A/n: Hello, my fellow readers, I know it has been a long wait, I've been super occupied lately, but I'm hoping to make it up to you guys. This fic is super angsty and emotional, oop. Enjoy and I will be writing so much more in the next few days. Comment for part 2!!
Pairing: Azriel x fem reader! x Eris
Summary: Two years after shattering the mating bond, Azriel is forced to face the female he lost. She returns with a new mate, a child with her eyes, and a happiness he can never reclaim. But as buried truths begin to surface, he is left questioning whether he ever chose to betray her at all.
Warnings: mentions of cheating! super angsty and teary, mentions of regret!
"And I don't wanna learn another scent"
"I don't want the children of another man"
"To have the eyes of the girl that I won't forget"
It had been two years since you left.
Two years since he'd last seen you. Two years since his heart had shattered so completely that not even time could piece it back together.
Beyond the balcony, the sea churned beneath a colourless sky, violent waves crashing against the jagged cliffs below. Once, he had found comfort in storms. Now, they only mirrored the turmoil within him, restless, empty, forever searching for something that no longer existed. A void stretched through his chest, vast and unforgiving, one that no amount of time, training, or solitude could ever hope to fill. The House of Wind had changed after your departure.
Or perhaps it was simply him.
The halls that had once echoed with your laughter now stood oppressively silent, every room stripped of the warmth you had unknowingly left behind. Even the air felt colder. Your favourite books still rested untouched upon the shelves, your abandoned shawl remained draped over the arm of the sitting room chair, and yet, with every passing day, even those small remnants of you seemed to lose their meaning.
That frightened him more than anything.
Some mornings, he could still remember the exact shade of your eyes when sunlight caught them, the sound of your quiet laughter drifting through the halls, the warmth of your hand finding him without a second thought.
Other mornings… He struggled. Your voice became little more than a distant echo. The delicate lines of your face blurred around the edges of his memory, and each forgotten detail carved another wound into his already fractured heart. The guilt never eased.
Over the past few months, he'd quietly reduced the number of missions Azriel was assigned, offering excuses about needing him in Velaris more often. They both knew it wasn't the truth. A distracted Shadowsinger was a dangerous one, and Rhys no longer trusted his brother to return from every assignment unharmed. The conversation from the previous evening still lingered in his mind.
"I don't understand you," Rhys had said, his violet eyes hard with something that looked far too much like disappointment.
"You're the one who replaced her."
A long, suffocating silence.
"So why do you look like you're the one who lost everything?"
He'd simply realised it far too late.
Elain had become little more than a distraction.
Quiet conversations over late-night drinks. Lingering touches that neither of them acknowledged. The occasional kiss stolen in moments of weakness. Nights spent convincing himself that if he reached for someone else, perhaps the ache in his chest would finally disappear. It never did.
Every moment they shared felt hollow, a poor imitation of something he had once believed impossible to lose. No matter how desperately he tried to drown himself in her company, his heart remained stubbornly tethered to you.
Sleep offered him no escape.
Every dream ended the same way with your face. The devastation in your impossibly blue eyes as they searched his, silently asking the one question he could never answer.
He woke each morning with that same expression burned into his mind, your disappointment haunting him long after the dream had faded.
She suggested morning walks through Velaris, hoping the fresh air would clear his thoughts. She lingered beside him during meals, filled the silence with gentle conversation, and stayed close whenever she sensed him drifting into himself. She tried, in her own way, to become the comfort he so desperately needed.
But grief was a cruel thing.
It did not loosen its grip simply because someone else reached for your hand.
Deep down, Elain had never cared for you. She had hidden it well enough behind polite smiles and carefully chosen words, but there had always been something unreadable in her gaze whenever your name was spoken. And when your relationship with Azriel crumbled, whatever guilt she might have felt disappeared with it.
The questions never stopped.
What if he'd walked away before the argument escalated?
What if he'd trusted you enough to tell you what had been happening to him?
What if he'd fought for you instead of letting his impulses win?
Would the bond still exist?
Or had fate already decided long before either of you realised?
Rhysand knew where you were.
Azriel had stopped asking.
The first, and only, time he had, Rhys's expression had hardened into something colder than anger.
"You don't get to know where she is."
That had been the end of it.
He had no right to search for you. No right to demand forgiveness. No right to intrude upon whatever life you had managed to build from the ruins he had left behind.
