Chapter Text
“I know you’re mad, Nesta,” Feyre murmured, voice quiet and thick.
Nesta’s face felt sticky from dried-down tears. Her fingers went numb some time ago – it could have been minutes or hours or eternities; she didn’t know. Her jaw was clenched so hard she had the fleeting worry that her teeth might crumble under the pressure. But she didn’t feel mad . She felt numb.
“But we-,” Feyre’s breath hitched. “I. I decided that these are the only two options suitable for your situation.”
Nesta stood silent. There wasn’t anything to say. The initial cool flare of indignance at her sister’s meddling simmered to stillness, kept prisoner behind steel walls. A previous Nesta, one from before the world was ripped out from under her, might have had something snarky and biting to whip out, but this Nesta’s mind was as buzzing and thick as a still summer night.
“What, um,” Feyre croaked, clearing her throat before continuing. “What do you choose?”
Nesta stared through her sister, willing herself to say something, anything. But, still, there was nothing to say.
The silence trailed on, filled only by the shifting of their bodies and quiet, short breaths. Nesta inhaled sharply, savoring the tension in her shoulders, before shaking her head.
“It doesn’t matter,” she hissed. And, truly, it didn’t. It didn’t matter where Feyre sent her or with whom, it didn’t matter what specialists she hired or programs she enrolled Nesta in, it didn’t matter because nothing could change the monster Nesta had become.
Feyre flinched back. The cold fire in Nesta burned brighter, harsher.
Feyre was still looking for words, for a response to her sister’s vitriol when the door fluttered open behind Nesta. Both women fixed their attention on the doorway, twin eyes seeking the intruder of this moment between sisters – enemies – to see Rhysand. Composed and dominating as always, he floated in, and behind him, his two brothers: one who melted into the background and one who couldn’t hide if he wanted to.
Nesta felt her cold fire sputter out. These men… she was an aberration to her sister’s husband, and the ghost of a memory to his brothers. She wouldn’t deign to convince them otherwise.
Rhysand must have sensed some of the tension, whether in Feyre’s face or somewhere in the ragged silence of the room, for he turned his pinpoint gaze on Nesta and glared.
“Have you chosen yet, Nesta?” he asked, voice smooth and unyielding. There was no compassion in his voice. Nesta ignored him, attention instead sliding to the two brothers who had arrived with him. She had enough sense to recognize that they represented her two possible fates: solitude and a fool’s attempt at healing with Cassian, who was as wild as the mountains he treasured, or retreat into hiding, a dedicated facility for people like her , with quiet, discreet Azriel as her transport.
Cassian and Azriel both returned her gaze, and Nesta felt a flicker of surprise at the emotion etched onto their faces. Azriel, whose beautiful face could be carved of stone for all it gave away, was looking at Nesta with what could only be described as understanding – kinship, like he had some secret knowledge of the war that was tearing Nesta apart from within. It ripped open some other part of her, vulnerable, and she took a physical step back.
But Cassian – Cassian met her eyes with a single nod, a moment of solidarity, before fixing that hard gaze on the back of Rhysand’s head. Nesta realized he looked angry, and the ashes of her fire glowed brighter, if only for a moment. Anger, Nesta knew well. Furious, untamable rage had kept her alive for months, and if Cassian was willing to wield it, that was the poison she’d pick.
Too many moments had passed in silence. Feyre opened her mouth to cajole Nesta once more, a façade of comfort, but Nesta cut her off before the platitudes could fall.
“Cassian,” Nesta inhaled, deep breaths to stoke her fire. “I’d rather freeze atop whatever mountain he’s currently perched on than sit in some bullshit residential facility pretending to heal, ” she spat out. Feyre’s face crumpled at the declaration, but she nodded in acceptance anyway.
Rhysand turned to his brothers, raising one eyebrow at Cassian. Cassian barely shook his head at Rhysand, a gentle dismissal, before he stepped around his brother to approach Nesta. A wide smile split his face. Nesta didn’t believe it for a second.
“I, for one, am looking forward to seeing you amongst the wilds,” he grinned. “I always knew that like calls to like, Nes.” Azriel rolled his eyes from behind Cassian, flickering a smirk at Nesta when he saw her watching.
“Don’t get your hopes up,” she whispered, pouring whatever menace she had left into the comment. Cassian held his smile, but something in his expression deflated, just a bit, and Nesta wanted to hide.
“Well, we’ll leave straight from here,” he said, hands flaring out to rest on his hips. Nesta turned towards Feyre sharply.
