A Court of Silver Flames

by Sarah J. Maas

  “You’re not a coward.”

  “You said I was the other day.”

  Nesta winced. “I spoke in anger.”

  “You spoke truth. I stayed awake that night thinking of it. And then you had Cassian deliver the spices and tea and I realized that there is a world out there. A vast, vibrant world. Maybe these lessons will make me a little less scared of it.”

  Nesta offered a tentative smile. “Sounds like a good enough reason to me.”

  Cassian watched Rhys’s face carefully as Nesta and Emerie spoke, and Gwyn drifted over to join them. Promises of books to be swapped filled the air.

  Rhys said to him, This is an interesting development.

  Cassian didn’t bother to make his face look pleasant. I could have done without you giving Nesta a mental warning.

  Rhys’s brows narrowed. How did you know I did that?

  The bastard didn’t even try to deny it.

  I noticed the way she tensed. And I know you well, brother. You saw Gwyn and thought the worst of Nesta. She’s treated her—and Emerie—with kindness.

  That’s what pissed you off?

  I’m pissed off that you can’t seem to believe even one good thing about her. That you refuse to fucking believe one good thing about her. Was it necessary to bait her like that?

  Regret glimmered in Rhys’s eyes.

  Cassian went on, You’re not making it easier. Let her build these bonds, and stay the hell out of it.

  Rhys blinked. I’m sorry. I will.

  Cassian blew out a breath. Rhys added, Did you really feel you had to put your arm around her shoulders to restrain her?

  I don’t want the two of you within three feet of each other. You have a pregnant mate, Rhys. You’ll kill anyone that presents a threat to Feyre. You’re a danger to all of us right now.

  I’d never harm someone Feyre loves. You know that.

  There was enough tension in the words that Cassian clapped his brother on the shoulder, squeezing the hard muscle beneath. Maybe drop Emerie off on the other side of the House tomorrow. Give Nesta some time to sort her shit out.

  All right.

  The three females approached them. Rhys opened his wings and said to Emerie, “Shall we?”

  Emerie took the hand Rhys extended. “Yes.” She looked to Cassian, then to Nesta, and said, “Thank you.”

  Damn if it didn’t hit him in the heart, that gratitude and hope in Emerie’s eyes.

  Rhys gathered her to him, careful of the intimate press of her wings against his body, and shot into the sky.

  As Rhys soared above the House’s wards, just before he winnowed to Windhaven, he said to Cassian, I don’t know what the fuck the two of you have been doing in this House, but it reeks of sex.

  Cassian snorted. A polite male never tells.

  Rhys’s laughter rumbled in his mind. I don’t think you know what the word polite means.

  Thank the gods for that.

  His brother laughed again. I told Az playing chaperone would be useless.

  CHAPTER

  29

  Nesta’s legs gave out on step three thousand.

  Panting, sweat running down her back, down her stomach, she braced her hands on her trembling thighs and closed her eyes.

  The dream had been the same. Her father’s face, filled with love and fear, then with nothing as he died. The crack of his neck. Hybern’s sly, cruel smile.

  Cassian and Azriel hadn’t been at dinner, and she’d received no explanation for it. They were probably either at the river house or out in the city, and she’d been surprised to find herself wishing for the company. Surprised to find that the silence of the dining room pressed on her.

  Of course she wouldn’t be invited out. She’d made a point to be as unpleasant as possible for well over a year now. And more than that, they had no obligation to include her in everything.

  No one had any obligation to include her at all. Or the desire to, apparently.

  Her panting echoed off the red stone. She’d awoken from the nightmare in a cold sweat, and had been halfway here before she realized where she was going. If she even made it to the bottom, where would she go? Especially in her nightgown.

  She could still see her father behind her closed eyes. Felt every flash of horror and pain and fear she’d endured during those months surrounding the war.

  She had to find the Dread Trove—somehow.

  She’d failed every task they’d ever given her. Had failed to stop the wall from being blasted apart, failed to save the Illyrian legion from the Cauldron’s incinerating blow—

  Nesta shut down that train of thought.

