Chapter 19 — Lucien - A Court of Splintered Harmony

Lucien hated everything about Rhysand and Feyre’s house.

Mostly because he loved everything about it.

If he could have designed a place for himself, it would have been this. The blend of sweeping yet cozy, the grandeur melding effortlessly with the intimacy. The Spring Court manor had been all hard marble and gilded finery. And while the river house was no less opulent . . . it was a home.

The Mother knew he hadn’t had one of those in a long, long while.

As he lay in the bed in the lovely room overlooking the Sidra River beyond the lawn, the scent of his mate floated like a ribbon of spring in the air, reaching him all the way in the guest wing.

He’d smelled Elain the moment he’d set foot in the temple earlier.

He hadn’t seen her since Winter Solstice, more than nine months ago. She’d frowned at his gift like he’d offered her poison, and left it discarded on the table beside her chair.

He didn’t expect anything from her. He knew damn well he didn’t deserve her. Why the Mother had made them mates, he had no idea. Elain clearly had no interest in him, and though he’d tried to get to know her . . . it hadn’t gone well.

It didn’t stop his mouth from watering whenever he was near her, his every predatory instinct rising to the fore, his blood roaring to find her, woo her, claim her.

He considered himself a reasonable, civilized male. What pumped through him at the thought of Elain, at her floral scent, was anything but. His straining cock was anything but.

Lucien flipped onto his side, gritting his teeth. Would it be a violation of her if he took care of himself? He’d never let himself do so when thinking of her, but this had been the longest stretch in his existence without sex—without any sort of physical contact. And seeing Elain today, even with the terror of Bryaxis still heavy upon them all, even though she hadn’t spoken to him at dinner, hadn’t even looked at him . . . Gods, he ached.

Lucien glanced at the fine molding around the ceiling, and the gold of his enchanted mechanical eye clicked. Handmade beauty, it informed him. No hint of enchantment.

The eye was a gift and a curse. It allowed him to see as he would have before Amarantha carved his eye out of his skull with her fingernail, but it could also see magic in its own strange way. Auras, usually.

Feyre’s was a rainbow of colors—all the magics of the High Lords that had been handed over to her, and something silvery and radiant that was Feyre herself. It was different from Nesta’s burning silver. Or Elain’s sparkly gold and rose—like the dawn itself. No, Feyre’s was something wholly unique.

Gone was that starved, sullen girl he’d first met. A High Lady, a mother, had been with him today, seen him to this room after dinner, wholly confident in her place here. Even her scent projected it—along with a newness.

The first layer of scent was small and soft—a baby scent—wrapped around what he could only assume was the sweet smell of her milk. Then Rhys’s scent, and Mother knew that scent warned him and any other male to stay the fuck away from his mate.

Lucien thrashed onto his other side, kicking at the sheets. Did Feyre know?

He snorted. Of course she knew—at least, that mates had scents that deeply marked each other once the bond was accepted, but Rhys’s was terrifying. Did she ever forget who she’d mated with? Who had fathered her child? What sort of monster lurked beneath that smooth surface?

Yes, they’d all become allies of a sort. Yes, he himself had witnessed Rhys’s goodness, but he’d also seen what Rhys was capable of. His cruelty and scheming and utter lack of mercy. There was a reason people still shuddered to hear Rhysand’s name, even after the Hybern War.

And finally, beneath all that, Feyre’s own scent shimmered, her own innermost self. That silvery brightness, the smell that he’d first detected at their initial meeting at the Spring Court, which had only been amplified and clarified in becoming High Fae. High Lady. Her aura seemed to grow with joy at the family around her. The friends she’d made.

It pained him to remember that he had once been counted as one of them.

You gave up on me, she’d hissed at him all those years ago. I begged you so many times to help me.

He pushed past that old shame. At least his cock had calmed down.

Lucien exhaled deeply. He’d intended to tell them after the ceremony that he’d help them find proof of Koschei’s involvement at his father’s court. Part of him, a damned stupid part, had hoped that agreeing to manipulate the Autumn Court would get Elain to at least look at him without disdain.

But Bryaxis’s attack had ruined his plans. It had felt wrong to bring it up when everyone’s nerves were flayed raw, and he’d spent dinner wondering if Elain’s screams at the temple had been from seeing a vision of herself chained to him forever.

The Mother knew Elain’s screams had made him frantic with the need to protect her, even as his own nightmare had shredded his soul. Though he wasn’t entirely sure that Bryaxis’s illusions had been any worse than the reality he currently faced.

He didn’t know how long he could keep this up—this balance he precariously maintained. What was his role for the Night Court, anyway? Did it have an end, or would he be forever navigating different lands: Spring, the human lands, and here? And now the Autumn Court, too.

But how could he say no? After what Rhys and Feyre had revealed about the impending invasion of the human lands on the continent, with two of his friends—his only friends these days—being human themselves, how could he not agree to help them?

He knew Feyre wouldn’t push it if he said no. Rhys, despite everything, probably wouldn’t push it. He was a monster, but one with a conscience.

