Chapter Text
Elain and Azriel’s wedding was an intimate and beautiful event held in her garden in Velaris. The sun shone from a blue cloudless sky. The guest list was small. Immediate family and friends, only. They weren’t a shy couple. Both had simply learned the value of privacy. Chairs set out among the roses and blossoms that Elain herself had nurtured from seeds and sapling; an aisle of colourful petals leading them to a white pergola that Cassian had had delivered for them. Carved into the wood beneath the flowers and vines decorating it, was the story of Azriel’s life; his life with his brothers. His battles and victories. And across the overhanging beams were tales of Mortal born Elain, her names and titles engraved, her slaying of the King of Hybern, her love of things that grew. The intricate glyphs of their union Cassian himself had carved in the white varnished oak - his gift to them.
Azriel looked out over the cheers and claps of his family and friends. His brothers’ families, Masha and Mor - their dates. Friends from across the Courts and within the city. Amren once more brought Varian; she appeared on his arm in glittering black, wearing a belt of egg sized gemstones of electric blue and one of her rare, less terrifying smiles.
But seated on the far edge of a row of chairs at the very back - the furthest a guest could have been from the inner circle; from Azriel’s family - Tamlin, the High Lord of the Spring court sat looking pensive and bored, focused intently on the bride and groom. Anywhere but at Feyre and Rhysand - at their son, Kylan, with his father’s black hair and his mother’s eyes. A painful reminder of a future that was squandered. At a wedding filled with happy couples and ecstatic guests, Tamlin sat there looking like he really wanted to be anywhere else.
“Why exactly is Tamlin here?” Azriel asked Elain as they retired to the tables for food and drinks.
“Oh,” Elain smiled absently, “I invited him,” she said, “He’s my friend,”
And Azriel felt his eyebrows climb toward his hairline. The same Fae responsible for betraying them to Hybern. For taking her Human life from her; the cause of so much suffering. The High Lord of Spring was her friend? Azriel honestly didn’t think Tamlin had any of those left.
“I didn’t realize,” he simply said. His wife kept many things to herself. And this was unlikely going to be the last time he discovered something he didn’t know; something even his shadows hadn’t managed to uncover. The master of spies had married the mistress of secrets.
————————–
Tamlin had found her alone in the back gardens of Rosehall, pruning his geraniums and clipping back his late mother’s roses on an otherwise unmemorable, sunny Friday afternoon. Elain Archeron in a muddy blue dress, humming to herself, while she snipped at the bushes; tending to them as if they were hers and not his to care for.
Tamlin paused looking around for Lucien - the only thing his mind could draw on that would possibly explain her presence, but his old friend had chosen to remain in the mortal realms. Gone years. In recent times, Tamlin had heard rumors of half Fae children and other such far-fetched tales but the overlaying theme was that the Autumn prince wasn’t planning to return. Lucien had built a life for himself far from here. Tamlin searched. First with his eyes and then with his magic. But there was no one else with her. Nothing hidden from his sight, either.
Elain Archeron had come to the Spring Court entirely on her own.
Tamlin’s first response was to feel rage. Boiling, blinding anger. That any of them would turn up at his home unannounced, uninvited, entirely unwelcome. But for all his temper and misery, there was also the reality that not even his own subjects came to his estate these days, and a deeply reviled part of himself still longed for company. It seemed any company.
Rosehall had been empty for so many years, and her presence just so bizarre that curiosity ultimately won out against Tamlin’s temper. He’d taken on no servants since the war. Collected no tithe. The Spring rite he barely remembered. Nameless, faceless females. He did his duty - to the land and his birthright - and nothing more, retiring to his home at the first opportunity, though it could hardly be called such. Rosehall was now a cavernous expanse of thorns and wild grasses. Trees growing up through cracks in the marble floor, paint peeling from the walls. A storm had broken the impressive glass doors at the rear of the house; Tamlin had left them broken, glass where it fell. The wooden doors and banisters through Rosehall had sprouted green shoots that were winding their way along the doorframes and beams.
This was a home no longer. Certainly not his. Maybe to the spiders and mice. Few Fae saw him and those that did witnessed only the beast out hunting. With fangs and claws and horns. A wildness now in the High Lord of Spring that unnerved even the darkest creatures in his lands; sent them into hiding.
