(Bit of a long one. I have no regrets.x)
-e
Yrene
The plan... was nothing short of damned awful. It was far, far too simple and easy... so perhaps it was the best route to take afterall. If they- whoever they are- suspected that any of us had even an inkling of their plan- which they knew for a fact that one of us did- they'd expect us to pull out all the stops. Which had been my idea I supposed.
There was one floor of course.
We had no idea how many people exactly were involved in this scheme. At least two. At most... I didn't want to think about that. The entire guild? The thugs and ruffians they had recruited those years ago when burning down cottages and causing disturbances across Terrasen and Adarlan like they had done to Silas those years ago.
Fenrys had been right from the start. There had always been the bigger picture. Nothing had ever gone away, they'd never given up or settled, but plotted further and further until- until it was almost too late for anyone to realise.
They'd gotten their biggest problem out of the way almost too easily. Playing on how much Fenrys cared for Luna, how strongly he wanted to protect her. It had been so easy to get rid of him.
The whole hall was packed with people. A lot of which I didn't recognise, which wasn't comforting. Not when all of those people could be... not on our side. But how would we know? There was no way of telling, was there? It would've been easy had their scheme not evolved since the clearing. The void black eyes would've been easy to spot. Yet if they were regular people, threatened with theirs and their families lives... No, there was no way of knowing.
"You look nervous, love." Chaol said, breaking me out of my trance, his face was soft with the lack of worry.
Nervous? That barely covered half of it. A light sheen of sweat drizzled down from my hairline, trailing down my neck and racking a shiver down and throughout my body.
Secrets had never been my forte, especially not around Chaol, but it had been Fenrys' idea to keep the plan hushed. And well... he hadn't been wrong yet. Eighteen years ago, when convinced the disturbances across Adarlan and Terrasen had been linked; the night they'd come for Luna in her cot; Arobynn Hamel's heir and the guild.
I bit my lip, keeping my worries to myself and forcing a smile onto my face and choked out a brief laugh. Fake to even my own ears. "I'm about to officiate a royal wedding. Of course I'm nervous." My transparency was obvious, if only going by the frown Chaol replied with. But before he had time to ask, I quickly ushered, "Go and sit down. It's going to start any minute."
It was then, as he turned to walk away, that I noticed the limp. Clear as day even when he tried his best to conceal it. The almost silent scuff of his boot against the stone floor and uneven tempo of his footfalls.
I hadn't slept. Not so much as a wink, too tense to rest even a singular moment and now he was the one suffering. And I hadn't even told him why.
The nerves were instantly washed away by an overwhelming wave of guilt as Peter stood to help his father to his seat. Chaol had always been too proud, smacking away the offered hand and pushing his way past to his allocated seat.
"Good morning, Yrene."
"Your nose has healed nicely I see." I said in greeting, turning to finally face the man, or groom I supposed for the time being.
"I had a good healer." He winked.
I turned back to the crowd, searching for any sign of Fenrys. Aelin had just made her way down and past the seats parted to from an aisle, pulling at the collar and lapels of Sam's shirt and jacket. She was so good at it- through more than enough practice I was sure- acting like there was nothing going on.
Then again, after she was seated, there was that way her eyes kept flickering to the back of the room in a dreaded kind of anticipation. Using conversing with Aedion as an excuse to keep turning in her seat to face the back of the room.
"You look nervous, Yrene. Scared?"
I huffed, briefly glancing back at Malakai before keeping my eyes toward the open doorway, searching for a woman in a white dress with her mate hopefully not trailing too far behind. "People keep saying that." I said, rolling my neck, clicking out the knots and tense strain settling across them.
"And?" There was something in his voice, something more than just mild curiosity that was making my blood turn thick and start to boil. "Are you? Scared that is?"
"I like to think fear makes me stronger." Liking to think didn't make it true however, no matter how much I tried to make myself stand that little bit taller so I could at least try to ignore the unsettling way he loomed over me.
"Of course you do." He laughed. Chortled more like. As if he was trying to mock me. "Does all your Court think the same?"
"Fear and wrong-doing is what brought us together to begin with." And with that, I took one deep breath before turning to face him in challenge, looking down at him somehow even with the height difference.
There was a voice inside asking if he'd always been so intimidating. Always had that sickly pale tint to his skin that made him look like a dead man walking, with cold depthless eyes.
"Wrong-doing." He scoffed. "Yrene, you're very transparent today." Malakai took his time to scan the hall, remembering every smiling face. Every member of the Terrasen court.
And for a moment, I let myself do the same.
