elixir of truth ; chapter three
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“...ceased, a low grumble released from her mouth. Briar opened the door to her apartment, irked that someone would interrupt her, but stopped with such an abrupt force she shut the door again.”
Briar felt like an absolute idiot. She was also flustered and the world felt like got a hundred degrees hotter.
She’d known fae were beautiful--but Illyrian’s took it to a whole new level. They were...Fuck, Briar couldn’t even begin to think of how to describe those hazel eyes and that toned, dark skin, or those midnight wings--
Gods, she was such a girl. She couldn’t believe that she was pawing over him--pawning over the male that saw her in her weakest state.
“You’re digging a grave, Briar,” she muttered to herself as she struggled to get through the crowds--albeit not that much--with her mountains of bags. She should’ve asked Loren to stay for a while longer to drop this off at home. But, she also didn’t want him to know where she lived.
A bag fell, the one that carried most of her liquids, when she ran into yet another person.
A series of demoralizing curses escaped her mouth and she swirled around to look for it--
Azriel held her fallen bag.
Briar probably would’ve dropped another.
But, like the coward she was with confronting a male like him, Briar swiftly turned herself around, put a stern foot ahead of herself, and shoved her way through the crowds. She did not look back to see if he was following--though, she scolded herself for even thinking about that.
She was such--a--girl. A small, human girl who was crushing too hard on a fae. It made her feel pathetic--and also pleasurably tingly in the stomach.
Briar scrunched her nose, and turned a blind eye--she wouldn’t--couldn’t--have those feelings. He’s immortal--and she’s not--and she’s going to grow old and alone looking at his his ageless, wonderful, chiseled, face.
In the second room of Briar’s home, she sat on a stool and hunched over a stained wooden table. She’s just finished organizing the products onto their shelves. In fact, she named her shelves by powders to liquids to solids.
By doing so, she realized that the salamander skins were still low in supply--and along with the most of her roots and seeds for her alchemist studies.
There was no doubt that Amren would be displeased with the lack of those. Briar found herself quite foolish now, for running away from the very fae that held those bags.
That was money wasted, going down the drain. Who knew if she was ever going to get those ingredients back. And if she never did? She would have to wait another month for the restock.
Instead of worrying more about something she couldn’t change (due to her overly shy self), Briar had powdered some ingredients and then went straight to her room, where her most beloved possession sat on the bedside table.
Though, she didn’t get much time with it because of a knock on her door. Her music ceased, a low grumble released from her mouth. Briar opened the door to her apartment, irked that someone would interrupt her, but stopped with such an abrupt force she shut the door. Hard.
Perhaps one of reasons why the human girl paid less for rent was because of her music. Yes, her particular unit often smelled of smoke and other oddities, but she made up for it by the pleasantry soft and deep sounds of her cello. It was that, and the fact that Amren paid for most of it.
The people of the apartment didn’t mind it--the music that lofted from the girl’s walls. It was as though she caught the right moment to play her beloved instrument. It wasn’t everyday, but she always caught the tunes of the day. It wasn’t just a bright note, or a sad note, or a bored one--it was all of them, hinted with the perspective of everyone’s wishes.
She knew how to work with what she saw in the days--playing the strings and stick with grace. No one’s ever seen her play--which always raised the question: could the human girl, who had been born into a somewhat decent family, really play the cello?
But that was soon discarded. Briar’s music was her own--with it’s grace and it’s unique peak of incentive.
Many knew her--even out of her apartment complex--for her music. It spread word--of the human graced with such a talent and a peculiar knack for concocting the oddest potions with Amren.
Azriel shouldn’t have been surprised to hear about Amren, recruiting another person to do her weird witchcraft after Nesta had been very against it.
And it unsettled him, because this was new territory--something that he never paid much attention to. He didn’t know what could happen with this thing between Amren and Briar.
The thought of her sent a chill down his spine. He remembered her, the broken body that he carried along with Elain. He never thought he would see her again, but here he was--holding a bag she’d dropped and now standing just outside her door.
Azriel had never done something like this. Something that is so casual--but to him, it was so odd.
He also never thought that he would be so nervous. This was human girl, living in the city he loved, working with his closest friend, and who was once in his arms during a time of war.
What could he say to her? “Hello, I remember you--and you dropped these”? Or maybe “I saw you at Winstyn’s bakery, you dropped this--by the way, how are you? Great? Great.”
Azriel raised his hand up to knock, but paused. There was that cello that he had heard so much of. The deep sensations that vibrated off the door, and the soothing notes that lazed the tense muscles of his back.
He listened for a while, out the door. He was reminded of the past week--of training Feyre and then the silence that Mor is giving him. All of his troubles were heard, from the depth of the cello’s music.
Azriel had never heard such music that touched him this way. Not like Starfall, where the music only made him lighter. This was a melody of everyone’s days--the tones of all emotions in a single note...where he felt s--
“Curious, seeing you here,” said the voice of a short, high-fae with a wicked smile on her face. “These days are never too short of them. I assume you heard of her talents?”
Azriel snapped himself out of the melody and steadied his glare on Amren.
“You never said that Briar was your apprentice.”
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