But Tamlin decided that on this instance, he would hear out whatever it was that Elain Archeron had come to say to him. If for nothing other than the pleasure of hearing the sound of someone else’s voice.
“What are you doing here?” he demanded.
Elain let out a light gasp, looking up and over to him like she hadn’t noticed him arrive, holding a rose bloom cupped in the palm of her hand like one would hold a child’s cheek.
“Your roses have a blight, they’ll be dead before the end of the month,” she said casually. In her other fingers she held a small garden shears. Her feet were bare. Thorny stems scattered around them tearing at the ends of her dress. He frowned. Flowers and trees in his court didn’t get diseases. They didn’t get fungus. They didn’t wither.
“Impossible,” he snapped. “How did you get here?” Tamlin demanded.
She disappeared, reappearing beside him - too close - her head tilted to the side. He staggered back several steps in shock. Heart racing. No threats, no weapons. But her very demeanor left him on edge. There and not. Aware and very much someplace else entirely.
“A question for when I was mortal, maybe?” she asked quizzically and Tamlin pulled back his lips, his fangs elongating, his nails sharpening to claws. Fear giving way to his anger and he dropped down to all fours, changing into the beast that had terrified her and her father and sister those many years ago.
And the seer laughed at him.
“People think it’s just the future I see, but it isn’t. I see the past, too,”
“And what do you see now?” Tamlin snarled, slowly circling her like a wolf would an injured deer.
“It’s going to rain,” she said in a sing song voice, as she pocketed her shears. Tamlin reflexively looked up, cursing as Elain ran passed him and into the house through the long shattered doors. He scrambled after her, his claws ripping up the roots growing along floors as he skidded on dried leaves and crushed glass, bounding after her. She moved through the house like she knew every room and door, before finally making her way into the kitchen. When he burst in he found her sitting a kettle on the stove, setting out cups at his table. Outside, thunder sounded and rain started to fall, drowning out the noise of his animal growls.
But he paused as thunder shook the walls and Elain put a saucepan on the counter as water began dripping from the ceiling. Tap Tap Tap. It hadn’t looked like rain. Tamlin frowned, changing back; shedding his beastly form. He was suddenly inexplicably bone weary. His head throbbed and stomach revolted. Too much wine the night before. Too many nights before. His Court was in disarray. He was worse.
“Why are you here? Are you here looking for an apology? Do you want me to beg and grovel for forgiveness?”
“If I’d wanted to see you beg, I wouldn’t be here alone,” she reasoned. “And I doubt any punishment I could come up with would be worse than what you’ve done to yourself,”
Tamlin huffed and sat down as she filled a teapot.
“I’m here because I need your help with something,” she said.
“What could you possibly need my help with?” he bit out. She’d the High Lord and Lady of the Night Court at her back. The ear of Rhysand’s assassin. A sister who’s power rivalled that of gods. What would she possibly need that others wouldn’t willingly bend over backwards to provide.
“Some gardening,” Elain said, pouring out a cup of tea and sliding it toward him. “Ginger,” she told him, “It’ll help,”
Tamlin straightened, caught off-guard.
“You turn up here uninvited and tell me you want my help? With gardening?” he snorted, pushing the cup aside. “What in the hell makes you think I’ll help you?”
“You’ll have the opportunity to meet your mate,”
———————
Her idea of ‘some gardening’ involved the laborious task of growing a city’s worth of vegetation in the newly restored city of Calcarum, up in the treacherous mountains north of the Night Court. A place he’d only heard in stories. Destroyed by Rhysand’s family when they’d taken these lands; now restored in all its former splendor. The air was so thin Tamlin could barely breath without feeling weak - every three steps made him feel light-headed but the volcanic remains in the city made for a fertile base and to Tamlin’s astonishment the grasses and trees that blossomed from the new rich earth he made grew aggressively, even more so than in his own court. Illyria was wild place. In a way, he couldn’t help but like that about it. At the foot of the mountain, preparations for the Illyrian wedding and coronation were underway as Feyre’s older sister, Nesta, prepared to marry Rhysand’s former guard dog - now finally off his leash it seemed. And as compensation for Tamlin’s work in the city, he’d been extended not just an invite to the celebration, but also one to visit the city that Rhysand had been hiding all these years. The city Feyre had abandoned Rosehall for.
