Warning: Toxic Relationship
It takes weeks before Cassian begins to understand why she left. And if that isn't symbolic of their relationship he doesn't know what is.
Nesta knowing better, being better, as he trots behind. Coated in the arrogance of ignorance, always righteous until he's not, always catching the rhythm a beat too late.
Me: What song from midnights do people want a song fic for?
Everyone: ANTI-HERO! VIGILANTE SHIT!
Me: Cool, cool, um actually I’m gonna do Bejewelled tho
*Sorry guys I was in a Nesta fucking shining away from the Night Court mood rather than a depression fic mood so here you go*
Link:
Snippet:
Nesta had gripped a sword that never belonged to her and trained her body into a weapon she never wanted to be. She wrung the plum red wine from her brain and confused a soldier doing his duty with a prince come to save her. She trusted even the beast that raged beneath her skin to be tamed by this male. This person who was … who was supposed to be her person.
Cassian was a broken promise. A great, cosmic joke. Just hers enough to fool her.
Prompt: Based on a post I saw about how Nesta is very soft girlfriend in private with Cassian combined with how I picture Drunk!Nesta. | Originally posted on 01.02.2018 Genre: Fluff/Humor Rating: SFW
hii i hope you’re doing well! from the prompt list, could you do a blackevans brotp for general #18?
18. “Cheers, I’ll drink to that.” “You drink to everything.” “Cheers!”
Summary: Nesta has been chosen as a sacrifice from her village- to appease the monsters, she's ordered to die.
But what's monster and what's merely humanity are two wholly different things. And on Calanamai, Nesta will learn which is which.
OR WHATEVER THIS IS MONSTER NESSIAN OKAY?
[note: based on this prompt: Calanmai for the fae is a time for celebrating their magic and fucking like rabbits, but to the humans it's time to pick their sacrifice to the demons of the woods to ensure their people and lands prosper and remain safe for a year. Every year the town picks a name of a human female to dress up like a virginal sacrifice in white, bound and gagged, and left at the border of the forest for the demons to take. Girls growing up are told to be kind and pure or else they could be chosen next. This year the name chosen is Nesta Archeron. That night a group of burley and aggressive men show up and force Nesta to comply or she could see her younger sisters taken in her stead. She willing dawns the gown and walks to the edge of the forest. When the men start to gets handsy while they try to tie her up the demons show up early and decide to make a meal of the human filth before taking the tantalizing and feisty human.]
Warning: dubious consent, inappropriate use of tails, human men | 6k words | NSFW | read on ao3
“Don’t tell Elain.”
Nesta didn’t know why it was so important Elain was left out of what was happening. It wasn’t like Elain would try and stop things, nor would Nesta risk her engagement to Graysen by telling the truth.
Pity is for those who have lost. He cannot lose Nesta. There is not a universe he can fathom where he does not belong to her.
Cassian handles their breakup like a champ.
Warning: Cassian is a creep here-manipulation, stalking, the gamut
The author has indicated this post may contain content that may not be suitable for all audiences.
Always. Continuously. With increasing apprehension, and decreasing hope.
