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highqueenofelfhame · 11 months

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a/n: i'm so sorry this one took so long to get out. it's very dialogue heavy and i struggle with dialogue and it was a tough one. i hope it was worth the wait.

rowaelin // 5k words // ciwyw masterlist // masterlist

The sun was barely above the horizon, and Aelin was already awake. Nothing but her ceiling fan and Rowan’s deep, even breathing filled the room around them as she reached for her phone and began mindlessly scrolling on social media.

Cocooned within his arms and surrounded by his scent, her nausea hadn’t been what kept her awake. It was just after eight and her body was so used to waking up for work that it refused to let her drift back into a land of sweet dreams. At least Rowan was still snoozing. He needed it as much as she did.

Upon opening twitter, she opened trending topics to see what juicy gossip was making the rounds today. A few politicians were popular for no good reason, and a handful of celebrities were having their looks celebrated per usual. Third from the bottom, however, she stopped and stared.

ROWAN WHITETHORN

His name glared at her in all capital letters, a bit of text beneath it reading: trending with Aelin Galathynius and Aedion Ashryver

Oh, gods.

The trending tag was bombarded with articles from tabloids and fan tweets, the same few pictures circulating along with them. The photo of Rowan with the little boy at dinner was the main one, but she quickly understood why her name was attached when she saw the others.

All of them were grainy, but Rowan and Aelin were no less identifiable. His arm was around the back of her chair in each picture. One he was leaning toward her and saying something in her ear. She could easily imagine that it was him asking if she was okay for the thousandth time. In another, she was pointing at Aedion with a fork, laughter dancing in her eyes while she gazed at Rowan, lips parted around words.

Aelin looked down at the tattooed arm draped over her side and the hand that rested on her stomach. There was no way for her to know how he would react to this, especially not so early in the morning. It was starting to settle over her heavily as her phone began buzzing in her palm.

MOM flashed on her screen, a picture of her and her mother from Yulemas last year bright in her face. Aelin sighed and began extricating herself from Rowan, lifting his arm and rolling out from beneath him. It would be quicker to just move over his body in order to avoid missing her mom’s call so she began crawling over him.

So abruptly it startled a squeal from deep in her chest, Rowan launched into a sitting position just as her toes hit the ground. With his eyes still closed as he asked, a little too loudly, “Are we sick?”

The commotion had her phone slipping from her hands and careening toward the ground. With reflexes no human man should possess, Rowan’s leg darted beneath the blanket and somehow managed to catch the phone with his foot before it shattered on the floor. Aelin gaped at him as he picked it up and handed it to her. His godsdamn eyes were only cracked open, what the f—

“Hi, Mom. One second.” She sandwiched the phone between her ear and shoulder, ignoring the huffy sigh from her mother. “I’m fine, spiderman. Go back to sleep.”

“I’m up,” he argued, throwing his legs over the side of the bed. Despite his words, Rowan was very much not awake. Squinty green eyes took in every inch of her body as she stood up and started walking backward to the door. She was still gawking at him as he followed after her and rubbed at his face.

“Seriously, how did you do that?” A sleepy smile formed on his face and Mala above, she wanted to kiss it until it was a full blown grin.

“It’s kind of my job, love,” he teased.

“That doesn’t happen to be Rowan Whitethorn, does it, love?” Evalin drawled, clearly having heard what Rowan called her. That little pet name that tied her veins into pretty ribbons to make her heart pound against her bones.

Shit. She was in deep fucking shit.

“Yes. Yes, that is Rowan Whitethorn.” Aelin replied, Rowan towering over her as he wrapped an arm around her waist and pressed his lips to the top of her head. It was so short and sweet that she almost wondered if it had really happened as he slipped past her and padded into the kitchen.

“And when were you going to tell me about this?” Her mother demanded. Aelin could vividly picture her pacing with one hand on her hip and the other whipping sharply through the air as she spoke.

“Technically, I did tell you.”

“You told me you were sleeping with someone. There was no indication about who it was.” The name had been left out, sure, but she had only known him as Rowan and, at the time, it was entirely too soon to tell her mother all the details.

“I mean, we were? Rowan and I are in a… situationship.” The man in question turned to look at her, eyebrows disappearing into his hairline. Aelin grimaced.

“What the hell does that even mean?!” Evalin cried.

“Did I just get demoted?” Rowan turned and looked at her, eyebrows disappearing into his hairline. Aelin shook her head at him while biting back a laugh.

“We’re seeing each other. We’re dating. He’s my boyfriend. Right?” She looked at Rowan amidst her rising panic over her mothers frantic, betrayed voice. He walked over, placing a glass of water in front of her, and leaned against the counter. Two fingers swept hair behind her ears and ran down the side of her neck. Something about his touch was a cooling balm to her nerves. “He’s my boyfriend. It’s just… it’s complicated. I was going to tell you—”

“What, when you got married?! I found out from news articles and your father getting questions about it this morning, Aelin.”

“I was going to call you this morning after everyone woke up because like I said, it’s complicated.”

“Don’t tell me you already eloped.” Rowan was grinning while he eavesdropped. Aelin reached out and punched his stomach only to be met with rock hard muscle.

“No! Gods above, Mama. No. Not— fucking hell this is worse than I thought it would be,” she grumbled, forehead thumping against her boyfriend’s chest. Rowan’s hand stroked over the back of her head sympathetically. “Can we switch to video? This is too much to do over the phone while I can’t see your face.”

The frustration in her words was evident when her voice cracked. When her mom accepted the video call, her features were soft. If she had been in Varese with her, Aelin knew her mother’s fingers would be stroking her hair to calm her down, the same way Rowan was now threading his fingers through the golden strands.

“Can you please put a shirt on before I put you in frame?” She asked, watery eyes turning onto his face.

“I’m a bit more worried about you than I am about clothing right now, love.”

“You can’t meet my mom like this.” Rowan’s eyes traced her face and body long enough that she sighed. “I’ll be fine for the thirty seconds it takes you to get there and back.”

“Baby,” her mother cut in, worry clouding her features. Aelin looked away from Rowan as he jogged across the apartment. “You’re scaring me.”

“Because I’m scared. Of everything and your reaction and what Dad is going to say and— all of it is scary.” The worst part was that she wasn’t even entirely sure why she was crying. On a normal day, hard conversations were difficult, of course, but nothing she had ever cried over. Her parent’s gave her unconditional love. There wasn’t a worry in her mind that she would ever cease to be the center of their entire world. These hormones were going to kill her.

When Rowan came back, he picked up her water and pulled on her hand until she stood, leading her toward the couch. Evalin was quiet and patient while he got her tucked in with a blanket and settled beside her. His face held no judgment as he brushed tears from her cheeks.

“Everything’s okay,” he promised her, pointer finger bumping beneath her chin. Aelin smiled a little and shook her head before arranging her phone so her mom could see him.

“Mama, this is Rowan. Rowan, this is my Mom, Evalin.”

“It’s good to finally meet you, Mrs—”

“You’ll call me Evalin,” she interrupted with the wave of her hand. Rowan smiled and nodded once before looking back at Aelin.

“It’s good to meet you, Evalin,” he repeated, trying her name out for the first time. Aelin’s mother beamed and the anxiety that was creeping and crawling over her nerves paused for the time being.

“Is Dad around?”

“Right here, Fireheart,” Rhoe slid into view, immediately frowning when he took in her tear streaked face.

“Before you start, I’m not crying because of Rowan. I mean, technically I am, but it’s not anything bad. Rowan, my father Rhoe, Dad, I’m sure you already know him, but this is my boyfriend Rowan Whitethorn.”

“We’ve met a few times actually,” Rowan chimed in, lifting a hand in greeting. “It’s nice to see you, sir.”

“You too, son.” So far, so good. Both of her parents were smiling and Rowan was a steadying weight beside her. Somehow he felt more at ease than she did. Aelin just had to get the next part out without falling apart. A deep and almost cleansing breath filled her lungs as she looked up at the ceiling to keep the tears from rolling down her cheeks. Gods, this was ridiculous.

“We um…” Aelin exhaled and looked at Rowan who nodded encouragingly. “I want to start off by saying that this is still really new. Our relationship and everything attached to it is really new. And I really was planning to call you today. I decided on that well before the news broke this morning.”

“Sweetheart. Just say it,” her mother said, giving Aelin a knowing look. Of course Evalin had it figured out before she had even tried to search her brain for a coherent sentence. Hell, she had probably known the entire time.

“We’re having a baby.” Aelin’s lip quivered, and Rowan reached over to lace their fingers with the hand that wasn’t around her shoulders. She sunk into him, resting her head on his shoulder while gnawing on her lip.

“Not planned, I take it,” her father tried to joke, and despite the tears that had sprung free, Aelin laughed.

“No. Definitely not planned but not a bad thing either.”

“I knew it as soon as you spit out that piece of candy a few weeks ago.” Evalin beamed, dabbing at her eyes with the pocket square she had stolen from Rhoe’s suit. “Are you happy?”

“Yes. Scared as hell, but I’m happy. Are…” Aelin looked at Rowan, “You’re happy, yeah? Now isn’t the time to ask but we haven’t really addressed that.”

“I’m very happy,” he promised, leaning in to kiss her temple. Aelin let out a shaky breath and laughed again, rubbing at her eyes with her sleeves.

“I was an emotional wreck the entire time I was pregnant with you. I’m sorry that I passed it along.” To her credit, Evalin did look a little sorry. Aelin had grown up hearing about it off and on. Rhoe frequently reminded her that she was a spitfire from the moment of conception.

“The hormones are a bitch. And the morning sickness? It’s all the time and it’s awful.” The only time she didn’t seem to be heaving the entire contents of her stomach was when Rowan was there to soothe it away. Sure, she had been sick a few times over the weekend, but something about the way he smelled seemed to keep it at bay for the most part. Human bodies were so bizarre.

“You are supposed to come home in a few months,” Rhoe wondered out loud. Rowan seemed to stiffen a little beside her. “Are your plans changing in that regard?”

“I don’t know,” Aelin admitted with a shrug and a sigh. “I’m working every day that I feel able to. Except for today and yesterday because Lysandra put Aedion on a plane. The bastard is still asleep right now, actually, but I am keeping up with work. Usually just half days because I’m exhausted and sick all the time. And Rowan is so busy with the season we only see each other on the weekends. If I come home when I was supposed to, though, I’m sure his teammates and fans would be thrilled if he stopped getting red cards.”

“If you think I’m going to play better while you’re pregnant on another continent, you’re insane.” Her parents chuckled, but she knew how serious he was. Rowan tended to worry to the extreme and her being away wouldn’t help.

“We’ll cross that bridge when we get closer to it. How’s that?” Aelin looked up at him and he nodded. It would have to do for now. There was too much going on with Fireheart for her to abandon her responsibilities entirely, baby or no baby.

“Is there anything you need from us?” Her father asked, concern heavy in his brow. Not that she could think of, and she said as much.

“Between Rowan and Aedion, it’s all covered. Plus Lys is coming at the end of the week when Aedion leaves. I have my first appointment next week. I did have a blood draw that confirmed the pregnancy because I was so sick I couldn’t keep anything down. Lysandra berated me into an ER visit. They gave me some nausea medicine that seems to be helping, but we’ll know more about the baby next week. I’m not even really sure how far along I am aside from the basic math of when we met.”

“When you met?” Evalin’s eyebrows flew toward the sky and Aelin choked.

“Sometime around then,” she tried to save her prior phrasing, but her mom saw straight through it. Rhoe, on the other hand, looked eager to think about anything but his daughter’s sex life.

“What the hell are you already doing awake?” Aedion grumbled from the hall, rubbing his eyes as he stumbled into the room.

“FaceTime with Mom and Dad.” Her manicured hand patted the open seat next to her.

“Oh shit, already? I thought it would be this afternoon.” Aedion dropped down beside her and leaned in, waving to his aunt and uncle.

“Well. Mom found out about me and Rowan before I could even call her. Pictures of us from last night seem to be making the rounds all over the internet.” Rowan’s head whipped toward her, eyes wide and lips parted. His mouth was moving to form words, but before he could get an apology out she added, “It’s okay.”

The apology came anyway, and Aelin’s eyes jumped from his face to her mom and dad’s. Evalin’s lip quivered at the sincerity and Rhoe looked like he respected the man even more already.

Aedion reached around to pat Rowan’s shoulder sympathetically. “It comes with the territory. Surely you know how famous you are.”

“I mean, sure, when I’m playing.”

“Oh, you sweet child,” Evalin mused, causing Aelin to crack a wide grin. Their family knew better than anyone that certain athletes tended to sky-rocket into full on celebrity status. The tweets she had seen about all of them showed that tenfold.

“Rowan, you are quite literally a superstar,” Aedion told him. “You aren’t just huge on the field. Surely someone has mentioned to you that you’re insanely famous.”

“My agent and PR team are always nagging me to go to events and get on social media but… no one has ever really…” Rowan trailed off at the looks on everyones faces. Aelin was holding back a grin, her bottom lip tucked between her teeth.

“Baby, you’re kind of a big deal. And your face and body really don’t hurt,” Aelin told him, squeezing his hand. “Like people were so excited that someone saw you out and about.”

“I– what?”

“Okay, I think Aedion and I need to give Rowan a crash course in his fame. I’ll call you later?” Aelin said to her parents, who nodded in agreement.

“We love you. And we are absolutely thrilled about a grandbaby,” Evalin swore, a sentiment that Rhoe repeated almost verbatim. A weight lifted from her chest as she once again felt like fighting off tears.

“I love you,” she choked out just before ending the call, and then she was fully slumping into Rowan’s side. Giggles bubbled out of her all over again as she looked up at him. “I can’t believe you don’t know how famous you are.”

“What are people saying?”

“This one is my favorite.” Aedion showed Rowan a screenshot of his phone. It was a tweet that read: Look, I know we’re excited that 1. Rowan was out for once and 2. That he was spotted with sOCCER PRINCESS AELIN GALATHYNIUS??? But can we just talk about how good Aedion Ashryver looks?

A choked sound came out of Aelin before she could stop it, snickering following immediately after. Of course that would be his favorite.

She quickly opened the app, letting Rowan scan through news headlines and fan tweets while she peered at the screen with him. Most of them were good. A lot of the fans seemed to be happy about their potential romantic link. A few expressed their distaste, saying that Aelin was chasing fame after falling into irrelevancy. Those made her laugh, but Rowan didn’t seem to find the humor in it.

“They shouldn’t be talking about you like that,” he grit out. Aelin merely shrugged her shoulders.

“You can’t win them all. I’ve always been a little polarizing amongst the soccer community, anyway.” Gods, if that wasn’t the truth she didn’t know what was.

A lot of people accused her of nepotism and everything that fell under that umbrella. Yes, she was a nepo baby. But she was doing her best to make her own way in the world without relying too heavily on what her parents had built. Starting Fireheart was the first step of that and while they had contributed financially, it had been her idea. They just backed it with money when she needed the initial boost. Aelin liked to think that, relevant or not, she was using her name and generational wealth to put good back into the world.

“I had no idea I was this… big,” Rowan murmured, finally handing her phone back to her. There was an innuendo that Aelin’s childish mind couldn’t ignore. Her teeth clamped down on her bottom lip to bite back a laugh. “I knew Fenrys was, but he feeds into it. He likes the attention. I just assumed that since I stayed out of everything that didn’t have to do with the game, I was just known for playing.”

“There are girls that are dying to be me right now.” Aelin was grinning, but Rowan still wore a displeased frown. “Hey. It’s really okay. It was going to come out eventually and we don’t have to confirm or deny anything yet.”

“The thought of having to publicly comment on my personal life is so irritating.”

“Your comments can just come in the form of agreeing with what I put on social media or whatever statements I put out. You don’t have to do anything that you don’t want to do, Rowan. People are going to speculate regardless, and while I would eventually like to talk about us, I don’t have to.” She shrugged like it was simple. It wasn’t, but she would make it as easy for him as she could. Rowan sighed and rubbed his eyes with his forefinger and thumb. “I bet you’re wishing you went back to sleep when I told you to, huh?”

“You shut up,” he murmured, a playful bite to his words.

“People did find your instagram, by the way. And you’re only following me,” Aelin pointed out. “Maybe today we can post a picture or something and follow at least your teammates?”

“You’d help me with that?” Rowan looked surprised.

“Of course. I’m really good at social media. We’ll get you all set up before you go home later. I’ll even help you with everything you want to post. It’s not like I won’t be around to help you out for the next eighteen years at least.” Rowan squeezed her hand in thanks, his lips finally tipping into a smile at her joke. A bit of relief flowed through her at his smile. “With that settled, I’m going to shower and I believe you promised me chocolates.”

“That I did.” Rowan pressed a chaste kiss to her knuckles as she stood and headed walked toward the bathroom.

Everything with her parents had gone exactly as expected. The fact that they were happy about it despite the circumstances meant the world to her. Having that support in her back pocket at all times, no matter what was more important than she would ever let on. Rowan blended seamlessly in the conversations and she could only imagine how charming he would be when they officially met in person.

Everything was still beyond terrifying, but she tentatively felt like everything was going to be okay. She hoped, anyway.

~*~

“I want to talk to you about something,” Aedion said, waiting to speak until the shower was on and the soft thud of the shower door indicated she was inside. Her cousin leaned forward with his elbows on his knees, rubbing his hands together as he looked over at Rowan. “She would kick my ass if she found out, so please don’t mention it for the time being.”

“I’m all ears.” Rowan had been expecting this. The two hadn’t spent any time together alone thus far, and since he was more like a brother than anything else, he’d anticipated the big brother talk. It had only been a matter of when, not if.

“Aelin has… Gods, she’s been through some shit. I don’t know how much she’s told you about her last relationship, but it did a fucking number on her. For years she was a shell of herself and it was rare to even get her to smile. It would be a lie to say that she didn’t start acting like herself until she met you.”

“What do you mean? She seemed in good enough spirits when I met her,” Rowan said, thinking back to the spitfire woman in the bar. Aedion’s head shook.

“Aelin has always been good at putting on a front. We call it her insufferable swagger. While it’s part of who she is, it lacks a certain edge. Being able to rile you up about soccer was likely just part of that,” her cousin explained, scratching at his jaw. “Once she started telling Lysandra about you, something was different. The first call they had after, Lys burst into tears as soon as they were off the phone. Normally she keeps Aelin’s secrets, but she couldn’t even keep it from me because she was so happy that she just seemed normal.”

“I can’t take credit for any of that.”

“Maybe not. But we all think you sparked something in her. You brought her back to life, Rowan. Even just being here, it feels like Aelin, not the person she tried to be to make us not worry about her. There were times when she told us she felt like dying. That she would never try, but she was drowning and dying sounded like the more peaceful option. Constantly she told us how tired she was, and she never meant physically. It was the kind of exhaustion you feel deep in your bones that feels suffocating. But once you walked into the picture, everything about her has been different.”

Rowan turned the words over carefully, lips twisting while he considered. Aelin had always been the same to him, but he could see what Aedion meant in some ways. Now she was much sharper with her teasing tongue. It had him wondering if things would have been different without a troubled past relationship.

None of it sat well with him. The idea of Aelin withdrawing into herself and withering away to fragile, dried petals made him want to hit something. That anyone had ever dampened her golden light was beyond him. It took a special kind of asshole to do that to a strong and brilliant woman. He didn’t know what to say. Thankfully, Aedion had a little more to give.

“I can’t stand to see her go back to that place. I like you, Rowan. I do. But if I think for a single second that you’re not good for her or the baby I will not hesitate in beating the absolute shit out of you.”

“If you come to that conclusion, I would probably be in agreement. I’d let you.” It was the truth. Might even outright ask for it. Rowan had always accepted the punishments that he deserved.

“Glad we’re on the same page,” Aedion murmured, finally relaxing enough to sit back against the couch. The shower shut off moments later, the sounds of Aelin readying for the day filling in the silence.

When she finally opened the door, makeup and hair done with a robe wrapped around her body, she chirped, “Chocolate?”

“Yeah,” Rowan chuckled. “Chocolate.”

~*~

While they ate lunch at a little cafe downtown, Aelin had helped him make his first ever Instagram post. It was a picture of him leaning back in his chair, looking out at the bustling city around them. Despite feeling that he always looked awkward in photos, this one looked natural and candid. Aelin called him her boyfriend again and he was smiling when she snapped the winning shot. So far it had amassed several thousand likes and comments. Rowan wasn’t sure what to do with any of it.

Three dozen chocolate truffles and several bakery items later, Aelin and Rowan wandered back into the apartment. Aedion had let them go out alone for some time together. Now that he knew people were eager to sneak photos of him, he noticed cell phones turned their direction all morning. It was hard to not be frustrated about it, but Aelin’s touch was a soothing balm to the rising anger. If she wasn’t bothered he would try his hardest not to be, too.

“I probably need to go soon,” he said, sitting on the edge of her bed while she shucked off her leggings and pulled on a pair of little shorts. A sullen look pulled on her features as she stood between his legs, hands resting on his neck.

“Would it work if I said that I want you to stay?” Nails lightly scratched at his scalp and it was an effort to keep his eyes from slipping shut.

“It would make it harder for me to leave, but I do have practice in the morning. I can’t be late.” Never mind that he wished it weren’t the case. If she outright asked, he probably would stay and then hate himself for it tomorrow.

“Fine,” she sighed, hands sliding down his shoulders. Rowan wasn’t sure what it was about her touch, but it drove him mental in the best way. The loss of her skin on his was a new kind of hell he hadn’t known existed until he met her. “I have a scan next week. Do you want to go with me?”

“Do you want me to be there?” If she didn’t, he wouldn’t go. It might kill him a little, but he would stay away if it was what she wanted.

“I obviously want you there. Otherwise I wouldn’t have told you about it. That wasn’t my question. ” Ah, there was that sass Aedion had talked about earlier.

“I want to,” he swore, fingers trickling up and down her outer thighs. A smile took over her entire face and damn him, he couldn’t help his own grin to match.

“It’s Thursday afternoon. I can text you the details about where so you can meet me there from practice.” Rowan nodded as he collected the few things he brought with him and followed her out to the living room.

“It was good to meet you, man,” He told Aedion, the two bumping fists casually. Aelin was smiling while she watched, her fingers covering her mouth like an eager child.

“Hopefully I can make the trip over here again soon.” Rowan would genuinely enjoy that. Aedion seemed cool and cared so much about his cousin that he doubted he would ever have anything negative to say about the man.

Aelin led him to the front door, their loosely linked fingers swinging between them. Unable to help himself, he pushed her hair back from her face. Her eyes hid a secret smile as she gazed up at him. Gods, she was so beautiful.