But it had been Elain Archeron’s promise that had lured him from his Court. At first he’d scoffed at it. But the longer he sat alone in his ruined house, the more the idea pulled at him. Taunting him. Lonliness could be crippling when you knew just how many years were waiting for you. And his roses had been suffering from a blight. His own power was unstable. The Spring Court was in turmoil. So Tamlin decided to indulge himself.
Elain told him he would meet her among the guests. In a past life, Tamlin would have pressed her for a name; would have taken her by the throat and pinned her to the stone until she gave him the information he wanted, through sobs and tears if need be, but he was very weary of playing the villain. Despite appearances, he wasn’t actually okay with being so universally hated. He could also admit that there was an element of thrill in stalking about the party of guests putting names to the faces. Wondering who it might be.
There were no shortage of attractive females present. Helion himself seemed to have travelled with his entire court, and there were dozens that had travelled from Summer with their Prince - the male hanging off the arm of the Night Court’s residing demon.
Cleaned up, Tamlin was still considered beautiful. And even in a world such as this it was still enough to turn heads and intentional or not, he garnered the interest of plenty of females at the wedding. The fact that he hadn’t been seen in public for so long only seemed to add to the desirability. He’d been reluctant initially, but after a few glasses of wine, Tamlin found himself enjoying it. Enjoying the attention at least. He had no reason to trust Feyre’s sister, but he didn’t take her for a liar. Which meant that there was a chance, a small one perhaps, that one of the females hanging off his arm, wine glass in hand might be the one she’d spoken about.
“Oh, I’m empty,” A red haired vixen with blood red lips wiggled her wine glass at Tamlin suggestively and he took it from between her fingers, their hands brushing.
“Allow me,” He turned and grabbed one of the Illyrian females by the arm as they passed, dropping the glass into her hands. “Refill it, and be quick about it,” he snapped his fingers.
He turned away to find the females giggling amongst themselves. Something humourous he must have missed. The red haired Fae grinned deviously at him.
“My wine?” she asked him.
“One of the servants is fetching it,”
And then Tamlin felt cold shock run down his back. Wine running into his eyes and down his tunic. The Fae he’d been with, laughed at him even as anger boiled in his blood and fangs sprouted in his mouth. There was the sound of ringing steel and as he wiped his eyes and blinked back into focus he saw the female he’d mistaken as a servant. Eyes the colour of wet bark stared him down. In moments they were surrounded by Illyrian soldiers.
“Is there a problem?”
Tamlin made to open his mouth but never got the chance.
“There was a problem, but I think it’s been resolved,” and Tamlin watched them bow to the female who’d spoke; with her scarred face and wings. As he noticed the tunic - the dress uniform, he realized she wasn’t a servant. She held military rank. He clamped his mouth shut, tasting blood as his own lengthened teeth bit into his mouth. There would be no victory picking a fight here. Feyre, Rhysand, the soon to be crowned King and Queen, and an army at their beck and call. Tamlin had expended a lot of energy replenishing the city gardens.
“At your word, Commander Masha,” the warrior said bowing, sparing a distinct glare Tamlin’s way.
“Please help find the High Lord a clean shirt,” she said, turning away.
—————————-
Humiliated and stinking of wine Tamlin had left soon after the wedding. Slinking back to his house. He stopped by the roses circling his home, noting the old scars from the blight Elain had cut off. She’d been right. With a growl of rage and and angry flit of his wrists, the bushes withered away into dead husks as Tamlin slipped inside. He’d seen the dilapidation of his home for some time. Roots had broken the floors. Grass. Weeds. They’d the run of the place now. This had been his father’s home, and it was with a moment of clarity in the foyer that Tamlin realised how he’d come to hate it. And it had been easy to let it fall down around him because in this place, there were so few good memories; and the ones here of joy he’d poisoned himself. His idea of love was twisted. What was worse was knowing the truth and having no idea how to go about fixing it.
Tamlin took a final look around the High Lord’s home before stepping out through his front doors, locking them behind him and disappearing into the woods.
