Chapter Text
Eris Vanserra detested the Hewn fucking City, but every inch of him ached and he didn’t hate it so much as he hated the Forest House, so here he was. It was exceedingly pitiful that the most dreaded city in the Night Court was actually better than his own home but there was no changing that at the moment. A groan slipped from between his lips as he stood, the skin of his back stretching and pulling the barely healed flesh. Eris was used to burns, hell he lived and breathed fire, but his father had been particularly irate at his disappearance regardless of that fact that it had been to save Autumn Court soldiers. It had been close—too close—to Beron finding out about his dealings with the Night Court. As it was, he had barely passed it off.
He was lucky it was Rhysand’s shadowsinger who had grabbed him from Koshei’s thrall and not his brute of a general. Eris could bend that story to his advantage, that he had been saved by the shadowsinger thanks to his snooping around and not because the Night Court was protecting their ally.
Ally. Eris scoffed as he poured a hearty measure of whiskey from the decanter on the sideboard. Mother tits, what a pathetic fucking turn his life had taken. The liquor burned as he dumped it down his throat, trying to forget the pity on the general's face before he left just minutes ago. He wasn’t a bad male, Eris knew that, but he let every fucking emotion show on his face and it was nothing if not grating. He was 500 years old for fuck’s sake and still hadn’t mastered the subtle art of Prythian politics? In his position?
Not for the first time Eris wondered what kind of court Rhysand was running here, and he was going to vomit if he heard one more person say “the Court of Dreams”. He supposed it was fitting that he fit in at the “Court of Nightmares”, at least from the Night Court’s rulers point of view. But in reality, the Hewn City wasn’t so bad those above made it seem. Many of its people were cruel, true, and its traditions were archaic at best, but there were good people, Eris had found, people worthy of the “Court of Dreams” if Rhysand actually decided to give a shit. It was nearly funny to him, how after all these centuries Morrigan still had the audacity to play the victim and paint him as the villain in her story while she had left this place and not had a care for all the females she had left behind.
Yeah, some fucking dreamers that group is.
He finished his glass and poured another. The vintage was one he had brought from home, he’d never stoop so low as to drink anything that wasn’t from the Autumn Court, it was all practically swill compared to what his home produced. And now he was right back to the subject he had been trying to avoid thinking about. Home. He couldn’t be gone long, not if he wanted to keep his father from growing suspicious. Eris was always allowed a bit of reprieve after his father’s “lessons” but if he was gone too long he’d end right back in the cell Beron loved so much.
His back itched as if in reminder. At least that itching was a testament to the healing process, it was also a signal for dread to begin curling in his gut. It was time to go home. His forces needed attending too, especially after some of the contingents had gone missing. Cassian had told him that the Illyrian Blood Rite had been affected, but no other court had soldiers up and vanishing. Even if Briallyn was dead, Koshei wasn’t, and Eris didn’t think it was a coincidence that only Autumn’s people were affected. His father was mixed up in this somehow, but he wasn’t confiding in Eris about it.
Beron had always been a power hungry piece of shit, so it wasn’t particularly surprising if he had teamed up with Briallyn and Koshei. Eris had hoped after his visit to the continent that his father might be a touch more willing to share his plans, but hours in the cell beneath the Forest House had showed him that hope was in vain. It was fine, it just meant that he’d have to figure it out himself. His father was the oldest High Lord for a reason, and he never really stopped looking beyond his borders.
With a sigh he tossed back the contents of his glass and set it down on the sideboard. He was wasting time here, and his dealing with Keir could wait another day. With one last look around the room, Eris winnowed home.
- - - - -
Azriel was tired. Between trips back and forth to the continent, maintaining his spies in the other courts, watching the Hewn City, and now having to watch Illyria, he could admit that he was being run ragged. Plus he had to deal with the idiotic decision of his high lord and lady to bind their lives together, as if he didn’t have enough to worry about, now he had to worry about that secret getting out too. Even days later he was still reeling from the near deaths of Rhys and Feyre, how their own selfishness nearly left the Night Court in turmoil. What would they have done?
