A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas
Lucien rushed into the foyer below just as Tamlin shouted, “The table—clear it off!” Lucien shoved the vase of flowers off the long table in the center of the hall. Either Tamlin wasn’t thinking straight, or he’d been afraid to waste the extra minutes bringing the faerie to the infirmary. Shattering glass set my feet moving, and I was halfway down the stairs before Tamlin eased the shrieking faerie face-first onto the table. The faerie wasn’t wearing a mask; there was nothing to hide the agony contorting his long, unearthly features.
“Scouts found him dumped just over the borderline,” Tamlin explained to Lucien, but his eyes darted to me. They flashed with warning, but I took another step down. He said to Lucien, “He’s Summer Court.”
“By the Cauldron,” Lucien said, surveying the damage.
“My wings,” the faerie choked out, his glossy black eyes wide and staring at nothing. “She took my wings.”
Again, that nameless she who haunted their lives. If she wasn’t ruling the Spring Court, then perhaps she ruled another. Tamlin flicked a hand, and steaming water and bandages just appeared on the table. My mouth dried up, but I reached the bottom of the stairs and kept walking toward the table and the death that was surely hovering in this hall.
“She took my wings,” said the faerie. “She took my wings,” he repeated, clutching the edge of the table with spindly blue fingers.
Tamlin murmured a soft, wordless sound—gentle in a way I hadn’t heard before—and picked up a rag to dunk in the water. I took up a spot across the table from Tamlin, and the breath whooshed from my chest as I beheld the damage.
Whoever she was, she hadn’t just taken his wings. She’d ripped them off.
Blood oozed from the black velvety stumps on the faerie’s back. The wounds were jagged—cartilage and tissue severed in what looked like uneven cuts. As if she’d sawed off his wings bit by bit.
“She took my wings,” the faerie said again, his voice breaking. As he trembled, shock taking over, his skin shimmered with veins of pure gold—iridescent, like a blue butterfly.
“Keep still,” Tamlin ordered, wringing the rag. “You’ll bleed out faster.”
“N-n-no,” the faerie started, and began to twist onto his back, away from Tamlin, from the pain that was surely coming when that rag touched those raw stumps.
It was instinct, or mercy, or desperation, perhaps, to grab the faerie’s upper arms and shove him down again, pinning him to the table as gently as I could. He thrashed, strong enough that I had to concentrate solely on holding him. His skin was velvet-smooth and slippery, a texture I would never be able to paint, not even if I had eternity to master it. But I pushed against him, gritting my teeth and willing him to stop. I looked to Lucien, but the color had blanched from his face, leaving a sickly white-green in its wake.
“Lucien,” Tamlin said—a quiet command. But Lucien kept gaping at the faerie’s ruined back, at the stumps, his metal eye narrowing and widening, narrowing and widening. He backed up a step. And another. And then vomited in a potted plant before sprinting from the room.
The faerie twisted again and I held tight, my arms shaking with the effort. His injuries must have weakened him greatly if I could keep him pinned. “Please,” I breathed. “Please hold still.”
“She took my wings,” the faerie sobbed. “She took them.”
“I know,” I murmured, my fingers aching. “I know.”
Tamlin touched the rag to one of the stumps, and the faerie screamed so loudly that my senses guttered, sending me staggering back. He tried to rise but his arms buckled, and he collapsed face-first onto the table again.
Blood gushed—so fast and bright that it took me a heartbeat to realize that a wound like this required a tourniquet—and that the faerie had lost far too much blood for it to even make a difference. It poured down his back and onto the table, where it ran to the edge and drip-drip-dripped to the floor near my feet.
I found Tamlin’s eyes on me. “The wounds aren’t clotting,” he said under his breath as the faerie panted.
“Can’t you use your magic?” I asked, wishing I could rip that mask off his face and see his full expression.
Tamlin swallowed hard. “No. Not for major damage. Once, but not any longer.”
