, and then offers her the cup of tea. “You don’t. This is what friends are for.”

They pull back and look each other in the eye. “He’s not forcing you to do this, is he?” Rebecca asks at last, breaking the silence.

The bluntness of the question startles Riza, and she almost drops her tea. “What?”

“Come on, Riza,” Rebecca says softly. “He’s your commanding officer. Is he--”

She wants to deny it, she should, but she respects her friend too much to lie to her face. Rebecca deserves better than that. Riza shakes her head. “No,” she says. “I… I made the call before I even told him.”

“Are you sure this is what you want to do?”

“It’s what I have to do,” Riza repeats, for what feels like the hundredth time, out loud and in her mind, that day. “For both of us.”

Rebecca sighs. “You don’t think there’s a way to keep it, without revealing who the father is?”

“No.” Riza stares into her teacup. “People would talk, and they would assume it’s him. It would end my career, and jeopardize his as well. And I can’t do that.”

“Fuck his career," Rebecca mutters under her breath. "Adoption?” she suggests, though she sounds unconvinced.

“I admire women who can make that choice, but carrying this pregnancy and holding our…” - Riza chokes - “Our child in my arms, and giving it to someone else to love? I know I can get through this, but I don’t think I could survive that.”

Riza turns away, unable to face the sympathy on Rebecca’s face. “It’s for the best,” she repeats. “The pain will be temporary.” And she remembers her father tattooing the Flame Alchemy array onto her back, and the agony of Roy burning away parts of it.

The physical pain will be temporary. She has heard about the cramps, the bleeding, that can occur with abortifacients. But the rest of it, the grief, the emotional pain - she will carry that with her, just like Ishval.

Rebecca takes her hand. “I’ll be here for you,” she says bracingly, reading her mind. “You’ll get through this, just like you did the rest. Now, I’m going to go make us something to eat.”

Riza’s stomach rebels at the thought. “Thanks, but I’m not hungry right now.”

Rebecca holds a hand up. “Not up for discussion. Dinner, then sleep. You need to keep your strength up.”

Riza can’t argue with that.

Riza had thought that sleep would be difficult in coming, but she is so weary emotionally that she succumbs just after dinner with Rebecca. She dreams of Ishval, and wakes up with tears in her eyes. She wonders if this is penance.

The morning has a surreal, dreamlike quality to it. Rebecca receives Madame Christmas’s courier at eight, and the two of them open the paper bag and look over the tinctures inside, and the enclosed letter. Riza reads the letter twice, taking in the instructions and the warnings. The tinctures have to be drunk consecutively. There will be cramping, and the bleeding will start one to four hours after taking the second of the two tinctures. There might be blood clots that could be “up to the size of a lemon.”

Rebecca takes Riza’s arm, and she holds on to it, grateful for the stability and gravity of Rebecca on one side of her and Hayate sitting next to her.

“Come on,” Riza says, finally. Her throat aches. “Let’s do this.”

They sit on the bathroom floor together. Rebecca holds a glass of water, and Riza holds the two tinctures of amber liquid. They look so innocuous.

“It’s not too late,” Rebecca says. “If you change your mind, know that I will do anything to support you. I have family connections in the civilian sector that can help you find another job.”

Riza takes her hand and squeezes it. “I know. Thank you.”

She is scared. It hurts to admit it, and it’s stupid, because this is the natural consequence of their actions, but she is scared. And as much as she had wanted him far away last night, right now, she wishes Roy were by her side.

Both tinctures taste bitter on their way down.

Roy goes straight to the liquor store after leaving Riza’s apartment.

He pastes a bright smile on his face the moment before he steps inside, and greets the employees cheerfully. He chats with them as he grabs a bottle of vodka, then whiskey, and then rum. He is stocking up for a party tonight, a gathering of old friends from his academy days. He can’t wait. It’s been more than a year since they last got together.

The smile falls off Roy’s face as soon as he leaves the store. He wants nothing more than to break open one of the bottles on the walk to his house, but he stops himself. Public intoxication is conduct unbecoming of an officer. Just like carrying on a secret affair with one’s subordinate and forcing her to face the consequences on her own.

Roy opens the bottle of vodka as soon as he’s back in his dark, small apartment. He has three gulps down, burning his chest like fire, by the time he collapses on the sofa, head in his hands.

The next day is hell.

Drunk for most of the night, raging hangover and trying to hide it, three hours of sleep, painfully hot shower to attempt to wash the smell of liquor off of him before coming into work, hell.

