Rhys's mind twisted in around itself, in pain and fear for his family and guilt. He could feel Tamlin somewhere in the back of it, trying to find him, but Rhys buried himself in the dark, his heart pounding in his throat, only vaguely aware that he could still feel the warmth of Tamlin's skin against his forehead through his shirt, where he still stood just behind him, could see the bright of him against his closed eyes.

He'd felt this way three times before. Once, when his father had opened a box to discover his mother and sister's heads, the bloody mess, the last look of horror on both their faces. Cauldron, what has Tamlin done?! Second, when he had stood outside Tamlin's door at night, ready to slaughter him, and realized that for all his grief and hate, he could not kill him, not Tamlin, for reasons he had never understood. I can't kill you, you son of a bitch, I can't, I don't want you to die and leave me-

The third time, when Amarantha's curse took hold, and he'd felt her rip away nearly all of his power, felt it slipping through his fingers faster than he could grasp it. The absolute terror and pain of it, feeling the core of himself being torn out and put into her, too far for him to ever reach to bring it back. The screams of every High Lord, ringing in unison, as they all fell apart. Only Tamlin had seemed less than totally surprised.

But this.

This was not being inflicted on him. This was so much worse than that.

She knew where Velaris was. It was over. It was over and nothing had mattered at all.

He felt, deep within his mind, the sense of a green and verdant sunshine, the perfect spring day. The sun shining through leaves, trying to break through and find him inside his fear. Along the tether that connected them, he felt Tamlin's voice more than heard it. Come back to me.

Amarantha was talking to him still, taunting him, but he couldn't hear her. He couldn't hear her over the roar in his mind. The only light left in the room came from Tamlin's skin. The rest was darkness, and wind, and fury.

He could not hurt her. He'd been commanded never to hurt her, he had to defend her with his life, and his power, churning within him, had nowhere to go. He heard a rumble, from somewhere, thunder Under the Mountain. The room shook around them, books falling off bookshelves. If she hadn't bound up nearly everything he had within herself, he would have brought the mountain down on all their heads right then and there.

Come back to me, Tamlin repeated into his mind along the mating bond. Rhys forced himself to try and relax. He lifted his head, just slightly, pressing his mouth to the back of Tamlin's neck, briefly. Finally, he opened his eyes and looked up.

"-have a plan for you," Amarantha was saying, sweetly. "You don't have to worry, Rhys. You'll be right there to see the show." She had moved in front of them, while the storm raged in his mind. He wondered how Tamlin had broken her magic, how he had been able to kill Lucien's brothers back in the garden. Wished he could do it again, right now.

"If you hurt them-" He growled.

"Oh, Rhys darling," She said, and stepped forward, simply pushing herself between he and Tamlin. Tamlin stumbled back slightly, his own face not even masking his rage, though some of his light dimmed. The air smelled like crushed leaves. She pressed the length of her body against Rhys's, pressed her mouth to his cold one. She murmured against his frozen lips, "I'm going to hurt them all. In every possible way. And you'll get to watch."

Rhys let out a sound, the anger in him needing somewhere, anywhere to go. He tried to pull back, but her hand around his neck was like iron, and he couldn't even move an inch.

"I feel how much you hate me right now," She said, desire lighting her up. "Did you think if you distracted me I'd never think to ask where all your people were, in that great vast land you live in? Did you think I'd never be suspicious that my pet liar might be lying to me?"

Rhys just stared her down, as the darkness around them blew an ice cold wind, blowing over chairs he could hear clattering but could not see. Tamlin, he noticed, had stood his feet further apart to brace himself, hands in fists. Can't win this one on brute strength, Rhys thought only to himself. "You are only emptiness yourself, aren't you?" Rhysand's voice was cold, a High Lord offended. The fear was gone and in its place was an endless well of glacial rage. "You can't even find rock bottom. There isn't one. You'll never fill yourself up. You'll always be empty. Whatever you take from us, it will never fill you up."

