Chapter Text
They may not be speaking to each other, but some rituals stay the same. The two of them on a bench together, tucked in the corner of a busy arena, lacing their skates up in unison. She’s said a total of five sentences to him since yesterday’s practice: a far cry from the kids they used to be, told to do their pattern again (and then once more) by his aunt for not paying attention.
They’re in the last group for the free dance, in the lead after the original dance. She’s practically vibrating out of her skin at the boards, waiting for their turn to warm up. Her body is so sore, but she can’t stop now. The entire country, the entire world, is watching them right now, to see if they can do what no one has done before.
Youngest gold medalists. First to win on home ice. First to win in a debut Olympics.
She wants it so badly, but it terrifies her.
He grabs her wrist and taps his fingers twice on the heel of her palm like he’s done a thousand times. She doesn’t let her shock show on her face, but he catches it anyway. She thinks—knows—he can read her body better than she can, some days. It’s his job to be able to read her. It shouldn’t surprise her.
It’s the first time Rhys has touched her outside of practice in weeks.
“Focus,” he says, without looking at her. “We’re almost there.”
Feyre bites her lip. His hand tightens around her wrist, silently chiding her for the habit. How many times had she bitten her lips bloody before their junior competitions? How many times had his cousin dabbed one last coat of lipstick on her before sending them out to the ice?
“Breathe. We can do this.”
She nods. Her mouth is too dry to form an answer right now.
The warmup goes by in a blur. One, two, three laps around the ice. The entrance to their first combination lift, trying to get a sense of the space of the rink. Rhys had nearly hit the boards in the original dance, his blade just a hair’s breadth from the side.
The cameras are watching them. Thousands of eyes in the stands, millions more on the television, and she still doesn’t know where they stand. Time passes like paint drying yet in the blink of an eye, and it’s their turn.
They step out onto the ice together, strokes in sync. He takes her hand, and everything else bleeds into a hazy blur.
“This is our time,” she says with a firm determination. “We deserve this.” Blood, sweat, and tears went into this.
“We’re here,” he replies. We made it. I knew you would.
“Showtime.” Put on a show for them. Make them believe it.
The announcer calls their names, hers and his, together as they’ve been for the past thirteen years.
Our next skaters are skating to Mahler Symphony Number 5… Feyre Archeron and Rhys Aster—
The crowd goes wild. She leans into him one last time for luck, their foreheads touching.
Don’t think about anyone else, she hears him say in her mind. No one else matters. Not a damn one of them. It’s just us.
Only us.
She tries to tune it out, but it’s hard to ignore the burning feeling of his eyes on her, somewhere in the crowd. She doesn’t know where he’s sitting, but she knows he’s here.
Feyre takes her position, slightly off the center ice. She knows exactly where Rhys is: just behind her, a few feet back. She always knows where he is, like an extension of herself that exists outside of her body.
Look up. Take your pose. Put on your mask, she chants to herself. One deep breath, and the music starts. The clock ticks down: four minutes to change her life.
Her body moves on instinct. They’ve done this a hundred times, and a hundred more. The crisp, cold air of the arena bites at her lungs, the sound of their blades cutting deep edges into the ice rings in her ears. Feyre spins in his arms, reaches out for him, lets him flip her upside down and right her again. They move in perfect synchronization, two parts of one pattern that align seamlessly together.
None of it matters. It’s only Rhys. It will only ever be him. No one else can do this. No one else can be us. No one else can be him.
Dance for him. Nobody else matters but him. Fuck the judges. Fuck the audience. If you win, you do it with him.
One last lunge. She feels his arm brush down her back, righting her skirt where it rode up her body. Rhys always pays attention to the details like that, even when it slips her mind. The last spin. She slides away from him, turns, and ends in his arms.
The cheers are deafening. He presses his cheek to hers, soaking in the moment.
“Thank you so much,” he says breathlessly. It might be the one true thing he’s said to her in the past few days.
She stands first, holding his hands to steady him. He looks up at her from his knees with wonder in his eyes. His smile could break his face. Her cheeks will be sore in the morning.
She hugs him. They only hug on the ice anymore, it seems. She can feel how his body shakes from the exertion. They’re Olympians; no one can take that from them.
She has to let him go though. The moment has to end, because there are still other teams left to skate. But right now, in this moment, with Rhys holding her hands as a crowd of thousands shout their names, she lets it all fade from her mind.
They somehow make it to the Kiss and Cry. Ambrose sits on the end, allowing them to be next to each other. They’ll need to do at least as well as their season’s best to take the lead and be guaranteed a medal.
Feyre doesn’t breathe when the announcer calls for the scores. She looks up at the Jumbotron, Rhys still as a statue and shaking with energy beside her.
She doesn’t hear the decimals. She only hears the first three digits in the announcer’s clear voice (one hundred and ten point—), and the world collapses down to Rhys. His grin could power the country. He pulls her into his arms and crushes her to his body, lifting her as he holds her close.
“We won the Olympics,” she cries breathlessly. And then Rhys crushes her to him again and presses a long kiss to her temple, and it almost feels like forgiveness.
But Ambrose is standing right next to them, clapping for the team he trained from scrawny juniors to Olympic medalists, and she can’t forget the chasm of reality that still separates her from Rhys.
They stand together, Ambrose between them, and bathe in the celebrations of the crowd.
It isn’t until they’re back in the ready rooms, waiting for the small medal ceremony, that Feyre creeps toward him.
There are no cameras to see them, no proof of the turmoil that threatens to break them apart. Rhys has been very careful, but then he’s always been better at that: putting on a good face for the world to see, quietly raging and broken and moody in private.
She just wears a blank mask. Let them read what they want to see.
So she waits until they’re alone, the echoes of teams dancing and crowds cheering and coaches humming floating down the concrete halls until she closes the door of their dressing room.
Rhys has his back to her, tugging his shirt out from where it’s tucked in his pants. She knows he wants to neaten it before the medal ceremony, part of his routine. How many times has she watched him do it now?
But he doesn’t say anything to her.
She leans against a vanity. Her stage makeup is a pile of detritus in front of the mirror.
It’s hard to get the words out of her mouth.
I know you’re still upset—
We haven’t really talked since we got here—
We won, can you forgive me now—
But none of them come out.
So instead, “Can I hold your hand on the podium?”
It’s quiet and meek, in a way she hasn’t been since she was little. Even saying it out loud makes her feel small.
Rhys finishes tucking his shirt back in. He wobbles in his skate guards and leans against the opposite wall.
“Feyre,” he starts, and this must be what it feels like to have your heart break. She thought she knew what it was, but this is a thousand times worse.
She bites the inside of her cheek. She can almost taste the iron. Is it blood, or is it the way she’s still coming down from the adrenaline high of skating their season’s best to win the Olympics?
And just like before, Rhys is next to her in a moment, holding her wrist to chide her for the habit.
He squeezes, not too tight to be constricting, but tight enough that he’s moored her to him. She doesn’t want to look at him, but his fingers under her chin make the choice for her.
Maybe it is heartbreak, but Feyre knows Rhys as well as he knows her, and the aching pain is written across his face as plainly as it must be on hers.
“Of course I’ll hold your hand,” he says softly. Just for the two of them to hear.
Nothing else matters, she thinks to herself. No one else can be us.