Chapter Text
Nesta strode out of Amren’s apartment with the conviction of a woman on the way to the execution block.
At any moment, she expected the blow to come. For the High Lord of the Night Court to flick his fingers and send her body apart into a million tiny pieces.
Or for someone else to do his bidding. For a single swipe of a blade to cut through her neck, far cleaner than the hack job she’d done of the King of Hybern.
Nesta was ready.
After all, her sister would be joining her soon, anyway.
Feyre’s face flashed in her mind – the shock, the denial, and then, worse, the heartbreak as the truth of her situation crashed over her.
As Nesta’s words found their mark, and shattered the world of perfect, hopeful peace her sister had cultivated.
It was all she was ever good for – shattering people’s perfect peace.
She heard Amren’s words, the simple, unaffected ‘you should take this up with your mate’ as if none of them felt morally compelled to tell this female about her fate. As if she couldn’t handle it.
As if she wasn’t their High Fucking Lady, as they all liked to hold over everyone else.
It felt too much like the world she’d left – the idea of being kept that, apparently, wasn’t supposed to exist here in Velaris.
As the thought crossed her mind, Nesta’s throat tightened, and she paused, just for a moment, on the corner of two streets she didn’t know to catch her breath.
They were keeping Feyre like a lamb for slaughter. Filling her days with sunshine and laughter and bliss, while knowing that when she went into that birthing bed, she would more than likely not come out.
They had taken her choice, her will, her freedom, in the name of an heir.
It was supposed to be her job, Nesta thought bitterly. If anyone was going to die in childbirth to fulfill a grievous expectation of a male babe, it should have been her.
At least she’d grown up knowing that could be her fate.
Feyre had made this child out of love, with the notion that she’d be there to raise him. Nesta had thought, as High Lady, she’d have been granted the utmost care, the ability to make every single decision, to have a full working knowledge of her world.
Instead, they treated her sister no better than they did herself. With secrets.
And while Nesta may have deserved it, she would rather die than let Feyre suffer the same fate, even if it required the look of devastation on her sister’s face when she’d revealed her mate’s darkest secret.
The coward.
As the thought passed her mind, the heavy boom of Illyrian wings echoed through the air, and Nesta closed her eyes, prepared for whoever was coming to execute her punishment.
Azriel, perhaps, would be swift about it. Swift, cold, and unfeeling.
But Cassian would want to know why. Would draw it out until she had nothing left to give.
Naturally, it was his scent that enveloped her, that gave her barely a moment to turn her body and take in his blazing eyes as he touched down on the pavement, his hands reaching for her without so much as a ‘what have you done.’
Sucking in a breath, Nesta awaited the abduction.
His face was hard, as if this was his solemn duty. His siphons pulsed with bright red light, and her chest tightened as he landed before her, her eyes pricking with tears.
She closed her eyes, readying for the blow.
Instead, the earth trembled, tilted, and abruptly, the male she felt too much for yet no longer knew how to deal with was stumbling away, flames erupting between them.
“Put your hands on her and you’ll lose them.”
Nesta blinked, pushing herself upright on the wall of whatever building she’d been leaning against, and looked over the barrier to see her sister in all her glorious fury, her hand outstretched.
“Feyre,” Cassian croaked, looking as shocked as she felt, something agonized in his eyes. “Rhys told me to-”
“Speak his name to me again, I dare you.” Her sister hissed. “I know exactly what he told you.”
Pain speared through Nesta’s chest as her mind gave her a thousand different possibilities.
Did Cassian truly value her so little that he was prepared to kill her without thought?
“Feyre, believe me, I never wanted this.”
“And yet you did nothing to stop it. I never took you for a coward, Cassian.”
As her sister said the words, she circled around her flames, to stand at Nesta’s side. It gave Nesta time to meet Cassian’s gaze, which was full of so much emotion she couldn’t properly understand it.
“He’s not in his right mind,” Cassian warned, and suddenly he sounded downright frightened. “You know that. He might-”
“He touches her, and he’ll learn just how vengeful I can be.”
