Tamlin Redemption Arc

Tamlin redemption arc - P1

CONTAINS ACOSF SPOILERS

LAST WARNING

I gave myself to the black wind, wished for it to swallow me, eat me, rip me apart as the numbness took over.

It had been a while since I felt this, but the pain was familiar; an old friend that still haunted me. My body shook, reeling from the news. I wasn't going to make it. My babe was not going to make it, Rhys would die as well. The only thing I could think of was 'not again'. Why, after everything that had happened - didn't we deserve a happy ending. Apparently the Mother disagreed.

That wasn't the thing that made me winnow away so suddenly. The fact that they all kept it from me, that Rhys kept it from me - I knew why they did it, I knew they wanted to protect me from the truth of death; but...but it struck too close to home. Took me back to the times when I was suffocating from 'protection', back in the manor.

Maybe I should've waited for an explanation, but the biting cold wind of winnowing had seemed a much better option to me. I didn't know where I was going, I just knew that in that unending blackness, there would be no pain. I felt Rhys on the other side of the bond, he knew - I could feel his anger, his pain, his grief. I knew then that it wasn't going to end well with Nesta. Right now though, i could only think of myself, at the bundle of bliss inside me - the blue eyes I had once seen in the damp cave of the Bone Carver - who would never come to be. I could feel warm droplets run down my face, silent sobs racking through my body.

The voice of stolen starlight echoed through my mind, more familiar to me than the back of my hand.

'Feyre... Where are you Feyre.' I could sense the regret in his voice, the tentativeness of his tone, the apology was clear as glass. I knew inside that I had already forgiven him, forgiven all of them, I knew that I probably would've done the same. It hurt no less though.

'Why Rhys, why didn't you tell me?' Even though I asked, I knew half the answer.

'I'm sorry Feyre, I am so sorry. Please come back to me, it's not safe.' He meant it well, but the talk of my safety - I couldn't hear any more of it. I blocked him out, I put up that adamant wall, shining and strong - blocked the bridge between us; effectively wiping myself off the map, I closed my eyes - trying to stop the stream of salt seeping through.

When I opened them, I hissed. It was bright and blinding. I reeled from the effect of the winnowing, reaching out and holding the thing closest to me for support. The place was warm - not suffocatingly so, but this warmth was familiar. When I stopped panting and looked up, sure enough, I was back here.

The Manor was unrecognisable from the last time I had seen it. The walls were overrun with thorns and roses, cracks spider webbing through the walls. All the glass in the windows was shattered and pieces of it glinted in the noon sun. The once beautiful and well kept garden was strangled and left dead by weeds and animals. There was no sign of life here.

I thought that when I finally came back here, I would panic, be angry, be scared. Something. Instead I felt nothing, slightly tired from winnowing and numb. Perhaps because the monstrosity before me in no way resembled the gilded prison it once was.

I wasn't going to test it by going inside. I instead walked out of the gates- ripped from their hinges and left in shreds of metal - into the rolling green hills covered in blankets of meadow. The scenery was torn up in many places with rose bushes - that same ugly blood red colour. My paint-splattered overalls had been ripped up by the shrubbery but I continued walking, again with no particular place in mind. The views of the land were painfully familiar. I could recognise where the many festivals had taken place. The wood to the left was where I had first met The Suriel. I kept walking despite the pain that followed as a result of carrying a child.

The sun continued its aimless crawling across the too-blue skies as I trekked through fields of dancing wheat, groves of cherry blossoms that snowed pink flakes on me. Soon blood-red and marigold was splintering across the sky, tearing apart the day to welcome the arrival of night. The smells of the land were soothing as night flowers stretched their arms and prepared to blossom. My legs were shaking like newborn fawn by the time I reached the crest of the hill I had been climbing for the past half an hour. I gaped in shock at what I behold.

A pool of liquid starlight.

The same one from eons ago, when I heard sounds with unhearing ears, when I smelt scents so bland and when my clumsy hands only just discovered the wonders of Prythian. When my human heart was full of hate.

I stumbled down the small hill to the pond, my feet tripping over clumps of mud and nondescript twigs. When I reached the edge of the pond, I looked into the rippling reflection. My hair was wild, my eyes blotchy and tearful, splatters of paint were still in my hair and on my face from earlier as well as traces of dust and mud. I felt bad as I plunged my dirty hands into the pond and splashed my face and drank the cool, fresh liquid. Warmth blossomed in my core as the liquid travelled through my body. Maybe I should have questioned whether it was drinkable first.

The pounding adrenaline finally washed out of me and my exhaustion was too great to ignore. I leant against one of the silver birch trees surrounding the pond, noticing how the bark shimmered slightly from the pond. I tucked the sight into a place in my heart to paint it later. My eyes drooped and closed of their own accord; sleep was a winning battle inside me as I finally acknowledged the feeling inside.

Betrayal, Hurt, Anger, Fear for the babe sleeping inside me. The emotions were a whirlwind inside that ripped apart any semblance of normality I had formed. Why was I here in the middle of a forest, the middle of a land which I hated and not with my mate, trying to figure out the wreck my life had become. The betrayal I felt was still too strong, along with pride that kept me from going back to my Court, to my home against better judgement. I laughed bitterly as I realised I was acting like a child when I was to be a mother soon. Hopefully.

That thought set off a trigger inside me and fresh, burning tears falling rapidly. I felt Rhys on the other side of that wall; his worry and pain that I was gone. His anger. His matching fear for me and the baby. I was guilty for adding to his ever-lengthening list of worries, I realised that I had not thought of the pain he had been feeling, the truth he had held for so long on his own. My heart broke for him, for me, for my sisters, my friends, for the child inside - it shattered into a myriad of pieces as -against any sane person's judgement- I finally fell into unconsciousness surrounded by the beasts of Prythian.