Chapter 68
His name tumbled from her trembling lips. "Cassian."
Cassian lay on his stomach across his bed, deep in a nap. At her voice, he roused but didn't fully wake. She leant over him, vigorously shaking his shoulders. Azriel had been so angry. She didn't know what he was talking about, what he would do.
Cassian jerked onto his side and it took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the low moonlight to make out the details face. He squinted up at her, a hand rising to his face as if to wipe it before it snapped out toward her instead. "Ar..." Kicking the blanket that had been up to his hips away, Cassian swung his legs over the edge and sat up along the mattress's edge. "What's wrong?"
Arwen's chest heaved with each breath, so very aware of the carpet underneath her bare feet. The coarse fabric prodded its way between her toes, and she swore she could feel every individual fibre. "A-Azriel. H-h-heâ"
"Hey." Cassian clasped his hands to either side of her face, forcing hazels to meet violets. "Calm down. Is someone hurt? Is Azriel hurt?" Arwen tried to pull her head away to look over her shoulder as if she could find Azriel standing somewhere behind her, but the general did not relent his grip. "Talk to me. You have to talk to me."
She shut her eyes, focusing on each breath as Cassian had taught her to practice after her nightmares. He counted to her breaths. Arwen blocked out the sensation of anything below her hips, pretending that she couldn't feel the carpet. Azriel was more important. "Azriel. We were speaking, and he got angry and stormed off. I've never seen him like that."
Cassian kept his voice calm and slow. "Angry about what, sweetheart? What were you talking about?"
Gods her mind would think straight. Her eyes fluttered to the far corner of his ceiling as she collected them once again into something Cassian could understand. Her toes curled upwards, her stomach twisting and tightening and dropping all at the same time. "He says Rhys lied to him. I think he's gone down to the town house."
She watched his face shift with that information. His eyes turned away in thought as hers had, his breaths growing even but long. "I'll go after him."
Arwen snatched his wrist as he moved onto his feet and veered around her. "Take me with you."
"Stay here," Cassian told her.
But Arwen did not let go of his wrist. "Please," she uttered. They shared a silent moment of looking at each other, defiance and stubbornness ruling their stances. She couldn't stay behind, thinking and worrying until someone deigned to return to her.
Soon they were flying over the starlight city. Arwen shivered against the winter's hissing winds that belted against her bare arms. The town house front door had been left ajar. Arwen tore through it first, though Cassian had a grip on her wrist now, not letting her get ahead beyond a reach that he could pull her back.
Lights filled the town house and scents hit her nose, leading her to the sitting room. Before she entered past the threshold, Arwen could already see the tipped armchair, as though it had been thrown towards the hearth. Mor and Feyre stood together, staring wide-eyed at something along the wall adjacent to the arched entrance. Mor looked to Arwen upon her arrival, red painted lips parting.
Azriel had Rhysand against the wall, a forearm to his throat. Her brother, for all it was worth, looked nothing short of calm. He held Azriel's eyes, arms by his side. Cassian knocked into Arwen's shoulder as he bolted past her, wedging between the High Lord and spymaster.
"Azriel, what the fuck are you doing?" he growled when Azriel would not give him the space to push away. Cassia gripped his shoulders but even his strength could not tear Azriel away.
There was nothing in Azriel's eyes except hatred. Cold and vicious loathing. "Tell him," he snarled to Rhys. "Tell him what you fucking did, Rhysand."
The strength in Cassian's arms visibly wavered against the spymaster, his eyes darting unsurely between him and Arwen's brother. Arwen stepped further into the room, Mor snatching her hand that she couldn't be bothered to hold back. Now she could see Rhysand's eyes. They were slick with tears that had yet to fall.
Feyre's shuffling and hard looks at Mor informed Arwen that she had already tried to intervene only to be told to stay back. Never interfere with an Illyrian fight. Even Arwen didn't dare. Yet.
"Did what?" Cassian's voice had dropped to a low, dangerous tone.
Rhysand looked down, not a tendril of his power to be seen. He wouldn't aggravate this fight.
"He altered our memory," Azriel filled in, the edge in his voice becoming rougher. "He went into our minds. That day was a lie."
