A Court of Weeds and Whispers

. f i v e .

c h a p t e r      f i v e .

Solys

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MORNING SUNLIGHT BROKE THROUGH THE frozen canopy, and Elain's first morning comment on the days I was awake in time to hear it was always how beautiful it was. To see the beaming rays shimmering on the snow outside the cottage, the way the leaves flickered like shadows as they bent and swayed at the mercy of the breeze.

Elain commented about it as usual today. I told her I agreed but did not dare look outside and see it myself. I couldn't look at it. The sight of the forest, vast and full of hidden life, was a wrenching reminder of the life that had been lost inside this house just days ago. A life that had been lost because I had sat there and merely watched it leave. Nesta said nothing in reply to Elain's comment; just like me, she hadn't spoken much since that beast stormed into our home. Instead, she looked at me, her usually fiery eyes exceptionally soft this morning. Soft or tired? Had she slept? I didn't know, but I had not. I had been unable to sleep since I'd seen Feyre walk out that door.

However, it was clear to both of us that something had happened, that the faerie had done something, and if not to Nesta and I, then to Elain. I thought it was starting to take effect, whatever curse he had put on her. The day after my sister was stolen, Elain got up as usual and asked where her little sister had gone, as if she did not remember. After a few more days, a belief seemed to have worked into her head that Feyre had gone somewhere, to visit someone.

At first, I might have put this down as a coping mechanism- everyone had different strategies. I knew that, but it was primarily the same for most of my sisters and I. For Nesta and I, it was to lock ourselves away, in my case for weeks at a time, while Feyre's was- had been- similar, although I felt she was very good at hiding what she went through. Perhaps Elain's- sweet, beautiful Elain's- was to mentally block out the traumatic events and replace them with stories that did not happen. Nesta had stayed by her side every second of the day, asking if she was feeling alright. No one offered me any consolation, but that was fine. While I locked myself up in my room, mulling over a plan and having to force myself away from the temptation of giving up altogether, I came to no conclusion.

So, I decided that a plan was unnecessary since I could not develop one, and I was running out of time.

I did not bother sitting to eat breakfast, I would grab something later. I grabbed my boots from beside the front door, where they had been sitting to protect them from the wet and cold. That was another thing I had noticed. The days after Feyre had vanished, violent storms raged throughout entire days and nights, as if they were trying to mimic the sorrow, rage, and burning vengeance in my blood. The only day the storms ceased was today. The day I, too, would vanish from this home.

"Where are you going?" Nesta asked as I laced up my boots and grabbed my worn-out coat from the hook by the door. Slipping my arms into it, I turned back to look at her, finding her cool gaze linked with mine.

"Out," I replied stiffly.

I did not need my sisters tagging along, not when they saw who I would visit- if she was still there. My sisters complained to no end about the dirty, stinking mercenaries in the marketplace. My twin would often badger me when she saw me inclining my stance toward them whenever I couldn't find a better sale. She would order me to stay away, to keep my distance, claiming they would do anything they could to take my money, even if they had to rob me of it. But I needed to find her- the one who showed me kindness. She was the only one I hoped would take me seriously.

"Where to?" my father asked. I barely acknowledged him in response.

While Nesta and I had worried over Elain and her state of coping, none of us cared to say a word about our father, who just as Elain was, was acting strange too. I chalked that down to the fact that he didn't care. He didn't care- or he was trying to ice out the well-deserved guilt of instructing my sister to take the hand of a fae and never look back. I scowled in his direction when he spoke to me, vile hatred in my gaze, and decided then and there that I would never forgive him.