Chapter 1: Chapter 1: The Ultimatum
Summary:
Nesta's sanctuary of decay is invaded by Feyre, Rhysand, Amren, and Cassian, who demand that she change her life. They present her with two options: to be exiled with nothing or to submit to forced training. After a bitter confrontation, Nesta pretends to surrender, but secretly, she makes a decision that will change her destiny forever.
Chapter Text
The stench of stale alcohol and loneliness was the first thing that hit you when you walked in. To anyone else, the small apartment on the outskirts of Velaris would be a hovel. Empty bottles lay like fallen soldiers on every surface. Leftover food grew cold on plates, forgotten. Dirty clothes formed small mountains in the corners, and dust danced lazily in the few rays of sun that dared to enter.
To Nesta Archeron, however, it was a sanctuary.
Here, amid the clutter and decay, no one expected anything from her. The bottles didn't judge her. The shadows in the corners didn't whisper to her about the war, about the sister she couldn't protect, or the power that burned under her skin like a poison. This chaos was a reflection of her own interior, and because of that, it was honest. It was the only place in a world of shining heroes and glittering courts where she was allowed to simply be... ruins.
Lying on the frayed sofa, her gaze lost on the cracks in the ceiling, Nesta took the last sip of wine straight from the bottle. She didn't know what day it was. She didn't care. The days had blurred into one long, monotonous night since Feyre had brought her here. She had given her a home, given her money. Her sister called it a new beginning. Nesta called it a cage with invisible bars, a debt she could never repay.
That was why, when the knock came at the door—too firm, too authoritative to be a delivery person—every muscle in her body tensed. The sanctuary was about to be invaded.
She didn't move. Perhaps if she ignored them, they would leave. But she knew it was a futile hope. No one who knocked like that gave up easily.
The door opened without waiting for her permission, and the light from the hallway spilled inside, blinding. In the doorway, silhouetted against the glare, stood the figures of her family. No. Not her family. Her jailers.
Feyre, her face twisted in a concern that felt like an offense to Nesta. Beside her, Rhysand, the High Lord, his power swirling around him like a contained storm, his violet eyes scanning the room with cold disapproval. Behind them, Amren, small and lethal, her gaze as sharp as broken glass. And finally, closing the group, was him. Cassian. The Illyrian general, his arms crossed over his chest, his expression a mix of fury and a pain that Nesta refused to acknowledge.
The army had arrived. And she knew, with a certainty that chilled the blood in her veins, that they weren't here for a visit.
They were here to pass judgment.
Feyre was the first to speak, her voice soft and tinged with a pity that tasted like poison to Nesta.
“Nesta… we’ve been worried. You don’t answer our messages.”
Worried, Nesta thought with bitter mockery. Such a pretty word for “controlled.” She straightened slowly on the sofa, the movement deliberately languid, defiant. She wouldn't give them the satisfaction of seeing her rattled. She placed the empty bottle on the floor with a clink that echoed in the tense silence.
“I’ve been busy,” she replied, her voice hoarse from disuse and alcohol.
“Busy rotting in here?” Cassian snapped, taking a step forward. His patience, always a thin thread when it came to her, had already broken. His gaze swept over the disaster of the room, and Nesta felt the heat of shame rise in her neck, a weakness she hated. She crushed it before it could reach her cheeks.
“It’s my rot, General. I paid for it.” Every word was a sharpened dart.
“With our money,” Rhysand interjected, his voice calm but with an edge of steel. He hadn't moved from the threshold, but his power filled the room, pressing in on Nesta, leaving her breathless. It was a demonstration, a warning. I am the High Lord. You are nothing.
“A minor detail,” she retorted with a shrug.
It was Amren who finally stepped into the room, her steps as silent as a predator’s. She stopped in front of the coffee table, observing the chaos with an expression of pure disdain.
“This is over, girl. This pathetic spectacle of self-pity ends today.”
Nesta let out a laugh, a hollow, ugly sound.
“Oh, really? And what are you going to do? Stop paying for my wine? Kick me out of this palace?”
“We’re giving you two options,” Rhysand said, his tone leaving no room for negotiation. “The first is that you return to the human lands. Alone. No money, no support, no us. We will leave you at the border, and you will never see us again.”
A shiver ran through Nesta. It was the ultimate threat: exile. Oblivion. A small, terrified part of her screamed at the idea. But the larger part, the one forged in anger and resentment, clung to the thought. Alone? Free from their looks of pity and disappointment? It sounded dangerously close to peace.
“And the second option?” she asked, keeping her voice steady, not letting them see the tiny crack in her armor.
It was Feyre who answered, stepping forward, her hands clasped as if in prayer.
“The second option is that you come with us. To the House of Wind. You’ll train with Cassian. You’ll find a purpose. We’ll give you a home, Nesta. We’ll give you a chance.”
Another cage, Nesta thought instantly. A prettier one, with bars of wind and clouds, but a cage nonetheless. A purpose. The purpose they choose for me.
She looked from one to the other. Feyre's concern. Rhysand's unyielding power. Amren's disdain. Cassian's wounded fury. They were four walls, closing in on her. And in that moment, with an icy clarity, she knew she wasn't going to choose either of their options.
She was going to create a third.
Nesta rose from the sofa, and the movement, though slow, was charged with a new energy. She was no longer the apathetic woman from a moment ago. She was the cornered wolf finally baring her teeth. She crossed her arms, a deliberate imitation of Cassian’s stance, and an icy smile touched her lips.
“Two options,” she repeated, savoring the words with disdain. “Exile or a gilded cage. How generous. But I think you’re forgetting a third Archeron.”
Elain’s name was not spoken, but it hung in the air, dense and heavy. Feyre’s expression fractured, pain showing in her eyes. Rhysand visibly tensed, his power darkening at the edges. It was a low blow, and Nesta knew it. It was a perfect strike.
