Chapter Text
CHAPTER I
pet problem.
Light. Cold. Stiff. Traumatized.
Christina breathes in what seemed to be months of dust that had built up on the airy duvet surrounding her. She runs her hands down the comforter before finally letting her eyes flash open.
Spring Court. She never thought she’d see this pale green bedroom again. After everything that happened Under the Mountain, her only hopes were to see the sky just one more time. She wonders in slight horror who carried her body back to the Spring Court. Everyone who was Under the Mountain was utterly petrified of her.
How that time had changed everything.
She remembered every second of it. The sound of the whip cracking against Lucien’s back. Tamlin’s unflinching demeanor to her torture. The Attor slicing her body and severing her arm. Rhysand bloodied on the floor of the throne room. Melting the flesh from Amarantha’s skull.
If they called me a monster, what do you think they’ll call you?
Christina looks at her hand and is surprised to see Rhysand’s tattoos remain, though they’re completely blackened and charred. She presses a finger against one line, and it crumbles completely. She sucks in the copious amounts of dust in the room and replaces the lines of tattoo. The dust was unfortunately a darker shade than her sandstone skin, stubbornly standing out still. Though the connection between her and Rhysand was severed the moment she let that red energy take over, the design still persisted. She bet it would make him laugh. Couldn’t get rid of me, could you? She could imagine him saying.
Christina rouses herself from the thought and turns to the wooden bedroom door, noticing the soft tinkering of piano keys in the distance.
Tamlin.
She recognizes the song instantly. It was the same one he played for her the day they shared their first kiss. As she exited the bedroom to follow the sound, adding a quick oversized dress to replace her charred clothes, she felt suddenly nervous. What was she going to say? He did nothing Under the Mountain. Nothing. It made her angry. Confused. Sad. Bitter.
As she walks silently down the hall, the sound continues to get louder as she finds herself now halted in front of the closed study door. The music was soft, caressing, a memory of a simpler time.
As she places her hand on the doorknob, a flash of Rhys crosses her mind, his head tilted back in laughter. When Winter Court runs out of snow, they put Rhysand on the mountain tops.
The thought alone fills her with joy, and then overwhelming guilt as she turns the handle.
Tamlin sat hunched over his piano, his back to Christina. He was sporting an off-white tunic, dark grey cotton trousers and noticeably his leather baldric was missing. His hair had grown considerably since she last saw him, with his golden locks passing just below his shoulders now.
As Christina approaches, a dip in the wood causes a loud creak, alerting him to her presence. He turns and Christina can’t help but gasp at the face that turns to her. She had only seen a brief glimpse of it before she flew off from Under the Mountain, Tamlin without his golden wolf mask. Despite all the feelings of confusion and sadness and anger - he was just as handsome as she had pictured.
Tamlin stands slowly, his face a mix of utter disbelief and relief.
“How long was I—?”
“Too long.”
Tamlin rushes over and scoops her up into a bone-crushing hug. The warmth of his presence was overwhelming, all of it was. He nuzzles his nose into her neck, whispering onto it, “I missed you so much…”
He pulls back and frames her face with his hands, regarding the now tan-colored tattoos. He shakes his head, smiling, “We’ll find something to do about that, later.” And swoops down to press his lips firmly against hers. She couldn’t think, couldn’t process. Everything just felt confusing and weird. And it felt… wrong.
The door to the study suddenly swings open, causing Tamlin to jerk up from Christina’s lips. Lucien enters carrying several files of varying size and color. He hadn’t even noticed the two of them intertwined within one another, “Tam, we need —”
Finally, he peers up and freezes in place, “By the Cauldron… Christina?”
She smiles wide, her friend, Lucien. She approaches him slowly, weirdly missing that fox-mask of his, “You look so different without your mask.”
“Better, right?”
Christina and Lucien embrace in a tight hug, a wave of relief crashing over her. He was okay, he was alright, he was here, alive and seemingly well. Christina can’t help but have horrible flashes of Lucien pass through her mind, that terrible sound that emitted as Rhysand gripped his mind.
“I need to talk to you.” Christina pulls back and grips Lucien by his shoulders, “Rhys and I had a plan, I never meant for you to get hurt —!”
“It’s okay.” He reassures. He closed his eyes that day, ready to die — “No, it’s not, it killed me, it killed me to see you get hurt. I—I didn’t know what else to do.” Tears well up on her eyeline and Lucien laughs, “It’s okay, I’m okay, look—!”
Lucien steps out of her grasp and gives her a twirl. She would’ve laughed, had Tamlin not come in from behind to wrap his arms around her tightly, laying several kisses along the side of her head and neck.
Lucien grimaces at the sight, “Keep it in your pants, Tam. Come on.”
“Get out.” He growls.
“Hold on.” Christina holds out her hands, backing Tamlin off from her. She lets out an exhausted laugh, “—how long have I been out?”
Tamlin and Lucien exchange a concerned look, then Lucien nods for Tamlin to answer. He sighs, “It’s been a year since you killed Amarantha.”
A year.