"Rhysand is being a prick again," Nesta drawled in a bitter hiss. It was only then that Arwen noticed Nesta and Elain standing on the stairwell that was just visible from the far entrance to the sitting room. Nesta's face was fixed into a sneer, but there was a trace of glee as well. Glee that her brother was being pounded on. Elain's face had paled by numerous shades, eyes fixed on Azriel but her sister's hand on her shoulder held her from moving. "How surprising."
"Stay out of this, Nesta," snapped Cassian. He shoved his way deeper between the two males. "What day?" he demanded, looking at both for whoever would give him the answer. Arwen's mind ran blank, not feeling Mor's hand squeeze hers so tight that her fingertips tingled. Rhysand had changed their memories of her death. Cassian ran the same line of thoughtâshe could see it formulating when he glanced at her. "Rhys."
Azriel pressed himself closer, his nose nearly brushing Rhysand's. "Give it back."
"Azriel!" It was Elain that dashed forward, tearing from her sister's grip. Golden hair bounced off her shoulders with each bound down the stairs, her hand outstretched.
"Elain!" Nesta screeched.
"Don't." Rhysand did not look at her but it was unmistakable who the order was set to. Softer, calmer: "Elain. Do not get any closer." Elain paused half way between the bottom of the stairs and the males, Nesta quick to seize her wrist with a withering glare. Rhysand stared at Azriel who had not taken his eyes off the High Lord. "You won't want it."
"I want the truth," Azriel hissed through his teeth. The fabric of Rhysand's jacket wrinkled under his whitened fingers. "I need to know what happened. What I did. Wha... what I said."
Rhysand, in defeat, tipped his head back against the wall. Azriel took the sign and loosened his grip. Beside Arwen, Mor inhaled sharply. Arwen watched as Mor seemed to travel someplace far away though her body remained there. Cassian too turned away from his brothers, head bowed and chin cocked. Azriel took three blind steps back, unblinking.
It was now that Rhysand sought out Arwen's gaze. He mouthed, "I'm sorry."
Cassian fisted his hand and put it to his lips. He looked like he was going to be sick.
"Rhysand," Mor whisperedâin disappointment and horror. But Arwen realised that Mor was looking at her. Arwen shifted on her feet. She didn't know what Rhysand had made their memory to beâhad no idea how different the truth was.
Cassian scoffed. Once, then twice. He looked at Rhysand like he had three heads and a tail.
Arwen saw her own memory before her. She saw Rhysand standing in one of Amarantha's personal chambers, his head bowed as he was forced to submit to one of her orders that Arwen knew was tearing him from the inside out. She saw the same defeat and loss. A day when she could do nothing.
Azriel's long strides took him back towards Rhysand, his hands as fists by his side, webs of blue power netted around them. Feyre stepped forward as well, her hand outstretched but Arwen was quicker. In a blink, she winnowed across the room, her back pressed against her brother's chest as she faced Azriel.
"Do not touch him." The sharpness in her own voice surprised her.
He faltered at the sudden sight of her and Rhysand was quick to wrap an arm around Arwen's stomach, ready to yank her to the side. Azriel didn't look at her thoughârefused to. Cassian stood in a readied stance to their sides, eyeing each of them carefully.
Azriel's chest heaved against his plain leathers. "He took my last memory of you." A plea to her and a strike to her brother. "I have been remembering a lie. All because he was ashamed!"
Rhysand's voice sliced past her ear. "I did it for you!" She grappled at his arm that tightened around her, wanting to be ready to move forward at a moment's notice.
Azriel snarled to the air, his wings flaring. "You want me to believe that you didn't do this for your own sake? So we didn't remember what you fucking said to her? That you ignored her plea for help. Telling you that she was sick! That she was poisoned! You ignored her and she died because of it." He stole another step forward and Arwen lengthened herself to remind him that she was there. That she would protect her brotherâeven from him.
Rhysand's hand began to edge her to the left but she battled it. "If I did it for my sake," he said, just as carefully as before, "then I would have found a way to erase it from my own mind. But I have lived with it every single day. I gave you a memory that was good."
Azriel shot forward. "It was a lie!"
Arwen braced her hands against his chest, using every ounce of her strength to push against him. Azriel stumbled back on his heels, the flicker of his eyes down to her in that moment the first time he had looked at her since he left her in the hall of the House.
"Do not. Touch. Him." She waited for another scream, for him to try again or for Cassian to intervene.
"It's your fault that she lost her wings."