His shadows mourned you almost as much as he did.
Once, they danced eagerly around you, slipping through your fingers and curling around your wrists whenever you laughed. Now they rarely ventured far from his shoulders, quieter than they had ever been, as though they too had lost something they could never recover.
Sometimes, in moments of unbearable weakness, he wondered if you had found someone else.
The thought twisted painfully inside his chest.
He couldn't bring himself to hate you for it.
If another male had succeeded where he had failed, if someone loved you the way you had always deserved, then perhaps that was the punishment fate had intended for him all along.
Your voice drifted through the study like sunlight, effortlessly pulling his attention away from the reports scattered across his desk.
He looked up to find you leaning against the doorway, a teasing smile tugging at your lips.
He didn't think he'd ever grow tired of looking at you.
Your smile had always undone him. It wasn't simply beautiful,it was warm. Gentle. The kind of warmth he'd spent five centuries searching for without ever realising it. Growing up, affection had been a foreign language spoken by everyone except those around him. Then you arrived, and somehow made it feel as natural as breathing.
His own lips curved instinctively. They always did around you.
"Yes, love?" he asked softly. "Do you need something?" You stepped inside, your hands clasped behind your back as though hiding some great secret.
"I was wondering if you were alright." His brows knitted together.
"What do you mean?" You tilted your head innocently.
"I haven't felt you through our bond for the past few days."
His heart lurched. "What?"
For one terrifying heartbeat, every ounce of colour drained from his face. Then you laughed. Bright. Unrestrained. The sound echoed through the room, chasing away the silence that had settled there.
"I'm teasing you." You crossed the room until only a step separated you, reaching up to smooth an invisible crease from his tunic.
"Of course I can still feel you." A grin spread across your face.
"I just wanted to see your reaction." Azriel let out a slow breath, pinching the bridge of his nose. "You are impossible." "So I've been told." "By Cassian?" "And Mor."
He sighed dramatically. "I'll have words with both of them."
Your laughter returned, softer this time, and Mother, he'd have gone to war every single day if it meant hearing that sound waiting for him when he came home. The smile lingering on your lips slowly faded. "But..." you said quietly, "...Mor wasn't entirely wrong."
You searched his face carefully. "She mentioned you've been... distant lately." Guilt settled heavily in his chest. "I've had more court work than usual."
"And?" "I leave for the Illyrian camps this evening." "And?" His shoulders sagged beneath your patient stare. "I've just been busy." You nodded slowly. "Of course." You smiled again, but something about it felt different. Smaller. As though you believed him… yet wished you didn't.
The lie sat heavily on his conscience long after you'd left the room. Because the truth was far more frightening. Something inside him had changed. He just didn't know when. Or why. It began with fleeting moments he couldn't explain. A glance held a heartbeat too long. An unfamiliar flutter in his chest whenever Elain entered a room. Thoughts that didn't belong to him, yet refused to leave. He hated himself for every single one. You were his mate. His equal. His home. The Cauldron itself had woven your souls together long before either of you had taken your first breath. Nothing should have been capable of severing that certainty. Yet every time Elain appeared, something inside him shifted. It wasn't love. It couldn't be. It felt... wrong.
Like a splinter buried beneath his skin that he couldn't reach no matter how desperately he clawed at it.
Her lavender scent lingered in the air long after she'd gone, invading his senses against his will. His instincts sharpened whenever she spoke. His gaze sought her out before he could stop himself, only for shame to crash over him moments later.
Each night, he lay awake questioning his own mind.
Why does my own heart feel like it's betraying me?
Nothing, not his guilt, not his confusion, not even the strange pull threatening to consume him, could change that truth.
So why did it feel as though fate itself had turned against him?
Something was terribly, terribly wrong.
Over the following months, Azriel found himself spending more time in Elain's company than he ever intended.
She had taken a particular interest in the gardens surrounding the River House, cultivating plants so rare that even the healers of Velaris struggled to grow them. Delicate blooms with silver-tipped petals. Vines that only flourished beneath starlight. Flowers whose roots held remarkable healing properties when brewed correctly.
The Night Court's healers often sought her knowledge, requesting tinctures and remedies crafted from the herbs she nurtured so carefully. Some mended broken bones within days, while others restored strength after long battles or replenished depleted magic.
Before every mission, she'd insist on preparing several bottles for him herself.
