Flames of Cobalt and Crimson

Departure

Cassian

I couldn't stop myself from pacing. I had tried sitting down twice since everyone else had left the town house, but it was no use. I needed to be moving . When I had gotten her tersely-written note yesterday I'd immediately felt like a heavy stone had dropped into my stomach and it hadn't lessened a fraction since then.

I need to talk to you. I will be at the town house tomorrow morning. There had been no signature, but we both knew I would recognize her elegant script.

It was too much to hope that she was planning to apologize; that she would finally be honest with me - with herself - about her feelings. I cursed myself for a Cauldron-blinded fool for every day that we had circled one another like wary cats, wasting time. Because somehow I had lost her in that forest on the edge of the battlefield. I didn't know whether I had lost her when her father died, when I failed to protect them, or when she beheaded the king of Hybern with Azriel's dagger, but I had lost her. And I feared she might never forgive me.

The liquor was supposed to have helped with that stone in my gut last night, but it had failed miserably. Az's presence had been a small comfort, but not long after he left I had stumbled over to the couch, stretched out, and had fallen asleep sometime later. I hadn't wanted to dream, but the liquor had failed me in that regard, too. Sleeping on a couch when one had wings was already among the least comfortable of choices, but you learned to make do. The town house was running short on empty bedrooms, and flying back up the mountain had been out of the question.

I had slept even more fitfully than the couch and wings could account for, however, dreaming of war and death and screaming until the pale light of dawn had peeked in through the sitting room window. I'd jolted awake, expecting someone to be in the room with me, but I had been alone. I doubted the bloody dreams were a good omen for the day I was anticipating.

I'd bustled everyone out of the town house as soon as breakfast was finished, though I hadn't eaten, with strict instructions not to return until this evening. Mor had yelped in indignation as I had physically pushed her out the door, though I had tried to be gentle. She was the last one out of the house and had quite literally dragged her feet, as though she hoped to linger until Nesta arrived. Purely by accident, of course. I had no idea what to expect with Nesta, but it was better to prepare a clear battleground just in case.

I had been pacing ever since, as the minutes ticked slowly past, and I had begun to wonder what exactly 'morning' meant to her when I finally heard the front door open and shut. I froze. That stone in my stomach felt like it dropped impossibly lower, and I felt it twist. The fist in my chest wasn't present at the moment, so that was a small mercy. Troubling in its own right, but it was one less disadvantage.

I heard her footsteps crossing the foyer and I still hadn't moved, and should've probably tried to meet her in the antechamber. And so it was that Nesta found me standing, like an idiot, in the middle of the sitting room.

Framed in the doorway, she stood imperiously straight-backed in an understated, fitted black dress. It wasn't a remarkable gown; like all the dresses she owned it was elegantly tailored, but it was unornamented. The material, cut, and craftsmanship spoke for themselves, and the simple elegance drew attention to her face.

Eyes that blazed with cold intelligence sat in an angular face with high cheekbones and a straight nose. Her plump lips looked to have been tinted, just slightly, which was an oddity. Her honey-brown hair was braided and coiled behind her head in her usual style, and the light from the window illuminated the gilded threads that mingled with the brown.

That face haunted me. And, as usual, it gave absolutely nothing away. Nesta was mystery, wrapped in questions, wrapped in secrets. My curiosity about the silver fire that sometimes burned in her eyes was partly what had drawn me to her, but it was absent now, her coolest mask firmly in place.