When Feyre grabbed Lucien's uninjured arm and whispered "We're getting out of here," Lucien wasn't sure what exactly she meant—neither of them had anywhere to go. At least, Lucien didn't.
And Lucien couldn't leave Tamlin. He-He couldn't.
"He'll find us, Feyre. He'll-We'll never get away."
"We will. I have a plan. I've been working with some-" Feyre froze. The walls had ears and Feyre was terrified. "-some friends at the, the Night Court restaurant. You know, the one down on-"
"I know the one." Lucien knew exactly what the people down at the Night Court restaurant did and what they were like. They were the type of people you didn't piss off. Tamlin had just gotten away with his life last time he infringed on their territory, and Lucien wasn't about to get involved with them.
"They… do this kind of stuff."
"Feyre, what have you gotten us into?"
Feyre sat back on her heels. "I thought-I thought you'd be on board with this."
"Fey, the Night Court are dangerous. Rhys is-"
"You know Rhys?"
Lucien swallowed thickly. "Yeah. I know him, he's dangerous Feyre. They all are. You do know they run the nastiest crew this side of the Atlantic, right?"
Feyre frowned. "They want to help me-They promise-"
"They almost killed Tam once, Fey."
"Almost isn't good enough." Feyre muttered under her breath.
Lucien slapped a hand over Feyre's mouth. "You can't say that. He could hear-"
They both froze as they heard footsteps. Lucien's heart beat in his ears, his breath came quick and because of how close they were Lucien could feel Feyre's breath on his neck. He could feel her tense under his hand. Lucien knew if they were caught this close he'd be in trouble but as it was he was too petrified to move.
When the footsteps moved away Feyre let out a breath so loud Lucien tensed up again. When he finally went back to his constant state of agitation and alertness Lucien let his eyes weld up.
"Please." Lucien whispered. "Please, Feyre. Don't do anything stupid. The Night Court are worse than Tamlin. Now, you gotta go before he finds us."
"Nothing could be worse than Tamlin." Feyre bit back. She pushed herself away from him and stomped out of Lucien's room.
"Feyre, leave. Lucien, close the door." Tamlin said softly. Lucien swallowed thickly. Feyre's eyes flicked back and forth from Tamlin to Lucien. Lucien walked stiffly, his arm barely healed from the Incident in the kitchen.
Feyre couldn't want him do this to Lucien. Not anymore.
"Feyre," Tamlin growled, "I said, get out."
Go. Lucien begged her with his mind. Go, please get out of here.
Feyre turned, each step paining her. Feyre walked through the door, and pressed her back to the wall in the hall. She closed her eyes as Lucien closed the door, and knew what she had to do.
Feyre awoke Lucien in the dead of night. "Feyre, no. We can't-"
"I'm not letting him hurt you again, Lucien." Feyre hissed. "Neither of us. Ever again." Feyre reached out gently to touch Lucien's face and he flinched away from her.
"I don't have time." Feyre whispered. "I'm going. Are you coming with me?"
Lucien stared at her eyes wide. He looked down at the bag in her hands. Then, back at her. "It's a mistake." Lucien whispered. "But it's a mistake I won't let you make alone."
Feyre kissed Lucien's forehead, and grabbed his hand. Together, they ran.
The Night Court was open when Lucien and Feyre arrived. The Morrigan, Lucien was one of the few who knew her on sight (thanks to Tamlin and Eris's altercation with them), ushered them through the restaurant and into a back room. The room was already set up with two beds, a bathroom with a shower and a toilet, a kitchenette, and two dressers.
"This, this was your master plan." Lucien asked Feyre.
"Anything is better than him."
Lucien wanted to disagree, but he wasn't necessarily free to. The Night Court employees—the gang called themselves the Inner Circle, as far as Lucien heard—were watching. He could feel their eyes on his back, their ears on the door, watching, wanting to see what he would do.
Lucien wouldn't let himself give them the satisfaction.
A soft knock.
"Come in." Feyre called out. "Just be grateful." She hissed to Lucien.
Just be grateful. That doesn't sound like a recipe for disaster. Lucien thought.
The Morrigan was the one to enter, if they thought that The Morrigan would somehow be the least threatening of all of them then they clearly didn't know Lucien knew of her. "Are you two hungry? Thirsty?"
Feyre shook her head, thankfully. She ran to The Morrigan and hugged her. Peeling back Feyre began to cry. "Mor, thank you so much. We can't thank you enough I-"
"Feyre, darling, it's our pleasure. We're going to keep you safe, I promise. Here," Mor dug around in her purse and pulled out a packet of tissues, "here, darling use these."
Feyre took them and blew her nose with them.
"How about you, Lucien? Need anything?"
To be safe. "I'm fine. Really, you've gone to enough trouble for us."