"Just in case," she'd say with a gentle smile, pressing the cool glass into his scarred hands.
Azriel had never questioned it.
The first few times Rhysand sent him into the mountains with Cassian, the potions proved invaluable. A cut that should have taken days to close disappeared overnight. Bruises faded before morning. By the end of each week-long assignment, he'd return to Velaris almost untouched.
Eventually, drinking them became routine. Two bottles a day. Every mission. Every patrol. Every battle.
He never noticed when routine became dependence.
He tried to keep his distance after that. Whatever had begun stirring inside him whenever Elain was near... he refused to entertain it. For days, he deliberately altered his schedule, taking different corridors through the River House, leaving meetings early, arriving late to training. Anything to avoid crossing paths with her. It made no difference. She was everywhere. Passing him in the gardens with dirt beneath her fingernails and sunlight tangled in her golden hair. Laughing quietly with Feyre over breakfast. Offering him another bottle before a mission with the same soft smile she'd always worn.
And every single time she appeared, something inside him tightened. It was as though his instincts recognised her before his mind did. Her lavender scent lingered in the air long after she'd gone, refusing to leave his senses. His gaze sought her out without permission, lingering for a heartbeat too long before guilt crashed over him with suffocating force. He hated it.Mother above, he hated it.
The female he'd chosen every day without hesitation.
The female whose laughter filled every empty corner of his heart.
Why did another woman occupy his thoughts against his will?
Had the Mother made a mistake?
Was the Cauldron capable of choosing the wrong souls?
Or was something inside him simply... broken?
The worst part was that nothing between you had changed. You still greeted him with sleepy smiles each morning. Still reached for his hand beneath the dinner table. Still laughed whenever he pretended to be annoyed as you absentmindedly ran your fingers along the sensitive membranes of his wings, earning a quiet grumble that never fooled you.
Wasn't he? So why, as your fingers remained intertwined with his across the table...did his eyes betray him, lifting over your shoulder to find Elain standing on the opposite side of the room?
The guilt that followed was immediate. Crushing. And for the first time in five hundred years… Azriel was afraid of his own heart.
------------------------------------------------------
Starfall arrived sooner than he had hoped.
Velaris glowed beneath a blanket of starlight, the city alive with music and laughter as thousands gathered to welcome the fallen stars. Lanterns floated through the streets below, their golden light reflecting across the Sidra like scattered constellations, while the House of Wind buzzed with celebration.
As it always had. A feast stretched across the grand dining hall, filled with friends, family, and every member of the Night Court. Glasses clinked together in celebration, laughter echoed through the halls, and for one fleeting evening, the burdens of war and duty were forgotten. It should have been perfect.
You stood beside him, your hand comfortably resting in his, dressed in a gown of deep crimson that caught the candlelight every time you moved. He'd already caught himself staring more times than he cared to admit.
Everything he'd ever prayed for without knowing prayers could be answered.
Then Mor appeared, a mischievous grin already forming on her lips.
"I refuse to let you spend the entire evening attached to him," she declared, taking your wrist before either of you could protest.
You laughed, looking over your shoulder at him.
"I'll hold you to that," Azriel replied, the corner of his mouth lifting.
You disappeared into the growing crowd, Morrigan already pulling you towards the centre of the ballroom as music swelled around you.
Then someone stepped beside him.
She smiled politely, folding her hands in front of her.
"It looks like you've been abandoned."
He let out a quiet huff of amusement.
Silence settled between them.
Azriel's gaze never left you.
You were laughing now, spinning beneath the lights as Mor twirled you effortlessly across the floor. Every so often your eyes searched the room, finding his almost instinctively before smiling once more.
So why wouldn't this feeling stop?
It had only grown worse over the past few weeks.
Every day it became harder to ignore.
Harder to breathe whenever Elain stood too close.
Harder to silence the thoughts that didn't feel like his own.
Hated every instinct screaming at him to turn away from you.
His fingers curled tightly around the crystal glass in his hand until tiny fractures spread across its surface.
His shadows writhed anxiously around his shoulders.
Please... stop. But the pressure inside his mind only intensified. His pulse quickened. His breathing became uneven. The scent of lavender surrounded him, sweet enough to make him dizzy. Something was wrong. Something had been wrong for weeks. He just didn't know what.Then Elain reached for his arm. The moment her fingers brushed against his sleeve… Everything snapped. His body moved before his mind could catch up. One hand found her waist. The other cupped her face. He kissed her. Hard. Desperately.
