Summary:
Of all the ways, Azriel expected to meet his mate, this wasn't it.
Notes:
Mostly Canon Compliant Through A Court of Silver Flame. Set 2 years into the future, where it veers off wildly.
for the first time, what's past is past
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His mate literally stumbled into him.
Of all the ways, Azriel could come across her, that was not the one that he thought it ever would be.
It was so...mundane.
It was a spring evening in Velaris. Less than a year after Elain's wedding. 2 years since that Solstice. Nyx would be 2 in just a few weeks.
To say that Azriel hadn't been...doing particularly well, was an understatement.
He hid it well.
He buried himself in his work, he did everything anybody expected from him...he existed.
It was fine.
Everybody was busy with their mates or their significant other and Azriel...well, he kept busy with other things. It was better that way.
The problem was only that even Rhys had suggested for him to take a break. Just that it wasn't a suggestion. It had been an order.
"Take the rest of the day off. I am sure there is something or somebody that could get your mind off your work."
He had wanted to bristle. He had wanted to make a sharp-cutting comment about how Rhys had been the one making sure that Azriel didn't have anything to do, nobody to go home to. He hadn't.
He had stopped doing that. Granted, his shadows hadn't and had been bristling around him about how the High Lord didn't know better than they did. Azriel had ignored that too.
He didn't protest anymore. Why should he even bother doing that? If Rhys wanted to send him on some bullshit mission, well, then Rhys was going to do that. Why should Azriel fight it?
He was so tired of fighting.
So there he was, in the Rainbow, looking for a birthday present for Nyx. Then he could cross that off the neverending list of things he needed to do. He hated gift-giving with a passion.
He had never liked it here overly much, even when it was his High Lady's domain. Feyre loved the Rainbow and the hustle and bustle of the artists' quarter. For Azriel, it bordered on too much. Azriel only liked the bars with their constantly changing lineup of musicians performing for an evening.
Never anywhere twice, just for a few hours...
He had done that a lot over the last few months. When sitting alone in his house didn't help him. Cloaked in shadows, so people would leave him alone...sitting in one corner of the bar, and just listening to the music...
He never really patronised the shops around there, because...well, he didn't really need anything. He never had. He bought the things he needed and that was that. And to be honest, he was completely content with a couple of daggers, Truthteller and his Illyrian fighting leathers.
She stumbled against his chest when somebody bumped into her. The str
Azriel didn't react fast enough...and then it already happened.
The mating bond snapped into place in an instant and he could just stare at her, hands reaching out to hold her up.
His.
Even his shadows agreed with him, hissing in agreement.
Ours, Master
He was frozen in place as he drank her in.
For once in his life, he wasn't the only one surrounded by shadows. His were different than hers, Tartera shadows seemed to surround the fairies making it impossible to see anything but just sometimes a hand or a shoulder poking out.
Hers were...far weaker than he had ever seen, just smudged at the edges. And then there were the pointy ears that stood out from a dark cloud of beautiful curls and the near-black skin that covered the rest of hers.
So not Tartera after all? A high Fae?
Either? Both?
It didn't matter. He had never cared about anything less.
And then her eyes had looked up at him. They smoldered like embers, nearly red and he could swear he saw flames licking into them. It was probably the most startling thing he had seen in centuries. And then she blinked, and they were completely pitch black, and the embers were gone.
Full lips pulled into a wide smile, showing white teeth.
"Oh, I've been waiting for you!" Those were her first words to him at that street corner.
Waiting for him.
His heart constricted. She...she was happy to meet him?
He hadn't expected that.
He could feel the bond pulling against his ribs, pounding in time with his too-quick heartbeat. He couldn't help himself. Azriel had never felt quite as wrong-footed with another fae in his life.
But with her he was. She made him just want to stare at her.
She was beautiful.
She stepped back and immediately he ached with the lack of her warmth surrounding him and the feeling of...loneliness. He wanted to stare at her, wanted to drink in every inch of her because this was... her .
He had waited, hoped, and prayed for her for so long that it had become second nature to him.
