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𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐟𝐨𝐮𝐫 | the city that never sleeps
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Velaris was as how they had described it. A city made of starlight hidden between the mountains of the Night Court. The city radiated joy, safety and a kind of warmth that Zara had not felt in a long time. The kind of warmth you'd feel from a child discovering that Santa ate the cookies they had left for him. The warm embrace of a mother after a nightmare and the feeling of coming home after having been gone for a long time. Velaris was all that and more.
Morrigan and Zara were discovering the city at night. Zara swore she had never seen this many stars before, only in pictures. The moon was bright enough to light up the snowy peaks of the mountains that surrounded the city. Tiny, bright lights lit up the streets of Velaris. Fae lights, Morrigan had called them.
The streets resembled those old French streets you would see in the movies and for just a moment, Zara had thought that she walked onto the set of Beauty and the Beast. Unfortunately for her, that wasn't the reality she was living. No matter how beautiful she thought Velaris was, it wasn't home. That cheesy quote that is printed on those cheap decorations, something like home is where the heart is, it was true. And for Zara, that was with her mom, in Massachusetts.
"What's your home like?" Morrigan asked, breaking the comfortable silence that they had. Genuine interest sounded in her voice. Zara considered her answer.
"I don't know, it's hard to explain to someone who doesn't know what a skyscraper is." Zara she joked, though there was truth in what she told her. How do you explain a skyscraper to someone who has never heard of it? How do you explain that the streets of the city she grew up in wasn't made out of cobblestone but concrete, that most buildings weren't built with bricks but with metal and glass?
"I guess it's bigger, more people, more concrete, and less brick. The air is less clean, people live and work in buildings that have a hundred floors. My mom and I lived in a neighborhood outside of the city, we call that the suburban, a little safer, but definitely not better." Zara explained.
"A hundred floors?" Morrigan asked "What does that even look like?"
Zara chuckled. "They're very high, I suppose they reach the height of the House of the Wind, some even go above the clouds, hence the name skyscraper."
"It's funny, I always wished to be somewhere else. Back then, I only thought about what I wanted, never about what I had. I'd do anything to go home, now." Zara continued. She wasn't sure why she felt like telling Morrigan that. Back home, Zara had been walking around with those thoughts. She had wished to be somewhere else, to find an escape from the live she was living. She had found that, but not in the way she had wanted. Be careful what you wish for, that was what they always said.
It stayed quiet after that, both of them lost in their own thoughts. Morrigan pitied the young girl, it had to be terrifying. She is just a child, an adult to human standards, but not the fae standards. Morrigan could only imagine what she had to be going through. She herself had been through horrible things, but she always found her way back home. They already knew that Zara would not suffer the same fate. She wouldn't go home, there was no way.
The day after Zara was found, they had contacted Helion, the High Lord of the Day Court. He couldn't find any reason for her appearance in the Night Court. There wasn't anything that suggested where she came from, that suggested how she could get back. The only reason he could give them was that the place Zara had visited was magical, whether she believed it or not.
"You know what was weird?" Zara asked, breaking the comfortable silence they had.
"Hmm?"
"I didn't even realize it. When I was in those woods, I didn't see the difference. It seemed like it was the same place. It was all the same to me, until, well, it wasn't." Zara said. "Nothing happened, no weird sensation, nothing like what you would expect."
"We're doing everything we can to ensure your way back home, Zara. It just takes time." Morrigan told her. It pained her, lying to the girl like that. Rhysand had said to give her some time, so that is what they did. Lie, and hope that one day she'll come to terms with it.
"Hey Morrigan?" Zara asked after a while.
"Call me Mor, Zara." Morrigan replied.
Zara gave her sheepish smile, "I-uhm I'll try to remember that. Why is everyone awake at night?"
"Well, we're in the Night Court, but not everyone is awake. Some people choose to spend their day at night and others, well, during the day. Both is possible here." Morrigan explained, as Zara took in the bustling city around her. There was a market, many cafes, bookstores and even some flower shops.
"The city that never sleeps." Zara said under her breath.
"What?" Morrigan asked, not having heard what she had said.
"There is a city, back where I'm from. It's nicknamed the city that never sleeps. The city where all your dreams can come true." Zara repeated. "I don't know why I told you that. I guess Velaris really reminded me of that place."
