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[lunamariawriting]

Falling Leaves: post-ACOMAF oneshot

Summary: Tamlin sees the Feyre of past. Lucien sees Feyre as she has become.

Falling Leaves . . Lucien knows what he sees.

He knows the truth, so thinly veiled before him.

The truth of Feyre Archeron…Cursebreaker…and traitor. Member of the Night Court, of Rhysand's Inner Circle. His mate, of all damned things. The Mother does have an eye for incongruity, making a mockery of them all.

Especially of Lucien, it seems. Who sees it all unfolding, and does not believe for one moment Feyre's grand transformation of character.

He does not see what Tamlin sees – what he chooses to see, in his relentless blindness: the victimized savior of Prythian, newly returned from the clutches of the Night Court. The painter, healing quietly under the Spring Court's ministrations. A girl, human and fragile, in need of every protection.

Tamlin sees the Feyre of past. Lucien sees Feyre as she has become.

At those eyes, so ready and sure, and that arrow primed for release. Aimed at Lucien, as his center of understanding shifted to accommodate this new Feyre. The eyes, the wings, the gravitation toward the High Lord of the Night Court, and her words.

Every word and every sharpened, purposeful defiance echo back at him. He understands what she has become in her time with Rhysand. She has changed in a way that Tamlin's watchful eye of her cannot reverse. She has learned things, and done things.

I will hunt each and every one of you down.

I will destroy your court, and everything you hold dear.

Her words are as sharp as Rhysand's magic, as dark and uncompromising. As powerful, as unyielding.

She is of the Night Court.

It is testament to how strongly Tamlin holds onto his illusion of Feyre, that he does not see her. He does not see the darkness, the cunning, the strength waiting patiently just beneath the surface.

Tamlin sees Spring in her, but it is artifice, every piece of it.

Lucien does not trust this new Feyre, bonded so permanently to his enemies.

Tamlin does not understand this Feyre, the one seven High Lords reaped into existence. He thinks her gentle and defendable, so Spring. He does not see the Night in her, as Lucien does.

The truth of it is, Tamlin would rather see Feyre as human, so complete in her love for him. In the safety of his mind, she is the victim of a villainous bargain and a High Lord with a magic that touches and changes minds. She was taken and held and manipulated. So helpless and broken.

As if Tamlin does not remember Under the Mountain. What Feyre did, what Feyre was capable of. What strength bloomed there, despite every belief to the contrary.

Yet he refuses to believe and remember, so weak to the pain of memory and loss.

Lucien understands, but he is not quite the fool Tamlin is.

Tamlin may believe the mating bond broken, may believe Feyre's mind and allegiance resorted, but Lucien always had been the more cynical of the two.

And as his own bond chafes against the absence of his mate, he knows what Tamlin does not.

The mating bond cannot be broken. Not even the king of Hybern could unmake such a thing. It's something Lucien feels to his bones, this pull and longing unlike any other thing.

The feeling, the bond, it could not be fabricated or erased or unmade.

Which leaves Feyre – a fox in a chicken's coop, biding, learning, planning.

I will destroy your court, and everything you hold dear.

She will be good to her word, Lucien has no doubt.

But…Elain.

There is much Lucien is willing to sacrifice to get his mate back. To see her, be with her. Including pretending Feyre is not this dark, vicious thing, a worthy mate to the High Lord of Night. That she does not bite, that her sleepy smiles and gentle way with Tamlin are not calculated pieces of a mask.

But Lucien knows a thing or two about masks.

He also knows where his mate is, and with whom.

Feyre knows too; he sees the reminder in her soft smiles, what is at risk and what price he must pay.

For his mate, he will pay it and more.

He will play Feyre's game.