Hello hello hello! TheLastBookBender here! I've decided to change things up a bit and to write some fanfics for ToG series. I hope you all enjoy! I have written two other fanfics, set after ACOTAR (1) and ACOMAF. The ACOTAR is probably one I will not be continuing, because you know, ACOMAF is out. The other fnafic is called A Court of Twisted Lies set right after ACOMAF. Not my best work though *winces*
Anyway, enough of my self-promotion! All characters go to our dear author, Sarah .J. Maas. Enioy, and please comment! I would love to hear any constructive criticism and what you guys think! This will be a series of one-shots, not in any partciular order.
For the first time in a decade, Lorcan Salvaterre was pissed at none other but himself. Well, that was not exactly true.
He was furious at everyone, everything. The gods, the universe, Maeve.
Angry. Raging.
She had no right. He would have taken any punishment, and discipline she felt inclined to rain upon him for his percieved betrayal. Everything he had done was for her, and then that bitch of a queen cut him loose from the bond that had both tormented and saved him the past centuries.
Every pain, every step he had taken from her was to perserve her.
But…something had changed along the way. Suddenly it had become not just his survival and the welfare of Maeve, but the safety of Elide.
And then to something like awe, and desire, and this overwhelming burn to protect.
A long forgotten pain strummed in his chest, every pulse of agonzied devestation breaking him down to his core.
He could feel it. The wave of crashing loss, threatening to break through his mental barriers. Rowan leaving, his cadre breaking apart, Maeve, and now Elide. Elide, who had spurned him, rejected his best efforts.
Nothing he did was ever good enough, not since that time he was abandoned as a child and left to fend for his rotten self.
No one wanted Lorcan Salvaterre.
So he chose bitterness, a frenzied anger to keep his regret in check.
He schooled his face into familiar, passive coolness, and went to join the others around the campfire, running his hands along the rough bark of the ancient oaks. The flames illuminated the solemn faces of Gavriel and Elide, making them seem less than human, ghost-like.
Rowan was nowhere to be seem, probably flying in some sorrow-induced stupor. Lorcan suppressed the urge to snort. Whitethorn was a formidable romantic.
Before, he might have teased him about it, barely disguising thinly veiled disgust, but now, he thought he could understand a little better.
Losing the person you cared about most did that to a person. Could drive in a stake so deep so that it was nearly impossible to pull it out.
Lorcan waited at the edge of the clearing, for what, he didn't know. Maybe permission from Elide. That was the least he owed her.
Gavriel spoke first. "We know you're there, Lorcan." We? Were Gavriel and Elide a team now?
His pissy mind just didn't want to shut up, jumping at the most foolish concluisions. Lorcan shook his head to clear his mind, unbound hair whipping into his eyes.
"You can join us, you know." Elide. Her musical voice hit him like a physical blow, harder than any knife.
"We don't bite," she smiled weakly, a poor attempt at lightening the mood.
Yes you do, he was tempted to say. Sunk her little fangs into his soul and didn't let go, tearing him apart. He swallowed and stepped into the firelight, holding up a rabbit, skinned and gutted. An offering.
He knew he wasn't welcome to share the log that his companions had convinced themselves was a bench, so he claimed a spot opposite them to cook to the rabbit. He could have caught several more, but he didn't think anyone was hungry enough.
For awhile, there was only the sound of crickets and the crackling of the fire to keep them company. Elide kept staring at her hands, as if expecting them to do something useful or at least do other than sit limply in her lap.
Gavriel just stared into the distance.
In the end, it became just too much for Lorcan.
"Where the hell is Whitethorn?" He snarled in Gavriel's direction. Elide's head snapped up.
"Mourning," she said teresely. "Like he as every right to be." She stared pointedly in Lorcan's direction, obviously blaming him for the source of Rowan's sadness.
He wanted to growl right back, it was for you. I did it for you. I summoned her for you.
She looked away. Gavriel, like always, said nothing, and they settled into a tense silence, like they had for the past few days.
*(insert time divider here but it won't let me so….)*
Lorcan purely regretted his decision to help resuce that fire-breathing bitch. The incessant silence of Gavriel, the painful exhaustion of Elide, and Rowan descending rapidly into a catatonic, feral state was enough to drive the sanest man mad.
He loosed a sigh, the closest he would go to reveal any inner frustration. Elide, of course, noticed it and pinned him with a piercing glance, as if to remind him once again that it was his fault that they were even on this journey.
Lorcan looked away. Hurt stabbed briefly in his chest, but he suppressed it under layers of the cold, icy hate he had harboured for centuries.
She would probably hate him forever, and the thought made his heart drop like a stone to his stomach. He almost throttled himself for being so unbearably weak. He had endured worse; he could endure this too.
"We can stop here for the night,' Rowan rasped, the first words he had spoken all day. They silently followed him to a copse of trees well hidden from the road.
By an unspoken agreement, Lorcan went to gather the food for supper, while Gavriel helped set up the weathered tents, mere scraps of cloth at that point.
It took Lorcan a grand total of ten mintues to snare a rabbit before he noticed the crunching of twigs and leaves in his wake. The wind shifted, and the scent of the being following him wafted in his direction.
Elide.
He did not feel like doing this right now.
Lorcan waited until she was barely a foot away, then whirled to face her, rabbit in hand.
"What do you want?" He asked. It came out harsher than intended, and Elide's lips thinned.
She twisted her hands in front of her, and fidgeted her feet.
"I just wanted- I just wanted to say-"
She abruptly lunged forward and kissed him hard on the mouth. Lorcan went still in shock and dropped the rabbit before clasping her face and deepening the kiss.
Elide groaned hungrily, her body lined up agasint his, when she gasped and yanked away from him.
"I- I'm sorry," she stuttered, heat blooimng across her pale cheeks. Lorcan opened his mouth to say whatever stupid thing he was thinking, and she held up a hand to shush him.
"I can't do this. I can't hate you Lorcan, as much as I want to." Elide drew in a ragged breath, grasping the roots of her hair and tugging slightly to relive her tension.
"I don't know if I can forgive you yet," she muttered, almost ashamedly. "I don't know if I ever will. But I can't stand being apart from you, and I feel this pull towards you, and this is stupid. I shouldn't have said anything."
Elide started babbling, backing away, turning on her heel to flee. Lorcan grabbed her forearm, her back to him.
"No," he growled. "I feel it too."
She grinned, that ancient sadness falling away from her face. Lorcan almost couldn't stand it, her happiness that was meant for him. Couldn't stand it, because he had never dreamed of anyone looking at him like that, like he was something worth smiling over.
He looked at her, and he saw her, not the scars, not the limp, not that unnatural pale skin. But that inner beauty and light that semeed to shine through, unsullied by years of hardship. He looked, and thought he had never seen anything so worth living and dying for.
Lorcan gathered her lithe body into his arms, sensing it was what she needed. Strong arms to support her, hold her.
And like everything that had happened had suddenly rushed to the surface, she went limp, and cried.
Sobbed into his chest like he was the one being anchoring her to the world.
So he did not let go.