Acotar retelling

Rebirth

I was far away but still seeing—seeing through eyes that weren't mine, eyes attached to a person who slowly rose from his position on a cracked, bloodied floor.

Amarantha's face slackened. There my body was, prostrate on the ground, my head snapped to one side at a horribly wrong angle. A flash of red hair in the crowd. Lucien.

Tears shone in Lucien's remaining eye as he raised his hands and tried to remove the fox mask.

His face grew confused at his inability to remove it. But my host was looking at Tamlin now, who slowly faced my dead body.

Tamlin's still-masked face twisted into something truly lupine as he raised his eyes to the queen and snarled. Fangs lengthened.

Amarantha backed away—away from my corpse. Tampon approached and then launched himself at her. He shifted into his beast form but when he lunged at her she easily side stepped him. He hit the ground hard, whirling to get back up and face her, his canine face confused.

My host's face widened in understanding and I felt a rush of power.

My bargain, the magic knew I loved Rhys and not Tamlin.

Night exploded. Violet and black fury punching out and throwing Amarantha into the wall.

She had no sooner landed than he gripped her by the neck, and the stones cracked as he shoved her against it with shadowy talons.

She thrashed but could do nothing against the brutal onslaught of Rhysand.

The Attor and the guards rushed for the queen, but several faeries and High Fae, their masks clattering to the ground, jumped into their path, tackling them. Amarantha screeched, kicking at Rhysand, lashing at him with her dark magic, but a wall of night encompassed him like a second skin. She couldn't touch him.

A sword hurtled through the air, a shooting star of steel.

Rhysand caught it in a single deft movement. Amarantha's scream was cut short as he drove the sword through her heart and into the stone beneath.

Silence fell.

Soon I was again staring down at my own broken body, but Rhysand didn't come any closer to my corpse, not as rushing paws—then a flash of light, then footsteps—filled the air. The beast was already gone. Tamlin slammed to his knees.

He scooped up my limp, broken body, cradling me to his chest. He hadn't removed his mask, but I saw the tears that fell onto my filthy tunic, and I heard the shuddering sobs that broke from him as he rocked me, stroking my hair.

"No," someone breathed—Lucien, his sword dangling from his hand. Indeed, there were many High Fae and faeries who watched with damp eyes as Tamlin held me.

Someone appeared beside Lucien—a tall, handsome brown-haired man with a face similar to his own. Lucien didn't look at his father, though he stiffened as the High Lord of the Autumn Court approached Tamlin and extended a clenched hand to him.

Tamlin glanced up only when the High Lord opened his fingers and tipped over his hand. A glittering spark fell upon me. It flared and vanished as it touched my chest.

Two more figures approached—both handsome and young. Through my host's eyes, I knew them instantly. The brown-skinned one on the left wore a tunic of blue and green, and atop his white-blond head was a garland of roses—the High Lord of the Summer Court. His pale-skinned companion, clad in colours of white and gray, possessed a crown of shimmering ice. Kallias, the High Lord of the Winter Court.

Chins raised, shoulders back, they, too, dropped those glittering kernels upon me, and Tamlin bowed his head in gratitude.

Another High Lord approached, also bestowing upon me a drop of light. He glowed brightest of them all, and from his gold-and-ruby raiment, I knew him to be High Lord of the Dawn Court. Then Helion, the High Lord of the Day Court, clad in white and gold, his dark skin gleaming with an inner light, presented his similar gift, and smiled sadly at Tamlin before he walked away.