#our panic and scrolling and constant clicking on anything with his name or actions is the point of all this | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

otterthewasted · 6 years ago

Text

[SNIPPET] ACOMAF - Rhysand's Perspective - Part 2

WARNING: If you have not read A Court of Mist and Fury by Sarah J. Maas I strongly suggest you go read it first - it’s undoubtedly better written and what I have written will spoil the book for you.

I am re-writing all of ACOMAF from Rhysand’s perspective, using all of the original characters/scenes/dialogue, and adding in new bits and bobs to flesh his story out more.

This is Chapter 1 of Part 2 - click HERE to read the rest of the chapters in this part.

I hope you all enjoy!

*Disclaimer - I do not take credit for the any of the characters or the world created by Sarah J. Maas.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The following three weeks were… indescribable. They were pain and longing, nagging fear and solid hard work. There were brief moments of happiness with my family, a constant source of comradeship and trust that always helped ease the ache of the emptiness, even if only for a few minutes at a time.

I remained resolved in my intention to release her from the bargain, though there were moments that tested my resolve. Occasions when the bond between us would thrum with emotion, and never feelings of joy but rather of pain and grief. But that did not mean she wasn’t happy, she was still recovering, we all were – it could take time, years, centuries even for her to work through everything from Under the Mountain.

But if I was honest with myself, worse than the moments when the bond echoed the feelings of grief and guilt, were the moments when the bond echoed… nothing. Despite the distance, and the rather impressive shielding she was doing, I should have still been able to feel… something. Some hint of her being alive. And there were moments, hours and days, when I felt absolutely nothing. And terror would grip me, and I would not be able to resist reaching out and tugging ever so lightly on the bond just to feel the resistance of it – insuring she was still there, at the end of it. Still alive.

With only a week and a half to go before I would see her again, I was finding it more difficult to focus, but I was trying. Because it would always be this way and I had to find a way to manage these times when she was the only thing I could think about. I had a responsibility to my people, and I couldn’t shirk those jobs just because my mind was so full of Feyre there was hardly room for anything else.

And unfortunately, this was one of those days. And I was in a meeting with Amren that could not be avoided any further. I was sitting in her loft apartment, across from her as she sat in front of her desk, leaning back in her chair, books piled in front of her on the table and her eyes narrowed at me with accusation.

“Rhysand you have been holding back on me.”

I winced slightly – she was not wrong. For months now she had been digging through books, looking for answers to the dilemma of how the King of Hybern intended to take down the wall.

“Let me guess, your research has not been… successful.”

Her eyes narrowed further, “I have come across some theories, but no, it has not been. Until I decided to take a wild leap of faith.” She leaned forward and tapped a scroll, the only one on her desk. “I remembered something and went digging and found this.”

I arched a brow at her in silent question at what that scroll might be, but instead of her answer that she stared at me and spoke the words I had been dreading to hear.

“The Cauldron… is real.”

I sucked in a slow, shallow breath and closed my eyes briefly. I had heard Amarantha mention it in passing while she was having a conversation with the Attor – a conversation I was not meant to hear. It had not been easy to garner information about it while I was still trapped Under the Mountain, but I had worked at it cautiously. Snippets of information collected over the years, and often correlated by the High Lord of the Day Court – an old friend who few realized was even a friend of mine. His knowledge of the Cauldron was limited, and without his libraries to aid him, there was little he could tell me, but it had been a start.

I opened my eyes to meet Amren’s and nodded once before I said, “I know.” I wished it wasn’t true, the implications were not good.

I gestured, “What is that-“

FEAR

FEAR PANIC BLOOD

Red blood… or was it paint? Coating a wall, and fear so strong it pumped through my veins thrummed down the bond. I saw Tamlin, standing in front of me, breathing hard, his face shifting from pure anger to terror and then… Nothing.

All emotion cut off. All vision to what she was seeing disappeared.

I sat frozen in my chair, my heart racing and my lungs burning with a need to breath. I gasped hard for air, my nails digging into the arms of the chair as I reached out blindly and felt for the bond, running my claws along it, pulling…

Please please please…

Resistance. She was still there. Feyre was still there, still alive.

I nearly sobbed, as it was a low sound choked out of me as I sagged back in my chair.