The faerie on the table whimpered, his panting slowing. “She took my wings,” he whispered. Tamlin’s green eyes flickered, and I knew, right then, that the faerie was going to die. Death wasn’t just hovering in this hall; it was counting down the faerie’s remaining heartbeats.
I took one of the faerie’s hands in mine. The skin there was almost leathery, and, perhaps more out of reflex than anything, his long fingers wrapped around mine, covering them completely. “She took my wings,” he said again, his shaking subsiding a bit.
I brushed the long, damp hair from the faerie’s half-turned face, revealing a pointed nose and a mouth full of sharp teeth. His dark eyes shifted to mine, beseeching, pleading.
“It will be all right,” I said, and hoped he couldn’t smell lies the way the Suriel was able to. I stroked his limp hair, its texture like liquid night—another I would never be able to paint but would try to, perhaps forever. “It will be all right.” The faerie closed his eyes, and I tightened my grip on his hand.
Something wet touched my feet, and I didn’t need to look down to see that his blood had pooled around me. “My wings,” the faerie whispered.
“You’ll get them back.”
The faerie struggled to open his eyes. “You swear?”
“Yes,” I breathed. The faerie managed a slight smile and closed his eyes again. My mouth trembled. I wished for something else to say, something more to offer him than my empty promises. The first false vow I’d ever sworn. But Tamlin began speaking, and I glanced up to see him take the faerie’s other hand.
“Cauldron save you,” he said, reciting the words of a prayer that was probably older than the mortal realm. “Mother hold you. Pass through the gates, and smell that immortal land of milk and honey. Fear no evil. Feel no pain.” Tamlin’s voice wavered, but he finished. “Go, and enter eternity.”
The faerie heaved one final sigh, and his hand went limp in mine. I didn’t let go, though, and kept stroking his hair, even when Tamlin released him and took a few steps from the table.
I could feel Tamlin’s eyes on me, but I wouldn’t let go. I didn’t know how long it took for a soul to fade from the body. I stood in the puddle of blood until it grew cold, holding the faerie’s spindly hand and stroking his hair, wondering if he knew I’d lied when I’d sworn he would get his wings back, wondering if, wherever he had now gone, he had gotten them back.
A clock chimed somewhere in the house, and Tamlin gripped my shoulder. I hadn’t realized how cold I’d become until the heat of his hand warmed me through my nightgown. “He’s gone. Let him go.”
I studied the faerie’s face—so unearthly, so inhuman. Who could be so cruel to hurt him like that?
“Feyre,” Tamlin said, squeezing my shoulder. I brushed the faerie’s hair behind his long, pointed ear, wishing I’d known his name, and let go.
Tamlin led me up the stairs, neither of us caring about the bloody footprints I left behind or the freezing blood soaking the front of my nightgown. I paused at the top of the steps, though, twisting out of his grip, and gazed at the table in the foyer below.
“We can’t leave him there,” I said, making to step down. Tamlin caught my elbow.
“I know,” he said, the words so drained and weary. “I was going to walk you upstairs first.”
Before he buried him. “I want to go with you.”
“It’s too deadly at night for you to—”
“I can hold my—”
“No,” he said, his green eyes flashing. I straightened, but he sighed, his shoulders curving inward. “I must do this. Alone.”
His head was bowed. No claws, no fangs—there was nothing to be done against this enemy, this fate. No one for him to fight. So I nodded, because I would have wanted to do
“Feyre,” he said—softly enough that I faced him again. “Why?” He tilted his head to the side. “You dislike our kind on a good day. And after Andras …” Even in the darkened hallway, his usually bright eyes were shadowed. “So why?”
I took a step closer to him, my blood-covered feet sticking to the rug. I glanced down the stairs to where I could still see the prone form of the faerie and the stumps of his wings.
