Why lie? (Part VIII to Why me?)
azriel x rhys' sister! reader
angst/eventual comfort ( angst angst confessions and more angst!! Don't mind me rubbing my hands together and cackling maniacally in the corner)
Summary: When you walk in on Azriel and Elain the mating bond snaps leading you to flee to Autumn with Eris so you can be free of Azriel. Your absence causes Azriel to come to some drastic realisations, but is it already too late and has your time in Autumn led to you moving on?
Parts I, II, III, IV, V, VI, and VII if you missed them!
-
Your mother had once told you that the longer you ignore a problem and let your emotions brew, the thicker your anger becomes. You do appreciate the sentiment of dealing with your problems head on and you kept that in mind as you downed your 6th? Maybe 7th? Goblet of wine.
Right now you didn't want to deal with your emotions or the emotionally charged state that Azriel's presence had left you in so you did the next best thing and had gotten drunk.
Laughing unboundedly, you spin Nesta around on the dance floor. The music played, an accompaniment to the sound of the Night Court revelry. It had been a few hours since you had arrived and after your reunion with the court, you had been drinking and dancing for the rest of the Night.
The lively music which had been playing began to transition into a slow dance. The last dance of the evening, according to the conductor of the mini-orchestra that your brother had hired. Cassian marched up to you guys and held his hand out, an unspoken invitation for his mate. She nodded to you, half in apology and half in thanks, and was whisked away by the Illyrian warrior.
You sighed, unable to tell if you were dizzy from the spinning or from all the drinks you'd had throughout the night. Azriel was usually your dance partner at the end of the night. While everyone would pair off with their mate, it had become an unspoken promise that you guys would save the last dance for each other. He would whisper bits of information he learned throughout the ball, and you would try to not look shocked at some of the things that he's learned. It would give you both a moment of respite from your roles and actually let you enjoy yourselves at the ball.
You did see Azriel leaning against a pillar in all his glory, blade on his hip and cat-like hazel eyes scanning the room accompanying his blue siphons and wind-tousled hair. He looked like a dream. One that you've had many times over the years where the spymaster saves you from irreparable danger and confesses his undying love. It was a dream that had started in your adolescence, and now you saw why it needed to stay there.
Your mate. The one you were supposed to be destined to be with. The one you had to watch be in love with another member of your family. Twice. Your traitorous heart skipped a beat or two.
You put in too much work and had gone through too much pain to still be hung up over him. A single dance wouldn't change anything. You turn around giving your back to the shadowsinger and see Eris directly in front of you.
He doesn't even give you a chance to question him as he grabs your hand with one hand and your waist with the other and whisks you away into a Waltz.
-
You're sitting at your vanity for the first time in months. After your dance with Eris, the ball had ended and everyone had gone home. Your room is different from how you remembered it, the emptiness of your objects was something you were expecting, but all your things had appeared to be slightly shifted which had thrown you off.
There was also another scent that seemed to underly all your things that you were choosing to ignore, thinking about for peace of mind.
You were freshly showered and in your nightgown. Your room was dimly lit, with the only source of light being a few candles that were flickering in the dark.
You were brushing your hair when there was a knock at the door. "Come in." You looked in your mirror to see who entered. Your hand stopped mid-brush as your eyes met Azriel's hazel ones through the mirror.
He opened the door and began to enter the room timidly, like a child approaching a cat scared that they were going to scare it away.
His voice is soft and careful, "I didn't see you after the ball." No questions about why you blew up at him or what you meant to say before you were cut off.
You take a breath. You really didn't want to see him tonight, you thought that you had time before you had to speak with him again, but it seems like Azriel's will is stronger than your avoidance.
"I left right as it was over. I had to help Eris and Lucien settle in." The tension in the room was palpable. Your words had been polite, but there was a bite in them. You never leave without Azriel. He was only a few feet away, but distance between you two was greater than it has ever been.