I had no idea what happened, what caused that surge of panic, that overriding fear, but the brief flash of Tamlin gave me a hint.

Rage built up inside of me… if he had hurt her, if he had even raised a hand to hurt her – I would slaughter him, I would peel him apart piece by piece…

My vision was tinted with red, rage so thick it coated my tongue as I felt my darkness clawing its way out of me, beginning to spill out in waves…

“Rhysand.”

One word. My name. But spoken from a creature who was more ancient than our world.

I froze and raised my gaze to meet hers.

Amren was not prone to sympathy, but there was kindness in her eyes.

“Is she alive?” Was all she asked.

How she knew I could not guess. But I managed a nod.

“Then reign it in boy. Destroying this city will not save her, especially if she is not dead.”

My anger surged again at her words, but I recognized the logic in them, and drew my darkness back inside, inch by inch, until none of it leaked out.

When I had control again, I spoke harshly, my voice rough with the rage that was still there beneath the surface, “I need to find Azriel. Now.”

She nodded once, “Go. We will finish this later.”

I stood and prepared to winnow to the House of Wind but hesitated and turned back to her. “What did you find in the scroll?”

She smirked slightly and lifted it, “Oh this?” She unfurled it and showed it to me. Blank.

“Nothing – you confirmed my suspicion.”

Any other day I might have said something in response, called her out on it – but this time I just turned and between one breath and the next, stepped through my shadows and to the air above the House of Wind, falling freely for a moment before spreading my wings and circling down to the roof, landing with a soft thud and tucking my wings in, making my way inside to the war room – looking for Azriel.

- - - ~*~ - - -

Azriel had very little to report to me.

After I had found him and asked him to call in reports from his spies at the Spring Court – of which he did not have many – they could not report many details to either of us. There had been a fight, they could confirm that, and they could confirm that Feyre was alive and unharmed.

And that was it.

And it was enough to drive me nearly to madness. I still had over a week to wait, and the resolve I had once held to free her wavered until it was practically nonexistent. Not because she didn’t deserve her freedom – but because I couldn’t bear the thought of having some way, any way of getting her out if I needed to.

Mor cornered me only once during the week, to prudently remind me that I already had a way to get her out – and it was more solid than a silly bargain made Under the Mountain. I had managed not to kill her, but I had yelled at her – an action I regretted and later apologized to her about. She forgave me, I suspected before I had even apologized. She did not push me about it again.

The day before I could collect her, I was useless, and Cauldron bless my family, they left me alone. I had retreated to the Night Court and spent the day pacing the palace, trying to hold myself together by inches, checking the sky over and over, waiting for the sun to sink behind the mountain and the stars to appear. And then wait just long enough for midnight to pass.

Finally.

I pulled the darkness in around myself and cast across the world until my feet landed on the flagstone pavers in the Spring Court outside the manor house. It was pitch black out and the manor and all its inhabitants were asleep. But I knew he would feel me arrive. My heart thudded and I could taste the echo of rage I had felt that moment her fear had raced down the bond through me.

I still wanted him dead.

I made my way up the steps to the front of the manor house and felt the wards there and almost laughed – they were soap bubbles, fragile constructs. He had always been more beast than fae, his control of magic was child’s play compared to the constructs I could form. A gesture of my hand and they were pushed aside.

I opened the carved front door and stepped inside. The scent of her hit me so hard it was almost like a physical impact.

Feyre.

I swallowed and made my way to the stair case and began to climb up it, step by step.

I had done this once before – climbed these stairs, but that had been with the intent to kill. This time, while I would not hesitate to kill Tamlin, this time I had the intent to rescue.

I reached the landing and began down the hallway, when a door opened suddenly and Tamlin stepped out to meet me – his face suffused with rage. And I could smell her on him. Bile rose in my throat.

“Get out.” He growled, his talons extending past his knuckles.

“Good morning to you as well.” I purred.

“I’ll say it one last time-“

“I’m not interested in anything you have to say. Where is she?” I grinned at him tauntingly.

As if in response, the door he had walked out of opened, and peeking past it was Feyre, hair a total disaster, wrapped in a blanket.

And my heart froze. My grin faltered and fell.