———————
Tamlin had long since given up asking himself how the seer kept finding him. He changed his location on a weekly basis, magic bending the trees and vines, sleeping on a bed of moss and grass. As far as he knew, Elain Archeron wasn’t familiar with the lands of the Spring Court but she was still able to locate him. Sometimes she would bring him things. Clothes. Cakes. Other times she would ask him for assistance with something, dragging him back into civilization. Normally it was to a meeting of the High Lords; to a banquet for all the Courts where his presence would be expected, but sometimes it was for mundane reasons, like she needed advice on her garden. A troublesome patch of returning weeds. A fussy orchid. He enjoyed those more. No expectation, casual conversation. She was Lucien’s mate and had there been different circumstances, they might have been happy together. But it was a harsh lesson Tamlin had learned. Sometimes even with all the will in the world - fate itself - it just wasn’t enough.
Seasons passed like dreams; Tamlin scarcely remembered them but the pain of seeing Feyre lessoned with the years. It was only seeing her well, and happy that he recognized how miserable she’d been with him; how ill. And power suited her, he loathed to admit it, but it did. She was kind, and decisive. Young, but a quick learner. He’d have been lucky to have ruled with her. But she wouldn’t have been fortunate in that partnership. She’d have grown to outright hate him eventually. Bound to him. Trapped in a prison.
Tamlin would ask Elain each time he’d see her - each time she would coerce him out into the world - ask her if his mate would be there, and she would sometimes answer yes and occasionally answer no. In the beginning it had been a game, checking off names, crossing out faces, but in the last years he’d found himself forgetting who he’d ruled out, who still remained a possibility. He enjoyed Elain’s friendship. A relationship without the complication of status. They shared common interests. Through her, he’d rekindled a love for growing things again.
He hadn’t remembered to ask if his mate would be present when Elain Archeron invited him to her wedding. He’d not set foot in Velaris before and the sheer beauty of the city staggered him. He couldn’t blame Feyre for leaving, when this was what was waiting for her. A place of starlight and splendor.
Tamlin’s gift to Elain had been a single stem of roses that would ever bloom, would be untouched by winter, untouched by the scorch of the summer sun. As white and pure as snow. A tiny piece of the High Lord of Spring, left in the Court of Night. A gift….and, if he was honest, an apology too. His betrayal of Feyre and her sisters, there was nothing he could offer save his life in recompense for that. And Tamlin doubted his life was worth much these days.
She didn’t visit him for some time afterward, the winds whispered to him that she’d given birth to twins. Married, blessed with children, she had better things to do than visit him. And Tamlin took the time to visit the towns within his borders where he found that with the years he’d failed to collect his tithe the people of the Spring Court had prospered. They required little governance, certainly none from him, and provided he tend to the land, the land provided to his people. In the years of late, they’d told him the harvests had been the most bountiful in memory.
When Elain came to him next, there was something distinctly wrong. She wore an armoured corset of blackened bone, and a dagger at her belt when he’d rarely even seen her wear shoes.
“You need to leave!” Elain told him. Tamlin sat up on his elbows.
“I must commend you on your greeting, it’s been, what, a decade since I’ve seen you last? No pleasantries?”
Elain paused, clearly considering just how many years it had been. Realizing it had been as long as he said, her children were turning nine. Time for Fae was a strange concept. Years often passed without notice. For Elain it was often even more confusing. As her power grew it frequently became difficult to tell the past, present and future apart; the visions blurring her sight unbidden, assailing her in her waking hours.
“A fleet has landed from Hybern just south of your border in the mortal lands, they will sweep though your court in three days. They’ve come for you,”
“Then I suppose you should have visited earlier,”
Elain clenched her teeth, ignoring the jab. “The other Courts are raising their forces but it will be too late for you,”
“I’ll send word to the Court guard - ”
“They won’t be enough - they won’t be in time. If you stay here, you are going to die and since you have no heir, no family to pass the title onto, another line will be chosen and Hybern plans to replace you with one of their own,” She grabbed his arm, her hands were cold. Elain had changed in the years she’d been gone. Tamlin was so used to her calm knowing, that this obvious panic shook him.
“If I flee, my people will be slaughtered,” he whispered, slipping free from her fingers.
“If you stay, you will be slaughtered,”
And Tamlin felt the burden of a life of sins fall heavily on his shoulders. All his failings. His crimes and betrayals.