“Because I wouldn’t want to die alone,” I said, and my voice wobbled as I looked at Tamlin again, forcing myself to meet his stare. “Because I’d want someone to hold my hand until the end, and awhile after that. That’s something everyone deserves, human or faerie.” I swallowed hard, my throat painfully tight. “I regret what I did to Andras,” I said, the words so strangled they were no more than a whisper. “I regret that there was … such hate in my heart. I wish I could undo it—and … I’m sorry. So very sorry.”
I couldn’t remember the last time—if ever—I’d spoken to anyone like that. But he just nodded and turned away, and I wondered if I should say more, if I should kneel and beg for his forgiveness. If he felt such grief, such guilt, over a stranger, then Andras … By the time I opened my mouth, he was already down the steps.
I watched him—watched every movement he made, the muscles of his body visible through that blood-soaked tunic, watched that invisible weight bearing down on his shoulders. He didn’t look at me as he scooped up the broken body and carried it to the garden doors beyond my line of sight. I went to the window at the top of the stairs, watching as Tamlin carried the faerie through the moonlit garden and into the rolling fields beyond. He never once glanced back.
Chapter 18
The next day, the blood of the faerie had been cleaned up by the time I ate, washed, and dressed. I’d taken my time in the morning, and it was nearly noon as I stood atop the staircase, peering down at the entry hall below. Just to make sure it was gone.
I’d been set on finding Tamlin and explaining—truly explaining—how sorry I was about Andras. If I was supposed to stay here, stay with him, then I could at least attempt to repair what I’d ruined. I glanced to the large window behind me, the view so sweeping that I could see all the way to the reflecting pool beyond the garden.
The water was still enough that the vibrant sky and fat, puffy clouds above were flawlessly reflected. Asking about them seemed vulgar after last night, but maybe—maybe once those paints and brushes did arrive, I could venture to the pool to capture it.
I might have remained staring out toward that smear of color and light and texture had Tamlin and Lucien not emerged from another wing of the manor, discussing some border patrol or another. They fell silent as I came down the stairs, and Lucien strode right out the front door without so much as a good morning—just a casual wave. Not a vicious gesture, but he clearly had no intention of joining the conversation that Tamlin and I were about to have.
I glanced around, hoping for any sign of those paints, but Tam pointed to the open front doors through which Lucien had exited. Beyond them, I could see both of our horses, already saddled and waiting. Lucien was already climbing into the saddle of a third horse. I turned to Tamlin.
Stay with him; he will keep me safe, and things will get better. Fine. I could do that.
“Where are we going?” My words were half-mumbled.
“Your supplies won’t arrive until tomorrow, and the gallery’s being cleaned, and my … meeting was postponed.” Was he rambling? “I thought we’d go for a ride—no killing involved. Or naga to worry about.” Even as he finished with a half smile, sorrow flickered in his eyes. Indeed, I’d had enough death in the past two days. Enough of killing faeries. Killing anything. No weapons were sheathed at his side or on his baldric—but a knife hilt glinted at his boot.
Where had he buried that faerie? A High Lord digging a grave for a stranger. I might not have believed it if I’d been told, might not have believed it if he hadn’t offered me sanctuary rather than death.
“Where to?” I asked. He only smiled.
I couldn’t come up with any words when we arrived—and knew that even if I had been able to paint it, nothing would have done it justice. It wasn’t simply that it was the most beautiful place I’d ever been to, or that it filled me with both longing and mirth, but it just seemed … right. As if the colors and lights and patterns of the world had come together to form one perfect place—one true bit of beauty. After last night, it was exactly where I needed to be.
We sat atop a grassy knoll, overlooking a glade of oaks so wide and high they could have been the pillars and spires of an ancient castle. Shimmering tufts of dandelion fluff drifted by, and the floor of the clearing was carpeted with swaying crocuses and snowdrops and bluebells. It was an hour or two past noon by the time we arrived, but the light was thick and golden.
Though the three of us were alone, I could have sworn I heard singing. I hugged my knees and drank in the glen.