“I’ll see you Thursday, then?”

Rowan nodded, “And I’ll talk to you every day in between.” It felt a little cheesy to say it out loud, but Aelin’s smile was enough to chase away the self consciousness he felt.

She stopped him with a hand around his wrist as he turned to open the door. When he turned back to look at her, Aelin rocked up on her toes and pressed a soft kiss to the corner of his mouth. He had a feeling she knew it was a teasing move. Those brilliant turquoise and gold eyes confirmed it when she pulled away, mirth swimming in their depths. Such a cruel, beautiful thing she was.

“Drive safe,” she said, one more little smile shared between them before he walked out the door and began his short trip back to Doranelle.

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highqueenofelfhame · 1 year

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rowaelin // 4.9k words // ciwyw masterlist // masterlist

It was golden light that roused Aelin from sleep, sneaking in through gaps in the curtains and blinds. It took her a moment to remember that it was Rowan’s bed she was curled up in, completely wrapped in his cool pine scent. She inhaled deeply, ducking her nose down into the plush duvet and savored it. Part of her wished he was laying beside her, the sunlight casting soft shadows over his face. With her eyes closed she could imagine it.

It was better that he wasn’t. She knew that. There was hurt on both sides. Words had been said that cut them both in sensitive places, and the wedge between them was starting to feel like an ocean. Yet being here, in his bed, his house, were the first steps toward reconciliation. They just had to get through the hard conversations first.

The best part about Rowan not being in bed with her was the smell of bacon, eggs, and something sweet creeping up the stairs and beneath the door. For what felt like the first time in her pregnancy, her mind and body were in agreement: she was hungry. Though she was hesitant to believe her head wouldn’t be in the toilet immediately following breakfast, she slipped out of bed and padded her way downstairs.

“How did you sleep?” He asked her, eyes roving over her head to toe before he turned back to the pan on the stove. Aelin wondered if it was because she was still in the clothes he’d given her to sleep in, or if it was some instinct of his to make sure she was in one piece. She slid onto one of the chairs at the bar, folding her arms atop it, and laid her head down.

“Like the dead.” A sleepy yawn escaped her before she could finish her response. One of these days, she really needed to take to the internet to see when, exactly, she would stop feeling so wholly exhausted all the time. “Did you sleep okay?”

“I did,” he confessed, the muscles in his back rippling beneath the simple gray t-shirt he wore. “Better than I have all week, actually.”

Rowan was careful as he deposited an egg onto a plate next to a few pieces of bacon and a cinnamon roll. Aelin thanked him when he handed her the plate and a glass of orange juice. It was freshly squeezed if the notes of orange zest throughout the kitchen were any indicator, but when she lifted it to take a sip, her stomach turned violently in protest.

“It’s freshly squeezed. No additives or anything.” Two strings pulled the corners of her lips toward the floor. The confirmation that he spent gods knew how long juicing oranges until she had a full glass worth made her feel guilty for the way her body was reacting.

“You didn’t have to do that,” she said as she put it back down on the bar, far enough away that her nose couldn’t smell it anymore.

“It was nothing.”

“No I mean…” She paused and took a deep breath, eyes closing at the nausea rising in the back of her throat. “Can you put that anywhere else please.”

“Shit. Fuck, Aelin, I’m so sorry.” Rowan was quick to swoop in and pour it directly down the kitchen sink, letting the water chase it down the drain.

“You didn’t know. I didn’t either until I smelled it,” she admitted, finally opening her eyes and lifting her fork.

The first bite of the cinnamon roll was heavenly. It was baked to perfection, the gooey texture nearly melting away on her tongue. It was exactly how she loved her cinnamon rolls, but couldn’t remember ever telling him that. Perhaps once in passing. The eggs were scrambled and in a neat pile of soft, pillowy clouds. None of it touched.

“Did your mom teach you to cook?”

“She did. I was hungry just about constantly growing up, especially after practice and games. It’s come in handy now that I follow such a strict meal plan.” Indeed, his plate didn’t have a cinnamon roll. Instead he had two pieces of toast, some bacon and sausage, and three eggs. When he slid into the seat beside her she noticed two bowls, one with oatmeal and the other full of fruit.

“I was underfeeding you at my house,” she murmured, sitting back and resting her hands on her stomach. The baby, apparently, didn’t want her to enjoy breakfast. She took deep, steadying breaths to keep the food down even as a sheen of sweat started to coat her skin.

“Are you sick a lot?” Concern swam in his gaze as looked her over head to toe, but she nodded her head.

“Lysandra made me go to the emergency room a few days after I found out, and—” Rowan’s head whipped around, eyes wide and full of concern. Aelin held up a hand for him to wait a moment and continued, “There are days I couldn’t keep water down. That’s what the blood test was from. They gave me some medication to help with the nausea.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Something like devastation flashed across his features, squeezing her heart like he’d squeezed those oranges.

“Because I was still freaking out about being pregnant and how I was going to tell you, and I didn’t want you to find out because I was in the hospital over it. Imagine your reaction in an ER, with nothing between us and strangers but—” Aelin was cut off by the all too familiar tell of her mouth watering, head becoming unclear and dizzy as she launched off the chair and sprinted to the bathroom. She barely made it to the toilet before dropping onto her knees and emptying the little contents of her stomach into the bowl.

Rowan was there, like he’d seen the color of her face drain to stark white. His hand was a steady weight on her back, moving slowly up and down her spine while he gathered up her hair in his other hand.

By the time she was through, her throat burned from the pure bile that clawed its way out of her body. Aelin’s ribs and stomach ached from the force of it all and Rowan had to help her back onto her feet, gripping her shaky hands and grounded her to earth.

“Do you want to lay back down?” he asked her, using his fingers to comb her hair up onto the top of her head. Goosebumps erupted over her body when he tugged the hair tie off her wrist and secured the bun into place.

Aelin shook her head and gestured toward the kitchen where their breakfast grew colder by the second and said, “I’m going to shower while you finish eating. And don’t object to it. I know you’re hungry. So eat.”

His eyes were wary as he appraised her. They scanned every feature from head to toe like he was cataloging every single thing about her. Deeming her well enough to manage on her own, he led her out of the bathroom and toward the stairs. Even when she protested, he followed her up and gathered towels and the small bucket of necessities that had everything she would need: body wash, shampoo, conditioner, razors, shaving gel. The little box of tampons almost made her laugh. She wouldn’t be needing those for a while.

When he finally left her alone, she stared at the bin full of everything she might need for her stay. Aelin didn’t question if it was meant for any female visitors he might have. She didn’t have to. Everything in it was smaller sizes of everything she had in her shower at home. Like he had made a list so he knew what to get.

It almost made her angry, how thoughtful it was. Simply because it made it virtually impossible to be upset with him. All of her anger toward him was gradually slipping through her fingers, just like the water she gathered in her cupped hands.

~*~

By the time she was done showering and walked back downstairs, Rowan had finished eating and cleaned up the kitchen. It was near pristine. The dirty dishes had vanished from the stove top and sink and an empty trash bag was in the garbage bin. One of his tattooed fingers was just about to mist the room with air freshener to cover the lingering scent of cinnamon and bacon when she stopped him.

“That’s overkill. I’m fine.” Her polished fingers toyed with the ends of her damp hair as he looked up at her.

Rowan’s eyes swept over her, lingering on her still flat stomach. There was nothing to see, not yet, not for several weeks, but he looked and looked like he could see the baby through her t-shirt, her skin. When he finally looked at her face again he simply nodded and put the can back under the sink.

“Come on,” Aelin said after several heartbeats of silence, her head nodding toward the living room while he pulled a glass from the cabinet and filled it with water from the fridge. Once it was in her hands she glanced at the living room again. “We should talk.”

When she turned her back she heard him sigh deeply. It was strained, like he wasn’t at all looking forward to what was coming, like he dreaded it. Almost like he was scared. She wondered if his heart was racing and pounding like hers as she walked across the room and tucked herself in the corner of the sofa. A blanket is pulled over her legs with hands that have a small tremor. Aelin tucked them between her thighs to make it stop.

“At the time,” she said slowly, turning the words over in her mind before speaking them out loud, “I didn’t understand why you asked me if it was for money. But now, knowing what you actually do for a living, I understand why you felt the need to ask.”

“That isn’t what it was.” The words were clipped, his jaw clenching as he paced in front of her. Aelin watched him until he finally sat down on the edge of the couch, fingers drumming against his knees to quell his nervous energy. Confusion rose to the surface in her mind.

“Okay. Explain it to me then.”

“I— fuck. I don’t like talking about this.” The second part seemed to be said more toward himself than to her, so she waited patiently while he sifted through letters and syllables to make words.

Rowan looked over at her and chewed on his cheek. More than once, his lips parted to try to sew together his words, but closed again. Like he didn’t know how, when, or where to begin. Aelin wasn’t sure either. They both had a lot to say, had apologies to make. There was so much, though, that it was hard for her to find the words, too.

“I don’t like talking about it because I don’t… I don’t want you to think I’m making excuses about how I treated you. I’m not. But it’s the truth. Any single one of my friends, my family, they can back it up.”

“Rowan. It’s okay. Just talk to me.” The fingers in her lap ached to reach for him, twitching against her bare legs beneath the blanket. She wove them together to stay put.

“I had been sleeping with a woman for a while. Nothing serious, just casual when I had the time. She ended up getting pregnant about six months or so into it. I didn’t want the relationship to get serious. She… Lyria and I weren’t really well matched. We didn’t know each other. I found it hard to open up to her. More than that, I didn’t want to open up to her. But I was more than willing to step up where the baby was concerned.” He paused, tongue swiping over his teeth. Aelin’s heart was trying to escape her ribcage. She took a steadying breath, telling herself to listen and not draw conclusions before he finished. Still, she wondered. Did he have a kid already?

“Lyria was pushing for a relationship, to marry eventually. I was 23, still pretty early in my career, nowhere near ready for marriage. Especially not with a woman I barely knew . Every time it was brought up I shut it down. Not to break her heart,” he added with a swift glance at Aelin. “I don’t think she was ever in love with me. But because it wouldn’t have been a fruitful marriage, we would have been miserable, and I truly didn’t see the point.”

Aelin nodded in understanding, “You didn’t want to settle.”

“I didn’t want her to settle either. It wouldn’t have been fair for anyone, especially not the baby in a few years time. I didn’t want to raise a child in a loveless home. But all of that isn’t why I reacted so… fucking horribly.”

“Okay.” Her voice was barely above a whisper, but loud enough to encourage him to keep going. After another steadying breath, he did.

“One night I very firmly shut it down again. I told her it wasn’t on the table. I want to make it clear that she had a good job, she had really good health insurance. But she started asking me for money. Of course I wanted to give the support she needed, so I gave. And gave. And gave. I couldn’t not give her the money. We weren’t close enough for me to know the extent of her income, and I had money I could afford to lose. Maybe she did, maybe she didn’t, but whenever I asked about it she would get cagey. Accuse me of accusing her. It was such a complicated web to unravel and the fighting was so tiring.”

Aelin was nothing more than a concrete statue, her limbs heavy at her sides. She was unable to move while he spoke, eyes focused on the frayed corner of the blanket in her lap. Every sentence was turned over in her mind carefully, knowing that the grief and frustration that marred his face and sharpened his words was absolutely true.

“One day she called me several times in a row. I didn’t answer because our flight got in really late and I was exhausted. There was no energy in my soul to argue with her about money, so I sent it to voicemail. Later she sent me a text that she miscarried and… I didn’t want the relationship with her but I was just getting used to the idea of being a dad. I have always wanted to have kids. The timing was off at the time, but I was excited about it. And then it was just… gone.”

“Rowan,” she started gently, desperate to offer him comfort of some sort. No words would be a balm to that wound, but she couldn’t bring herself to reach out and touch him. Instead of looking at her he held up a hand, silently asking her to wait. Gods, he wasn’t finished. How could it get worse?

“I found out a few weeks later through a mutual friend that she had miscarried nearly an entire month earlier. All through that month I was still sending her money for appointments, for nursery furniture, car seats…” Rowan shook his head, silver hair falling into his eyes. “We stopped talking after I told her I knew the truth. That she was using all the money I was giving her to fund her lifestyle, hardly any of it was going toward anything for the baby, and that she weaponized the miscarriage to hurt me. It was a massive fucking blow out, and we haven’t spoken since.”

All the letters and words had evacuated her brain. The weight of his eyes trailing over her face made her finally meet his gaze. All the empathy she had in her heart was swimming in the ocean blue of her eyes that gleamed with unshed tears. In his, she saw that he knew the words she couldn’t find to speak out loud.

“It makes me feel like a massive piece of shite, but sometimes I wonder if she was even pregnant at all or if the whole thing was just a way to get money from me.” His fingers pinched the bridge of his nose, green eyes fluttering shut as he took a moment to just breathe. Aelin wondered if he had ever voiced that confession out loud before.

“I can understand why you reacted the way that you did.” The words swept out of her mouth on a heavy exhale, hands flexing in her lap.

“But?”

“I don’t fault you for the reasons behind your actions, Rowan. But I also can’t just freely let go with what you said and how you said it. I wish that I could, but I felt like we…” Aelin trailed off, eyes shifting around the room on a scavenger hunt for words she had lost.

“Like we had something more than what I reflected in my reaction,” he finished. A hand dragged through his hair and down the back of his neck before settling over the mouth that had put him in so much trouble in the last eight days.

“I thought you trusted and respected me more.”

“I do, Aelin. I– fuck. I do. I am so sorry for what I said, how I said it, what I accused you of, that I hurt you. For all of it, I’m so fucking sorry.” Rowan’s hands flexed against his thighs like he was dying to touch her almost as much as she was dying to be touched by him. They curled into fists so tight she could see his thumb nails turning white from the pressure.

“I know,” she assured him. “I know that, I just–”

Her hands moved restlessly in front of her, trying to pull her thoughts into coherent sentences. Trying to fully express how deeply it had cut her for him to react that way was difficult. The empty space in his arms where she had fit so perfectly had started to feel like home. It was the safest she had ever felt and following this path of life had felt so entirely right. But then he opened his stupid, perfect mouth. Those words had been dripping with such a sharp edge there wasn’t a way it wouldn’t have hurt.

“I think I just need some time. I think we need to slow down. This wasn’t supposed to become anything. You know? It was just meant to be fun, but–” She cut herself off with a shrug, her fingers falling onto her flat stomach. Somewhere in there, a baby that was equal parts of her and Rowan was swimming around. Those feelings threatened to undo her if she allowed herself to feel them. Instead of letting them bubble over, she shoved a cork deep down into that bottle to avoid it just a little while longer.

Rowan’s inhale was sharp, a blade against its scabbard. A chilly silence filled the room, faint buzzing in her ears like she was on the snowboarding slopes in the Staghorns after a heavy snowfall. His fingers drummed against his thighs, eyes staring straight ahead when he finally nodded in understanding.

A relationship hadn’t been on her radar. It was why the long-distance nature of it worked out so well. With time between each visit, she wasn’t able to throw herself into his heart no matter how much she may have wanted to. Nevermind that the last time she had dived head first into something it had ended with her broken and bleeding. That relationship left scars that were still tender, still itching as they healed.

It didn’t matter how badly she was desperate to be curled up against him, feel his skin warm where they touched. How much she craved to taste his lips, to kiss the hollow of his throat and down his chest, to just feel his body splayed beneath her fingers. To know that things would be okay. There was so much more at play here than what she wanted. A little baby was caught in the crossfires, and she has to be sure that going forward their relationship was built on more than a whirlwind romance.

Instead of reaching for his hand and continuing to let herself fall for him, she carefully constructed a wall around her heart and nodded in return.

“About me lying to you about… everything,” she began, but was quickly cut off by Rowan shaking his head so rapidly it made her dizzy.

“There’s no need for you to explain that. I do not fault you for wanting to protect yourself, Aelin. I wish we had both been more honest with each other, but, no. You don’t need to explain or apologize. I understand. I did the same thing.” The tightness in her chest eased. For the first time since everything had come out, her ribs weren’t so tightly constricted when she took a steadying breath. They had both lied for similar reasons, and her secrets didn’t seem to change anything for him, at least.

Rowan’s eyes seemed dark and distant, not at all what she was used to. But the conversation at hand was one of pain and hurt. It couldn’t be easy for him to lay this all at her feet, yet he had, and now they could move forward. He would give her the space she required and after that, they would figure things out.

A kernel of hope nestled itself into her heart. Aelin just hoped she wouldn’t get hurt this time.

~*~

White noise skittered along his skin, his nerves. The stifling sound of silence filled his ears like cotton as she finally stood and began to gather her things. The minutes ticked by like hours and Rowan hated every single drawn out second of it. He just wanted her to stay despite Aelin admitting that what they had between them wasn’t supposed to be anything. Those words were sure to echo between his ears during every hour he existed for the rest of his life.

Deep down in the trenches of his mind he was aware it was the best option for now. For them to pump the brakes, for him to make it up to her. Rowan understood why she needed time to process. He had assumed the worst of her when in reality, the truth of those pregnancy tests had shaken her to her core, just like they had him.

Still, he couldn’t deny his excitement. While he had been wholly unprepared when Lyria was pregnant, he was ready this time. Ready in a way that only resulted in happiness buzzing through his bones when he imagined what the child would look like, what they would be like. And if he and Aelin could figure this out and work through the missteps…

Gods. He was going to be a dad. After she took the time she needed and he proved himself, they could be a family. A real family. It wasn’t going to be like last time because he was already tripping and stumbling over the edge of a cliff, his feelings rising as rapidly as the water. He was falling in love with her, and it terrified him.

Rowan could wait. He would give her all the time she wanted, that she needed, and on the other side of it he would make sure that she was the happiest woman in the world. That their baby had the universe at their feet. Anything either of them wanted, he would ensure they had it. Nothing else mattered like this, not even football.

A new determination had melded into his bones by the time Aelin came downstairs with her bag over one shoulder. He stood as she slipped on her shoes, then walked her out to her car. Apprehension was all over her face, evident in the way her fingers twisted together when she faced him after opening her door.

“I’ll give back your clothes soon, I just felt gross putting the ones from yesterday back on.” Aelin gestured to the pair of boxers and t-shirt she wore. Rowan shook his head.

“I’m not worried about that. Keep them if you wish.” A lock of hair blew into her face with the wind. Without thinking he caught it with his fingertips, grazing her cheekbone as he pushed it behind her ear.

Aelin stiffened and took a single step back. The emotional distance was wider than the ocean when her head shook, brows meeting between her eyes that didn’t quite meet his.

“Please don’t touch me like that,” she said quietly, but not weakly. Ice water had been dumped over his head despite the warmth in the air. His fingers clenched into a tight fist as they dropped to his side and he promptly shoved them into his pockets. Rowan took several steps back, jaw wired shut. Uncomfortable. Aelin looked uncomfortable at his touch, and he wanted to slam his fist into the concrete because of it.

“I’ll text you soon,” she said, and he suddenly remembered the question that had been floating around in the back of his mind for the last two days. Just as she was about to shut the door, he grabbed the top of it to keep it from closing. Aelin jolted a bit, her eyebrows rising high as the clouds.

“How did you find out?” She looked at him for a second while she processed the question, and then laughed. It was the most beautiful thing he had ever heard.

“My best friend, Lysandra. I hadn’t sent her very many good pictures of your face yet, so she just googled ‘Rowan’ along with soccer and Doranelle hoping for a team photo or something.” Rowan laughed, too. Some of the tension eased from his shoulders as she smiled at him in their truce.

He nodded after a moment, a small smile still on his face. He stepped back to let her drive away, standing in the mid-afternoon silence while her tires kicked up clouds of dust. It would be a long road to win her trust back, but he wouldn’t stop until he had earned it.

~*~

The car ride back to Varese was spent choking back tears and forcing air into her lungs to ground her. As soon as she was back in her apartment, however, the dam broke. A tidal wave of emotion crashed down upon her head, and the front door was barely closed before her thumbs were punching buttons on her phone. By the time Lysandra picked up there were sobs violently shaking her entire body.

Before pregnancy, this wouldn’t have been anything to cry over. She still would have called Lysandra, of course, but it wasn’t something that would wreck her like this. Truthfully, Aelin didn’t even know why she was crying, other than the fact that she just felt alone. No universe existed where Aelin Ashryver Galathynius was alone in anything, much less a pregnancy. But she had nowhere to go to seek comfort in Varese. Two weeks ago it would have been to Rowan, but that was off the table. Now she just had an empty apartment and her thoughts.

Lysandra listened while she cried and tried to get a deep breath down. Aelin hadn’t been so upset in years and was positive that if she wasn’t pregnant, everything wouldn’t feel quite so out of control. As it was, there were no handholds to grab onto, no footholds to keep her from sliding down the cliff. While her emotions waxed and waned, Lysandra was there to listen to it all, to soothe her anxiety when she started to spiral out of control.

Part of her wished Aedion knew about the pregnancy because she needed him right now. But Lysandra filled his shoes almost well enough for everything to dwindle to a simmering calm.

Though she was set to fly out next week, Lys managed to find a lone ticket that would put her in Varese early the next morning. They talked while she packed, the blonde managing to calm down enough to go over everything that had been said between her and Rowan earlier that morning.

“I want to forgive him,” she said quietly a few hours later, curled up in her kleenex-covered bed.

“Why can’t you?”

“I–” Her lips twisted into a knot as she frowned at the floor. “I just need to be sure. You know? I need to… I don’t know.”

“You need to know that if this is going to be an actual relationship and not a co-parenting situation, that he isn’t going to hurt you again,” Lysandra offered, somehow seeing directly into Aelin’s mind and knowing the inner workings better than she did herself.

“Yeah,” she sniffed, those emotions threatening to spill over once again despite how much she had already cried. Even though a relationship was the last thing she wanted. “I just need to be sure.”

An hour later, Lysandra was ready for her 6:30 AM flight, and Aelin was more than ready to not feel quite so alone.

When she pulled up to the airport to pick up her best friend in the early hours of the morning, the sun just beginning to crest over the mountaintops to the east, it wasn’t the dark-haired beauty she was expecting. In fact, she almost drove right past the man that shared her eyes and golden hair. The man that could be her twin.

It was Aedion.

