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arlathavellan-acotar · 1 year ago

Text

The Silence Left in My Wake

Fandom: ACOTAR

Pairing: (past) Rhysand x Reader, Azriel + Reader, Morrigan + Reader, Cassian + Reader

Reader: she/her, High Fae, Y/N used

Genre: Angst, fluff

Word Count: 3.6k

<<request>>

For a while, you had convinced yourself they would come for you. Cassian, Azriel, Morrigan... Rhysand. It was the one hope you held onto over the years. But fifty years is a long time to hope for something that will never happen. || The world keeps spinning when we're gone. Unfortunately for you, that means when you're finally free after over fifty years of captivity, nothing is the same. Once told you would marry the love of your life and become his Lady of Night, you come come face-to-face with your new reality, and reunite with the family you had been waiting on to save you.

The Court of Nightmares was no place to dream. You had no hopes, no freedom, no choice in the life you would live.

Then came the High Lord; Rhysand. A dark force of nature, who came into your life like a terrific storm and upended everything you thought you knew. With Rhysand, you let your walls crumble, let yourself imagine a life outside of that mountain. There were politics to navigate before he could steal you away, of course, but he assured you that one day he'd sweep you off into his City of Dreams and make you his wife, his Lady.

But The Court of Nightmares was no place to dream.

Rhysand had the perfect story to spin for your father; a proper marriage alliance with the High Lord himself. Your father was not the ambitious fool your lover took him for. He knew there would be no true alliance, that marrying you off would be no better than sending you away to never hear from you again. After all, Morrigan was at his side, and Keir was no better in his good graces for it.

Cassian and Mor both advocated for taking you anyways, but you agreed with Azriel when he argued all the ways that could end badly. As much as you wanted out of that mountain, you wanted to truly be free from it. So, Rhysand continued his painstaking negotiations, with his patience whittling down to nothing. Compromise seemed impossible between the two bull-headed fae, and you began to wonder if the end was in sight.

Then, the worst came to pass.

Amarantha, who you had been carefully hidden from upon her visit to Hewn City (one of the only things Rhysand and your father could agree on), forever changed the the course of fate in one fell swoop.

It was Azriel who had visited you that morning, half-hidden in the shadows in case your father or one of his servants entered your room. He told you of the meeting Rhysand had been invited to with the other High Lords, Amarantha hoping to “make amends” for her actions during the war. He told you of Rhysand's plans to finally take you to Velaris, father be damned, before she was made aware of your existence.

"Pack only what you need," Azriel had said. "If Rhysand doesn't make it, I will come get you myself— Mor and Cassian have been preparing for you all morning."

You had laughed, sending him off with a chaste kiss on the cheek as he melted back into the darkness, his shadows curling around the hand you’d held against his jaw.

That was the last you had heard from them. For the next fifty years, you were well and truly alone.

-----

That night, your father had stormed into your room while you were getting your bag together. Grabbing it and you, he dragged you down to the dungeons and threw you in a cell with a simple “be quiet, and stay safe.”

It wasn't often that your father came to visit you himself. His visits became more and more scarce over the first few years, until you would go years before seeing him again. He looked more haggard every time. You were so lonely that you started to miss him.

You took solace in the darkness at first, but it soon became your greatest torment. Something would move in the corner of you eye and your heart would soar, thinking maybe—just maybe—those familiar shadows had found you. Maybe you would soon be free.

The wraith servants who brought you your food were your only company, and they barely said a word. The room was smaller than your bedroom, not much more than a cell with a bed, desk, and bookcase thrown in, and the bathroom had you longing for your carved tub.

No one would tell you anything. Screaming yourself hoarse got tiring after a while, and your father remained outwardly unmoved by your tears. A dread had crept into your chest, wondering if he had discovered Rhysand's plans to take you away to Velaris. He never mentioned it, but the timing couldn't have been more suspicious. No one had come for you, not even Azriel. How had he stopped even the Shadowsinger from getting to you? Surely the High Lord and his Spymaster had access to the Hewn City dungeon.

You stopped asking questions years ago. Now, you wallow in your monotony, reading every book on your shelf by dim candle light, and occasionally letting those delivering your food know that you needed new ones. They'd always bring you more the next morning, your father's scent, fir and petrichor, faint on the covers and pages. Some nights, when the isolation grew to be too much, you'd hold onto them and cry. You never thought you'd miss the days of your childhood, of him teaching you personally from his own library. You never thought you'd miss your father.

