The Rose and the Sinbound

Chapter 6: Was it a dream?

The day slipped past like a fever dream—fleeting moments lost in the haze of worry as I tried to stitch together plans to save my court from the encroaching darkness. One idea surfaced from the chaos: reckless, desperate, and just mad enough to work. What if I invited Lysander, the human general, to the Court of Immortals? A symbol of mortal defiance might make the high fae listen, force them to see what lay beyond their narrow worlds. Or they could kill him before he spoke a single word. I imagined a pair of motel eyes as they regarded me, cool and calculating. Humans hailed him as their king, but here, he'd be nothing more than a curiosity—or a corpse.

The thought of it unnerved me. Not because Lysander was human, or even because I feared for his life. It was the strange weight in my chest, the way his gaze in my imagination of him stayed with me, as if threading a connection through worlds that shouldn't intertwine. Why did I even care what happened to him?

As I mulled over these tangled thoughts, something cold crept into the room—an invisible shadow pressing against my chest. The breath caught in my throat. Darkness. It wasn't the soft night of the fae, full of whispers and magic. This was suffocating, gnawing, as if I'd stumbled into the mouth of some unseen beast.

I gasped, clawing at the nothingness, but the weight only tightened until my pulse thundered in my ears. Then, just as quickly, it vanished. Air rushed into my lungs, leaving me gasping, my skin clammy with cold sweat that clung like wet silk. I bolted upright, shoving tangled sheets aside as panic tightened its grip on me.

"What... what was that?" I whispered into the darkness, my voice barely audible over the pounding of my heart.

Staggering to the balcony doors, I threw them open and stepped into the night. Cool air rushed in, carrying the scent of night-blooming jasmine and the distant hum of wings—small fairies flitting among the flowers. The breeze kissed my skin, but it did little to chase away the remnants of fear clinging to me. That presence... it wasn't just a dream.

Below, the moonlight bathed the rose garden in silver, making the petals gleam like spilled starlight. My breath hitched. A figure shifted among the roses, cloaked in shadow—its movements unnatural, like smoke twisting into bone and back again. My pulse surged. Unseelie? Or something worse?

Without a second thought, I leapt from the balcony, landing softly on the damp grass. The figure melted into the shadows as I gave chase, my bare feet slipping over dewy earth. I could feel it ahead of me, just out of reach, teasing me with every turn it took through the maze of roses.

Then—wham! A solid force collided into my face, knocking me off balance. I looked up, bracing for a fight, only to meet a familiar face.

"Silver," I breathed. The tiny dew fairy hovered above me, her wings trembling. Even under the soft moonlight, her gray eyes were wide with fear, darker than I'd ever seen them.

"Miss... you shouldn't be out here," she whispered, wringing her small hands. "That thing—it was watching you. Waiting. I saw it... bones and smoke... bones and gold." Her words tumbled out, frantic, breathless.

"Not fae?" I murmured, heart pounding. "Not Unseelie?"

Silver shook her head so violently that her curls bounced like droplets of water. "Not fae. Not even mortal," she whispered, her voice breaking with terror. "It didn't have magic—it had... power. Raw, terrible power."

Her words chilled me more than the night air. Fairies couldn't lie—not without turning to dust. If Silver was telling the truth, whatever had been in the garden wasn't part of any realm I knew.

"Silver," I whispered, offering my hand to the trembling creature. She clung to my finger, her tiny body quaking with silent sobs.

"It will come again," she murmured, her tears warm against my skin. "You have to be careful. It... it wants you."

Her words pressed against my mind, heavy as iron. I felt the ground tilt beneath me, as though I were standing on the edge of a precipice, looking down into something vast and unknown.

Then, a shadow fell over us both. I looked up, heart sinking.

"Rose," my father called softly from the garden's edge, his silhouette framed against the night sky. His face was haggard, lined with exhaustion that went deeper than sleep could cure. "I've been looking for you."

Silver let go of me, melting into the mist with a final shudder, her form evaporating like morning dew.

"What is it?" I asked, rubbing my thumbing forehead.

"A letter arrived," my father said, his voice heavy. "From the Immortal Court."

Cold dread knotted in my gut. Letters from the Immortal Court were never good. They were promises wrapped in riddles, threats woven in silk.

"What did it say?" I asked, my throat dry.

He hesitated, as though reluctant to speak the words aloud. His gaze drifted toward the distant horizon, where the stars blurred with the darkness.

"They believe you have a connection to Sorin." His voice cracked under the weight of the admission. "They want you, Rose. They want to claim you as their own. The unseelie priestess does"

I stared at him, disbelief and fear warring in my chest. "Claim me? For what?"

"I don't know." His expression twisted with helplessness. "But they're not the only ones. Orion—" He faltered, pain flickering across his face. "Orion already has a claim on you. I told them that."

His meaning settled over me like a shroud. Orion. The arranged marriage. It was no longer just a political alliance—it was a lifeline. If I didn't bind myself to Orion, the Immortal Court would take me, for reasons I couldn't begin to understand.

"You need to leave for the Day Court," my father continued, his voice brittle. "Strengthen the bond with him. Make it unbreakable. The Immortal Court will support us only if—"

He stopped, but he didn't need to finish the sentence. I already knew the rest.

I was a bargaining chip. A pawn on a board I didn't choose to play on. My heart twisted with anger, with despair. The life I wanted—the freedom I craved—was slipping further out of reach with every passing moment.

I looked up at the stars, their light distant and indifferent, and felt the weight of inevitability settle on my shoulders.

There would be no escaping it.

I was no longer just Rhosyn. I was Rose—a flower meant to be plucked and offered, a gift wrapped in thorns, pretty but dangerous, yet never truly my own.

And my future? It wasn't mine anymore.