A Court of Fate and Failure | Azriel

1: Cons and Connections

Naoise stood just outside the border of Velaris, as she had every day for the past 50 years. 

A hand nicked in the scars of a life beyond the barrier behind her gripped at the sword hanging by her side. Yawning into her other hand and then scratching at the point of her ear, she held it out before her. Letting a breath filter in and then out, she watched her skin turn scaly and dark as the wings that twitched at every breeze between her shoulder blades. Then it rolled back as if it had never happened and all Naoise saw was the dark tan of her own skin. Free of the wrinkles she knew pulled at the mortals born five, maybe six centuries after her. The world was ever as cruel as it'd always been.

Deep within the trees sprawling before her, a branch snapped. Her feet shifted in the dirt within seconds, darkness darting into the familiar shadows and the shining silver of a sword held in front of her. When her darkness blanketing the earth returned without a soul writhing in its grasp, she relaxed and resumed her previous stance. Blood still sat in the crevices of her leather from whence she'd last killed to protect the city of starlight. A city whispered among the few to know of it, both the hopeful and those harboring poisoned hearts. 

One Naoise would never admit to having spent days dreaming of when her father still lived. Walking those streets... living till the end of time by each other's sides. Focusing not on strength and fortitude and survival but the joys in life's every second.

Just as the years with him were never enough, those without would always be too many.

Something in the air shifted. Naoise jolted and focused on the darkness swirling by her ankles, watching as it swarmed the base of the barrier. One standing to protect a piece of life so divine from the cruelties she worked everyday to ward away. Until silence fell all around and it... rushed in. Just like that. Barrier gone, Velaris in her sights, in her grasp. Her fist clenched by her side. She stood and stared at the lights shining through the trees that could have easily been mistaken for sunlight, breath catching in her chest and absentmindedly slinging her sword into the sheath resting between two powerful Illyrian wings. Ignoring the lightning of spasms threatening to buckle her knees, she called the darkness to her and forced it into the modified siphon positioned just above her heart, shining with a wicked kind of depth akin to a void.

Then, as easy as breathing, Naoise's skin covered in inky black feathers, her wings warmed and shrank, and she stood in the forest as a raven, dark as night with wings too angular to be natural. But not enough to be noticeable.

Lifting off the ground, feeling more free than she had in 50 years, Naoise flew into the city of Velaris and all those dreams they'd never fulfilled. Feeling the wind sift through the layers of feathers over her skin, she focused on the light through the trees. Peeping through evergreens and great, ancient oaks like winking stars. Music and melodies meeting her halfway in flight over the trees.

Then it was there. Then she saw how it breathed with life, how a culture hidden away had grown into more than she'd ever been able to imagine. Truly imagine. Fae of all walks of life roamed cobblestone streets below her as shining beacons of life themselves, and when she saw the opportunity in an outreaching roof, Naoise landed without a sound. She tucked her wings that now seemed to glow with the same near essence of life and art as the streets below into her sides. Then, took a moment to watch, and she took a moment to feel the weight of what she'd been protecting settle into her heart. To push aside the wistful dreams she could see then for herself, her and her father walking where a high fae father and daughter did below.

That moment, same as any other for the past 500 years, was not one for mourning. The tight ache in her chest was now a familiar friend, and a reminder that he once lived, and she once had too.