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“Feyre,” Eris calls hesitantly after the High Lady of the Night Court.
She was… not quite a friend. But Feyre Archeron had shown him kindness, something that had surprised both him and the High Lady’s Inner Circle. And for that reason, she was perhaps the only one he felt comfortable enough to speak with outside of a professional setting, aside from Azriel who he hadn’t seen or heard from in weeks.
Rhysand glances between the two of them, unsure before Feyre reassures him with a nod, and then the hallway is empty. And filled with a terribly awkward silence.
“Is everything okay?” Feyre finally asks, giving him a comforting smile.
Eris has to resist shaking his head and instead looks up towards the ceiling and clears his throat. “Is there somewhere we could talk privately?”
“Of course.” She looks concerned for him, which seems ridiculous to Eris. There was no reason for her to be concerned for him, not related to what, or who, he wanted to discuss at least.
She loops her arm through his, hand resting in the crook of his elbow, and leads him down the hall. It’s such a casual movement that it startles Eris, there’s a clear contrast between the stoic High Lady he had been speaking with moments ago in their meeting and the kind female next to him.
The room is filled with paintings both finished and unfinished. Eris can see art clearly belonging to Nyx, a menace with plenty of personality and a flair for the dramatic at age 5, including an abundance of finger paintings and handprints on the walls in varying colors and shades.
There’s a total of 5 chairs in the room and Feyre and Eris move two so they can sit facing each other. Feyre sits in silence, waiting for him to speak, and Eris finds himself nervous.
“How-” Eris takes a deep breath and exhales quickly “- how is Azriel?”
She smiles, clearly relieved, having expected worse. Then she chuckles softly. “Out of everyone, I’d expect you to know.”
It’s like a switch has been flipped, Eris’ mind racing at the implications. In an instant, he was on the defensive and preparing for the stinging feeling on his skin. But it never came and Feyre hadn’t moved from her seat. Still, Beron’s voice is clear, “out of everyone I’d expect you to know.”
He was 17 when Beron had uttered those words and it had been something he wouldn’t, couldn’t, forget. He had been summoned to Beron’s study, expecting to be scolded for not getting a report in on time or for a mistake he had made in a meeting, he was met with something much worse.
Arawn was one of his guards, the same age as him, still so young but with so much promise. He had trusted him and one night that had led to something more. Something that led to sneaking kisses in dark corners, risking the brush of hands in a crowded ballroom where it was unlikely for anyone to notice, and praying to the mother that no passerbys would hear their laughter on the night they fell into bed after booking a room in a tavern that no nobility would even think of entering.
As Eris fell for the male, allowing his emotions to overrule his logic, he became foolish. He should have known one day someone would tell Beron, that it would never last. Their relationship should never have started in the first place.
Stupidly he asked why Arawn, his guard (never referred to as his lover where others could hear), was there.
“Out of everyone, I’d expect you to know.” Beron scoffed and shook his head. Dread pooled in Eris’ gut. “Your guard certainly does.”
Eris attempted to look Arawn in the eyes, to show him how sorry he was, to plead with him silently for forgiveness. It was his fault, he knew the risks.
“Father, please.” Eris hates the way his voice shakes, knows it’s a sign of weakness he’ll be punished for. “It was a mistake.”
“And you’re going to fix it.”
“It’s over. Nothing like this will happen again.”
“I’m sure it won’t.” Beron’s hands are curled into fists, knuckles turning white, Eris doesn’t want to think about what will happen when they no longer have an audience. “But we can’t allow this to get out, I will not allow your lapse in judgment to ruin our family.”
“Father, you don’t mean-” He couldn’t finish the sentence, could barely bring himself to look at Arawn who did nothing to mask his fear.
“This is your fault, if you hadn’t done this I wouldn’t need to fix it.”
Eris couldn’t look at Arawn as he grabbed the knife. “I’ll make it quick.” He whispered, Arawn nodded.
His cuts are precise and deep. Arawn is dead within seconds, still, Eris sees the pain in his eyes when he makes the mistake of looking into them. It’s something he knows will haunt him, that he’ll have to hope Arawn has forgiven him because he will never forgive himself.
Beron dismisses him quickly after that, saying he’ll handle the rest of the mess. ‘The mess’ not Arawn, not a person who Eris has killed, but ‘the mess’. Something to be dealt with swiftly and without much thought.
The knife clatters to the floor, Beron glares but doesn’t scold him for it as he scrambles out of the room.
His mother is in her chambers, separate from Beron’s, she only stayed in Beron’s chambers when he called for her. She’s looking at the sunset with a wistful expression when Eris stumbles in, tears streaming down his face, eyes burning, choking as he gasps for air around hiccuping sobs.
She doesn’t flinch the way she has before when Eris has startled her. There is something about her in this moment, something beyond the broken woman Beron had made her. Both a loving mother, reaching out to comfort her son, and a woman who had witnessed war and its horrors and would not look away as she gently washed the blood from Eris’ hands, whispering that it was not his fault (he knew it was and the moment his mother heard of what happened, if Beron deigned to tell her, she would know it was his fault too) and that here he was safe (another lie but a comforting one coming from his mother’s lips).