Amarantha laughed, a brilliant lunacy in the sound. "I guess I'll just keep filling myself with other things, hm? Tamlin," She said over her shoulder, to the golden-haired man behind them, half-obscured by the darkness Rhys's anger had conjured. "How much do you hate me?"

"You can't even imagine," Tamlin replied, hair blowing around his eyes, his own voice choked. He stepped forward, grabbing her by one arm and spinning her around to face him. "I don't even have the words."

"Words have never exactly been your specialty, though, have they, Tamlin?" Amarantha teased. With her eyes off of him, Rhys felt he could breathe again, taking a couple of steps back, trying to calm the darkness, the windswept void of his helplessness that had the three of them at the center. Amarantha, unbothered, her hair whipped around her by the breeze, pressed up against Tamlin now and Rhys felt a spike of jealous rage.

Stop touching him. Stop touching him, he's mine, stop-

Tamlin grabbed her by the shoulders, trying to push her away, holding her at arm's length. He growled, low in the back of his throat, as though even now the beast might find its way back out. Rhys saw a shimmer of claws in his fingers before his grip tightened against the pain. "Amarantha-"

"How well you protect him," Amarantha said softly. "What a protector you turned out to be."

Tamlin froze, stricken. "Stop it." His words were a barely-breathed whisper.

"How well you've kept your mate safe," Amarantha smiled, a flash of white teeth.

"You have to stop." The light that had edged his skin simply blinked out, all at once. The scent of spring that had lingered in the air was gone.

"I'm going to tear his home down to its foundations and kill everyone he loves and you cannot protect him at all. If your father had simply sold you to me, Rhys would never have felt an ounce of the pain he's feeling now. The High Lords would be free. This is all your fault, isn't it? All that hurt in him, all his pain and the things he is going to lose... it's all because you said no to me."

"Stop!" Tamlin shouted, moving as though he would attack her, only to have her net close in, groaning, letting go of her.

Don't listen to her, Rhys pleaded down the mating bond, and saw Tamlin's green eyes meet his own, narrowed against the pain. Everything she says is a lie.

We're going to save them, Tamlin said back, with absolute conviction. I'll be with you. I'll be beside you.

The wind was calming, the darkness beginning to recede.

Amarantha stepped back up to Tamlin, pressing a finger to his lips. "You're both so beautiful when you're hopeless. Do you hate me so much?"

"Yes," Tamlin said hoarsely.

"So incredibly much," Rhys said.

"Then I suggest we see how well you use it in bed," Amarantha, sliding one arm up around behind Tamlin's neck. "Come here, Rhys."

Closing his eyes against the fear and hate and disgust that roiled inside of him, Rhys stepped slowly up behind her. She slid her other arm back and around behind his neck, so they were both pressed against her, one on either side. "Come on, my captive High Lords. Fuck me like you mean it. Enjoy every minute."

Tamlin took in a deep breath, and then his eyes drifted from her to Rhys, just behind her. I'm sorry, Rhys. I'm so sorry.

She's going to kill them all. My family.

She's not. I'm going to fuck her until she breaks in half.

If that was possible, I would have solved Prythian's whole problem all by myself about fifty years ago.

The last of the darkness faded from the corners of the room. He leaned down, keeping his eyes locked on Tamlin's, and kissed her shoulder. He was somewhat gratified to see his own jealousy echoed in Tamlin's eyes as he watched.

One day she won't be the voice in our heads, Spring.

They all but threw her onto her bed, and threw themselves at her. Rhys shed his clothes in a fury. Tamlin was with him, on him, a murmur against him and behind him, a calming spring day to his raging midnight storm.

"Oh, Rhys, try to have fun," Amarantha purred, sitting up on one elbow to look up at him as he slid his shirt off.

"I'd rather rip you limb from limb," Rhys said, leaning down to kiss her, sliding a hand behind her back along her warm skin. She arched into him and Rhys briefly wished he were dead.

