Morrigan - ACOTAR Fanfic

Chapter Eleven - Freya's Bone-crushing Hug

An image flashed in my mind. The human girl was lying snug on her side, her head resting on her arm against a silk pillow.

Except she wasn't snug.

I peered closer and Alexandra's eyes met mine in an intense soul-stare. Though I knew she couldn't see me.

It took a second for me to realise that she wasn't lying in comfort; she had both hands covering her ears. And my mate was crying, my mate was in pain.

Blood as red as roses spilled from her ears, covering her fair, delicate hands. Her brown hair was rustled and tussled, as if she'd woken up to find herself bleeding from the head and not expected it.

My mate looked wild, untamed, but not in a way that made me smile. That panic rose within me, steaming and sizzling, ready to boil over at any point. So, I did the first thing that came to mind.

I winnowed to the rooftop at the House of Wind and found Azriel waiting there alone, hidden in a corner surrounded by his darkest shadows. It fitted the mood. He saw me instantly and gave me a surprised, then concerned look once he noticed my discomfort.

I strolled right up to him, placing one leg in front of the other, trying to keep my breathing steady. Pausing before him, I collapsed into his arms.

As we waited for the Valkyrie warriors to arrive the same chilly morning, I spent the entirety of it in Az's embrace. His wispy, curling shadows provided a source of comfort I couldn't describe well enough in words.

After I supervised training that day for the month, I visited Helion at his Palace, but he too had found nothing on the human girl visiting me in my dreams. So, I retreated home to an undeserved-but-very-much-needed afternoon reading fest, followed by an early sleep.

*****

The human girl returned to my dreams. But she did so with seldom jubilance, forgoing her usual lightness.

I studied her face. She lay face-up, sinking into the bed mattress, her arms resting effortlessly on her stomach and her breathing soundless and deep. But it was the colour of her blue eyes that I focussed on.

For they had turned a solemn grey; the sort of grey-blueish shade you'd glimpse in the sky before a wave-crashing storm arrived. Her eyes—once embracing the colour of the wide sapphire ocean, and once holding such depth of the Cauldron knew how magnificent—were now a cloudy sad, having lost their usual light.

Alexandra didn't speak as she lay there in her bed, nor did she send any thoughts through the bond. However, I could hear it in her steady breathing, see it in her unblinking stare at the pale roof of her bedroom, scent the longing seeping from her body—she missed her friends.

She missed her closest friend Freya the most, no doubt.

Alexandra lay unmoving, adopting an unnatural predatory stillness that I thought only Fae could master. It only convinced me further that the girl of my dreams—literally, was worth something more than just human, something more than simply my mate.

A knock sounded on Alexandra's door and the girl didn't shift her unflinching scrutiny away from the roof as her mother entered the room. The girl's mother didn't bother with pleasantries as she demanded, "Clean your room, Alexandra."

My mate blinked, then gazed at her mother. Her voice was calm, unfaltering as she asked, "Why?"

Her mother frowned, then said, "Don't ask questions. Just do as I say."

And that was that. As the girl's mother walked away, Alexandra flipped her off.

I chuckled.

Minutes later, her mother returned to ask her daughter, "Are you decent?"