“What about my stuff? Is it not being banished with me?” Nesta bit. Feyre held herself steady, looking to her husband instead of the monstrosity her sister had become.
“Elain is packing it up now,” she murmured. Nesta thought of Elain – her loveliest sister, more agreeable and charming than Nesta or Feyre could ever dream to be. “Azriel will head up the mountain tomorrow to bring you what you need.”
“Elain is- is in town?” Nesta croaked, thinking of the last time she saw Elain. She had moved out to the rural flatlands, and last Nesta heard, she was spending her days tending to prettily organized garden beds of wildflowers alongside other traditional homemaking. Elain never wanted the vastness of modern life, and instead clothed herself in linen and lace and homespun dreams. No husband or family to tell of – though, last Nesta had heard, a man a few farms over had been jockeying for Elain’s attention. His most recent gift had been hand-sewn gardening gloves. That was months ago.
Feyre just nodded, lips pursed like she was afraid if she so much as opened her mouth, secrets would come spilling out. Nesta blinked. Since when did her sisters keep themselves from her? It had always been Elain and Nesta that were closest, with Feyre too untamed for the elder two’s preference. Now, though, Elain hadn’t even written to Nesta to tell her of her visit.
There was a curiosity deep inside her, but Nesta was too tired to yield to it. So instead, she nodded haltingly back at Feyre. She could feel herself retreating, closing off from the too many people in the room. Too many, and too invested.
She returned her gaze to Cassian. He’d lost his smile, but was looking expectantly at her. Waiting for her consent, she realized. Waiting for her to say she was ready.
He would be waiting a long, long time.
—---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Cassian’s truck had seen better days. It drove fine, but it took several minutes - it felt like hours - to start blowing warm air out of the vents. Nesta shivered and leaned into her seat, eyes closed. The leather was cool and hard, but it smelled good, like warm winter spices and smoke-
Like Cassian.
With a grimace, she pulled herself forward again, eyes focusing on the road ahead.
They hadn’t said a word to each other in the fifteen minutes they’d been driving, and Nesta knew it was driving Cassian crazy. Long ago, she’d mastered the ability to sit in silence, no matter how uncomfortable it made the people around her. It was her go-to power move, a surefire way to unnerve somebody, ruffle them up so it was easier to corner them: check, checkmate.
Her mother had been gifted at it, too - one of many things Helene Archeron instilled in her eldest daughter before abruptly passing when Nesta was twelve.
It was working perfectly on Cassian. Nesta guessed he’d break within the next five minutes, and he’d be so desperate to hear her voice that it wouldn’t matter what she said, as long as she spoke at all.
It would be too easy to hurt him, let poison fall from her lips instead of civility.
Maybe tomorrow. The weight of the morning’s conversation - her sister’s intervention - still sat heavy on her, and she felt like she was watching the world through blurred glasses.
The buzzing of her cellphone ended up being the first crack in the quiet.
She looked down at the device in her lap, frowning when she saw it was a text from Azriel.
Hey. Know you probably don’t want to talk, but you can always call. I’m not gonna pity you and make cagey explanations for what Rhys and Feyre are doing. I don’t like it. I’m sorry. I’ll still bring your stuff tomorrow. Don’t kill Cassian.
It made sense, in a way. She and Azriel had been on good terms since they were introduced. Civil terms, anyway. No barbed insults flung back and forth. Azriel had always only ever shown her respect, and she had offered nonjudgement in return.
She clicked the screen off. It was kind, she thought, but not a problem for today. He would know she saw it, anyway, and that felt like enough.
“You’re probably gonna lose service in and out as we go up the mountain,” Cassian said, voice soft. His eyes were glued to the road. “So if you need to text or make a call or anything- I, uh, recommend sooner rather than later.”
He’d made it seventeen minutes in silence.
“And have you listen in so you can report back to Rhysand on my diabolical plans? No thanks,” she snarked.
Cassian made an exasperated noise. “It was a genuine comment, Nes, and I’m not reporting shit back to Rhys. Today or ever.”
Nesta hummed noncommittally. “Well someone’s been keeping Rhysand informed of my business,” she said, sickly sweet and slow. “And I didn’t see anyone else in your little circle besides you in the past two weeks.”
Cassian had found her, drunk and shoeless, outside the Townhouse a few days ago. No one was supposed to be staying there - Nesta walked there from a nearby dive, intending to put her spare key to use and crash somewhere nicer than her shitty studio.
