The Echo Beneath The Skin
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You woke with the sense that the night hadn’t quite let go of you.
For a moment you weren’t sure why. The ceiling above you was the same pale stone, faintly lit by the last glow of the faelights. The air carried the familiar chill of early morning, edged with the clean scent of the river drifting up from far below. Your blanket lay in a soft heap around your waist, warm where your body had been, cool where you’d kicked it away.
Then you flexed your fingers. The warmth was still there. Not the fever-bright thrum from the sitting room, not the too-hot rush from the night before. This was quieter. A smoulder rather than a flare, sitting low beneath your skin like embers covered in ash. Awake. Waiting.
You exhaled slowly, watching the faint cloud of your breath dissolve in the dimness.
The House stirred around you as if in answer. The faelights brightened a shade, casting a gentle amber over your room. The floor warmed beneath where your feet would fall before you even moved them, like it was bracing to catch you.
“Good morning,” you murmured, and your voice rasped in a way that made it sound like an apology.
You swung your legs over the side of the bed, sinking into the warmed stone, and sat there a moment longer than you needed to. Your head ached faintly behind your eyes, the dull sort of ache that came from sleep heavy with dreams you couldn’t quite remember. Your magic felt…attentive. Not agitated. Not calm. Simply listening.
You made yourself stand anyway.
The House had left out a soft sweater for you at the foot of the bed—dark blue, sleeves a little too long, the kind Mor favored. Leggings lay folded neatly beside it. Someone, or something, had finally taken the hint that you couldn’t live in healer’s robes every day for the rest of eternity.
You smiled despite the heaviness in your chest and tugged the clothes on, letting the knit fall loose over your hips. You braided your hair over one shoulder by the small alcove bench, fingers brushing the leather spine of your journal without opening it.
You weren’t sure you wanted to see what you’d written to them last night, in the bleeding edge of exhaustion and stupid, aching honesty.
The corridor outside your room was quiet. The House brightened the faelights in a soft trail as you walked, coaxing you toward the dining level with the smell of tea and something sweet. Your steps echoed faintly down the stairwell, accompanied by the muffled hum of voices.
You paused just outside the archway and took a breath, smoothing your hands down the sweater as if that would press whatever was too visible back under your skin.
Then you stepped in. The world met you with warmth and noise.
Cassian was already at the table, somehow managing to occupy twice as much space as his actual body required. He was arguing with Nesta over the correct way to slice bread, which seemed to involve more jesting violence than the task justified. Nesta sat with her spine straight and her hair braided back, completely unmoved by his theatrics, though the faintest hint of amusement touched her mouth when he wasn’t looking.
Mor was perched on the edge of a chair, one leg tucked under her, gesturing dramatically with half a pastry as she told Feyre some story about Rita’s and an unfortunate set of stairs. Feyre listened with her chin propped in her hand, eyes bright, a slow smile spreading as Mor hit the climax.
Rhys lounged beside her, entirely too pleased with himself for someone who looked like he’d only just stopped drafting decrees. Elain slipped in from the terrace with a small vase in her hands, filled with something delicate and pale blooming despite the chill.
And at the far end of the table, half in the shadow of the tall window, sat Azriel.
His plate was mostly untouched. A mug of something dark steamed gently near his hand. He sat very straight, as if rigor alone could keep him awake, shadows lazily curling and uncurling along the back of his chair.
He looked up when you entered.
It was quick. A flicker. The kind of glance most people wouldn’t notice. But his eyes caught yours for a heartbeat, just long enough for you to see the subtle shift in his expression, the slightest easing around his mouth.
Then he looked away, as if nothing had happened.
“Morning,” Mor called, catching sight of you. “There she is. Our resident miracle worker.” Her gaze swept over you, from the loose braid to the sweater to the lack of healer’s robe. She grinned. “The House has excellent taste.”
You tugged at the hem, cheeks warming. “Good morning.”