"You have been spending a lot of time with them lately. Especially Eris." His words were bitter, like poison, the kind that he wished he could have slipped into Eris' drink when he saw you and him dancing together.
"Well, I'm sorry if I wanted to be hospitable to official guests of the Night Court during their stay here. Especially when they treated me so well in Autumn." Your anger immediately flared up. How dare he question you in this way.
"Well, what I was seeing seemed a lot more than hospitality." Azriel knew he messed up the second the words were out. He had gotten a better handle on his emotions since the mating bond snapped, but seeing you with Eris dancing and laughing all evening was something that he wasn't prepared for when it was him who you were supposed to be dancing with.
Seeing his mate in the arms of another opened up the floodgates of emotions that he wasn't prepared to deal with.
You put your hairbrush down. "You are seriously putting my integrity into question? Also what I do with whom is none of your business shadowsinger."
You turn around to face him, a million emotions burning in your eyes, "Besides, why do you care when you are already pursuing a relationship with one of their mates?" He flinched at the last word that left your tongue.
His wings dropped and there was a look in his eyes that you couldn't quite place. Fear? Shock? You had never spoken to him like this. He didn't know what to do or how to react.
You started at each other in the silence until he decided to break it.
"Why did you never tell me you were upset with me? You're telling me I can't fault you when you left without saying a word?" He asks almost pleadingly.
"I had to sit here and watch you talk to everyone else in our family, knowing that I had somehow wronged you without knowing what it was that I even did." He broke eye contact, took a breath and resumed.
You were shocked you had no idea where this was coming from or that he was this aware of your actions in the first place.
"You can't say it wasn't me because I know you and every sign points to me being the reason you left. You leave without telling me and then come back and ignore me. You're acting all buddy buddy with enemies of the Night Court and refuse to talk to me." You look away from him, it's your turn to avoid eye contact now.
He doesn't accept this and walks up to and gets on a knee. He's so tall that kneeling, he is almost eye level to you sitting. He tilts your chin up to meet his gaze.
"What happened to us?" He is almost pleading with you. Longing in his gaze, but longing for what? Longing for the attention he's been accustomed to that you won't give him anymore?
You're exhausted you can't even pretend that nothing is wrong anymore. You meet his eyes, resolution written across your features.
"You have a family that loves you Azriel. You have Rhys, you have Cass, and you have me. You were going to throw all of that away for a Blood Duel with Lucien Vanserra over Elain."
Panic flashes across his features. "That was in the past I've changed-" He tries to reassure you with everything he has in himself that it was in his past. He's changed. Why would he want that when his mate was right in front of him?
"You were ready to die, Azriel, and I understand that you think your life is worthless and I wish I could go into your head and change the way you think and I wish I could go back in time and cut down anyone who has ever wronged you and make sure that your father suffers tenfold, but you were going to leave behind everyone that loves you for a woman with a mate." Tears well up in your eyes and you take a breath.
You are really trying to hold it together, but you don't care anymore about hiding anything from him. There was a crack in the dam and everything came spilling out.
"I know you saw the blade I was going to gift you for Christmas. It wards off a singular death blow and I spent so long calling in favours and having it crafted for you because I know that with your loyalty and selflessness, you would one day meet your end in the name of someone you loved."
Azriel's resolve is cracking and you can see his eyes beginning to glisten in the candlelight. His shadows left him, giving you guys privacy for this tense moment except for the singular shadow that has been sitting on your wrist for months.
"I would have given you the blade for the duel, but that would've been the end of our relationship as you knew it."
More tears spill and you don't even try to fight them. "I dealt with you prioritising Elain over me and I have dealt with your questionable decisions when it comes to women for hundreds of years, but to kill Lucien for wanting to fight for his mate or killing yourself because you think you're unworthy of everything in this life is something I couldn't deal with. Not when I have spent my entire life being there for you and fighting for you."
You were full on crying and Azriel was fighting tears. You can could the number of times on your hands that you had ever seen Azriel cry.