@elentiyawhitethorn @autumnbabylon @fancysludgeshoelamp @wordsafterhours @live-the-fangirl-life @the-hospitality-of-knives @tangledraysofsunshine @readandlisten @westofmoon @rowanaelinn @morganofthewildfire @writtenonreceipts @feynightlight @emster1622-blog @scarblx @secondstartorightand @thefaetrove @loveyatopluto @actuallybarb @peppermint-fae @the-devils-own @scottmcgivemeacall @livingmylifeforme @wordsafterhours @foreverfallingforthestars @llyncooljones @emily-gsh @loosesimplicity @emilyrose111294 @charlizeed @aelinchocolatelover @cretaceous-therapod @sayosdreams @fireheart-violet @the-regal-warrior @backtobl4ck @shyvioletcat @autumnbabylon @bellasbookboyfriends

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highqueenofelfhame · 1 year

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rowaelin // 5.8k words // masterlist // ciwyw masterlist let me know if you want to be tagged in my writing :) i hope you enjoy <3 i can't wait to see all your comments. y'all are kILLING me with them on this one.

As much as he knew he shouldn’t be, Rowan was drunk. Again.

Tomorrow they had a match against Adarlan on Doranelle’s home field. While Rowan laid on his back, staring at the ceiling fan above him with a full half-empty bottle of whiskey resting on his stomach, he knew they were going to lose. Not because Adarlan was better or because they wanted it more, but because Rowan was a selfish piece of shit and couldn’t put the bottle down. There was no way he would be in any condition to play tomorrow— at least not well.

Burying his sorrows at the bottom of the bottle seemed like the better alternative until he could figure out how to repair what he had catastrophically obliterated. It had been a full week with no word from Aelin. Not a single one of those days had passed without him sending an apology text into the void. There had even been a few voicemails Wednesday night that went unanswered. He wouldn’t be surprised if she was erasing them without bothering to listen. He deserved that much.

Rowan Whitethorn had never had social media. Ever. Not even in high school when it was just becoming a cool thing to do. Nobody needed to know that much about his life. At this point in his career, his agent and PR team begged him to do it because it would garner him more popularity. Even Lorcan posted on instagram from time to time and kept everyone happy.

The thing that finally drove Rowan to making an instagram account was stalking Aelin Ashryver Galathynius. It was easier for his thumbs to scroll through her feed while nursing sips of whiskey, trying not to double tap on any pictures. He was pathetic enough— Aelin didn’t need to be aware of his sulking and pining.

This all came after he googled her name paired with various words like ‘spouse,’ ‘husband,’ ‘wife,’ and ‘wedding.’ Nothing came back with a result, but it had been lurking in his mind when she didn’t answer his question earlier. Besides, Rhoe Galathynius very well could have been her father-in-law. As it were, she wasn’t married, and Evalin and Rhoe only had one child: their daughter. At least if she was married, there was no record of it. No photos of her in an elegant white gown standing next to the love of her life.

Good. He could deal with that.

What he couldn’t deal with was the photos of her in bikinis, arms wrapped around the waists of other men. She was nestled between the pair on the deck of a yacht all three of them with wide smiles and sunglasses covering their eyes. Her bathing suit looked more like lingerie and Rowan had never wished so hard for summer to come back around than he was right then.

There were pictures of her with a stunning brunette woman, both of them dressed in finery or night-out attire depending on where they were headed. Aelin with a full face of makeup, with sultry dark eyes and a full pouty lip was enough to drive him into madness.

He found photographs from holidays with her family, Aelin perched on a couch in comfy clothes and thick socks with Aedion Ashryver standing behind her. Further down her page he found the ones from years ago of her on Aedion’s shoulders after he won some match or another. It was captions Always my hero.

Lower and lower he went until he finally hit her first post: a simple kingsflame flower from nine years ago with the caption Fireheart. He supposed that was where she garnered the name for her foundation. Gods above, she was incredible. A super-hero amongst ordinary women.

Rowan scrolled back towards the top of her instagram, all the way back to the most recent one. It was from their day downtown, when they had bought a piece of chocolate hazelnut cake and sat outside the bakery. Aelin was laughing around her thumb that she held between her teeth. At that moment, he had been teasing her about getting the frosting everywhere. Behind the camera he was smiling just as brilliantly as she was. The light in her eyes, her smile, the utter joy that radiated off of her… It was enough to make him breathless all over again.

“Fuck,” he murmured to himself, heart squeezing and soul dying at how absurdly beautiful she was. It didn’t seem fair. Everything about her was perfect. Not just outside, but inside, too. Aelin Galathynius was the most selfless and loving person he had ever met. Inside and out, she shone with the light of a thousand suns. It made it impossible to look away and broke his heart that he had driven her away so sharply.

“M’such a bloody dobber,” he mumbled, zooming in on her face as close as it would get, until she was little more than a monochromatic cluster of pixels, none of her features distinguishable.

The phone fumbled where he held it over his face, falling directly onto it. Rowan swore, the taste of metal blooming over his tongue where his tooth had cut through his lip. Worse than that, though, was when he noticed the giant heart that appeared in the center of the picture he’d been staring at.

Rowan had accidentally liked it. Just as quickly, he unliked it and tossed his phone to the other end of the couch. Jail. He needed to be in phone jail.

It had over ten thousand likes and three hundred comments. There was a chance she would never notice the notification appearing and disappearing. She might never notice. It didn’t stop the ice creeping into his veins, though. The idea that she would realize how utterly pathetic he was, as if all the texts weren’t indication enough.

Rowan swore violently under his breath and grabbed his phone again. With bleary, bloodshot eyes he opened their text thread to send off another message. Just as his fingers started their drunken dance over the letters once again, his phone began to ring loudly. The vibration shook him to his core as he beheld the name flashing on his screen, a photo of the two of them laying on her couch flashing in front of him. The sight of it knocked the wind out of him.

Aelin.

Fuck. Shit. Mala fucking fry him.

“Hello?” he said, breathless like he’d been running a marathon.

“Hi.” Aelin’s voice was quiet. Rowan could imagine her sitting in the middle of her couch, a tv show paused.

“I am so sorry, baby,” he began, letters and syllables stringing together with no space between. “I need to explain, to—”

“Did you just like that picture on my instagram?”

“I…” it was long and drawn out as he squinted at the ceiling, trying to find a way out of it. There wasn’t one. Heat crept up his neck and bloomed over his cheeks like rose petals. “Ye-yeah. That was me.”

“Are you drunk?” was her follow up question. On the other end of the phone it sounded like she was rolling over in bed. Gods, he would love to be wrapped up in bed with her. The expanse of her golden skin under his hands wasn’t beat out by anything, not even football.

“No,” was his quick response.

“You sound drunk.” It was impossible to tell what, exactly, her emotions were. Rowan swallowed thickly, setting the bottle on the coffee table and nudging it out of reach.

“I sound like a pathetic bastard that ruined something perfect.”

“You’re definitely drunk.” If Rowan wasn’t positive that she hated him, he might mistake her tone as amusement.

“I miss you. And I’m sorry,” he paused to hiccup, “And I want you to tell me what to do to fix what I’ve broken.” A heavy, resigned sigh came through the phone and Rowan froze.

“Start with sobering up–” Fuck. She was going to hang up, and he had blown his only chance at making things right. Shit.

“Don’t hang up,” Rowan pleaded, lip tucking between his bottom teeth while he waited for her to respond.

“Get some sleep and win your game tomorrow. After that… maybe we can talk.” If that was what it took, then yes. A thousand times yes he would do both of those things. Anything to get her to talk to him, anything so he could hold her, feel her lips on his skin, taste her and feel her beneath him.

“Do you promise?” A schoolyard thing to say, but he couldn’t help it. The gift of hearing her voice again after an entire week of deafening silence was the most beautiful thing he could ever imagine hearing. If he could, he’d bottle it up and get drunk off it. It was better than any alcohol, any drug.

“I promise,” she replied, and Rowan swore he heard a hint of laughter weaving between each letter of those two, simple words. That couldn’t be right, though. Aelin was mad at him. They wouldn’t be laughing together anytime soon.

“Okay.” It felt stupid to say, but it was the only word he could find.

“Okay.” Aelin’s voice was still soft and told him nothing of the status of his forgiveness, or if he needed to beg on his knees and worship her as penance. He would never, ever stop if that was what she required. “Goodnight, Rowan.”

The line went dead before he could say anything else and a new zap of determination electrified his blood. If she wanted a win, she would get it. But he had to get sober first.

With a pained groan, he pulled himself upright. A few deep breaths later the room wasn’t spinning quite so quickly and he was able to stumble to the kitchen. The smell of coffee made his nose wrinkle when he opened the bag. It quickly filled the space of the kitchen as he dumped the beans into the grinder, wincing at the shriek it made. Coffee and bread would help sober him up, and then he would focus on fluid intake to not be a useless sack of meat on the field tomorrow.

He leaned against his counter, ignoring incoming messages from his teammates checking on him, and shoved half a piece of bread into his mouth. A cold shower would wake him up, and tons of water and painkillers before bed would help the hangover tomorrow.

Anything Aelin wanted, he would give her. Starting tomorrow night by defeating the Adarlan Wyverns and handing it to her on a silver platter.

When he finally drifted off to sleep, his phone screen was still illuminated in his palm: that final photo he’d taken of her at the bakery wearing a smile just for him.

~*~

As soon as she took one step into the Neon Moon, she found Connall looking over at her with a healthy dose of surprise in his eyes. Aelin moved through the crowd that had gathered to watch the game, managing to snag a single barstool in front of the beer tap.

“Water, please,” she half-shouted over the loud voices filling the room. As soon as it was in her hands she took a long drink before placing it down on a napkin in front of her. “Hi.”

“Hi yourself.” A crooked grin spread across his face and he leaned forward on his forearms. “Watching the game?”

“Against my better judgment,” she sighed, ruffling her fingers through her hair. Now that she knew that he played for Doranelle, she just couldn’t miss it. Had she known from the get-go, there wouldn’t have been a single game that she missed. Even if it meant she’d be catching up on work during the short commercial breaks. “How much do you know?”

“Oh just… everything.”

Aelin groaned and looked up at the ceiling. She wasn’t upset that he’d told his friends, his support system. Rowan needed that, just like she did. Though she had yet to tell her family, she was going to do it soon. Maybe tomorrow or the day after. Some of the dust had to settle with Rowan first.

Though she was content to let him stew for a few more days, the single like she’d gotten from an account called actuallywhitethorn made her pick up the phone. A result of her doom-scrolling before bed, the notification had dropped from the top of her screen. By the time she clicked her notification icon, that particular like from that specific account was gone. It was like fate, she decided, for her to have seen it in its brevity. If he was miserable and pining enough to accidentally like an instagram picture, it wouldn’t hurt to call him. So she did.

At first, she didn’t know what to say, but as he talked it became more and more clear that he was very drunk. All his words had melded into one long syllable, and the fact that he was likely drinking away his feelings and problems had tugged at her heart. He really was adorable when he was drunk, calling her baby and trying his hardest to apologize, begging her not to hang up the phone. As much as she really did want to talk to him, it wasn’t a conversation to have while he was only half-aware. The apology she deserved needed to come from his sober lips, not drunk, loose ones.

After they hung up, Aelin had decided she would go to the bar to watch the game. It didn’t seem like a feat she could conquer at home alone on her couch. Even with Lysandra a phone call away, it felt too big to do on her own. The bar made sense.

“Congratulations?” Connall offered, and it was the first time she’d really picked up on any shyness or hesitancy from the man.

“Thank you.” It was still so new, so foreign. The racing of her thoughts hadn’t died down about it yet, her emotions didn’t have a full grasp on the situation. “How is he?”

“I think you already know the answer to that.” Kind of. If his texts were any inclination to his mental state, he was having a rough go of things at the moment. “Feels like a piece of shite.”

“Yeah, well.” That was a little deserved after what he’d said to her. Connall didn’t seem to disagree, merely shrugging as he followed her eyes to the television.

The game had been on for fifteen minutes, and Doranelle had scored one point. Adarlan had nothing. It was a bit of a feat to score so early on in the game, showing just how skilled Rowan and his teammates were. A camera zoomed in on the players, a towering, dark-haired man with a glove tucked under his arm, using the bottom of his shirt to wipe his face. Aelin’s eyes widened and her head whipped toward Connall when the spitting image of him appeared on the screen. The only difference was the color of the curls: Connall’s were black, his brother’s golden.

“You have a twin?” By way of answer, Connall merely winked and nodded back at the TV where Rowan had come into view. His uniform for home games was navy blue with white letters. Hands braced on his hips, he joined his teammates where they talked. It was only when he turned around that she saw how horrible he looked.

Though his skin was golden brown as ever, his face was ashen. Dark circles clung beneath his eyes and his bottom lip was swollen and scabbed over. The sweat gathering at his temples didn’t do anything at all to make him look well, if anything he just looked sicker.

“Whitethorn looks a bit… peaky,” Connall said cautiously, the corners of his lips tugging downward into a scowl.

“As drunk as he was when I called him last night, that makes perfect sense.” She was frowning, too. The most put together part of him was his hair, the single french braid down the center until it all met in a mess of a bun on the top of his head.

As soon as the whistle blew, he inhaled and exhaled a deep breath. That was when the cameras zoomed back out to take in the entire field, all the players getting into position. Aelin watched closely, one eye on the ball and the other always aware of where Rowan was in the frame.

For a while, it was a lot of passing back and forth, working up and down the field, the ball getting stolen one way or the other. Once, Adarlan got close to scoring but the goalie for Doranelle was quick to block it and pass it back down the field. Another of Rowan’s teammates was quick to get it back toward the Adarlan goal. It was passed back and forth between a few as they worked further and further down the pitch until a pass from Connall’s twin had the ball being juggled between Rowan’s feet.

Watching Rowan play brought back the old feelings she felt watching Aedion. Her competitive temper rose in her chest as he sprinted downfield with the ball between his feet. Somehow, he never tripped or stumbled. When he passed it off to a dark-haired man, Vaughan, Connall told her, it was with tricky footwork that he made look easy. Seconds later and a single pass back toward him, Rowan lunged from behind a crimson jersey. By some grace of the gods he managed to land the perfect kick that arched beautifully through the air. Adarlan’s goalie missed it by a fingertip.

The bar became deafening– some of them rooting for Doranelle, others wanting them to lose for the sake of Varese’s team. On the TV, Rowan’s teammates pulled him off the ground and jostled him amongst them, Connall’s golden-haired brother smacking a kiss to Rowan’s sweaty forehead.

If Aelin didn’t know any better, she would say his teammates were being a little more gentle with him than they might be otherwise. Rowan’s jaw remained clenched tightly, that muscle feathering as he nodded to the only person on the team that was taller than him where he stood down the field.

“Who is their goalie?”

“Lorcan Salvaterre. Team captain and one of Rowan’s closest friends. My twin’s name is Fenrys.” Aelin nodded and rested her chin on her hands as the next play started, polished blue nails digging into her palms. She knew of most of these names from Aedion’s soccer days and the afternoons at her parents house where her father prattled on about different team rosters.

The minutes ticked by, Rowan fiercely focused on the game. That look of sheer determination never left his eyes, even in the brief moments of reprieve he had to gather his wits. Whenever he could, Connall hovered near her for the moral support she’d come in search of. It meant more to her than she could ever put into words. Being in a new city, far away from her support system, with no one else to lean on? It was really nice to know he was there. Even if they barely knew each other.

When Adarlan scored, Aelin had over half the pub groaned. The Doranelle players looked beyond pissed. Rowan and Lorcan shared matching expressions, both of their jaws grinding as they shook their heads before getting back into position.

It led them into more volleying back and forth, the ball little more than a blur between feet. And then it was back in Rowan’s possession. It was like the wind sang for him, pushing him faster as he bolted down the field. Almost as soon as he made his goal, the one that would get them a point ahead though, a whistle blew and a yellow-checkered flag was waving.

“Shit,” she murmured, closely eyeing the playback. It was a fair call, he had been offside. When the camera showed Rowan again though, he was pointed at the goal, mouth wrapping around words that looked a lot like fucking bullshit. The words weren’t more than a whisper as she said, “Rowan, you stupid idiot.”

Connall chuckled, despite the dire situation at hand. She knew he was only laughing at her, not his friend’s situation. Still, she wadded up a napkin and threw it at his head. It nailed him in the temple.

“It’s not funny,” she hissed, nibbling on the end of her straw, a sick feeling roiling in her gut.

The referee pulled a yellow card brandishing it in front of his face. A spark of anger flickered behind his eyes, mouth opening to spew something else when Fenrys grabbed him by the shoulders and made him turn away. Aelin exhaled a tight breath as Rowan shook his head on screen. Fenrys said something in Rowan’s ear and he nodded, lips thin in a stiff line.. It was enough to make him nod and hustle to his spot on the field, shaking his arms out when he came to a stop.

Beneath the bar, Aelin’s legs were bouncing. Butterflies flitted their way through her insides enough that she braced her hands against her stomach as though it would calm them. It was impossible to look away as Adarlan took their free kick from the offside, launching the ball halfway down the field and into another frustrating back and forth between the two teams.

This was always the part of the sport that Aelin hated. No, perhaps hated was too strong of a word. The build up always made her feel nauseous, waiting for one team to make one quick move to kick everyone into high gear to avoid a goal or make one. Being pregnant, it was worse. It felt as though her stomach was in the back of her throat.

Just before the end of the second half, disaster struck. Aelin saw it coming. She was pretty sure everyone watching at home or in the stands did, too. Connall swore filthily as Rowan ran for the ball and dove feet first to knock it away from Adarlan. Except in the process, his cleats clashed into the other player’s feet and they both went down in a heap on the field.

“What the fuck did you say to him?” Connall asked over his shoulder, never taking his eyes off the screen as a ref jogged across the pitch.

“I told him to win and maybe we would talk! I didn’t tell him to–” A yellow card appeared in the ref’s hand, followed by a red one and Aelin lost all of her words. Both were for Rowan.

“I think he took that a little too do or die.” And so it seemed he had.

Distantly, she heard the announcer saying it was the first time he’d ever been red carded in his entire career. The patron’s of the bar murmured amongst themselves, many of them asking what the hell was wrong with Whitethorn tonight.

The cameras zoomed in to where he walked off the field, sweat trickling down his face. Their coach followed him to the end of the field, the words he muttered only for Rowan to hear. Though he looked ready to hit anyone that was close enough, Rowan simply nodded. Fenrys caught his arm just before he walked off, mouth moving too quickly for Aelin to decipher.

The last clear shot of him was walking into the tunnel and off the pitch, body rigid and muscles rippling while he pulled his jersey off his body.

“I… I need to go,” Aelin said to Connall, who only nodded in response. She threw a few bills on the counter as a thank you and pushed her way out of the pub, walking as fast as her feet would carry her to her rental car down the street.

~*~

Even though his team had another win under their belt by the time the game was over, it had been a fucking disaster. Rowan watched the second half on his phone from the comfort of his car after getting kicked out.

It was the first time in his eleven year career he’d ever received two yellow cards, and consequently a red card, and been ejected from a game. All that anger and frustration from the week, from his hangover, had boiled to a head and exploded on the field. Next week he would have to sit out, too.

Failing his teammates didn’t sit right with him. Lorcan was probably fuming and Rowan anticipated a less than friendly visit from him tomorrow. Coach Malakai was mad, too. The last thing he told Rowan was to get his shit together before practice on Monday. Only Fenrys, who never missed a chance to be a jokester about anything, had murmured words of encouragement before he left the field.

By the time he pulled into his driveway, he was exhausted. His entire body ached from that last dive. There would definitely be bruises on his hips and thighs tomorrow from the way Ress Taylor landed on top of him. All he wanted to do was let his muscles thaw under a shower so hot it burned. A glass of whiskey would be great, too. Not that he deserved it after his performance on the pitch.

The game was… rough.The entire day was rough. From the time he’d woken up his mood had been in the pits of hell. Drunk Rowan hadn’t been able to piece together what Aelin said just before they hung up, but sober Rowan did as soon as his alarm sounded.

Win your game tomorrow.

Not win the game, like she used to say when she thought he was the coach. She didn’t ask him to wish the boys good luck like she had in the weeks prior. The words had changed. Win your game. The game he would be playing in, that belonged to him. She had given him a personal goal and though he helped his team achieve it, he still felt like he failed. Especially since he would have to sit out next week, too, because of the red card.

It had been stupid of him to think she wouldn’t find out the truth before he had the chance to tell her. Everything had just gone to such absolute shit before he had the chance. Rowan Whitethorn would be groveling at the feet of Aelin Galathynius for the duration of his life, and then some more after he crossed into whatever afterworld awaited him.

The news of his career was just another lie he had to make right. All day it sat with him, festering like an open wound. It wasn’t that he suddenly felt bitter about his job. He didn’t. Rowan loved what he did, he loved the sport. It was his greatest passion and love in life. But Aelin deserved to hear about it from him. Not knowing how she found out only made it worse, until everything he felt was bleeding out into the astroturf beneath his feet and getting him thrown out of a game.

Upon pulling into his driveway, something white in front of his house caught his eye. His heart came to a stop as soon as his car did. Rowan didn’t even bother to pull into his garage, just parked beside the white SUV and stared at his porch. It felt like a fever dream, getting home from a hard game and seeing Aelin on his porch swing. The wind slowly moved her back and forth, but when she saw him step out of the car she stood, hands sliding into her back pockets.

“I told you to win, not get a red card before the second half was up.” The lilting tone of her voice made his knees buckle. It forced him to gather himself before approaching, slowly walking up the stairs until he stood one below her.

“My mouth keeps getting me in trouble this week, it seems,” he said back, mouth completely dry. It was an effort to make his tongue form the words with his lips. “But it got you to my house, so I suppose there are worse things that could have happened.”

“Few things are worse than a red card.”

“Not talking to you might beat out all of them,” he said smoothly, fingers sliding along each of his keys until he found the one for his front door. He held it up between two fingers and Aelin nodded, stepping to the side and gesturing toward the door.

She wore simple leggings and an oversized t-shirt, a pair of socks and slides on her feet. Though she wore no makeup and her hair was twisted half-hazardly onto the top of her head, she had never looked so beautiful. Lorcan would laugh himself hoarse if he heard the thoughts Rowan had about this woman, yet he didn’t care. Even in her most dressed down and casual state, she was breathtaking.

He led her inside, locking the door behind them. It was late enough he assumed she would be staying for a while. Few people made a nearly two hour drive to turn around and leave upon arrival. Then again, he hadn’t seen last weekend going that way, either, and it’s exactly how that night ended.

“You played…”

“Shittily,” he offered, hanging his keys on a small hook by the front door.

“Brutally,” Aelin amended, slipping off her shoes and heading to the kitchen. Rowan watched as she grabbed two bottles of water from the fridge and handed one off to him before heading for the couch. “Have you eaten?”