He'd never been like Keir, never treated you the way Mor was, but you'd certainly never have called him loving. And now, he'd locked you in a heavily warded cell and refused to tell you why. You started to feel an odd kinship with the monster you knew lurked beneath the stone, trapped here as you were, only seeing someone when it was time to be fed.

Time blurred together. How long had it been since Rhysand had promised to marry you, since Mor promised a shopping trip, Cassian promised to train you, and Azriel promised to make sure you made it to Velaris? Why had no one come for you?

"Who?" you ask, voice shaking as you sit up in your bed. "Why did you do this to me?"

Then, you’re woken one morning to some answers from your father.

"I'm sorry," he says, sitting on the edge of the mattress with his back to you. "I couldn't let them find you. They would have torn you to pieces just to hurt him."

A tense silence falls on the room. "Amarantha trapped the courts Under the Mountain. Rhysand stood at her side for fifty years, and his Inner Circle were unreachable."

Your heart plummets in your chest at his admission.

"I told Keir you were gone, that they had taken you before they disappeared," he continues, voice oddly soft. "I couldn't reach his daughter or the Spymaster, or even that damned General to take you away from here. He told Amarantha about you, wanting to get in her good graces, and she had that damn Attor tear the manor apart looking for you."

He runs a hand down the wall your headboard is against, and you get a peek at new scars across his skin as his sleeve falls at the motion. "This cell is warded heavily. If Rhysand knew you were in here, he was good at hiding it. But Keir kept sending his Darkbringers to check every so often, either hoping to catch me off-guard or just remind me of where I stand. This was the only place I could think of that even they wouldn’t search."

"What happened?" You finally ask. "Why tell me now?"

"Feyre Cursebreaker," he says with a resigned tone. "High Lady of the Night Court, and Rhysand's mate. She defeated Amarantha, and now we’re preparing for war with Hybern."

Nausea rises in your throat. Out of everything he said, Amarantha, Keir, war—one fact continues to ring in your head. "His mate."

“I’ve tried to get into contact with them since they reemerged, but they’ve refuse to hear me.” He looks back at you, and you wonder if his gaze has always looked so empty. “If Keir knows you are alive, he will kill us both. The High Lord’s lackeys are the only ones who can get you out safely.”

The stress of your situation settles heavily on your shoulders. “So I’m stuck here. Is that what this is leading up to?”

You watch his brows pinch as he considers for a long moment. With a weary sigh, he stands from your bed. “I’ll bring some stationery.”

He drags a heavy hand down his face, but makes no move to deny it.

“Let me write a letter,” you say. “They may not listen to you, but I may have more luck.”

-----

News of the war ending comes long before any response. A letter a month for three months, before they start getting sent back. Perhaps that in itself is a response. The first time he brings a letter back, you let yourself break down. It had been years since you had any hope hopes to crush, but you had let yourself imagine for a moment that it could all be over.

What was even waiting for you out there, now? Your future had been stolen from you the moment the High Lords put their trust in Amarantha, the moment Keir turned his gaze your way. Perhaps it was always supposed to happen like this, with you alone in the end and Rhysand with his mate and High Lady.

In the end, it's Keir who lets it slip and hands you the key to your freedom. Keir, whose mouth works faster than his brain, who looks for any opportunity to hurt his daughter. Keir who sneers, asking how Rhysand’s Hewn City pet felt about being pushed aside for Feyre Archeron.

And it's that daughter who finds you. Holed up in your cell, sitting on your bed and reading anything you can find to take your mind off of your eternal solitude.

It scares you, the way she throws the door open. Her eyes are wide, breath ragged, as if she'd run all the way down to the dungeon instead of the simple winnow she'd more likely done. You hold her gaze, eyes burning as the silent disbelief stretches between you. Setting your book down carefully, you stand from the bed slowly, as if moving too quickly would make her disappear. She stumbles forward, and you find yourself meeting her halfway as her arms wrap around you almost too tightly.

"I thought he was lying," she says, voice shaking. "I wanted him to be lying. I wanted to go back up there and tear his tongue from his lying mouth and—"

"I'm so sorry, Mor," you manage, squeezing her just as tightly.

"Rhys said you were dead, Y/N," she presses. "Your father—"

"Has been trying to tell you all."

A sob chokes its way through her throat, and you're soon joining her. You hear her try to ask more questions, most starting with why, but she seems to find the answers herself before she even gets them out.