As though some invisible force had seized control of every instinct he possessed.
For one horrifying second...
Silence. Not throughout the room. Only within him. The world stopped turning. His eyes opened. And across the ballroom… You stood frozen. Your smile was gone. The music still played. People still laughed. Stars still drifted across the night sky. Yet somehow, none of it reached him anymore. All he could see...was you. Those brilliant blue eyes stared back at him, wide with disbelief. Confusion. Heartbreak. Then something inside them shattered.The bond between you tightened painfully, burning through every part of him until he thought his soul itself might split apart.
"Love..." The word barely left his lips. You took one slow step backwards. Then another. Tears gathered in your eyes, though none ever fell. You simply looked at him as though you no longer recognised the male standing before you."I waited," you whispered. Your voice was so quiet he almost thought he'd imagined it. "I kept hoping you'd choose me." His heart stopped. "I'm sorry. please let me fix this" The words sounded meaningless. Pathetic. Worthless. You shook your head.
A bitter smile crossed your face. "No, Azriel." Your fingers rose to the place above your heart, where the bond connected the two of you. "I refuse to spend eternity wondering if I'll ever be enough." Power rippled through the room. Every conversation ceased. Every head turned. Even the stars outside seemed to still. Your magic surged around you like a storm. "I release you." The mating bond screamed.
It wasn't a sound heard with ears. It was felt. A violent tearing through the soul itself.
Azriel collapsed to his knees as agony ripped through his chest, his shadows shrieking wildly around him. It felt as though someone had reached inside him and torn away the very piece of himself that had made him whole. Across the room, you swayed but never looked away.
Your own pain was written plainly across your face.
"I hope," you said, your voice trembling for the first time, "that one day you find the happiness you chose over me." You looked at Elain.Then back at him. "But it will never be with me." You turned. And walked away. He never saw you again.
The memory still haunted him. Every detail remained painfully vivid, replaying itself each night the moment he closed his eyes. For months afterwards, he'd continued accepting Elain's healing tonics out of habit, convincing himself they might somehow numb the hollow ache left behind by the severed bond. They never did. If anything, the emptiness only deepened.
Elain stayed close, offering quiet words of comfort and leaving fresh bottles upon his bedside each morning before he woke. Whether out of guilt, affection, or something else entirely, he never asked. One morning… He'd had enough.The bottles shattered against the marble floor with a deafening crash, glass scattering in every direction as crimson liquid seeped between the white stone.
"Don't," he'd snarled, his voice rough with months of grief. "Don't ever bring me another one."Even now, long after the stain had been scrubbed away, he found himself staring at that same stretch of marble.
It was the very place where your red gown had once pooled around your feet on nights when laughter had filled these rooms instead of silence.
His dreams belonged to you. Always.
Those impossibly blue eyes haunted every restless night, staring at him with heartbreak, disappointment, and questions he would never be able to answer.
He woke with tears he never remembered shedding. For the first time in five hundred years...Azriel, the Shadowsinger, felt utterly helpless. The Inner Circle had never truly forgiven him.
Cassian spoke to him only when duty demanded it. Mor could barely look at him.Feyre's disappointment cut deeper than anger ever could. Rhysand remained his High Lord. But no longer his confidant.
To them… He hadn't simply broken your heart. He had driven you from the only home you had ever known. And some wounds, they feared, could never be mended.
------------------------------------------------------
The meeting room felt strangely incomplete. Your chair remained exactly where it had always been, tucked neatly between Rhysand and Feyre.
Only now...Elain occupied it.
Azriel's gaze lingered there for a moment too long before forcing himself to look away. A replacement. Not because anyone expected her to become you. Because no one else had been willing to sit there.
The silence stretched until Rhysand finally broke it. "She'll be here tonight." Every muscle in Azriel's body tensed. For the first time in two years, hope stirred painfully inside his chest.
Rhys's violet eyes met his own. "I expect you not to do anything reckless." Azriel swallowed."I won't."
Rhys studied him for a long moment, as though deciding whether he believed him. Then, quietly, he added, "She's not coming alone." The words barely registered.
A heavy silence settled over the room.
"She's moved on," Rhys said evenly. "Just as you did."
His heart stopped. "She'll be arriving with someone."