“We’ll need to alert the other courts that you’ve resurfaced.” Lucien says, as though reminding Tamlin of this caveat as well.
Tamlin seemed nervous by this idea, “We could host an event. A party. Here at the house.” He says, each word soothing the High Lord’s nerves.
“That’s an excellent idea.” Lucien snaps a finger, ready to rush off when Christina stops him.
“Wait—that’s a terrible idea, did you think I forgot what happened before I left?” She’d never be able to scrub her brain clean from the screams she heard from the High Fae trapped down there – faerie-killer — “All their faces… even your faces… you were so scared.”
“We were worried about you.” Lucien promises. She looks down at those tattoos that ran up her arms, a constant reminder of her time there. She sighs, defeated, “I need time… I know it’s been a year for you, but it’s been a minute for me.”
“Of course.” Tamlin pats a hand on her shoulder, like a coach to a little leaguer, “Whatever you need.”
“I need you to tell me what I missed.” She announces, “And more importantly I need to tell you why I did what I did Under the Mountain. Because if I were you, I’d hate me right now.” She finishes, breathless once again from her grief. Lucien shakes his head, looking at her with such sorrow, “Christina, we… we thought you were dead. We grieved you.”
She turns to Tamlin, eyes pleading with him, “I knew she’d never hurt you; you have to know this.”
“I do.” He reassures.
She flips to Lucien, giving him the same begging look, “Could you see me in your head? Rhys and I had a plan—!”
Tamlin clears his throat loudly, “We don’t — need to talk about this anymore.”
She frowns. Lucien sees the tension between them and throws a lazy arm around her shoulder,
“We’re just happy to have you back. There’s a lot you need to catch up on.”
Lucien wasn’t joking.
In the year since Christina had killed Amarantha, Under the Mountain had been completely dismantled. Sealed shut and the door destroyed, all its inhabitants, including the Attor, returned to their original courts. In Amarantha’s fifty-year reign, all the courts sustained catastrophic damage to their towns and people. The main focus after everything now was peace – peace and rebuilding.
Indeed, the High Lords had their powers returned to them upon Amarantha’s death, the Spring Court’s curse reversed per their mask-free faces. It was the happily ever after Christina was hoping for when she and Tamlin walked hand in hand into Under the Mountain. Mission accomplished!
Then why didn’t it feel like a happy ending?
Tamlin rationalized her avoidant and standoffish behavior as a result of the traumas she faced Under the Mountain and gratefully gave Christina the space she needed to try and come up with a gameplan for her next steps, whatever they may be. But, before she could even think about her new life in Prythian, her fresh start at the Spring Court, she felt the need to revisit her crash site. Once where she camped, next where she retreated to, and finally where she nearly died.
Arriving at the site the next day was more emotional than she had expected.
Christina sat atop that cliff that overlooked a massive and ancient green expanse of woods below. Over her time here, she had come to love it all. Eternal spring.
She felt anything but eternal spring.
She was so sad. So sad and so lost. Christina came to this world with relaxation in mind, and what she discovered instead was a breed of immortal hierarchical tyrants, hellbent on depravity and maniacal rites. She wanted to leave, but something, something deep within her tethered her to this realm, to these people, to the Meeting Place.
A presence steps out from behind an ancient tree trunk. Christina quickly wipes her tears away and turns to see Lucien approaching from the tree line.
“It was Rhysand who found you.” He answers her unasked question. She turns to the crack in the ground and unceremoniously seals it back together, “How?”
Lucien is now at her side, staring at the ground she just mended, as though nothing important had ever happened there, “Do you refer to this spot as the Meeting Place?”
The question hit her with a pang of nostalgia. Rhysand must’ve chased after her once she left Under the Mountain.
Lucien continues, confirming her suspicions, “He asked Tamlin almost a year ago, where the ‘Meeting Place’ was.” He shifts his weight to one leg, leaning against the tree he stepped away from, “I gave him your lyrics.”
“You kept them?”
“Of course.” She regards Lucien for a moment. Her fox-masked friend. You should see the delicious thoughts he has about you, Rhysand once revealed.
“He must’ve gotten into my head as I was… spiraling. I crashed here and thought how ironic, to be crashing into the Meeting Place.” She says with a forced laugh, no part of her was laughing. Not now. Not after everything.
Lucien takes another daring step towards her, “Tamlin doesn’t see it, but I do. You’ve changed since you entered the mountain.”
She doesn’t even turn to regard him, her eyes still fixed on the grass, “How could I not?”
“Whatever happened, whatever Rhys did to you, for Tamlin’s sake you need to let it go.” She throws him a dirty look, whatever Rhys did to me – “What are you talking about?”
Lucien wasn’t offended by her look, though, “You’re different. You avoid him like the plague. He notices it but thinks it’s just from everything you went through.”
How pathetic that Lucien sees through the charade, but Tamlin can’t? Another reason to leave. “And you think differently?”
“I remember that day in Rhysand’s room.”
His words ring hollowly through her. She remembered that day as well. She had defended Rhysand against him. Said there were bigger fish to fry when he suggested killing Rhys. The bastard, he had called him.
