Hi guys!

Here is chapter 12, I hope you enjoy it, I tried something a little bit different with the point of views, you'll see ^^

little announcement: I WON'T be updating until September 24th because I'm going on vacation and won't have my computer with me. Chapter 13 is nearly finished though, so I'll update for sure on the 24th! I'll still be active on tumblr if you want to talk to me ( my blog is "No Matter The Oceans" and I would be thrilled if you came down there :D)

As always, thank you so so much for commenting and letting me know what you think! It means a lot :)

Rhysand and Cassian were seated at their usual table in the familiar diner, waiting for the waitress to bring their order. Cassian had just got home from four months in the mountains, meeting with the different Illyrian clans, and he'd called Rhys that morning, telling him to meet him at the diner for lunch, not leaving him much of a choice. Not that Rhys minded. He was glad for the opportunity to finally catch up with his brother after spending that long apart.

They had seen each other on Thursday when Mor had convinced them all - Azriel finally agreeing to her endless pleas - to go to Rita's to celebrate his return, but a nightclub wasn't exactly a good place to talk. Cassian had been eager to claim the dance floor and had rapidly found many dance partners to enjoy his night. Although he hadn't gone home with any of them, him and his friends hadn't really taken the time for an actual conversation that night.

"So, how was your trip?" Rhys started, taking a sip of his soda.

"Good. I moved around about once a week at first, but then I kind of stayed at our old camp most days, helping the kids usually."

"Is everything good with Devlon?"

"As good as it can be, I guess. You know how he is when I'm around. But the girls have regular access to the library apparently, even participating in sports practice, so those are good points."

They were. A few years back, when Rhys had been given the opportunity to take the lead on various projects for his father's company, he'd decided to finance the construction of libraries and community centers for the Illyrian clans. The projects hadn't cost a dime to the clans, on the condition that women be given illimited access to those structures. The girls went to school just as the boys did, because the national laws forbade the clans from withholding education from any child regardless of gender, but they were still denied access to plenty in the mountains. Rhysand had grown up hearing the stories about his mother's childhood, and had witnessed first hand the Illyrian misogyny when living with them. Now that he had an actual opportunity at influencing the way they treated women, he was careful to do it as best he could. After months of relentless negotiations with his father and the differents chiefs of the clans, he had managed to obtain for the company to finance the entire project, and in return, the chiefs had promised to grant unrestricted access to the facilities to every member of their communities, women included. The "unrestricted" part wasn't exactly a given for all of the chiefs, as they considered women inferior - just thinking the word made Rhys cringe - and educating them a waste of time.

So Cassian had spent his summer traveling from one clan to another. In some, supervising the construction process, in others, making sure that the chiefs respected their end of the bargain. Hopefully, with time, the situation would get better and they wouldn't need to check in that often.

"I was at the camp for the Rite. It seems easier than when we did it."

"How so?"

"Well, there was less teens participating this year, but more of them managed to complete it. The camp looked like a tattoo convention the rest of the summer!"

Rhys couldn't help his laugh. His brother could be very competitive, he had always been that way and that had led to many fights during their teenage years. Seeing young men doing better than he had, at something he was so proud about, had probably been excruciating for him, and Rhys was certain his brother had likely wished he could participate again just to prove to teenage boys he was still better than them.

"Oh I'm sure it's really easy now, I mean it stayed the same for hundreds of years, but they obviously decreased the level of difficulty in the last ten years."

Cassian picked up on his sarcastic tone and kicked him under the table.

"Oh you talk like you would have been able to finish the Rite alone, in your fancy clothes and with your mother watching your every move."

It was a running joke between them, a reminder of the year they'd met, when Rhys had stood out from the crowd of Illyrian kids. He had adapted pretty quickly, and his mother hadn't been around at the time of their Rite, but Cassian had never stopped teasing him, even twenty years later.

"Oh like you would have!"

Cassian laughed and Rhys continued:

"Did you help with the tattoos this year?"

"I did, and it was pretty cool, I got to ink an entire arm myself and…"

But Rhys had stopped listening. A flash of violet caught his eyes in the street, capturing his attention immediately. It was his violet hat, on the head of the beautiful woman that barely left his thoughts those days. He got up and said quickly:

"Hang on, I'll be right back."

And he was out the door before Cassian could answer.

Feyre was indeed on the sidewalk in front of the diner, headphones on, her back to him. He caught up to her and grabbed her shoulder when she didn't hear him call her name. She startled and turned to him, her blue-grey eyes wide for a millisecond before she recognized him.

"Rhys! Hi!"

