A Court of Magnolias and Ash

One

Nesta:

It's been sixty-one days, sixty-one days since the war. Since the violent beginning met a grizzly end. Sixty-one days since I saw my sisters conjure more courage, more fight than I could, than I did. It would be daft to say the war didn't change me. I just didn't realize how much it would.

Staring out the window in my room, I could see the garden Elain had been working so diligently on. I watched her as she spent hours perfecting the courtyard—creating a garden that would put the Spring Court to shame.

I couldn't speak to her. After I abandoned them when we arrived in Velaris, retreating to my room, I couldn't face her. Even now, through the distance and window pane, it was still painful.

Feyre reminded me of mother and Elain, she reminded me of father. Both of our parent's dead. Both death's I've witnessed, I watched utterly helpless as they died before me. Both reminding me of the horrid memories that I can never erase.

My feet moved me away from the window, sweeping me towards the small shelf with my favorite novels. Someone had hung the shelf when I was bathing, just above the cozy filigree green and cream fabric chair. All the novels I treasured, stacked neatly in a row.

How anyone knew of them, I'll never know. I guess we all have our secrets.

I scanned the shelf, my eyes falling on the chestnut leather bound at the end. A series of poems, love and death, sun and moon. The usual poet's choice of topics. However, this wasn't usual, nor is it unusual. It's purity in the form of ink. My fingertips gently touched the leather, pulling it out of its new home. I opened to the first page, my eyes scanning the small print until the book slipped out of my slender hand.

The sound of leather smacking against the wooden floor reminded me of Illyrian leathers, bracing themselves against the army of Hybern. The army of weak demons and blood thirsty slave drivers. The book splayed opened, pages unveiling the words I never taught Feyre, the words of failure and cruelty.

This happened once before, when we first returned, I tried to read. To escape. I couldn't get past the penetrating silence, the painful ringing in my ears. It was similar to the silence that radiated through me as my power surged before emptying to save...to save...I can't even say his name in my head. I even failed him. To protect him, us.

Decadent emerald walls edged towards me, slowly caving in like they had many times before. Before they could swallow me whole, I ran to the roof. Breathlessly clinging to the railings edge as I looked towards the horizon, towards the cobbled streets disappearing into the azure sea.

This was the only place where there were no walls to keep me, no cauldron to imprison me, no king to attack me. I still couldn't take baths without buckets; sleep in unforgiving darkness.

"You missed practice...again." Cassian's commanding voice emphasized. His wings tucking behind him as he stood beside me, careful not to touch my skin. If he is the sun, I am the moon. His skin had darkened from several days of travel; and while his grew darker, mine became paler.

We stood on the roof top deck, overlooking Velaris. The sun had felt different, even though it was a fireball above us, it felt strangely cold. The wind and air, the sea—all these natural beauties had felt distant, colder since the war. It had been several weeks and normalcy had not replaced the ache each one of us felt, that much I knew.

"I'm sure you managed just fine by yourself, bastard." I replied with venom, hoping it would scare him away.

Cassian's eyes darkened, his lips twitched, "how will you defend yourself in the next war? Books?"