Azriel circled low over Velaris, landing with hardly more than a whisper on his apartment’s rooftop. It didn’t feel right being at the House of Wind these days, not with Cassian and Nesta newly mated. Not that Azriel thought they would tell him to leave, but he didn’t want to make them uncomfortable, and he certainly didn’t need to smell the aftereffects of their arguments while he was eating breakfast. He couldn’t stay at the townhouse either, not when that had somehow fallen into Elain’s domain. Azriel wasn’t going to tempt fate like that, and he didn’t need another earful from Rhys about it no matter how badly he wanted Elain.
He pushed open the door to his apartment a bit harder than he needed to as his thoughts wandered. Its just didn’t make any sense. Rhys and Cass were his brothers and they were mated to sisters. Why then, were the third brother and the third sister not paired? Why was she paired with Lucien of all people? Grumbling, Azriel made his way into his lifeless apartment. Shadows stretched along the floor, reaching their needy fingers toward him. His own shadows swirled about him, whispering. Always whispering. The grumbling of his stomach went unanswered as he tapped the siphons on the back of his hands, his scaly armor retreating, leaving him in nothing but his leathers. Azriel stretched his arms above his head, popping the joints in his shoulders and neck.
Azriel ?
Rhysand’s voice was soft in his head.
Hmm? It was all he could manage when all he wanted to do was curl up in his large bed and pass out for once
Meet me at the house tomorrow for breakfast. I want a report on the goings-on since Briallyn was destroyed. We can’t grow lax now.
Azriel scoffed out loud where Rhys couldn’t hear it. It certainly wasn’t him growing lax. It wasn’t like he had a mate to distract him after all.
I’ll be there. Was all he said before Rhys’ consciousness faded from his mind.
He didn’t let himself think about the coming day, or anything else he had to do. Azriel simply fell into bed and slumped into an immediate, dreamless sleep.
*****
A misty rain clung to Azriel has he swooped down onto the steps of the river house. He didn’t bother knocking, just pushed into the warm interior and shook off his wings, the droplets showering Rhys’ entry hall. Servants already bustled about casting him nods and hellos as he made his way to the dining room, where the soft murmur of voices drifted from beneath the door. His High Lord and Lady were already seated when he entered, looking worse for wear.
Azriel snorted. “Parenthood going well then?” They both shot glares at him as he took a seat on Rhys’ left and began digging into the food in front of him.
“Nyx isn’t fond of sleep it seems,” Feyre grumbled.
“And where is the little bat?”
“With Elain, thank the cauldron, giving us a much needed break,” Feyre answered.
Azriel ignored Rhys’ discreet side-eye. He wouldn’t give his brother the satisfaction. Plus, he rather enjoyed that his brother was suffering just a little with a newborn. While Azriel couldn’t be happier for him, he also couldn’t understand the decision to have a child when they were still so far from peace. Azriel loved Nyx with all his heart, but the child was now just another thing he had to worry about, another person their enemies could target.
“Then I won’t keep you.” He turned to face Rhys and began detailing everything he had monitored in the last week: how the human queens had seemingly given up on their quest to become fae after Briallyn’s failure, how Koshei had drawn back but hadn’t yet sent for Vassa, as she remained in the human lands with Lucian and Jurian, but Azriel didn’t dare get too close, even with the crown gone.
“And how is our favorite Heir of Autumn?” Rhys probed. “What did Beron have to say about his absence?”
“You know the Forest House is practically a vault, almost more so than the queen’s castle on the continent?”
Rhys smirked. “And?”
Azriel ignored the flicker of annoyance that lashed through him. Sometimes Rhys made it seem like everything was easy for Azriel when it very much wasn’t. For several hundred years he had carefully curated spies and shadows to stretch in a net across Prythian and the continent, but the Forest House in the Autumn Court had always been a snag, a hole in an otherwise perfect tapestry.
“From what I can tell, he was…displeased, regardless of the fact that Eris went to save their own soldiers. Beron has a part in this, I just can’t tell what it is. And with Briallyn gone I worry about a potential alliance between him and Koshei.” He didn’t tell them that he had surmised as much not from his spies in Autumn, but instead from the shadows that lingered in the Hewn City, the ones that had told him of Eris’ arrival and departure, of the stiff way he moved and the blood spotting through the back of his shirt. Azriel hadn’t been particularly displeased to discover it—the male deserved worse.