Mor looked at her, as Zara looked at the river that flowed through the city. "Let's go back. We can continue this tomorrow." Zara nodded, turning around to make the walk back.
She jumped when someone fell, no- landed, in front of her. Cassian, to be precise, landed in front of her. He chuckled at her response. "Bad conscience?" He asked her, as he stared down at her.
"No," Zara shook her head. "Just not used to people landing in front of me. People don't fly where I'm from, remember."
"Oh, I remember." He said, "Come on, let's get you back."
Zara turned to look at Mor "Are you not going back?" After noticing that Cassian was specifically speaking about her and not the two of them.
"No, I'm going dancing." Mor responded, and giving her a big smile that showed her teeth.
"Oh okay, have fun." Zara replied, and turned her focus back to Cassian, who stretched his arms at for her. He picked her up bridal style, placing one arm underneath her legs and the other around her back. If Zara had been in any other situation she might have blushed, but in that moment, she was too focused on not looking down.
The wind soared around her face as Cassian took off. She dared a look down, but balked when she saw the long way down. She subconsciously tightened her hold on Cassian. "Oh, god. That is high."
Cassian laughed, "Are you scared of heights?"
Zara frantically nodded. "I am."
"Don't worry, I won't let you fall. I've been doing this for centuries." He replied, making Zara feel a little safer. As if to prove the fact that he won't drop her, he gently tightened his hold on her. Zara sighed in relief when she saw the shapes of the House of the Wind.
She refrained from kissing the ground when they landed on the balcony that overlooked the city. "Thank you for not dropping me." Zara said, as the entered the house.
"You know, that's the first time someone said thank you for flying them up here." Cassian commented, while he took a seat next to Azriel, who was lounging on the couch. Rhysand sat on the opposite side of them.
They looked relaxed, but Zara could feel the tension in the room. If the other three noticed, they didn't give her any signs. "Is everything alright?" Zara asked, and Rhysand gave her a look of pity.
"Zara, I don't know how to tell you this without hurting you." He started, but stopped and looked at Cassian and Azriel.
"Tell me what?" Zara asked, she stared at him with concern and a little bit of fear. "Don't dance around it, I hate it when people do that."
"There is no way to get you back home." Azriel said, staring at the girl, as if waiting for her to break.
Zara didn't break. In fact, she felt nothing as she went over the words. There is no way to get you back home. She looked at the males up before her.
"What do you mean there is no way to get me back home?" Zara asked, her voice barely a whisper. She wished that Mor was here, perhaps she had known, and didn't want to be here to witness it. Zara might have done the same.
"We had Amren and several other people look into it. There is nothing we can do, not from here. The only thing that we can think of is that the place you were at was cursed. You were at the wrong place at the wrong time." Rhysand explained.
"No." Zara shook her head, tears were starting to roll down her cheeks, but she didn't acknowledge them. "That can't be true, I have to go home." She fell quiet looking at the floor, "What am I going to do? I have nowhere to go."
She felt two hands on her arms and she looked up to see Rhysand, his violet eyes staring right into her brown ones. "It's going to be alright. You can stay here, Zara, for as long as you want to. And we'll keep looking for answers, we just didn't want to keep you in the dark."
She nodded, wiping her face with the end of her sleeve and took a deep breath. She sat down, taking in the feelings that she had right now. She considered what he had said. She really did believe that she was going to be okay, but that didn't mean that she wasn't afraid. "It's normal to feel scared, Zara." Rhysand said, for a moment she had forgotten that they were in the room with her.
She lifted her head to look at him, to really look at him. To look at the people she knew he called family. "I need to be alone." She said to them. She stood up, it wasn't a long walk to the room she was staying in, but it felt like the longest one she ever made.
It took everything she had not to break before she entered the safety of the closed door. And when the door closed, and she her the familiar click of the lock. That was when she let out the first sob, and the next one and the one after that. For the first time in her life, she felt grief. Grief for the life she was never going to get back, the people she was never going to see again, and her dreams that cracked into a thousand tiny pieces.
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hey guysss, I'm back with chapter four. writing this was honestly so hard, and so new to me. I hope you like it <3