“I deserve far worse,” he whispered, brow furrowed. And he meant it. There wasn’t a hell for the things he’d done - things that he knew to be evil but did anyway. He’d told her - told Amarantha that Feyre couldn’t read. He’d seen her and Rhysand together, seen the marks of their bargain and he’d betrayed her - betrayed the woman he’d claimed to love, all out of jealous spite. Rhysand kept her alive while he’d been powerless, and Tamlin knew now that if he’d truly loved her, he should have bowed down to kiss the High Lord of the Night Court’s feet. That wasn’t the first, and it wasn’t the worst, but it was a sin he hadn’t yet faced. Tamlin stood, stretching and squaring his shoulders. This was his land, if he died, it would be here and he would be fighting for it.
He watched Elain look through him, her eyes passing him into a future unknown and then she sighed softly.
“I’ll do what I can to help. But you need to live,”
For what comes next
And she winnowed away.
——————–
There were three thousand Fae that landed on Prythian shores, emerging from the ocean mists without warning and making camp there on the beaches. Elain was right, Tamlin wouldn’t have had time to organize a defense for this. Their numbers were too great. Had she not provided the warning he wouldn’t had had the time to evacuate his lands; send his citizen’s fleeing north with his own guard as protection. Though not all were willing to leave, some choosing instead to stay and fight. To die with him if need be, while others were simply unwilling to leave their homes. They’d no intention of abandoning all that they’d built.
When Tamlin and his remaining soldiers had found the advance forces of the Hybern Fae, they were burning his people from their houses, putting their fields to the torch. And the winds blew a storm as Tamlin unleashed his wrath upon them, his beastly body tearing through armour and rending flesh. He had fifty guards with him, not enough to stem the horde sweeping through Spring but it was enough noise to pause the enemy advance. Elain had said they were planning to kill him. Well, there he was.
Blood soaked ash soaked the earth as Tamlin and his soldiers made their final stand. They’d slaughtered hundreds but more had come, eventually surrounding them. Arrows rained from the sky, falling indiscriminately on both Spring Court soldiers and injured Hybern Fae. Tamlin had been fighting for hours without rest, his strength had dwindled to the point that not even his winds were enough to take them all from the sky before they landed and unable to save them, he watched his guards fall, their screams and shouts drowned out by his own. One by one they died, pierced by feathered shafts. Tamlin blocked most but two made it through to him. One striking his shoulder and another in the thigh bringing him to his knees. He watched Fae advance from all sides. Closing in on him. When he looked up, there were males in armour all around him.
“Pathetic,” One dressed in silver laughed down at him. “You don’t deserve the title of High Lord,” the male said raising a spear tip to Tamlin’s throat.
Tamlin blinked, bracing himself for death. The cold edge of steel pricking his skin.
And then it was all gone in a blaze of light. Hybern soldiers shouted and roared around him and Tamlin clenched his eyes against the shards of splintered wood and the blood and white light that seared his face. It was so hot it burned his eyelids and lips. A whirlwind of blistering power. And as suddenly as it came it was gone. And as the noise and the heat died down Tamlin risked opening his eyes and found himself at the center of a guard of Illyrian warriors.
“Don’t move,” One of them barked, pulling his helmet free and crouching down in front of Tamlin. His skin paler than the rest, with blue grey eyes and black hair so strikingly familiar. Had it really been that long? The child that hadn’t been able to sit still at Elain’s wedding was now a fully grown male. Where once he’d been fighting imaginary beasts with a wooden sword, now he wore wings as Rhysand did; the sword at his hip was steel, and blood stained.
“You’ve grown, Kylan,” Tamlin hissed out. Feyre’s son examined his wounds and before he could protest, pulled the arrow from his thigh. Tamlin wavered at the sudden rush of blood from the wound as Kylan prodded the one through his shoulder, frowning. That would not be so quickly removed.
“You recognized me?”
“I’d know your mothers eyes blinded in a darkened room,” Tamlin laughed softly. The sound morphing into a hiss of pain.
“And I’d know the High Lord of the Spring Court, by the attempted suicide,” he growled back.
The anger in his veins gave Tamlin enough strength to rise on one leg and snarl back at him. Displaying a set of razor sharp teeth.
The Night Court prince laughed at him, a laugh so reminiscent of his father that for just a seconds delirium, Rhysand was there before him and not his son.
“Good,” was all he said, winnowing them all out of the battlefield.
