A Court of Mist and Fury (A Court of Thorns and Roses, #2)

by Sarah J. Maas

“I’ve never allowed anyone to see or touch my wings during sex. It makes you vulnerable in a way that I’m not … comfortable with.”

his every touch visible to them … and yet it might as well have been only the two of us.

“When Rhys came back, after Amarantha, he was a ghost. He pretended he wasn’t, but he was. You made him come alive again.”

“He thinks he’ll be remembered as the villain in the story.” She snorted. “But I forgot to tell him,” I said quietly, opening the door, “that the villain is usually the person who locks up the maiden and throws away the key.” “Oh?” I shrugged. “He was the one who let me out.”

“Smile again,” he whispered. I hadn’t smiled for him. Ever. Or laughed. Under the Mountain, I had never grinned, never chuckled. And afterward … And this male before me … my friend … For all that he had done, I had never given him either. Even when I had just … I had just painted something. On him. For him. I’d—painted again. So I smiled at him, broad and without restraint. “You’re exquisite,” he breathed.

“Of course I’ll dance with you,” Rhys said, his voice still raw. “All night, if you wish.”

“I am … very glad I met you, Feyre.”

“She’s mine,”

Saved me from that wedding day, actually.

“When you spend so long trapped in darkness, Lucien, you find that the darkness begins to stare back.”

I was guilty that I didn’t feel awful, not truly. Not for wanting him.

“You look good with wings,” he said, and kissed my brow. Even the rain stopped feeling so cold.

“I’ll try to keep my hands to myself.”

SCREAMING

“I love it when you look at me like that.” The purr in his voice heated my blood. “Like what?” “Like my power isn’t something to run from. Like you see me.”

no im not crying

Maybe that’s why I couldn’t keep away.”

“And yet I found myself deciding that if you took his hand, I would find a way to live with it. It would be your choice.”

“Then I would have torn apart the world to get you back.”

OK IM SOBBING

“I’m thinking,” he said, following the flick of my tongue over my bottom lip, “that I look at you and feel like I’m dying. Like I can’t breathe. I’m thinking that I want you so badly I can’t concentrate half the time I’m around you, and this room is too small for me to properly bed you. Especially with the wings.”

I CANT DO THIS

“What is it you want, Feyre?”

I can’t breathe when I look at you. Let me touch you.

“I’m going to let myself roar loud enough to bring down a mountain.”

And I knew it was just as rare for him to sleep that soundly, peacefully.

And I realized I might very well be content to do exactly that forever.

“I don’t walk away—not from you,”

painted stars and the moon and clouds and just endless, dark sky.”

I wonder if I was looking for this place—looking for you all.”

“You saved me,”

“I was looking for you, too,” Rhys murmured.

“The High Lord of the Night Court is your mate.”

I felt it snap into place between us.

I looked at you then and the strength of it hit me like a blow.”

Not as my heart—my heart—ached, so viciously that I realized it’d somehow been repaired in these past few months. Repaired by him.

I’ve never seen him so happy as he is when he’s with you. And I don’t think that has anything to do with you being his mate.”

And there it was. A future. The future I saw for myself, bright as the sunrise over the Sidra. A direction, and a goal, and an invitation to see what else immortality might offer me. It did not seem so listless, so empty, anymore. And I would fight until my last breath to attain it—to defend it. So I knew what I had to do.

I thought nothing of them, until one of the images was of a hand … This beautiful, human hand. Holding a brush. Painting—flowers on a table.”

“And that time, I pushed a thought back. Of the night sky—of the image that brought me joy when I needed it most. Open night sky, stars, and the moon. I didn’t know if it was received, but I tried, anyway.”

And then—then I learned your name. Hearing you say it … it was like an answer to a question I’d been asking for five hundred years.

If there was a shot of freeing us from Amarantha, you were it. I thought … I thought the Cauldron had been sending me these dreams to tell me that you would be the one to save us. Save my people.

I was jealous of him, and pissed off that he’d used that one shot of being unnoticed not to get you out, but to be with you,

If you were going to die, I was going to die with you.

I wrapped my power around the bond. The mating bond. I could feel you flickering there, holding on.”

Home. Home had been at the end of the bond, I’d told the Bone Carver. Not Tamlin, not the Spring Court, but … Rhysand.

I hadn’t seen her in fifty years, and my first words to her were, ‘She’s my mate.’

I knew I was in love with you that moment I picked up the knife to kill Amarantha.

couldn’t stop being around you, and loving you, and wanting you. I still can’t stay away.”

“And now I want you to know, Rhysand, that I love you. I want you to know … ” His lips trembled, and I brushed away the tear that escaped down his cheek. “I want you to know,” I whispered, “that I am broken and healing, but every piece of my heart belongs to you. And I am honored—honored to be your mate.”

“I love you,” I said again. I hadn’t dared say the words in my head. “And I’d endure every second of it over again so I could find you. And if war comes, we’ll face it. Together. I won’t let them take me from you. And I won’t let them take you from me, either.”

“You’re mine,” I breathed.

knelt before me. Knelt on those stars and mountains inked on his knees. He would bow for no one and nothing— But his mate. His equal.

My friend through many dangers. My lover who had healed my broken and weary soul. My mate who had waited for me against all hope, despite all odds.