"Hi. What are you doing here?" He couldn't force the smile out of his face at seeing her so unexpectedly. She seemed happy too, her cheeks flushed with colors and a broad smile on her lips.

"I have a meeting in the area in twenty minutes. I was looking for a cafe to kill the time until then. You?"

"I'm having lunch with Cassian," he said, turning quickly towards the diner to find his brother smirking at him through the window. Rolling his eyes at him, Rhys turned back to Feyre and blurted out: "do you wanna join us?"

Her smile faded and she said:

"You want me to… meet your brother?"

Rhys could feel Cassian's grin on his back, he could almost feel his brain sorting through the most embarrassing stories he could tell about Rhys, if he dared bring Feyre inside the diner. But he didn't care. He liked that woman so much that he really wanted her to meet his family. Maybe it would have been in another context if he'd had the choice, but he really didn't mind all the hard time Cass could give him if it meant Feyre got to meet him.

"Yeah. I mean, if you want to. Cassian can be a lot to take in, if you want some peace and quiet before your meeting, I understand."

"He's the guy staring at us in the diner, isn't he?"

"Yep!"

She laughed and nodded, looking at him again. Her tongue run slowly on her lips and he realized he hadn't even kissed her yet.

"Can I… Can I kiss you?

She raised an eyebrow and said in a very serious tone:

"I don't know Rhys, I mean, we only had sex yesterday, I don't know if we're there ye…"

He cut her off with his mouth and felt her chuckle against him before returning his kiss.

"Shall we go in, my Lady?"

"After you, Sir."

When Rhys had left in the middle of his fantastic tattoo story, Cassian had strongly debated going after him to drag him back at the table. But then he'd seen him go up to a woman passing in front of the diner, and she'd smiled at his brother. A broad, happy smile, and Rhys had the same one on his face. Cassian snorted and didn't take his eyes off them. So that was the girl Mor had told him about, the one he'd met not long ago and was reluctant to talk about but was clearly infatuated with. Rhys turned to him and Cassian couldn't help but smirk at him, laughing when his brother rolled his eyes at him and turned back to the woman. She was pretty enough, and the way she looked at Rhys said enough about what she thought of him. He had to bring her inside, oh please let him bring her inside to seat with them. Cassian was imagining the best way to tell the story of how Rhys had once drunk-texted their high school biology teacher while believing he was talking to his girlfriend, when he saw him kiss the woman and take her hand to guide her towards the diner. Oh, that was going to be fun.

They entered the diner and Rhys led the way to their table, the woman sliding in the booth beside him and smiling a bit shyly at Cassian.

"Cass, this is Feyre. Feyre, my brother Cassian," Rhys said, glaring at him as if to say "don't you dare be rude to her". He answered with an offended look and smiled at the woman - Feyre.

"So you're the girl I've heard so much about?"

Feyre raised an eyebrow. "I don't know. Why don't you tell me what you heard and I'll tell you if that's me."

Oh she had some fire, that one.

"I was told you were very interesting and very pretty. Does that seem like it could be you?"

She blushed and turned to Rhys, whose murderous eyes were fixed on Cassian, and said to him:

"Well I certainly hope so."

His brother slid an arm around her shoulder, smiling but his eyes still on Cassian as he said:

"It is, although I don't recall telling you any of it. And I'm going to kill Mor."

"What did you expect? That you could tell her something personal and we wouldn't know about it a minute later? Come on, you know her better than that, Rhys."

His brother shook his head and was about to answer when the waitress arrived with two giant burgers, and two orders of fries.

"There you go. Do you need anything else?"

Rhys turned his attention to Feyre and asked her in a somewhat softer voice if she wanted something, but she refused, saying she had to go in ten minutes and had already eaten. Cassian started eating right away, and asked between two mouthfuls:

"So Feyre, Mor told me you're an illustrator, huh?"

"I am. And what do you do when you're not eating cheeseburgers like you haven't eaten in days?"

"I'll have you know that I indeed have not had a decent burger in months, and that's entirely your dear Rhysand's fault."

"How is it my fault?" He countered before she could say anything, "Did I force you to spend the entire summer there? You were allowed to come back now and then you know."

Feyre started eating some fries from Rhys' plate, and his brother didn't flinch at the gesture, as if he had grown accustomed enough to her presence to not realize when she touched his food. Mor hadn't been able to tell him how close they were, because she hadn't met Feyre. But it was clear enough that they were very comfortable around each other, and Cassian couldn't help but wonder how much his brother had omitted to tell Mor.

"I still don't know what you do, by the way," Feyre said to him. He tried to swallow fast to answer, but Rhys took over.