“No. Have you?”

“Not since lunch.” Phone in hand, she curled up in the corner and pulled a blanket over her lap. “I doubt we have any notable options, but Taco Bell is open and is shockingly one of the few things not making me sick at the moment.”

Rowan watched her from where he stood in the center of the room. It didn’t feel real. None of today did, really. It could be the hangover talking, but the day felt like a horrible dream. He was scared to move, scared that if he sat on the couch with her that she would vanish into nothing and he would wake up alone in his bed.

“Are you going to just stand there all night?” Her eyes didn’t leave her phone while presumably selecting everything she wanted to eat, eyes narrowing at the screen briefly in thought. A moment later she held it out for him. Rowan stared at her, heart thundering away in his chest. “Rowan.”

“Right. Thank you,” he murmured, taking the phone and trying not to acknowledge the rush he felt when his fingertips grazed her palm. Not big on fast food most of the time, it took him a little longer to pick his dinner. “What do I owe you?”

Aelin just snorted as she submitted the order, eyes rolling slightly before placing her phone face down on the couch next to her, head tilting as she said, “Come to think of it, maybe you do. I think your twenty dollar fast food order might do me in completely. I’ll have to take out a loan.”

“I can Venmo it,” Rowan said dumbly, reaching for the phone in his back pocket.

“I don’t need your money any more than you need mine.” Once there might have been a teasing edge to her voice. Her delivery was much drier than he was used to from her. But there it was. That stupid thing he’d said before he could stop himself, the words that brought everything they were building crashing down.

“Sit,” she told him, patting the cushion next to her. Rowan was careful to leave plenty of space between them. There were definitely lines and boundaries now. The risk of getting ensnared in one was too great and he had a lot of apologies to make. With his arms elbows braced on his knees and hands clasped loosely between them, he stared at the floor.

“You’re actually getting a pretty sweet deal.” Aelin sighed, shifting so she was facing him full on. His green eyes didn’t leave the rug. “According to google my net worth is two-and-a-half times what yours is. Isn’t that crazy?”

“I didn’t know,” he finally said. As much as he wanted to look at her, he couldn’t. He was a fucking coward. Guilt was a disgusting, oily thing crawling beneath his skin. It threatened to consume him whole even worse now that he was talking to her than it had the rest of the week.

Aelin sighed again, finally pulling his attention to her face. She laid her head back against the sofa and a few tendrils of hair fell down to frame her face. Rowan’s fingers curled into fists to fight the urge to sweep them behind her ear. She must have sensed it because she did it herself. The blue of her fingernails was the same blue as his jersey. Part of him wondered if it had been on purpose.

“I think tonight we can call a truce.” Aelin seemed to notice his gaze on her fingers because she folded her arms over her chest, curling her hands so her blue nails were hidden. “We’ll eat, sleep, and then tomorrow… Tomorrow we’ll talk.”

“Okay,” he agreed. The word was falling off his tongue as soon as she finished speaking. Her cheeks seemed to twitch with amusement, and if he had reacted differently last week she would probably be smiling.

“I am curious, though. Did you make an instagram for the sole purpose of stalking me?”

Rowan cringed. His eyes squeezed shut, lips rolling between his teeth as he looked away. Beside him it sounded like Aelin laughing, though it was little more than puffs of air coming out of her nose. It would have been easy to go on the defensive, to add one more lie to their crumpled house of cards. Instead, he went with the truth.

“I missed you. I just wanted to see your face.” He looked back over at her then, but it was she who looked away now. Her eyes were glassy, the dim lighting making the unshed tears in her eyes sparkle. “Shit. I’m sorry.”

“It’s these fucking hormones.” She dismissed him with a wave of her hand when he started to reach for her. It stung more than he would ever let on, but he retreated and dropped his hand into his lap while she used the collar of her shirt to dry her eyes.

It was silent after that, the two of them alternating from staring at nothing to sneaking glances at the other. Rowan only knew because he caught her staring at him more than once when he thought he could take a second to drink her in. It was only when the doorbell finally rang and he stood that she said his name, stopping him when he was halfway to the front door. Turning to look at her, eyebrows raised in question, he watched her lick her lips.

“I missed you, too.” It was barely a whisper, spoken so softly he might have dreamed it if he was any more tired.

Still, it was enough to get him through the rest of their silent night. Enough that it didn’t hurt as much as he thought it would when he insisted she sleep in his bed without him. Enough to chase him with sweet dreams when he finally slipped into the guest room down the hall and tumbled into a deep sleep.

@elentiyawhitethorn @autumnbabylon @fancysludgeshoelamp @wordsafterhours @live-the-fangirl-life @the-hospitality-of-knives @tangledraysofsunshine @readandlisten @westofmoon @rowanaelinn @morganofthewildfire @writtenonreceipts @feynightlight @emster1622-blog @scarblx @thefaetrove @loveyatopluto @actuallybarb @peppermint-fae @the-devils-own @scottmcgivemeacall @livingmylifeforme @wordsafterhours @foreverfallingforthestars @llyncooljones @emily-gsh @loosesimplicity @emilyrose111294 @charlizeed @aelinchocolatelover @cretaceous-therapod @sayosdreams @fireheart-violet @the-regal-warrior @backtobl4ck @shyvioletcat @mariamuses

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highqueenofelfhame · 1 year

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a/n: okay so chapter three of this might be up before ten of ciwyw simply because i'm excited about it and it's already like halfway done. i'm sorry if this is disappointing news BUT i promise it's a really really good chapter with delicious content. love u, thank you for reading <3

rowaelin // 5.6k words // skoh masterlist // masterlist

“I wish I could tell you guys about this bullshit, but it’s fucking classified,” Aelin hissed into the cell phone she had sandwiched between her ear and shoulder. To their credit, Elide and Lysandra tried to disguise their laughter on the other end, but it came back muffled all the same. The two were drunk on a beach somewhere in Ellywe, and it showed.

Everyone knew that Aelin joining the Cadre would be a disaster one way or another. When the idea was proposed to her, she turned it down. Three different times. The bad blood with Rowan flowed so deep that she didn’t care about an increase in pay or the less boring missions that came along with it. Truthfully, she would rather be lost in the Staghorns somewhere with Aedion’s unit or back in the desert with the one that showed up to take over for the Cadre.

Yet when Darrow approached her with the idea a fourth time, stressing how much they needed an extra person, she caved. The claims that she was the only person fit for the job had gone to her head a little bit, and it was biting her in the ass. He had even brought in her Uncle Gavriel to talk to her about going. The bastard knew that it would sway her, and it had worked. Now that this mission required them to be married, she was pretty sure it had been in the works for a little longer than they knew, and convincing Aelin to join them was the final piece of the puzzle.

Currently, she was quickly washing her hands in a bathroom at the Rifthold International Airport. The flight had been sixteen hours, and she was desperate for a bath that didn’t require body wipes to make her smell decent. The boys were probably waiting for her, but she didn’t care. Rare was it that she could use her personal phone to call her friends, and godsdammit, she was going to take advantage.

“Is he still an ass?” Lysandra asked as Aelin ripped a few paper towels from the dispenser to dry her hands.

“Of course he is. He has the nerve to act like he’s the one that was scorned! As if I didn’t fight tooth and nail for our relationship to work until the physical and emotional distance was too much to deal with.” She huffed as she poked her bags with her boot, fingers pulling her braid over her shoulder just to have something to do with her hands.

“I mean, you have to come to some sort of truce to make it work,” Elide piped in, crunching sounds filling the space between words while she snacked.

“I know. Gods, I know. It’s just harder than I thought it would be.” Aelin sighed, her chest decompressing as several women scurried into and out of stalls around her. “I should go.”

“Where are you, anyway?” Lys asked.

“I can’t say, but I can allude that I’m closer to home.”

“Can you get a normal job? You coming on vacations would be fun.” Elide’s sad-drunk tendencies were starting to peek through, making Aelin smile.

“If Rowan doesn’t kill me first, I might end my active-duty career as soon as possible after this shit is done.” It was only half a joke. Being this close to Rowan was already far more taxing than she imagined. If anything, she thought they might ignore each other and carry on with their jobs like responsible adults. Sure, she knew her old wounds were tender at best, but the explosive tension was slightly unexpected.

The three muttered their goodbyes as she hefted her bags onto her shoulders and filed out of the bathroom, immediately spotting Lorcan and Rowan’s heads towering over everyone else near the exit to baggage claim. Aelin forced her shoulders back and stood straight as she could.

Approaching Rowan was a battle of its own sort. She had to be ready for a fight constantly. There was just no way of telling if she was walking straight into the line of fire or not.

~*~

The house they would be living in was beautiful. It was a large estate sitting on the cleaner side of the Avery River, nestled back in a little grove of oak trees. A large iron gate kept any outsiders from easily getting onto the property, but it was so far off any main road that they didn’t anticipate trespassers being much of a problem.

Not that it really mattered– every inch of the land surrounding the house was under twenty-four-seven surveillance that they could watch from inside. The day before, a tech team had come in to set up all the equipment they would need for quick and secure communication with their superiors. Though the equipment they used was always the best the Terrasen government had to offer, it was always a little more fun to use when stationed in a big city.

Though the house had six bedrooms, they quickly learned during the initial walk-through that three were being used for mission-related activities. One room comprised a large desk and about a dozen monitors for surveillance; another had enough desk space for all six of them with room to spare, and the third was primarily for communication. It was filled with phones and computers connected to a highly secure network that, in theory, was breach-proof.

That left three rooms for the six of them to divvy into, and Aelin tried to cut the corners of arguing with who was sleeping where by quickly voicing her own option.

“I’ll room with Fenrys. Lorcan and Rowan can share and–”

“No.” Rowan’s response was immediate and flat. A single eyebrow quirked up as she slowly pivoted on one heel to look at him. His eyes, however, were on Fenrys. It had been years, and apparently, their casual affection was still grating on his nerves like soft cheese.

“No?” She questioned, arms folding over her chest. Rowan slid his gaze to her face as the others took a few casual steps away as if they would rather be anywhere but in the middle of their divorced parent’s fight.

“No.” The word was harder, more final this time.

“Fine, you and me then?” She threw a hand in the air for sarcastic flair and laughed sardonically. Surely he would drop his weapons and retreat with arms raised, but he didn’t. It surprised everyone in the room, herself more than the rest.

“Fine.” Shock washed over her in a static wave, running across her body like an electrical current. Everything buzzed from her fingers to her toes as he told no one in particular, “We get the master.”

Nobody was going to disagree with his claim. The two of them needed as much space between them as possible. With all the tension and white-hot energy, they could hardly share a room for meetings, much less a bed. Mala must have boiled his brain to sludge during their stay in the desert. He clearly wasn’t thinking things through.

She was further surprised when he yanked both their bags off the floor where they’d dumped them upon entry and headed toward the north wing of the house. Aelin glanced at Lorcan, hoping he would have something to say on the matter, but he shrugged and grabbed his own bags, shouting that Vaughan was with him as he did. Fenrys, at least, looked as confused as she felt.

“Have fun with… whatever the fuck that was,” Connall told her, the three remaining men collecting their bags from the floor.

“You really put your foot in your mouth this time, didn’t you, babe?” Fen drawled, ruffling her hair and following his brother.

“You’re all traitors!” She called as they dispersed, leaving her to begrudgingly march toward the room Rowan had claimed for them. Their low chuckles followed her down the hall, and she was pretty fucking sure she even heard Lorcan laughing with them.

When she reached the master bedroom, she was pleasantly surprised at the size of it. A king-size bed was centered against one wall, each side with its own lamps and nightstands. The large bay window on the right side had a bench perfect for reading in if she ever found herself with downtime. There were two doors to the left of the bed. One led to a large bathroom with a shower and a huge bathtub that she would most definitely be soaking in soon. The other was a walk-in closet that rivaled the one she had at home.

It was also where she found Rowan.

Each side of the closet had plenty of drawers and space for hanging clothes and a dozen or so cubbies scattered about. Rowan stood to one side, unpacking his clothes and placing them into drawers. She pretended she didn’t notice that he had chosen the left side– the same as when they lived together.

Aelin followed suit, kneeling on the floor by her bag and dividing things amongst her drawers. Since they were in need of civilian attire for the mission, she would be going out to purchase new things sometime tomorrow before the real work began. For now, she just wanted a shower and a nap.

Rowan had slipped out moments before she was finished. Once satisfied with her portion of the closet, she entered the bedroom to find him peering through the curtains, eyes scanning the backyard. He didn’t seem to notice her, or if he did, he chose to say nothing. Taking a deep breath, she wrapped her arms around her body and steeled herself for another fight.

“Is it okay if I shower first?”

“Yep.” His fingers released the curtain, and it slipped shut, the sheer fabric not doing much to shield them from the outside world. Aelin made a mental note to get some blackout curtains tomorrow, both for safety and to keep the early morning sun out when she had the luxury of sleeping past five am.

“Are you sure?” For once, she wasn’t pushing to get on his nerves. If he wanted the bathroom to himself first, she would allow it if it meant no verbal sparring.

“I already said yes, Aelin.” The edge of his words was sharp and short as a brand-new dagger. So much for not fighting.

“You don’t get to do this.” She blurted, fingers gripping her shirt tightly.

“I don’t get to do what, exactly?” Rowan looked at her then, eyebrows slightly raised and shoulders tense. At his sides, his hands were rolling up into fists.

“Be pissy about our sleeping arrangements when you’re the one that booted out my perfectly good option.”

“You were doing it to fuck with me, and I’m not giving you the satisfaction,” he said calmly, taking up a casual fighting stance: feet shoulder-width apart, arms folded over his chest, muscles coiled and ready to strike.

“I was doing it because I highly doubt the other three would want to catch me in any state of undress accidentally, and only me and Connall can handle Fenrys full time,” she shot back. Her fingernails dug into the skin beneath her shirt like they would sew her up if she fell apart. The tendons in Rowan’s neck were visible, hard lines. If she were closer, she would probably be able to see his pulse pounding against his skin. “I don’t know why you think I’m just here to fuck up your life. I didn’t even want this job to begin with.”

Hating that she was the first to retreat, she walked to the closet to gather what she would need for her shower. Footsteps followed her, stopping in the doorway as Rowan asked, “What is that supposed to mean?”

“Which part?” Aelin plucked a pair of boring cotton underwear from the drawer.

“That you didn’t want this job.” Selecting a pair of shorts and a t-shirt, she turned to face him with her facial expression calling him ten kinds of stupid.

“It means that I didn’t want this fucking job.” Maybe she drew out every word a little more slowly on purpose to needle beneath his skin. The feathering of his jaw said it worked.

“I understood that part.” He sounded frustrated, his fingernails white where they pressed into his biceps. “You didn’t ask for the transfer?”

“I turned it down three times. In the last few weeks, Darrow was up my ass about it. Even had Uncle Gav try to convince me, so I caved. Did you think I asked for this to come rain a special kind of hell down on your head?”

“I wouldn’t put past you,” he retorted, and something in her broke. Just a little bit.

“Contrary to whatever bullshit you’ve made up about me to craft me into your villain, I was perfectly content to never see you again. I don’t want to work with you, I don’t want to share a single molecule of oxygen with you, and I don’t want to constantly be ready to fight with you at the drop of a hat. This isn’t what I wanted for my career or my personal life. I’m here because I took an oath to protect my country, and despite my multiple refusals, they wanted me here with this unit.” Aelin shoved past him, her shoulder ramming into his arms as she did. “Do us both a favor and get over yourself, Rowan. This self-centered bullshit is exactly why I fucking left you.”

Though she hadn’t meant to be quite so dramatic, the bathroom door slammed in his face when she closed it. The sickly feeling of guilt washed over her at the look on his face. That last hateful sentence wasn’t even supposed to be said out loud. Did she even mean it?

Aelin didn’t realize she was holding her breath until she finally heard his footsteps retreat from the room and a heavy exhale whooshed from her lungs.

~*~

“Aelin, I–” His hands reached for her, but she smacked them away hard enough that it stung his palms.

“No, no, no. I told you a thousand times if you took another deployment, I was done. And there is just no–” Aelin let out a gasping sob, one hand on her heart and the other wrapped around her torso. Unable to stop himself, he tried to pull her to him. If he could just calm her down, it would be okay.

Before his fingers could even graze her skin, she stumbled backward. A gust of wind had rain blowing at him from behind. He wasn’t sure if his face was wet with tears from his eyes or the sky.

“Baby–” The back of Aelin’s wrist pressed to her mouth and did nothing to muffle the sob. Knowing he was the source of her pain had him wishing for a lightning strike.

“There is no coming back from this.” The words were almost carried away in the storm. Not once had he ever heard her speak so softly, so broken. Tears streamed down her cheeks and neck, soaking the collar of her t-shirt while she shook her head and pointed for him to leave with a shaky finger. Her other hand was still pushing her heart back into her chest. “There is no coming back.”

The front door slammed in his face and triggered a final fissure in his heart that had his heart and soul shattering into a million jagged pieces on the rain-soaked ground.

A firm hand on his shoulder made him jerk forward, twisting on his heel. A soldier through and through, he started to go on the defensive. Just as he reached for his attacker, he realized it was Lorcan and dropped his hands, shaking his head to clear his mind of the memory.

Lorcan’s eyebrows knit together in confusion as he said, “I said your name twice.”

“Sorry. What’s up?” Rowan hadn’t meant to be so wrapped up in his thoughts as he stood on the back porch. A mirror image of the gloomy gray sky reflected on the surface of the swimming pool. The sound of the door slamming in his face still echoed in his ears, but he didn’t know if it was the past or present that haunted him. Probably both.

“I want to go over what needs to be done this week,” Lorcan told him, nodding toward the house. Through the windows, he could see everyone lounging on the couches and chairs that made up the formal living room. Each of them held a folder; Aelin’s was in her lap, where she curled up in the corner of the couch. Deft fingers twined her damp hair into a braid over her shoulder. Lorcan’s eyes followed his gaze as he braced his hands on his hips. “Do you need to talk about it before we go in?”

“I don’t know what there is to say.”

“Look, I am by no means any sort of authority on relationships, but the fact that you two can barely be in the same room without starting a fight shows how deep it all goes. You sure as fuck aren’t over it–” Lorcan gave him a stern look when he opened his mouth to object, then continued, “And neither is she. You can both act like you don’t care, but you do. At some point, an olive branch needs to be extended one way or the other. Otherwise, it will stack up to messy mistakes in the field and you’ll both drag everyone else down with you. I can’t allow that. So find a truce. Wave your white flag if you fucking have to. Talk about it. Fuck it out. I don’t care. But don’t let it compromise the job.”

Rowan nodded, hands sliding into his pockets as he took a deep breath. All of those things were easier said than done. If they were ever going to talk it out, they would both have to come to some peace with the past and present. Right now, he wasn’t sure how to do that. His behavior had clearly torn into her with a jagged blade, the same way her leaving him did. Both had raw, gaping wounds that were still bloody from the battle. The time apart had done nothing to heal either of them. If anything, it made it worse.

There wasn’t ever supposed to be so much distance, time, or emotion stretched between them, to begin with. Rowan could strut around like he didn’t care all he wanted to, but he did care. Looking at her made it hard to breathe.

“Did you ever, at any point in your relationship, tell her about what happened to Lyria?” Lorcan asked, just as Rowan took a step toward the house. His teeth snapped together so hard that it hurt, narrowly missing a bite of his tongue. “Maybe start there.”

“I don’t think it would matter at this point.”

“Not that I don’t think she’s a swaggering asshole ninety-nine percent of the time or anything–” Rowan snorted, looking back at Aelin through the window. She was looking back. “– But she isn’t a bitch. Not all the time, anyway.”

Part of him wanted to throttle Lorcan for talking about her that way, but their personalities had always been mixing oil and water. Even still, Lorcan would never hold his personal relationship against her. She was far too good of an asset.

“Can I ask something of you?” Rowan inquired, restlessly scratching the back of his neck. His eyes didn’t leave Aelin’s, and she tilted her head curiously. Almost as if, despite their fight, she was trying to inquire if he was okay.

“Of course.” Rowan sidestepped out of view, not wanting her to read his lips as he looked at his commander. Lorcan leaned against the table that decorated the patio, an open and caring demeanor slipping into place.

“If anything on this mission goes sideways, if it ever comes down to a split second when it has to be her or me… I don’t care if it’s a temporary thing where you come back for me later or we’re both bleeding out somewhere, whatever the situation is. If shit goes down and it’s her or me, you take her.” Green eyes bore fiercely into onyx ones. Lorcan’s eyes widened in surprise and something that looked a little like fear.

“Rowan…” He wasn’t one to leave a man behind, but Rowan knew all too well that sometimes it became a necessary call to make. When forced with a split-second decision about who lived or died, the luxury of time to juggle your choices didn’t always exist. This oath would take the struggle out of it.

“Promise me that you will get her out first.” He hated the way his voice cracked like the fissures in his heart. Hated that he was prepared to fall to his knees and beg if it might save her life at any point in the future. Yet he knew that he would if Lorcan refused. The bad terms he and Aelin were on didn’t matter. Rowan would never forgive himself or his comrades if he woke up and something had happened to her. “Promise me, Lorcan.”

He wished he could tell himself it was for selfish reasons. That he was asking to clear his conscience should it ever become a reality. Deep down, he knew it had nothing to do with that, though. It had nothing to do with guilt and everything to do with her and the wildfire of unresolved feelings that haunted his waking and sleeping hours.

Rowan tried to get over her. Attempting to lose himself through sex with other women had been a fruitless endeavor. No amount of boiling showers had made him feel clean, like any level of intimacy with someone that wasn’t Aelin left behind an oily residue he couldn’t wash away. After the third time, he quit trying. It felt too much like cheating on her, like betraying her, even if she had been the one to leave him.

He had followed her career over the last two and a half years. Though she had passed on another deployment when she thought he would too, months after the breakup, he heard she was back in it. Lorcan had passed him details of her missions, and Rowan had a mental list of every injury she had ever received. Nothing had been remotely close to life-threatening, but he felt every one of those wounds like they’d happened to him. It had been difficult not to follow up with her directly to see if she was okay, but she was better off without him. Of that, he was certain.

Being part of the same unit, he would do whatever he could to protect her. It hadn’t surprised Lorcan when Rowan declared he would always choose her first the morning she arrived. The commander made him swear that it wouldn’t compromise any missions, and it wouldn’t. But for Rowan, if the choice were anyone else or Aelin, he would save Aelin first. Now he needed to be sure someone else would choose her over him.