The Morrigan smiled at Lucien, which only made him more uncomfortable. It must have shown on Lucien's face (stupid stupid stupid!) because the Morrigan's face melted into one of… indifference.
Oh god. She was going to get angry. She was going to get angry and yell and-
"Okay. I'll leave you two to settle in. If you want, we're all upstairs on the second floor playing poker. Family game night, you know-"
"We don't mean to intrude." Lucien insisted.
"You wouldn't be!" Liar. "We'd love to have you there!" Liar, there's not way she's telling the truth. She knew who Lucien was, what he'd done. Why would she ever do anything nice for him?
"Really, this is enough for us."
Feyre smiled, and put a hand on The Morrigan's arm. "I'd love to. Maybe… later, though."
"Okay, well we'll be up all night. It's about two am now anyway, and Rhys and I have to be up by four, so if you need anything—anything at all—come on up."
The Morrigan left the room and Lucien slumped onto the bed. He shook as he fell onto the mattress, he stared at his small duffle bag. Everything he had in the world, gone. Including his only way to make money, all of his accounts were in Tamlin's name (not that Tam would let him have access to them), his books, his computer… Everything.
If he went back now, maybe Tam wouldn't know. Maybe…
Feyre would be alone, all alone among these… people.
He couldn't leave her, even if it meant getting into bed with a snake.
Lucien woke up to the sound of the shower running. He closed his eyes again, turning towards the wall his cot was pushed up against. He smelled cooking meat and bread from the restaurant. He was shaking, after a horrible night of bad dreams, he was more than happy to be awake, maybe for the first time.
The thrumming of the sound of the shower filled Lucien's ears. He synchronized his breathing with the pulse. When Feyre finally turned it off, Lucien felt as though he'd been pulled out from underwater, all the pressure on his chest was gone. Lucien opened his eyes and turned back over when she exited the bathroom.
"Good morning."
Lucien said nothing.
"How did you sleep?"
Lucien shrugged noncommittally.
"I'm sorry about last night. I know you didn't want to come here. I just-I couldn't stay there any longer. I had to leave."
Lucien still said nothing.
"Do-do you want to shower? I know-I know we forgot to bring toiletries, but they have some for us. A bottle of shampoo and conditioner, and toothbrushes and stuff..." Feyre's voice trailed off as she changed into fresh clothes. Lucien turned his head back towards the wall to give her privacy, and because he wasn't in the mood to deal with her.
He felt pressure on the other side of his bed. Groaning, he turned towards her. Feyre pushed back Lucien's tangled and matted hair from his forehead. "You should take a shower. You know it'll make you feel better."
Lucien scowled at her.
"Lucien, you hungry?"
Lucien was.
"I'll go out to the rest-"
"No." Lucien surged forward and grabbed Feyre's hand. Feyre flinched back. "You can't go out there! What if he sees you? What if-?"
"He won't. He hates coming here, you know that."
"What if someone he knows is here? Like Nuan or-?"
Feyre sighed. "Fine. I won't go out there. But you have to know, we're safe now."
"How? How are we safe now?"
"We aren't being abused."
"We can't leave, or he'll find us. All we did was trade one cage for another!"
"The Night Court isn't a cage!" Feyre snarled. She stood up, glaring at Lucien.
"He'll find you. And then he'll do everything in his power to get you back, just like he did last time."
Feyre's eyes widened. "Yeah." She growled. "And whose fault was that?"
Mine. It was mine. "Exactly. Now he doesn't have me to reel him in, can you imagine what he can do now?"
Feyre's face fell, turning stony and angry.
Lucien was right, at least partially, and Feyre knew it.
"I'm hungry. Are you?" Feyre asked slowly.
Lucien nodded.
"I'll get some food."
"Feyre-"
"I'll stay out of sight. He won't know unless the Inner Circle tells him."
"I'm only being like this because I don't want to go back, you know that, right?" Lucien asked softly.
Feyre's face stayed like stone. "That sounds like something he would say."
She wasn't wrong, and Lucien knew it. But he couldn't think of any other way. Lucien stood and took a shirt and a pair of jeans from his go-bag and headed towards the shower.
By the time he finished (washing his hair took a while) Feyre had managed to get food into their backroom. Trays packed with waffles, pancakes, bacon and eggs, bagels, toast and jelly—everything a person could possibly want for breakfast. The smell was mouthwatering, and too good to resist—even though Lucien did on principle.
He filled a plate (Feyre had also brought down coffee, orange juice, and water each in it's own pitcher), and a mug of coffee, dumping a truckload of milk and sugar in. He would need it if he was to survive today. "Pass the syrup." Lucien asked Feyre.
The soft knock on the door interrupted their meal, and Feyre called for the persons to come in.
Rhysand and Azriel entered. Lucien tensed, but kept eating.