“Elain spends her days in the garden, smiling at her flowers, dreaming of a human lord who barely remembers her. She is broken, just as broken as I am, but in a prettier, more acceptable way. Where is her ultimatum? Where is her forced training?” Her voice was low, cutting, each word a shard of sharpened ice. “Ah, no. You leave her in peace. You allow her to live in her quiet misery because she isn’t an inconvenience. Because her pain is convenient.”
“That’s not fair, Nesta,” Feyre whispered, her voice broken.
“Fair?” Nesta laughed, the sound harsh and full of venom. “Don’t talk to me about justice, sister. You, who have an empire at your feet. Or is there only justice for queens and not for the broken weapons that are no longer useful?”
She turned to Rhysand, meeting his power without flinching.
“You will not lock me up for your convenience. And you will not exile me to cleanse your perfect city of my presence. If you force me into that house, I will make Cassian’s life a living hell. And if you cast me out, I will find a way to become a problem so great, you’ll wish you had killed me when you had the chance.”
The silence that followed was absolute. She had laid all her cards on the table—a total declaration of war. She saw the fury boiling in Rhysand’s eyes, the desperation in Feyre’s. She saw Cassian look down, a crack in his general’s facade. She had won. For a moment.
Finally, exhausted by her own venom, Nesta let her arms fall. She looked at the floor, allowing a calculated shadow of defeat to cover her face. She would give them what they wanted to see, the illusion that they had broken her.
“Fine,” she mumbled, the word barely audible. “The House of Wind. You win.”
She heard the collective sigh of relief. She saw the mistaken gratitude in Feyre’s eyes. They didn’t understand that her submission wasn’t a surrender. It was a maneuver. It was the silence of a strategist who had just seen the board and was already planning her own move, one they couldn’t anticipate.
Let me have my cage, she thought as they began to talk about preparations, their voices a distant hum. A clever bird knows to wait for the jailer to fall asleep to find the window open.
And that night, while Velaris slept under a blanket of stars, she would find hers.
Notes:
Thank you so much for reading to the end!
I'd love to read what you thought of this chapter in the comments.
I hope to see you in the next chapter!
Chapter 2: Burning the Bridges
Summary:
To ensure her freedom, Nesta confronts Cassian in a bitter and painful farewell. With words designed to wound, she breaks the bond between them once and for all. Although the act leaves her with an icy void, it solidifies her decision to disappear that very night.
Chapter Text
They left. Rhysand and Feyre with promises to send someone for her things, Amren with a final warning glare. They left Cassian behind, a guard of honor for the prisoner. He stood by the door, arms crossed, filling the small room with a tension so thick it was nearly suffocating. The silence stretched on, heavy with years of unspoken words and open wounds.
Nesta moved first. She walked to her meager pantry and pulled out a half-full bottle of wine. Her hand didn’t tremble. It was an act of pure defiance.
“Really?” Cassian said, his voice a low growl. “After all this?”
“Especially after all this,” she replied without looking at him. She poured the wine into the only clean glass she could find and leaned against the counter.
“You don’t have to do this, Nes. Not like this.”
The nickname, spoken with that familiar mix of frustration and an affection she could no longer bear, was like a match to a pool of oil. She turned to face him, her grey eyes like storm-forged steel.
“You don’t have the right to call me that. You lost that right the night you watched me fall down those stairs and did nothing.”
The blow landed. She saw the hurt flash across his face, as clear as lightning.
“You know that’s not how it was. I tried to help you.”
“Help me?” she laughed, a sound devoid of joy. “You looked at me with pity. You treated me like a broken little girl. Just like now. You come here with them, with your High Lord and Lady, to corner me and dictate my life because you’ve decided I’m not capable of handling it myself.”
“Look at yourself!” he exclaimed, finally exploding, taking a step toward her. “You’re not handling anything! You’re surviving on alcohol and self-hatred. Do you think this is a life? Do you think this is what any of us want for you?”
“What you want!” she spat, her voice rising to meet his. “That’s always been the problem! You want to fix me! You want to be the hero who rescues the damaged damsel! Did it ever occur to you that maybe I don’t want to be saved? Or that, if I did, you’d be the last person I’d ever turn to?”
Every word was cruel, designed to wound, to sever the last thread that tied them together. It was the only defense she had left. If she was going to run, she needed to burn every bridge. And he was the biggest one of all.
He recoiled as if she had slapped him. The fury in his eyes was replaced by something far worse: a devastated resignation.
“Fine,” he said, his voice barely a whisper. “If that’s what you truly think… then you’re right. There’s nothing I can do here.”
And with those words, the final bond broke. Nesta felt an icy void open in her chest, but she ignored it. It was the price of freedom.
“Leave,” she commanded, her voice glacial.
Cassian looked at her one last time, and there was nothing but ash in his eyes. He turned and left, closing the door behind him.
This time, the silence wasn't tense. It was absolute. It was the silence of an ending.
Nesta stood motionless, the wine glass in her hand. She didn't drink it. Slowly, she walked to the sink and poured the red liquid out, watching it disappear down the drain.
The war had been declared. And tonight, she would execute her first and final order: disappear.
Chapter 3: Flight into Oblivion
Summary:
Nesta stops being a prisoner and becomes a strategist. With cold determination, she gathers the resources she needs to disappear and navigates the alleys of Velaris. By joining a caravan bound for the mountains, she not only escapes a city but frees herself from the woman she used to be.
Chapter Text
The click of the closing door was the sound of a starting pistol.
For a long moment, Nesta didn’t move. She stood in the center of her ruined sanctuary, the absolute silence now her only companion. There was no triumph in it, not even relief. Just an immense, icy void where the bridge to Cassian had been. She had paid the price. Now, she was going to claim her prize.
The paralysis broke. Every movement from that moment on was deliberate, wasting no energy. Years of watching Illyrian warriors, of tacitly absorbing their lessons in efficiency, emerged from the depths of her memory.