At a quick glance, there was that joy. Lorcan was curling a strand of Elide's hair around his index finger, planting a soft kiss against her cheek as she settled into him, arm falling to hold around his waist.
Lyssandra was wailing about how beautiful the whole hall was, smacking Aedion on the back of his head when his only reply was a grunt.
Henric was laughing at something Evangeline had whispered in his ear before turning around to relay the joke on to Asterin and Felix. The former, despite herself and her cold, well kept facade let a smile creep across her face.
Then looking again closer I could see it. Could see exactly what Malakai was seeing. The way Felix's face furrowed as he held one hand tightly onto Marion's thigh. Marion herself seemed as reserved as usual but there was that calculating gleam that made it seem like she was waiting on bated breath for- something.
"Tell me what you're afraid of Yrene." Malakai ordered as he turned back to look at me dead in the eye. "Is it me? Are you afraid of me, Yrene?"
"No." Gods damn the way my foot took an involuntary step back when he leaned forward.
Looking down to my feet and letting a malicious grin spread across his face was enough to turn the sweat across my body freeze ice cold. "I think you should be."
"You're being very transparent today, Malakai."
He laughed. "I like my odds. Tell me, what is it you're afraid of? That you and that dog have a plan with the current rulers, and... what you don't like it? You think you should've gotten the whole court involved?" He shrugged, feigning some kind of sympathy for me. "I would've thought the same."
"How do you-"
"I have eyes and ears everywhere, Yrene. You think you won't lose today. You and your Court have a bad habit of underestimating everyone. How did that turn out for Sam Cortland? Nehemia? The other dog... Connal was it? What about dear uncle Gavriel?"
I could feel the way my eyes bugged from my head as my head shook, refusing to believe that this was real, that he was real. "You know too much."
He wouldn't win, I reminded myself. We had a plan. No, he wouldn't win. Not now. Not today. Not ever.
His eyes rolled back and he shook his head, picking at the dirt from under his nails. "I know everything about all of you. Like the fact you all presume you'll never lose."
"Good always avails over evil. But I'm sure you don't believe that."
"I think Maeve ruled for a long time. I think I'd quite like to do the same."
"Maeve was a Valg Queen."
His head whipped around at the blatant disregard for his threat. The implication that he was nothing, no one. "And I am born from a fae and an Assassin King!"
My whole body recoiled as if I'd been struck, tripping back a step before catching myself.
Fae. He was fae. The way he'd kept the face of youth when in reality, he was perhaps even older than Aelin. And had been plotting for longer than any of us could even fathom.
No, Fenrys had not said there was a possibility of Malakai being the heir of Hamel himself. A link to him perhaps but- his son. Malakai Hamel.
My eyes found Mel amongst the crowd and she was already staring at me intently. As if hearing every word, knowing what was to come as she sat besides Sam, grinning. They hadn't been romantically connected for months but they'd stayed close and- oh gods.
Melantha Hamel.
Heirs of Hamel.
"It's fine, I didn't expect you to know that part. Your Queen was always far too absorbed in herself to divulge into Clarisse DuVency. I hope it haunts her for the rest of her life."
"That's impossible."
Fae.
Clarisse DuVency, a fae. Fae who took the form as a human when the tower went up just in the same way that Aelin had. Hiding from the King of Adarlan. It was no wonder Arobynn had become almost unstoppable. How he'd known about Lyssandra and Aelin. Clarisse had no doubt sniffed them out the moment they stepped into the Guild.
"Is it? Aelin never deemed to visit her when the curse on magic was lifted, when the tower fell. You've all brought this upon yourselves. It's time to repent for your sins, Yrene. One day at a time. For everything you took from my mother. From everything you took from me."
"You won't win. Not today."
"Yrene..." His eyes were scrunched with general confusion, like he might've mistaken the words that had tumbled so willingly from my mouth. "I already have."
"What makes you so sure? We defeated a Valg Queen. We defeated a Valg King. We defeated gods. And here you are, a fae thinking he stands a chance against any of us. A court of fae and humans touched by the gods, witches, shapeshifters-"
"I'm going to stop your little monologue right there. You're so blind. This-" He waved his hands out, gesturing around the room like he owned it. Like it was already his. "This is checkmate. You're a smart girl you must know what that means." When I didn't respond, he proceeded. "No matter what your next move is, I win. I've been two- no, I've been ten steps ahead of you all this whole time. I win whether you decide to kill me or not."
