A/n: This is a repost, once again- this story was written by my friend Rebelle (RebelleHeart on Quotev, RebelleCrown on AO3, rebellesong on Tumblr, rebelle_wing on Instagram). I really love this story so I thought I'd share with you guys too! Don't worry, I do have permission and I'll be letting her know what you all think ;)

For a moment, she was not in her body. For a moment, she was floating on a phantom wind, in the ageless, endless dark that lay somewhere within her chest. For a moment, there was silence, even peace. And then she was back.

"No," she said. She meant her voice to be strong, to be steel, but what fell from her lips was little more than a broken whimper. She shook her head and tried again. "No."

"Nesta," Cassian said, and it was the firm yet gentle voice she'd heard him use on his soldiers. Heard him use, tell them to breathe while healers tried to put their guts back inside them in dingy war tents that smelled of blood- "Nesta," Cassian repeated, "this is not up for debate." She could almost see the unspoken words in his eyes. Not anymore.

She let out a bitter laugh at the sight of it, even as some fractured part of her soul recoiled. Amusing, in a sad sort of way; unwanted for so long in the mortal lands, now unwanted in Velaris and not even wanted to try in the Illyrian Steppes. She had half a mind to set off and search out Lucien's little Band of Exiles- that was, if only she didn't loathe the male so much.

"Wonderful," she bit out instead. "I go through all that Hell with the Cauldron, go to war and back for your stupid court-" she rose to her feet, forcing herself not to balk under the simmering glare of the High Lord, "and yet you can't even stand to have me around after the fact."

"We couldn't stand to have you around before the fact, either," Amren muttered, "you just happened to be useful to us, then." Nesta's nostrils flared and Feyre spun around to shoot the tiny female a glare.

"Nesta," Feyre said, now turning to face her sister and walking to meet her in the centre of the room. She reached for her hands and Nesta flinched away. Feyre flinched a little herself, but kept her hands back as she said softly, "I am not sending you away because I cannot stand to have you around."

"No," Nesta agreed flatly. "You tend to make a point not to have me around in the first place."

Rhysand made a noise at least vaguely reminiscent of a snarl as Feyre's eyes shuttered, and plumes of night began to swirl around him as he fought to keep his power in check. Nesta could feel that struggle, that battle, through her own power- some tendrils within her even trying to free themselves from her and go to him. As if even they couldn't stand her.

"You are always welcome here," Rhysand managed to say, the sentence vaguely oxymoronic given the ire still dashed over his face, the tension in his muscles. "Your choosing to stay away cannot be used as a weapon against us."

Nesta forced herself to straighten, to look down on him over Feyre's shoulder. Gods, even from here he seemed to tower over. Unearthly magic, he possessed, the most powerful High Lord in Prythian's history. And even then, pale in comparison to Feyre's magic, though hers tended to be tamer until unleashed.

"I know how to read beyond an invitation," she snapped. "It's clear whether or not I'm wanted in your happy-go-lucky little menagerie. But I don't care. Because I don't want to be here either." Feyre's face crumpled further, shielded though Nesta could sense she tried to be, and she could have sworn it was true devastation on her features. But she pushed on, "So I don't care if you dump me in Velaris, or the Illyrian Steppes, or the gods-damned Hewn City. I don't care if you ship me off with Lucien's little Band of Exiles, or toss me in the Sidra to float out to sea, or leave me to rot in a lightless alley. I don't care, not what becomes of me, and not what becomes of you. I don't care."

Amren snorted, still curled up in her corner of the room. "If you spoke truth, girl, you wouldn't feel the need to defend it so much."

Nesta's lip curled back from her teeth. "I don't care."

Amren responded only with a wicked, knowing smile.

While Nesta's eyes were cast away from her, Feyre managed to reach out and grasp her sister by the hand. Nesta tried to pull away, but Feyre held her fast, looked her in the eyes. As if she could see past the horror and fear and melancholy Nesta tried to keep hidden there. As if she could see it all.

"I think it will help you," Feyre whispered hesitantly. Almost like... gods, she almost seemed like Elain in that moment. "Hope it will help you."

"If I needed your help-" Nesta sneered at the word, "I would have asked."

She pulled her arm away from Feyre, spun on her heel and strode for the door. She pretended not to hear Amren's witty comment on Nesta's "help"- of course, yet more innuendoes about her nightly activities- and slammed the door as hard as she could on the exit, wishing it hadn't been built for immortal strength and would shatter off its hinges. She let out a wisp of her magic, barely a tendril of what built in her like a thunderhead, and tried not to look too satisfied at the shattering sound of a large vase in the adjacent hallway. She didn't dare look towards what she'd done.

The luxurious hallways and open rooms of the happy little estate gave way to elaborate doors, open to Elain's gardens and the long pathway that would lead her back to the streets of Velaris. Back home.

Home. A cruel taunt of a word, for someone who had never, and likely would never, had one. Perhaps that first house had been considered one, before it had simply became the deathplace of her mother and the crumbling monument of all the family had lost after. But it was nothing now. Just as that awful forest cottage had been nothing, and that ruined manor house was now nothing, and Velaris was nothing and the Night Court was nothing and Prythian was nothing.

Or maybe, just Nesta was nothing.

She had made it all the way to the gate at the end of the property when beating wings sounded through the air, and Nesta stiffened as she turned to face their culprit.

Cassian's eyes were wary as he reached for her- reached out, and tugged his hand away again. Looked at her without either of them saying a word.

"You can choose when we leave," he said eventually. Hollow words, a hollow offer.

"I don't care," Nesta replied bitterly. The words were almost a mantra to her now, echoed with every shared glance and joke she wasn't a part of, every smile she washed off happy faces, every insult meant to make her shatter. I don't care, I don't care, I don't care.

