A Court of Gold and Shadows

I breathe flames each time I talk - Chapter 3

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Chapter 3: Miscommunications lead to fallout

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I found him. He's...will be alright. We need to talk.

That was all Cassian had said. It was something. Something eased in Rhys at these words. even when they still made him wonder.

What...what did Cassian mean? Where was Azriel that Rhys couldn't reach him but Cassian could? What...

They were all milling around in the Garden of the River House, waiting for Cassian, because he had needed to admit to Mor and Amren what was going on, and Feyre and even Nesta had come down to wait for her mate's return. She was playing with Nyx, softening for the boy in a way she only rarely did for any of the adults.

Nyx was playing the glowing ball that Azril had bought him for his birthday that day. Fast becoming a favourite toy for his son, who loved the way the colours would shift.

And then Cassian landed in the garden where they had all converged. Rhys could just stare at his sudden appearance.

Nesta was the one who voiced it.

"Cassian, what happened to your hair?" she asked, incredulously. Cassian's thick dark hair, normally pulled back into a knot at the base of his neck was...non-existent. At least half of it.

"Long story," Cassian gave back, his voice dark. "I still have my eyebrows, right?"

"Is that a question you need to ask?" Feyre asked with some amusement. "Yes, you have."

"Where did you find Azriel?" Rhys demanded and Cassian turned towards him.

"At his house. He'll be out of commission for at least a week...rather plan 10 days," Cassian said evenly. That was not what Rhys had wanted to hear, but it was better than what he had half expected.

"Did you bring him to Madja?" He asked and Cassian glowered.

"As I wasn't about to kidnap him from his mate, no." He bit out those words and Rhys blinked.

"What?" he asked, hoarsely. His mate? Azriel had a mate? Since when? How? Who?

When had that happened? He hadn't...He hadn't heard a single thing about that, hadn't had one bloody inkling. Azriel had kept it a secret, hadn't he? A secret from him even, locked away from his daemati abilities.

"So you didn't know. I was wondering," Cassian said, harshly.

"Azriel has a mate?" Feyre finally managed to bring out. "Since when?"

"Did you know?" Mor asked Cassian, who shook his head.

"Did you really think I was going to pair him off with some random florist if I knew that he had a mate? No, I didn't know," Cassian assured her. "I was...shocked."

"That still doesn't explain the hair," Nesta said quietly. Cassian sighed, touching the hair with a near grievous expression.

"Yeah, it does. She burned it off me."

Rhys could just stare. Yeah, the hair was singed off rather than cut off now that he looked at it. But...how.

"She burned off your hair," he repeated flatly. What?

Why had she done it? How had she done it?

It was Cassian. Lord of Bloodshed, General of the Night Court's Armies. And some random female had...gotten him to hold still somehow to burn off his hair?!