You took your usual place halfway down the table, where you could see the balcony and the glittering line of the Sidra beyond. A mug of tea appeared by your elbow a moment later, steam curling in the cool air. You murmured your thanks to the House, earning a pleased flick of faelight in response.
Mor leaned over to kiss your cheek in greeting as she snagged another pastry. Her hand brushed yours for the briefest moment. Her eyes dipped to your fingers.
“Sleep okay?” she asked, light as ever, but the question slipped between words like a blade between ribs.
“Fine,” you said automatically.
Mor looked at you a fraction too long for that to be entirely believed. Then she smiled, bright as sunshine, and let the conversation sweep her up again.
You wrapped your hands around the mug and tried not to notice how your palms made the ceramic feel warmer than it should.
Breakfast spun itself out in familiar lines—Cassian stealing food off Nesta’s plate and getting stabbed with a fork for his trouble, Rhys making some smug comment about court politics that earned him twin eyerolls from both Mor and Feyre, Elain quietly arranging her flowers in the middle of the table. The warmth of it sank into your bones, slow and hesitant, like your body didn’t quite trust that you were allowed to relax here.
Solstice came up the way weather did: inevitable and lightly argued.
“Just one,” Feyre was saying, tapping her finger on the table. “We agreed. One tree. Not three. The House doesn’t need one in every room.”
“The House disagrees,” Mor countered. “The House respects the sanctity of festive excess.”
A plate beside you shifted slightly, as if nudged by invisible hands. You tried not to laugh.
Cassian shrugged innocently. “I’m just saying, the more trees, the more surfaces for hanging things. Swords, decorations, Illyrian commanders—”
“You’re not hanging from the ceiling again,” Nesta cut in, voice flat. “Last year you broke two beams and a candelabra.”
Cassian put a hand to his chest. “That candelabra attacked me.”
Rhys’s lips curved. “The candelabra was stationary.”
“Emotionally, it was aggressive,” Cassian insisted.
Elain’s soft laugh slipped out, warm and bell-like. “It did fall very dramatically.”
Solstice, you thought. You remembered frost on the windows of the apothecary back home. The way your mother would wrap a shawl around all three of you and squeeze onto the worn little bench outside to watch the first snow fall. No gifts, not really. Just a loaf of slightly sweeter bread if there’d been enough coin that week. Your father taking your cold hands in his and breathing on them until you could feel all ten fingers again.
You remembered their faces in the glow of your old world’s small hearth and something inside your chest gave a quiet, painful twist.
“Will you help me with the river lanterns?” Feyre’s voice cut gently through the noise, turned toward you. “We’re doing more this year. For… everyone Velaris has lost.”
You smiled before the ache could show. Soft. Practiced. The kind you were very good at offering when you didn’t trust your voice.
“That sounds beautiful,” you said, and it almost didn’t crack.
Feyre smiled back, accepting it for what it was. Rhys’s gaze flicked between the two of you, but he didn’t push.
“First Solstice with us,” Mor said, bumping your shoulder lightly. “We’re going to make it ridiculous.”
You made a sound that was close enough to a laugh if you didn’t count the hollow echo of it.
Your fingers tightened around your mug until your knuckles pressed white against the ceramic.
Azriel’s eyes were on you.
You felt it, even without looking. A prickle along the side of your face, the awareness of being watched and weighed and seen. The silence around him sharpened. His shadows stilled.
“I should check supplies in the healing wing,” you said lightly as you rose, smoothing your sweater. “If Solstice is coming, people will find new ways to injure themselves.”
Cassian grinned. “That’s a threat.”
“It’s a prediction,” you replied, managing something wry. “You leave stairs and wine in the same house, and patterns emerge.”
They laughed. The sound followed you to the doorway, warm and easy and genuine.
You slipped out before anyone could notice that your smile dropped the moment you turned away.