Cassian's nostrils flared, and Nesta wondered if he scented it on her. If he could tell- beneath the smell of the male, the old wine, the utter indifference- that there was an empty part of her that still hurt. Ringing with a dull ache she waited to fade into nothing like the rest of her.

I don't care, I don't care, I don't care.

"Then we leave at noon," Cassian declared, whatever had been simmering in his eyes melting away as he straightened up. Leaning one arm against the iron of the gate, he added with a roguish grin, "I'll pick you up."

Nesta scowled, straightening herself as she backed away a step. "And fly us all the way to the Steppes?" She'd seen a map; she knew the distance.

Cassian just purred, "I figured the time would only get us closer."

Nesta's scowl deepened. "Call one of the others to winnow me in. I assume we'll be spending more than enough time together as it is."

She shoved the wrought iron gate until it swung, and slipped into the outside world. Away from that mindless, blissful place her sister was so happy to call home. Cassian grinned at her over the top of the gate as she turned to close it, though there was something halfhearted about the expression. Good. Let him give up on her, too. It was about time.

"You'll have to get used to flying with me eventually," he said, humor dancing in those still-grim eyes. Grim at the thought of flying so much with her that she did, indeed, grow used to it. Well, that made two of them.

"See you at noon," Nesta said flatly.

She turned on her heel to walk off, into the streets of Velaris, feeling Cassian's eyes tracking her every step of the way. As he always did.

The wind roared around her, cold and merciless, and she let herself lean into it as if it were a comfort. Let that glimmer of ice in the clouded summer morning try to bank those flames within her- those life-flames that had turned to nothing but screaming embers in all the months she'd been festering here. Those life-flames that had once raged and burned and roared with the fury, the force of everything she felt so deeply, so much, too much. Doused to embers while Nesta waited, patiently, for them to be stamped out entirely. Until she could feel nothing.

It wouldn't be long now, she figured. But she didn't care.

A pillar of steel.

Even as disheveled as she was, fraying at the seams, Nesta was a queen in every right, with every step she made towards Velaris. Every step away from him.

Cassian told himself to pull away, to go back inside, but he still found himself staring after the female for long minutes as she started towards town. Maybe he deserved this, this hatred she felt towards him.

I will find you, in the next life, and we will have that time.

She hadn't argued, then, though perhaps she simply thought to humor him on his deathbed. Perhaps had been disappointed at the way things had turned out- disappointed Cassian was not in that next life, hounding after the next Nesta. But this was the next life- this, after the war, this rebuilding land of peace. This was the time for them to have their promised time together. Yet Nesta...

Cassian sighed, suddenly heavy, and made himself fly up into the sky, into the cloudy summer morning. Made himself soar high above the streets of Velaris, curving through the air and letting the wind hammer into his face. He needed to go fast, even if he wanted to fly forever. Needed to feel himself go fast.

Folding his wings back in, he came in for a sharp landing on the balcony at the front of Mor's quarters on the estate. He couldn't help but admire the strength of the stones, not even cracking, as he speared down onto them. Built for Illyrians- or at least reinforced for them.

He heard bustling footsteps inside as he opened the door, and sure enough, Mor was just stumbling through the doorway in her usual lazy morning disarray as he stepped across the threshold. His temper must have shown in his body, because Mor's footsteps were soft as she walked towards him. No yelled remarks about wrecking her beauty sleep, no insults.

"Hey, Cass," she said, and her voice was chipper even if it was wary. He hated that wariness, that awareness that he wasn't okay when he was fine. "The meeting went well?"

He only grunted in response, shutting the doors a bit harder than he meant. "I need you to winnow us in at noon."

Mor didn't object to the demand, didn't ask why he didn't fly the pair of them. Perhaps she'd already guessed this would be the case. She only asked, "Are you unhappy with this arrangement? Or is Nesta?"

Cassian snorted. "No, Mor, I'm being bitchy for no reason and Nesta is over the moon with it. What do you think?"

"I think you were very quiet when Rhys and Feyre asked this of you and you haven't spoken a word of it to any of us since."

Cassian fell silent at that, and for once cursed his friendship with the female. Cursed that they were close enough she could tell things like that, when he tried desperately to hide them. They all knew his tells by now- Cauldron, they'd probably been whispering about him for days. Worst of all, they'd probably been right, too.

So he said, in a low voice that told Mor he wanted nothing to do with the subject, "And what of it, Mor?"

Mor sighed. "You knew she'd react badly-"

"We all knew she'd react badly-"

"-and you didn't want her to," Mor continued, eyes narrowing at the interruption. "You wanted her to want to be with you, and talk to you, and go with you. And you've been trying to convince yourself she wouldn't, but that part of you still wished for it, and now she has reacted exactly as we all figured she would, and those hopes have been crushed, and it makes you hurt."

Cassian glowered at her. "Quit talking bullshit."

Mor rolled her eyes, turning away. "Fine. I'm sorry I said anything. I'll be ready by noon."

Cassian sighed, still scowling after her as she left the room once more, and slumped down on the nearest chair that would accommodate his wings. Put his head in his hands and thought over all the words roaring through his head.

You wanted her to want to be with you.

My only regret is that we did not have time.

I don't care.

Nesta didn't care. Didn't care about him. He should try not to care about her, either, but... but he'd failed her. Mate bond or no, he should have had Nesta out of this pit by now, should have helped her get better the way Rhys did for Feyre. The way Feyre had done for Rhys. Yet Nesta was still a hollow shell, and Cassian was beginning to feel like one himself. A failure. A failure for not saving her the way he should have.

The way he wished.

But wishes were empty, wishes were nothing. He was learning that the hard way.

So he waited for noon to come, and refused to let himself hope that Nesta might have changed her mind about him by the time he arrived.