I will love you with no regard to the actions of our enemies or the jealousies of actors. I will love you with no regard to the outrage of certain parents or the boredom of certain friends. I will love you no matter what is served in the world’s cafeterias or what game is played at each and every recess. I will love you no matter how many fire drills we are all forced to endure, and no matter what is drawn upon the blackboard in a blurring, boring chalk. I will love you no matter how many mistakes I make when trying to reduce fractions, and no matter how difficult it is to memorize the periodic table. I will love you no matter what your locker combination was, or how you decided to spend your time during study hall. I will love you no matter how your soccer team performed in the tournament or how many stains I received on my cheerleading uniform. I will love you if I never see you again, and I will love you if I see you every Tuesday. I will love you if you cut your hair and I will love you if you cut the hair of others. I will love you if you abandon your baticeering, and I will love you if you retire from the theater to take up some other, less dangerous occupation. I will love you if you drop your raincoat on the floor instead of hanging it up and I will love you if you betray your father. I will love you even if you announce that the poetry of Edgar Guest is the best in the world and even if you announce that the work of Zilpha Keatley Snyder is unbearably tedious. I will love you if you abandon the theremin and take up the harmonica and I will love you if you donate your marmosets to the zoo and your tree frogs to M. I will love you as the starfish loves a coral reef and as kudzu loves trees, even if the oceans turn to sawdust and the trees fall in the forest without anyone around to hear them. I will love you as the pesto loves the fetuccini and as the horseradish loves the miyagi, as the tempura loves the ikura and the pepperoni loves the pizza. I will love you as the manatee loves the head of lettuce and as the dark spot loves the leopard, as the leech loves the ankle of a wader and as a corpse loves the beak of the vulture. I will love you as the doctor loves his sickest patient and a lake loves its thirstiest swimmer. I will love you as the beard loves the chin, and the crumbs love the beard, and the damp napkin loves the crumbs, and the precious document loves the dampness in the napkin, and the squinting eye of the reader loves the smudged print of the document, and the tears of sadness love the squinting eye as it misreads what is written. I will love you as the iceberg loves the ship, and the passengers love the lifeboat, and the lifeboat loves the teeth of the sperm whale, and the sperm whale loves the flavor of naval uniforms. I will love you as a child loves to overhear the conversations of its parents, and the parents love the sound of their own arguing voices, and as the pen loves to write down the words these voices utter in a notebook for safekeeping. I will love you as a shingle loves falling off a house on a windy day and striking a grumpy person across the chin, and as an oven loves malfunctioning in the middle of roasting a turkey. I will love you as an airplane loves to fall from a clear blue sky and as an escalator loves to entangle expensive scarves in its mechanisms. I will love you as a wet paper towel loves to be crumpled into a ball and thrown at a bathroom ceiling and an eraser loves to leave dust in the hairdos of the people who talk too much. I will love you as a cufflink loves to drop from its shirt and explore the party for itself and as a pair of white gloves loves to slip delicately into the punchbowl. I will love you as a taxi loves the muddy splash of a puddle and as a library loves the patient tick of a clock. I will love you as a thief loves a gallery and as a crow loves a murder, as a cloud loves bats and as a range loves braes. I will love you as misfortune loves orphans, as fire loves innocence and as justice loves to sit and watch while everything goes wrong. I will love you as a battlefield loves young men and as peppermints love your allergies, and I will love you as the banana peel loves the shoe of a man who was just struck by a shingle falling off a house. I will love you as a volunteer fire department loves rushing into burning buildings and as burning buildings love to chase them back out, and as a parachute loves to leave a blimp and as a blimp operator loves to chase after it. I will love you as a dagger loves a certain person’s back, and as a certain person loves to wear daggerproof tunics, and as a daggerproof tunic loves to go to a certain dry cleaning facility, and how a certain employee of a dry cleaning facility loves to stay up late with a pair of binoculars, watching a dagger factory for hours in the hopes of catching a burglar, and as a burglar loves sneaking up behind people with binoculars, suddenly realizing that she has left her dagger at home. I will love you as a drawer loves a secret compartment, and as a secret compartment loves a secret, and as a secret loves to make a person gasp, and as a gasping person loves a glass of brandy to calm their nerves, and as a glass of brandy loves to shatter on the floor, and as the noise of glass shattering loves to make someone else gasp, and as someone else gasping loves a nearby desk to lean against, even if leaning against it presses a lever that loves to open a drawer and reveal a secret compartment. I will love you until all such