"Just like I ripped apart Tamlin's mortal lover?" She said, in the softest lover's voice.

Rhysand felt the awful lurch in Tamlin's mind all the way down the bond, felt Tamlin bury himself in guilt. For a moment, both of them were darkness.

She's going to take my family away. Everything gets taken away. It's over.

I couldn't even protect one single mortal girl.

Lucien was in a panic.

He ran through the tunnels, pushing past soldiers and the endless closed doors. The thunder rumbled behind him, and courtiers were peeking out their doors, whispering to each other, worried as the mountain itself seemed to shake. He threw himself through the hallways like the hounds of hell were on his heels. His heart was pounding, he nearly tripped over his own feet, hair flying out behind him.

At some point he'd dropped the careful glamour that kept people from realizing he'd been traveling, but if the soldiers even noticed, no one so much as stopped him. No one even seemed to look at him. No one except a pair of shadows that briefly detached from the wall into two dark-skinned women, who watched him impassively, and then faded back again.

When he stumbled back out into the strawberry patch outside the tunnel door to Spring, he came to a skittering stop. She knew where Rhys's friends were, and she was going there. She'd won, she was right about that. She had the whole land of Prythian in her grasp, and the southern border of Spring was full of thousands of her soldiers, waiting for her to find a way to take down the Wall.

And still she was going to take the time to raze Rhys's world to the ground. She was out of her mind in a way Lucien had never truly understood until just then. Even knowing as he did that she had cost Hybern a war with her obsession over torturing Jurian as slowly as possible to avenge her sister's death... even knowing that, he hadn't understood the depths of her madness until now.

If the Suriel's riddles did not work, they were all going to be under her thumb, forever. But the Suriels spoke true. They always spoke true. And Lucien had every piece of the puzzle except for Cassian. Azriel had said Cas was the key, and they were still in Valeris. If he hurried, maybe he could get Feyre and everything else there before Amarantha did.

When he got back to Rosehall, it looked more abandoned than ever. The front yard had been trampled by traveling soldiers on horseback, and he tried not to look at the ruin they'd made of Tamlin's rosebushes. No one was here, though. No servants. No soldiers.

They should be down by the border, now. He could pull this off if he were careful.

He didn't have time to be careful. Amarantha had said her soldiers were already winnowing north.

What are you doing? His sword asked, a note of concern ringing its usual song.

"I don't know," He said, thinking of the look on Rhysand's face. "I don't know but I think I have to beat her to Velaris."

He'd hidden everything in Feyre's mausoleum, with her body. He'd have to get her body to Velaris without being seen and into somewhere out of the way, without people wondering why he was just… carting around a very well preserved dead mortal and a bag of random antiques while going to see the people who ran the Night Court in Rhysand's absence.

That might cause some raised eyebrows, His sword noted.

"I have to beat her there," He muttered, as he skidded to a stop in front of the door to the mausoleum. Even the cemetery had been trampled by the soldiers, but thankfully no one was here. He wondered if the servants were even still in Rosehall, without even his glamour to attend. He hoped they'd all run off to safer courts.

"If she wins," He said out loud, as he unlocked the mausoleum with shaking hands, "There is no safer court to run to. There is no safe place. She'll find them all - she'll find Viviane, she'll find that female with her baby, she'll hunt down Tarquin, she'll find them all."

Then I suggest we don't let her win, the sword replied.

"I have one trick left," Lucien said, as he pushed open the massive mausoleum door and went inside, lighting the faelights as he walked. "Just one."

Feyre, laying on the slab, as beautiful as the day she died but for the black threads that marred her body where they had sewn her back together. He looked at her hands, clasped over her stomach, where he'd moved them. His heart lurched with it, his love for her, the love he'd never said a thing about. She'd been meant to save Tamlin, after all. And Lucien had been glad for it, even if he'd intended to pine after her until she died a mortal death soon enough.

