A Court of Secrets and Moonlight

15: The Brink

Leur

506 years ago

Our remote little cabin seemed more like paradise than ever before.

With everyone on the brink of war with Hybern and the humans already beginning their rebellion, even Velaris seemed to have a black cloud hovering over it. My father was utterly insufferable lately, my mother was stressed beyond belief. Tensions were so high in the House of Wind that it could be cut with a knife, and I was stuck on the go between with my parents.

Sometimes, I was really jealous of Rhysand.

That's a lie, I was almost always jealous of Rhysand.

At least he could escape somewhere. At least he was useful in some way, his training and his newfound status in the Illyrian troops after the Blood Rite had changed everything. And now he was always gone, and so was Cassian and Azriel. And it was just me and occasionally Mor. Everything felt like it was changing so fast, too fast. All I really wanted, if I was being honest, was for everything to stay as it was. I didn't want a war. I did not want to be locked up in Velaris or some other "safe" location. I didn't want to see those I cared about most go to battle while I sat on the sidelines like some helpless damsel. I did not want to read casualty lists, desperately scanning for the names of my brothers or Azriel. I didn't know if I could bear it.

And it wasn't just my parents that were on edge. The last time I had seen Mor, she spent a ridiculous amount of money just stress shopping around Velaris. Rhysand was pretending like everything was fine, but I could see straight through him. Azriel was even more silent than usual, and had been sent in 20 different directions all day by my father. He was so desperate for information by this point that he had even started sending me on spying missions to take some of the weight off of Az. And Cassian...

Cassian was pissed.

He'd just been assigned to a new legion, where he was essentially no higher than a footsoldier. He was more powerful than the lot of them combined, a Carynthian soldier no less, the first to reach the summit of Ramiel- lowered to a rank so far beneath him that it was laughable. More than that, the oncoming pressures of war were beginning to take their toll. My brother would never admit it, but he was worried about all of us. This training session was just the next in a long line of gradually more intense practices. Normally, I would have whined until his ears fell off at how hard he was pushing me. But I knew it was not out of cruelty.

No, Cassian wanted to be as sure as possible that I could protect myself. He wanted to know that even if I wasn't marching into battle, which I undoubtedly wouldn't be, I could hold someone off. I didn't need to have Daemati abilities in order to figure that out.

But when I did look into his mind, I didn't expect what I found.

Cassian was at utter war with himself, at least regarding me. He had all of the thoughts and feelings of an older brother, maybe even more protective than Rhysand. He did not want me even within miles of any battle, did not want even the slightest hint of a risk to me. He detested the thought, was plagued with nightmares about me surrounded by Hybern soldiers. No amount of training me could make up for that, no matter how confident he was in my ability, no matter how much power I had. He did not care. He wanted me as far away from the war as humanly possible, and he wanted so badly to tell me to stay where I would be safe.

But he'd never do that. He believed, stronger than almost anyone I'd ever met, that females deserved their rank in the Illyrian legions. What had happened to his mother, how she had been forced to work in the camps until her death... he could not stand that treatment. He could not stand seeing females have their wings clipped, bit his tongue as he watched them sew and launder while the men went off to fight. He thought I should be free to do whatever the hell I pleased, unrestricted by my father or some asshole Illyrian general.