compartments are discovered and opened, and until all the secrets have gone gasping into the world. I will love you until all the codes and hearts have been broken and until every anagram and egg has been unscrambled. I will love you until every fire is extinguished and until every home is rebuilt form the handsomest and most susceptible of woods, and until every criminal is handcuffed by the laziest of policemen. I will love you until M. hates snakes and J. hates grammar, and I will love you until C. realizes S. is not worthy of his love and N. realizes he is not worthy of the V. I will love you until the bird hates a nest and the worm hates an apple, and until the apple hates a tree and the tree hates a nest, and until a bird hates a tree and an apple hates a nest, although honestly I cannot imagine that last occurrence no matter how hard I try. I will love you as we grow older, which has just happened, and has happened again, and happened several days ago, continuously, and then several years before that, and will continue to happen as the spinning hands of every clock and the flipping pages of every calendar mark the passage of time, except for the clocks that people have forgotten to wind and the calendars that people have forgotten to place in a highly visible area. I will love you as we find ourselves farther and farther from one another, where once we were so close that we could slip the curved straw, and the long, slender spoon, between our lips and fingers respectively. I will love you until the chances of us running into one another slip from skim to zero, and until your face is fogged by distant memory, and your memory faced by distant fog, and your fog memorized by a distant face, and your distance distanced by the memorized memory of a foggy fog. I will love you no matter where you go and who you see, no matter where you avoid and who you don’t see, and no matter who sees you avoiding where you go. I will love you no matter what happens to you, and no matter how I discover what happens to you, and no matter what happens to me as I discover this, and no matter how I am discovered after what happens to me happens to me as I am discovering this. I will love you if you don’t marry me. I will love you if you marry someone else – your co-star, perhaps, or Y., or even O., or anyone Z. through A., even R. although sadly I believe it will be quite some time before two women can be allowed to marry – and I will love you if you have a child, and I will love you if you have two children, or three children, or even more, although I personally think three is plenty, and I will love you if you never marry at all, and never have children, and spend your years wishing you had married me after all, and I must say that on late, cold nights I prefer this scenario out of all the scenarios I have mentioned. That, Beatrice, is how I will love you even as the world goes on its wicked way.
unhappily married nessian one-shot, angst, hurt/comfort, nesta is sick
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“Okay,” Cassian says, brushing by her, “I’m off. I’ll see you tonight at Helion’s.” He grabs his coat off the rack and swings it around his shoulders. “Don’t be late, alright? Six o’clock.”
Nesta leans against the kitchen counter and nods. She’s never late. She’d be excommunicated by her husband’s friends—not that she’d really mind. He puts his hand on her shoulder and brushes a kiss to her forehead. “Bye,” she says, but his back is turned and he’s pretty much gone.
Without him and his interruptions, his footsteps on the penthouse floor, the place is coldly quiet. Nesta pads to the bathroom and starts to run water for a bath. It’s too cold today to do anything, and her head hurts, anyway. Sometimes Feyre will call and ask her to take care of Nyx, but there’s been no hurried voicemail today, no blinking time on the phone, and she knows the rest of the day will pass in the way of most others: slow, like molasses, tired and dripping, until someone cleans it up in time for the party, the dinner, the gala, the whatever. She puts a hand to her head and fumbles around in the cabinet for painkillers. After she takes a bath she’ll figure out what she’s going to wear tonight.
Out of the bath, she only feels worse. She pins up her hair and ties her robe, then goes to the guest room where she keeps all her clothes. There’s a lot of clothes. Being married to the general of the Night Court gives her a lot of money and a lot of time and a lot of clothes. Numbly she looks through the racks, head spinning.
at all times there is a random combination of taylor swift lyrics playing on loop in my brain
Would you consider a part 2 for the fic where nesta just does as she’s told? Maybe where Cassian confronts the inner circle about it?
Pretty please <3
I’m not sure this is the closure people are looking for from this but uh … this is what came out. Sorry everyone.
Feyre rolled her eyes before Cassian could even finish speaking. It wasn’t like her, to be so dismissive. But that look in her blue-grey eyes, so alive that it twisted his gut thinking of the shade, it was pure dismissal.
“Listen, Cass,” she sighed, as if speaking to Nyx when he wouldn’t finish his mushed up sweet potatoes. “I … I don’t know what went on between you and my sister in the war. I know that she pushes your buttons and I know that you two have your … whatever it is, but just because Nesta doesn’t want to play that game anymore doesn’t mean anything is wrong with her. She’s finally herself again.”