First, the money. Feyre had left her a small fortune in a drawer, a stipend to keep her afloat. Nesta ignored it. She wouldn’t touch a single coin tainted with pity. Instead, she went to an old jewelry box she rarely opened. Inside, among worthless trinkets, lay a single object of power: a delicate sapphire necklace her mother had given her, one of the few things she had managed to keep from her previous life. It was a ghost from a lost world. Without hesitation, she slipped it into her pocket. It would be enough.
Next, the clothes. She ignored the dresses and silks. From a forgotten corner of her wardrobe, she pulled out a pair of sturdy leather trousers, a dark tunic, and worn travel boots she had bought on a whim months ago and never dared to wear. They were the clothes of a stranger, of the woman she needed to become. She dressed in the gloom, her reflection barely visible in the dirty windowpane: an anonymous silhouette, a shadow.
From the kitchen, she took a small canvas pack. Inside, she placed a sharp kitchen knife, a piece of stale bread, and a waterskin. Nothing more. She could not afford the weight of sentimentality.
When the Velaris moon appeared, high and silver between the buildings, Nesta was ready. She covered her head with a dark hood and opened the door to her apartment one last time. She didn’t look back. There was nothing to see but the tomb of a life that was no longer hers.
She slipped through the corridors like a phantom, her steps muffled by years of practice in not being noticed. The night air was cool and smelled of moonflowers and the promise of rain. Velaris, the city of starlight, was beautiful, a dream made of marble and magic. And Nesta hated it with every fiber of her being. She hated its beauty, its peace, the happiness that seemed so easy for everyone but her.
She did not head for the main gates. Instead, she ventured into the alleys of the artisan quarter, a labyrinth of narrow streets and dancing shadows she knew well from her drunken nights. She knew exactly where she was going.
To a pawnbroker's shop, a shrewd old Fae with eyes that saw value more than soul. It was the only place in the city where no questions were asked, as long as the payment was right.
It was her first stop on the road to oblivion.
The pawnbroker's shop was a dark hole wedged between a closed bakery and a tailor. It had no name, only the symbol of three golden spheres hanging above the door, tarnished by time. The tinkle of a bell announced her entry, a sharp sound in the dusty silence of the place.
The interior smelled of old metal, parchment, and kept secrets. Artifacts from past lives filled every shelf: an Illyrian dagger with a splintered hilt, a Spring Court brooch whose magic had faded, musical instruments missing strings. It was a cemetery of broken hopes. For a moment, Nesta felt she fit in perfectly.
An elderly Fae with skin like wrinkled leather and small, bright eyes like obsidian shards watched her from behind the counter. He showed no surprise at seeing a hooded woman enter his shop in the middle of the night. He simply nodded, a silent invitation for her to speak.
Nesta approached, her movements measured. There was no fear in her, only a cold purpose. She pulled the sapphire necklace from her pocket and placed it on the worn wooden counter. The blue gems, even in the dim light of the oil lamps, shone with the fire of a more opulent era. A memory of balls, of forced laughter, and of a mother she barely remembered.
The pawnbroker leaned in, examining the necklace with a jeweler's loupe. His surprisingly nimble fingers traced the silver setting. He asked no questions. He didn't ask where she got it, or why a woman like her needed to sell something so valuable. His business wasn't history; it was value.
“Good quality,” he finally said, his voice a whisper as rough as sandpaper. “Old-style silver. The sapphires are from the southern mines.”
Nesta said nothing. She waited.
“Two hundred gold marks,” he offered, setting down the loupe.
It was a robbery. The necklace was worth at least triple that. The old man was testing her, looking for desperation in her eyes. He didn’t find it.
“Five hundred,” Nesta countered, her voice as cold as the gems on the counter. She didn’t argue. She didn’t plead. She stated a fact.
The pawnbroker stared at her, his bright eyes assessing her. He saw the absence of fear, the iron resolve in the line of her jaw, barely visible beneath the hood. He saw someone who wasn't running from a problem but walking toward a solution. a slow, toothy grin spread across his face. He respected strength.
“Three hundred and fifty. And I’ll give you a map of the caravan routes leaving the city at dawn. No questions asked.”
Nesta considered the offer. The money was less than she wanted, but the map… the map was more valuable than any coin. It was a way out. A route to anonymity.
“Done,” she said.
The old Fae counted the gold marks with astonishing speed, stacking them in small towers before sliding them into a leather pouch. Then, from under the counter, he produced a roll of yellowed parchment.
Nesta took the pouch and the map. The weight of the gold was a welcome burden. The feel of the parchment was the promise of a nameless future.
“Pleasure doing business with you,” the pawnbroker whispered.
Nesta simply nodded and turned away. When the bell on the door tinkled again as she left, she was no longer Nesta Archeron, sister of the High Lady, the broken woman from the filthy apartment. She was a stranger with three hundred and fifty gold marks and a map that would lead her to the end of the world.
With her hood hiding her face, Nesta blended into the city's shadows. The map the pawnbroker had given her was a treasure. It didn’t show the main routes, which would undoubtedly be watched, but a network of service roads and smugglers’ trails that wound along the outer edge of Velaris. It was the perfect escape route for someone who didn't want to be found.
Her destination was the meeting point for a merchant caravan heading south, toward the great mountain ranges that bordered the human lands. According to the map, they would depart at first light to avoid the high taxes of the main gates.
Walking through Velaris at night, with a secret purpose, was a strange experience. The city, even in its darkest hours, hummed with a soft magic. Starlight seemed to cling to every building, and the sound of the Sidra River was a constant, soothing murmur. For the first time, Nesta didn’t see it as a threat, but simply as a place. A beautiful place, yes, but one that was no longer hers. She felt no sorrow in leaving it behind. Only a cold, determined resolution.
She followed the map through alleys that smelled of fresh bread and cooling metal, passing under marble bridges and along silent canals. No one paid her any mind. She was just another shadow in a city full of them.
Finally, she reached the eastern stables, near the city's outer wall. The air here was thicker, smelling of hay, leather, and the sweat of pack animals. She saw a group of Fae and a few sturdy humans loading wagons by torchlight. They were merchants, weathered by the road, their faces tired but their movements efficient. There was no nobility in them, only the pragmatism of survival.