“Mama, mama” He repeats the word over and over again, forgetting to breathe until she hushes him gently.
She wipes at his face with a warm cloth, the way she did when he was a child and calming down after a tantrum, his breathing is deep and uneven and he’s sniffling but at least he’s stopped sobbing. His throat feels raw and he desperately needs a glass of water.
Of course, his mother knows this and she lifts a glass to his lips. “Drink.”
As he starts to calm down he feels a little ridiculous, rushing to his mother in tears, her having to comfort him as if he’s a child. Still, he nearly starts crying again when she pulls him into her arms, humming an old lullaby he only faintly remembers.
This tentative peace can’t last, Eris has to tell her what he’s done. He’d rather her find out he’s a monster from him than from Beron.
“Mama.” Eris’ voice breaks and she holds him tighter, rocking them back and forth. “Mama, I killed him, I loved him and I killed him and it’s my fault and I should never have let us get caught. I messed up, and he made me fix it, and now I feel worse. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, it’s my fault.”
His mother doesn’t respond, shushing him and guiding his head down so she can press a kiss to his hair.
“Sweetheart, I need you to breathe.”
“Sweetheart, I need you to breathe.” The voice is not his mother’s but it’s the first thing he’s able to focus on, that and the scarred hand on his cheek. He’s at odds, wanting to both pull away and lean into the touch.
The next thing he notices is how he’s trembling and how his jaw is clenched. He moves his hand to his knee, registering the feel of the fabric beneath his fingers.
He’s present enough to notice Feyre standing in the doorway and attempting to slip out unnoticed but not enough to care. He counts the number of paintings hanging on the walls and then focuses on the color and shape of the frames.
It’s the same routine every time he’s pulled back to that moment, the night he killed Arawn, but he’s never had someone here with him. He’s still shaken but gently guides Azriel’s hand away from his cheek, pushing it back to the shadowsingers side.
Slowly Eris stands and Azriel rises with him. He takes a step back and Azriel does not attempt to follow, the shadows do but with some silent command Azriel forces them to stall and they retreat entirely.
Eris thinks he would be grateful, knows he should be grateful if he weren’t busy thinking of what Beron would say, how he would react. Would Eris have to put a blade against his throat the way he did with Arawn? Surely Beron couldn’t, he wouldn’t dare risk war with the Night Court simply to save face and erase Eris’ mistakes.
“Eris-”
“Stop, just stop.” he snaps, squeezing his eyes shut. “I don’t want you here.”
Azriel sighs and Eris’ eyes snap open to glare at him. “It’s not that’s been much of an issue for you. Why are you even here now?”
“… Because Feyre said you needed me.”
Eris scoffs. “I haven’t seen you in weeks, clearly I don’t need you.”
Azriel briefly looks hurt before his expression turns to cool indifference. The look Azriel gives him, completely uncaring, hurts more than he wants to admit. He had become accustomed to seeing Azriel with his shields down.
“I can see you were faring so well in my absence.”
“Maybe it’s because I’m not dependent on you. I don’t need whatever’s going on between us.”
“Is there anything going on between us anymore?”
“I don’t know Azriel!” Eris ran a hand through his hair in frustration. “Why don’t you tell me since you took it upon yourself to disappear to mother knows where for weeks?”
“I’m sorry I didn’t know I had to inform you of my every move if I’m not where you can keep an eye on me.”
“That’s not the issue here.”
“Then what is?”
Eris shakes his head, huffing. “That I even let this happen, that I was worried because I didn’t know what happened to you. This was a mistake.”
“This or us?”
“Us, shadowsinger. It was stupid and we’ve both become foolish thinking it would last.”
“Is this about Beron?”
“No.” Eris bit back, sharply.
“He doesn’t know, Eris.”
“Well, he will. We can’t keep our secrets forever can we?”
Eris can hear the exhaustion in his voice, feel the weariness creeping into his bones. He can see the feeling mirrored on Azriel’s face. The shadowsinger of all people should have understood, this was for both of their safety. And even if Beron didn’t find out, didn’t kill them both, one day Azriel would get sick of hiding or simply sick of him. When that day came Eris knew he wouldn’t be able to give Azriel that, wouldn’t be strong enough to stop keeping secrets or to let him. It was why he was doing this now, pushing Azriel away while he could, before he caved and let Azriel stay before he could no longer keep Azriel safe.
“I’m leaving.”
“We need to talk about this, Vanserra. Before you do something stupid that you’ll regret.”
“I regret this! Everything I’ve done with you was stupid. I made a mistake and now I’m fixing it.” He smiles bitterly and laughs. “I’m leaving and I don’t want to see you again, tell your High Lord and Lady that they can send someone else if they wish to contact me. And don’t want your shadows anywhere near me.”
The shadowsinger nods face twisted in what Eris might call grief if he didn’t know the male better. “I understand. I’ll inform them now and the shadows will stay away.”
Then he’s gone and Eris’ breathing is picking up until he holds his breath and forgets he needs to breathe to live. All he could do was tell himself he did the right thing, that now they were both safe, but it somehow felt like a lie. He would just have to hope that if he repeated it enough he would believe it.