“No she isn’t,” Cassian insisted. “She’s … I don’t know, faking it. Going through the motions. She’s -“
“Healing,” Feyre said with yet another sigh. “She’s healing, Cassian.”
“She’s numb, Feyre. And I swear to the Cauldron if you sigh at me one more time-“
“You haven’t known her as long as I have!” Feyre crossed her arms over her chest, clearly fighting back a fucking sigh. “You didn’t know her when she was young. Before we lost everything …” Feyre swallowed hard, shifting on her toes. “This is what she was like. Free, unburdened, quiet. I’m sorry that you liked the version of her that was bitter and afraid, but that wasn’t her. Not really. This is her.”
“Bullshit,” Cassian spat. “You said it yourself months ago. Nesta is like a wolf who never got to be a wolf. If she acted like this when you were rich humans it was only because she thought that’s what the world wanted from her!” Cassian knew Nesta. Feyre was her sister, had known her longer, but Cassian … Cassian knew her. In his bones, in his soul, the piece of him that was … not missing, that wasn’t how to describe it. The piece of him that was reaching. It knew. He knew.
This was not Nesta.
“Even if that is true,” Feyre sighed, “it just proves my point. She is healing. Finally. It took me so long to remember who I was again and Nesta … she’s been through so much. We all have.”
Suddenly, Cassian understood why Nesta snapped when he tried to shove stories about Rhys and Feyre and their special little journey’s down her throat.
“She. Is. Not. Ok.”
“She is,” Feyre spat. Hands tightening and jaw clenching. “She is fine. My family is finally together and happy and I won’t let you ruin it because she won’t fuck you, Cassian!”
Cassian stumbled back three steps. Feyre’s hand flew to her mouth. “I didn’t. Cassian I didn’t mean that. I know-”
“It’s fine, Feyre.” Cassian held his hands up in surrender. “I get it.”
And he did.
He should have gotten it a long time ago.
It was never about Nesta or her behaviour or her power. It was about Feyre, it had always been about Feyre.
Rhys’s plan, the insistence on training, it wasn’t about Nesta.
Nesta never wanted to be a warrior. She said it herself, there are other ways to be strong.
The plan … the entire plan had never been about Nesta.
It was about Feyre.
Fixing Nesta when she was never broken.
Creating impossible choices.
Using him to manipulate her.
No one had ever cared if Nesta got better. They only cared that Feyre was happy. That Feyre had her family. That nothing upset Feyre after everything she went through.
And the worst part of it all was that Cassian couldn’t even blame anyone. He couldn’t blame Feyre for wanting to believe that everything was finally fine. He couldn’t blame Rhys for doing all of this because … he was doing everything he could to protect his mate. To make her happy.
The same thing that Cassian was supposed to do for Nesta.
He was supposed to be the one on her side the way Rhys was on Feyre’s.
Complete loyalty.
He was supposed to protect her, and instead he broke her.
Failed her in every way a male could possibly fail.
Nesta Archeron had lived through a war, had removed multiple heads with her bare hands, had been shoved into the freezing waters of good and evil and creation itself and had her humanity ripped away.
But none of that broke her.
None of that was the worst thing to happen to her.
He was.
Ok ok so hear me out
Prompt- basically one where Nesta and Cassian didn’t mate at the end of of ACOSF, never even slept together. Nesta just ends up giving in and agreeing to train or work in the lib and eventually becomes ‘apart’ of the inner circle and does magic and shit for them or whatever.
And cassian of course is overjoyed because nesta is part of the fam now and he keeps trying to play with her or rile her up (like the old Cassian did) back to his old self now that she’s doing what they want but because nesta was forced to submit she’s just a shell of a person, doesn’t want to argue with him or anyone, just does what she’s told. And now cassians beginning to really panic (as he should) because he just wants her to be happy
Love your work btw <3
Did someone ask for ✨Angst✨
Nesta learned young that the world wanted silence from women.
Yes, she had been a woman then. A girl and then a woman and now … a female. Pretty dresses and panting creatures who thought with the parts between their legs and a list of rules she never wanted to follow. The only difference in this life was that it would never end.