“Okay. I promise,” Lorcan finally swore, his eyes saying that he hoped for all the world it never came down to it.

When they made their way inside, there were two seats available. One was smack dab between Aelin and Fenrys; the other was an overstuffed chair near the window. Rowan knew for a fact that the two blondes had been sitting side by side moments earlier and knew that one or both of them had done this on purpose. They lived in a constant state of scheming and had been driving Rowan insane from the moment their friendship began.

Lorcan hijacked the chair, which left Rowan to drop onto the sofa between Bonnie and Clyde. He swore the commander was fighting off his smirk while settling into the chair away from the drama. Bastards. All of them were bastards. It was starting to feel like everyone had been part of a private meeting on the best ways to drive Rowan insane with Aelin around.

“Here,” Aelin said softly, nudging his arm with a folder. Nodding his thanks, he flipped it open and began skimming the pages while Lorcan got into what the next few days would look like. Every breath he took was more shallow than it needed to be, but he would lose his mind if he inhaled deep enough to smell her jasmine shampoo.

He tried to focus on Lorcan’s words, but sitting beside Aelin was a distraction in itself. The promise their commander had just made soothed a small part of his chest, even if he thought she would throttle him if she ever found out about it. The woman beside him was more than capable of taking care of herself, yes, but Rowan needed that security blanket to fall back on if things went to hell.

Aelin nudged him with her elbow, and he blinked, looking into her quizzical gaze. It was strange to find a hint of concern hidden behind the brilliant band of gold around her iris. With a shake of his head, he looked at the folder in his lap and tuned his ears to Lorcan’s voice. Right. Now was definitely not the time to think about this.

They would start by surveilling the notorious Glass Castle. It was imperative they find out how easily the outside guards could be distracted and bribed. While they had inside contacts close to the prince working with them under extremely delicate conditions, they needed to see if anyone was willing to waver. Finding the weak links could lead to it all being over before an assassination attempt began.

The Prince’s closest and really only friend was his captain of the guard. Through their contacts, he agreed to work with them on the castle’s blueprints and help them however he could. If everything went smoothly, nobody would die, lose their jobs, or be accused of treason, and in the process, their president would be safe from the fallout.

“We need to take passport photos in the morning, and someone is coming by tomorrow afternoon to stage some pictures of our Duke and Duchess over here.” Rowan and Aelin’s heads both snapped up at neck-breaking speed.

“What?” Rowan said, eyes darting to Aelin. There was no way in hell she would be okay with this.

“All of the royals in Fenharrow have websites,” she answered for Lorcan. “Do I get to wear a pretty gown?”

“You’ll wear whatever shows up, and you won’t give anybody any shit about it,” was the commander’s flat response. Aelin’s smoldering gaze told him she would do as she pleased, but her eyes wandered back down to the pages in her lap. If the wardrobe weren’t to her taste, they would surely hear about it no matter what Lorcan said.

“Box dye is going to absolutely ruin our hair.” Rowan didn’t know anything about that. According to his passport, he had blonde hair and brown eyes. Curiosity got the better of him, and he leaned a little toward Aelin to see what hers said. With a flick of her wrist, it was turned toward him so he could see better. Red hair, green eyes. Rowan had a hard time imagining it.

“Are you going to complain the whole time?” Lorcan snapped. Aelin, to her credit, grinned.

“Maybe. It’s fun getting under everyone’s skin so easily.”

It felt like a jab with one of the daggers she favored. A quick stab into his back, the twist of the blade as it sunk deeper. Rowan sat up straight and tried to keep from crumpling the papers in his hands.

It might not be an outright bloody war, but every vaguely altruistic word that left her mouth made him tenser than any gunfight ever did.

~*~

A book lay open upon the pillow in her lap, eyes skimming the pages when Rowan soundlessly opened the door and slipped into their room. He was clearly hoping she would be asleep when he came to bed to avoid any awkward interactions or heated arguments. Aelin was too tired for anything beyond a few pulled punches tonight and closed her book. The t-shirt he wore was pulled over his head in a single, fluid motion, and he slipped between the sheets. After placing her nightly read on the bedside table, she snuggled under the blankets. Rowan was on his back staring at the fan when she turned her light off. Aelin lay on her side, facing him straight on.

“This is… weird,” he admitted as the air deflated from his lungs in a deep sigh.

“Sleeping together or, however fake it may be, being married to me when you never wanted it in the first place?” Aelin wasn’t sure why flames kept spewing out of her mouth every time they spoke. Closure was what she was after, yet she knew it wouldn’t come this way. It was more of a defense mechanism than anything else.

“We aren’t doing this tonight, Aelin. I’m tired.” Rowan rolled onto his side, facing away from her, hand smacking at his pillow before he settled against it.

Through the dim moonlight slipping through those sheer curtains, she could make out the scars on his back. Some she knew, others she didn’t. Without thinking, she reached out and touched one she didn’t recognize. Rowan’s inhale was sharp, shoulders expanding and muscles tightening beneath her fingers. As tense as he was, his body betrayed him in the form of goose flesh over his skin.

“Rowan?” Aelin must have been imagining his jagged breaths. It sounded too much like shredding self-control to be real.

“Yeah?”

“I’m sorry. For today, I’m sorry.” Doused in a burning tension, she traced her fingers over another pale scar on his back. Tears pricked her eyes over the featherlight touches she made, at the emotion that welled up in her throat. This sort of casual intimacy used to be second nature. Aelin hated that her fingers craved to touch more of him, all of him. They never thought about touching before; they just always were. It had once been necessary, vital even. Now he was a coiled asp ready to strike, waiting for the fighting words she couldn’t find.

“Okay,” he finally whispered back on an exhale.

“I didn’t mean to slam the door, either. I know you won’t believe me, but I–”

“I do believe you.” Her throat was suddenly tight as she swallowed, dropping her hand from his back. Sometime soon, she would ask how he got those new markings. Maybe Fenrys would have the answers if her cowardice won over and she couldn’t ask him herself.

“Okay,” she parroted, the word muffled by the blanket as she pulled it up and tucked her face into it.

Seconds stretched into minutes before he rolled onto his back, head turning to face her. With her eyes more adjusted to the dark, she could tell he was looking at her. They didn’t say anything, just took each other in. It was the first quiet moment they’d shared since her arrival. Somehow, the heaviness of this moment was far more abundant than the times they were yelling.

“Were you talking about me when you said it’s fun to get under our skin?”

“I’ve always liked getting under your skin,” she teased, but he didn’t smile. Aelin’s own faltered, mouth twisted to the side as she considered it. Yes, she had. “It is fun but… I didn’t mean it quite how it sounded. I haven’t been picking fights with you the last few days for shits and giggles. I’m sure you aren’t doing it for that reason either.”

It’s what she wanted to believe, anyway. Perhaps it made her naive, but she knew Rowan. Even if they hated each other, they didn’t like causing the other unnecessary pain.

“Why are we fighting then?” The bald vulnerability he gave had her mouth parting in surprise. Of all the ways she saw this first night going, a calm discussion was nowhere on the list. Murder definitely was, but this?

“I don’t think we know how to be around each other like this,” she said slowly. “We had moments of bickering when we first met, sure, but…”

The words she wanted to say would strip her a little more bare than she wanted to be, yet she wasn’t ready to let the moment go. Rowan saw her hesitation and waited patiently, eyes scanning her face as though he could sneak into her mind and steal the thoughts for himself. Tomorrow the fires would rage again but for tonight? Tonight she would settle close to the truth without laying it all at his feet.

“But?” Aelin sighed and shook her head.

“We’ve always been intense,” she shrugged a shoulder. “Now that we aren’t in love, I guess it’s just going to be in the form of verbal sparring and screaming matches. Maybe a few physical blows during training.”

Aelin averted her eyes, slipping her fingers out from beneath the blanket to inspect her nails. It probably looked as stupid as it felt, considering she could hardly see, but Rowan didn’t call her on it. Nor did he point out how unlike her it was to balk from a conversation, yet here she was, being a coward and avoiding his gaze. It was a half-truth wrapped up in a teasing taunt at best and clearly not the answer he sought.

It wasn’t fair that he still had her tied up in so many knots. For years she paraded around, pretending she was over it and it didn’t matter anymore. Not being in love with Rowan was one of the biggest lies she’d ever told, one she whispered to herself every time she found him looking at her. It was a foolish, stupid mask she wore to hide the pain of the ugly, bleeding truth of everything.

Rowan handled it better than she did, and it hurt more than she would ever admit.

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highqueenofelfhame · 1 year

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a/n: ciwyw is next, i promise lmao. i'm very excited for the feedback on this one. <3

rowaelin // 5.7k words // skoh masterlist // masterlist

Considering how they had always slept twined together, Aelin wasn’t particularly surprised when she woke up with her back against Rowan’s chest. She tried not to move while her eyes adjusted to the sunlight coming through the curtains. Curtains were at the top of her list of things to buy when she went shopping later.

His arm was a warm, steadying weight over her side and she could feel his breath tickling the back of her neck. In sleep, her fingers had tangled with his over her stomach. Now, she had no idea what to do with any extension of her body. It had been a long time since she had been so hyper-aware of anyone touching her. Even longer than that, she hadn’t woken up with another person like this since the last time Rowan left all those years ago.

And then there was the hardness pressing against her ass that had a giggle threatening to bubble out of her lips.

Aelin bit her bottom lip to suppress the smile that would surely spiral into a fit of laughter as her hips began wiggling against him like she was trying to get comfortable. Rowan’s breathing changed slightly, a sharper inhale indicating he was at least a little awake now. She paused her movements just long enough to make the whole thing seem innocent before starting up again. The solid length of him grew harder against her. With the nightgown she slept in bunched up around her waist, their underwear was the only thing between them.

It was the bare skin of her hip that his hand clamped down on to still her, his breath hot against her ear as he growled, “What do you think you’re doing?”

“Trying to get out from under your arm.” It was an effort to keep her voice level with any amount of sass lacing the letters together. Rowan’s morning voice was truly a work of art, slightly deeper than normal and raspy from sleep. If he listened closely, he could probably hear her heart pounding away in her chest.

“That isn’t what it felt like,” he murmured, pushing his hips flush against her ass. One shaky inhale later, she was rolling out of bed. Rowan’s hand fisted the sheets where she had just been, eyes sleepy and squinting against the morning sun.

“We can go back to shouting then.” With a coy flip of her hair over her shoulder, she slipped into the bathroom as he flopped onto his back, hand running down his face.

The shower was so cold she was shivering by the end, her skin pink from the failed attempt to scrub away the feeling of his body pressed too tightly against hers.

~*~

“This is the most depressing thing I have ever had to do,” Aelin mumbled, fingers working black hair color into Fenrys’s roots. The shitty box dye was going to wreck the stunning threads of gold and she hated that she had any part in it. When she went down for breakfast her heart had nearly fallen out of her ass at the sight of Fenrys and Connall with close-cropped cuts. Thankfully there was some length remaining on top where their curls were able to thrive, but it wasn’t enough. It could barely be tucked behind their ears. It felt like a crime.

Aelin had already dyed, washed, and styled her hair into soft waves. She even took to snipping at the ends until her burgundy strands grazed the tops of her breasts. It had taken up the first two hours of the morning— the last thirty of it spent frowning at her reflection. Ever since she was little, her golden waves had been a source of pride. When she put in the green contacts, all of her remarkable features would vanish down the drain.

“It’ll wash out,” Fen reminded her. “And it’s just hair.”

“It’s going to take forever to grow back and probably just as long for the dye to wash out. This shit is hard to come back from.” It would be easier for her, but not for him. Evidently, Fenrys didn’t know that. A frown took over his entire face as he looked at his reflection in the bathroom mirror. While being identical, there were subtle differences between the twin’s faces that those close to them could point out. He was still beautiful, but his naturally golden blonde hair had made him look like the sun to Connall’s moon. Now they were both night-kissed with darkness.

There was no chance in hell that they could swap places without anyone catching it. As soon as Fenrys opened his mouth anyone would be able to tell that they most definitely were not the same person. Where his brother was calm and subdued, Fen was a raging storm of chaos and Aelin loved that about him.

“Now we let it cook,” she sighed, plopping a processing cap over the top to keep the hair from slipping over his forehead and staining his skin.

With a pat on his shoulder, she headed for the kitchen with Fenrys trailing behind her. Aelin grabbed a bag of grapes from the fridge and slid onto one of the barstools while she skimmed the file of her temporary identity. Having read through it several times already, the facts about her fake life were cemented into her mind.

Her name was Lillian Gordaina, and she was the Duchess of a small territory south of Bellhaven in Fenharrow. They received their titles and territory a year ago as a wedding gift when she married her husband, Asher Gordaina, the Duke. Both of them came from royal bloodlines, and their pairing and the work they did together is what had their Lord and Lady titles. While they didn’t have any children, they loved their dogs and were very involved with animal rights charities and the arts. According to the king and queen, they represented what the future could and should be like. Their attendance at the ball alongside Fenharrow nobles was to properly introduce them to royals from other countries.

Terrasen had a quite strong allegiance with Fenharrow, partially because her uncle was good friends with their king and queen. It was likely that he spoke with them to loop them in without giving away too much detail of the mission. Aelin wasn’t sure a real Duke and Duchess even existed for that little cluster of villages, or if they were taking an imaginary workload from the ones that oversaw Bellhaven. Not that it mattered, but she still wondered.

“Aelin?” Rowan’s voice carried down the hall from their bedroom and caused her heart to lurch beneath her ribs. Aelin’s eyes slipped shut as she dropped her forehead against Fen’s shoulder harder than she meant to. A dull throb pulsed between her eyebrows and he patted her sympathetically on the shoulder.

“Say I’ve died,” she whispered with pleading eyes as she lifted her head.

“Considering how little I want to experience his raw panic at that phrase, I’m going to offer a piping hot fuck no to that little request of yours.” And to think she thought she’d won everyone but Lorcan in the divorce.

Aelin tsked as she rose to her feet, back arching in a feline stretch. She savored another grape, eyes unfocused and staring out the window and wondering how long it would take for him to come looking for her. Fenrys swiveled in his seat and guided her with a hand on her waist until she was forced to take the first damning steps toward her ex-boyfriend. Fenrys was a traitorous bastard.

Shoulders rolling to loosen her arms, she steeled herself for a fight. Rowan hadn’t sounded angry when he called for her, but it was odd that he was seeking her out for anything to begin with. The uncertainty had her on high alert as her toes crossed the threshold into their room. Rowan was found sitting on a stool in the bathroom, running his hand over the back of his neck.

No evidence of his silver hair remained on his head, nor in the bits of hair on the floor around him. It was now a dirty blonde that toed the line of being light brown. They both looked equally surprised at the other’s makeovers and neither said anything for a moment. Their eyes remained locked through the mirror as she leaned against the bathroom door.

“Hey,” he said finally, reaching up to scratch his jaw.

“Hi?” It came out as perplexed as she felt. Even her nose was wrinkled a bit as he turned to look at her directly.

“I was uh– I was wondering if you’d help me cut the longer bit.” Rowan motioned to the pair of scissors that lay beside the clippers he’d used for the parts he wanted shorter. “I don’t trust any of the guys with scissors near my head, and you always did a good job.”

There were times when Rowan shaved his head in the early days of their relationship for ease of things while deployed. Once he started letting it grow back in, Aelin had watched a thousand tutorials on how to cut men’s hair. Eventually, she was pretty good at it. Not enough to quit her job and start a new business, but well enough that Rowan asked her for haircuts and trims when he was home.

“Of course.” She pushed off the door and reached for the scissors, Rowan’s hand darting out to stop her from picking them up. Her raised eyebrows asked the question her lips didn’t have to say.

“Without fucking it up.” The corners of her mouth twitched into a smile, her fingers closing around the cool metal. She grabbed the comb with her other hand and began running it through his hair. Because she had the excuse, her fingers slipped through the silky strands as she debated on how to cut it. Rowan took the moment to shake his arms out, loosening the muscles that seemed to stay too tight when she was around.

“Relax,” she mused, slipping into the space between his thighs. Using her fingertips, she tilted his head from one side to the other. “I’m cutting your hair, not getting ready to kick your ass in a sparring match.”

Rowan snorted but seemed to ease up if only a little. His hands were resting flat against his thigh, one leg bouncing to dispel anxious energy. When he bumped into her she shot him a warning glare, snipping the scissors in his face as a reminder of what might happen if he didn’t take a breath and chill out.

Aelin began cutting, taking her time to ensure it was even. Rowan alternated from sitting with his eyes closed to gazing up at her face. The only other place for him to look was at her chest, and he seemed to be doing an okay job of avoiding that. She was pretty sure she caught him a few times, though.

“Your hair was so pretty,” she sighed, moving to stand beside him while she cut the sides and around to the back. “Now it’s ruined.”

“You don’t like me like this, Princess?” Aelin’s tongue ran over her teeth as she glanced at him briefly in the mirror.

“I always liked you however you happened to be.” It felt like too vulnerable a thing to say, especially when he turned his head to look at her. Ignoring his eyes, Aelin turned his head forward. “Be still. I’m almost done.”

A few minutes later she was back between his legs and working a pomade through his freshly dyed locks. Considering how long it had been since she’d readied him for any sort of occasion, it took her longer than it used to. She was probably being a little nit-picky, but they had a photoshoot in two hours where they had to look royal for crying out loud. If there was a time to be precise, it was now.

“There. Perfect.” Aelin smiled a little and turned, reaching for the faucet to wash her hands. Halfway his fingers caught hers and tugged. Ever so slowly, she turned back to look at him. The calluses of his free palm scratched against her skin as they slowly wrapped around the back of her thigh just above her knee.

A suppressed shiver broke free as it dragged up her side and finally reached hesitantly toward her face. The other spread her fingertips until he could weave their fingers together. If he noticed the residue of the pomade on her hands, he didn’t seem to care. She knew she should stop this– that she should pull away from him and haul ass to the kitchen to wash her hands to put distance between them. Instead, she leaned into the first brush of his hand against her cheek.

Their eyes were locked, his pupils blown wide with what could only be desire. The heat of his body so close had her taking another small step toward him without needing to be guided. Her legs were trapped between his and in this secret moment, she didn’t want to be anywhere else.

The pad of his thumb brushed over her jaw while his hand slid around, fingers nestling perfectly into the dip at the base of her skull. All of the air in the room must have been sucked out because she was finding it increasingly hard to breathe. Each breath was measured and it seemed like he was doing the same thing as he gently guided her face closer to his.

Rowan untangled his hand from hers and guided her hand to the side of his neck where her fingers immediately twined into the hair at his nape. Almost involuntarily, she traced over the cupid’s bow of his lips with her free hand. In a moment of aching defeat, she rested her forehead against his and allowed her eyes to close. For a long moment, they just breathed each other in. It was a breathtaking intimacy that only two people that loved each other deeply could share.

The grief that steeped in her mind like a long-forgotten cup of tea washed over her. It became abundantly clear that she had never worked through it. Their relationship had always been more about their romantic feelings. He was her very best friend as much as her lover, sometimes more so. This moment didn’t poke and prod at the wounds that still felt so fresh most days. It soothed them.

Never stilling the movements of his hand that ran up and down her side, he pulled back just enough to look at her. The tips of their noses brushed as he whispered her name like it was the most reverent prayer he could offer to any god. Aelin shivered, lips parting on a shallow breath. Rowan’s mouth grazed the corner of her’s and he looked at her one more time like he was asking permission. There was a desperation in his eyes that she hadn’t seen in ages.

It was a man begging the god he worshiped. For what, she didn’t know. If it was forgiveness he sought it would be a long time coming. Or was it just the taste of her lips that he needed? Was he begging to brand her skin with the touch of his hands, his lips, his tongue? The crumbling self-control she grasped for was slipping like sand through her fingers. At the soft whisper of her name, it blew away with the wind.

Whatever expression lay on her face must have been good enough because the next moment his lips were on hers and she was unraveling at the taste of him. Nothing mattered but the feeling of his hands on her body, of his lips taking little breaks to press sweet kisses to her cheeks before claiming her mouth again. At the first brush of his tongue her knees nearly gave out, the grip she had on his hair tightening until he groaned low in his throat. It wasn’t the sound of pain, but one of pleasure.

The fingerprints she left on his neck and jaw were sticky from the pomade, but neither of them cared enough to stop. The strokes of his tongue were exploratory like he wanted to relearn every part of her. His lips were starving to memorize every inch, every dip, curve, and angle of her body until it was scorched into his memory. Aelin needed it, she realized. She needed to taste him, feel him beneath her fingertips. Every atom in her body was aching to be touched and felt and explored by only him. Only ever Rowan.

The nip of his teeth against her bottom lip didn’t hold the bite of their words. This kiss felt like that first deep breath on a snowy morning. It awoke all of her senses and sent shivers down her spine and heat blazing across her skin. The warmth of his body grounded her as his hand pressed against the small of her back and pressed her chest flush against his. Rowan’s lips seared trails of fire down her jaw and neck, then back up to capture her mouth again and she wanted to burn right here in this spot forever. Desire and need flooded her body and pooled in her core. The moan that slipped through her lips was caught with his teeth and tongue. Shaking hands contracted against her sides, fingertips digging into her skin roughly as he pulled her toward him and—

And then he pushed her back, ripping his mouth from hers. The heat of his body vanished as he leaned back to put space more between them. A thousand emotions flashed through his eyes before he managed to pull any kind of mask together by clearing his throat.

“There.” Spare bravado was pulled from his pockets as he smirked, dropping his hands from her waist. She hated how much she missed the contact. “Now we’re even from this morning.”

It would be a bald-faced lie to say the words didn’t burn worse than flames licking at her skin. But she also knew Rowan Whitethorn better than she knew anyone. As good as he was at hiding his emotions from everyone around him, there was no point in even trying when it came to Aelin. She looked into his eyes and could see that it was about more than just this morning. There was no possible way that those kisses had meant nothing more than settling an imaginary score. Not when his chest was heaving and his cheeks were stained a rosy red. Words said one thing, but the intent way his eyes remained focused on her said something else entirely. He was a predator hunting his prey and she would let him devour her.

Unless that was all it had been: a game. The thought cut deep and she had no one to blame but herself. A stupid game she accidentally started this morning because being a pain in his ass was easier than being civil.

Her lips pressed together in a thin line and she had to ball her hands into fists to hide their tremors. Fresh heat crept over her cheeks and down her neck as she nodded once and stepped out of his reach lest he try and touch her again. It wasn’t a luxury she could afford to indulge in. That one would wreck her and everything she was entirely.