“Where’s Hawkeye?” Havoc asks, as soon as they’re all (not all) in the office. Riza’s absence is conspicuous; Roy feels it like one of his senses had suddenly vanished.

Falman scratches his head. “Don’t think I’ve ever seen her miss a day before.”

Roy stares down at his paperwork and tries not to flinch.

“Out sick,” Fuery replies, looking up from his radio. “She left a message. Said she should be back by mid-week.”

“Must be a hell of a cold,” Breda says. “Let’s order a soup delivery from Harmann’s to her place over lunch.”

Roy spends the day staring at his paperwork and getting nothing significant done. His head pounds. Every other moment he finds himself thinking about how Riza is doing.

He knows more about medical abortions than the average person, from listening to his aunt and the ladies at the bar. He knows more than he wants to. The painful cramps, clots, nausea, dizziness. And he remembers hearing about the infection that had sent Vanessa to the hospital in the middle of the night and nearly killed her.

He was supposed to protect Riza. She is the most important person in his world. He was supposed to protect her, not put her in one of the worst positions of her life, to the point of putting her health in danger. He hasn’t failed so colosally since Ishval. The shame makes Roy’s throat close up and his face burn.

He let her down. Riza has shown him nothing but loyalty, devotion, compassion, empathy, and love, for all these years, and he has repaid it like this. With a secret abortion alone at home. He can’t even be by her side today, because then they’d be out of work at the same time. Then people would talk, rumors would spread, and that would sabotage their careers and his ambition.

Roy rubs his eyes and curses himself for selfish garbage. He asks himself, for the tenth time since the last evening, if his ambition is worth it.

At least Riza isn’t completely alone, he remembers belatedly. Rebecca is with her. That is a small comfort. And he can go see her as soon as he leaves work (but after night falls and the city streets begin to empty out, because nobody needs to see him visiting his adjutant’s apartment alone, because then people would talk, rumors would spread…)

The thought of seeing Riza makes Roy’s chest tighten with anxiety. He wants to see her, he needs to see her - your selfish wants and needs are what got Riza into this situation in the first place, he reminds himself brutally - and at the same time, something in him shrinks back from the thought. He remembers the way she had looked at him last night, removed and distant. Riza has never looked at him like that before.

What if she hates him now? What if she’ll never be able to look at him again without remembering the pain he has put her through?

His palms are sweating. Roy wipes them against his chair, trying to still the slight tremble to them.

He can’t remember the last time he felt so sickeningly, viscerally anxious. The rest of the hours drag by. One by one, the rest of the team leaves for the evening.

Roy locks up the office once they have all gone. Stops in the locker room, changes out of his uniform, washes his face, dry heaves over the sink a few times.

He goes to Bosque’s after leaving and picks up food for Riza. It’s blissfully dark by then. A blessing, considering how badly the lights and sunshine have made his head pound all day. He’s walking up the stairs, lost in thought, and almost runs into someone coming down.

She is short, dark-haired, and looks just as preoccupied as he had been. They recognize one another the instant they lock eyes.

“Catalina,” Roy manages, inclining his head, suppressing the immediate, instinctive reaction of fuck, this is bad.

Rebecca’s eyes narrow. “Scumbag,” she says, and shoulders past him, continuing down the stairs.

Roy stares, taken aback. Before she can get too far, he reaches out, grabbing her by the arm. “Wait,” he says, too loudly. “How is she?”

Rebecca shakes him off. “Like you ca--”

“Please,” Roy interrupts. In any other time, he would have been incensed, but now, all he feels is weariness and worry.

“She’s okay,” Rebecca says at last, refusing to make eye contact with him. “It went as well as can be expected. No sign of fever or complications.”

Roy closes his eyes, and all the breath leaves his body in a long sigh. “Thank you,” he says. “For being there when I couldn’t.”

Rebecca glares at him and then whirls around, leaving without another word.

Roy proceeds upstairs, unlocking the door with some trepidation. “Riza?” he calls, stepping inside.

Hayate yips, but doesn’t rise from his spot on the sofa, next to Riza. She sits there, wrapped in a blanket, the book he had given her on her lap, cup of tea in her hand. She looks at him, and her grasp on the teacup seems to tighten. “Hey,” she says quietly.

Her face is pale, and there are dark circles under her eyes. She looks drawn, exhausted.

Roy drops the bag of food on the floor and walks over to her, enfolding her in his arms without a word. There is so much he wants to say, so much that he had planned to say during those hours of work, and now, he can’t bring himself to speak.