Nesta watched from a distance, waiting for the right moment. She saw the one who appeared to be the caravan leader, a burly Fae with a braided beard, reviewing a ledger. She approached him calmly.
“I need passage south,” she said, her voice low and direct.
The Fae looked her up and down, his gaze appraising. He saw the travel clothes, the lack of luggage, the determination in the only part of her face that was visible.
“Passage costs. And we don't carry trouble.”
Nesta pulled ten gold marks from her pouch, the metallic sound cutting through the morning air.
“I’ll pay for my passage and for my trouble. I won’t speak, I won’t complain, and I’ll stay out of your way.”
The caravan leader looked at the coins, then at her. A shrewd smile touched his face.
“For that price, you can even help drive one of the wagons. Get on. We leave as soon as the sun touches the mountain peak.”
Nesta put her money away and nodded. She walked to the last wagon in the line, one loaded with woolen bales, and settled into a corner, making herself as small as possible.
As the sky began to turn a pale grey, the caravan set off with a creak of wheels and the snorting of animals. They passed through a small service gate in the wall, one Nesta never knew existed.
As they crossed to the other side, Nesta looked back one last time. She saw the peaks of Velaris’s houses, the fading starlight. She felt nothing. It was just a city.
She turned around, facing the road that opened before her, toward the dark silhouettes of the mountains in the distance. The air was colder here, wilder.
No one knew where she was. No one knew who she was.
For the first time in years, Nesta Archeron was free.
The silence began here.
Chapter 4: Chapter 4: The First Winter
Summary:
In a forgotten mountain village, Nesta fights to survive the winter and her own ghosts. Physical labor and isolation strip her of everything she once was. One night, after hitting rock bottom in absolute despair, she finds a strange calm in accepting her new reality.
Chapter Text
The journey south lasted three weeks. Three weeks in which Nesta became a ghost. She kept her promise to the caravan leader: she didn’t speak, didn’t complain, and stayed out of everyone’s way. She spent her days sitting in the back of the wagon, her hood always up, watching the Prythian landscape transform. The soft, green hills gave way to denser, older forests, and finally, to the rocky foothills of the mountains she had seen in the distance.
She learned to live with the bare minimum. She ate hard bread and dry cheese, drank water that tasted of leather, and slept curled up among the woolen bales, shivering from a cold that came not only from the mountain air but from her own bones. Nightmares haunted her every night: armies of the dead, a king's neck snapping, her father's lifeless eyes. She would wake with a choked scream in her throat, drenched in a cold sweat, grateful for the darkness that hid her terror.
The caravan stopped in a small, nameless village nestled in a valley, the last stop before the routes became too dangerous with the coming of winter. It was a rough, functional place, made up of no more than thirty buildings of stone and dark wood, with smoke from the chimneys rising like tired souls into a grey sky. The mountains loomed over it like silent giants, both intimidating and protective.
It was perfect. It was the end of the world.
Nesta gave the caravan leader two more gold marks for his silence, a payment he accepted with an understanding nod. She watched the caravan leave the next morning, leaving her alone in the village square with her small pack and a pouch of coins that suddenly seemed terribly insufficient.
The first few days were hell. The alcohol had left her system, but the poison in her mind remained. Withdrawal hit her with the force of a battering ram: uncontrollable tremors, nausea, and a headache so intense that sometimes she could do nothing but curl up in an alley, waiting for it to pass.
She rented a tiny, freezing room above the tavern, a place that smelled of sour beer and desperation. The owner, a burly man with small, distrustful eyes, watched her with the same caution as everyone else. She was a stranger, a lone woman with the soft hands of someone who had never worked a day in her life. They didn't want her there, but her money was welcome.
She soon learned that gold wasn't much use if there was nothing to buy. Food was scarce, firewood a luxury. If she wanted to survive the winter, she would have to earn it.
Her first job was in the tavern itself, scrubbing floors and washing dishes until her hands cracked and bled. The work was grueling, monotonous, and the pay barely covered her room and one hot meal a day. But it was... honest. At the end of each day, her body ached so much that it was sometimes enough to keep the nightmares at bay.
She was shedding her old skin, layer by layer. The arrogance, the pride, the resentment... they were useless here. Here, only one thing mattered: enduring until the next day.
Winter arrived with a fury, blanketing the valley in a sheet of snow so thick the entire world seemed to disappear. The isolation became absolute. And in that white, relentless silence, Nesta came face to face with the only monsters she couldn't run from: herself.
The days blurred into a painful, hazy routine. Waking before dawn, her breath turning to mist in the freezing room. Going down to the tavern, where the warmth of the fire was a momentary relief before the work began. Scrubbing, hauling firewood, serving beer to men who looked at her with a mixture of suspicion and lust that she learned to ignore with a stony coldness.
At night, she would climb to her room, her muscles trembling with fatigue, and collapse onto the cot. The physical exhaustion was a blessing. It was white noise that sometimes, just sometimes, managed to drown out the thunder of her memories. But other nights, it wasn't enough.
There were nights she would wake with her heart hammering against her ribs, her father's face, pale and lifeless, seared onto the inside of her eyelids. She would sit in the darkness, hugging her knees, struggling to breathe against the wave of panic that threatened to drown her. The Cauldron. The power it had taken from her, the life she had stolen. She could feel that power writhing in her gut, a cold, silver thing she didn't know how to control.
In Velaris, alcohol had been her anchor, a way to drown that feeling. Here, she had nothing. The isolation was total. The villagers didn't speak to her beyond what was necessary. She was "the outsider," a shadow at the edge of their lives. At first, that invisibility was what she had craved. Now, it felt like a punishment, as if she were truly disappearing, erased by the snow and indifference.
One night, after a particularly brutal day, she found herself staring at her own reflection in the dirty water of a bucket. The woman staring back was a stranger. Her hair was matted, dark circles like bruises under sunken, listless eyes. Her hands, once soft and manicured, were now red, chapped, and covered in calluses.
