A Court Of Fire And Pain

Fenrys and Azriel go on a date... Kinda

I was in the mood for shipping so here you go.

Chapter 35 Fenrys:
I was bored.
Aelin was in Adarlan and Rowan was in Terrasen, Feyre and Rhys were doing who knows what in the office and everyone else were... I actually had no idea what the others were doing. The past couple of days I'd just been spending some alone time with Connal, getting us to be brothers again. I had missed him so much.
But I had the feeling I was bothering him with my constant need for attention, and let him have the day off.
Which he used as an excuse to lock himself alone in his room for the day.
And now I had nothing to do. So I was wandering around the city, seeing the sights, trying food, casually flirting with the ladies that passed by. It was just out of habit now, but it felt wrong. Stupid mating- nope. Nope nope nope nope nope. Not a mating bond, definitely not going to start thinking about that. It doesn't exist.
I really needed to blow off some steam, but my mental anguish was getting a bunch of stares. I headed to the edge of the city, where a forest started to appear. Perfect.
I always went into the forest when I needed time away from Maeve and the everyday hell of my life.
I know it's selfish of me to be thinking about myself and my life when so much is at stake for the others, when they've been through a whole lot worse, but I couldn't help it. There was too much happening.
I wasn't supposed to think about it, but I had a mate now. And Connal was back. And I saw my mother again. And my father was dead. There was just a lot for me to unload in the confinement of everyone else's horrible lives, and I needed to get away.
So here I was, utterly lost in a random dark forest. Except it wasn't a random forest, I was starting to remember the stories mother would tell Connal and I when we were younger.
"That forest at the edge of the city? Oh, well that's where the nightmares live. You see kids, for us to have such a city of dreams there needs to be a place of nightmares to balance it out nearby. That forest allows us to have this wonderful life, so it's truly not that bad. But still, never set one foot in there or the monsters will get you!"
Obviously she could have been simply trying to scare us so we wouldn't be idiots, but her words had truth.
There should be things in this forest, and it was awfully quiet.
I paused for a second until a branch snapped. Then everything seemed to go to hell.
I had no weapons on me so I shifted into my white wolf. Which might have been a mistake considering how much bigger this thing was compared to me.
I had no clue what it was. I only had a second to see it before I was thrown against a tree, but I glimpsed a huge mass of black. Just dark and black with no seeming solid shape.
I hit the tree and fell on an upright stick, which then impaled me in the side. What were the odds of that? And why did a simple stick hurt so much?
I didn't have much time to curse the existence of twigs, because I was picked up and tossed to the side again. Did this thing intend to beat me to death then eat my soul or something?
I tried to speak and say 'time out' but it came out as a bark because I was a wolf. It didn't seem to understand and just picked me up again. Well that's fucking rude.
I shifted back to a fae in hopes that I could slip out of its grasp, but no luck. Then it opened its mouth, which didn't seem to be there a second ago.
What the hell was this thing?
I started twisting but it was no use. Then it let go and dropped me into its mouth.
Just as I was sure to become a tasty gourmet meal, there was a giant blast and I was standing on the ground surrounded by something incredibly soft.
Huh?
...what just happened?
I shook my head back to reality, and as my senses came back I realized that the soft was from feathers, that were attached to wings, that were attached to Azriel.
His left wing was wrapped around me, holding me close to his body as he faced down the monster. He was holding a sword, which he then hurled straight at the monster. I couldn't see what he was aiming for, although I wasn't really looking at the monster, just at his beautiful face. Wow he looked really hot while doing badass shit.
I mean what. Nope. I shook my head again and tried to regain my sense of balance and intelligence.
Whatever he had been doing must have worked, because the monster was gone.
Azriel's wing let me go, which I was kind of sad about. He looked me up and down without saying anything.
I tried to smile. It was a bit difficult considering I was still terrified and also slightly in awe. "Thank yooouuuUUUUUUUUU"
I was cut off as he wrapped his arms around me this time, and shot up into the sky.
I might have screamed the whole time in the air, but who can really say?
We landed on a small secluded cliff edge. As I flopped to the ground, Azriel finally spoke.
"What were you doing there? Hadn't anyone warned you it was dangerous?"
I chuckled nervously. "Well yes, but I was thinking too hard and forgot."
What happened next was not something I was expecting in the slightest.
He didn't start yelling, or leave, or even just stand quiet. He smiled then laughed.
He laughed.
To be sure it was very quiet and small, but that just made it really adorable and more able to catch me off guard. Unwillingly my cheeks began to heat up. What was wrong with me, I should not find this cute. But it was.
He sat down next to me with his remaining smirk. "You're an idiot."
I couldn't even get offended by that. To be fair I wasn't really listening to what he said in the first place, I was looking at his face. He was surprisingly pretty out in the sunlight. I wasn't able to tell before since he was always wrapped in his shadows.
He waved his hand in front of my face. "Fenrys?"
Oh. Oops. "Sorry. Anyways Azriel, how were you able to find me so quickly?"
This seemed to embarrass him and his cheeks grew a bit red. He muttered something that I couldn't make out.
"Sorry, what did you say? I couldn't hear."
He avoided my eye contact and spoke clearer. "The mating bond."
My eyes widened. "What? The mating bond?"
He nodded and closed his eyes. "It activated for some reason. Did you do that?"
"Ummmm" maybe all my thinking about it was the cause. But I wasn't going to tell Azriel that I was thinking about it, him and I...
He frowned. "Then I got the message of fear and danger and I couldn't stop myself from shadow travelling. I got to the clearing, got you out of that thing's mouth, and here we are."
Nice. I said as much, which he answered with another small smile. I hoped he couldn't sense how my heart rate sped up.
He lay down on the grass and started playing with one of his shadows.
"Do you want to stay here for a while longer?"
With surprise, I realized I did. Time had passed quickly and it was getting late, but I was happy here, with him.
With Azriel. My...
"Yea. Let's stay here."
I laid down next to him and watched him twirl a shadow around his finger. "So tell me about yourself. I know you formally, but who are you as a person?"
He stilled, and the shadow disappeared. After a moment of thought he seemed to relax, and started to talk.
We kept talking long into the night.