Nesta turned her head to her sister, at a loss for what exactly was happening. At whom she should trust, or what she should do. Not for the first time, she felt utterly at the mercy of these fae she’d barely come to know.
What she did know, however, was that no one would harm her sister again. Not after this.
Feyre looked back to meet her eyes, and suddenly, in her mind, she heard,
Did he hurt you?
Nesta shuddered at the thought but shook her head.
Feyre, I’m so-
She didn’t get the chance to finish. Abruptly, Feyre stepped forward, gripping her wrist, and was saying,
“He wants Nesta gone? Then I go with her. Tell him if he comes for me uninvited, it will be the last time he has the right of laying eyes on his mate.”
Cassian stepped forward, but the flames roared, cracking the ground beneath it.
“Feyre please!”
The last thing Nesta saw before they disappeared in a winnow was the moment Cassian’s expression cracked into agony, and tears spilled out onto his cheeks.
---
The cabin felt desolate, the cold Illyrian air settling deep into Nesta’s bones as she followed her sister over the mountain terrain and towards the tiny structure. They couldn’t winnow in, apparently, similar to the House.
With every step, Nesta fought the urge to tell Feyre to be careful, to not stress her body more than she needed to. Out here, there was little she could offer should something happen.
But soon enough, Feyre was pushing open the door to the place, and Nesta was greeted with an absolutely absurd amount of painting on the walls.
Fucking hell were those eyes?
“I want it gone!” Feyre shouted, waving a hand, and Nesta watched in mild fascination as each little doodle disappeared into the woodwork.
Nesta turned, ensuring the door was shut and locked behind her, before she heard the sound of an agonized sob rip from her sister’s chest.
Returning to her side, she barely had time to reach for her before Feyre sunk to the floor, wretched, devastating heartbreak pouring out of her throat.
“I’m sorry,” Nesta said, drawing her close. “I’m so sorry.”
Her own eyes burned with the shame at what she’d done – at the fact that she’d absolutely destroyed her sister’s happiness.
How cruel and vicious she was, to want her to feel this pain.
“How could he hide this from me?” Feyre gasped, and suddenly she was clutching onto her, as if Nesta were the only thing keeping her in this world. “How could he?!”
That thick, visceral rage began to bubble up in her throat, heating her veins, and waking the monster that constantly lurked in the pit of her stomach.
Rhysand would pay for this, she decided.
She would find a way to make him pay.
“Men – males – they always think they know best,” Nesta offered, stroking her sister’s hair, utilizing every bit of her strength to keep herself from crumbling.
But the ire was building so quickly it was almost uncontrollable. The need to scream and destroy and live up to this monstrous being that everyone seemed to think she was.
So, too, was the desire to simply be numb. To forget it all and never face any of them ever again.
It made it hard to breathe, hard to comprehend what was even happening.
But Feyre remained distraught in her arms, grieving the security she thought she’d finally obtained after all the years of suffering, and Nesta had enough wits about her to know that it was her atonement and solemn duty to hold her for as long as it took for her to calm.
“It’s my life!” Feyre shouted. “And if I go… fuck, if I go, he goes. How fucking stupid!’
Nesta was inclined to agree but would save her opinion for later.
“He won’t get away with it,” she vowed. “He will pay for his actions.”
Something about her voice must have jarred Feyre enough to pull away and look at her face. Her sister reached up, and it was only then that she realized that she, too, had tears streaming down her cheeks, as those painted fingers brushed them away.
“Thank you for telling me,” Feyre whispered. “I know… I know it was because you were angry about what we kept from you. And Nesta, know that I wanted you to know what you made. I wanted you to know about the weapons and have a right to deciding how they were used, but-”
“Enough,” Nesta said, gripping her shoulders. “That doesn’t matter. I shouldn’t have told you so crassly. I should have told you sooner, it was selfish. I’m sorry. I probably deserve –”
“Do not finish that sentence.”
Nesta fell quiet, a frown tugging at her lips.