He just had never thought that he was going to actually have this.
"Are you alright?" she asked him softly. "You look pale." He probably was.
Azriel had fought for his life, waged war and lived for centuries...and still, this female that he didn't even know could put him on the floor with nothing but a smile and a look out of black eyes.
"Yes, I...I didn't think I was ever going to..." he managed to bring out and she gave him a soft smile.
"You let me wait a long time," she teased him and he barked out a laugh.
"You made me wait too," he responded quietly and she laughed, a tinkling tone like a bell.
"I am Oriana," she introduced herself, holding out her hand and he took it dumbly, only a moment later realising that she hadn't flinched back from his scarred hands for even a second. Instead, she held it in her smaller and much, much darker one, her skin nearly as pitch black as her eyes.
Oriana .
It suited her.
But then he would have thought that about any name because it was her .
"Azriel," he told her, still hanging on to her hand, feeling the soft skin underneath his fingertips.
"You want to come with me? My apartment is around 5 feet to your right," she told him and he could just nod as she pulled him along into her life, without even a moment of hesitation.
Was this how it was supposed to be?
He swallowed.
It was the work of just a few steps, until she unlocked the door to a tiny jewellery store, holding it open for him.
He followed along, the door closing, shutting out the hustle and bustle from outside, shutting them into a quiet room and...He smelled her for the first time, the scent of wood and...burning? seemingly clinging onto her.
He had never thought that that would be an appealing scent, but it was. She smelled like a bonfire. Something wild and unbridled, warm and safe.
"You live here?" he asked her, as she ventured into her shop, doing something, before she opened a door that showed a small staircase that he would just manage to traverse if he tucked his wings as tight to his body as possible.
"It's mine. I live above," she explained.
That did make sense with her Tartera ancestry. They were well known for living in the mountains of the Night Court, masterful goldsmiths that had a love for jewellery that revelled Amren's.
The pieces were artfully made, all of them in a very specific style that he couldn't quite put his finger on. Though he was sure that he would always be able to pick out pieces she had made now.
A lot of it was gold, arched, beautiful pieces that held stones in a wisp of nothing, beautiful scroll work and jewels in every colour of the rainbow.
He took it in for just a moment longer before he followed her up.
Oriana let him into her apartment, walls covered with pieces of jewellery and pieces of metal carefully formed into what probably passed as art and Azriel blinked twice as he saw precious gems carelessly piled high in a bowl in her entranceway.
"Tea?" she asked then, but then she had already waved to a kettle that seemed willing to do all the work for her if she told it to do just that. Her bag was carelessly hung onto a chair and another wave got teacup to fly from her shelves onto the small table.
"Yes, thank you," he managed to bring out, his shadows skittering away from him for the first time in what felt like months as they started to investigate their surroundings.
He wanted to pull them back, he probably should, shouldn't scare her like that, but then she turned around and saw a tendril crawl along her wall towards a blue stone that seemed to glow from within, an amused smirk covered her face.
"Curious, aren't they?" she asked him and Azriel swallowed.
He wanted to respond, but then she was giving a delighted little laugh and Azriel watched in horror as she lifted her hand to reveal a shadow winding its way around her wrist, threading through the golden bangles she wore, up her arms.
Stop , he warned them sharply, and they froze. Didn't disappear though.
"You upset them," Oriana said with a pout, her other hand carefully, gently touching his shadows. She hesitated for a moment before she started to pet the shadows like they were a cat or something.
Azriel could just stare at her. Oriana trailed her fingers across her arm nearly thoughtfully.
Azriel wanted nothing but to be the one that she touched and not just her shadows.
"I...forgive me. They shouldn't be doing that," he apologised, heat beginning to blossom on his face.
"Why?" she asked him, still looking at the shadow that had wrapped itself around her arm like it belonged to the collection of armcuffs she wore anyway.
Only now he realise that while she wore multiple pieces of jewellery, most of it was simple, gold pieces, nearly architectural. Not that many stones, though there were some...
