eclipsed nova (UTM Feysand)

35

"I know you do."

"I'm sorry for dragging you here." He looked at me incredulously, stopping his steps. He cupped my face with both hands, studying my eyes.

"I go where you go."

My eyes stung as I nodded, trying to keep from tearing up. He pulled me into a long hug before he released me. When he did, his expression was unreadable as he turned his attention back to our surroundings.

We walked until we arrived at my family's home.

Immediately, I knew something was wrong. The windows were all dark and the door hung slightly ajar. I threw Rhysand a concerned glance before creaking the door open and stepping inside. The hearth was dead, like it hadn't held fire in quite a while.

The kitchen was empty, as was the bedroom. No one was here.

"Feyre?"

"I- I don't..." I shook my head, looking around for any sign of where my sisters or father could possibly have gone. Everything looked abandoned- there were no indications that any packing had been done. My father's whittling work sat half finished. There was a basket of flowers that had since died, never being put into a vase for preservation. It appeared that someone was in the middle of cutting up vegetables for dinner, a carrot sitting half cut on the wooden board, growing moldy from exposure to the air.

"Is there somewhere they could have gone?" Rhysand asked me, but my ears were ringing. I felt like I was losing everything all over again, the hollow feeling eating my stomach from the inside.

"No," I breathed, knowing it was the unfortunate truth. We had nowhere else to go- even during times we were at risk of starvation. So my sisters had not left this cabin voluntarily, or with any kind of preparation.

"Amarantha wouldn't have known to find them here, would she?" He asked, causing me to flinch at the sound of her name on his lips.

"I don't know."

Rhysand muttered something under his breath that I couldn't quite make out, but I couldn't even attempt to make conversation right now. Not with my pulse pounding in my temples.

I darted into the bedroom, opening the drawer with flames painted along the front. It was Nesta's- I'd painted each drawer with things that reminded me of my sisters. I dug through her clothes, shoving them messily to the side as I reached for the ornate hand mirror that had been my mother's.

Nesta never would have left without this if she'd been given the choice. I sank to my knees, the mirror in my palms. I looked into it, my reflection foreign to me. The circles under my eyes were purple and my hair had seen better days. I looked like hell.

Rhysand loomed in the doorway, watching me closely. I held up the mirror to him.

"Nesta never would have left my mother's mirror here if she'd known she was leaving," I explained to him, a tear rolling down my cheek and dropping into my lap.

"Feyre," Rhys tried again, but I shook my head, squeezing my eyes shut.

Amarantha had no way to know where my sisters were- I hadn't even told Rhysand how to find them. The only person in Prythian that could have known where they were was... My stomach roiled.

Tamlin. Tamlin had seen my sisters- had taken me from this very place when he'd taken me to be his bride. When we'd left under the mountain, we'd looked for him and had found nothing. We'd hoped it'd meant Amarantha had killed him, but now...

Rhysand must have read my face well, because he paled.

"You don't think..." He started, wincing at me.

"He took them," I said, my voice bleak. "Tamlin has my sisters."