A Court of Death || ACOTAR

76

Astryn did not care to stay for the talks of war and alliances, or the lack thereof. She had not feared the creature in the library, but the thing she did fear was finally beginning to settle in.

They had almost been taken. Almost been dragged off to Hybern. She would not survive it a second time. No, no, she would choose to die if she ended up there again. Every time she closed her eyes, even for only a blink, she saw the King of Hybern looming over her. It was enough to make her feel like she might vomit.

Azriel had tried to join her, to go to her room and comfort her. She insisted he go be a part of the war talks. Talks she was not necessary for. She laid out in bed and stared at the ceiling and willed herself not to blink even as her eyes began to burn from it.

Astryn knew the conversation was not nearly over by when Azriel came into the room. He sat on the edge of the bed, not far but not near enough to risk causing her a panic. He knew it was not the sight of the nightmare creature in library that had her like this.

"Is there anything I can do?" Azriel asked, not wanting to risk doing the wrong thing. It was better to just ask, he decided, than to guess at what she needed and risk a misstep.

"I'm not going to fight if they take me again," she murmured, inching just the slightest bit closer to him, "Death said I can choose when I die permanently. If Hybern takes me again, that's what I'll do. I won't—I can't live through that again."

Azriel did not know what to say, so he said nothing. Silence, apparently, was the correct response.

"Down there when they showed up...I think I only managed to do anything because Nesta and Feyre were there. I think if it had been just me, I would have frozen. And then I would have died. Which would have been entirely selfish because, despite what Rhys said about it being okay if I'm not ready, I know my power could make a difference in the war. Even if I don't fight physically, I have enough power to make a difference. But I would have disregarded that and died instead if it had been me down there alone. It wasn't even me they came for. It was Nesta. But they were going to take all three of us anyway. They said..."

Astryn trailed off, eyes still unblinking.

"They called Nesta a thief, they referred to Feyre by her title. And they called me the King's favorite whore. I can't...all I can think about is if they had taken us, if they had taken all three of us, I would have had to live through it again because I couldn't just die if all of us were there, if it was more than just me. I'd have to make sure Feyre and Nesta made it back. I couldn't...and would the King have done to them what he did to me? I couldn't let that happen. We got Nesta out, and I wanted Feyre to run too but I knew she wouldn't. She wouldn't have left me there alone with them. If she had..."

She didn't need to finish the sentence. If Feyre had gone with Nesta, Astryn would have chosen to die today.

Azriel could not stop his movements as he reached out and pulled her to himself, held her tightly in his arms and wrapped his wings around her. She gripped him like her life depended on it and he could feel her tears soaking the side of his neck as he moved a hand to gently cradle the back of her head when she nestled her face against him.

He closed his eyes but he still ended up finding himself shedding tears with her, feeling her pain and fear through the faint beginnings of the bond regrowing between them.

It was a long few hours later that there was a knock on the door. Astryn peeled herself away from Azriel, and inched over to the door. She opened it only partway at first before letting Rhys into the room.

"Can we speak in private?" Rhys requested hesitantly, eyes darting from Astryn to Azriel and back again.

Astryn looked back at Azriel and he nodded before exiting the room without a word, casting a knowing look towards Rhys. He closed the door on his way out. Silence stretched for a few moments before Rhys found his voice again.

"Are you okay?" he asked, though he already knew the answer.

"No," she confirmed, and he nodded.

"I understand," he murmured, "not entirely but I understand at least parts of what you went through. There was some time after I came home...after Amarantha—there was some time when I wouldn't let anyone touch me. I punched Cassian for even trying. Sometimes it still makes my skin crawl, makes me wish I could peel all my skin off and burn it. I haven't told Feyre that, nor do I plan to."

"I threw my power at him and blasted him backwards into a wall when he tried to help me calm down from a nightmare. Cassian, I mean. I blasted him into a wall."

Rhys choked back a watery laugh.

"I suppose that means you one-upped me," he joked halfheartedly before his expression shuttered. "Astryn, I...I know what happened...it wasn't the same, your experience and mine weren't the same, but if you...if you need to talk to someone who knows, I'm here."

"I...most of the time, I know how to be okay. Most of the time, I can just not think about it. But sometimes something happens and then that's just...it's there again. At the front of my mind. I swear in those moments I can feel him in all the worst ways," she confessed, and Rhys nodded his understanding.

"I had these pants of a certain fabric...they reminded me of a specific night with her. Every time I touched them, even just brushed against them when sorting through my closet for something else, it was like it was that night again. One day, not long after I had come home, I snapped and I yanked the pants out of my closet and threw them into the fireplace and watched them burn. And I imagined it was her burning. I imagined watching her bones melt in the flames."

"After I kill the King of Hybern," she began, "will you watch him burn with me."

"I'll watch him burn with you," he answered, "and then I'll spit in his ashes."