For a moment, self-pity hit her with a force that left her breathless. Was this what she had become? A scullery maid in a tavern at the end of the world? Anger, her old, familiar companion, rose to her defense. Anger at Feyre for her pity, at Rhysand for his power, at Cassian for... for everything.
But the anger was exhausting, and she no longer had the strength to feed it. For the first time, the rage faded, leaving her with something far more terrifying: the simple, plain truth.
She was alone. And if she died here, from cold or hunger or despair, no one would care. No one would come looking for her.
That night, she didn't fight the panic. She let it come. She let the terror, the grief, and the sorrow wash over her, shake her until she had no tears left to cry. She broke, there, on the freezing floor of her room, in the absolute silence of a forgotten village.
When the dawn came, painting the sky a pale blue, something had changed. The emptiness was still there, but the terror was gone, replaced by a strange, hollow calm. She stood up, every muscle aching. She washed her face with icy water, and when she looked at herself again, she no longer saw a stranger. She saw herself. Stripped of everything. Reduced to her most basic form.
And for the first time, she felt no urge to run from that image. She simply accepted it.
It was the lowest point. And it was, also, the first foundation upon which she could begin to build.
Chapter 5: A Small Purpose
Summary:
The end of winter marks a new beginning for Nesta. Her body and mind are strengthened through a strict routine. By taking the initiative to repair an old cabin, she not only builds a home but also lays the foundation for a new identity, finding value in self-sufficiency.
Chapter Text
Winter did not give up easily. It clung to the valley with claws of ice well into the spring, releasing its grip only gradually and reluctantly. But finally, the sun began to win the battle. The snow, which had been an oppressive blanket, retreated to the mountaintops, revealing damp, muddy earth that smelled of new life.
With the thaw, something inside Nesta seemed to loosen as well. The acceptance she had found at her lowest point during the winter was not a miraculous revelation, but a foundation. A place from which to start building.
The work at the tavern continued, but it was no longer a simple struggle for survival. It became a routine, and in routine, she found a strange kind of strength. Her hands, once torn and raw, had hardened. The calluses were now armor. Her body, once weakened by alcohol and inactivity, had become lean and strong from constant physical labor. Hauling beer barrels and chopping firewood for the tavern’s hearth had sculpted muscles in her arms and back that she didn’t know she had.
She left the freezing room above the tavern as soon as the weather allowed. With the money she had painstakingly saved, she bought a few basic tools: an axe, a hammer, nails. On the outskirts of the village, nestled at the edge of the forest, was a small hunter's cabin, long abandoned. The roof was partially collapsed, and the wind whistled through cracks in the walls, but it was hers. No one had offered it, no one had given it to her. She found it, and she claimed it.
Her days found a new rhythm. In the morning, she worked at the tavern, earning the money she needed for food. In the afternoon, she worked for herself. She learned how to cut and lay wooden shingles, how to mix mud and straw to fill the cracks in the walls. She learned the language of wood, the feeling of a nail sinking in cleanly, the satisfaction of a well-made repair.
One afternoon, as she was securing a loose beam on the porch, sweat sticking her tunic to her back and a splinter digging into her palm, the thought hit her with the force of a hammer blow. In her human life, in the miserable cottage she shared with her sisters, she had never lifted a finger. She had watched Feyre hunt, skin animals, and mend their worn clothes until her fingers bled, and she... she had done nothing.
She had cultivated her bitterness like a shield. A silent fury against a father who had given up, clinging to the stubborn, painful hope that he would rise up and take on his role again. Her inaction hadn't been laziness, but a useless vigil. And when he never did, that hope soured and became the only armor she had.
Now, here she was, rebuilding a home from ruins with her own hands. Not for anyone else. For herself. The irony was so sharp it took her breath away.
Physical work became her meditation. While her hands were busy, her mind, for the first time in years, grew quiet. The roar of memories didn't disappear entirely, but it softened, becoming a background hum instead of a deafening scream.
The nightmares still visited, but they no longer woke her with paralyzing terror. She would wake, yes, her heart racing, but now, instead of curling up in the darkness, she would get up. She would leave her cabin and sit on the small porch she had built, breathing the cold, clean mountain air. She would look at the stars, so different from the ones in Velaris—wilder, more distant. And in that vastness, her pain seemed a little smaller, a little more manageable.
She was not happy. Happiness was a strange, distant word, the memory of a language she no longer spoke. But she had found something else, something perhaps more valuable: a purpose. Not a grand purpose forced upon her by a High Lord, but a small, personal one, forged by her own hands.
To survive the next day. To fix a wall. To chop enough firewood for the night.
It was enough. For now, it was more than enough.
Chapter 6: Chapter 6: A Ghost in the Mountains
Summary:
Nesta's disappearance has become a personal obsession for Azriel. When a material clue finally emerges, he secretly tracks it to a forgotten village. There, he finds not the woman who left, but a stronger, more serene version of her. His discovery leaves him with an impossible decision that conflicts his loyalty and his conscience.
Chapter Text
Three years.
Three years since Nesta Archeron had vanished from the face of Prythian.
For Azriel, Spymaster of the Night Court, those three years had been a personal failure, a stain on his reputation, and a constant echo in the shadows he commanded. His job was to know. To know everything. And for over a thousand days, there was one secret that eluded him, one ghost he couldn't catch.
Nesta’s disappearance had left a wound in the Inner Circle that refused to scar over. In public, and on good days, some pretended it was only a matter of time. Rhysand would sometimes say, with a forced confidence, that it was merely the longest tantrum in history, and when Nesta grew tired of her drama, she would come home. Amren would echo the sentiment with her usual disdain. But Azriel saw the truth behind their words. It was failure speaking, guilt searching for armor. The hope that she would simply "return" was easier than admitting the terrifying truth: that one of their own was lost, and they, the most powerful beings in their world, had been unable to do anything to find her.