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"Like I said, you're blind. Just as you always have been. You all made it too easy for me really. You're all so scared of the past you refuse to admit when something's wrong right in front of you. How many times do you have to see a collar around her neck to realise what it is?" Collar? What the fuck was he talking about. A collar-
"Luna." I gasped under my breath.
"You were all noticing she was ill but you were so convinced it was because of the rejection from her mate." There it was, that sadistic mocking that spat out of him like venom.
"You've been using her. Her powers-"
"I mean Lyssandra warmed up quite quickly to me don't you think? It even worked on you for a while. Seeing this perfect human turn up out of the blue saving her from her spiral of despair." His grin narrowed into something bitter before focussing back on the crowd of people. Specifically, the young woman sat beside Felix, glaring directly at the man beside me. "Before Elide's daughter got in the way and the stupid Galathynius boy taking the damn thing off her."
"He can take it off again."
"How daft do you think I am? I made adjustments. I'll be fine. Stronger, even."
"I'll never let you marry her."
"And what if you were to think it was Fenrys you were giving her away to?" Malakai laughed, pulling at the sleeves of his jacket. "She's very powerful. I think you've all been underestimating her."
"It won't work. It made her sick for months-"
"Do you really think I care? I want Aelin and your whole damned court to pay for what you've done. What Aelin did to me and my family. I'll rule all of Terrasen. Then Adarlan. Then the whole of Erilea." He was looking forward unseeing, like he was picturing the map in his head. Watching his plan unfold before his very eyes. "Luna will either have the power to change how you all conceive everything and put me on the throne..." His eyes flickered to the doors as if speaking alone he might be able to summon her. To hurry this whole sickening ordeal along.
Bringing his eyes back to me for three words.
Three words that had me almost falling to my knees.
"Or die trying."
Where the fuck was Fenrys?
"Either way, Aelin loses." I took a step to put some space between us, like somehow it could erase everything. Imagining that one more step would have me tumbling out of my bed and realise this was all just a horrid nightmare. "I mean, if you want to try and stop her, I've heard beheading works a treat."
"You're a monster."
"We're all monsters. I just chose not to hide it behind those masks you wear. Now tell me, have I won?"
I couldn't answer past the lump of bile caught in the back of my throat, past the sick feeling roiling around my stomach and tightening the constraints of my chest. Couldn't think past every admittance and every revelation that had poured so willingly out of him.
But he hadn't won. Not yet. He wouldn't.
The voice in my head disagreed. Screaming his words over and over again.
'You're so blind'.
So naive. And he was right. We weren't prepared, and we hadn't seen the obvious signs. Caught up in the idea that everything was over. That this was our happy ever after.
"Yrene? Are you scared of me?"
He couldn't win.Only...
He could. And he was just about to. And there was nothing I could do to stop it.
"Yes."
***
Fenrys
"Mate." I choked.
It had only been minutes since I'd found the strength to stand and I'd been pacing ever since, wearing down the carpets with every step and every lap of the room. The scratch of my stubble against my palm was soothing, something to focus on beyond the inner turmoil beating around my mind.
"She's my mate." I gasped, running my hands back through my hair and tugging on the strands, as if that would somehow help.
Through even my own ears I sounded surprised, which was utterly ridiculous. I should've known. 'Should've' being the key part of that sentence. Of course I knew I loved her. Strongly. Really fucking strongly. I supposed the signs were always there too.
She knew. Luna must've known. How long had she bloody known and not told me? Wyrd, she'd known that day when training hadn't she? And Lorcan- the bastard- knew then too. So much was making sense now. Maybe... maybe the bond had snapped for her then at that moment. But that had been so long ago...
Perhaps- a part of me reasoned- even she knew I was never quite good enough for her. That much was true, I nodded to myself. After everything I had put her through.
I groaned at that, pinching at the bridge of my nose. "I'm her mate."
"So you've said." Rowan snorted from where he was resting on his bed, throwing up grapes and catching them in his mouth. "I'm not entirely sure why it comes as a surprise."
It didn't. Not really. Not after the dreams. The dreams, the letters, everything.
"Why are you so calm about this?" I huffed, standing at the edge of his bed with my fists on my hips. I almost laughed. Acting like his bloody mother.
"Thought I'd give you the time to freak out about it now. Aelin and I have known for a very long time. Or suspected at least." He said rummaging and sorting through the books on what was no doubt his wife's nightstand. "There's a lot of shit going on right now. I'll threaten you about it later."
My foot kicked the bedpost with enough force for the whole thing to shake, Rowan succeeding in catching himself before tumbling off. The pain was worth it. There was a cold promise of death in the narrow eyed stare that was directed plainly at me. Still, the pain and threat was worth it.