“Next time I’m fucking up your hair,” she quipped, pockets empty of her usual swagger. Aelin didn’t look at him again as she walked out and grabbed what she needed to finish getting ready for the afternoon.

The bathroom she chose to get ready in wasn’t nearly far enough from Rowan. Close was too close but far was too far. Every cell in her body needed to be touched by him, to feel his muscles flex and relax beneath her fingertips. It was a slow descent into madness that she wasn’t sure would ever be able to crawl out of if she kept going down that forgotten, overgrown path.

Even though he was currently winning the game with no rules between them, one thing was for certain: Aelin would be the one to secure victory over the whole damn thing.

~*~

“The gods are playing a cosmic joke on me,” Aelin said to Fenrys, staring at the gown she was expected to wear for the photoshoot in half an hour. Even her friend was gobsmacked over the miles and miles of tulle and lace that seemed to take up half the room.

Simply put, it was the dress for a royal that couldn’t show too much but gave just enough. The monstrosity of a dress would turn her into a walking cupcake and she was already imagining how itchy the lace sleeves would be that ran down to her wrists. It was a far cry from what she would have worn for her wedding, but she supposed that didn’t matter. Not anymore, not ever.

“At least it couldn’t be further from what you would actually wear,” Fen offered, carefully pulling it off the hanger. The comfort was lost as she sighed heavily and undressed to her undergarments. allowed him to zip her into the dress. Fen zipped her into it, careful to avoid getting the excess fabric caught in the teeth. The skirts were so long that she would have to carry them to avoid getting tripped up on the short walk to the living area.

“If Rowan says a single smarmy thing, I will throttle him while wearing this dress.”

“I’ll take videos and send them to everyone I know. It’ll travel quickly through the entire military and he’ll never live it down.” Aelin chuckled darkly, heaving the skirts up as the funeral procession to her twisted fate began.

Over the last hour, the sitting room was carefully staged for the photos. They were only doing a handful of poses and she was thankful for it. With that kiss still haunting every corner and crevice of her mind, she was uncertain how long she could be near him without combusting.

Rowan may have made it about a game, yet she wasn’t entirely sure it was. Games were far more reckless, but maybe he was aiming to destroy her like she thought she was trying to do to him. At the thought of those slow, exploratory kisses she stumbled. The combination of her sock and the tulle made the floor much more slippery than it should have been. Fenrys caught her elbow to keep her from falling outright and she murmured a quiet thank you.

If it wasn’t for the swishing of the gown, she would have been able to sneak up on the rest of the Cadre. Rowan and Lorcan were discussing something with their backs to her, while Vaughan and Connall shared a bowl of popcorn. When Rowan turned around she pointed a finger at him and then every other man in the room.

“I don’t want to hear a single word.” Her voice was hard, eyes slightly narrowed. Rowan’s mouth opened but she swung her finger back around to him. “Not. One. Word.”

In a shocking display of self-control, his jaws clamped shut. For once, his expression was unreadable as he scanned her from head to toe. The feeling of not being able to read his thoughts on his face was foreign. Aelin did not like it.

Rowan didn’t look like a dessert the way she did. Well, he did, but she shoved those thoughts far out of her mind as she looked at him. Aelin had always loved him in a tux and this was no exception. It was a simple black with a bow tie hugging his neck. A few medals and pins signified he was of some military ranking for Fenharrow like most of the royal men were. Aelin didn’t bother looking too closely, it would just wind her even tighter than she already was.

“Are we ready?” The photographer asked. It was a young man she had met a few times over the years named Luca. While she had the strongest desire to say that no, she wasn’t and would likely never be, she nodded. As she came to a stop at Rowan’s side, a woman she hadn’t noticed and was unfamiliar with adjusted her skirts around them. “Where is Aelin’s ring?”

“I have it,” Rowan said, lifting her hand and sliding it into place. His lips were pressed so tightly together that they had disappeared entirely. This was going to be harder than she thought, much like the rest of her current job requirements.

“Relax. It’s a fake ring, not your death sentence,” she hissed, yanking her hand away and adjusting the fake diamond ring on her finger. Like the dress, she supposed it was pretty but wasn’t her style at all. It was a large stone surrounded by a dozen or so smaller ones. Where she preferred true yellow gold, it was silver. Not that her thoughts on the fake wedding ring she wore mattered.

The pair of soldiers were painfully stiff during the shoot. Halfway through Fenrys marched over and grabbed Aelin by the hands, shaking her arms around until she was loose and laughing. Though Rowan didn’t dissolve into a fit of laughter as she did, Fen did the same thing to him. It took some time but they were eventually able to lean into each other without looking like they were trying to escape their own skin.

“Can you look at each other and like, I don’t know, pretend you’re looking at someone you love?” Luca asked halfway through. The poor kid was completely unaware of their volatile history. Their peanut gallery groaned, anticipating violence to be brewing in their eyes.

“That would take an entire bottle of whiskey each,” Connall murmured, popcorn crunching between syllables. It took Aelin longer than she would have liked to get the courage to look up into Rowan’s face.

Neither of them were up to par because Luca sighed so hard with epic frustration. Aelin looked at the ground and closed her eyes for a moment to collect herself. Large hands flexed at her sides like he was doing the same. Years of unresolved feelings and pain settled heavily between them.

Look at each other and pretend you’re looking at someone you love.

The worst part was that for her, it wasn’t a stretch. She hated it, grinding that irritation to dust between her teeth until they squeaked. It was like nails on a chalkboard and she shivered violently in Rowan’s arms.

“Much better, Rowan. Aelin, this isn’t a battle. Can you like? I don’t know? Relax?” Each staccato phrase flipped up at the ends like a question. With a dry look at Luca, she took a moment to open her mouth as wide as she could to stretch out her jaw. She practiced smiling at Fenrys who gave her an encouraging thumbs up. It took a few extra wiggles to loosen her limbs, but she looked back up at Rowan.

Just like this morning, his features had softened around the edges. He brought one hand up to rest along her jaw and gazed down at her with a familiarity that made her stomach flip. With her heart taking off in her chest, she found it harder to breathe when he was looking at her like that. Aelin lightly held onto his wrist, the other on his waist, and let out a long breath.

“If it’ll help,” Rowan murmured, his thumb idly stroking along her jaw, “We can go outside and you can kick my ass after this.”

As much as she didn’t want to, she laughed. At the sound that came barrelling out of her, Rowan grinned widely. Click click click. Luca fired away, a few of the shots while they were in light motion. Aelin shaking her head at Rowan, him leaning his face a little closer to hers.

“We can do the garden shots and be done. I’m sure they can work with what we have.” Their young photographer announced. Relief flooded her body in cooling waves. The gown was unzipped before she made it to their room, heaps of fabric falling into a pile on the floor just inside the room.

It helped that she didn’t feel like herself at all. The hair, the contacts, and the clothing style were so at odds with her own. None of it was her. It was a character she was playing. Not being able to recognize herself had her wondering if it made things easier for Rowan, too.

~*~

Seeing Aelin in a wedding gown, however ridiculous it may have been, was nearly enough to send him to his knees.

Trying to reign in his emotions and school his features into a bored mask had been difficult. While he knew it was nothing like her, Aelin in a white gown implying that she was wholly his for the rest of his life was soul-crushing. It took everything in him to pretend he was as irritated about the whole thing as she was. Sure, he hated the whole thing. It was a constant struggle to keep his emotions in check through all of it. He just didn’t hate it because he hated her the way she did him.

Rowan’s violent dislike of the situation was because it was a window into their past. It was a glimpse at how things were meant to be years ago when he had dropped the ball time and time again. The distaste that overcame his features while putting the ring on her finger had nothing to do with the act itself, and everything to do with it being the wrong ring. The cheap silver with a CZ stone was not the one that he should have been sliding into place. The dress that made her look like a pastry was not the one she was supposed to be wearing.

It was all just fucking wrong, and every single piece of him was vividly aware of it.

Voicing that wasn’t an option. What good would it do anyway? She was better off without him, always had been, and he wasn’t going to start dragging her down that road now. Rowan could deal with her anger. They could fight it out and have once-in-a-blue-moon moments together when they were alone and it would sustain him. It had to be enough because it was all he could give her.

The only future for them would be a working relationship full of barbed comments and wicked words slung like gunfire. Aelin would keep being mad at him and he would let her because it was easier than the alternative. Even asking, begging for forgiveness as he should, was too much to put her through. She bore enough wounds on her heart and soul to him. There was no reason to add any more.

And he damn sure wouldn’t be kissing her like that again. Not when the feeling of her soft lips and the taste of her tongue had undone him so thoroughly his hands still shook. All of the walls he had erected over the last several years where she was concerned were crumbling at an alarming rate. Calling it a game had been a shitty attempt at self-preservation in the moment, one he hoped she didn’t see through like glass.

“You good?” She asked him as they walked through the garden. Aelin had changed into a long-sleeved, brown turtleneck. Her pants were a few shades darker and wide-legged with cream-colored shoes peeking out as they walked. Rowan was wearing a simple navy blue suit with the collar of his shirt undone.

“Yep,” he replied, adjusting his hand until their fingers laced together. These photos were just meant to look candid like they had been caught on a stroll. In a few, Aelin had the smart idea to smile and wave toward the camera like she had spotted paparazzi. Though he knew she would be good at this, it was still a little surprising that she had thought of something to make it that much more tangibly believable.

“We’re almost done. Then you can go back to hating my guts.” She looked up at him and smiled, though it didn’t quite reach her eyes. Rowan hated those contacts. It was like a wall between them and he felt like he couldn’t see her anymore.

“I don’t hate you, Aelin.” Rowan sighed at the truth and immediately wanted to shove it back down his throat. Waterboarding was less painful than giving her pieces of him that were real these days. “I do, however, hate the contacts.”

“Do you know how weird it is that your eyes are brown right now?”

“Probably as weird it is for me that yours are green,” he murmured just as Luca announced the ending of their session.

Aelin groaned a thank you to the gods and dropped his hand so abruptly it was like he’d been burning her the entire time. The heels came off and were carried back to the house, both of them quiet. The heartbeats of silence were heavy and he couldn’t decide if it was better or worse than the chaos of their arguments. At least with the arguments, he knew what she was thinking.

“I might take you up on training later,” she finally said as they walked through the back door.

“Oh?”

“I’m going to do some shopping for civilian attire, but maybe when I get back?” Aelin paused and turned to look at him, her eyebrows slightly raised. It felt stupid, but Rowan thought he might be able to read her better if she just took out those stupid lenses.

“You don’t want to train with Fenrys instead?”

Aelin’s eyes rolled and then crossed as she stuck her tongue out at him and replied, “Are you still making me promises you don’t intend to keep?”

It was a cheap shot meant to get under his skin, and Mala fucking flay him, it did. For the first time all day, something almost playful flashed in her eyes while waiting for an answer. This woman was going to be the death of him.

“I’m not— No. Find me when you get back.”

“I won’t be pulling my punches,” she said as she turned to walk away. A warning or a promise, he wasn’t sure. He didn’t know which option he preferred, either.

“I wouldn’t expect you to.” His words were said to nothing and no one because, by the time he finally found something to say, she was already gone.

@elentiyawhitethorn @autumnbabylon @fancysludgeshoelamp @wordsafterhours @live-the-fangirl-life @the-hospitality-of-knives @tangledraysofsunshine @readandlisten @westofmoon @rowanaelinn @morganofthewildfire @writtenonreceipts @feynightlight @emster1622-blog @scarblx @thefaetrove @loveyatopluto @actuallybarb @peppermint-fae @the-devils-own @scottmcgivemeacall @livingmylifeforme @wordsafterhours @foreverfallingforthestars @llyncooljones @emily-gsh @loosesimplicity @emilyrose111294 @charlizeed @aelinchocolatelover @cretaceous-therapod @sayosdreams @fireheart-violet @the-regal-warrior @backtobl4ck @shyvioletcat @bellasbookboyfriends @icantfindmychashma @swankii-art-teacher

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highqueenofelfhame · 1 year

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rowaelin // 5.3k words // ciwyw mastlist // playlist // masterlist

It had been a frustrating day to begin with. After failing to sleep for more than a collective two hours the night before, Rowan had tried to carry on with his day like he would any other Sunday. The conversation with Aelin, and more importantly her response, pounding with every slap of his shoes against the treadmill. Not even a full leg-day workout could dispel the dreadful, anxious energy brewing at the forefront of his mind.

Lorcan had showed up at the house early in the afternoon and chewed his ass out for the red card. He was fully in Team Captain mode for the full lecture, barely letting Rowan get a word in edgewise. At some point he gave up on defending himself and let Lorcan get his rant out. Once he was finished, he’d flopped onto Rowan’s couch and gestured vaguely with his hands.

“Alright. Your turn. Talk about it.”

“I already told you I was sor–” He’d started, hands bracing his knees as he debated groveling on his knees for Lorcan to let up. It had been a long enough weekend and he couldn’t handle another half hour. Sure, he deserved being called a stupid, selfish bastard, but he was tired. There wasn’t much left for him to say other than he was sorry, and he’d already done that multiple times.

“I’m not talking about the match. The girl. Something’s bothering you, so talk. The other idiots aren’t here to give you shit about it.” The man had a point. Without everyone else there to make subtle digs, it was easier for him to nod his head and dive headfirst into the clusterfuck of a situation he was in with Aelin.

To his credit, Lorcan listened to every word until it was all laying before them like a jigsaw puzzle. The pieces were hard to put together because there were about a million of them, all tiny, and several of them were missing entirely. Rowan couldn’t find the corners and didn’t know which way was up or down. Lorcan listened anyway. The migraine that had been coming on for the last few hours hit in full force when Lorcan compared it all to a fucking onion.

“Give her space. Give her time. The shit with Lyria is a lot to unpack on its own. Add into it that you’ve found yourself in a similar, however different, situation with Aelin… it would be a lot for anyone. It’s an onion, mate. Shit has fucking layers to it.” Rowan had given him a flat look that caused Lorcan to raise his hands in front of his chest. “I’m just saying. Might also be a lesson to check the expirations on those rubbers before you use them, too. Twice in one lifetime? You are one unlucky bastard.”

“You’re not helping,” Rowan glowered, eyes narrowed into little slits. Even if it was good advice, it didn’t do him a lick of good at this point. So much for not getting any shit about this.

“What brand did you use? I need to avoid those fuckers like the plague.”

“Lorcan,” Rowan sighed exasperatedly, all ten fingers raking through his hair until it was a mess of tangles.

“Just give her the space she asked for, Ro. She told you what to do. So do it.”

“It’s hard to give her space when I just want to be with her all the time,” he finally admitted, slumping back against the sofa. The position did nothing to help the throbbing in his head, but he didn’t move.

“I really need to meet this woman if she has you, of all people, wound so tight you look like you’re about to explode,” Lorcan said with the shake of his head. “Do you think she’s worth all the trouble?”

Rowan didn’t have to think about it. The answer was a huge, resounding yes. She was worth fighting for. He said as much and Lorcan nodded, eyes focused on the empty fireplace.

“For what it’s worth… I’ve never seen you as happy as you are when you talk about her. Don’t get me wrong, until she cuts you a break and gives you a real chance, she’s on my shit-list. But she makes you happy. I’ve never seen you this way about a woman and I think… I think she pulls out the best parts of you.” Lorcan’s confession made Rowan’s chest feel a little tight. “Except for when she’s the reason you’re so pissed off you get carded.”

They had both shared a quiet laugh at that, then spent the rest of the evening sipping beer and watching the major sports channels for highlights of the other games that happened over the weekend.

Hours later, Rowan truly was about to explode. Sleep was already hard to find despite scouring every drawer and pocket in his brain. When his phone pinged, hope had swelled that it was Aelin. As much as he loved to see her smiling face lighting up his phone, it was not what he had in mind.

Rowan Whitethorn liked to think of himself as a man with self control and reason. Amongst his teammates he was known for being level-headed, someone that thought things through and didn’t jump the gun. To his core, he always had been those things– until he met Aelin Galathynius, and he was unraveling quicker than a dropped spool of thread.

You know, the one that rolled under the bed and there was no hope of getting it back unless you kept pulling on the string. The spool would re-emerge from the shadows once the thread was in a mess of a knot at your feet and there was absolutely no hope of getting it wrapped back around its little home neatly. In fact, you might even scrap the whole thing and throw it in the garbage because the reward didn’t outweigh the tedious task at hand.

Rowan felt like that unraveled spool of thread as he stared at his phone screen at two in the morning, the simple plastic phone case groaning under the pressure of his white-knuckled grip. The edges of his vision were hazy because he hadn’t blinked a single time since he saw the picture that Fenrys sent him.

Mala fucking help him, he was going to murder his teammate. A brutal, bloody murder. Rowan had never been so sure that he was going to end up in fucking jail.

Aelin was radiant– something that had been missing from her the last time he saw her. The woman in the picture was exactly the woman that had ripped his heart from his chest before he even knew what was happening. The more muted version he’d had over the weekend still held his throbbing, bleeding heart. But the woman beaming in the photo was the one who stole it in the first place.

Her hair was down, the golden waves cascading over her shoulders and out of frame. With rose-kissed cheeks and plump, sensual lips spread wide in one of the smiles she used to give him, she was devastating. A little tipsy from his afternoon with Lorcan, Rowan had to physically restrain himself from tracing the shape of her mouth with his fingers. Gods, when did he become such a sap?

The first photo was just her. A tiny cocktail straw was between her teeth, eyes closed from the force of her smile. Her eyelashes seemed to graze the top of her cheeks they were so long. Because of the angle of the photo, taken from a lower, upturned angle, one of the golden lightbulbs gave her a halo. It was fitting, because she was a fucking angel.

>> She’s even more beautiful in person.

Rowan knew that. He was well aware of how fucking beautiful she was. But why did Fenrys know that? Why was he discovering the truth of it at two in the godsdamn morning?

>> What the fuck?

<< I mean, if you’re not going to, she should get it from somewhere. You haven’t had sex in her bed yet, have you?

>> Fenrys I swear to the fucking gods if you touch her I’m not responsible for what happens to your face.

The picture that followed made him want to throw his phone across the room and hope it shattered into a million pieces he couldn’t put back together. Someone across the table had taken it, probably Connall if he had to guess. Aelin’s arm was around Fenrys’s neck and they were cheek to cheek with matching smiles. Mischief was wild in Fen’s eyes while Aelin just looked… happy.

And then he noticed, just at the edge of the picture, how low on her hip his godsdamn hand was and he thought he was going to lose his mind. Yep. He was definitely going to be arrested for homicide in a few hours. The mugshot would be in every newspaper in the country, across the world, and he didn’t care.

>> She’s just wearing minty lip balm. My face will be nothing but hydrated and tasty.

<< You motherfucker

>> Well… not yet 😉

And then Fenrys stopped replying.

The self-control and level-headedness he had once prided himself in was nowhere to be seen. He tried to pull on the thread of his sanity, to tell himself it didn’t matter, that all of this was fine. Yet every time he looked back at the screen, every muscle and tendon in his body was so taught it felt as though one movement would have them all in ribbons.

Rowan hadn’t ever had a relationship where he felt the need to protect as much as he did with Aelin. Maybe it was partially because of the baby, but a roaring silence filled his head at the thought of her with another man, least of all Fenrys fucking Moonbeam. If Fenrys respected any kind of friendship code, he wouldn’t even act like he was thinking about toeing that line.

It felt stupid. They were barely dating and only knew the tip of the iceberg with each other. Still, there was something so different with her. For the first time in almost a decade, he had let his guard down. There were no mile high cement walls around his heart with nowhere to grasp to climb up and over. He was just Rowan, an unopened book with unexplored pages begging to be read.

It was highly unlikely that he was the only person that found himself inexplicably drawn to her. She was sweeter and more intoxicating than any drug, than any brand of alcohol money could buy. Aelin Galathynius had the energy of someone that you just wanted to taste once, because once she was gone you wouldn’t experience anything like her ever again. Coming so close to losing her, Rowan was keenly aware of that fact, and he wasn’t sure how he would ever move on if they didn’t really give themselves the chance to explore it. They were opposite ends of two very strong magnets. It was impossible that she didn’t feel that, too.

Rowan Whitethorn didn’t open up to just anybody. He didn’t let people in. Aelin wasn’t just a fluke. He was absolutely sure of it.

The thoughts wouldn’t stop chattering through his brain. Words flashed behind his closed eyelids a thousand miles a minute, leaving nothing but explosions of stars and colors where he tried to rub them away. Every time he looked at his phone, the desire to get in his car and drive to Aelin’s grew stronger and stronger. It was becoming an itch that he couldn’t he couldn’t ignore, and once the sun finally started to peek in through his blinds, he was rolling out of bed and nearly running to shower and change clothes.

By the time eight rolled around, he had forced a small bowl of cereal down his throat and downed what was probably too many cups of coffee. By eight-fifteen, Rowan was in his car and speeding toward the highway to Varese with something that belonged to Aelin sitting in his front seat.

~*~

Rowan felt… Well, he felt insane.

Not for the first time, he was asking himself what the fuck he was doing as he knocked on the door to Aelin’s apartment. At several red lights through the city, he debated going home. Halfway up the staircase, he had paused and gone down three steps, only to turn around and march right back up and to her door. The echoing of his fist on the wood had him hesitating once again, wondering if he should just get in his car and go home. He had no clue what he was doing here, besides just needing to see her and make sure that both she and the baby were okay, regardless of her late night activities.

That’s what he was telling himself, anyway.

In the ten agonizing seconds it took for him to head footsteps from inside her apartment, he almost turned and bolted. Rowan was well aware that he was being a territorial fool. Evidently there was no reasoning with that very stupid and very irrational part of his brain, even as the clicking and sliding of locks had him wondering how quickly he could make it down a flight of stairs without being caught.

“Oh,” came her surprised voice, wide eyes and raised brows to match. It was his very favorite version of Aelin that opened the door. All of her golden hair was in a messy knot on the top of her head, a few pieces framing her face. Much to his satisfaction, he realized she was wearing the shirt he’d told her she could keep a few days prior. A pair of little black shorts peeked out from the hem, and the long expanse of her bare legs had him almost forgetting why he was there in the first place. “What are you doing here?”

Her voice brought his eyes back to her face. There was no evidence of the makeup she’d had on the night before and though he could tell by looking at her that she was exhausted, he could also see that she had at least a few hours of good sleep. The skin around her eyes was a little puffy and a few lines were tattooed on her cheeks from her pillow or the blanket.

“Did I wake you up?”