"Why?" he echoed back and she shrugged.
"They aren't doing anything. They're sweet."
That was the last thing that he expected her to say. Especially when nobody in his life had ever called them that. Or willing to reach out to touch them. His shadows didn't even want to touch. They had disappeared out of Elain's sight whenever they could, probably because she had done her level best to outright ignore them.
Cassian and Rhys...well they saw them as tools. Which they were.
But Oriana...she seemed to see them as...an extension of him.
He watched bemused when a tendril of his shadows crawled up her arm and disappeared between her black curls, nearly blending in, pinning it out of her face.
"I...people don't say that," he finally settled on. "They aren't...normally sweet."
They weren't. They were the stuff nightmares were made out for most of the population.
And she just...
The teakettle shrilled. Oriana moved, filling two chipped mugs with it and took a seat at the small table tucked away in a corner. "You should sit," she told him easily.
Another shadow was winding itself around her other wrist and he glared at it. There weren't even words coming from them if one ignored them purring like a bloody cat.
What in the world was happening?!
"You know, I spent my first century in the mountain. I know darkness," she told him drily. "I always found it...comforting."
He finally managed to move, tuck the wings out of the way and he sat down across from her. As he met her gaze, he once more stared into the fire.
Until she blinked, and it was back to pitch black.
"I apologise. I have a better handle on the eyes most of the time," she apologised to him, taking her mug in both hands and gently blowing on it.
"Should I apologise for the wings?" he blurted out and she grinned at him.
"Not on my accord," she promised him sweetly. "But I have it on good authority that my eyes are fucking creepy . They kinda show up when emotions are high. I have it under control most of the time."
Her eyes were...fascinating. It was like looking into a bonfire and not...not seeing anything else. Like he was staring into flames and eaten alive and somehow Azriel loved it.
He didn't think that he ever would. He didn't normally particularly like fire. The scars on his hands had taken care of that. He hated the cold even more though, so that was the trade-off he needed to make.
When emotions are running high?
For the first time, he tried reaching out through the mating bond and felt a twinge of nervousness coming from her. Nervousness and Giddiness and...happy. She was so happy to have him hear.
It was startling.
He cleared his throat. "Who told you that?" he asked her and she laughed.
"My brother," she told him with some amusement. "I got most of the...Tartera blood. He looks very much like a normal High Fae. Got out of the Mountain as soon as he could. He loves the fresh air too much to stay down there for too long," she explained to him. "Mom is Tartera. Dad was a High Fae. It was the talk of decades when he ran off with him." She said all of that so matter of factly like her heritage just was another thing about her. Like she was proud of it even
His thoughts about his heritage were a whole lot more... difficult. Harsher.
Maybe because there wasn't anything amusing about the way he had come into the world. Maybe because he wanted nothing more than to just ignore what had happened through his childhood and never wanted to think about it anymore.
"And you?" she asked him, looking at him over the rim of her cup.
"Illyrian," he answered her, because wasn't that obvious?
"Yeah, the wings are a bit of a giveaway," Oriana agreed with a smile. "But that wasn't what I meant. Tell me about yourself," she invited him and he could just stare at her, terrified.
Alone the question terrified him and he couldn't help it.
What was he supposed to tell his mate that wasn't going to send her running away screaming?
Azriel was quite certain that he could do just that with one ill-thought-out sentence, and he didn't want to do that.
He really didn't want to. He was a master strategist. His plans had backup plans and backup plans had backup plans, but right now, he felt utterly unprepared for what his mate was offering.
What was the right thing to say? He hadn't gathered enough intel to know what sweet little lies would make her fall in love with him and to be honest, he didn't want to lie to her. Not like this. She deserved better than that.
Better than him.
He was a monster dripping in blood and she...she was...dipped in temptation and gilded around the edges.
He didn't even know her and still he ached for her.
For her and what she represented.
"What do you want to know?" he asked hoarsely. Wondering to what god he needed to sell the bit of soul that was still belonging to him so that she wasn't going to look at him in hatred and disgust.