  Something thudded on the step beside her, and she blinked to find a glass of water.

  “Thank you,” she said, drinking deep, letting its coolness settle her further. She asked into the dimness, “Have you read any books by Sellyn Drake?”

  The House didn’t answer, which she assumed amounted to a no. “A friend is bringing me one of her novels tomorrow. I’ll share it with you when I’m done.”

  Nothing. Then a cool breeze ran down the stairwell, soothing her sweaty brow. “Thank you,” she said again, leaning into the breeze.

  Something else clinked beside her on the step, and she found two flat oval stones and three chunks of age-browned bone—anklebones of some ovine beast. Her mouth dried out. Bones and stones—for scrying. “I can’t,” she rasped.

  That breeze knocked the bones together, their clicking like a question thrown into the stairwell. Why?

  “Bad things happened the last time. The Cauldron looked at me. And took Elain.” She couldn’t stop her body from locking up. “I can’t endure it, risk it. Not even for this.”

  The bones and stones vanished, along with that cooling breeze.

  Nesta began the ascent, groaning softly. With each step, she could have sworn she tasted disappointment in the air.

  “Nesta has to start looking for the Trove,” Amren said, swirling her wine in its glass as she sat across from Cassian at the river house’s massive dining table. Their monthly court dinner, as usual, had turned into hours of talking around this table, and multiple bottles of wine later, as the clock ticked toward one in the morning, none of them showed any signs of moving.

  Only Feyre had gone to bed. Being pregnant made her unbearably sleepy, she’d groused. So tired that she needed naps throughout the day, and was asleep most nights by nine.

  Cassian met Amren’s gray stare. “Nesta’s been looking. Don’t push her.”

  Rhys said from where he lounged at the head of the table, “She’s had the priestesses researching for her. I’d hardly call that looking.”

  Varian, seated beside Amren, his arm draped over the back of her seat, asked, “You still haven’t asked Helion to research the Trove in his libraries?” Varian was the only person outside of the Night Court—and Eris—whom Rhys had allowed to know of their search. But it had come with a risk: Varian served Tarquin, High Lord of the Summer Court. Though he had promised Rhys not to say anything about it to Tarquin without prompting, if Tarquin asked Varian about it, he’d find his allegiances held in a precarious balance.

  Tarquin and Rhys’s relationship had healed since the war, but not enough for Rhys to trust the male with knowledge of the Trove. And Cassian, who’d gotten into one tiny little fight that might have resulted in one tiny little building being destroyed the last time he’d been in the Summer Court, was inclined to agree. Not about Tarquin. No, he liked the male. And liked Varian a great deal. But there were wicked people in the Summer Court—in every court—and he did not trust that they were as kind as their ruler.

  “Helion is a last resort,” Rhys said, sipping his wine. “Which we may come to in a matter of days if Nesta does not at least attempt a scrying.” The last words were directed toward Cassian. “I’d have Elain try her hand before we approach him, though.”

  Elain had already departed with Feyre, claiming she had to be up with the dawn to tend to an elderly faerie’s garden
. Cassian didn’t exactly know why he suspected this wasn’t true. There had been some tightness in Elain’s face as she’d said it. Normally when she made such excuses, Lucien was around, but the male remained in the human lands with Jurian and Vassa.

  Cassian countered, “Nesta will do it, if only to keep Elain from putting herself at risk. But you have to understand that Nesta was deeply affected by what happened during the war—Elain was taken by the Cauldron after she scried. You can’t blame her for hesitating.”

  Amren said, “We do not have the time to wait for Nesta to decide. I say we approach Elain tomorrow. Better to have both of them working on it.”

  Azriel stiffened, an outright sign of temper from him as he said quietly, “There is an innate darkness to the Dread Trove that Elain should not be exposed to.”

  “But Nesta should?” Cassian growled.

  Everyone stared at him.

  He swallowed, offering an apologetic glance to Az, who shrugged it off.