He'd never told her how much she reminded him of Jesminda - fiery and funny and as stubborn as a drunk mule even on her good days, the sort of person who would be given an order and immediately make it her entire life's goal to disobey. Tamlin had loved the idea of her, but Lucien didn't think he'd really… appreciated her, for the hellcat she was. There hadn't been time. Her golden-brown hair lay around her, as if she were only sleeping and would soon wake up.

Try to remember it's not Feyre you're waking up, the sword said, a note of sympathy. Remember that it's not her. She's been dead for nearly a year and a half, Lucien. Her soul is beyond you, now, and I'm sure she feels peace.

"I know," He said, hoarsely, unable to stop staring at her in this moment when he needed to do anything but hesitate. "I know."

Do you, really?

"Yes. I think. Mostly. Oh, Cauldron, how do I get everything to Valeris?"

"You ask for help," A woman's voice said behind him, and he turned to see the Morrigan there, arms crossed. Her golden hair was pulled into a low bun, and her brown eyes blazed in her face. It occurred to him that she must have been a sight on the battlefield during the war in all her armor, something to rally loyalty or engender fear… depending on which side of the fight you were on.

"How… how did you-"

"I've been waiting for a while. I got bored and scouted the soldiers at the border to see if anything had changed there. They're restless but about the same. I found someone in the house, they said you'd gone for a ride, then headed straight Under the Mountain to see her. Everyone here is terrified. Did you? See her?"

"Yes," Lucien said softly.

"Did you see… Rhys?" There was another look in her eyes, then. Longing, and a fierce, all-encompassing love. "Under there?"

"Yes."

"What is he like, now?"

"Doesn't know when to shut up."

"So the same, then."

"Also our lords are mates. Morrigan, we've got to get-"

"Call me Mor." She stepped up, looking around behind him into the mausoleum. Then, suddenly, she jerked back and looked at him. "Our lords are what?"

"Mates." Lucien did not quite spit the word, but he wasn't far off. "I could smell it on them both when I was there. Tamlin didn't deny it."

Mor whistled, long and low. "Well… shit."

"That would pretty well encapsulate my thoughts, yes."

"Half of me is glad Rhys finally found someone who has to put up with him forever. Half of me… doesn't have time to deal with this right now."

"Probably not. Whether or not they're mates isn't going to matter much if they're bedding Amarantha for eternity."

She took in a breath. "I am pretending you did not say that, and filing this under deal with later. What are you doing in a grave?"

"See for yourself," Lucien said, and Mor looked around him, putting a hand up to her mouth as she looked at the woman lying on the slab.

"By the Cauldron, she was beautiful, wasn't she? Amarantha did this to her?"

"Yes. while Tamlin and Rhysand and I were forced to watch. It's funny, you can't even see it, when she's… gone. She had this fire in her-" Lucien fought back the sudden tightening of his throat, the tears that threatened his good eye while his metal one whirred, dry and undeterred. "I would have followed her anywhere." He thought of his night with the Spirit of the Glass, the futures and presents and pasts that slid around and into and through them while he had moved in her. "I think in some times, I did follow her anywhere. Mor, we have to get everything in this room to Valeris as quickly as we can."

"I gathered that," Mor said quietly. "Why?"

"Because this is our only chance."

"This?" She raised an eyebrow, looking at Feyre's body again. "Lucien, I read your letter, but this is a dead body. She's very pretty, but she is also very, very dead. Your letter did not mention the fate of our land depends on a very well-preserved corpse."

"She is also our last best hope to get ourselves the fuck out of this nightmare."

"Sign me up for getting us out of this," She said, stepping closer. "Why the hurry now? Azriel said you've been at this for… a year. More."

"Because Amarantha knows where you are," Lucien said, and watched the same progression of face paling to white and the rise of an all-consuming fear in her face that he'd seen in Rhys's. It was no less awful to watch this time, although at least darkness didn't start to grow when Mor was upset. "Amarantha knows where Valeris is. And she's coming to you. She said her soldiers are already headed north."