She was worse. So much worse.

I scanned her from head to toe and her body was thin, too, too thin, her cheeks were sunken, the marks under her eyes nearly black, and her eyes… they seemed nearly vacant. That radiance in her… it was… it was dimmed, so dark, it seemed almost snuffed out.

“Feyre,” I managed, nearly choking on her name. I shifted my gaze to Tamlin, as rage had begun boiling up in me at the sight of her. The thoughtless, self-absorbed coward! Why couldn’t he see what was happening to her? I nearly growled as I asked, thinking maybe, just maybe, he might finally recognize how bad off she was. “Are you running low on food here?”

He was completely oblivious. “What?” He demanded without an ounce of realization.

One day I was going to kill him, and I would take a long time doing it. But not today. Today I had to get her out.

I turned my eyes back to Feyre and extended a hand to her, “Let’s go.”

In an instant Tamlin was in my face, snarling, “Get out.” He pointed towards the stairs, “She’ll come to you when she’s ready.”

If he thought for one second that he could intimidate me – he was sorely, sorely mistaken. The only reason he was still breathing was because the only thing more important than killing him was standing behind him in the doorway, and I had to get her out. Now.

And I wanted him to realize how absolutely powerless he was against me. I wanted him to feel just a fraction of what Feyre must be feeling every day beneath the yoke of his control.

I reached up, and brushed a fleck of dust from his sleeve, and smirked at him.

Feyre’s shields were lowered slightly, they had been since she had come to the door, and I had been avoiding looking too closely – respecting her privacy as best I could.

But I couldn’t help when she shouted things down the bound at me, which this time was almost a relief as it had been nearly a month since she had done so, and this thought nearly made me laugh – her fear of his teeth anywhere near her throat.

I shifted my gaze to her, “No you wouldn’t have.” I told her and grinned, “As far as your memory serves me, the last time Tamlin’s teeth were near your throat, you slapped him across the face.”

I felt her shield snap back into place solidly, and though this meant her contact with me was ended, I was still proud of her.

“Shut your mouth,” Tamlin snarled at me, stepping further between us, “And get out.”

This was getting us nowhere. I could have just winnowed into the bedroom and grabbed her and winnowed out – but that would have led to all sorts of additional problems, the least of which being Feyre thoroughly pissed off with me. Instead, I conceded one step back and slid my hands into my pockets and continued on conversationally.

“You really should have your wards inspected. Cauldron knows what other sort of riffraff might stroll in here as easily as I did.”

I shifted my gaze back to her, examining her minutely, continuing to note the subtle marks of neglect, the rage continuing to simmer inside of me.

“Put some clothes on.”

She bared her teeth at me before slipping back into the room, Tamlin following right behind her and slamming the door hard enough to make the chandeliers above my head shake.

I waited and listened, ears straining to hear through the door.

“…get in…”

“…part of…. game he’s playing…”

Silence.

“…war is coming… mend things.”

Interesting, so she had mentioned what I told her to him, at least in part.

“…releases you… bargain.”

“…listen to him.”

“…recover in peace... earned it… relaxed… sentries…. isn’t the time….”

Silence again.

And I was impatient. So, I coughed, once.

The door opened a moment later and Feyre stepped through it, walking towards me and I couldn’t help but frown at the sight of her. She wore the Night Court clothes she had left in last time, but they were so loose on her, they slid across her skin, which was pale and sallow, and her hair, still tangled with sleep, was dull and failed to shimmer with the dim lights of the hallway.

She looked half dead. And it killed me. Get her out – I had to get her out.

I locked down my face, removing all expression, and just raised a hand for her to take.

But Tamlin appeared in front of her, shoving my hand aside roughly – the panic riding high across his face, “You end her bargain right here, right now, and I’ll give you anything you want. Anything.”

Feyre went still. “Are you out of your mind?”

Tamlin didn’t even look at her as he stared me down.

I simply arched a brow at him. “I already have everything I want.” Which was the most bold-faced lie I had ever made about anything – ever. But I doubted he would give me her… besides, she was not an object, a prize to be given.

I stepped around Tamlin and reached for Feyre, taking her hand, and without letting her say goodbye, I winnowed us to the Night Court.

0 notes