His hands move from your face to your hands and he hands his head in shame.
"I couldn't- I can't" You hiccup.
He pulls you into his chest, you want to fight him, but you are full-on sobbing and no matter how mad you are at him he is a comfort that you struggle to resist, especially in your emotionally exhausted state.
"You can't expect me to just sit there and watch that and pretend like I'm not upset." Your words are muffled in his chest.
He's stroking your hair with one hand and holding you close with another. "I was very unhappy. I thought something was missing and the answer to the emptiness within myself was Elain. It seemed too perfect, three brothers for three sisters and I told myself that. I convinced myself that I would never be truly happy until I had what my brothers had."
Azriel takes a breath. He's not used to spilling his emotions out for anyone to hear them, he's been working on it, but this sort of thing was new for him.
"I thought our bond was solid and you said you didn't mind me spending time with Elain, so that's what I focused on. The emptiness had never gone away and I convinced myself that the Blood Duel would fix my problem one way or another."
You pulled back from his chest and he made sure you were looking him in the eye as he said this because he knows he would never be able to say it again.
"I'm so sorry for everything. I have never had anyone care about me the way that you do and I became so used to it that I started to think it was a right, that I was entitled to your care."
He blinks away tears and looks to the side, pausing momentarily as if he's trying to find the words.
"I have never been more miserable than in the time that you were gone. Not hearing from you is the worst punishment the Mother has ever bestowed me with and I would rather give the wings off my back than to sentence myself to that treacherous fate. I'm sorry I was so careless before."
He takes your hand and puts it over his heart. "I swear to the Mother or whatever gods that will listen that should I forsake you ever again in either this life or the next, that may they take pity on my wayward soul and sentence me to a fate worse than death for all eternity."
You feel his heart racing under your palm and you feel the breath that he takes. "The only terrible fate that I can imagine of that magnitude is being away from you. Is never being around you or seeing your smile or hearing you laugh because if there was one person that I would ever want to be stuck with for all eternity it would be you."
His eyes bear into your soul with an intensity you had never seen from the shadowsinger. He is very good at his job, but has never been one to deal with his personal problems head on.
You feel the mating bond in your chest. It has been snuffed out for a while, a result of you ignoring it, but now you felt it stirring, almost fighting for its survival.
"You don't have to forgive me right now or even a hundred years from now. But I need you to know that I am sorry for everything and I will fight to earn your trust again and be worthy of you."
His eyes flashed with a determination you had never seen directed at you from the shadowsinger and you had no idea how to react.
You just nodded your head. "Thank you Azriel."
-
Azriel has never had to pour his heart out like this. He never realised how hurt you were from his actions and it certainly didn't help that he could feel your emotions through the bond.
He brings you in again in an all-consuming hug and feels pain, so much agony that must have been building up for years and years. He brings you in to an all encompassing embrace and begins to cry into your shoulder. "I'm so sorry."
He cries out and means it. He can feel the wetness on his shirt from your tears while he mars your nightgown with his own. He sits there and holds you as he falls apart and you let him, never seeing him in this state before.
He feels your pain and his own and the world feels like it's ending, but the contrast of the comforting warmth of your hold keeps him together.
At one point he noticed that your breathing had evened out. You had fallen asleep. He carries you over to your bed and lies you down. He sits next to you a moment taking in your features.
Your brow is furrowed and your jaw is clenched, for a moment he's scared that his anxieties and anguish are bleeding onto your side of the bond, but since it hasn't snapped for you yet he shakes the thought off.
At the sight of you sleeping, his shadows come back and encompass your resting form. They surround you, checking your sleeping form for danger and settle around your outline in the bed.
Azriel begins to feel the exhaustion of the past day settle into his bones. The mating bond snapping. His fight with Rhys. Watching you dance with Eris at the ball. Fighting with you. Spilling his feelings out. It had all been so much both physically and emotionally.