If anyone watched you go—if Azriel’s gaze tracked you until you vanished around the curve of the hall—you didn’t see it.
The healing wing felt oddly empty that morning.
The beds were made, sheets tucked with Madja’s uncanny precision. The tall windows let in pale light that made everything look sharper, brighter edges on the cabinets, colder gleam on the metal instruments. The familiar smell of herbs and tonic greeted you as you hung your satchel on its hook and rolled up your sleeves.
The warmth in your hands hadn’t faded.
You washed them thoroughly anyway, scrubbing until the skin reddened. The water ran clear. No light leaked out, no gold, no shimmer. Just the ordinary drip of liquid into the basin.
“Late,” Madja said mildly from her desk.
You glanced at the clock on the wall. “It’s barely past eight.”
Her spectacles slid down her nose as she peered at you over the rims. “Late,” she repeated, then flicked a hand toward a chart. “Sprained wrist. Tripped over his own ego on the training ring.”
The patient—young, wide-eyed, and built of pure Illyrian panic—sat rigid on the nearest cot, cradling his arm. You smiled, gentle, and reached out.
Your magic surged to meet you.
Not explosively. Just first. Before you’d consciously decided how much to use. It flowed up, eager as a hound lurching on its leash. You wrestled it down to something more appropriate for tendon and muscle, guiding the warmth into strained ligaments and stressed bone. The boy hissed softly as the heat sank in, then blinked in surprise at the easy relief.
He twisted his wrist cautiously. “Yes. Thank you.”
You nodded, stepping back. The buzz in your hands lingered, stronger than it should have been for such a simple thing.
Madja watched you over the top of her file. She didn’t say a word.
Patients trickled in and out as the morning wore on. Minor training injuries. A cook who’d cut his thumb in a rush. A painter with cramped fingers. You patched and soothed and worked, moving from bed to bed with the familiarity of routine.
Your magic came quickly every time. Too quickly. You kept your hands steady. Kept your breathing even. Kept your face calm enough that no one had reason to ask questions.
At one point, as you turned to retrieve a jar from a high shelf, the glass rattled violently in place and slid an inch toward the edge. You snatched it before it tipped over, heart lurching. The air still shimmered faintly where your hand had been. Like heat on stone. Like wards humming.
You set the jar down carefully. Behind you, in the doorway, Mor leaned one shoulder against the frame, watching you. Her gaze flicked to the jar, then to your hand, then back to your face.
“You’re in demand today,” she said lightly. “I had to bribe the House with the promise of future cake to get it to tell me where you were.”
The words were easy. The eyes weren’t.
“I’m just working,” you replied, smoothing your palms down your robe. “It’s what I do.”
“Mm,” Mor said. She pushed away from the door, striding into the room with her usual effortless grace. “Well, I need you to do something else, for at least an hour.”
“Ah,” she cut in. “Before you say ‘I’m needed here,’ Madja already said you’re no good to her if you fall asleep standing up. Her words, not mine.”
As if on cue, Madja grunted from her desk. “Go. Before you start trying to heal paper cuts out of boredom.”
You opened your mouth, then shut it again. You were tired—sore around the edges in a way that rest hadn’t quite fixed. The idea of leaving the wing made your chest flutter uneasily, like you were abandoning something important. Like if you weren’t here, someone might need you and you’d miss it.
Mor must have read that thought on your face. Her hand found your forearm, fingers warm and steady.
“You know they survived a few centuries without you,” she said gently. “You’re allowed to walk in the sun.”
You let out a breath that wasn’t quite a sigh. “Just an hour.”
“That’s all I ask,” she said, and tugged you toward the door.
The city was softer than yesterday.
Clouds had drawn thin veils over the sharp blue sky, turning the light diffuse, like it was filtered through milk. Velaris still thrummed, but gently, a hum rather than a buzz, with shopkeepers rolling out awnings and children darting between stalls, their laughter echoing down the cobbled streets.
