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Feyre sat before an easel in the room Tamlin had given her as a studio, a frown creasing the space between her eyebrows, her gaze faraway as she stared through the floor-length windows. Evening light poured in through the glass and stars began to twinkle in the sky as the sun sank lower and lower beyond the horizon. The last rays of light blended into the darkening blanket above, a mixture of pinks, oranges, and purples fading into the deepest blues and blackness beyond.
Feyre blinked and looked around at the manor…the palace she found herself in. Dread filled her stomach. It had been two months since they’d returned from Under the Mountain. They were alive, they were safe, and yet… She couldn’t shake the feeling that the peace would not last for long.
Even thinking it made her feel ungrateful. Looking around at the evidence of their good fortune, she told herself this was where she belonged. Wasn’t it? She had everything she could possibly want here. Enough food to fill her stomach for lifetimes, a beautiful home, a male who loved her. If not a friend then at least a female companion in Ianthe. And all the time in the world to paint.
And Lucien, of course.
She pushed the thought of him away immediately, noticing as her breathing quickened.
Yes, it was true that she had everything she could have once dreamed of here, Tamlin had assured that, but Feyre wasn’t used to having someone else provide for her, and it made her uneasy. This wasn’t the in-between time of living in Prythian and still trying to get home. This was…forever.
Who was she if not a hunter? If not the one looking after those she cared for?
Paint dripped from her brush onto her lap and she looked down at it without care, brushing the droplet away with two fingers. If she was no longer a provider, was she finally an artist? A painter? Or nothing but?
She wouldn’t be High Lady; Tamlin had dismissed the possibility at once. So what did that leave her? Was she only suited to be a trophy? A plaything? A wife?
A prisoner? The thought came unbidden to her mind and tasted like the ashes of a burnt promise. From the first day she’d met Tamlin, she had been his prisoner; her only reprieve had been the few weeks she’d spent in the human realm after she’d already fallen in love with him. In a way, she’d still been his captive then too.
Feyre didn’t want to be held captive anymore.
Guilt ripped through her and a flashback to Amarantha’s court suffused her senses. She saw Tamlin sitting there, unfeeling at Amarantha’s side, his face not moving at all as she prostrated herself before the evil queen and traded her freedom for the possibility of saving him. Feyre knew that his stoic expression had been to keep her safe but she couldn’t help the anger that boiled hot in her when she remembered his indifference.
She had escaped Under the Mountain, freed the faeries, broken Amarantha’s curse— she had done all of that. For him. For them. She had died for him to be free, and now she felt as if she had become just another fixture of his manor. Her chest rose and fell more quickly as her anxiety grew, and her fae sight locked onto the flowers at the edge of the garden she could see through the window. Roses budded eternal around them, and Feyre knew the magic imbued within the Spring Court would stop them from ever losing their final petal. Her own personal curse would never break, trapped in the tallest tower with a beast.
Tears welled in her eyes. A beast maybe, but a beast she had loved. She had traded her freedom and her life and now Tamlin looked at her either like glass or something to be feared. He kept her locked up, just like a prisoner. Just like he had been. How couldn’t he see it? See her pain? Maybe he didn’t think she was as capable, or as worthy. He had spent six months fooling her after all, even if he had come to love her in the end. Did he view her as a prize, as his right? They weren’t even mates, as far as she could tell; he had no divine claim on her. But Tamlin knew her better than anyone. And yet he couldn’t see her pain.
Feyre bit the inside of her cheek hard to stop herself from crying, and a rush of magic soothed the spot. Every time she felt her magic rippling through her, coursing along her spine to her fingertips, Feyre felt a rush of power and life, as if her magic simply making itself known allowed her to breathe more deeply.
And yet Tamlin would stamp it out. Maybe he did want to keep her as a prisoner. Or maybe he just didn’t care how she felt.
But there had been one person in the Spring Court who seemed to care how she felt, if the way his eye caught hers across the dinner table was any indication. Late at night, she imagined those fingers trailing down her skin as his burnished hair glinted in the moonlight. She imagined her fingers caressing the metal of a mask he no longer wore as he sent her careening over the edge into bliss.