“How are you feeling?” he manages, at last.

“I’m okay,” Riza says, drawing away from him, resting her hands on Hayate again. His fur warms her hands so well. She’s felt cold most of the day. “Still a bit...sore. But the worst of it has been over for hours.”

“I’m glad,” Roy says, pulling in a ragged breath, and Riza looks at him out of the corner of her eye, through her bangs. Even now, the sight makes her aching shoulders tighten a little further out of worry. He looks as awful as she’s ever seen him, and he smells faintly of alcohol. He had made the effort to shave, but there’s a fresh cut on his cheek.

It’s clear that he hasn’t taken this well. Or in stride. She never likes to see him agitated, let alone deeply disturbed like this, but it gives Riza a sense of perverse reassurance. That at least she isn’t the only one suffering. The thought makes her feel guilty a heartbeat after she has it.

“I’m so sorry,” Roy whispers. He takes her hand, holds it tightly, stares at the coffee table.

“Don’t be,” Riza makes herself say, because that is the right response. “This wasn’t your fault. It was both of us.”

Roy turns and looks at her with that intense, penetrating stare she knows so well, the one that can root anyone to the floor and cause any thought of untruths to wither and die. “Are you all right?” he asks, and that look on his face prevents her from her first, instinctive response. “I��ve always counted on you to be honest with me. Please don’t stop now. Don’t feel that you have to hold back in order to spare me anything.”

That sincerity, the plea, cuts deep. Riza meets his gaze. “I know this is what I had to do,” she says carefully, willing herself to keep her voice steady. “What we had to do. I kept - keep - telling myself that. And you. And Rebecca. I kept thinking that, but…”

She trails off, suddenly unable to say another word.

“Oh, Riza,” Roy whispers, sounding anguished, and he puts his hand on her shoulder.

Riza folds into herself, wrapping her arms around her stomach, and breaks down sobbing. Roy pulls her into him, holding her tightly as she weeps, curling against him, painful, gasping for air, gut-wrenching sobs, like she hasn’t since her mother died and then Ishval. As hard as she tries, she can’t stop. “I wanted it,” she cries. “I know it’s stupid, but I wanted it, so badly, and...and--”

“It’s not stupid,” Roy says hoarsely. She can feel the moisture in her hair and knows that he is crying too.

She hadn’t cried when the cramps had wracked her body, and hadn’t cried when the bleeding had started. She had put herself into a stoic daze, like she had so many times before. Now, it’s like a dam has broken. Riza cries for what feels like hours, until her ribs and eyes ache and she can barely breathe.

Roy holds her the entire time, stroking her hair, wiping her face with the corners of her blanket. When her tears finally subside, he tilts her face up to his with a gentle pressure of fingers on his chin, and Riza looks up into his reddened eyes.

“Next time, it will be different,” Roy says quietly. “I promise you that.”

His voice is deadly serious, the way it had been when he had vowed to become Fuhrer. The words take a moment to sink in, and they make her eyes burn all over again. Riza nods wordlessly.

Roy reaches out and tucks a lock of stray hair behind her ear. Then he looks at her, a searching, tentative gaze. He leans forward, slowly, like he’s never done before, clearly telegraphing the movement, and kisses her softly on the lips.

Riza kisses him back, like she has a thousand times before. But this time, instead of feeling like coming home, like comfort, it hurts. As viscerally as it had when he had burned the skin on her back so long ago.

She jerks away instinctively, automatically. Roy blinks at her, startled, and then turns red. “I’m sorry,” he says hastily. He reaches toward her, and then hesitates, pulling his hands back, as if remembering himself. “I shouldn’t have just--”

Riza touches his knee, feeling his leg twitch beneath her hand. “It’s not you,” she says, with feeling. “It just feels too...raw...right now.” She pauses, struggling with the words. “It might be a while until everything feels...right. I just need time.”

“Of course,” Roy says, running a hand through his hair, making it stand on end.

He looks like he is going to say something, and Riza forestalls him. “You don’t have to wait for me,” she says. “If all of this has become too much of a complication in your life, a distraction from your goal. Or if you’d rather be with a woman you can actually take out in public. Someone without all of this--” she tries not to choke on the word, and gestures between them. “Baggage.”

Roy grabs her hand, giving her another one of those intense looks. “Riza,” he says. “There is nobody else I would rather be with. I don’t care how long I have to wait for you. Whether it’s weeks, or months, or years. I’ll wait, without question.”