“We brought a blanket,” Tamlin said, and I looked over my shoulder to see him jerk his chin to the purple blanket they’d laid out a few feet away. Lucien plopped down onto it and stretched his legs. Tamlin remained standing, waiting for my response.
I shook my head and faced forward, tracing my hand through the feather-soft grass, cataloging its color and texture. I’d never felt grass like it, and I certainly wasn’t going to ruin the experience by sitting on a blanket.
Rushed whispers were exchanged behind me, and before I could turn around to investigate, Tamlin took a seat at my side. His jaw was clenched tight enough that I stared ahead. “What is this place?” I said, still running my fingers through the grass.
Out of the corner of my eye, Tamlin was no more than a glittering golden figure. “Just a glen.” Behind us, Lucien snorted. “Do you like it?” Tamlin asked quickly. The green of his eyes matched the grass between my fingers, and the amber flecks were like the shafts of sunlight that streamed through the trees. Even his mask, odd and foreign, seemed to fit into the glen—as if this place had been fashioned for him alone. I could picture him here in his beast form, curled up in the grass, dozing.
“What?” I said. I’d forgotten his question.
“Do you like it?” he repeated, and his lips tugged into a smile.
I took an uneven breath and stared at the glen again. “Yes.”
He chuckled. “That’s it? ‘Yes’?”
“Would you like me to grovel with gratitude for bringing me here, High Lord?”
“Ah. The Suriel told you nothing important, did it?”
That smile of his sparked something bold in my chest. “He also said that you like being brushed, and if I’m a clever girl, I might train you with treats.”
Tamlin tipped his head to the sky and roared with laughter. Despite myself, I let out a soft laugh.
“I might die of surprise,” Lucien said behind me. “You made a joke, Feyre.”
I turned to look at him with a cool smile. “You don’t want to know what the Suriel said about you.” I flicked my brows up, and Lucien lifted his hands in defeat.
“I’d pay good money to hear what the Suriel thinks of Lucien,” Tamlin said.
A cork popped, followed by the sounds of Lucien chugging the bottle’s contents and chuckling with a muttered “Brushed.”
Tamlin’s eyes were still bright with laughter as he put a hand at my elbow, pulling me to my feet. “Come on,” he said, jerking his head down the hill to the little stream that ran along its base. “I want to show you something.”
I got to my feet, but Lucien remained sitting on the blanket and lifted the bottle of wine in salute. He took a slug from it as he sprawled on his back and gazed at the green canopy.
Each of Tamlin’s movements was precise and efficient, his powerfully muscled legs eating up the earth as we wove between the towering trees, hopped over tiny brooks, and clambered up steep knolls. We stopped atop a mound, an
Tamlin grasped my wrist and tugged me down the hill, his callused fingers gently scraping against my skin. He let go of me to leap over the root of the tree in a single maneuver and prowled to the water’s edge. I could only grind my teeth as I stumbled after him, heaving myself over the root.
He crouched by the pool and cupped his hand to fill it. He tilted his hand, letting the water fall. “Have a look.”
The silvery sparkling water that dribbled from his hand set ripples dancing across the pool, each glimmering with various colors, and—“That looks like starlight,” I breathed.
He huffed a laugh, filling and emptying his hand again. I gaped at the glittering water. “It is starlight.”
“That’s impossible,” I said, fighting the urge to take a step toward the water.
“This is Prythian. According to your legends, nothing is impossible.”
“How?” I asked, unable to take my eyes from the pool—the silver, but also the blue and red and pink and yellow glinting beneath, the lightness of it …
“I don’t know—I never asked, and no one ever explained.”
When I continued gaping at the pool, he laughed, drawing away my attention—only for me to find him unbuttoning his tunic. “Jump in,” he said, the invitation dancing in his eyes.
A swim—unclothed, alone. With a High Lord. I shook my head, falling back a step. His fingers paused at the second button from his collar.
“Don’t you want to know what it’s like?”
I didn’t know what he meant: swimming in starlight, or swimming with him. “I—no.”