Guilt ate at Feyre in a quiet, constant way. And Cassian... Cassian was the epicenter of the pain. The initial fury had extinguished long ago, leaving a devastated emptiness. He blamed himself, Azriel knew. And that guilt had poisoned the air of the House of Wind for three long years.
For the others, it was a family tragedy. For Azriel, it was that and something more. It was an insult to his craft. To his very essence. He was the one who saw in the dark, who heard the secrets the wind forgot. That Nesta had managed to erase her trail so completely was a direct affront to his power. She had become his obsession, the one mystery his shadows could not unravel.
That was why, when the clue arrived, he told no one.
The clue didn't come as a whisper, but as an object. During the first years of the search, Azriel had set his spies to look for a woman. A mistake. He had been looking for the wrong person. The right clue came when one of his assets in the neutral city of Vallahan—an antiquarian with an eye for rare jewelry and a debt to the Night Court—informed him of a peculiar item that had come to market.
A sapphire necklace. Old silver, in a style not seen since before the war. A style favored by the fallen human nobility.
The necklace itself was nothing. But Azriel, in his meticulousness, had a record of every valuable possession the Archeron sisters had brought with them to Prythian. The necklace matched the description of a family heirloom Nesta had refused to sell even in her worst moments in Velaris.
It wasn't a hunch. It was proof.
It took Azriel two months of patient, silent work to trace the necklace’s journey backward. From the merchant in Vallahan to a traveling trader, from the trader to a small, dusty pawnbroker in a southern border town so insignificant it didn’t even appear on most maps. The town’s name was Stonehaven.
He told no one where he was going. Not Rhysand, not Feyre, and certainly not Cassian. If he was wrong, he didn't want to reopen the wound. And if he was right... he wasn't sure what he would find.
He traveled through the shadows, a method of transport he loathed but that was undeniably efficient. The air in the mountain valley was cold and pure, so different from Velaris. The village was exactly as he had deduced: a handful of rough-hewn buildings huddled against the vastness of the mountain range. A place to be forgotten.
He concealed himself in the shadows of a dense pine grove on the slope overlooking the village, his senses sharp, sweeping the area. He watched the villagers go about their daily tasks. Loggers, hunters, a blacksmith. Hard people, accustomed to a hard life. He saw no one who looked like her. Disappointment, a bitter and familiar taste, began to settle in his throat.
And then, he saw her.
She came out of a small cabin on the edge of the forest, the same one he had dismissed as nearly derelict. She wore leather trousers and a simple tunic, her silver hair pulled back in a practical braid. In her arms, she carried a load of freshly chopped firewood that would have made many males sweat.
Azriel held his breath.
She was not the same woman. The Nesta he remembered was sharp, yes, but with edges softened by a life of relative comfort. She was pale, thin from alcohol and rage. The woman he was seeing now was... solid. Her skin was tanned by the sun. There was a strength in her shoulders and in the way she moved, an economy of motion that spoke of constant, physical work.
She stacked the firewood by the cabin door, and for a moment, she stopped and stretched her back, rolling her neck. And it was then that she looked up, not at him, but at the snowy peak of the nearest mountain.
Her face. It was calm. There was no trace of the caustic fury or the icy contempt he remembered. Her features, always beautiful, were now stripped of any artifice. There was a serenity in her expression, a hard-won peace that Azriel had never seen in her.
In that moment, the Spymaster, the assassin cloaked in shadows, realized two things with absolute, terrifying clarity.
First: he had found her.
Second: he had no idea what to do next. His duty was to report to Rhysand. To bring her back. But seeing her there, in her quiet peace... how could he be the one to destroy the first true home she seemed to have ever found?
Chapter 7: Capítulo 7: Where Duty Ends
Summary:
Azriel finds Nesta, but upon seeing the peace she has built, his 500 years of loyalty conflict with his conscience. Making a momentous decision based on his own trauma, he chooses not to inform Rhysand, creating the first secret between them. Azriel begins a double life, becoming Nesta's silent guardian, protecting her sanctuary from the shadows.
Chapter Text
Duty was Azriel's spine. It was the armor that kept him whole, the code that gave meaning to five hundred years of violence and secrets. His loyalty to Rhysand was not just an oath; it was the fundamental law of his existence. To break it was unthinkable. It was like asking a mountain to move or a star to change its course.
And yet, as he watched Nesta from the shadows of the pine grove, he felt that fundamental law crack for the first time.
Every instinct, every fiber of his training, screamed at him to contact Rhysand. A simple thought, a whisper through their bond, and the High Lord would know. Within minutes, Cassian would be here. They would bring her back. Mission accomplished.
But what did "accomplished" mean?
He saw Nesta go back into her cabin, moving with an efficient, unassuming grace. The image of her calm face was seared into his mind. The peace that emanated from her wasn't the absence of pain—Azriel, more than anyone, knew how to recognize hidden pain—but the absence of war. The internal war that had been consuming her in Velaris had been extinguished.
To bring her back would be to reignite that war. It would be to rip her from this rough but real sanctuary and throw her back into a cage, no matter how gilded. It would be, in essence, to punish her for finding a way to heal that they had been unable to offer.
The sun began to set, painting the sky orange and purple over the mountain peaks. The air grew colder. The time to act had come.
Azriel closed his eyes and focused, gathering the power to send a single, clear message through his bond with Rhysand. The words formed in his mind: I have found her.
He saw the scene with brutal clarity. Rhysand and Amren would appear in a blink. Then Cassian. He would see Nesta, and hope and guilt and three years of pain would collide with the peace she had built. He would see her harden again, her face becoming the mask of ice they knew so well.
And it would all be his fault. He would be the one to light the match.
He opened his eyes. The words had not been sent. His power stirred, confused by the countermand.
What are you doing? a part of him hissed, the part forged in duty and loyalty. It is your oath.
But another part, a much older one, one that remembered being a broken boy in a cell, whispered back. And who watched over you?
He looked at the cabin again. Smoke curled lazily from the chimney. She was inside, safe. At peace. She had saved herself.
