A Court of Flame & Shadow - Eris x OC

The Night Court

"What happened?" Vel breathed. Whatever hope for respite she'd held had instantly vanished when she beheld their grim faces, the blood that crusted Rhys's hands.

"There was another attack on Velaris. Hybern used a spell to break the wards on the library. He sent his Ravens here to kidnap Feyre and Nesta."

Vel's eyes slid over the sisters making a mental note of everyone present. She hadn't been to Velaris in months, too busy courting alliances with the rest of Prythian. Even Lucien was there, standing guard by the front window. She hadn't seen him since that day in her cabin, when he'd come to take Feyre back to the Spring Court, when he'd trampled over the shreds of their friendship. Before he'd found his mate, before he'd abandoned his last friend.

"It looks like everyone is safe, yet from your faces, I assume there's more to it?"

Vel's eyes met violet ones like star-flecked night and Rhys projected the images in her mind – the wards, the Ravens, Cassian descending into the library. Vel shuddered as the images of Bryaxis, seen through Cassian's eyes, flooded her consciousness.

"The priestesses will keep silent about what happened today. And the people of this city won't learn why Amren is now preparing to hunt. We can't afford to let the other High Lords know. It would unnerve them—and destabilize the image we have worked so hard to create." Rhys said to the others while Vel still grappled with the information he'd given her.

"The attack on Velaris," Mor countered from her place on the couch, "already showed we're vulnerable."

"That was a surprise attack, which we handled quickly. Az made sure the information came out portraying us as victors—able to defeat any challenge Hybern throws our way."

"We did that today," Feyre said. It was not the same, the other High Lords would not take the news well. Rhys echoed her thoughts out loud.

"It's different. The first time, we had the element of their surprise to excuse us. This second time ... it makes us look unprepared. Vulnerable. We can't risk that getting out before the meeting in ten days. So for all appearances, we will remain unruffled as we prepare for war."

Mor sagged against the couch cushions. "A war where we have no allies other than Keir, either in Prythian or beyond it."

"No allies yet, but I think Helion and Thesan will meet with us, maybe Kallias too."

Rhys gave Vel a sharp look. It was not enough, his eyes seemed to say. The solar courts he would have been able to convince himself. And yet ...

"The queen might come," Elain chimed quietly from the couch.

Silence. Elain was staring at the unlit fireplace.

"What queen," Nesta said tightly.

"The one who was cursed."

"Cursed by the Cauldron," Feyre clarified to Nesta, pushing off the archway. "When it threw its tantrum after you ... left."

"No." Elain studied Feyre, then Nesta. Then her eyes slid to Vel. "Not that one. The other."

Vel's breath caught in her throat. Elain's brown eyes were glazed, fixated on someone or something far away. Her pupils were blown, but what should have been black was a murky gray, reminiscent of clouds before a storm. Azriel asked something that Vel didn't hear.

Elain's brows knitted together in concentration. "The queen—with the feathers of flame."

"A seer." And not just any seer. Elain had said the queen might come. A seer that saw a branching future just like her.