He was about to make the move to get up when you started mumbling in your sleep. He turned back to you and you turned in your sleep towards him.
Azriel watched you for a moment longer and unknowingly, in your sleep you had grabbed his arm. Azriel didn't know what to do because he should get up, but you were here holding onto him.
He brushed your arm off and had begun to walk away when you had started tossing and turning. He told himself that this was for your benefit, that you needed a good night's sleep and that he would be gone before you even woke up.
Bringing over one of the chair's right next to your bed, he sits himself down next to you. He leaves his arm on the bed and you immediately roll over and press your check into his hand, holding onto his arm. He lets himself revel in the touch because he knows it's the only one he is going to get from you.
Your tossing, turning, and mumbling stopped and he heard your breathing and heartbeat even out, as you were taken into a deep sleep. The sight of your peaceful slumber had started to make Azriel sleepy.
He leaned back in his chair and even though it was not the most comfortable position he had ever been in, he felt himself being dragging into the lull of sleep. Azriel has never had much luck with sleep, it was something he fought against every night waking up multiple times and struggling to stay asleep. Even though he was in a chair, your presence was comforting enough to allow him the luxury of a restful night of sleep. As the last bits of his consciousness were slipping away, Azriel focused on the warmth of your hand and thanked the Mother and swore that he would make it right if it was the only thing he would do for the rest of his days.
-
The Mother looked at Fate. He scoffed at her, "So dramatic this whole mating bond business is. If they're meant to be together then why isn't she just accepting him already?"
Fate had never been particularly patient. He believes that the time for everything was now because putting off your fate is an impossible feat.
The Mother believes in divine timing. Everything will occur when it is meant to. The Mother and Fate have been going back on forth on this issue for years.
She looks at him, amused by his eagerness, "Because it's time for him to show her that he can fight for her and himself. That's the important part, he's just realising now the error of his ways at least give him some time to prove it."
The Mother moves her chess piece into an advantageous move. Fate looks pensive.
She teases him, "Don't tell me you're actually getting attached to these ones."
He smiles, a wicked sight filled with smugness and a sureness that he did not always have. "They remind me of us in the beginning. I am beginning to become quite fond of them."
He's about to counter her attack when he pauses for a second. "But I like to think I didn't look that pathetic."
The Mother offers an immediate retort as he moves his piece. "You're right. You were more pathetic." She moves her piece.
"Hey now-"
Fate has always been cruel and unyielding, but the Mother had softened him over the years, a realisation he begins to acknowledge when he realises that he does want these two to end up together and curses himself for being a part of the reason it's been dragged out so long. He can almost hear his sister Karma laughing somewhere in the distance.
part ix
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note: I honestly really struggled with this part. The conversation was something I really wanted to get right and while it's not a complete resolution, them actually beginning to get their emotions out is a good thing and progress in their relationship. I hope you guys are enjoying this story and as always thank you darlings and until next time!
note note: There were some troubles with the taglist that I hopefully fixed in this part and as always this will be edited eventually!! Hopefully...
My lovely taglist: @alimarie1105 @chaosabroad @bbontenswhhore @tele86 @ashblooddragons @circe143 @i-am-infinite @princesssunderworld @thestartitaness @tiffany-xx @cpfantasybooks @lucia-valentinaa @jennigsonl @ivy-34 @firefly-forest @k-homosapien @coeurdeveea @cherryjain17 @bckynatt @becstersworld @rcarbo1 @gojospearlycim @atluky @juliebluehufflepuff @willowpains @abadfantasybook @neverendingstay @hellohauntedturnstudent @highladyofhogwarts @littowl @iluvyewman-blog @lunaticpotatoe @justlivinginadaydream @julesiebean @shylahstarzz @olive-main @lreadsstuff @noonenuts @sourapplex @aquellaspequenascosas @anuttellaa @honethatty12 @moonlwghts @kittymeyers @beabogsims @sillyfreakfanparty