  Amren drained her wine and said to Cassian, “Nesta has a week. One more week to find the Trove with her own methods. Then we seek out other routes.” She threw a nod toward Azriel. “Including Elain, who is more than capable of defending herself against the darkness of the Trove, if she chooses to. Don’t underestimate her.”

  Cassian and Azriel looked to Rhys, who merely sipped from his own wine. Amren’s order held. As Rhys’s Second in this court, short of Rhys overruling her, her word was law.

  Cassian glowered at Amren. “It’s not right to wield Elain as a threat to manipulate Nesta into scrying.”

  “There are harsher ways to convince Nesta, boy.”

  Cassian leaned back in his chair. “You’re a fool if you think threats will make her obey you.”

  Everyone tensed again. Even Varian.

  Amren’s lips spread in a sharp grin. “We are on the cusp of another war. We let the Cauldron slip from our hands in the last one and it nearly cost us everything.” Amren’s new Fae form was proof of that—she’d yielded her immortal, otherworldly self to remain in this body. No gray fire glowed in her eyes. She was mortal, in the way that High Fae were mortal. Varian’s fingers tangled in the blunt ends of her hair, as if to reassure himself that she was here, she’d remained with him. “We must head off this potential disaster before we lose the advantage. If we need to manipulate Nesta into scrying, even by using Elain against her, then we’ll do what is necessary.”

  His stomach tightened. “I don’t like it.”

  “You don’t have to like it,” Amren said. “You just have to shut up and do as you’re told.”

  “Amren,” Rhys said, the word laced with reprimand and warning.

  Amren didn’t so much as blink in remorse, but Varian frowned at her. “What?” she snapped.

  The Prince of Adriata gave her an exasperated smile. “Haven’t we talked about this? About … being nice?”

  Amren rolled her eyes. But her face softened—ever so slightly—as she met Cassian’s stare again. “A week. Nesta gets a week.”

  Three days passed. Emerie came to each lesson, and while Gwyn had mostly caught up to Nesta’s progress, Emerie would need more work. So Nesta and Gwyn partnered with each other, going through the sets of exercises that Cassian showed them before he worked one-on-one with Emerie on her balance and mobility.

  None of them minded, not when Emerie had been right about the Sellyn Drake books. Nesta had stayed up two nights in a row reading the author’s first novel, which was as toe-curlingly erotic as she could have wished. And, as promised, Emerie had brought a copy of one of Drake’s tamer novels for Gwyn, who had arrived blushing the next morning and told Emerie that if the book was considered tame, then she could only imagine the content of the others.

  After that first day, Emerie stayed for the entire length of their lessons, which had now officially stretched into a full three hours, deciding that her morning business traffic was slow enough to risk it. So they trained, and between their exercises they talked about books, and Nesta woke on the fourth morning and found herself … excited to see them again.

  She was shelving a tome in the library that afternoon when Gwyn found her. Thanks to Gwyn’s lesson each morning, she’d been busier in the afternoons, which meant that Nesta rarely saw her in the library save for when Gwyn was running through the stacks, hunting for some book or another for Merrill. Occasionally, Nesta heard a lovely, soaring snippet of song from some distant corner of the library—the sole indicator that Gwyn was near.

  But that afternoon, it was Gwyn’s panting that announced her presence seconds before she appeared, her eyes wide enough that Nesta went on alert, scanning the dimness behind the priestess. “What?” Had the darkness below chased her?

  Gwyn mastered herself enough to say, “I don’t know how, but Merrill learned you swapped the book out.” She gasped for air as she pointed up to a level high above. “You should go.”

  Nesta frowned. “Who cares? I’m not going to let her scare me off like some errant child.”

  Gwyn blanched. “When she’s in a fury, it is—”

  “It is what, Gwyneth Berdara?” crooned a female voice from the stacks. “When I’m in a fury, it is what?”

  Gwyn winced, turning slowly as the white-haired beauty appeared from the gloom. Her pale robes flowed behind her as if on a phantom wind, and the blue stone atop her hood flickered with light. Gwyn bowed her head, face paling. “I meant nothing by it, Merrill.”

  Nesta ground her teeth at the bow, the fear on Gwyn’s face, in her soft words.