The decision to do nothing settled over him, not as a relief, but as a weight. It was a silent acknowledgment from one survivor to another. He would not be the one to tear down the walls she had spent three years building.
The bond with Rhysand remained silent. Not broken, not damaged, but... paused. A door he had chosen not to walk through. The power that would normally have flowed through it to report now coiled back, contained by a will that, for the first time, was not his High Lord's.
It was his own.
And in that deliberate silence, something new took shape within him. A dark, private space that only he knew.
The Spymaster now had a secret.
Thus began his double life. He lied to Rhysand, claiming the trail had gone cold, an act that tasted like ash on his tongue. By day, he was the loyal Spymaster. By night, he became the silent guardian of Stonehaven. He learned Nesta's routine, the small acts of kindness she performed in secret, and felt a strange connection to the survivor she had become.
One night, when a storm damaged her cabin's roof, Azriel waited for her to fall asleep and, moving like a ghost, repaired it before dawn. Seeing the confusion and awe on Nesta's face the next morning, he understood the nature of his new role. He wouldn't just watch. He would protect. He had become the guardian of her sanctuary. A ghost to protect another.
Chapter 8: Capítulo 8: Echoes in the Stillness
Summary:
A year after finding Nesta, Azriel maintains his dangerous double life, secretly watching her as she grows physically and mentally stronger. At the same time, Nesta becomes aware of the latent power within her and a strange sensation of being watched. Taking the initiative, she makes her first conscious attempt to use her magic, an act that drastically complicates Azriel's secret.
Chapter Text
A year passed.
Four full seasons cycled by since the day Azriel found Nesta and chose to keep the greatest secret of his life. A year of silent lies, of evasions, and of a double existence that was wearing him down in ways he hadn't anticipated. The secret was a slow poison, isolating him from his own family in a subtle but undeniable way.
During that year, Stonehaven became his true sanctuary. The only place where the Spymaster could remove his mask. From the shadows, he watched Nesta flourish in a slow but steady way. He saw her survive another brutal winter with a fierce tenacity, chopping her own firewood with clean swings, her body strong and toned from ceaseless work.
He discovered her routines. In the mornings, she worked at the village smithy. The blacksmith, a burly Fae named Iarlen, had needed help, and Azriel watched as Nesta went from cleaning the forge to handling the hammer on simple pieces. The rhythmic sound of metal on anvil became the soundtrack to her new life.
In the afternoons, he watched her train. Alone, in a forest clearing, she practiced the Illyrian fighting moves she had seen so many times. Day after day, with no one watching—or so she thought—she perfected her stance, her balance, her strength. Azriel never intervened. He became her invisible guardian, the silent witness to her rebirth.
Now, the second winter of his vigil was approaching. The first snows were beginning to blanket the mountain peaks.
Nesta finished stacking the last load of firewood against the cabin wall, her muscles tight from the effort. The air smelled of pine and snow, a purity she had grown used to breathing. The first winter here had been hell. The second, a battle. This third one, she told herself, would simply be... a winter.
Inside, the fire crackled in the hearth. As she prepared a simple stew, something made her pause. A sound. Or rather, the lack of one. The forest, always full of whispers, had gone completely silent. It wasn't a peaceful silence. It was an expectant, tense silence. As if the whole forest was holding its breath.
The feeling prickled her skin. Over the last year, she’d had these moments. Flashes of perception that made no sense. She would hear the heartbeat of a deer a hundred yards away. Sometimes, staring at the fire, she could see threads of silver heat dancing in the air. Iarlen would complain the metal was too cold, but she could feel the latent heat within it, a vibrant energy that whispered to her fingertips.
She had chalked it up to Fae senses, sharpened by a quieter life. But this was different.
The feeling of being watched returned with force, so intense that she spun around to look at her cabin's only window. She saw nothing but the trees and the first swirling snowflakes. But the feeling lingered. It didn’t feel threatening. It felt… constant. Like a shadow that was always just at the edge of her vision, an echo in the stillness.
Ignoring it, she sat by the fire. She looked at her hands, no longer a lady’s, but a worker’s. Calloused, strong. And under the skin, she sometimes felt a hum. A silver power, cold as ice and ancient as stars. The Cauldron's power.
For three years she had ignored it, buried it under physical labor and exhaustion. But the power would no longer be ignored. It stirred within her, like a beast waking from a long slumber.
It was waking up. And with it, woke the fear that if she didn't learn to control it, it would consume her entirely.
The decision was made in the silence of the night, with only the sound of the crackling fire as her witness. Fear was a poison, but inaction was a slow suicide. The next morning, her routine changed. After her work at the smithy, she walked much deeper into the woods, to a small, rocky basin fed by an icy stream.
Azriel, watching from a safe distance, felt a pang of curiosity and alarm. He followed, his shadows clinging to the trees, his senses on high alert.
Nesta stopped in the center of the basin. She closed her eyes and held out a hand, palm up. Azriel felt a chill in the air that had nothing to do with winter. A hum of raw power that made his own shadows stir restlessly.
A thin layer of frost, silver and shining, crept across the surface of a rock near Nesta's hand. It spread, drawing intricate patterns, before vanishing as quickly as it had appeared.
Nesta's eyes snapped open, staring at the rock with a mixture of terror and awe. It had been her. The power had answered.
From his hiding place, Azriel remained utterly still. He had seen all kinds of magic in his five hundred years. But this was different. It was a cold, ancient, and wild power. It was the power of Death itself, stolen from the Cauldron.
And the woman who wielded it, untrained and unguided, had just taken her first conscious step toward controlling it.
His secret had just become infinitely more complicated. And far, far more dangerous.
Chapter 9: Chapter 9: Heartbeats
Summary:
Nesta's frustration leads her to unleash her power through fury, with lethal consequences that leave her horrified. The intense remorse for her actions forces her to confront the terrifying and uncontrollable nature of her magic. Terrified of what she is capable of, Nesta flees, unaware that Azriel has witnessed the true magnitude of the power she hides.