"Can, can we sit down?" Rhys asked.
Feyre nodded smiling. Lucien shrugged. They sat.
"We uh, we realized we didn't put a clock in here so… here's one." Rhys said. Azriel pulled one of thin air and stood. He starting putting it up. "I'm glad you like our food." Rhys smiled. Feyre paused in her snarfing of the meal. Lucien had suddenly lost his appetite.
"We wanted to offer the two of you jobs." Az said. That got Lucien's attention. "Lucien," Az acknowledged politely.
"Azriel. How've you been?" Lucien said, clipped.
"High school was a long time ago, Lucien." Rhys said slowly. "Let's not reopen old wounds."
Lucien let his mask fall back into place. Now he was Lucien the Press Representative and CFO of Spring Court Consolidated- Well, not that he had a job there anymore.
"What do you mean 'offer us jobs'?" Feyre asked, ignoring the past between Lucien and the Inner Circle members.
"We would offer you any jobs you want in the restaurant. Until we take care of Tamlin-"
Lucien was about to let the comment slide, and then he remembered just exactly what the Inner Circle was said to have done. "'Take care of Tamlin.' You're not-You're not going to kill him, are you?" Lucien asked. Fear built up in his gut, making his mouth taste like dust. He was glad for the mask he wore or he would have started shaking, but Lucien the Press Preresentative and CFO of Spring Court Consolidated didn't tremble. He never had and never would, especially not in front of the Night Court's CEO Rhysand.
Both Rhysand and Azriel looked confused. They turned to Feyre. "Yeah. We-uh, did Feyre not tell you about that?"
"No. You- You monsters!" Lucien cried. He flew to his feet, knocking over his coffee. "You bastards! You can't kill him!" Lucien turned to Feyre. "Is this what you want? Is this why you brought us here?"
"Lucien, we need to stop him!" Rhys snarled. "We can't keep him around! He'll just come after you! You know that!"
"You can't kill him Rhys. I know the two of you would love to," Lucien shot an angry look at Az but the man nodded as if it was a fair cop, "but he doesn't deserve to die!"
"He hurt you. Both of you." Rhys was on his feet too. "I won't stand by and let him get away with that!"
"You can't kill him, Rhys. You can't."
"Oh yeah? And how could you stop me?" Rhys raised a hand on instinct, not to hurt Lucien, just to push him. But Lucien flinched. A big, notable flinch.
Rhys's eyes widened, his jaw slackened. His hands fell to his sides.
Lucien was mad at himself. Stupid stupid stupid stu- "Don't kill him, Rhys." The words were steady but Lucien's heartbeat was anything but. Normally confrontation didn't take this much out of him, but normally when he argued with Rhysand he wasn't trying to defend Tamlin's (his friend, the only one who'd ever cared for him, who kept him safe and fed and happy, there had been good times, there could be again why didn't they see that-) life. "You can't kill him. He didn't used to be like this, he's still a good person."
"The Tamlin Rose that took you in when you ran away from Beron is gone now. He left that person behind the first moment he laid a hand on you, and you know it."
The words stung. Lucien's eyes were wet. He remembered the moment. He'd fucked up a big deal going down between Spring and Dawn Dynamics and Tech and Tamlin-Tamlin had just lost his head for a moment, that was all. They'd argued, they'd shoved one another, and then Tamlin had-
Lucien told everyone he'd fell. And that was how it started.
Just like that, Lucien lost his mask. It fell away from him, cracked and broken. Crumbling beneath the weight of his heat.
"He's still there." Lucien whispered, his chest shook, his voice raspy and weak. "He's still in there. After-After everything he's been through, he's allowed a couple bad years-"
"Lucien, getting drunk every night is a bad year, going to rehab is a bad year, buying an island for no reason—that is a bad year. Hitting his best friend and keeping his girlfriend under lock and key, micromanaging every moment of her life, keeping you all so afraid the only people you could turn to for help were us. That's not a couple of bad years, that's abuse. Your friend is gone, Lucien. All we'd be doing is getting rid of the rest of him."
No. No, it's not possible. He's still there. "He's still there." Lucien whispered. "He's still in there. Don't kill him. Put him in jail for life, sic the authorities or your-" Lucien grimaced at the word, "-friends on him, just… don't kill him. Please."
Rhys stared at Lucien. Lucien had never begged Rhysand for anything; their relationship had always been anger and friction and sometimes kindness when it came to their acquaintanceship in high school. But never had he begged. Never had he asked Rhys for anything.
Now he was asking Rhys not to kill his abuser.
Rhysand glanced back at Azriel and Feyre. Together he and Azriel had a silent conversation.
The others would need to be notified. They would have a meeting planning it after the restaurant closed tonight.
"Fine." Rhysand said. "We won't kill Tamlin. We'll just take him for all he's worth instead."