A Court of Gold and Shadows

I breathe flames each time I talk - Chapter 7

✦ . ⁺ . ✦ . ⁺ . ✦

Chapter 7: You and me forevermore

✦ . ⁺ . ✦ . ⁺ . ✦

The house had quieted down, everybody leaving, just him and Oriana. The wards were armed to their teeth and he was certain that if Cassian ever tried to force his way through them again...well he would probably lose.

Oriana would have patched every weak spot there was as soon as she realised that there was one.

Still, she was the one who more or less poured him into the bathtub and then scrubbed his hair, using the kind of soap bar she used, not him. It left his hair too soft to his own touch. Still, he let her do that because he knew that she was doing that not only to care for him but also to calm herself.

She tucked Azriel into bed, giving him potions to drink and he did so without any protest, immediately feeling his muscles relax as the pain lightened.

"How are you feeling?" she asked him quietly.

"Good," he promised her. "I am alright," he repeated, leaning back against the pillow, trailing a finger down her cheek. "You don't need to worry."

"Sweetling," she protested, her voice hoarse.

"I swear I am alright. I promise," he repeated to her. "I promised I wouldn't lie to you. And I won't."

Not when he knew that she could immediately pick out that he did indeed lie.

She sighed, but she took him at his word.

She moved throughout their bedroom, wearing that cobalt blue dressing gown that he had come to connect with her, picking up her hairbrush and starting to pull it through the length of it.

"May I?" he asked. He didn't need to say anything else. She would understand.

"Of course," Oriana agreed, sitting down at the edge of the bed and handing the brush to him.

He started at the ends, gently starting to tease out the knots in her long hair that fell down her back in waves. It was beautiful, long and thick and curly when she didn't use the brush to tame it into silky waves.

He didn't know what he liked more. It didn't really matter. He loved her every which way he could.

"Every time I do that, I feel myself calming down. I am at peace here," he said quietly.

Azriel didn't think that he ever going to reach a place where he could be that. But somehow Oriana had become that for him. Become this oasis of peace and quiet in his life, a sanctuary and paradise at the same time.

As long as he had her, everything was well in his life. "I love it," he whispered.

"I love it here too," Oriana agreed softly and they lapsed into silence, like they sometimes did, completely content to be in the same room and ignore each other if that meant that they could be in each other's nearer vicinity. And he thought about that evening about his family all coming together, about Oriana surrounded by his brothers, and Feyyre and Nesta, Amren and MOore...and Nyx, baby Nyx who seemed to have his first crush on Oriana of all people when his wide blue eyes and grins were any indication.

She had slid into place with them as there had always been a place for her.

And still...

"The only reason why I didn't introduce you to them sooner was Rhys. It had nothing to do with you," he finally said, and Oriana twisted around, staring at him. The Flames in her were dancing wildly, surprise written all over her face. "I swear. I know you probably thought that it had something to do with you, but it didn't. It was on me and I was scared." He sighed. "I am not good with words," he told her quietly.