She put down her brush and mentally shook herself, looking at the canvas. A small gasp escaped her; there, below the night sky she had been drawn to paint (one she still did not understand), was a small fox, walking along a river. She had taken up the orange and gold and red without even realizing it, and now even her palette looked like him. Feyre stared down at her paint stained hands and willed them to stop shaking—more from want than fear.
Tamlin could never know. He’d throw them both to the naga.
She shivered and a melodic voice came from the doorway. “Missing something?”
Feyre looked up from her empty hands to find Lucien standing in the doorway. He leaned casually, his arms crossed as he looked at her, amused.
“If you need more colors, you know they’ll be provided.”
Tamlin would provide them, was what went unsaid.
Feyre looked down to the half-finished canvas. “No, it’s not that.” She tried to swallow but her throat was dry and she coughed to clear it. “I—I just—” She licked her lips but her mouth was a desert and any lies she could have conceived of dried up under the burning sun that shone before her, standing in a doorway.
She met his gaze, desperate for him to save her from having to invent a falsehood to save them both. Silently pleading to help her maintain this delicate balance. But he had already seen the look on her face, could probably scent her arousal, and his eyes widened.
A scarlet blush colored her cheeks.
Lucien’s eyes flicked to the painting and Feyre wondered if he could immediately see what she’d subconsciously been depicting. If he recognized the flow of his hair in the brush strokes, the glint of his eyes in the autumn leaves in this strange land, the pull of his lips in the lilting stream.
The fox.
He looked back at her, the smirk falling from his lips as he asked her seriously, “Do you want me to go?” It wasn’t a trick question. He was truly asking. Lucien always asked, always protected her, the bond they’d formed since coming back from Under the Mountain stronger than either of them could have imagined. Even in her dreams, even when she saw those faces still in her nightmares, he was there, shielding her. Sometimes in those dreams, there was a shadow in the corner, a hint of someone else on their side, but when she woke the image was inevitably gone like mist on the wind.
And as Feyre looked at him now, she just saw his pain, his punishment for helping her Under the Mountain.
She hadn’t lied to Amarantha. She did love Tamlin. She had loved Tamlin.
But the longer he kept her caged like a bug under glass, the more she saw him for who he truly was.
And who he wasn’t.
But one person hadn’t looked at her any differently after she’d been Made High Fae. And he was staring at her from behind a mask she never thought she’d see on him again.
“Your—your mask.” It was a question and a statement. The flat metal mask sat securely against his face.
He shrugged, the amusement returning to his lips. “You seemed more comfortable when things were like this.”
Tears burned her eyes and she blinked them away, freezing for a beat before shaking her head vehemently. Though he wasn’t wrong, she didn’t want him to hide. Feyre was so tired of hiding.
Lucien’s eyes darkened and his expression grew serious. Feyre’s heart rate quickened.
“What’s wrong?” he asked her, probably aware that she wasn’t usually one to cry and she could guess that she looked like the picture of grief. He tilted his head down, beseeching her as he looked up at her through the eyelashes that were visible beneath the mask. “You can tell me, Feyre. You’re safe here.”
She wanted to laugh at the irony, that the male who would provide the most comfort she’d felt in two months would also be the one who had nearly gotten her killed when she first arrived in Prythian. But this was also the male who took the punishment for her Under the Mountain, whose own pain rivaled hers. Being hunted by his own family, watching his love die, escaping to another court…Lucien’s own story was stained with blood as dark as his hair.
And yet here he was, trying to comfort her.
She wondered if he felt trapped in this foreign land as much as she did.
At that her lip trembled and she ducked her chin, wiping furiously at the corners of her eyes with her orange and pink and purple and blue stained hands. But the words came out of her in a rush. “I don’t know how to do this. I don’t know how to live with… all of this or talk about it”—memories of the faeries she’d killed flashed before her eyes—“and I want to harness my magic, I want to control it, I want to be able to protect myself so next time, next time—” Her voice caught on a sob and she wiped at her nose with the back of her hand.
“You will never go through that again. I promise.” His voice was deep and there was a hint of anger in it, though not at her. She met his eyes for a moment, but his gaze was too strong to hold.