Lucien shifts uncomfortably, and there’s a moment where it seems he may not continue the train of thought at all. Christina lets out a pointed exhale, “Speak. I hate this type of dancing.”
“Tamlin did everything in his power to make sure you exited the mountain safe and unharmed.”
She couldn’t help but scoff. Christina couldn’t even bear to look at Lucien, her eyes fixed on the beautiful vista ahead, “Did he, now?”
“I know you don’t believe it.”
She rolls her eyes, already deeply over this conversation, “Perhaps I looked at the culmination of my experiences Under the Mountain and came to a reasoned conclusion.”
Lucien sees her rejecting every notion, and grabs her by the shoulders, forcing her to face him, “Christina, listen to me, listen to your friend; your friend you’ve known since you first entered Prythian.” He looked so different without the mask. The facial scar was much more noticeable now, and she couldn’t help but feel sorry for him. She wondered if he felt a kinship to her with her facial tattoos, making her look as though she were perpetually crying.
He gently gives her a shake, “Tamlin did everything he could to protect you Under the Mountain. I know you think he stood by and did nothing, and I promise you, that’s just not true.”
Lucien drops his hands with a sigh while Christina thought back to all the times she saw Tamlin Under the Mountain. The memories fuel her anger as she turns to Lucien, “Can you give me an example of how he protected me?”
Was it the dinner with Amarantha and the High Lords, where he did nothing to stop Rhysand from controlling me? Couldn’t have been the breakfast with Amarantha and Rhysand where he did not utter a single word.
“How he kept me safe?”
Not when the summer lordling Rhysand had killed, where Tamlin stood by and watched. Not the day the Attor carved me within an inch of my life – the day he didn’t even flinch. Or perhaps he protected me at the party where I danced all night in that horrible skimpy outfit, the High Fae spitting on me.
Tamlin didn’t even bother to meet my eyes that night.
“Can you show me how he didn’t in fact do nothing?”
Did you forget Tamlin didn’t even save you the day Rhysand was meant to melt your mind? Tamlin didn’t even cry out when Christina’s spine nearly snapped as Amarantha tortured her to what she had thought would be Christina’s undoing. He sat there and watched. He did nothing.
“Talk to him.” Lucien pleads.
“So, no, is the answer then.”
“Why are you so angry?”
“I was left to die!” She screams, her voice disturbing several birds in the area as they cawed and flew off. “I was left to suffer! You were hurt, and I will rake myself over the coals for that every single day until I finally burst like the goddamn sun, but Tamlin was not. You visited me. Tamlin did not. Not one moment, not one fleeting fucking second did he try.”
What she expected to be a gut-punch of emotion for Lucien ended up turning his countenance sour, “What did you expect? He was under constant watch down there. He was at her side twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, are you seriously blaming him for that?”
It hurt deeply. She didn’t want to admit it but pouring her heart out to her friend to only have his boss’ wishes forced upon her once again… it hurt.
She shrugs, tired now, “I just thought he’d try harder. Fight harder. And the worst part is that it’s not even surprising.” Lucien lifts an eyebrow, and she explains, “When Rhysand broke into Spring Court? ‘Oh, don’t worry, Christina, I’ll protect you, I’ll do anything to protect you!’ This is anything? That faerie died on the dining room table, I asked him how he’d retaliate, how he’d ensure this would never happen again. What did he say? ‘Ugh, I have to bury him. Wish we could do more! But alas, nothing to be done’.”
She was so, so bitter. Even Lucien could tell, “Christina, this isn’t you. This isn’t right.”
“Maybe you don’t fucking know me then.” She snaps angrily. Lucien seemed hurt, but she was too bitter to even care.
Lucien says softly, “I know you don’t believe that.”
Christina plops herself down at the Meeting Place’s cliff’s edge, her feet dangling below the lush valley below. Christina’s voice was low, laced with frustration. “Maybe I’m just pissed I was left to die.”
Lucien didn’t join her, “Yeah, maybe he’s just pissed you tried tooth and nail to have Amarantha torture him.”
Christina stiffened, snapping back at him, “I knew she wouldn’t!” But Lucien’s tone was cold, cutting through her defense, “Did you know she wouldn’t torture me?”
A flicker of hesitation crossed her face before she sighed, “I knew she would. To a point, though.”
His laugh was bitter, “Glad I could be the pawn in your game then.”
Christina’s anger flared, this was the last thing she needed, I tried my fucking best, and I was the only one actually fucking trying! How dare he do this now? After everything!
“Fuck you, Lucien.” She snarls. Lucien stepped closer, his voice rising, “Fuck me? Fuck me!?”
She finally turns to him, eyes narrowing, “Yeah, fuck you.” Her voice was harsh, her words sharp. “I was put in an impossible situation and still managed to make it out, killing your fucking captor and releasing you from your curse. You’re fucking welcome.”
For a moment, there was only the sound of their ragged breaths. Then Lucien’s voice softened, edged with exhaustion, “Talk to Tamlin, Christina. Then you can run off to your next world.”
By the time Christina had picked up a stone to throw at him, he was already gone.