"There's no time for jokes, King. There is a young woman, not only about to walk down the aisle to meet a monster she doesn't love, but with a collar around her neck. I don't pretend to see anything funny in this situation-"
Rowan was quick to his feet, growling at me as we stood nose to nose. "Don't raise your voice at me boy! I bid you to remember that that young woman just so happens to be my daughter." Right. Of course it was. "Don't make the mistake of thinking you're the only one here that is aware of the severity of this situation." His neck cracked as he stood back, sighing briefly before cradling his face in his palms, continuing on more gently. "Though you must understand, it changes nothing to the plan. We do the same, and cross the collar when we get to it."
"Cross the collar when we- The collar should be our number one priority!" The frustration was abundantly clear in my voice, as I proceeded in pacing around Rowan's quarters. "We need to tell the rest of the court. About everything. Get that damned thing off. Sam's done it before he can do it again."
Rowan was shaking his head before I'd even come close to finish my sentence, collapsing back onto his bed, head in hands. "Do you think that Kai would risk making the same mistake again, Fenrys? No. No... He must've had time to change it after realising it'd been taken off."
There were moments of silent contemplation before it hit me. "Last night." Luna hadn't come from her rooms even with all the commotion and Malakai's screaming. She must've been sleeping. Deeply. "He was coming out of her rooms." And had looked almost panicked when seeing me. Terrified that I'd caught him, that all of his planning and fails and death of his right hand men would've all been for nothing. I nodded to myself. "It was then. It had to have been."
"Exactly."
"But... it doesn't make sense." I rubbed at my eyes, willing them to look back and search for whatever it was that we were missing. "If he's had the collar on her for so long why hasn't he used it?"
"Waiting for more power? More standing? Who knows, the collar might not even work in the way they did back then. Arobynn was looking for a way to use Aelin. Perhaps he was modifying them to be under his own control without having to deal with Valg."
"Why target just Luna?"
"She was vulnerable." The subtle accusation in his voice stung, but it was true.
That night she'd shut out everyone. Her family. Her friends. Marion, Asterin, Sam-
Sam.
"Oh... Oh it wasn't just her." Because this wasn't about me. It never had been. They'd used me to get to her. And now, seeing clearly as the pieces all fitted together, it'd be using Luna to get to everyone else. The fall of Luna would've been devastating to both the old court and the new.
And especially to Aelin and Rowan. The people that essentially toppled the first domino. The last, we thought, had been Arobynn. But here we were, watching everything still falling around us.
So no, Luna had not been the only one targeted. Because if she had turned away the advances in the beginning, they needed a back up.
They needed Sam.
"They went for Sam too. He took Mel to the ball. That only lasted, what a few months? Why give up? Why give up on Sam when they could've had both?" And had the assurance of the plan working. Only they didn't need assurance I supposed. Not with a collar.
"Maybe they didn't think they needed him anymore. They had a way in." Which was true. Then why was there something nagging in my gut, in my mind, that I was forgetting something.
"No... no that's not it. I mean perhaps, but not wholly. The amount of power they could've had..." They had Luna. They had a way onto the throne. Luna.
My mind was screaming her name at me. Over and over.
Mate.
Luna.
Luna.
But what about Luna made them think they had enough power?
Power.
Then it clicked. "Stop making yourself see something that isn't there." I said under my breath.
"What?"
"It's just- it's something I said a long time ago. Rowan, do you think she could change how people see things? Change people's perceptions, their memories? She joked about it in a letter once saying that she was experimenting, that it'd never worked but- do you think it's possible?"
"I don't think she's done it before. I mean she's shown us what she sees but-"
I stopped, whipping my head around to glare at him. There was no time for dancing around answers. "Do you think she could?" The blatant dread in his eyes told me enough. Told me everything. "Rowan, do you think she could?"
I needed him to tell me I was wrong. That this theory was nothing but that. Something that the anxiety and fear was making up.
"It's light. Surely all she'd have to do is to just not recall it in the same way."
"This isn't just changing how she sees things!" I shouted. "It- it's about changing people's memories, their realities altogether."
There was that silence, the way Rowan didn't move, didn't move like he was frozen. That deadly stone-like features and glassy eyes that would be seared into my mind forever. That the worst possible outcome was flashing before his eyes just as it was mine. Like somehow we'd already lost.
Because now there was that possibility that we could lose everything.
His throat bobbed once. "I think- I think it's possible." I blocked out the way his voice shook when he answered. Blocked out the implications.