Feyre shook her head, and leaned back, eyes scanning around the cabin as she wiped roughly at her own cheeks.
“He could be here any minute. He knows where this place is. I… I don’t have anywhere to go that he can’t access.”
Something ancient and powerful burst into life in Nesta’s chest at the insinuation.
She would not let that happen.
She would protect her sister – the closest and most dear bond she had. No one would touch her without Nesta’s permission.
“Let me handle it,” she said simply, somehow inherently confident that she could, even if she truly had no idea what that entailed. “You need to rest.”
Feyre sighed, a shuddering sound that seemed to rock her entire body. “I don’t know what to do,” she whispered, brokenly.
But Nesta leaned forward, grasping her hand.
“Do you want this child?” She asked.
Feyre sniffed, her eyes a shocking shade of blue in the dim light.
“What?”
“This child. Do you want it?”
Nesta knew her way around the herbs necessary, should they require it. She knew what needed to be done, if that was the choice Feyre made.”
“I-…” Feyre stopped, thinking about it. Really thinking about it. “Yes. I love him. More than anything. Is that wrong?”
“No,” Nesta counted, reaching up to brush tears from her cheeks. “No, Feyre. It’s not wrong. He’s yours and that’s the rightest thing there is.”
Feyre nodded slowly, trembling beneath her hands. “Even if…?”
“We will figure it out,” she answered, her voice cracking. “Together, Feyre. I… I have a friend, an Illyrian. I’ll go to her, ask her for help.”
Her sister’s lips pursed, but she nodded her head, offering a tiny, grateful smile. Gently, Nesta helped her up to her feet, and squeezed her hands in what she hoped was reassurance. It felt strange to comfort her this way; so far beyond the norm of how they usually treated each other.
But it didn’t feel wrong. Perhaps just overdue.
“Go get warm,” Nesta said, squeezing her shoulders. “We weren’t dressed for this weather. I’ll be in shortly.”
Feyre stared at her for a long moment, perhaps wondering what she was going to do. But slowly, she nodded, and did as she asked, disappearing into what she assumed was the bedroom.
Nesta waited until the door shut before she let out a breath and closed her eyes.
Now that she was alone, she loosened the chain on that power that had begun to tug at her, desperate for freedom.
She’d failed time and time again at protecting her family.
She’d failed so significantly that no one had faith in her any longer.
She was a burden, and a liability.
But in this, she would succeed.
No one would lay a hand on her sister, or her child, or else they would face her wrath. No one would find this place, unless they were invited. No one would breach these walls, unless welcome.
This would be a safe haven. A place to begin their work.
When Nesta opened her eyes, only silver fire remained.
---
Miles away, in Velaris, Cassian stood at the hearth in the living room of the River House, listening with his head bowed as his High Lord raged at his situation.
At Cassian’s failure, to do as he asked.
“That witch I never trusted her! I never should have let her anywhere close to Feyre or my child. All she does is destroy, she has no idea what’s good for her.”
As he spoke, Azriel was searching everywhere for Feyre and Nesta. Cassian, however, had been given the unfortunate duty of informing Rhys that his mate had vanished into thin air, with orders not to be bothered.
Wisely, he kept his mouth shut as his brother ranted, knowing full well that rationality was not present in the room.
“If she’s within my Court’s borders, I’ll kill her,” Rhys snarled, pictures falling off the walls and windows cracking as his power fought to release itself from his body. “If I so much as see her face I'll--”
The door flew open, and Azriel appeared, slightly breathless.
At once, Rhys turned, his blazing eyes pinning the shadowsinger in place, a million questions in his expression.
“Well?!”
Cassian held his breath.
Azriel, too, seemed strangely unnerved.
“They’re at your mother’s cabin, in Illyria.”
Rhys straightened, stilled. “And you didn’t bring my mate back with you when you found this out?”
Now, Azriel looked downright uncomfortable.
“I tried. I went there myself and tried. But...”
“But what?! Spit it out, dammit!”
“The cabin,” Azriel said, tucking his wings in tightly. “It’s gone.”