Tamlin must have lost consciousness for a moment because he only remembered opening his eyes, not closing them, and when he came around, it was in a war camp. Fae in the armour of at least half the Courts in Prythian and a legion of Illyrian soldiers, all mobilizing for war. He heard Far speaking. Voices that were familiar.
“I didn’t want to take it out, the pain would probably have killed him,”
“Yes, but you’d no problem pulling out the one in his leg and nicking the artery there,”
Tamlin’s eyes snapped open as rough hands fell on his shoulders, holding him still as something snapped the shaft of the arrow in his shoulder and forced it all the way through. He cried out in pain, gasping as it faded to warmth. His eyes refocused and he saw an Illyrian female with hands covered in blood throw the broken arrow at Kylan angrily.
“If he’s still alive with an arrow in his shoulder and his leg, you leave them in!” she raised a finger. “If you aren’t trained to take them out, then you leave them for someone who fucking is,”
“Yes, General Masha,” the son of the High Lord bowed even as Tamlin rattled the name around his head. His mind momentarily struggled with the command structure of what was happening - it took him an instant to remember that the Illyrian’s didn’t fight for the Night Court anymore. They had their own leaders. Rhysand’s son looked to be here, operating under, or with at least the Illyrian forces.
“Go do something useful before your Uncle arrives and I’ve to explain to them why you’re hog tied with the Summer Court horses,”
He left quickly, and Tamlin stood.
“Thank you!” he inclined his head, genuinely grateful but she only huffed at him, shaking her head.
“That’s not normally the polite response to gratitude,” Tamlin growled at her.
“Gratitude? You should be on your knees thanking me,” A warrior passed her carrying a dozen spears and she paused, stopping him, “They go to the east flank,” she snapped, circling back to Tamlin, “I had to advance our lines three days ahead of schedule to pull you out of there, this line is now vulnerable thanks to you,”
Tamlin bit down on his anger.
“I didn’t ask to be saved by - ” he started to say but was interrupted before he could continue.
“Don’t you dare finish that fucking sentence!” she bared her teeth at him, her wings flapping in anger. “Spring is the only vulnerable Court, if they kill you and take a foothold here, then the fighting will never end,”
Tamlin took a calming breath, he knew she was right. If it were possible to supplant him in Spring, all they need do is replace him with someone from a large family and Prythian would see a Hybern ruler in Court till the stars fell. He realised that self exile to the wilds had resulted in knowledge gaps; Tamlin genuinely had no idea what the state of affairs were currently in Prythian. He studied her a moment longer. His mind clearing. He’d seen her before.
He narrowed his eyes. “You poured a glass of wine over my head at Nesta Archeron’s wedding,” he sputtered out. Though she wore heavy armour now and along her chest six Illyrian siphons sat, marking her power level as dangerous.
“I don’t recall that - or much else,” she hushed under her breath, “But now that I’ve met you and I’m entirely sober, I’m pretty positive you likely deserved it,” something caught her eye and she turned a half step towards a large group of Fae soldiers in Night Court garb handing out quivers. He saw the problem. There was a lot to be done and it didn’t take six males to distribute arrows.
Tamlin snorted, then winced with the ache in his shoulder, though both it and the one in his leg had closed with barely a scar, only the dull memory of pain and torn cloth remained. She was a powerful healer and it was clear from the organization in the camp she knew what she was doing. He watched her walk away and laughed as she took one of the soldiers by the collar and shoved him out into the ranks of the archers, throwing him a bow while males around him chuckled.
She stalked back to Tamlin, handing him a sword.
“If you stay here, you fight. And if you fight, you will be following my orders. If you can’t come to terms with that, I’ll have some warriors escort you north across the Summer border,” she said.
Tamlin thought it over. He couldn’t fight an army alone. He wrapped his hands around the hilt of the weapon. Testing it’s weight. He nodded, bowing slightly.
“Good to hear,” she said turning away from him. He followed her with his gaze as she walked away. Briefly wondering how he was going to manage taking orders when he’d only ever given them. But that was over two decades ago. Things had changed.
He saw warriors stop what they were doing and bow as she passed. A lot had changed.
“I DID deserve it!” Tamlin called after her, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth as she looked back over to him and shrugged, self satisfaction written on her face.
“I’m a good judge of males, then,” she hollered back.