"I'm so sorry, Mor," you repeat.

Your reunion doesn't last in peace much longer.

"We have to tell them," she says, face buried in your neck. "Cassian, Azriel— fuck, Y/N, we had a funeral for you. There's a bird bath in the garden with your name carved into it, we thought you were dead. Cauldron, we were just down here, how did we not…"

Pulling from her, you wipe your damp face with your sleeve. She doesn't let you go too far, an arm still wrapped firmly around your waist as she dabs at her own watery eyes.

"I'm getting you out of here." The words you wanted to hear all these years, feeling like a dagger to the heart.

"Mor," you sigh. "I don't know if I can go to Velaris anymore. It's been so long, but I don't know if I can stand in front of him and his mate and say I'm happy for him without breaking."

She cradles your cheek with her free hand, resolute. "Azriel should have taken you with him. He's regretted it every day, leaving you here. We won't make that mistake again. I have a place you can stay at, at least until you figure out what you want to do. But, please, don't ask me to leave you here."

Hesitation grips you tight, the fear of opening your heart up to hope once more. But the look in her brown eyes, her hands warm against your cheeks, has you nodding. "Okay. I'll go."

Her lips smash against your forehead, and you wonder idly if she left a smear of red behind as she pulls away to start grabbing your belongings.

The first time she winnows you into a forest, you cry. Maybe a single tear rolling down your cheek would have felt more poetic, but you're left with the embarrassing kind of chest-shaking sobs.

"It's okay," she murmurs, rubbing your back. "There's going to be a lot of that. Just let it out when it hits you."

Her attempts at lightening the mood are mostly successful, but a lingering dread persists in your gut as you get closer to Velaris. You trust Mor not to drag you there against your will, but there was nothing your mind was better at than exploring worst-case scenarios. The journey thankfully passes without incident, and as you set your bag down on her living room floor you find yourself buzzing with some kind of anticipation.

"Tell them." The sound of your voice has her head snapping to you, eyes wide. "I need a bath first, but… tell them. I can't ask you to lie for me, not to them."

Mor shows you to your room, and you do indeed take your bath. Feeling a little greedy with the hot water, you soak and scrub a little more than usual as you watch the trees outside the window.

A pained expression crosses her face as she takes you into her arms once more. As you wrap yourself around her in turn, you wonder the last time you've ever been held this much in your eighty-odd years.

"Take your bath," she says, voice soft. "There are very few things they'd drop to be here."

How did you ever survive inside of a mountain, never knowing the world outside? Would you survive if you were ever made to go back?

-----

You help Mor set the table. Adjusting plates to hide your shaking hands, rearranging silverware to keep your mind occupied. Eventually, she perks up with a shaking breath.

“Cas and Az are on their way,” she says, slowly sinking into her chair. Relief and disappointment grapple for control at the sound of the short list. The look she gives you does nothing to help.

“Feyre just… had a baby. She and Rhys won’t be leaving Velaris if they can help it.” A baby.

You manage a smile, as painful as it is genuine. “Tell them I understand, please. And that I’m happy for them.”

Her hands reach out across the table, taking yours and rubbing circles into your scrubbed-sore skin. “I’m so sorry this is how things happened. If we knew you were in there—”

“It wouldn’t have changed anything,” you interrupt. “Not really. But I’m out now.”

Squeezing her hands in reassurance, you watch her expression crumble. Desperate to change the conversation, a thought comes to you.

“Could we… eat outside?” Her head lifts at your words, eyes widening slightly. “I saw a table on the patio out back, and as lovely as your home is I don’t think I’ve gotten enough of… outside.”

She laughs, something happy and sad all at once as your words seep in. “Yeah. Yeah, we can eat outside. It’s nice out, anyways. Staying in would be a waste of a perfectly good sunset.”

And just like that, you once again busy yourself with setting the table. This time, however, your guests arrive before you can readjust the silverware. They sound like thunder as they near the patio, their wings covering you in momentary darkness. Then, a literal darkness as Azriel’s shadows swirl around you in a miniature tornado, checking for themselves that you’re you, and you’re alright.

“What the fuck,” Cassian begins, as eloquent as ever.

Mor comes behind you as you turn towards them, placing a grounding hand against the small of your back.