“Roy--”

“I’m a patient man,” he says, squeezing her hand. “And I won’t be deterred from my goals. You should know that.”

“I do,” Riza whispers, relenting at last. “I do. And thank you, for understanding.”

“Always.”

Roy stays over that night, though, just to make sure that she is all right. They eat dinner together and Roy takes Hayate out for a short walk. Afterward, he tucks her into bed and settles into the reading chair in the corner of her room, near the window. Riza falls into a deep, dreamless sleep.

She wakes up briefly at sunrise, to Roy moving around the room, getting ready to leave for work. The other side of her bed is still tucked neatly, and it looks like he had slept in the armchair.

“Try to get some paperwork done today, Colonel,” she says, turning toward him, half-getting up in bed. “I’m sure you have a lot to catch up on.”

His back is to her, and she sees him stiffen at the formality of the words. He turns to face her, and Riza smiles.

Roy visibly relaxes at the look on her face, and salutes her. “I’ll do my best, Lieutenant.”

He leaves, and Riza settles back into bed, feeling simultaneously melancholy and more at ease than she has in days.

#royai #royai fanfiction #royai fanfic #roy mustang x riza hawkeye #fullmetal alchemist: brotherhood #fma:b #roy mustang #riza hawkeye

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darling-archeron · 5 years ago

Text

Beneath the Dark - Chapter Four

What would have happened if Feyre had come to Prythian much earlier? Feyre Archeron has left her mortal life behind, and accepted being demi-fae. She has found her place in the Night Court’s Inner Circle. But when her and Rhys attend a ball hosted by Amarantha Under the Mountain, they are in for much for then they bargained for.

Chapter warning for strong implications of rape.

Masterlist

She had us by the balls.

We were trapped here, and utterly at her mercy. I knew there had been no real point slaughtering those couriers, no reason beyond showing what she could do.

I knew most of them had despised me.

And I would mourn them still.

But better for their blood to coat the floor than Velaris’s. Hewn City had always been the front with which I protected what was most precious. The Court of Dreams would take care of the city and protect it, even if it drove them mad. I knew they had received my message, but I had pulled away before I could hear their replies.

“You all should find quarters to stay in and retire for the evening. You’ll be down here for a long time, and I won’t have you all staying uncomfortably.” She mocked. “Tamlin is welcome to set out whenever he likes.”

“The Spring Court leaves now,” Tamlin growled, murder blazing in his eyes. Claws grew from his hands – and Amarantha, curiously, let them be. Lucien gave the order to round up servants from his side. His frown wasn’t concealed by his mask – though both were reminiscent of a fox. The face he would wear for forty-nine years.

I hadn’t seen that variable coming – that she would play this game with Tamlin, drawing it out as she did the cruelest of tortures.

My fault, for not exploring all the ways this gone.

“I’ll see the rest of you in the morning. I have some wonderful plans for our time together!” She chirruped. “And I certainly hope no one develops any little plans about not making an appearance.”

Feyre made eye contact with me, and I took in her appearance for the first time since we had left Velaris only a few hours before. She was disheveled, her delicate brown hair coming undone and half of her gauzy black skirt hacked away at the knee, though she still wore the bat mask.

Granted, I knew I probably looked like hell too. Flakes of blood spotted my jacket and pants.

“What now?” She asked quietly.

“We retire, as she wants. There’s nothing we can do right now.” It angered me more than I wanted to admit.

“Do you have a plan?”

“Velaris is safe. I’ve bound the Circle to the city, and anyone else here with an inkling will find themselves without that memory.”

“Good.” She didn’t comment on how I had avoided her question. I jerked my head slightly, indicating that we should start walking towards the doors where everyone else hurried.

“But there’s no way I’ll be finding any sleep tonight.” She almost shuddered, stopping herself.

“Your acting tonight hasl been excellent, Feyre.”

“She knows I’m a daemati, Rhys.”

“We both fucked up,” I admitted. Me, more than her. Amarantha’s interest in Feyre was exactly the opposite of what I had wanted. I shouldn’t have introduced her in such an important role, I should have disguised her as a servant instead.

We approached the doors, and I noticed a few stares clinging to us like cobwebs. “Nuala has found a chamber for you. Go ahead and try to rest.” I knew the idea sounded absurd. “I have a few things to attend to first.” I knew I didn’t have to remind her to place wardings around her room.