Feyre frowned. “He’d be a fool to ally himself with a death god.”
Azriel shrugged. “He’s the oldest High Lord for a reason. We’d be fools to assume there isn’t anything he wouldn’t do for more power.”
“Keep an eye on him, and Eris for that matter.” Rhys said, as if so much of Azriel’s energies weren’t already focused on Autumn. “What about Illyria?”
“Quiet,” Azriel said with a shrug, but if he was being honest, he hadn’t put much thought into surveilling the Illyrians. He hated being up there at all, and quite frankly they hated him. He let a few shadows do most of the heavy lifting there, that was Cassian’s domain anyway, so he wasn’t sure why Rhys was asking him about it.
“I was hoping, Az,” Rhys began, wincing a little as he did so, “that you might be able to pick up a bit of Casein’s slack where Illyria is concerned.”
Azriel frowned. Rhys knew how much he hated it there and if he thought he was going to be spending time in—
“I’m not asking you to spend ample amounts of time in Westroost,” his high lord said, as if reading his thoughts, which Azriel didn’t put past Rhys. “Just…keep more of an eye out that usual. Their dissension about the war won’t have gone away just because the Blood Rite was tampered with.”
“Is there something wrong with Cassian?” He certainly didn’t need more things to do, and Cassian was their general for Cauldron’s sake, the Illyrian’s at least tolerated him, Azriel had never been met with anything but disdain and fear in over five-hundred years. The fear he could handle, that he was used to, but to be so thoroughly cast aside by his own people…he didn’t know how Cass could stand it, how after five-hundred years he kept trying to shape them for the better.
Rhys glanced at Feyre, and Azriel could tell that they were speaking mind to mind. “After the events of last week with Cass and Nesta and now that they’re finally mated, I was hoping to give them a bit of a reprieve.”
He raised a brow, as much emotion as he dared show. This was a Feyre idea if Azriel had ever heard it, likely an effort to get Nesta to warm up to Rhys more if he gave her mate more time to spend with her. Azriel had been around the House of Wind enough to know that the new mates were still well in their frenzy, but that didn’t mean he wanted to babysit Illyria. He also couldn’t help the nagging at the back of his mind that wondered if he’d be given the same consideration if he had a mate. Azriel doubted it, but then again, he didn’t have a mate.
“Fine,” he bit out, rising from his chair.
“And we have family dinner tomorrow,” Rhys called after him as he strode for the door. “Don’t forget!”
“I never do,” he mumbled as he left the dining room.
*****
Five minutes later he was dropping onto the roof of the House of Wind amidst a crowd of stretching priestesses along with Nesta and Cassian.
“You’re late,” the eldest Archeron sister said, though it wasn’t laced with any of her usual malice.
He smirked at her. “Some of us have jobs to do, you know. We don’t all get to sit around in mated bliss.”
She rolled her eyes. “If you call Cassian’s snoring bliss.”
Azriel chuckled. “You forget that I’ve lived with him for five-hundred years.”
The ghost of a smile curved onto her lips as Cassian said, “I do not snore. And I don’t need you two talking about me like I’m not here.” Despite the dreary weather he’d already stripped off his shirt and more than just Nesta’s eyes were studying the muscles chiseled there. He withheld his eye-roll.
“Are you all going to stand around all day?” He called to the group at large. “You start with conditioning every day and stalling’s not going to change that.” The words were firm, but the priestesses had gotten used to him and Cassian enough that instead of quieting and shrinking in on themselves, they groaned and mumbled things Azriel pretended not to hear. Gwyn and Emerie walked toward Nesta. He hadn’t gotten to see them much since the Blood Rite but they looked well enough.
“Leg okay?” he asked Gwyn as she tied a strip of fabric around her head to help keep back her hair.
“Right as rain now,” she answered with a blinding smile. Everything about her was so…light. His shadows had always found her curious, and Azriel couldn’t pinpoint what it was about her that seemed different. Sometimes when he wasn’t looking directly at her Azriel could have sworn there was a soft golden aura around her, but every time he looked closer it vanished.