You’d pulled your sweater back on before leaving, wrapping your cloak over it. Mor had fussed with the collar until it sat just right, then declared you presentable enough to be seen with her.
“Not that you weren’t before,” she’d said as you both stepped through the winnow onto a quiet street by the Sidra. “But if I don’t at least make you put on something that doesn’t smell like ointment, the city will start spreading rumors that I’ve lost my edge.”
“Perish the thought,” you murmured.
Mor looped her arm through yours as you walked, steering you toward the market square. Your boots scuffed softly against the stone. The river gleamed to your left, its surface catching the light in small, patient flashes.
“Solstice decorations are starting,” Mor observed, nodding toward a cluster of fae hanging lengths of evergreen over a doorway. “Soon this whole place will look like a tree exploded.”
You smiled faintly. “That sounds…festive.”
Mor glanced sidelong at you. “That sounded like someone describing a funeral as ‘a nice gathering.’”
You tried to muster something warmer, but the knot in your chest only tightened. The smell of pine, the hints of spice and sugar from nearby stalls. It all reached back into your memory and wrapped cold fingers around the throat of it.
Your voice came out softer than you meant. “I’m just…not used to it, is all.”
Mor didn’t press. She changed the subject with the ease of long practice. She dragged you through a jewelry stall, insisting you try on earrings she had absolutely no intention of letting you pay for. She bought pastries the size of your hand and buttered them for you while you protested that you’d already eaten. She told you an outrageous story about Eris that made your skin crawl and laugh at the same time.
But she never stopped watching you. Not obviously. Not in a way that smothered. Just, checking. Measuring the set of your shoulders, the way your smile dipped when Solstice came up in passing, the too-careful way you spoke when people mentioned family gatherings and traditions.
At one point, she slowed your pace near the river, where the path opened wide and the water ran close enough to touch if you leaned over the low wall.
“You know,” she said, biting into her pastry and squinting thoughtfully at the far bank, “you’re allowed to not be excited.”
You looked at her, startled. “About…?”
“Solstice,” Mor said. “The noise. The expectations. The whole ‘everyone be happy at the same time’ madness.” Her mouth quirked. “It’s overrated.”
“I’m not unhappy,” you said quickly. Reflexively.
Mor’s gaze softened. “I didn’t say you were.”
The river slid silently by, catching the washed-out sky on its surface.
You exhaled, breath frosting faintly in the air. “I just don’t…have the same memories as everyone else, I suppose.”
“Mm,” Mor hummed, not filling the quiet. Not demanding more.
You offered it anyway, because it felt rude not to, because the words pressed so hard against your teeth sometimes that keeping them in felt worse than letting a few slip past.
“We didn’t have much,” you said. “Back home. For Solstice.” The word tasted strange. Mortal, somehow, even though it was the same one they used here. “Sometimes we had enough for sweet bread. Sometimes we didn’t. We’d sit outside and watch the snow until our fingers went numb. My parents would pretend they weren’t cold.” You huffed a small breath. “We didn’t need decorations. Just…being together was enough.”
Mor was still beside you. Thoughtful.
You shook your head, forcing a smile. “It’s silly. I’m lucky to be here. To have this. I just—I don’t want to ruin it for anyone else by…not being excited enough.”
Mor’s arm tightened around yours. “You couldn’t ruin it if you tried.”
You glanced at her. “You don’t know that.”
“Oh, I do,” she said. “Trust me. If anyone here can ruin Solstice, it’s Rhys. Or Cassian. Or Az if he glares too hard at the decorations.” She tipped her head against yours briefly. “You being quiet isn’t ruinous. It’s just honest. They can survive a little honesty.”
You swallowed. The ache in your chest didn’t vanish, but it shifted—less like a blade, more like the sore spot left behind after one was removed.
She didn’t ask you for more. You didn’t offer more. The moment settled between you like a small, fragile thing.