“Of course you aren’t retiring.” Her mental voice was soft. She turned and exited the room without looking at me again, shoulders back and head held high. Part of me wished I could go and find sleep. Using my magic against Amarantha had taken more of my remaining power than I would ever admit.

I continued to stalk ahead, maintaining that air of arrogance. No one dared approach me, and I found a path cleared for me.

Intimidation, I knew, would continue to serve me well. Set on my path, I turned the corner -

And was faced with Amarantha. This night was already down the drain – but it was obviously about to get worse.

“Rhysand.” She purred. The evening’s events didn’t appear to have taken a toll on her, and not a hair was out of place. She had removed her mask, baring her face.

I dipped my head. “My Queen.” Better to slip into the role right away. It would make everyone believe I had always been a two-faced bastard, but so be it.

She smiled. “I’m so glad to see you’re adjusting to this quickly. I fear others will struggle.”

“Ah, but I know you will guide them well. They will learn who their Queen is in due time.”

“Your faith is much appreciated, Rhysand. No hard feelings about your Court, I hope? I did what was necessary.”

Hard feelings. As if she hadn’t ended those lives without a second thought. But I only smirked. “Dealing with scheming couriers is one of the more irritating parts of my job. You’ve saved me a great deal of work.”

A smile. “Good. I can hardly be responsible for what will happen if my orders aren’t obeyed, not after I’ve given such a fair warning.” She shrugged.

“And do you expect Tamlin to bend the knee again soon?”

“Naturally. It’ll only be a matter of time before he grows tired of living as a shade of himself.” She paused, and I noticed how empty the hall around us was. Nobody wanted to be near Amarantha.

“But in the meantime –“ She placed a hand on her pale chest, Jurian’s eye once again still. “I fear I will grow lonely. So many of my subjects will fear me before they grow to love me.” She took a step closer to me, near enough that I could feel her breath.

And I realized what she wanted.

“Perhaps you are in a similar position. Lord of Nightmares, they call you. Though given your father’s reputation I’m surprised they all fear you so easily.”

Her hand grazed my arm, her pale skin warm.

That was what this was about. Not me, not even Tamlin. But how my father had murdered Tamlin’s.

“I’ve earned my reputation. Surely you’ve heard of all the tortures I’ve inflicted over the years, My Queen. But if you’ll excuse me, it grows late.”

She shook her head. “You’re High Lord of the Night Court.” Her voice was soft. “Nighttime should be of no consequence to you.”

I opened my mouth to refuse again, but she kept talking. “You made an impressive display against me in the ballroom. I was quite enthralled. You end lives like some give in to sleep.”

“I’ve always taken care to hone my powers.” The only true thing I had said to her during this conversation. I couldn’t decide if she knew it or not.

“Is it frustrating, Rhysand? I’m sure you can find no equal among the High Lords. Nostrus and Beron sit around reveling day and night. Calder is practically a child. Thesan and Julius are so dull. And….of course, we all know you and Tamlin get along.”

“The other High Lords bring me no interest, that’s true.” I clasped my hands behind my back. “My Court is diverting enough.”

“And do tell me, what about it is so diverting? I could never unravel that during my time there.”

I raised an eyebrow. “My Queen, you’ve been to the Hewn City. Did they not amuse you?”

“They were plenty amusing. I have plans to model this mountain’s architecture after theirs. But I can’t help but feel as though I didn’t see your entire Court. Members of key bloodlines were missing – where was the Morrigan? Where was that creature that men fear, who drinks blood like wine?” She tilted her head.

“She is little more than a legend – I thought you would have known that. A tale mothers tell their children to keep them from straying too far.”

“Is that not what all of Prythian is, to mortals?”

I fought the urge to grit my teeth. All these questions were striking too close for comfort.

“You must be lonely. All that power, half of a millennium by yourself, an equal never found. You never found a mate, did you?” Her voice took on a mocking edge. “Come to think of it, I’ve never heard of any lovers you’ve had."

It took effort to keep my expression the same. She couldn’t find out about Feyre, or any of my circle. That was my goal in all this – to protect them and my people.

“I never had the fortune to find a mate. But leadership has kept me plenty occupied.”

“Does it? Kier told me you barely ever make an appearance in the Hewn City.”

Damn him. “I prefer to rule from afar. I have a castle in the mountains where I spend my time.” Another truth.

“I plan to be an attentive ruler, Rhysand. But I have no intention to spend all of my time bored and alone.”

I didn’t say anything, a pit of dread growing in my stomach.

“Tamlin isn’t here right now. But you would occupy me well, in the meantime.”