There’s a moment of stunned silence, no one knowing quite where to begin, before Cassian rushes in as he does best and sweeps you off your feet. You can’t help the laugh that bubbles out of your throat, holding him tightly as he swings you around. What feels like a sentient breeze plays with your hair and caresses your cheek, and you find yourself in another pair of arms as soon as your feet hit the ground.

Unspoken words hang heavy as Azriel carefully lowers you back onto the floor. From the lack of questions, you can deduce that Mor had filled them in as much as she could before their arrival. This wasn’t to be an interrogation.

“Who’s hungry?” She asks, pulling out a chair.

-----

Dinner is significantly less awkward than you had feared. Cassian and Morrigan do most of the talking, and a familiar darkness curls comfortingly around your leg whenever it feels you drifting someplace less pleasant.

“I think you’ll like Nesta,” Cassian says. “She can be a viper, but only if you’re trying to piss her off.”

You laugh as you push what’s left of your food around. “I hear she’s quite the reader. We’ll have some common ground at least.”

Mor’s breath hitches and you feel the shadows at your feet twitch in apprehension, but Cassian takes it in stride with a booming laugh. “Cauldron, I’d like to see that. Maybe you could expand each other’s horizons, start a book club.”

The topic dances around what you’re all trying to avoid; the one you’d been waiting to save you for over fifty years. Your head is spinning a bit from all the talking and laughing, but you fear if you send them home you’ll never see them again.

“Do you want to come to Velaris?” Azriel’s voice startles you so badly you nearly don’t even register the question.

“Az,” Mor hisses, all her delicate conversation work thrown out with one question.

You look at him as you consider your answer, and find he has no expectations written on his face. It’s not a probing question, no demand for a response. Just a friend asking where you stand.

“Eventually,” you say, voice quiet. “Maybe not yet.”

He nods, unwilling to press further, and motions for Cassian to continue.

“Not like we’d mind coming out here to visit,” the General says, barely missing a step. “Mor never lets us come around, now she can’t turn us away.”

She laughs, brushing off the earlier upset. “If I want to spend time with you all, I can do it at one of our, what is it, four houses in the city?”

The two continued their lighthearted bickering as you all finished up dinner, acting as if no time had passed. While you had time to mourn your lost future as Rhysand’s wife, you had truly missed the friendships that had been taken from you. Right on cue, as the dark thoughts began to creep in, you were pulled back out. This time not by the shadows lazing about your ankles, but their master himself, his warm hand covering yours on the table. His gaze is soft when you look at him, more vulnerable than you’re used to seeing him.

Mor’s words from earlier swim in your head. ‘He’s regretted it every day, leaving you here.’

Turning your hand over, you squeeze his back with a smile. “It seems we all have some catching up to do.”

“I can go into the city tomorrow and get some stuff for your room,” Mor says, clapping her hands together and drawing your attention. “This place is mine alone, so it’s home for as long as you’ll have it.”

All the laughing, smiling, and talking is starting to make your face hurt, but you can’t seem to stop. “Make sure you stop by a market. I’ve been craving blackberry pie for the last thirty-odd years, and I might just have to make it myself.”

Azriel squeezes your hand. “Elain can make one. I think she’d like to meet you.”

“She needs more friends,” Cassian says. “She might even wander off and turn that weed patch over there into a garden.”

“Hey!” Mor laughs. “Those aren’t weeds, they’re the natural flora of the area!”

You shrug. “They’re pretty to me. But I wouldn’t mind some flowers.”

The blonde smiles with a roll of her shining eyes. “Fine, she can plant some flowers.”

“Pushover!” Cassian shouts with a barking laugh.

In the morning, you’ll wonder if dinner even happened. If you were really free, if Mor, Cas, and Az were really here, wrapping arms and hands around you like the past fifty years had been a bad dream. You’ll lay there thinking about the future, about the one person you had been longing to see most who hadn’t been there at all. You’ll think about how to move forward, how to build a new life, and how to find your place in lives already built. You'll wonder why no one responded to your father, what had happened to your letters, why no one seemed to notice a cell in the dungeons being used for fifty years. Why Rhysand told them you were dead.

But for now, you think only of the people who are there, who are keeping your thoughts light and your glass full. No matter what happens, you know you’ll be able to keep walking forward, in whatever direction that may be in. So for tonight, you let those worries sit in the corner of your mind for another time.

#acotar #acotar x reader #a court of thorns and roses #acotar fic #arlathavellan: acotar #arlathavellan: fanwork

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