“Come on,” Mor said after a while, voice bright again. “If I get you back to the House without buying at least one ridiculous thing, Cassian will say I’m losing my touch.”
She tugged you toward a stall glittering with tiny glass baubles, each one catching the dim light and breaking it into small, stubborn stars.
You didn’t realize you’d paused in front of a set shaped like little suns until Mor followed your gaze.
She didn’t comment. She just bought one and tucked it into your cloak pocket without saying anything at all.
By the time you returned to the House, the day had tipped fully toward afternoon. The sky outside the high windows had gone pale, the light stretched thin across the mountains. The House greeted you with a rush of warm air and the comforting crackle of a fire somewhere down the hall.
You parted ways with Mor at the landing, promising you’d try not to fall asleep sitting upright in a chair again.
She kissed your temple and said, “If you do, I’ll just bring you a blanket.”
The words stayed with you as you walked the long corridor toward your room. You didn’t make it that far. They found you first.
You heard them in the small sitting room halfway down—voices low, chairs scraping, the rustle of paper. It was meant to be a quiet space, all low couches and shelves of forgotten books, a place for lingering rather than talking.
You stepped in to find Feyre and Elain at the table beneath the main window, Nyx bundled in a bassinet nearby, sorting through small, hand-carved wooden lantern frames. Rhys leaned against the mantel, hands in his pockets, watching his mate with a look that made you feel like an intruder even when he wasn’t saying a word.
Feyre looked up when you entered. Her smile warmed. “Perfect timing,” she said. “We were just talking about lantern designs.”
“For the river,” Elain added, fingers gentle as she arranged the little frames. “We thought…more names this year. More lights.”
“Only if you want to,” Feyre added quickly. “You don’t have to help. I just thought—” She hesitated, searching your face. “I thought you might like to be involved.”
You walked closer, drawn despite yourself. The little frames were delicate things—simple, elegant, awaiting parchment and paint and the names of the dead.
You picked one up, running your thumb along the smooth edge. For a moment, your mind filled the empty panels with script you hadn’t written. Names you hadn’t spoken aloud in far too long.
You set it down carefully.
“I’d like that,” you said, and the words were honest, even if they scraped on the way out.
Elain’s smile was soft and sympathetic in a way that made you feel flayed. She didn’t know. She couldn’t. And still, somehow, she looked at you like she understood what it was to lose the shape of your life all at once.
Rhys’s attention brushed yours, like a hand hovering just above your shoulder. You felt the question there, held back—Are you alright?—and the deliberate choice not to speak it aloud.
You gave them the same soft smile you’d been practicing all morning.
“I might need help,” you said. “I’ve never made a lantern before.”
Feyre’s eyes brightened. “You’re talking to the right person,” she said, nudging Elain.
Elain flushed faintly, ducking her head. “I…may have started without asking permission.”
On the table near her elbow, a few completed lanterns sat—simple and beautiful, each painted with small, careful details. Stars. Leaves. Little clusters of lavender.
You touched one with the tip of your finger and felt the world tip strangely in your chest. For a second, you were eight again, watching your mother’s hands thread dried flowers into twine to hang across the apothecary window, pretending it was decoration and not desperate hope that people would see it and come in.
Your nails bit into your palm.
“Well,” you managed. “I’m in good hands, then.”
Feyre squeezed your forearm lightly as she brushed past, heading toward the door. “Dinner in an hour,” she said. “Don’t let Elain work you too hard.”
“I won’t,” Elain promised. Then, once Feyre and Rhys had gone: “You don’t have to stay if it’s too much.”
You looked at her, surprised. “Too much?”
She looked down at the half-assembled lantern in front of her. “It hurts,” she said quietly, tracing the edge with her fingertip. “Thinking about why they’re needed. Sometimes I have to…stop. Before I fall apart in the middle of a room full of people who are excited about celebration.”