“No, no. I’ve been awake for like half an hour. Just haven't gotten to dragging myself out of bed yet since I’m not going to the office today.” Right. It was Monday. In his hazy stupor, Rowan had entirely forgotten that she should have been going to work.

“Are you too sick today?” Rowan was immediately on edge, searching her face and body for any sign of what would keep her from working. There was no point– she was downright glowing today. A healthy blush heated her cheeks and he could almost make out the small smattering of freckles across her nose from where he stood across the threshold.

“No,” she said simply. “I feel really good today, actually. You didn’t answer me. What are you doing here, Rowan?”

“You forgot your toothbrush at my house,” he said lamely, patting at his pockets. Fuck. “It was purple? I left it in my car.”

“I did leave it at your house because that’s the one you bought for me to keep there.” There was laughter in her words as she spoke, like she was bringing up an inside joke they’d made. Mirth danced in her brilliant turquoise eyes despite her face contorting with confusion as she asked again, her tone softer this time, “What are you doing here, Rowan?”

What a loaded fucking question. He sure as hell didn’t know. How many times on the way here had he asked himself the same thing?

He didn’t have to answer it directly, though, because he realized her shower was running down the hall. Before he could stop himself he blurted, “Is that Fenrys?”

“Fen– what?” There was so much disbelief in her voice, but she started laughing. “You drove all the way up here to see if Fenrys spent the night with me?”

Rowan wasn’t sure if the laughter was a good thing or a bad thing. It was impossible to tell if she was laughing at him for being so stupid he thought he had any right to know about her private life when he wasn’t around, or if she was laughing because the idea was so stupid and he had nothing to be worried about. He was inclined to think it was the former, because even though Fenrys liked to rile him up, he didn’t know if he would push Rowan quite so hard.

“Hey, bub? You hungry?” A voice, one that was distinctly not Fenrys’s shouted from the bathroom. In that one, tiny pet name, Rowan’s entire heart sank through the floor. If he looked down, he was sure he would be standing in a puddle of his own blood. The world had gone very quiet, his fingers suddenly freezing as he stuffed them into his pockets.

“Yes,” she called back, her eyes not leaving Rowan’s face.

Aelin was seeing someone else. It wasn’t a thought that had ever occurred to him until those texts from Fenrys, but now it was glaringly obvious. She had already said once that their relationship wasn’t supposed to turn into anything serious. Had she been seeing other men the whole time? It wasn’t like they’d ever talked about being exclusive in any shape or form. They had plenty of time away from each other. He never would have known. It couldn’t even be considered cheating.

“Rowan,” she said, bottom lip tucked between her teeth to swallow her smile.

“I’ll… I’m sorry. I’ll let you get back to the guy in the shower,” he half-mumbled, crossing his arms to hide his shaking hands.

And then she was well and truly laughing. It was a bright, melodious sound that under any other circumstance, he would have loved to pull out of her, to bottle up and get drunk on it whenever he pleased.. But right here, right now? Rowan was fucking gutted, and she was giggling like he’d said the funniest thing in the world.

Rowan had just turned to start walking away when she collected herself enough to say, “You mean my cousin?”

Time stopped. His blood was pumping in reverse to turn back the clock, to take everything he’d just said and wipe it from existence. Even his movements felt slower as he looked at her, fire licking up his neck and covering his face. The tips of his ears would be nearly purple and if he walked out into the humid air, his body would be steaming. She could probably feel the heat of his body from where she stood in the doorway.

Rowan had never been so fucking embarrassed in his entire life.

“Yeah, I– I am so sorry. I’ll talk to you later,” he grumbled, turning on his heel to make his swift exit and go die in peace. Recovery wasn’t an option. There was absolutely no coming back from this.

~*~

The plan with Fenrys had either gloriously backfired, or he put much more into the prank than expected. She made a mental note to text him about that later, but there wasn’t time for that now.

Aelin stepped through the door and caught Rowan’s hand before he was too far away. He felt feverish, like his immune system was trying to burn out the embarrassment before it could settle too much. It took a lot of tugging but he stopped trying to escape her presence. His footsteps were heavy on the old wood floors as she dragged him back toward her apartment.

“I really just want to go,” he told her, tattooed fingers sliding through his hair. It was down for once, not braided or tied out of his face.

“Look at me.” But he wouldn’t. Green eyes stayed glued to a spot well above her head, looking at anything but her. Yes, it had been funny that he thought that Aedion was a random hookup. But the devastation on his face had done nothing but wreck her in return. The laughter was partially an involuntary response to an awkward situation, but also because it was cute that he was so worried about it. Rowan had absolutely nothing to be worried about.

“Aelin–” The more she reached for him, the more he leaned away. He took one step back and she took one forward, refusing to let him leave while so upset. Aelin reached up, her cool hands resting on his warm cheeks as she gently guided his face to look at her. Before he could protest or slip further from her grasp, she rocked up onto her tiptoes and pressed a soft, sweet kiss to his lips. All ten of his fingers were shaking when they came to rest on her hips and it broke her heart.

“Take a breath,” she whispered, sliding her hands down his neck and over his chest. Rowan’s eyes were still closed as he rested his warm forehead against her own, but he obeyed. “Fenrys was just fucking with you. Clearly he took it way too far and I am so sorry. We will most definitely be having words about that.”

Before he could respond, from the depths of her apartment Aedion once again shouted for her and Rowan’s hands flexed on her hips. Aelin sighed and grabbed his hands, walking backwards with him until they were inside. Her fingertips were able to reach around him to push the door shut, sealing him inside with her.

“Aedion, can you shut the fuck up and come out here and talk to me like a normal person? You’re freaking out my boyfriend and he’s been through enough for today.” Aedion’s hurried footsteps down the hall and the click of his door shutting was the only response she was given, likely to hurry and dress for their sudden company.

Rowan looked inclined to agree with her sentiments, but didn’t say anything as she walked to the kitchen to get him some water. There was something off about him, and not just because of the trauma Fenrys had inflicted on him, nor the embarrassment that still stained his cheeks. He seemed almost… dim. All of the energy he’d had mere moments ago was vanishing before her eyes. His posture was a deflated balloon hovering inches from the ground a week after the party.

“Are you hungry?” She asked, taking his hand and guiding him to the couch. Rowan shrugged as she nudged for him to sit in the corner while she curled onto the middle cushion beside him, her legs leaning against his thigh. If anything, she hoped it would ground him from the hell he’d been dragged through in the last few hours. “When was the last time you slept?”

Rowan exhaled, his cheeks puffing out with the gust of air. Dark circles haunted the skin beneath his eyes, which were bloodshot, making the green of them all the more piercing. Aelin frowned at his lack of response, tugging on his sleeve until he looked at her.

“The fact that it’s taking you so long to figure it out tells me enough.” As though they couldn’t help themselves, despite her telling him she needed space, her traitorous fingers reached out and brushed his hair out of his eyes.

“It’s been a few days,” He admitted, attempting to rub the tiredness away with his thumb and forefinger. “And my head is fucking killing me.”

“Let’s eat some breakfast and then we can nap, yeah? I’d tuck you in right now but I’m starving and I think you probably need to eat a bit, too.”

A crease appeared between his eyebrows, lips pursing into a line as he looked over at her and said, “Is that… okay? You said you wanted space. I’m not exactly giving it to you by showing up like this.”

“Considering I’ve barely been awake for an hour and could already use a nap, I’m going to go with yes. Besides, I do want you to meet Aedion while he’s here.” Thank the gods, his lips quirked into a small smile. Relief fluttered through her chest. She had never been so happy to see somebody smile at her before.

Just as he opened his mouth to respond, however, Aedion’s door opened and he appeared in the archway to the hall. Aelin looked over at her cousin with a look that threatened violence if he tried the man beside her even a little too hard. Much to her surprise, Aedion gave a short nod before walking closer to the couch.

“Aedion, meet Rowan. Rowan, this is Aedion.” Aelin was a little surprised that Rowan mustered the muscle power to stand and shake hands. “Rowan is very tired so save the groveling for later, please.”

“I think you should be telling him to save my ass-kicking for later,” Rowan amended, sitting back on the couch. Aelin grinned as he looked over at her. “I can assume you told him what I’ve done.”

“And that you’re very sorry,” she added sweetly, but her glance at Aedion was sharp as a dagger. Though his mouth had opened, likely to throw his own little quip into the sparring ring, it shut immediately.

“We’ll talk about it another time,” Aedion said simply, dropping onto the sofa beside Aelin with enough force that she bounced. She scowled at him, her hand immediately going to cover her stomach. “What are we eating?”

Half an hour later they had brunch delivered to the apartment, the three of them sitting knee to knee on the couch. The sofa in question had been chosen for the luxurious aesthetic it provided, but she made a mental note to look at sectionals. There was no way she could have any other visitors with only this and the overstuffed chair in the corner for seating.

Though he said a few things here and there, most of the conversation was Aelin and Aedion’s casual banter. While they did talk a little bit about the game he was carded in and what he expected for the rest of the season, as the conversation went on Rowan seemed to keep drawing further and further into himself. His broad shoulders were caved in and that wrinkle between his eyebrows got deeper and deeper. It looked like it was taking an astronomical amount of effort to keep his eyes open.

When they finished, Aelin and Rowan settled back against the couch while Aedion cleaned everything up. She had intended to just check a few emails before getting Rowan to bed, but he dozed comically fast. The email was half-read when she locked her phone and contemplated the best way to wake him gently.

“This is the man that got the first red-card of his career for being so fucking pissed on Friday?” Aedion asked incredulously.

“So it would seem.”

“You’ve never seen him play–” But Aelin cut him off with a shake of her head.

“I have. I watched the game until he got kicked out and then drove to Doranelle.”

“Before that,” his hand cut through the air, dismissing her. Aelin gave him a flat look before looking back at the man snoozing beside her. “He’s a demon, Aelin. When he’s on the field every move is calculated and with purpose. His face is always harsh and his body is always locked and loaded for the next play. Yet here he is, falling asleep on your couch with his mouth open. He might start drooling.” Aedion put his hands on his knees and leaned forward to get a closer look.

Aelin grinned, eyes cutting back to Aedion. She couldn’t help it. “Be nice, he’s getting old.”

She knew it was true. Ever since uncovering the truth about his job, she had spent an embarrassing amount of time watching highlight videos of his career online. Every photo she saw that was snapped mid-match, his face was all hard lines and angles like he was in the middle of a battlefield fighting for his life. On the soccer pitch, he looked like a warrior that had been honed for battle. Here, on her couch asleep, he just looked like Rowan. The real Rowan, and she was pretty sure not many people saw this side of him.

“He looks younger like this,” he observed, eyes squinting as if he could see the soccer persona in his face if he tried hard enough. It was nowhere to be seen, though.

“Probably because he isn’t awake to frown at me.”

“Yeah, no way this is the same guy that fought his way to a red-card before halftime,” Aedion concluded. Aelin snorted, her hand flying to her mouth to muffle the sound. Rowan didn’t so much as twitch.

“I’m pretty sure he almost cried when he heard you yell at me from the bathroom. He thought…” Involuntary giggles bubbled through her chest and out of her mouth, “He thought you were a hookup from last night.”

“That’s gross.” Aedion’s lips were downturned as he straightened, arms folding across his chest. “He almost cried?”

“That’s where it gets not-so- funny. Whatever Fenrys said to him really fucked him up.” She sighed then, reaching to trace his cheekbone with her fingertip. Rowan did stir then, eyes blinking rapidly as he took in a brute of a man staring down at him curiously and the feeling of Aelin’s skin on his. “Come on. Let’s go take a nap.”

In the most adorable protest of the century, Rowan started grumbling incoherently in the old language. Aelin smiled, only catching a few words here and there that equated to him insisting he wasn’t tired and they could nap later. His eyes betrayed him. They were heavy, blinking slowly and trying to roll back in his head.

“This is one argument you sure as hell aren’t going to win.” Aelin pulled him to his feet and guided him to her room. When she plopped him onto the edge of the bed his protesting started up again.

“What’s in it for me?” Sleepy, bleary eyes looked up at her as he refused to lay down. Aelin was standing between his legs with her hands on his shoulders, an eyebrow cocked to silently tell him he was being ridiculous.

“Besides sleeping for the first time in a couple days?” Rowan nodded, his fingertips grazing up her thighs and settling on her hips. She laughed, pushing his hair behind his ears. They would definitely be talking about his sleepless nights later. “What do you want?”

“A kiss, please.” His response was so immediate it made her heart play hopscotch in her chest. Sleepy Rowan might just be her favorite thing in the entire world. Not even cotton candy could make her feel so light and sweet.

“Okay, deal,” Aelin leaned down and pressed her lips to his forehead. Rowan swore in the old language but laid flat on his back and let her pull the blankets over his body.

“Should have been more specific,” he mumbled, pulling on her hand until she crawled over him to the other side of the bed and nestled into the sheets beside him. She let him pull her close until they were pressed flush together. A weight she hadn’t realized she’d been carrying fell from her shoulders, replaced by his arms around her body. Aelin didn’t pull away but snuggled into him as much as she could, her face against his chest as she deeply inhaled the scent that was so completely Rowan. The scent that was home.

“You should have,” she agreed, but Rowan was already asleep.

@elentiyawhitethornn @autumnbabylon @fancysludgeshoelamp @wordsafterhours @live-the-fangirl-life @the-hospitality-of-knives @tangledraysofsunshine @readandlisten @westofmoon @rowanaelinn @morganofthewildfire @writtenonreceipts @feynightlight @emster1622-blog @scarblx @thefaetrove @loveyatopluto @actuallybarb @peppermint-fae @the-devils-own @scottmcgivemeacall @livingmylifeforme @wordsafterhours @foreverfallingforthestars @llyncooljones @emily-gsh @loosesimplicity @emilyrose111294 @charlizeed @aelinchocolatelover @cretaceous-therapod @sayosdreams @fireheart-violet @the-regal-warrior @backtobl4ck @shyvioletcat @bellasbookboyfriends @icantfindmychashma

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highqueenofelfhame · 1 year

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rowaelin // 5.5k words // ciwyw masterlist // masterlist

AN: If your at starts with @secondstartorightand can you please comment on this so i can fix your tag? it somehow got cut off in the creation of my tag list and i can't find your blog lolol. ALSO, i'm sorry i update in the middle of the night. i'm nocturnal i'm sorry.

The car was barely put into park before she was throwing herself out of the driver’s seat and sprinting around the front. Aelin launched herself at her cousin, happy tears sparkling on her cheeks while joyous giggles flowed out of her. Aedion didn’t budge an inch when he caught her. His arms wrapped tightly around her middle and he squeezed so hard she thought her lungs might collapse altogether, but it didn’t matter.

“What the fuck? I thought I was picking up Lysandra!” She cried, scowling over her shoulder at the police officer shouting at her.

“You can’t park here.”

“I’m not parked, I’m picking up,” she argued, wiping her cheeks with the backs of her hands. Aedion’s hands came down on her shoulders, lightly pushing her toward the other side of the car so they wouldn’t wind up with a ticket thanks to her smart mouth. It wouldn’t have been the first time.

Once they were back in the car, seatbelts on and pulling out of the maze that was the Varese airport, Aelin said, “What are you doing here?”

“Lys said you needed me. She booked my flight instead of hers. I’ll go home when she gets here next week.” Love and appreciation swelled inside her for her best friend. Of course it would have been amazing to have Lysandra here early, but the relationship she had with Aedion… the two were on a different wavelength. Save for finding out about the pregnancy, the first call she had always made upon getting big news was always him. The only reason he hadn’t been her first call when she took the pregnancy tests was because if they were positive, it felt too important to tell him over a phone call. They needed to be face to face.

“I do. I do need you,” she confessed, reaching over to squeeze his hand. Telling him about the baby settled over her body like a heavy weight. It wasn’t that she was dreading it, but she was nervous about how he might react. It could go in a million different ways, starting with Aedion hunting down Rowan Whitethorn and beating him senseless for knocking up his little sister.

“What’s going on, bub?” Out of the corner of her eye she saw him shift so he was facing her more, eyes zeroing in on her face, scanning her body. Making sure she was okay. Strings plucked at her heart like a guitar and she had to swallow the crescendo of emotions that wanted to burst out.

“I’d rather wait until we get home to get into it. But, Gods, I am so happy you’re here.”

“It’s not like, a major illness is it?” The humor was gone from his face, replaced by stern determination to fight whatever it was that plagued her.

Aelin smiled. “No. I’m okay. I’m… mostly good. There’s just so much to catch up on. Apparently a lot can happen when we’re apart for three months.”

Aedion snorted in response as he ruffled his fingers through his hair. “I’ll accept that until we’re home. After that, all bets are off and you better start talking.”

Aelin swore she would, patting his knee to placate him.

The drive back to her apartment was short and quick. Even though she lived in the historic part of downtown, Aelin had quickly discovered that she was no more than twenty minutes away from everything she would need. The airport was the furthest, but all the stores, restaurants, and nightlife a girl could want were in that radius. Not that she was in the market to have a nightlife anymore. These days she found herself tucked into bed by ten or earlier.

After the hike up the stairs to get to her door, the exhaustion from the last forty-eight hours was starting to creep into her muscles, her bones. All of her limbs were made of lead. After she broke the news and they settled in a little bit, she would reward herself with a nap. Aedion wouldn’t complain about it either after she told him about the baby. In fact, he would probably insist on it.

Aelin gave him a quick tour of the two bedroom apartment, showing him the room he would be staying in for the week. They would have to share the one bathroom, but they had shared many spaces over the last decade. It wasn’t anything new.

“Just don’t leave your hair stuck on the shower wall,” was his only request, as if he wasn’t guilty of the same crime. Long and thick hair that had a tendency to shed was hard to wash off when it adhered to her skin while wet.

Evidently, the girls had been a little too tight-lipped. The only thing Lysandra had told him was that he was needed, and Aelin hadn’t given him much to go on. By the time they settled onto the couch, the man looked like he was ready to crawl out of his skin. His hands were constantly flexing into tight fists that relaxed into flattened palms with drumming fingers, then back again. The foot that was on the floor was bouncing so hard it was shaking the couch and threatening to send Aelin into a bout of motion sickness from hell. She put her hand on his leg to make him stop, brows raised pointedly until he obeyed.

“Can you please tell me what the fuck is going on?” Every word was wrapped in distress, the waiting game spiraling him into madness. A million and one scenarios had probably been flying through his mind from the time he found out he was coming to Wendlyn. There was one thing she needed to say first, though. He could wait a few more seconds.

“I want you to know that the only reason you weren’t the first person I told is because you were the one person I needed to tell face to face. Well. There were two of you, but I’ll get to that.”

“Aelin,” he whined, leaning forward and taking her hands in his. When he noticed the tremor in them, his entire demeanor changed. Gone was the impatience, replaced by his protective nature.

Aelin’s eyes were snagged on their hands. Her’s looked so small between Aedion’s, and she wondered how tiny the baby’s would look when he held it for the first time. The thought of him holding something so tiny and pure had her eyes brimming with tears all over again.

“Hey,” he said softly, drawing her eyes back to his face with a knuckle beneath her chin. “Whatever it is, it’s okay. We’ll deal with it.”

Aelin laughed a little because it would be okay. Not just her and the baby, but Rowan, too. All of them would be fine. The road through the woods was just a little scary, is all.

“Okay,” she nodded again, using her shoulder to catch a tear that escaped. Ripping the band-aid off was the easiest route. Dancing around it would only drive them both crazy, and they were each antsy in their own way already. On the exhale of a deep, steadying breath she said, “Aedion, I’m pregnant.”

“Bullshit,” he blurted, jerking back from her. His hands never left hers, if anything his grip tightened. But he was leaning so far away that his back hit the plush armrest of the sofa. Aelin tugged until he was sitting up straight again, mouth parted in a wide ‘O.’ With shaking fingers, she reached over and pushed up on his jaw until his lips were closed.

“You’re going to drool on my pretty couch.” Though she tried to sound serious, there was no bite to her words. In fact, it was getting hard to keep her face neutral.

“You’re– you’re fucking serious?” With eyes wider than the moon he took her in, pulling their arms out to look directly at her stomach.

“You aren’t going to see anything, it’s still stupid early. And I’ve been so sick I’m probably losing weight, but… yes. You’re going to be an uncle.”

The tears he had been trying to hold back broke free of their invisible cage, sliding down his face as he pulled her to him. One of his hands cradled the back of her head as his lips pressed soft kisses to her hair over and over again. Aelin’s arms snaked tightly around his waist, her face burrowing into his shoulder.

Aelin tried not to think about it, but until she met Rowan, nothing ever made her feel more safe than being with Aedion. They grew up so close that half the time they referred to each other as their siblings. Both of them were only children and had been each other’s best friends since the day she was born. According to their parents, the first time three-year-old Aedion held Aelin when she was merely a few hours old, he made her promise after promise to always be there for her, to protect her.

When her dad taught her to ride a bike at age four, Aedion had been there, too. When the training wheels came off, he ran alongside her with one hand on the middle of the handlebars for a little extra insurance. And when she had toppled over a bump in the concrete and skinned her knee, Aedion had picked her up and carried her back to the house while promising she was going to be okay.

At age nine when she was tall enough to ride her first big roller coaster, he was the one that rode with her. The entire time he kept her hand tightly in his, reassuring her that it was going to be so much fun, that she would feel like she was flying, and if she was scared she didn’t have to let go of his hand. They spent the rest of the day running ahead of their parents to get in line for everything she was tall enough to ride and if it only sat two at a time, he sat with her and their parents fell in line behind them.

When she was sixteen and experienced her first heartbreak, he drove home from college that weekend. They laid in her bed until she had it all cried out, Aedion making violent promises to break all of the boy’s bones if he ever so much as breathed in her direction ever again. There was a steady supply of chocolate truffles and popcorn while they watched every silly rom-com she wanted. When he left to go back to school, he’d promised her she was going to be okay.

At age twenty-two, when he found out the depth of her college sweetheart’s mental and emotional abuse, Aedion managed to keep his emotions under a careful lock and key when she showed up on his doorstep with nowhere to go. As she grieved over the loss of herself and the relationship, he was a steadying presence that refused to let her tumble into darkness on her own. On the bad days, he was there to make it better. Nearly every day for several months he promised she was going to be okay.

It took some time, but she was okay. Even on the days she felt like she might completely crumble, his pinky promises when they were children held true. Aelin was going to be okay. It didn’t matter what happened, what life threw at her, she was going to be just fine.