  Priestesses halted along the railings above them.

  Merrill turned her remarkable eyes to Nesta. “I do not appreciate thieves and liars.”

  “Neither do I,” Nesta said coolly, lifting her chin.

  Merrill hissed. “You tried to play me for a fool in my very own office.” She didn’t so much as look at Gwyn, who cringed away.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Oh? You mean when I went to see the book that my inane assistant had incorrectly given me—oh, yes, I knew about that from the start—and found the proper volume instead, with your scent upon it, it wasn’t you who did it?” Merrill looked between Gwyn and Nesta. “It is inexcusable to ask others to make up for your own stupidity and carelessness.”

  Gwyn’s fear grated against her senses. Nesta said, voice dropping, “Gwyn did no such thing. And who cares? Are you so bored down here that you have to invent these dramas to entertain yourself?” She waved a hand to the open walkway behind Merrill. “We’re both busy. Clear off and let us work in peace.”

  Someone gasped on a level above.

  Merrill laughed, that phantom wind around her whispering. “Do you not know who I am, girl?”

  “I know that you are keeping us from our work,” Nesta said with that flat calm she knew made people irate. “And I know that this is a library, but you hoard books like it is your own personal collection.”

  Merrill bared her teeth. “You think I do not know you? The human girl who was shoved into the Cauldron and came out High Fae. The female who slew the King of Hybern and held up his head like a trophy as his blood rained upon her.”

  Surprise lit Gwyn’s face at the graphic description.

  Nesta didn’t allow herself to so much as swallow.

  “The wind whispers to me even here, under so much stone,” Merrill said. “It finds its way in through the cracks and murmurs the goings-on of the world in my ear.” Merrill snorted. “Do you think you are entitled to do as you please now?”

  Nesta’s power rumbled in her veins. She stomped on it, shoved it down and strangled it. “I think you like to hear yourself talk too much.”

  “I am descended from Rabath, Lord of the Western Wind,” Merrill seethed. “Unlike Gwyneth Berdara, I am no lackey to be dismissed.”

  To hell with this witch. To hell with restraint and hiding.

  Nesta let enough of her power simmer to the surface that she knew her own eyes glowed. Let it cr
ackle, even as she ignored its wild, unholy bellowing.

  Gwyn had backed away a step. Even Merrill blinked as Nesta said, “With a fancy title like that, surely such a petty grudge should be beneath you.”

  Nesta smiled, savage and cruel. Merrill only glanced between her and Gwyn before saying, “Get back to your work, nymph.”

  Wind snapping at her heels, Merrill stalked into the gloom.

  Nesta dropped the thread of her power, quelling its music and roaring with an iron hand.

  But it wasn’t until Merrill’s brisk wind faded that Gwyn leaned against a stack, rubbing her hands over her face. The priestesses who’d been watching launched into movement again, their whispering filling the library.

  Nesta asked into the rustling quiet, “Nymph?”

  Gwyn lowered her hands, noted the lack of glowing power in Nesta’s eyes, and sighed in relief. But her voice remained casual. “My grandmother was a river-nymph who seduced a High Fae male from the Autumn Court. So I’m a quarter nymph, but it’s enough for this.” Gwyn gestured to her large eyes—blue so clear it could have been the shallow sea—and her lithe body. “My bones are slightly more pliant than ordinary High Fae’s, but who cares about that?”

  Perhaps that was why Gwyn was so good at the balancing and movement.

  Gwyn went on, “My mother was unwanted by either of their people. She could not dwell in the rivers of the Spring Court, but was too untamed to endure the confinement of the forest house of Autumn. So she was given in her childhood to the temple at Sangravah, where she was raised. She partook in the Great Rite when she was of age, and I, we—my sister and I, I mean—were the result of that sacred union with a male stranger. She never found out who he was, for the magic chose him that night, and no one ever showed up to ask about twin girls. We were raised in the temple as well. I never left its grounds until … until I came here.”

  Such pain filled Gwyn’s eyes then. Such terrible pain that Nesta knew not to ask about her mother, or the twin sister.