You swallowed. Something in you loosened at that, just a little. Enough to let you sit down, to pick up a brush, to let your hands move in small, careful strokes while your chest ached and your magic hummed and the world turned gently toward night.
You didn’t mean to find him alone.
You’d meant to go straight back to your room after dinner, to let the warmth of the meal and the steady hum of conversation sand down the sharp edges of the day. But the House nudged your feet a different direction when you weren’t paying attention, and your mind was still wrapped around lanterns and snow and the way Mor had tucked that tiny glass sun into your cloak pocket.
You thought you were headed for the balcony. You stepped instead into the quieter corridor near the training atrium, where one of the smaller sitting rooms opened onto a view of the mountains.
Azriel stood there, halfway between the window and the doorway, like he’d started to leave and then forgotten how.
His leathers were unbuckled, wings half spread as if he’d just come in from the cold and not decided whether to take them off. His hair looked slightly mussed, like he’d run a hand through it one too many times. Shadows clung closer than usual, gathered around his boots and the line of his shoulders.
He hadn’t heard you. Or if he had, he hadn’t reacted to it.
You could have turned around. You could have backed out the way you came, let the House redirect you to safety. You did not.
“Long day?” you asked instead, voice softer than you’d intended.
Azriel’s head turned. For a heartbeat his eyes were sharp, distant, the way they were on patrol. Then they focused fully, and you felt again that subtle shift, that barely visible easing at the edges.
“You could say that,” he said.
You stepped further into the room, letting the door whisper shut behind you. The air here felt cooler, touched by the mountain drafts that never quite surrendered to the House’s warmth.
He watched you, gaze flicking briefly to your hands before returning to your face. “You left quickly last night.”
You curled your fingers into your palms.
“I didn’t want to be in the way,” you said, choosing each word with care. “Madja hates when I loiter after a job’s done.”
It was a deflection. You both knew it. The moment Elain had stepped into that room, you’d felt like a piece in the wrong place on someone else’s board.
Azriel’s jaw flexed, barely. “You’re never in the way.”
You almost believed him. Almost.
“The House told me you were out with Mor today,” he said after a beat.
“Does it tell you everything?” you asked, trying to make light of it.
“Only when I ask,” he replied. There was no heat in it. Just honesty. His shadows shifted restlessly, like they wanted to contradict him. “Did you…enjoy it?”
There was something cautious in the question, like he was afraid of stepping wrong in a space he couldn’t see clearly.
“Yes,” you said. That, at least, was true. “She made me eat an obscene amount of pastries, though.”
One corner of his mouth tugged up. It wasn’t quite a smile, but it was close. “Sounds like Mor.”
Silence stretched for a moment, not entirely uncomfortable, not entirely easy. You crossed your arms loosely, more to have somewhere to put your hands than out of any real defensive intent.
“Solstice preparations have begun,” he said finally, as if he needed to name the thing lurking at the edges of both your minds.
He watched you. His eyes were sharp, but there was something cautious under the scrutiny, like he was trying to read a language he didn’t speak.
“You went quiet,” he said, almost an accusation and almost a question.
You swallowed. “It’s…a lot,” you said. “The noise. The excitement. I’ll adjust.”
It was easier than saying: I don’t know how to be happy about a celebration that reminds me of everything I lost.
His gaze flicked to the window, to the snowy peaks beyond, then back. “Your hands were shaking,” he said quietly. “At dinner.”
“I’m fine,” you said. The lie tasted like iron.
He studied you for a long moment. Then he nodded, the movement minute.
You didn’t know if he believed you. You didn’t know if you wanted him to. One of his shadows crept forward then, slow and curious, slinking along the floor until it brushed the toe of your boot. You looked down, startled.
It retreated the instant your gaze touched it, slipping back behind his ankles like it had been caught doing something it shouldn’t.
Azriel’s expression flinched almost imperceptibly. He hadn’t meant for that to happen. The embarrassment in his eyes was sharp and brief, and threaded with something like regret.