Not that Rhys, for all his power, had been able to do anything against Bryaxis. Yes, Rhys had gotten a sword into Nesta’s hands—a blade that had quite clearly been Made, and no one had explained how or why—but even the High Lord of the Night Court was not immune to fear’s grip.

Lucien couldn’t blame him, not for that. Not when the things he’d seen today . . . He locked out the memories. His face remained tender from where he’d clawed at it.

This wasn’t how he’d expected his life to turn out the day they’d emerged from Under the Mountain, Amarantha dead and already becoming merely a stain on the memory of these lands. He’d pictured long, content years at the Spring Court, maybe one day finding a female who’d make him feel alive in a way he hadn’t since Jesminda had died—

She hadn’t just died. She’d been butchered. Executed by his father, while his brothers had done nothing to stop it.

Bryaxis had shown him that moment in vivid detail. Shown him worse—possibilities that his darkest nightmares couldn’t conjure. He knew as he watched that they weren’t real, and yet the stark clarity of it all, the inability to turn away . . . He’d found himself wishing Amarantha had gouged out his remaining eye, too.

He gritted his teeth again. And now he was to return to another sort of nightmare: the Forest House, where he’d been born. Where he’d been tormented, and where he’d lost everything. He hadn’t set foot there since he’d seen the life vanish from his lover’s eyes. It had ceased being a home in that moment. And he’d ceased to have a family when his brothers had hunted him, on their father’s orders, to drag him home.

Lucien ran a hand through his hair. Tamlin had saved him. And then Lucien had rebuilt himself, his life.

Only for Feyre to bring it all crumbling down.

No, that wasn’t fair. Tamlin had brought it crumbling down by joining with Hybern. But Feyre, in her rage and vengeance, had ensured that the trust between him and his High Lord was forever shattered. Even if it had been a game she’d played to erode that faith … she’d broken something between them.

Maybe Lucien had let it break, too. Choosing to go after his mate, leaving the Spring Court behind.

He’d hoped, so stupidly hoped, that he’d find Elain and … she’d smile. That maybe she’d also be seeking a home in the world and would be eager to find it with him. He didn’t love her, certainly not yet, but he was at least open to the idea of it.

It had been two years, and she hadn’t smiled at him once. Had exchanged barely more than a dozen words with him. His heart lay like a brick in his chest.

But had he tried—really tried to get to know her? He’d always erred on the side of being polite, giving her space, but maybe he should insist that they at least sit together and talk, and he’d explain that he expected nothing, but that he only wanted to see if there was something, anything worth building together.

At a minimum, he owed her a long-overdue apology for everything that had happened in Hybern. He’d been the one who’d brought this momentous change about for Elain. For Nesta. Through his own actions, they’d gone into that Cauldron.

And after the shadowsinger had mentioned it at dinner, Lucien had realized he’d never apologized to his mate for it. Did she, too, relive those dark days, loathing him for his role? Was that what she had seen today?

Lucien sat up, exhaling heavily once more. The clock had chimed twelve a few minutes ago, but maybe Elain was still awake. Some part of him whispered that she was.

If there was ever a time to do it, it was now—having faced their very worst nightmares, having been split wide open by them. Maybe it had granted Elain some clarity, too. Maybe she’d be amenable to hearing him explain his actions before the Hybern War; maybe she’d accept his apology. Maybe it would be the one thing she needed to hear.

He slid on his pants and shirt, but didn’t bother with a jacket. Perhaps he’d seemed too buttoned-up. He’d always wanted to appear presentable, but maybe that wasn’t what Elain needed or wanted. Maybe she needed a person, not a title or a role, but an actual person to talk to—

Lucien didn’t let himself reconsider as he slipped into the hallway. He followed her scent past the top of the grand staircase, then down another hall. The private hall for Rhys and Feyre’s close family. Their scents were all mingled here—Mor and Cassian and Nesta and Azriel and Amren.

Elain’s was the last bedroom after Nesta and Cassian’s.

Lucien’s heart thundered, throat drying out. Maybe this had been a terrible idea. Even the shadows pooling in the hallway seemed to be gaping at him, as if saying, What the hell are you doing here? Go back to your room!

He should wait until morning. Or until—never.

But no. He owed it to himself and this shot at a future to try.

Lucien fought past the shaking in his hand as he quietly, so as to not wake the others, knocked. A muffled female sound—Elain—answered.

He’d learned to master his pain. Had survived his father’s cruelty and a grief so profound it had remade his very soul. After the horrors of today, he could certainly face his mate, and all that he had contributed to her suffering.

With a silent prayer to the Mother, Lucien opened Elain’s bedroom door.

It took him a second to understand what he was seeing. That it was not some nightmare conjured by Bryaxis.

The monstrous, bat-like wings attached to a tattooed, powerful male body.

Elain under that male body, now turning her head Lucien’s way, pleasure still flushing her cheeks, breasts he’d never seen, peaked and gleaming, where the male had been suckling on them—

Azriel was in his mate’s bed, naked. And Elain was naked too.