She mustered him, eyes dark, no more flames. He missed them suddenly.
"What do you want to tell me?" she asked him softly, holding out a hand to him over the table, his shadows still wrapped around her wrist.
He wanted to take it.
He didn't want her to shy away from his hands. She hadn't, not the first time, but he didn't think she had even really seen them, even...thought about it.
And now they would be obvious to her.
"This isn't an interrogation, you know," she told him with a soft laugh and finally, he inched his hand over the table towards her. Her fingers curled around his, the constant dull discomfort that they were in forgotten as he just felt soft skin...callouses though and one or two of her scars.
She mustered them for a moment, and there was a twinge of something... through the bond. Empathy maybe? It wasn't the disgust or fear that he had expected though. It was far sweeter than that. She held onto his hand and he didn't want to pull it back.
"What is it then?" he managed to bring out and her hand pressed his.
"Right now? Mostly a getting to know you," Oriana said. "The cauldron seems to think that we would be a fit for each other. I reserve the right to judge that for myself."
Right. He didn't know how he was feeling about that. Maybe it was better that way..that she wasn't just going to blindly follow the cauldron. But like this, she could also decide that he wasn't worth the hassle and that...that terrified him.
"That's...fair," he finally settled on, finally taking a sip of tea. Peppermint. Sharp and warm.
She smiled at him. "How about I start and then you can ask whatever you want?" she suggested. He managed to nod. He could do that.
"Well, you already know my name. I am the result of a very, very scandalous pairing of my mother with a High Fae enchanter. It was a whole thing when it went down," she said with some amusement. "I have a full older brother named Cyrus and a couple of nieces and nephews running around from him." It was obvious that she liked her brother. Her face lit up when she talked about him.
And he was soaking up every bit of information he could get about her.
At least this time, he didn't need to resort to anything...illicit. She was offering it all up for the taking. And he was a selfish male that he wanted every bit he could get off her.
"I have some half-siblings as well but they are in the mountains and I spend most of my time around here nowadays, so I don't see them that often," she explained. So she was obviously closer to Cyrus. It made sense.
"I was trained as a Goldsmith by my mother's people," she continued. Of course. Tarteras were known for the jewellery they made. They were literally the gold standard of their trade. It was also ridiculously expensive. "And as an enchantress by my father. These days, I mostly do jewellery though. I got some autumn blood through my father as well, which leads to a very... interesting combination of my natural abilities," she told him. "Also explains the creepy eyes."
He wanted to laugh at the way she rolled said creepy eyes. They stayed black this time. He wondered if it was an enchantment or if she summoned the black eyes through magic. Or maybe the flames were an emotional response?
It made him curious.
"Do I get a peek?" he asked her. She raised one dark eyebrow at him and he blushed, as he replayed his words in his head. Right . "Of your natural abilities?" he added quickly.
"Oh, you would like that, wouldn't you?" she teased him. For a moment, he regretted even asking, but he had done it.
"It's just fair, you have seen my shadows," he said, not allowing himself to overthink it.
"Well, then you can see my flames," she agreed with another laugh. He hadn't expected her to pull back her hand from his grip. Azriel couldn't help but mourn the loss, even when she was doing as he requested.
Just a moment later, she had flames dancing in the palm of her hand.
He could just stare at them. Right.
She had meant that literally .
Even his shadows froze, pulling back slightly higher up her arms, not wanting to get in the way of the flames that happily burned in her hands.
She closed her fist, the flame dying. "Surprisingly useful in the forge," she said lightly. "Took me a few decades to get a proper handle on it though."
Yeah, he imagined that.
"How old are you?" he blurted out. A few decades ? At least it made him feel less like a cradle robber.
"You are horrible for making a lady admit her age, you know," Oriana said drily. "200 years. Give or take a few," she admitted easily.
"540," he responded and she smiled brightly, showing a row of white teeth.
"Well, any questions?" she asked him.
Oh, he had questions. A lot of them.
He didn't quite know with what to start. But she seemed content to wait until he had managed to figure out what he wanted to ask her.