"We're warded," Mor said softly. "She can't find her way in. She can't find us."

"Amarantha learned where Valeris is from Cassian, and she seemed pretty confident about getting in."

"I… he'd never. He'd never tell her," Mor said defensively. "You don't know him. He'd never give that kind of information up! We all made a vow that we'd die first!" There was a silence. "Oh, no. That weird fire. They passed out, they were out for… hours… did he tell her then, somehow? Cas can't speak in minds like that."

"I don't think he told her," Lucien said. "My sword tried to explain it to me, but I can't… keep my mind on it. It just floats out again when I try. Do you have them somewhere safe?"

Mor pressed her lips together. "Nowhere safer than Valeris, until today."

Cassian will do worse than just tell her their location before this is done, his sword murmured. Lucien was glad that Mor could not hear it.

"Listen to me. Are they… secure?"

She shook her head, slowly, staring around the inside of the mausoleum. "No. We didn't… Az asked us to, but he hates locks. When he woke all the way up he didn't remember asking and he… the look on his face… I couldn't. Cas was furious at us for even thinking about it. Even Amren couldn't bear it. She'd never tell you, but Az has always been her favorite. She's off reading up, trying to figure out what the fire was in the first place…"

"We need to go back soon, and we need to get this done. I think whatever happened to Cassian isn't over."

Mor slowly nodded, looking at the objects he'd laid around the room. The necklace Feyre still wore around her neck, the lantern… "What is all this?"

"You read the letter. It's all the riddles," Lucien answered. "Here." He loaded Mor up with the lantern, the book of childrens' faerie tales, the Spirit of the Glass's eye.

Feyre's body, perfectly preserved.

The sword at his side, with its bloody song.

The necklace worn to celebrate a terrible death.

The eye of a spirit whose vengeance ruined a land for eternity.

A book of tales of the forgotten gods.

A lantern from the Autumn Court, that could not be lit by fae hands.

Somewhere in Valeris, Cassian, who feared no war, who had been tied to her throne.

Lucien's presence at the announcement of a High Lord's worst fear brought to life.

And the final piece of the puzzle…

Lucien gave Mor the last of the objects, and reached over to the slab himself, picking Feyre up into his arms. She felt as though she were only sleeping, her skin still lukewarm, her head dropped to the side and nestled against his neck. If it hadn't been for the strange way her arm hung and her heavy dead weight, he might have felt himself hope she was still alive, still in there somehow.

"The final riddle," he said, grunting slightly with effort, "I've never understood. I still don't quite… but I think I get more of it than I did before."

"What's the final riddle?" Mor asked.

Lucien snorted.

"Each loses a battle to win the war

Bring the first bargain between brothers to bear

When beast is gone, stars may soar

Let love undo the final prayer."

Mor frowned, biting her lower lip in thought. "I don't… I don't like that mention of losing battles."

"I'm pretty terrified of the part where it mentions the 'beast is gone', myself."

"Battles… haven't we already lost so many?"

"There's one more bit. A different Suriel… or maybe the same one, I honestly can never tell, also told me to trust the shadows, not the song." Mor's eyes widened. "What? Why are you making that face?"

"That's what Azriel said, when he woke up," She said, turning and walking quickly away from the cemetery. Lucien followed her, Feyre in his arms. "He told us… he said I am not the shadows. When we asked him later about it, he didn't remember saying it at all."

Lucien's eyebrows knitted together. "But he's been helping me from the start, as soon as he found out about it."

Mor let out a rush of breath. "I've been gone for almost a full day scouting, Amren's been busy making sure our defenses were refreshed after Az, and Cas, and I have all left the city… Let's get back to Velaris. Now. It's going to take a while to go that far from here, but…"

"I don't know how long we have, Mor. I genuinely don't. But… at least long enough for her to do what I think she's doing to Rhysand and Tamlin right now."

"I am also filing that under something I cannot deal with right now."

The two of them winnowed away.