“You can’t promise that any more than Tamlin can,” she said with a sad smile, reminding them both of the other male’s presence in their life. It was good, to remember Tamlin was there, that he and Feyre were still…something. “But I appreciate it,” she continued. “I just wish he would let me practice and discover what powers I do actually have. I feel like I’m going crazy just sitting here all day imagining everything I saw over and over again.” She took a shuddering breath and paused, squeezing her eyes shut tight before opening them as if that might erase the images burned into her retinas.
Lucien took a step into the room, but didn’t come further. “I want to help. Please, Feyre, whatever I can do, I want to help.”
She felt her face heat with embarrassment and something else. “I don’t even know what I need, Lucien…I…I’ve never…” She looked up at him and had the errant thought that he looked more the part of a High Lord than Tamlin did in that moment. She wished that Lucien were ruling the Spring Court instead. And then she took in the other parts of him. His long hair, his strong arms, his lithe figure, taut and yet statuesque.
She quickly looked away again, heat pooling low in her abdomen, but he didn’t give her the chance to brush away the dangerous thoughts as she watched his footsteps approach her.
Lucien used a finger to gently lift her chin, encouraging her to meet his eyes. “Say it.”
Feyre swallowed thickly, not wanting to divulge her truth but knowing that anything else would be a disservice to him. She breathed in and said, “I’m not used to having someone care. I don’t know what to do with it.”
Lucien looked down at her for several beats, and then suddenly, slowly, his hand moved gently up the length of her jaw until he was cupping her cheek. She couldn’t help the soft moan that emanated from her chest at his touch. He sucked in a breath. “Cauldron boil me.” And he pulled her to standing and pressed his mouth to hers in one fell swoop.
Feyre’s skin heated under his hands. Everywhere he touched felt like spring erupting from a frozen wasteland as something blossomed inside her.
“Lucien…” His name was barely a whisper on her lips.
He nipped along her jaw, to her ear, one hand pressed against the side of her neck as she leaned into his touch, the other wrapped around her waist, pressing her to him. “I care, Feyre. I have cared since you stepped through those doors. And it has been torture ever since.”
Her chest tightened. She’d never meant to hurt anyone. “I’m sorry—”
He pulled back to look at her seriously, but his hands stayed where they were and she could still feel his heartbeat through his shirt. “Please don’t. Don’t apologize. Without you…loving him…we’d all have been trapped Under the Mountain. Don’t ever be sorry for what you feel.”
That heart he was willing to share slammed hard and fast against her ribcage, and even Feyre didn’t understand its desires right then. She had loved Tamlin, yes. And she still felt some unmistakable pull to the High Lord of the Night Court, even though she didn’t understand it. But when she looked at the fae male before her, the infernal organ in her chest ached. Feyre burned with confusion and need and pain, but what did she want?
Who did she want?
No matter what else had been or may be, at that moment, there was only one answer—the male who had tricked and trapped and teased her since her arrival in Prythian. The one whose arms encircled her now.
She gave him a small smile as permission and he lifted her, her legs wrapping around his waist with ease. Within seconds he had her pressed against the wall, grinding against her heat as if they’d done this a million times before. She felt her body start to buzz with anticipation and a distinct lack of oxygen as he kissed her fiercely before trailing his lips along her jaw and down the column of her neck. Feyre had never felt such heat burn through her before. She needed more, needed release.
“Lucien, please…” she breathed, hardly knowing what she was begging for.
But he knew. He knew her, knew her heart. And he still wanted her.
“Fuck, Feyre, I need you.” It was a growl, but never a snarl. Not like Tamlin. Lucien wanted to possess her, but not own her, and she knew that made all the difference.
She reached between them, pressing her hand against the front of his pants to grip the length of him and he moaned against her shoulder. She couldn’t help the smile that came to her lips at the power she had over this male’s pleasure.
Reaching inside, Feyre gently held his length for the first time. His skin was soft, but he was hard and warm beneath her hand. She gasped as she felt him twitch. “I need you too,” she whispered. “I need you, just you.” She said it like a promise, but she didn’t know if it was one she could keep, and she had the absolute sense of surety that Lucien knew that too and didn’t care.
