A Court of Made Madness - Azriel's love

5. Father Father

I wake up in an infirmary of sorts with an IV drip in my arm because I still hadn't eaten when I arrived, making me weaker than I should have been. An old familiar-looking woman is tending to my neck and when I try to speak she silences me.

"Hey how're you feeling?" Feyre sits on a chair at my bed cradling a babe in her arms.

"She can't speak, Elain must have tried to permanently damage her vocal chords. She's ok physically, and will take time to fully recover", the old woman says, walking out with a glance back at me and a gentle smile.

"Rhys would usually do this but I'm going to enter your mind okay?", she asks and I nod.

Feyre struggles at first to get past the voices and winces at the darkness she hears, "That's weird. They're gone, your memories are gone".

I start panicking, trying to get up and she settles down her child on the sofa, "hey it's ok. I'll get Rhysand to take a look, he's more experienced than I am and he knows what to look for", she takes my hand and squeezes it.

****************

My return to the House of Wind is welcomed by soft foods and liquids that the house left for me. Thank you I mouth, still not risking damaging my voice and sit down to pick at the soft bread and cheese, but a cube of butter is dropped on the table in response. I'm still in an oversized white shirt and shorts that belong to someone much bigger than me, but they're very comfortable and smell fresh.

Apart from Feyre who winnowed me here, the house is empty. It would make a nice recovery if it didn't leave me alone with the voices and deep guttural feeling that something is very very wrong. This is exactly how I've been for the last 500 years, just cleaner.

'Hey, what's going on?' Feyre asks directly into my thoughts.

'I don't know but something is happening. I can't predict the future - that's Elain's thing. I can only have a sense of what's going on and be drawn to destruction, that's why I'm here', I reply, unintentionally sending a shiver down Feyre's spine.

'Destruction? On what scale?' She asks.

'Well considering the state of Prythian already and the mass destruction that it's dealing with, I'd say that because I'm here, this is much worse than what you've already been through'. I reply through my thoughts.

"How's our new addition to the Night Court doing?", the High Lord asks his mate. "Oh and please, call me Rhysand", he says to me.

The two of them communicate with each other through their minds, I wonder if they can because they're mates.

"No, we're daemeti. We have the ability to infiltrate people's minds, will you let me try?" He replies to my thoughts again and struggles too.

"Can you remember anything, anything at all?" He asks me, having given up.

'No, I just remember taking a bath and then Azriel leaving in a hurry', I say to him mentally, focusing on my own voice in my head trying  to ignore the others. Rhysand helps and silences them for me.

"So you don't remember the blood on the mirror?" he asks and I shake my head.

"Ok, we'll talk this through with Amren when Az and Cass come back. I also sent out for Lucien. Nesta and Gwyn are in the library doing research about how Elain did this, Nesta took a bit of convincing after... your incident but I got through to her. I don't know how Cassian does it", Rhys says out loud.

"Well she usually shuts up at the sheer size of me, brother", Cassian flies in and replies, earning a choky laugh from Azriel.

'Definitely a bottom then', I think and Feyre and Rhys choke down a laugh, Cassian just looks confused. I'm still a teenager in my mind, I'm allowed to think this.