You forced a small smile, made your voice light. “They’re braver than you are,” you said. “I don’t think you’ve come that close voluntarily.”
His eyes shot up to yours, something raw flashing across his face.
“I don’t want to hurt you,” he said, and there was something about the way he said it—rough, like it had been dragged from somewhere deep—that made you feel suddenly, terrifyingly naked.
“You won’t,” you said quietly.
He looked at you a moment longer. Then, as if afraid he’d say too much if he stayed, he inclined his head.
“Get some rest,” he said. “Madja will hunt me down if I keep you on your feet past midnight.”
“You’re more afraid of Madja than you are of ancient monsters,” you replied.
“Madja is scarier,” he said without hesitation.
You almost laughed. Almost. You stepped aside to let him pass. His shoulder brushed the air an inch from yours, shadows trailing like cool smoke as he moved into the hall.
You didn’t see the way he looked back once, just before the doorway swallowed him.
You tried to write that night.
You lit a single faelight by the alcove bench and pulled your sweater tighter around you, though the House kept the air warm. The glass sun Mor had bought you sat on the sill, catching the faint glow and throwing it back in soft little reflections across the stone.
Your journal felt heavier than it had yesterday.
You opened to a fresh page and stared at the blank expanse until your eyes blurred.
Ink pooled at the tip of the pen when you finally touched it to paper.
I wish you could see Velaris, you wrote. You would have loved the lights.
That was as far as you got.
The memories rose too fast—the apothecary, the cold, your father’s laugh, your mother’s hands, the way their faces had crumpled when the war came crawling over the horizon. The letters you never got to send. The goodbye you never got to say.
You closed the book before the ink dried.
“Not tonight,” you whispered. To them. To yourself. To the House.
The faelight dimmed in sympathy.
You slid under the covers and lay on your side, watching the faint shadow of the glass sun on the wall until your eyes finally closed. Your magic hummed beneath your skin, no longer pushing, no longer flaring—just a steady, low current you couldn’t quite turn off.
Sleep dragged you under in fits and starts, more like drowning in shallow water than slipping into deep rest. Somewhere between one breath and the next, the House pulsed.
It was subtle. A shift in the wards that almost no one would have noticed. A quiet tightening, a recognition—like two notes almost, almost finding harmony.
You turned in your sleep, fingers curling against the sheet, and did not wake.
Azriel snapped upright in bed, heart pounding.
For a disorienting moment he didn’t know why. The room was dark but familiar—the sharp outline of the wardrobe, the glint of metal where his blades hung in ordered rows, the faint glow of faelight under the door. His shadows crowded close around him, agitated, edges bristling like they were startled.
“What,” he said quietly into the dark, “was that?”
They didn’t answer in words. They never did. They only pressed against him, restless, pulling his focus downward, as if something beneath them, beneath the stone, beneath the House itself, had shifted.
He swung his legs over the side of the bed and stood, bare feet silent on the floor. The wards pressed against his senses—a low, humming awareness. He’d slept under them for years. He knew their song.
Tonight, there was a new note in it.
His eyes dropped, without conscious thought, to the floor. To the direction of your room.
His jaw clenched. “No,” he muttered to himself. “You’re imagining things.”
He scrubbed a hand over his face and crossed to the window, shoving it open enough to let the cold night air bite his lungs. The city stretched below, quiet and glittering. The sky was clear. No danger. No threat. No excuse for the way his chest felt too tight.
His shadows curled against the glass, whispering in a language even he couldn’t fully translate. He stood there a long time, until the chill sank deep enough to numb his fingers. Until his heart slowed, if not fully calmed. Until the wards settled back into their usual, steady thrum.
Only then did he close the window and return to bed. He lay awake long after, eyes on the ceiling, listening to the House breathe.
Somewhere below, you slept fitfully, and he didn’t know why knowing that unsettled him more than any nightmare ever had.
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