He pressed his mouth to hers once more, his tongue seeking hers. This was so different from Isaac, so different from Tamlin. This was more, and Feyre relaxed into his touch, safe. Her fingers lightly traced the fox mask before she gently pulled it off. He looked surprised and then relaxed with a grin, now bare before her as well.
Lucien’s hands squeezed where they held her thighs and she tightened her grip around him. His right hand released where it held her and trailed up the bottom of her leg until his fingers were pressed against the thin strip of fabric separating him from her core.
“Gods, Feyre, you’re soaked.” His voice was gravelly with need.
She felt her face redden, but any sense of embarrassment at her obvious arousal vanished the second he plunged two fingers inside her.
Inside me, inside me, he’s inside me, fuck, fuck, fuck. Her thoughts dissolved into incoherent moans as his thumb snaked its way under the fabric to rub her clit.
“You’re so beautiful,” he rasped against her ear. “Human, High Fae, it never mattered. Just so fucking beautiful, Feyre.”
Her heart clenched and she pulled his lips to hers as his hand worked her from the inside. She felt her release building and wanted to look straight in his eyes as it happened.
“Lucien, I’m—”
“I know, I can feel it. Come for me, Feyre. Please, I need it, I need you, come for me, come on my fingers.”
Her eyes wanted to roll back as his words pushed her over the edge, but she fought the pull and met his gaze as her muscles clenched and pleasure rushed through every inch of her body. He was looking at her with pure adoration, his mouth open just a little as he watched her body respond to him, and she knew exactly what she wanted next.
Still breathing heavily, she nodded at him meaningfully and he winnowed with her into his bedroom, her legs still around his waist. As he lowered her gently to the floor, Feyre took in the colors around them. Orange, red, gold…it was her painting. It was him. Surprisingly, though maybe it shouldn’t have been given his roots, the bedding was forest green and vines climbed up the four posters, a soft canopy above.
He stood with her a few feet from the bed and Feyre could feel the difference in his body, the tension as he waited for her judgment.
She smiled at him and said softly, “Will you take me to bed, Lucien?”
He swallowed and nodded silently. Something about the male being nervous now that they were in his room made Feyre’s heart stutter. She wanted to reassure him, but she was nervous herself. Not from any sense that he would change his mind or even that they’d be caught; Feyre had simply never longed for anyone without the threat of death hanging above them both. This was pure desire and she had no idea where it would lead.
She pulled him onto the bed, both of them kneeling as her fingers moved down the buttons of his shirt and pulled the garments one by one from his body. It was soft and slow as they undressed each other, kissing all the while. Feyre pressed her kisses to his mouth and to his chest, his arms, his stomach. She desperately wanted to take him in her mouth, to taste the salty bead of arousal she knew she’d find, but something told her this was not the time. This time—and only the old forgotten gods knew if it would be the only time—she wanted him inside her as he held her in his arms and against his chest with their eyes locked.
“Feyre, please,” he whispered against her mouth once they were both naked and breathing heavily. His arm was wrapped around her shoulder and her hand danced along his length, lightly stroking. His eyes bored into hers and she placed her hand on his waist, pulling him towards her.
“Are you sure?” he asked as he rolled above her, and she knew he meant the position. She knew Lucien didn’t want to be another person who made her feel trapped, and emotion settled thickly in her throat.
She nodded. “I’m sure. Please.” She reached between them and lined him up with her entrance, the feel of his cock pressing against her almost too much to bear and her walls clenched around nothing in anticipation. “I want you,” she assured him.
Lucien didn’t break eye contact as he held himself over Feyre and slowly pressed inside her. His cock was thick and heavy and she watched him breathing to control himself as he filled her an inch at a time, dragging back out along her walls to spread the wetness there. Until finally, he was seated fully inside her, their pelvises pressed together, which made her so aware of her aching clit, and she looked into his face, already covered in a light sheen of sweat.
For all of the emotion and care he’d demonstrated, now that he was inside her, filling her, stretching her, possessing her, Feyre felt a fierce surge of need rippling through her, and she wanted .
“Fuck me,” she breathed, her own voice raspy. She leaned up and took his lip between her teeth, pulling it teasingly. “Fuck me, Lucien.” And she clenched around him.