The Fae claimed to be different, well, the hypocrites she was surrounded by claimed to be different.
The humans rapped her knucles with hard wooden switches and pulled her spine up straight and sat her on the shelf like a pretty little doll to be silent decoration. They demanded silence and a pretty smile.
Feyre and Rhysand and their merry little court put a sword in her hand and sent her to war even as they demanded the same thing. She was allowed to speak and sweat and curse as much as she pleased. She was allowed to be wild as Feyre always had been, but still they expected silence.
Silence where it mattered.
Nesta found her spot in this court when she started to learn from Elain. When she noticed that no one bothered her no matter how far she fell, how depressed she clearly was, how haunted her eyes looked. No one yelled or locked her away or claimed to hate her. You could not hate a person who never said what they thought.
It was a different kind of freedom, Nesta supposed, to be completely numb. To watch your own too long, too graceful fingers slip past this beautiful, hazy possibility you once clung to with battered knuckles and a warrior’s spirit.
They never commented on her drinking now, though it was worse than it had ever been. Feyre giggled and set bottle after bottle between them on a coffee table as she prattled on about her mate and her baby and whatever new way the world was set to end this time. Nesta smiled now as she never had before. Smiled and nodded and made a well timed joke between sips of pink spiked summer water and Feyre never noticed.
How proud she was of herself, of the warrior sister she plucked from the slums and gave a purpose.
Nesta wore the dresses Rhysand gifted her even though the softest silk felt like sandpaper against her skin. She ate at their table and fought all of their battles and it was almost tolerable.
Living like a tiger in one of those roaming circuses. Not free, not allowed to be what it was born to be, not allowed to revel in its pouncing nature, but … secure. Fed and managed and perfectly fine.
She was perfectly fine.
“Nes is going to kick your ass pretty soon if you don’t get back in the ring, Rhys,” Cassian joked one night as he peeled sweat-soaked leathers from his toned body. Tossing them to the floor, treating the House like his maid the way he always had. The way he would have no reason not to.
“I could kick his ass now,” Nesta said on cue and without inflection. That was her line. Cassian baited Rhys and she flexed the muscles she let him train into her body and agreed with whatever he said.
“It would be a waste for Nesta and I to ever spar with fists.”
Nesta swallowed. She had no line for that. No witty response for mention of her party trick power that was only allowed out on Rhys and Feyre’s command. Cassian swooped in, convinced it was a lasting sensitivity he must save her from. “As long as none of us play her in cards,” he joked.
Nesta rolled her eyes and laughed how she was supposed to.
It wasn’t until later that night, long after the sun had set, when she was drinking her way through Rhys’ rapidly declining supply of good whiskey, that she realized her mistake.
The numbness only worked when no one looked too close. And no one ever cared to … except for him. He always looked too close.
“Mind if I join you?”
“Of course.” Maybe that was where she went wrong. Being too amicable. Somewhere, in a deep echo chamber where she kept all her true thoughts locked away, Nesta knew that she would never acquiesce without a snarky comment. She didn’t have the energy to find that line. And why should she? Everyone but him was fine with this.
Cassian sat too close on purpose, pressed his knee against hers and took a long drag from her glass rather than getting his own. He refilled it and licked the side before giving it back to her.
Nesta took a sip from the other side. His eyebrows knitted together.
“Still insisting on all this fabric I see,” he grinned lecherously, picking up the gauzy end of her nightgown. “Feyre and Mor don’t take you to that fun shop by the rainbow?”
“They do,” Nesta nodded, eyes fixed on a spot in the distance.
“Maybe you would let me join you next time?” He smirked, bicep brushing up against her shoulder.
“If you would like.”
“And you can try some things on for me?” Nesta nodded as she took another sip of her drink.
“If you would like.”
“And then we can go behind the store and fuck like animals in plain sight?”
“If you-“ Nesta paused, mind catching up to the words she had been tuning out.
“There we go,” he sighed, moving back and sinking into the chair beside her. “There was actually life in your eyes for a second there.”
“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.”
