A Court of Wind and Song

15: The Trove

Nesta

In a blink of an eye, everything had turned into chaos.

The amount of damage that had been done to Solarea was extraordinary. Even during the war, that kind of destruction was unforeseen. I was positive that the dreams I had been having every night would continue, maybe for the rest of my life. People screaming in pain, lightning striking all around me as I ran for cover, dragging people out of rubble who were already half dead, a 25 foot wave crashing into Leur and I, Cassian's face as he carried her out of the water.

And in the two weeks since, everyone had been on edge. My training had just resumed, mostly with Cassian while Leur was busy. I had seen her and Azriel only a few times, each time looking worse than the last. Shadows and bags under their eyes from lack of sleep, guilt and sorrow on their faces, pale and tired every time. Like open books, I could read the stress and worry on their faces.

No matter if they tried to act like everything was fine. Maybe for our sake or maybe for their own, but it wasn't convincing. They were splitting their time too heavily, bouncing between here and Solarea when they could. Arrangements for rebuilding, donations for cities all across Prythian, fundraiser galas and the like all across Velaris. Everyone wanted to help, and nobody knew exactly how.

Cassian had not let up on my training recently. Just sitting here in the living room of the River House, my abs hurt from holding myself up. If anything, it had become an outlet for him. Pushing me and himself at the same time, feeling like he could at least help something, change something. And as annoying as I found him most of the time, we at minimum agreed on that.

So that was all we did, all day, everyday. We trained all morning, and then Cassian went to work in Illyria or helping in Solarea while I worked in the library. Sometimes he was home for dinner, sometimes I couldn't bring myself to leave the quiet meditation of the library to go up and eat. Gwyn had become a... friend, I supposed it was the right word. We had spoken a few more times, each conversation revealing more about ourselves.

And at night, when the house was silent and there was nothing but Cassian and I- we pretended like we didn't hear each other screaming ourselves awake. But sometimes, in those moments afterward, when my heart was pounding back down to normal and the visions had faded- I could hear his steady footsteps in the hall outside my door. A soft brush of a hand against the doorknob, as if he might come in, might comfort me, might touch me.

And I never knew if I wanted it like air in my lungs or if I wanted to tell him to go away.

And he never opened the door.

We just continued on in that limbo.

Rhysand, Feyre, Leur, and Azriel had called a meeting here today. I knew that the attack on Solarea had been traced back to the escape of a former General, but apparently Azriel's spies had also gathered some concerning information about Briallyn.

I could not shake the feeling that all of this was connected.

Elain was next to me on the couch, trying to pretend like it was not obvious that she wanted to go and stand with Lucien, the male swirling a glass of whiskey in an armchair on her other side. Cassian was sitting next to Amren on the other couch, both of them locked in a conversation on the Illyrian troops. Feyre and Rhysand were sitting in a pair of twin black armchairs, their hands interlinked, my sister carefully watching the twitch in Rhysand's brow. Even Mor had returned from Vallhallen from this meeting, perched on the arm of the couch next to Amren.

But my eyes were on Leur and Azriel, the former occupying the armchair next to Lucien with the latter eternally stationed behind her, one scarred hand on her shoulder. Leur's legs were tucked under her, posture more slumped than I had ever seen it, shadows under her eyes failing to be fought away by the steaming cup of coffee she was sipping. Azriel only looked slightly better, a hard line formed between his brows.