But Cassian was there, frantic and angry as always, and their fight woke some neighbors. Those neighbors called the cops, and it took all of Cassian’s mirth and charm to keep the officers from making any arrests.
When Feyre called her this morning, Nesta assumed Feyre wanted the key to the Townhouse back. She wouldn’t put it past Rhysand to find a way to press charges against her for trespassing or something, so she showed up.
Feyre didn’t want to key back. She “wanted her sister back.” And this intervention reeked of Rhysand, who had a habit of avoiding and pushing away things that made him uncomfortable.
Azriel wasn’t the only perceptive one, she thought bitterly.
A long, slow exhale from Cassian broke her out of her thoughts. “I didn’t tell Rhys about that night. The neighbors did. We argued about it,” he admitted.
“I didn’t want him to make a big deal out of it. It’s our business, and we can handle that together-” he broke off, awkwardly. “We can handle it sometime, I guess.”
“I’m sorry, are you trying to tell me you disagreed with Rhysand about something? I thought you were like, duty bound to keep his head inflated.”
Cassian did another one of his long exhales. Nesta wondered if it was a recently-learned coping skill. She was shocked they weren’t screaming at each other yet.
Silence stretched on for a whole minute. Nesta counted. Cassian breathed.
“Rhys is my brother and I support him because I care about him,” Cassian remarked. “But he’s been shitty to you and I don’t think you deserve it. I don’t like this plan at all. But I do think you need help.”
Nesta blinked. It was a hell of an admission - but the crushing weight of her own burdensomeness came back. He didn’t want to be here, didn’t want her with him. He thought she needed help - that she was broken.
He was right, she was broken, but she was unfixable, cracked beyond repair. Something sinister had taken up root inside her, something that whispered loathing into her ear and told her to show it to the world.
Tendrils of that hatred rose up inside her. No anger, no tears - it was familiar, a bitter comfort.
“Then why are we still driving towards the mountain, Cassian? I don’t want to be here, you don’t want me to be here.”
“No,” he corrected, lightning fast. “That’s not true. About me, I mean. I do want you to be here. I don’t like the way this is happening, but honestly if we go back, I think Rhys might do something stupid and at least if we go up Mt. Ramiel, he can have some time to cool off.”
“What kind of something stupid?” Nesta ventured, confusion and fear taking root despite her fatigue.
“I don’t know, but he’s - he’s been on edge the last few weeks. Impatient, a little bit mean, honestly,” Cassian winced. “I figure we go up the mountain for a couple weeks, let him figure his shit out, and then we come home.”
Nesta felt like her world was on its side. Cassian seemed - afraid, almost, of Rhysand. For Rhysand? There was a fierce protectiveness stirring in her, indignation at the way his brother was making him feel like he needed to walk on eggshells.
It felt like too much, too soon, to voice that out loud. She settled for making a truce.
“Two weeks,” she stated. “I’ll stay with you for two weeks. But then I’m leaving. You can drive me, or I’ll call Azriel, or I’ll walk. But I’m not staying in the woods any longer than that. I’ll go fucking crazy.”
Cassian probably thought she was already crazy. But she wasn’t. Her behavior - it was rational, all planned. The starvation numbed her emotions, the drinking brought them back. Both helped her forget. The loathing kept her alive.
Helene hadn’t taught her that directly, but Nesta watched it happen. Had watched how her mother bit back at the world, with manicured hands and pretty words and perfection, always perfection.
But the perfect facade crumbled. A terminal diagnosis changed her - stole her will, her beauty, and her fight. In the end, the disease didn’t kill her. Feyre, eight years old, had found their mother in bed, delirious and sick with a bottle of empty pills beside her.
Nesta had long ago stopped wishing she could have been there, too. Been there instead.
“Nes?”
Nesta blinked back to reality when Cassian called her name, gentle and questioning. The fire inside her stirred at that - she hated it, the gentleness. She was afraid of it, if she felt like being honest with herself, and what she might do if he kept being gentle.
She and Cassian were supposed to fight. Anger was safe, but this - care, compassion. Allyship. It was foreign.
“What?” Nesta bit out, tone sharp. Angry. She saw Cassian’s shoulders rise, like hackles on a beast, but he did his slow breathing once more, and she saw the tenseness ebb out with the exhale.
“Stop fucking breathing like that,” she hissed harshly, just as he opened his mouth to retort.
Cassian breathed again.