Cassian leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “Talk to me, Nes.” She hated when he called her that, hated the softness he insisted on cloaking her with in his own mind. “What’s wrong?”
Everything. “Nothing.”
“That’s bullshit!” Nesta winced, because the last time Cassian said those words to her …
“I’m fine,” she forced a smile. “Really!” She couldn’t go back. Couldn’t go back to being locked away and cut off and terrified. She couldn’t go back to being desperate and under their control all the time.
“You aren’t fine,” he whispered. “You barely even seem like yourself, Nes.”
“Exactly,” she felt her eyes spark for just a second before dousing them in cold water. “I am better now.”
Cassian only blinked. “Better?”
“Just like you all wanted.”
“We didn’t want a shell, Nesta!” His voice rose, cracking at the top in a way she had never heard.
“Of course you did,” she shrugged. “Everyone is happy this way, Cassian.”
“I’m not,” he shook his head, eyes going wide with the realization of just how empty she was now.
Typical Cassian to change his mind just when she gave him everything he wanted.
“I am sorry to hear that.”
“Nesta what the fuck?” He nearly toppled out of his chair, falling to his knees with an audible crack. Nesta raised her legs up and hugged them to her chest to avoid contact. “Nesta this isn’t … where did you go?”
“I am right here,” she smiled her new smile. The one that danced like a reluctant spirit on her lips and would never reach her eyes.
“No,” he shook his head. “No this isn’t … this isn’t you, Nes.”
“Of course it is,” she shrugged. “It is exactly the me you told me to be.” Even her accusations sounded like sleepy sighs. “Train or go to the human lands. I trained. Live here or go to the human lands. I lived here. Play nice or be cut off. I played nice.” Nesta looked up, past his eyes instead of into them. “I followed all your rules, Cassian. You don’t get to change them now just because your favourite toy is broken.”
This is way out of my comfort zone, but for all you Nezriel lovers... here ya go! Nesta vs the Buffer - Part Two (18+)
Someone tell me why instead of editing my thesis I’ve spent this morning writing an angsty Nessian/furious Nesta one-shot, when I haven’t written fanfiction in… six whole years?? Have I just unlocked a new level of procrastination and putting off deadlines????
(Nope I don’t know when this is set. Maybe after Eris proposed? Idk. Maybe Nesta accepted the proposal and it was the kick up the arse Cassian needed. Maybe Eris treats Nesta right from day one. Maybe Cassian has to actually work for it instead of just telling her her opinions are bullshit. Idk. It’s out of my system now so will probs never finish this. It came into my head like this and I had to get it down. That is all. It’s not even edited but… here it is anyway.)
as promised, chapter one today, even though the cost was my writing 6k words in an afternoon RIP me i thought this was going to be a lot shorter lol. enjoy!
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When Nesta awakes, she knows she had a peaceful dream, she is in the House, and Cassian is by her side. She nearly smiles, more content than she's felt in living memory--when slowly, but not scarily, she remembers.
The scrying yesterday...it had left her mind bare and vulnerable and the Cauldron had taken advantage. She doesn't feel the pain now, but remembers that she felt it. Cassian, still asleep in the chair, had come in because of her screams. And...Rhysand?
Since you asked... Soft Nessian headcanon: Nesta is absolutely the type to read through the night and Cassian will be passed out asleep curled up next to her but periodically there will be a sleepy mumble of "go to sleep" but Nesta will just keep saying "one more chapter"
This technically was just a really good headcanon, but I am so sleepy that I wrote a fic about sleep. This is my second fic about sleep... being half awake must inspire me or something.
~
Nesta’s chest is a beautiful thing. Not just because her breasts mold perfectly in his hands and she becomes pliant as he tugs and bites, but because when Cassian lays his head there, he can hear her life like trickles of water. Her heart is the pitter-patter of rain.
There’s nothing quite like music than the sounds that Nesta Archeron makes. From her moans, to her yells, to her quick snapping fingers when she’s frustrated. There’s nothing much that can compare to the sound of her breathing. Even the symphonia can’t rival her heartbeat.