The words struck harder than any blade ever had. Across the table, Mor folded her arms, her expression colder than winter itself. Cassian stared at the polished wood in front of him. Feyre remained unusually quiet, her fingers intertwined with Rhys's. Nesta simply watched him, unreadable.
Not one of them offered comfort. Not one of them looked surprised by his reaction. Azriel lowered his gaze."...I understand." But he didn't. Not really.
-------------------------------------------------------
Sundown arrived far too quickly.
Every passing minute tightened the knot in his chest until breathing itself became difficult. Two years. Seven hundred and thirty days. He'd imagined this moment more times than he could count. Perhaps you'd yell. Perhaps you'd ignore him. Perhaps...
Perhaps you'd let him apologize. Maybe, somehow… You'd forgive him. It was a foolish hope.Yet he clung to it all the same.Beside him, Elain quietly slipped her arm through his.Her thumb rubbed slow circles across his sleeve, a silent attempt at comfort.He felt...Nothing.
The front doors opened. Conversation immediately died away.
Azriel looked up, and a small blur of red raced straight through the entrance.
Laughter rang through the hall. A little boy, no older than three or four, darted between startled guests, nearly colliding with Azriel's legs before giggling and changing direction. His hair burned a brilliant shade of copper beneath the candlelight.But it wasn't the hair that stole the breath from Azriel's lungs.
It was his eyes. Bright. Vivid. An impossible shade of sapphire blue. Your eyes. Exactly your eyes. His entire world tilted.
His gaze snapped towards the doorway. Then he saw you. For a heartbeat, everything else disappeared. You looked... happy. Healthier. The exhaustion that had haunted your features during your final months in Velaris had vanished, replaced by a quiet confidence he'd never seen before.
And beside you...Eris. Your fingers were intertwined. His arm rested comfortably around your waist. The male looked down at you, murmuring something that made you laugh softly before pressing an absent-minded kiss against your temple. The gesture was effortless. Natural. Practised.
Azriel's heart shattered all over again. "She replaced you... just as you replaced her." The thought echoed mercilessly through his mind. You greeted everyone with warm embraces. Rhys hugged you longer than anyone else. Feyre wiped discreetly at the corner of her eye. Cassian smiled for what felt like the first time in years. Even Nesta's expression softened as you embraced her. "I've missed you," Feyre whispered. You smiled gently. "I'm doing better now."
Better. The word lodged like glass in Azriel's throat. Better… Without him.
Only then did your eyes finally meet his. For the briefest moment. Your smile faded into something polite. Distant.
"Hello, Az." That was all. No anger. No bitterness. Not even sadness.
Just two simple words spoken to someone who no longer occupied a meaningful place in your life. Somehow...
That hurt more than hatred ever could. Eris stepped forward, his hand never leaving your waist.His amber eyes met Azriel's for only a second.
Protective. Warning. As though silently reminding him that the female standing beside him was no longer his to grieve. Azriel's hands curled into fists. Not from anger. From regret.Beside him, Elain instinctively moved closer.
Her touch made him recoil. His attention remained fixed on the little boy now hiding behind your skirts."...Is he..."
His voice cracked. He cleared his throat, though it did little to steady him. "Is he your son?"
You looked down, smiling so tenderly that it stole what little air remained in his lungs."He is."
You crouched, brushing a stray lock of fiery red hair away from the child's forehead before kissing him softly.
Eris rested a hand on the boy's shoulder, the child leaning instinctively into him. The gesture answered every question Azriel hadn't been brave enough to ask.
You stood once more, your fingers finding Eris's with unconscious familiarity. "We were married last year."
A quiet laugh escaped you. "I never imagined my mate would be so insufferable." Eris smirked. "I'll choose to hear only the 'mate' part."
You rolled your eyes affectionately before looking back at Azriel. "I was shocked when the bond snapped into place."
Your smile softened. "I suppose fate had other plans for both of us."
Fate. Azriel had spent two years cursing that word.Now...
It mocked him. He looked at the little boy nestled comfortably against Eris's side. At the wedding band resting upon your finger. At the peaceful smile on your face.
This wasn't his family. This wasn't his mate. This wasn't his future.
It belonged to someone else now. "...Yes," he whispered, barely recognising his own voice."Fate."
For the first time since you'd walked away… He truly understood what it meant to lose everything.