Imagining that we weren't talking about my mate. Because this was war. And in war you have to think rationally, about everything with no interference.
"Then there's the motive. Use L-" I couldn't even say her name. Not without completely falling apart in the way Rowan was so, so close to. "Use her to warp everyone's reality and get you thrown off the throne."
"Why?"
"What all this has been about since the start. Revenge."
My eyes caught on a book of a dead language resting on Aelin's nightstand. The book on top that Rowan had only just sorted. A dictionary of words written in Latin, a forgotten language. Why the hell had Aelin been looking through that? And out of mere curiosity, I searched up two words.
"Ultio. Malakai Ultio. Messenger of Revenge. That little prick-"
"Revenge against Aelin." Rowan sighed, still not moving an inch from his perch on his bed.
Revenge against Aelin, and she'd known. Had found it in her fucking library and hadn't even told anyone. Which wasn't at all surprising for her.
"Aelin, Lyssandra, Aedion, you- Against all of us. We took everything from him. We're all guilty from association alone."
"Fuck. FUCK!" His rage finally boiled over, his fist connecting with the bedside drawers and had it shattering into thousands of splinters, before charging at his desk and sending it flying across the room.
"Rowan-"
"No." He flinched away from my hand that had reached for him. To calm him. To show he wasn't alone. Wasn't alone in that fear and anger that was threatening to tear me apart from the inside out. "We follow the plan. We tell no one. She's safer that way."
"Safer?" I shouted incredulously.
He whipped around to face me, shoving me back against the wall growling so close to my neck I thought he might've torn it straight from my body.
It wasn't me. This anger wasn't aimed at me. He was just as helpless as I was. That's how I kept the wolf in me at bay. Telling myself over and over that this wasn't a challenge. That Rowan wasn't a threat.
Rowan was in pain. Was in absolute agony.
"I think you forget last time we had a problem with collars, people got into a bad habit of beheading." He was panting. Gasping around breaths.
"They wouldn't." I reassured, barely moving. If I did, too suddenly or too far he'd snap. "They didn't with Dorian."
"Dorian could be saved!" He choked, screaming at me before collapsing to the floor, head in hands, shoulders shaking with the force of his silent sobs.
I took a few breaths until my breaths fell evenly, before lowering myself to my knees beside him. We sat there for moments in complete silence. For a second, I let it all sink in. This wasn't just one woman. It was my woman. My mate. My mate, my Queen, my King and court.
This time tomorrow, we could have nothing. Because right now, the chances of us winning, of somehow finding a way past this...
It seemed impossible.
So as Rowan sobbed, I let a tear fall as my back fell against the wall. "We can make it through this. We'll find a way. We always do."
"Not all of us. Never all of us." There was nothing I could say to argue. There was no way of arguing against fact.
Connal.
Rowan was talking about Connal and Gavriel and my chest ached with the reminder that the best part of me was gone. And that I couldn't have done anything. Along with that thought came a selfish bit of hope. That I could do something. And that's what made this different. I could finally fight.
"What if we can't save her? Luna not being on our side is a threat I'm not sure any of us can quite comprehend. I couldn't-" He didn't have to voice his thoughts. I knew exactly what it was he was alluding to. He couldn't put an end to it if it came down to it. And as his watery eyes looked at mine, I almost shattered completely. "Could you?"
No. "We'll find a way to get that thing off her. We've done it before. We'll do it again."
"If others find out- what if they don't see it in the same way. She's a threat what if-"
"No one's going to touch her. I swear it. I will protect her with my life."
"Fenrys?" Rowan stopped me with a hand around mine as I went to stand. Eyes full of so much emotion I almost couldn't face it. "I'm glad it was you."
And with those words alone I promised myself we'd make it past today. Everyone. Having Rowan's blessing was one thing, but winning over Luna...
I'd fight for her every day even if it took an eternity. And even if through some miracle I got her...
Forever didn't quite seem like long enough. Not with her.
"You're still going to threaten me later aren't you?" I asked, using his hand clasped in mine to drag him up, dusting off his jacket. Because there would be a later. For all of them. Through whatever odds.
We have time. We all have the rest of our lives. And I'd kill whatever bastard stood in the way of that. For her. For us. For Terrasen and for Erilea.
"Oh most definitely." He let out a small huff that I presumed was the closest thing to a laugh any of them could manage right now, nudging me into the door frame as we exited towards the sound of chiming bells.
We stalked into the hallway and I rolled up my sleeves to my elbows.
Shit.
Was about.
To go.
Down.
"I look forward to it."