“Glad to hear it. That means you can work just as hard as everyone else now,” he said with a smirk.
“Is that why you were asking?” she complained. “So you can make sure I’m not slacking off?
He shrugged. “Just making sure you realize your full potential.” And he was convinced there was a lot of potential where Gwyn was concerned. She had ventured beyond the library and House of Wind to Windhaven. But she had yet to visit Velaris or expand her bounds beyond that. Azriel wasn’t going to push her, he would never be so callous as to press her when she’d made such good strides toward healing already, but the spymaster in him couldn’t help but think of all the ways the Night Court would benefit from her working for them.
He had been wary of trying to build any sort of relationship with her since he was the one who had found her during Hybern’s attack. But over the last months she didn’t seem to hold that against him, and treated him just the same as if he hadn’t saved her.
The priestesses began their grueling workout while Azriel turned to Cassian and drew Truthteller.
“I didn’t even get a proper ‘good morning’,” Cassian complained as he drew his own blade.
Azriel glanced back at Nesta, and then dramatically sniffed his nose toward the other male. “It certainly smells like you did.”
Cassian grinned wickedly. “Ah but not from you, Az.”
Azriel swung his blade once as he rolled his eyes. “Don’t let your mate hear you say that.”
From behind him Nesta called out, “Who says I’m not into that, Az?”
Azriel choked as Cassian swung his blade at him, a laugh echoing from his throat. Azriel parried it with ease as they began their dance. He and his brother had bedded plenty of females together over the years, he was well acquainted with the other male’s body but he had never considered it with Nesta, his mate of all people.
“Thinking about it are you?” Cassian chuckled as their blades clashed.
“Trying not to,” was all he said in response. Soon enough he had to strip off his Illyrian leathers despite the chill. By then the priestesses had moved on to the week’s obstacle course he and Cassian had set up for them, and the two males had cast aside their weapons in favor of their fists.
“Speaking of,” Cassian panted as if there hadn’t been any break in their conversation, “has there been anyone for you recently? I feel like we haven’t really talked in forever.”
Because you’ve been balls deep in your mate for months, he thought. Golden hair and brown eyes flashed in his mind. “No,” he answered, “no one of import at least.”
“No? Not even…” he gestured with his head toward Gwyn.
Azriel scoffed and shook his head. He would never imagine to pursue Gwyn in such a way. Not only because it would be inappropriate, but because he had always gotten the impression that she didn’t like anyone in that way, males or females.
Cassian frowned. “Then what’s with the necklace?”
Azriel’s stomach turned a bit. “I want Gwyn to be a friend, and I thought it might make her more comfortable around me and us since she’s so close to Nesta now.”
“Hmmm,” Cassian didn’t seem happy with that answer as he blocked Azriel’s punch but left his right side exposed. He grunted as Azriel’s fist met his ribs. “Cauldron, Az…”
“Maybe you should focus less on talking and more on fighting,” Azriel suggested, earning a glare from the other male, but at least he shut his mouth.
When they had both taken a thorough beating and the priestesses were done for the day, Azriel trooped downstairs to the House of Wind to the rooms that he still kept, even if he didn’t sleep there. Within a few moments he was soaking himself beneath a tub of scalding water, nearly searing his wings. But he relished the fine line between pain and pleasure, remaining there until it was past time for him to begin his duties. With a sigh he turned off the water and toweled off, wrapping it around his waist as he moved to his closet and picked out a fresh pair of leathers. As he stepped out of his rooms he could hear a faint thumping from Nesta’s rooms a floor above, a clear reminder of why he had moved out in the first place. Without so much as a goodbye, Azriel winnowed away.
- - - - -
“The border with Spring grows unruly,” his father said over the large oak table around which his highest officers and advisors sat. They’d been at it for hours, and Eris had grown thoroughly bored with all of it. Since Briallyn’s fall the High Lord of Autumn had been in a foul mood, picking fights where there were none. Next to him, Thoras, Damien, and Mordrin were literally dosing in their chairs, out of sight of their father. But then again, Eris doubted Beron even cared, his brothers’ responsibilities and rank were more for show than anything. The four of them, that’s all that was left of the original seven sons of Autumn. Not that he wanted Lucien back in this hellscape, but Eris would have endured his endless—albeit deserved from his point of view—sneering if it meant that there was at least one decent person with a spine sitting at this table.