"Cassian works for my father's company, he's in charge of overseeing various projects, and he spent the summer in the Illyrian camps to check the progress on the project I told you about on Saturday."

So he'd told her about his father, about the Illyrians, about the project that was most important to him. That was a lot of information to trust her with, especially for Rhys, who was always so secretive around new people.

"The libraries and community centers? That's interesting," and turning to him, she continued. "You must have had a good time then if you stayed there for so long without coming back?"

"Well, as I was telling Rhys before you grossly interrupted me by distracting him, I did enjoy myself helping with the tattoos."

He was about to continue but he saw Feyre's face crumble and she said softly "I'm sorry." He didn't know if he should go on. He had clearly made a joke about her interrupting them, and he thought she would just answer as she'd done before. But she bit her lip and seemed to shrink back into the booth. He saw his brother's face contorted in what looked like sadness, but it was gone in a second and when he opened his mouth, his voice was anything but sad:

"Oh don't listen to him, Darling, he would have bored my mind out with his stories if I hadn't spotted you."

That seemed to help her relax a bit and she smiled. The look Rhys gave her was gentle. Still arrogant, still Rhys, but gentle and understanding. Cassian made a mental note to ask Rhys later about what had just happened, but resumed talking, hoping that a radical change of subject would help her. And knowing it would certainly help him in his project to embarrass his brother:

"Oh you don't like this story Rhys? Maybe I should tell another one then? Something older. Did you tell Feyre a lot of anecdotes from when we were in high school?"

His brother threw him a warning glare, but didn't answer. It was Feyre who said :

"Some stories, but I don't think I've heard all of them."

"Oh I'm sure you haven't heard this one, don't worry." Rhys' eyes had turned murderous now, he knew what Cassian was about to tell her. But there was something else too, his lips were pressed as if to restrain from… smiling? Cassian shook off the feeling and started:

"Well you see, when we were juniors, Rhys dated this girl for a few months at the end of the year and during the summer. And a few weeks before the end of term, we threw this party and got pretty hammered. And Rhys' girlfriend wasn't here, but he wanted to talk to her, so…."

Feyre cut him off with "Oh wait I think I know this one!" He frowned.

"No I …. don't think you do."

"No but I do! He was so drunk he didn't realize he was texting your biology teacher an not his girlfriend! Yeah, Rhys told it to me the other night. That's a pretty good one!"

Cassian didn't have words. Beside Feyre, Rhys was grinning at him, his arm pulling her closer to him. He had told her about his most shameful highschool memory. And he had known that Cassian was going to go for this one in the hope of embarrassing him, that's why he had wanted to smile. Oh the bastard.

"I'm sure we can find some other embarrassing story about Rhys that he didn't tell you."

She laughed and said "I'm sure you could. But I have to go or I'm gonna be late for my meeting."

She took a sip of Rhys' soda and got up, saying to Cassian "It was nice meeting you," before leaning down to kiss his brother and said "See you."

He kissed her back and watched her exit the diner, not taking his eyes off her until she was out of sight.

"You are so smitten."

Cassian's words brought him back to reality. Rhys turned his eyes away from the door and found his brother grinning at him.

"What?"

"Oh you heard me, loverboy. Or were you trying to be subtle?"

Rhys sighed and took a bite of his burger to avoid answering his brother. He had wanted her to join them, and he didn't regret it, but he would have liked to avoid his brother's interrogation afterwards. Knowing it was coming didn't make it more pleasant.

"She seems nice. How did you meet?"

"Mor didn't tell you that?"

"Well she told me you met her at a pub, but she didn't know much else except that you'd gone on a date with her. She also said you were annoyingly joyful when you talked about her, and after seeing you two together, I have to agree. You're annoying when you're in love."

"I'm not in love, I met her two weeks ago."

"All right maybe you're not in love per say, but you're still extremely giddy. It's irritating."

"I was waiting for Mor, and Feyre was waiting for some friends. We had a good talk for like an hour and then we exchanged numbers. That's how we met."

"Come on man, give me details! You met this woman two weeks ago and she seems to know everything about you. I'm just saying you're not usually that open with new people."

Rhys couldn't help his smile. "Are you mad because you didn't get to tell her about me texting Mrs Calloway?"

"Okay first of all, you know how much I love to tell it to people, I'm pretty sure you told her just to piss me off. And second, I'm not mad, I'm just saying it's unusual."

"It's just… I don't know, I connect with her. I can't explain it, honestly. When I'm with her, everything is easy."

Cassian smiled at him, and it wasn't a mocking smile this time, it was genuine.

"Good then, I'm happy you feel like that. And she seems nice, really."

Rhys smiled back at his brother and dove into his food eagerly.