"Did you spend a lot of time living in the mountains?" he finally asked her. She had said her first century. But had it been longer or...
She nodded. "Most of my childhood, Most of my adult years as well," she admitted. "I married when I was 18." He just stared at her.
Just...please, everything but...
"You don't need to worry, he's dead," she quipped drily. He opened his mouth to apologise but she waved him off. "We were married for 80 years. Then he died. It was...difficult. My heart wasn't in my work anymore. Wystan was my husband, but he was also my research partner in many ways." She stared off into space for just a moment.
"Do you miss him?" he asked her quietly. She reached out for his hand again, his heart painfully thudding in his chest. Her fingers curled against his scarred ones, never once hesitating.
"Not in the way you think," she said after a moment. " It was an arranged marriage. I was... fond of him. He was a good friend to me. A better friend than he was a husband. You don't need to worry about him or my feelings for him," Oriana promised him. "I had a century to grief for him."
It was the truth. He could hear that in every word. She had griefed him and moved on.
"I spent nearly 500 years pining over a woman who couldn't possibly be less interested," he blurted out.
He had no idea where that was coming from. Or why he even wanted to tell Oriana about Morrigan, because quite frankly it was an idiotic thing to do. He shouldn't be doing this. He should be...
"Well, let nobody ever tell you that you aren't loyal," Oriana responded after a moment. "Are you still in love with her?" she asked him, not a grain of judgment in her voice. Nothing of that sort.
"No," he said softly. "I...got over her. Fell in love. Again. She had a mate. She chose him." And that summed up his romantic life that wasn't...just taking somebody home because he wanted it. Though he had never one much of that. Of course, his brothers thought differently, but they didn't need to know the full truth.
"I am sorry. That must have...hurt," she said sincerely.
She kept surprising him, not saying at all what he thought she would say. Shouldn't most mates be...jealous of some kind? But she seemed to just be happy to be in his presence and talk to him.
"Aren't you going to tell me that since she isn't my mate, I should get over her?" he asked her curiously.
She just shrugged.
"I have seen matings that were a catastrophe waiting to happen and I have also seen grand love stories. The mating bond...it doesn't..." she seemed to struggle with her words. "...guarantee a happy ending," she finally settled on. "In many cases, it helps. In other it doesn't," she said quietly. "My parents weren't mated. My father still loved my mother enough to give up his life for her." She mustered him quietly, eyes pitch black and even. He had only rarely in his life felt that assessed. "You aren't over her, are you?" Oriana asked him quietly.
"I...I don't know." Alone saying the words hurt.
She nodded. "You are honest. I like that," Oriana said evenly. "I would much rather you tell me the truth even when it hurts me momentarily than lie to me and let me believe that everything is alright, even when it isn't. Tell me the truth, and I won't ever be angry with you about it," she promised him. It was a heady promise.
He wanted to give her all his truth, even when he knew , he couldn't. He couldn't possibly give her every secret he held. But he wanted to.
Azriel wanted to get to know her. Wanted to see where it would lead.
"You don't owe me anything," Oriana continued. "Not your time and not your attention. If you want nothing to do with me...I understand that." She said the words and he knew that she meant them, but he could still feel the prickly of hurt down their mating bond.
Azriel could just stare at her shocked.
He had never even thought about the possibility that he was going to be the one refusing his made. And there it was.
"You know nothing about me," he finally said quietly. "Otherwise you wouldn't put that choice on me."
If she knew the whole truth, she would be running away from him right now.
Her eyes lit up suddenly, pinning him underneath the weight of her gaze.
"Don't I, Shadowsinger?" Oriana asked him pointedly. It was the first time she had even mentioned his ability, no one counted her sweetness to his shadows. "I can put 2 and 2 together. An Illyrian Shadowsinger. You work for the High Lord," she said drily.
Azriel swallowed. Inclined his head.
She sighed. "You have secrets. Some I can guess at and others I have no clue about," she told him. "Do you like your job?"
The question came so out of the blue that Azriel could just stare at her for a moment.