“If Tamlin will not control his lands then we might have to do it for him,” his father went on. When no one spoke, Eris felt it was his duty to at least provide some resistance to his father’s insanity.
“That would be a declaration of war, Father,” Eris pointed out. He didn’t quail as the High Lord turned his whole attention on him with a raised brow.
“And what of it? It’s a war we would win, and we would more than double our lands. Spring was always the worst season anyway.” Murmurs of assent ran around the table as Eris suppressed his eye roll.
“The war with Hybern wasn’t long ago and all too recently contingents of our soldiers were going missing. Who’s to say that won’t happen again? Our warriors need a reprieve do they not?” He was General of Autumn. He would stick up for his men a thousand times over no matter what punishment his father gave.
Blistering silence met the words, though at the change in atmosphere his idiot brothers roused themselves to witness the sparring match and Eris’ inevitable downfall. “If our warriors need a reprieve then they shouldn’t call themselves such,” his father snapped, the temperature of the room rising with every word. As a child, Eris had thought it a wonder that the Forest House had never burned down considering the number of rages his father habitually fell into. Of course, he’d only realized that it was warded against flame when he had tried to burn it down himself as a youngling.
“Regardless…” Beron went on, once again addressing the room at large, “I think a few more pieces need to fall into place before such an endeavor.” He turned to Roan, his spymaster, a greasy male nearly as old as Beron. “I want eyes on Spring and Night. Those half-breeds in the north are always up to something and I don’t want them establishing a foothold anywhere outside their court.” Roan’s slimy smile was acknowledgement enough. “You’re all dismissed.” They all made to stand, but Beron hissed, “Not you,” so Eris sank back into his chair as his brothers grinned devilishly at him, disappointment flickering in their eyes that they were going to miss whatever lashing he was no doubt about to be given.
When they were alone, his father stood, moving to the decanters lined up along the edge of the room and poured himself a glass. Eris waited patiently and quietly in his seat as he had been trained to do.
“I want you keeping an eye on the border with Spring.”
It wasn’t what Eris expected to hear. “But isn’t Roan-“
“Yes, but I don’t need you inside the court, I want you looking at its weaknesses, looking for the best place to attack. If it’s along our shared border then wonderful, if it’s from the human lands…” Beron smirked. “Well we can surely do that too.”
Eris suppressed a shudder. His father had never cared for humans no matter what side he fought on in the first and second war. He’d re-enslave humans tomorrow if he thought he would get away with it. Beron wandered over to the large window looking out over the jewel-toned forest. Slowly, as if not to scare a cornered beast, Eris pushed back his chair and rose to his feet. He hated being seated while his father was standing.
“That shouldn’t be too hard, I can have a report for you soon.” He waited for a dismissal that didn’t come, trying to ignore the dread rising and falling within him. Eris kept his face blank, flat.
The High Lord of Autumn sipped from his goblet. “And I expect our soldiers to be ready to move if I do decide to take Tamlin’s sorry excuse for a court.”
“Of course, Father. My soldiers are always—“
“Your soldiers?” Beron’s backhand was swift, but Eris managed to hold his ground. It was a stupid mistake, one he should have known better than to make. “My soldiers, you mean. Everything you have is because of me.” He placed a hand on Eris’ shoulder squeezing as burning heat radiated from it down to Eris’ skin. Still he didn’t let himself flinch. “And you would do well to remember that I can take it all away.” He shoved Eris hard away from him. “Get out.”
He did so without a moments hesitation like the coward he was. No scorch marks marred his shirt, but he could tell from years of experience the skin beneath was already blistered. His father was always so particular about what he burned. Eris sighed as he strode down the hall. It wouldn’t do for his father to expand into the Spring Court, he couldn’t be given more influence than he already had, and Eris refused to let his soldiers get drawn into another conflict so soon. Which meant…
Eris didn’t let his distaste show, but between one step and the next, he winnowed to Spring.