“Gods, Feyre.” His eyes fluttered shut as he tried to maintain control of his own pleasure. He grabbed one hip with his hand and started thrusting in and out of her molten core, securing her leg in place so he could move faster. “You feel so good. So damned good.”
Feyre knew what he meant. The stretch was perfection, the connection between their bodies easy and fiery and warm, and she felt him driving her towards another peak. But she didn’t want to come yet. She wanted to stay on that precipice with him for as long as they could.
Pulling back from another kiss, she pressed against his shoulder and he understood, following her as she rolled them over until she was straddling him.
She leaned forward with her hands on his chest, pressing her breasts together, and gave him an impish grin as she raised herself above him and hovered there, drawing out his pleasure as barely an inch of him remained inside her.
He laughed, a full and free sound, and smiled at her like he was pure sunshine himself. “Feyre…” It was a benediction and a plea, and she worshipped him back, taking all of him inside her.
Lucien’s hands held her hips as she rose and fell with agonizing slowness, squeezing him as she pressed him back in and grinding on him when she’d once again reached his hips with her own. This was pleasure, this was torture, and yet she would not end either one.
His mouth hung open as he panted beneath her and one hand traced up the curve of her ribcage to cup her breast. “Do you know what I thought when I first saw you?” he asked.
Feyre shook her head, never stopping in her movements.
“I hoped you’d fail.”
That startled her and she paused. But he didn’t look at her any differently. “Why?”
“I saw something in you that I knew would be stifled if you stayed in the Spring Court. I didn’t want you to be stuck. Not here. A garden doesn’t need another rose, but a rose needs air and light to survive. And I knew you wouldn’t find that here.”
She leaned forward with him still inside her and took his face between her hands, kissing him deeply.
“Don’t get me wrong,” he said with a crooked grin. “I am glad not to be stuck Under the Mountain, and I meant what I said…earlier.” He was referring to her loving Tamlin and breaking Amarantha’s curse of course, though neither of them felt the need to sully the moment with names that shouldn’t be spoken. “But I still wish there was something I could do to help you, Feyre. I think you’re still under that mountain and I don’t know what to do.”
Her throat bobbed with a swallow and suddenly her mouth felt too dry again as she tried to force the emotion down. “Just kiss me, Lucien.”
He was happy to comply, rolling them onto their side and hitching one of her legs over his waist so that he could thrust into her in this new position.
It was exactly what she wanted, to be wrapped in his arms while he took pleasure with her.
His movements became faster and she brought the hand that had woven its way into his locks down between them, pressing on her swollen clit. The way he had her leg raised made her warm skin feel tight, her entrance pulled taut around his cock so she could feel every pump as his thick base opened her to him. Right where she wanted him.
Their eyes were locked, foreheads pressed together as they shared breath. She knew it was coming, knew it would be over before she was ready.
She would never be ready.
“Lucien—” she breathed.
“Feyre.” An answer, a command, a bargain. Begging. And Feyre gave into his plea willingly, shattering around him in the lush forest of his room, holding him tight under the safety of the leaves and vines around them as he followed her with a strangled cry and poured himself inside her.
Their breathing slowly evened out as they remained right where they were, still staring into each other’s eyes. It could have gone on forever. It might have. Feyre wouldn’t have noticed, the only passage of time the feel of his heartbeat beneath her hands where they were safely tucked up against his chest.
But it couldn’t last forever. And as Lucien pressed his lips to Feyre’s forehead, his arms tightening around her for just a moment, she knew. She knew she had to go.
She kissed him one more time before she stood and slipped her dress back over her body, the fabric feeling all wrong compared to his skin. As she moved to walk towards the door, Lucien reached out and grabbed her hand.
“Wait. Please.”
She watched his throat bob as he swallowed, but he didn’t say more. Feyre crawled back onto the bed above the blanket, tucking herself into his arms, resting on his chest, where it was safe to feel unsure and afraid and small compared to the vast and vague concept of forever.
“I’ll find a way to get you out,” he said against her hair.
Feyre didn’t move, but she closed her eyes and breathed him in. Autumn and spring and sunshine. She would carry it with her into the darkness, wherever it may lead her. “I know.”
Maybe if the Mother was merciful, Lucien would meet her there.