Rhysand hardly breathed behind her. "I know."
"It's your fault that she died." Azriel stared at the floor between them. "You killed my mate."
"Azriel," Cassian barked but his voice was lost to all but Elain who flinched.
Her brother's arm loosened around her as if he expected Arwen at any moment to lurch away from him, for once she too realised where the fault lied. "I know."
Arwen met Cassian's eyes. They asked her if she wanted to leave, if she wanted him to step between them and take her away. She tightened her grip on her brother's arm.
"Glad we're on the same page then," is all Azriel had left to say before he twisted himself away from Cassian's approach. The front door shook the entire town house in his wake.
Mor turned wide-eyed to Cassian. "Are you going to go after him?"
Cassian sneered at her. "Do I look fucking stupid to you?"
She wasn't sure what happened in the next minutes. Minutes? It might have been an hour. The world flurried around her, bodies shifting and her own being tugged along. The next moment that reality becomes clear again, Arwen is seated in a chair at the island bench inside the kitchen. Mor leant against the opposite side of the table, a wine glass near full of golden champagne.
Cassian stood at Arwen's shoulder, his shadow looming over her. He sighed and the shadow moved across her. He touched his forehead to hers, then he pressed a kiss to her cheek. Then he placed one on her temple, and finally to the crown of her head. Arwen blinked through them, keeping her attention on her fiddling fingers. "Do you want me to take you home?"
Shutting downâshe knew that's what she was doing. It was all she had for so many years because nothing else worked. Shut it down and shut it out. Arwen didn't know what she was supposed to feel. It seemed a common theme since coming back to life.
"You should just take her, Cass," said Mor. She looked down at her still full glass. "I need more."
"I'm not going to drag her off her seat, Mor," Cassian shot back. "She can stay here the night if that's what she wants." He let out another grumbling sigh and spun to brace the small of his back against the island, folding his arms across his sternum as he stared at the wall behind Arwen. Arwen slid her legs from the seat. Cassian's hand shot out for hers.
"I'm okay," she told him, her voice stronger than she expected. "It wasn't my memories that were messed with."
"Do you want me to stay?" is all he asked.
"Come for me in the morning?"
Nodding, he let her go. Arwen's feet took her from the kitchen, her pace slowing in the main hall but she already had a sense of where she was going. Turning down past the main rooms, past the stairwell, her hand curled around the brass knob of his private office door.
Rhysand sat in his chair, head thrown back against it like it had been against the wall. One foot was pressed against the lip of the desk which had scattered parchment across it so unorganised that she could hardly see the wood below it.
Arwen didn't say anything as she entered, shutting the door behind her. Walking around to his desk, she skimmed her eyes across their titles. She reached for the ones that she could first easily identify as foreign correspondence, organising them by court.
"You don't have to clean up my mess," he muttered. "Please don't, actually."
Arwen didn't want to know the memory he gave them. It wasn't true, no matter if it might have been better.
"I've never followed your orders before," she replied. "I'm not going to start now."
"Arwen." She ignored him, tapping the letters against the table to straighten them and finding a spot on his desk to pile them. "Are you angry with me?"
"No," she answered honestly. "The others are doing a fine enough job at it without me joining in." And she was tired of being angry. Tired of feeling that way about her own brother. "I'm sorry for coming back to life and ruining your plan."
He gave an exhausted huff that was something close to a laugh. "Even Feyre is upset at me. Can I share your bed tonight, I think I've been kicked out of my own?" Rubbing rough hands down his face, he groaned. "Can't wait for Amren to find out. No doubt Mor will be over at her apartment first thing tomorrow. If she hasn't left already."
"I'd suggest quickly reconciling with your mate then because you won't have your balls by lunch."
"She does have a peculiar fondness for threatening them, doesn't she?" Arwen hummed in agreement, her lips even twitching into a light smile. "That was stupid of you. Stepping between Azriel and me. If he had any less control over himself, you would have been hurt."
She picked up a compiled set of parchment, trying to read through the first page. "I wasn't going to let him hurt you."
"You would protect me against your own mate?"
She placed the paper back down on the table. "He's not my mate anymore. But I think you already knew that." Rhysand held her gaze and Arwen read right through it. Azriel might not have told him outright, but her brother would have found out through a thought in his mind. "You're so disorganised it's a wonder anything gets done around here."
"That's why I need you."