"I don't know," he answered honestly. Sometimes he did. Sometimes he didn't. Sometimes he wondered if this was the prize he needed to pay. Sometimes... "I am not a...good male." This time it was him that struggled for words.
"You don't need to be good for me."
Somehow Azriel knew that she meant every word. And wasn't that a startling thing?
"Tell me one thing and we won't ever need to discuss it again. If you can't be good...can you be righteous?" Oriana asked him, fiercely.
"I...I think so."
"Then that's all I care about."
The truth rang out high and clear, like a mountain river.
"You are saying the truth," Azriel said, shocked. She couldn't...but she looked at him, eyes flaring.
"I am," she promised. "I don't like lying."
For a moment they just mustered the other, right there in that little apartment in the rainbow.
He didn't know her.
Not truly. He didn't trust Oriana either, because he was conditioned to not trust anybody. But...But there was something there, something in him that pulled him towards her. More than even the fledgling mating bond. And Mother knew he wanted that mating bond.
But Oriana was calm and even and intelligent and fiery and pragmatic and brilliant and...gorgeous.
And Azriel wanted her. In any way, he could have her. In many ways that he didn't even allow himself to think about.
"...can I come see you again?" he requested softly, his hand curling around hers and the smile that she gave him was wide and unbridled.
"Of course, you can. I thought you would never ask," she teased him.
And still, Azriel couldn't help but ask: "Why do you even bother giving me a chance? You could have...somebody else." He struggled to bring the words out.
She was gorgeous, there was no way around it. She mustered him for a moment, the hand that he wasn't holding playing the necklace around her throat. Gold. A rope as thick as his thumb. Dotted with clear stones that sparkled in the sunlight.
"You could have somebody else as well," Oriana responded evenly.
"Somebody more beautiful than you? I doubt that." The words were just flowers over his lips and he could feel the tip of his ears redden.
She couldn't help but laugh. "Flatterer." She looked at him fondly, before growing seriously. "You think a lot of faes like the idea of a half-breed? The answer is no."
"Don't call yourself that," he snapped. "Not unless you want me to call myself an Illyrian Bastard," he softened his voice.
She inclined her head. "I'll be there whenever you want to come over," she promised him.
And that was it. He said his goodbyes, even when he wanted nothing more than to stay right there with her in her tiny kitchen and listen to her talk about anything she wanted.
Because he was sure that if she didn't tell him to go, he never would.
He would be content there, staying right there with her.
But he couldn't do that. So he forced himself to go, leave her apartment and her shop and finally, he was back on the cobblestone streets of Velaris, his head still filled with his mate's scent and her smile.
He wanted to hoard her like a dragon hoarded his treasures. Hoard away her scent and her smile and every gesture, the flames in her eyes and her laugh.
That's what she was. His treasure.
Keep her safe and keep her to himself and...He didn't need anybody to know, did he?
Could he get away with keeping her a secret? Just for a little while? Just while he figured it out?
Just until...Just until he knew what they wanted, and how they wanted it?
And maybe until the mating bond was consummated? The fear was potent for just a moment. He didn't actually think that Rhys was going to tell him not to pursue how own fucking mate. He wouldn't do that. Right?
But when the Elain thing had taught him one thing then that he really shouldn't trust that...everybody had his happiness first on their mind. Granted everything with Elain had seemingly been a catastrophe waiting to happen, with a mate that she hadn't wanted at that point in time, but who was also the son of a High Lord and the brother to another and Elain herself being Feyre's older sister and...Maybe if he wasn't still bitter about the whole thing he could have seen where Rhys was coming from.
Still, Rhys had used his status as the High Lord to make an order about Azriel's private life once. What would stop him from doing it again?
Nothing.
And Azriel wasn't...Azriel wasn't going to take that risk. He was not.
He was willing to maybe use his own life to bargain but not hers. Not Oriana.
He had kept worse secrets for less.
And she was the most important of them all.
So he would keep her a secret.
The first secret in his long life that brought him joy.
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