“I don’t know if that would be wise, My Queen.” I didn’t break her gaze.

Her tone sharpened. “Are you questioning my judgment? You’re the only one worthy of me, Rhysand, and deep down you know it. And I could do….considerable things for you.”

Sleeping with her…..sleeping with her, giving a pretense about caring for her…. it would draw attention away from whoever I might be close to. Away from Feyre. Perhaps she would come to trust me, in time. I could use it to my advantage.

“These years may grow long. We will both need something to distract us.” She pushed, gripping my arm tightly. “Without your couriers to provide the amusement you claim, surely you will need a distraction.”

I blinked for a moment too long. And when I opened my eyes, the decision was made.

So I let my gaze turn wolfish, taking in her body. She was, objectively, beautiful. “I’ve been told I’m very, very good at distractions.”

“Then we’re in agreement. Escort me to my chambers, Rhysand.”

I linked my arm into hers, the portrait of a gentleman, giving her a small smirk. Her tongue grazed her lips, eyes dilating.

The mounting dread in my stomach grew and grew. The carnage of earlier hadn’t made me throw up, but this….this might do it.

I had slaughtered and tricked my way across battlefields for years, played mind games of politics.

This was a new, different sort of fight. But I would treat it as I had all the others.

I didn’t know the way to her rooms, but she told me where to turn with a tug against our linked arms. The hallways were dark, arches and corridors casting shadows onto the ground. Our own shadows looked monstrous in the dim lighting. Besides the guards stationed intermittently, we were the only two out, and not a sound came from the wing we approached. At last, at the end of a long corridor, we approached a wide door, finer than others I had seen. It alone was carved, depicting gods and monsters in the pattern.

Amarantha reached for the doorknob, dark-painted nails curling around the handle. The door opened with a click, and faelight from the corridor shone into the room, casting a bit of light.

She left my side and placed a glowing ball of soft faelight in a bowl by her bedside, illuminating the room. It was an oddly familiar gesture; one I had done myself countless times.

The suite was grand, and already well decorated in colors of purple and gray. Hybern’s color, and the color of her own House. A reminder of who this was all supposedly for.

The bed drew my attention first – grand and ostentatious, covered in rich silks. The bedposts rose like daggers from the ground. From high ceilings hung large silver chandeliers that remained unlit. Fine tapestries in rich colors covered the walls. The suite had been decorated far in advance. I had no doubts that her newfound prisoners were sleeping in less comfort.

No windows, obviously. One exit – the one we had come through - and a door leading to the rest of her chambers.

Amarantha strutted back to me, gate seductive and face half-hidden in shadow. In the darkness, her hair was much less red. She placed one hand on my chest, the other reaching up to tear off my mask. It landed behind me with a thud, and bile began to rise in my throat.

“You say you’ve spent your due time on battlefields, winning victory after victory. But I have fought for longer than you’ve been alive.”

She placed one hand on my chest, and with the other reached up to remove my mask with a gentle touch. I could feel her breath on my cheek, and the scent of rich perfume wafted towards me - a heady vanilla.

I didn’t lean away.

“And tonight, you will truly learn of war.”

When it was done, I lay on my back and watched the chandelier, trying to distinguish patterns in the twisted metal, its dull grey finish gleaming slightly in the faelight. She hadn’t extinguished it.

Amarantha lay only a few feet away, physical and mental shields as strong as ever. I had checked, laying here for minutes on end before I could rally the strength and will to try it.

The tides of her breathing remained steady, soft. She seemed almost innocent in sleep – red hair unbound and flowing across the pillow, naked body hidden by the silken sheets.

It felt like I was floating. Out of my body, to somewhere else. It had stopped feeling like my body halfway through.

Even so, the places on my back she had dug her nails into still stung, the pain lingering longer than I had expected it to.

I lay awake as the hours passed, blocking out the memories as I remembered who I was doing this for.

She had vowed to teach me of war.

And it was obvious who the victor was tonight.

@fireheart-of-your-dreams @rowaelinforeverworld Let me know if you’d like to be tagged!

AN: This chapter was uploaded to AO3 a few weeks ago but I completely forgot to post it here, I apologize! This chapter is also on the short side, they’ll get longer again as certain things start to unfold. Thank you all for reading!

#acotar #acomaf #acowar #feysand #acotar fic #feysand fic #btd #beneath the dark #kate's writing #my writing #kat's writing #acofas #amarantha #sjm #tamlin

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