Chapter Text
The days that followed the first spark of magic became a silent obsession for Nesta. Every afternoon after the smithy, she returned to the rocky basin, her secret sanctuary. It had become her classroom and her battlefield.
But the power was an elusive lover. It did not answer to her commands. She spent a week trying to recreate the frost on the rock, concentrating until her vision blurred, achieving nothing but a throbbing headache. The power remained dormant, deaf to her calls. Frustration was a familiar, bitter taste, an echo of the helplessness that had haunted her entire life.
Azriel watched her every day from the shadows. He saw her determination curdle into anger, and her anger into a bleak exhaustion.
One day, after an hour of failed attempts, the rage finally overwhelmed her. Not at the power, but at herself. For being weak. For being useless. With a cry of pure frustration, she flung a hand toward a nearby thicket, unthinking, only wanting her fury to manifest.
And for the first time, the power obeyed her rage.
A wave of cold, silver energy erupted from her hand. It wasn't frost; it was a pulse of pure silence. The leaves on the thicket turned grey and crumbled to dust. The grass at her feet withered instantly. The power swept forward, killing a ten-foot patch of earth in the blink of an eye.
Nesta gasped, staring at the circle of death she had created. But her horror intensified when something small fell from a branch above the now-dead thicket. A robin. It hit the withered ground, its wings still. It had been caught in the wave.
A choked sob escaped Nesta’s lips. No, no, no. Remorse hit her with the force of a physical blow, erasing the rage completely. She knelt beside the bird, her heart seizing with overwhelming guilt. It was so small, so innocent. And she had killed it.
"I'm sorry," she whispered, tears blurring her vision. "Please, I'm sorry."
She reached out a trembling hand, not daring to touch it. She didn't want to cause any more harm. Her intent was no longer to end anything. The deepest desire, the most desperate plea of her soul in that moment was: "Come back. Please, live."
And in response to that plea, the power came again. But it was different.
A silvery light, warm and liquid, dripped from her fingertips. It was not the cold, deadly pulse from before. It was a soft radiance that enveloped the small bird. From his hiding place, Azriel held his breath, his spymaster's eyes unable to process what they were seeing.
The light pulsed once, twice. The robin's chest swelled with a sudden intake of air. Its wings fluttered weakly. And then, with a confused chirp, it stood, shook its feathers as if waking from a dream, and took flight, leaving a trail of silver dust in its wake.
Nesta remained kneeling, staring at the empty space where the bird had been, and then at her own hands. She was shaking uncontrollably. Not from fear, but from a primordial terror.
It wasn't just a weapon. It wasn't just death. It was also... life. She was a killer and a healer. A destroyer and a creator. She was the Cauldron.
She scrambled to her feet and ran, fleeing not from what she had done, but from what she was.
Azriel remained in the shadows, his mind reeling. What he had witnessed defied all logic. The power of life and death, creation and annihilation, dancing at the fingertips of a woman who had no idea how to control it.
And he was her only, terrified witness.
Chapter 10: Chapter 10: Silver Echoes
Summary:
In an act of self-protection, Nesta builds an emotional wall to contain her power, which worries those around her in Stonehaven. Azriel, meanwhile, feels the weight of his deception in Velaris. He realizes his mission is no longer to protect her from the world, but to watch over the fragile control she maintains over herself.
Chapter Text
Nesta didn't remember how she'd gotten back to the cabin. Only the sound of her own gasps and the frantic drumming of her heart against her ribs. She collapsed against the closed door, sliding to the floor, and stared at her hands.
They weren't just hands anymore. They were weapons of an impossible duality. With a furious thought, they could turn life to dust. With a desperate plea, they could reignite an extinguished spark. There was no control. No logic. Only raw emotion and a power that obeyed the whims of her broken heart.
For the following days, Nesta did not return to the basin. She completely abandoned her attempts to train her magic. In fact, she did everything she could to feel nothing at all. She built a wall inside herself, one far taller and thicker than the one she had used to keep the Inner Circle at bay. Rage, despair, guilt... she locked them all in the deepest part of her being, terrified that the slightest crack in her control could unleash that power again.
She became an automaton. She woke, worked at the smithy with a fierce concentration, hammering the metal as if she could forge her emotions into submission. She ate, she slept, and she avoided any interaction that wasn't strictly necessary. Iarlen, the blacksmith, watched her with concern but didn't dare ask about the new, brittle stillness that surrounded her.
Azriel returned to Velaris that night with his soul in turmoil. The lie he had told Rhysand months ago about the trail going cold had felt like a betrayal. The lie he now upheld felt like a sacrilege.
He found Cassian on one of the balconies of the House of Wind, looking out at the starry city. The hope in the Illyrian general's eyes had dimmed over the past year, but it had never fully been extinguished. "Az?" Cassian said without turning. "Any word from your spies on the border?"
Every word was a test. "Nothing new," Azriel answered, his shadows swirling at his feet, restless, as if they sensed the falseness of his words. "The same old tensions between the mountain clans. No trace."
Cassian sighed, a heavy sound, filled with a year's worth of frustration. "Sometimes I think... maybe she's gone for good. And other times, I think she'll just show up at the door tomorrow, with that look of hers that could freeze hell over, and act like nothing happened."
Azriel said nothing. He just watched his brother, the weight of his secret pressing on his chest, suffocating him. He wasn't just hiding Nesta's whereabouts anymore. He was hiding the truth of what she had become.
Telling him now wouldn't be a relief. It would be unleashing panic. And it would draw an attention to Stonehaven that not even Azriel's shadows could conceal.
A week later, Azriel watched Nesta from his usual hiding place. He saw her move with a controlled rigidity, her face a mask of neutrality. She had stopped training, both her body and her magic. She was walling herself off, starving herself emotionally to keep the monster—and the miracle—at bay.
He understood perfectly. She had built a wall to protect the world from herself. And now, his task was to watch those invisible walls, knowing they were built of the most fragile material of all: Nesta's will.
Lady_Dreamer on Chapter 3 Sun 21 Sep 2025 03:01AM UTC
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