Aelin tried not to think about Rowan, how the safety of his arms had felt impenetrable the way that Aedion’s did. Not even her father had made her feel quite as protected as Aedion had. It wasn’t to say that he wasn’t a good father– Rhoe was the best father a girl could ever dream of having. There was just something different about the connection she had with Aedion. Now it was extended to Rowan, and she didn’t know what that meant.

When they finally pulled away with red faces and puffy eyes, Aedion was smiling so widely it was making her cheeks hurt because she wore a grin to match. His thumbs brushed her tears away, both of them exhaling so shakily it resulted in laughter.

“This is good?”

“It’s good. It’s… scary as all hell, but I think it’s good. It still doesn’t feel real. I haven’t had any scans yet, just a blood test because I was so sick. Lys made me go to the hospital for fluids when I couldn’t keep anything down. Then there’s the two dozen pregnancy tests under the bathroom sink. The throwing up has been the worst, though. Which shouldn’t even be called morning sickness, by the way. This shit hits me at all hours of the day without being provoked.” Aelin hadn’t thrown up since the day before, but she wasn’t going to jinx it by saying so out loud. It had a mind of its own and a vengeance against her.

The depth of how badly she wanted to tell him hit her then. The way the words just poured out of her lips in a steady stream made it so glaringly obvious that this was exactly what she needed. She wasn’t sure she could have gone much longer with a secret so hefty.

The muscles at his jaw rippled beneath his skin from the force of his clenching. Even the grip he had on her hands tightened further, almost to the point of hurting while he made peace with himself that he couldn’t protect her from being sick because of the baby. Something flickered through his eyes and it made her sigh as she said, “Go ahead and ask.”

“Who is the father.” The short, clipped tone had her fighting off another smile as he added, “And what is his degree of involvement, because if he isn’t–”

“Relax, bub. We had a moment after I told him where things were… rough to say the least. Yes, he upset me. No, he didn’t mean to.”

“That doesn’t answer my question.” His lips were bracketed with tension.

“You know that soccer player from Doranelle, Rowan Whitethorn?” She tried to make it sound nonchalant and dismissive. Partially because he wasn’t really soccer’s most famous athlete when they were together. He was just Rowan.

“What the hell does a living soccer god have to do with this?” The genuine confusion cloistered amongst his features made her bite her lip to keep from smiling. Gods, it was so good to have him back.

“I’m going to let you sit on that and connect the dots while I get some water.” Aelin patted his knee as she rose and walked to the kitchen. She was halfway there when he gasped.

“No fucking way!”

“Yes fucking way. That’s how it happened actually,” she called, swiping a bottle from the fridge and returning to the couch. His face was torn between pure excitement and disbelief. For the thousandth time in the last hour or so, she laughed.

“Rowan Whitethorn is one of the best soccer players to ever live, Aelin. I know you don’t care about it but he’s– I had posters of him on my dorm walls in college. I met him before the game I played against Doranelle and told him that he’s my hero, and– wait.” The excitement dropped from his face, eyes narrowing slightly. “What the fuck did he say that upset you?”

Aelin sunk back against the cushions with a heavy sigh, taking a long drink before getting into that mess. Her brother’s gaze didn’t once waver from her face, looking for any indication that he needed to get in her car and go kick somebody’s ass. It was sweet. Funny as hell, but sweet. Part of her would pay to see that fight, though. It could go either way depending on who wanted the win more.

“I found out yesterday that he had a situation a while back where someone he was sleeping with got pregnant and tried to milk him for all he was worth. And then told him she miscarried, and he found out weeks later that she lost the baby well before she even told him about it. It’s even more convoluted than it sounds, but when I first told him he asked if I was doing it for money. Whether he meant if I’d gotten knocked up or was lying about it, I still don’t know. He knew the truth when I told him, but went into self-defense mode. Anyway, I–”

“Why the fuck would you be doing it for money?”

“Well… He didn’t know who I was. Obviously I did it on purpose the first few times we hung out, but after that it just got to a point where it didn’t come up? So he didn’t know. But don’t worry, I plan on giving him shit about it for the rest of my natural life. Once I die, I’ll give him the occasional spook, too.”

“This isn’t funny, Aelin,” Aedion said flatly, lips pressed so tightly together they had disappeared.

“It isn’t,” she agreed. “But I’m pretty sure he’s willing to grovel for my forgiveness until we both die. Don’t worry, I’m going to make him work for it.”

“That’s my girl,” he grinned, bumping their knees together.

“I didn’t even know who he was until after he accused me, and–” Aelin was cut off by an abrupt cackle that startled her so badly she splashed water on herself. She scowled at Aedion, smacking him in the shoulder.

“What the fuck do you mean you didn’t know who he was?!” Incredulity dripped from every letter and matched his expression perfectly. Aedion was gaping like a fish. “He’s the most famous soccer player– no, forget soccer. The man is probably the most famous living athlete right now, period.”

“He told me he was a high school soccer coach! I didn’t think we were both lying about who we were!” She cried. Aedion’s whole body shook as he laughed at her. Even as she hit him again, she was fighting off laughter of her own.

“How did you find out the truth?”

“Lys wanted to know what he looked like. So she just googled a few key words hoping for a news article about his team or something. Lo and behold, it was him in his stupid blue jersey looking fine as hell even while drenched in sweat.” Aelin chuckled, shaking her head. “I’m sure mom, dad, and grandpa will all be thrilled I’ve made my way back into the soccer world.”

“If your baby isn’t a soccer prodigy by the time they can walk, Rowan should request a paternity test.” Aelin punched his bicep as hard as she could. Aedion howled with laughter as he rubbed at the hurt. She was hoping to leave a nasty bruise.

“He’s the only guy I’ve been with in…” Aelin puffed out her cheeks, eyes narrowing as she stared out the window to backtrack on her love life. When she came up empty handed on a time frame her lips morphed into a frown. “That’s so embarrassing I’m not even going to go down that rabbit hole.”

“Have you talked to him about Sam?” All of the joy from the morning was blown to tiny pieces. The blood in her veins thickened, turning into ice and making her shiver.

“I’m going to need a nap if we’re going to talk about that,” she declared, rising to her feet and heading toward her bedroom.

“We’re talking about this later,” he shouted after her, and she merely waved him off with the flick of her wrist. For that discussion, she needed to be fully rested with a full belly of chocolate hazelnut cake.

Just before she rolled over to go to sleep, Aelin checked her phone. A text was immediately fired off to Lysandra reading BITCH! I’m too hormonal for a surprise like this!!! Which was quickly followed up with I love you. Thank you.

Before allowing herself to drift into the waiting arms of unconscious bliss, she opened her message thread with Rowan. A text had come through an hour ago, likely just after he woke up. The idea that he texted her to start off his day did things to her that she wasn’t willing to face.

>> Just checking in. You didn’t let me know you got home safe last night.

It was hard to ignore her emotions when he did shit like that. They hadn’t parted on the most outstanding terms. She could have forgiven him and they could have gone back to how things were. Instead she told him she needed space, told him not to touch her in that way because it had sparked things that she wanted to ignore for now. There was so much to process and there was no room for error.

It was such a casual intimacy, him brushing her hair out of her face. In another world where he hadn’t stomped on her trust like a twig, he would have been kissed for it. Everything about the way he just looked at her, for gods sake, sent sparks exploding through her. Aelin knew she couldn’t let her emotions lead her on this. It had backfired before, and she couldn’t let it happen again. Like she had told Lysandra, she just needed to be sure about him.

Still, she felt a little guilty for not telling him she made it home okay.

<< Hi, sorry. Safe and sound, don’t worry. Had an early morning and now I’m going back to sleep for a bit. I’ll let you know if I start dying.

<< That was a joke. I’m entirely fine. Please don’t speed down here like a bat out of hell.

Her thumbs hovered anxiously over the screen, the blinking cursor mocking her. It was weird how quickly things had gone from amazing to awkward between them. Making jokes seemed weird when they still had things to work through and talk about.

Worse than the awkward tension that had settled over them like a fresh winter’s snow, she wanted to tell him that Aedion was in town. That she wanted them to officially meet. Not as two athletes, but just as people. Maybe crowded around a table at the Neon Moon, the two of them spouting off soccer stats and reliving match highlights from World Cup games.

That scared her. It made her stomach turn and her ribs constrict until it hurt. It filled her muscles with sand and made it hard to move. Aelin didn’t want to think about what that meant, so she didn’t tell him about Aedion, didn’t mention how much she wanted them to meet and get along. Instead, she sent a much simpler text before she rolled over and fell asleep.

<< I hope you have a good day.

~*~

The sun was setting and casting a beautiful golden glow over the city as Aelin and Aedion walked arm in arm down the street. What was supposed to be a few hour nap turned into a full seven hour sleep, but her cousin didn’t complain. After freshening up with a shower, she made quick work of a little makeup and an outfit she felt good about herself in. Lately all she had been wearing to the office was leggings and oversized shirts.

Aelin dragged Aedion down the sidewalk with their final location just around the corner. Tonight the pair were taking on the Neon Moon. She knew that he was going to love everything about it. The gritty but slightly sophisticated feel of it reminded her so much of the Staghorn back home, and Aedion loved finding hidden gems like this one. On the rare occasion that they had been able to travel together, their main goal was always finding the coolest bars and cocktail lounges in every city. The only difference was that tonight, and for the next several months, Aelin wouldn’t be running up the tab with him.

It was a good night to be here. The crowd was to be expected on a Sunday evening, but it wasn’t too noisy. There was a small table back in the far corner that she was quick to grab while he gathered their drinks at the bar. Aedion would no doubt come back with some sort of bourbon cocktail for himself and either a water or a mocktail of sorts for her to sip on while they waited for food.

A pretty waitress swiftly stopped by the table and Aelin immediately put in an order for soft pretzel nuggets and beer cheese. It had always been one of her favorite snacks, and over the last few weeks she found that she could almost always keep the pillowy bites down. Baby seemed to like those, which was great, because they were her favorite thing at the Neon Moon.

“You’re right about the Staghorn vibe,” Aedion said as he slid into the chair across from her. “I definitely get that.”

“This is where I met Rowan.” She pulled the fruity looking beverage from his hands, smiling a little when the flavor of lavender exploded across her tongue. It was nothing crazy, just a simple ginger ale with lavender syrup added, but it had become her go-to when she stopped in. Something about the lavender and ginger soda soothed her rioting belly. Plus, it was absolutely delicious. Connall must have seen her come in with Aedion if he knew to make it for her.

“What was he doing in Varese?”

“Friends. He has an apartment here, too. He says it’s easier to be low-key here than it is in Doranelle,” she shrugged and took another drink. “Fenrys Moonbeam’s twin brother Connall owns the pub. We’re friends, I think.”

“You and Fenrys or you and Connall?” Aedion’s eyes were scanning the room, checking out all the decorations that lined the walls.

“Connall. I’m assuming he made the drinks because I ask for this every time I come in.”

“I knew he looked familiar,” Aedion half-mumbled to himself. Aelin smiled, but it faltered when his eyes widened in the direction of the bar. Her stomach flipped and she started silently praying to the gods that she wasn’t going to look over and see Rowan sitting at the bar.

But it wasn’t Rowan that caught Aedion’s attention. It was a golden-haired man who looked just as surprised as Aedion did, though his full lips were starting to twist into a smirk. His long curls were wild, falling around his shoulders in ringlets. One side was tucked behind his ear, completely exposing one half of his perfectly chiseled face. The man was beautiful. There was no other word in the dictionary to describe him.

He looked so much like Connall, Fenrys’s coloring seemed to add a little more life to his face. She had ample time to take him in as he made a beeline for their table, an amber beer bottle in hand. While Connall was all dark shadows and whispered promises in a dimly lit room, Fenrys was life that came directly from the sun. His skin was a darker shade of brown than his brother’s, probably from spending so much time outside soaking up the sun’s rays during practice. And though his eyes were just as dark of an onyx as his twin’s, Fenrys’s seemed to glow as they settled on her face.

Before she had time to fully process what was happening, Fenrys had grabbed a chair and pulled it right up beside hers. He plopped down, their thighs nearly touching. The table shook when he dropped his elbow onto it, his chin resting on his first as he looked directly at Aelin.

“I have been absolutely dying to meet you,” he drawled, eyes jumping over every inch of her face. Aelin couldn’t help it. She started smiling, too.

“Fenrys.” Not a question. This was definitely the fair side to Connall’s dark coin.

“The assistant coach, at your service,” he winked, that cocky smirk never leaving his mouth. Her laugh was involuntary, lighting up the dim corner they sat in. Aedion looked lost, but Fenrys’s dark eyes pulled from her just long enough to look at him and extend his free hand. Everything about the man had a relaxed and almost giddy air about him. “Aedion Ashryver, it’s a pleasure to meet you. How’s your knee these days? I was bummed as hell about your injury.”

Aedion shook his hand, shrugging one shoulder, “Twinges when the weather is bad and gets achy in the winter, but doesn’t give me too much trouble. The pleasure is mine, by the way. Huge fan.”

“And I of you.” The interaction made her feel lighter somehow. There were times when Aedion still got extremely upset about his knee, especially if it was brought up in the context of how great his career could have been. This was one of the times where she didn’t sense an impending doom spiral. She would have to thank Fenrys for addressing it tastefully when Aedion wasn’t listening.

Fenrys’s eyes turned back to Aelin, cheek still squished against his fist. Up close she noticed little wrinkles around his eyes like he spent so much time laughing that it carved little canyons and valleys into his skin. Rowan always called him a pain in the ass, but she had a feeling it had more to do with jokes and teasing comments than anything else. Good. Rowan needed that in his life, even if it was in the form of annoyance.

“Whitethorn has been gatekeeping you. I’ve been begging for an introduction because anybody that can draw him out of his constant state of brooding is worth meeting.” Fenrys paused, his eyes dipping down to her fingertips that rested against her belly. “Congratulations, I think?”

“Thank you. I’m happy about it. A little more every day,” she confessed, brushing her thumbs in abstract shapes over her t-shirt.

“I know he said something stupid–” Aelin cut him off with a snort. Calling it stupid was an understatement, but the mirth in Fenrys’s eyes told her that he was well aware. “How much are you going to make him pay for it?”

“I’m nowhere near done, if that gives you any indication.” It wasn’t that she wanted to be mean to Rowan. It was just that there was no parallel universe where she wasn’t a little brash. Teasing was her second language. Aedion had frequently called it her love language, and he wasn’t wrong. It was almost like a test of sorts. An initiation. If he couldn’t weather the jokes and smart-ass remarks, they weren’t meant to have a relationship beyond co-parenting their child.

One of the biggest red flags she ever ignored was Sam not understanding or approving of her humor. The way he had made her swallow everything down and bottle up her personality until she was merely a shell of herself and couldn’t even pretend around her family anymore had been a mental battle she lost. It wasn’t the worst of everything she went through with him, but Aelin wasn’t going to lose herself again. Not for a man. Not even because they had to raise a baby together. That could be done at arms length with minimal contact unless necessary.

Fenrys was grinning at her, completely ignorant to the dark spiral she had just been on. Something like mischief danced in his eyes as he said, “What would you say if I had an idea to make him squirm?”

“For your own enjoyment, or ours?” Aedion asked warily. Always the protective big brother making sure nobody was laughing at Aelin’s expense.

“Why not both? I’m team Aelin. And if it’s a hard divorce, she wins my custody. Whitethorn was a dumbass and a little joke won’t kill him. It might take a few years but he’ll start laughing about it eventually.” Fenrys gave a dismissive wave through the air. The relaxed nature of him made her lean back a little in her chair. While Connall was easy going in all of their interactions, Fenrys was the amplified version. What would it take for him to snap about something? Going off first impressions, it seemed like a lot.

Fenrys was looking at her expectantly, almost hopefully. Like he somehow knew about the sass and swagger she liked to carry for a security blanket. He felt like a kindred spirit, and Aelin liked it. If things went sideways she just might have a shiny new friend to get her through it when her family couldn’t be by her side.

So Aelin smiled at him and leaned forward, bracing her arms on the table. Across from them, Aedion swore quietly. He’d been on the receiving end of her bullshit for twenty-five years. By the looks of it, she had just met someone that would stoke that fire into a roaring flame. Whether he was cursing the chaos the pair of them would bring upon Rowan, or hoping that it didn’t turn on him eventually, she wasn’t sure.

Either way, Aelin was so in.

“What do you have in mind?”

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highqueenofelfhame · 1 year

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rowaelin // 4.4k // ciwyw masterlist // masterlist

a/n: the next fic update will be some kind of haunted. if you haven't already, please give it a read. it's going to be a fun ride. chapter ten will come a few days after that update <3

Golden hair tickled his nose when he woke. The sweet smell of Aelin’s shampoo had him taking a deep breath, savoring every second of her wrapped in his arms. He remembered tugging her closer to him just as he drifted off, but he was surprised they hadn’t appeared to move an inch while they napped. If anything, they were closer together. Their legs were tangled, one of hers sandwiched between his. An arm was slung over his waist and her face was buried in his chest.

He thought she was still sleeping, but her fingertips started drawing lazy patterns over his back, like she heard the change in his breathing and knew he was awake. Mala burn him, he felt her touch through his whole body. While he was still exhausted, Rowan had never felt so awake.

“Are you okay?” He murmured into her hair, taking a chance and pressing his lips to the top of her head as his hand ran up and down her back.

“I’m nauseous.” Aelin’s reply was a whisper swallowed up by the cotton of his shirt.

“I promise I won’t get mad if you throw up on me. It might even finally make us even,” he teased. A soft chuckle from her lips sank through his shirt, goosebumps blooming over his arms and neck.

“The way you smell…” she hesitated, rubbing her nose against into his torso. Rowan waited, fully prepared to lunge for the shower if it was making things worse for her. “It soothes me.”

Rowan had to swallow a swell of emotion as he whispered, “Then we can stay like this as long as you want.”

His arm slid beneath her head, carefully as to not jostle her too much. Aelin’s only answer was the swirling of her fingers over his back and what he swore was a soft brush of her lips against his chest as she melted into him completely.

~*~

Being wrapped up in Rowan chased her nausea away after another half hour. They didn’t speak unless he was checking in to see how she was doing. Long fingers combed through her hair, pausing to twist at the ends. She was quire sure he braided a few pieces at one point before dismantling them gently. Occasionally she would feel the whisper of a kiss to the top her head. Aelin hadn’t felt so at peace since they had last been tangled together like vineyard vines.

Once her stomach didn’t seem to be revolting against her, she pulled back enough to look at his face and found Rowan’s bright green eyes peering down at her. Concern lay heavy in his eyes, like he was hesitant to let her go. When she offered him a small smile, though, his features immediately softened. However subdued his returning grin was, the twitching of his mouth made it clear he was holding a bigger smile back. It was so cute that the urge to kiss him was damn near overwhelming.

“Better?” He asked just before she could act on that impulse. Tattooed fingers still trickled over her skin, now moving to her upper arms since her back was harder to reach. Aelin nodded and tucked a piece of hair behind her ear as he said, “I have a question.”

“I have an answer.” Readjusting where she lay, she moved one hand under her head and dropped her other back over his waist. Their lips were inches apart, and she caught his eyes dipping down to her mouth. Being so close was tempting the both of them, it seemed, but she knew he wouldn’t push that line unless she did first. If he asked, she very well might say yes.

“I think you called me your boyfriend this morning,” he said carefully, like she was running water trying to slip through his fingers at any given moment.

“That’s not a question,” she pointed out, one eyebrow quirking up.

“I…” Rowan’s eyes darted over her face then up to the ceiling while he gathered his thoughts. “Does that mean I’m forgiven?”

Aelin wasn’t entirely sure how to answer that. The short answer was yes, for the most part. The long answer? That was complicated. There were doubts swimming in her head about being in a relationship. Sometimes she didn’t know if she could ever be all into one ever again. It didn’t mean she didn’t want to be, but after the last one blew up so spectacularly in her face and left her burned and scarred… Opening her heart like that was scary.

“It means… It means that you’re on probation.” Each word was slowly pulled from her mouth. The slight disappointment on his face tugged at every string that led to her heart and forced her to sit up and scrub at her face with her hands.

“I’m sorry if I’m pushing,” Rowan said immediately, sitting up next to her and doing his best to add a few inches between them. The left side of her body was cold without his warmth, and against her better judgment she put her hand on his thigh to keep him from wiggling too far away.

“You’re not. It’s– I–”

“I understand if you need more time and space to work this out,” he told her, letting her weave her fingers through his. Gods, she didn’t have enough words in her vocabulary to fully express how much it wasn’t him, not really.

“I’m not ready to talk about it yet. There are things I want to tell you that I’ve never told another soul. Not Aedion, not Lysandra, definitely not my parents. But there are things that I haven’t fully coped with yet and I need to figure it out first for myself. It isn’t… this sounds so cliche, but it isn’t you. Not entirely. I’m not holding how you reacted against you, Rowan. Especially not after what you told me about Lyria. I just need to figure myself out first.”

“Is it connected to why you didn’t want our relationship to become anything more than something fun?” A tattooed finger traced the tendons and veins on the back of her hand. When she looked at his face, Rowan paused and looked up at her.

“Yes,” she said softly. “I… I was in a really bad relationship. It took me a long time to get out of it. Sometimes I feel like I’ve only really just started coming back into myself. I have thrown myself into work so aggressively since I started the foundation to distract myself. But you… you made me feel awake for the first time in a really long time. I’m not ready to talk about it yet. I know I’ll get there eventually, but it’s so much to unravel. I just… I need you to be patient with me.”

It was a teensy, tiny baby step forward. It was something, though. More than she thought she could offer him to begin with. The truth of the words scared her more than anything else. She did want to talk to him about everything, but that also meant allowing herself to trust him fully.

Part of her brain didn’t want to allow it. Freely trusting had bitten her in the ass with very sharp teeth and shredded her down to nothing. Ever since Aedion showed up, she wondered if Lysandra had been so worried about her spiraling that she sent him to stop it before it got too out of hand. Up until she decided to make the trip to Wendlyn, she had been a shell of her former self. When discussing it with her family, while they fully supported the expansion of Fireheart, they had decided they wouldn’t– or couldn’t– leave her on her own for the several months she would be living out of the country.

On the other hand, they seemed to understand that getting out of Orynth for a little while would be good for her. So many memories, more bad than good, haunted every corner of the city she loved so fiercely. It was agreed that it would be beneficial for her to get away for a little while.

Her parents had hated the idea initially. With her anxiety and depression at an all time high, letting her out of sight for more than a few days or weeks was pushing it. Her dad had come around first, then talked her mom into being okay with it. By the time she was packed and ready to leave, her mental health was on the rise. Just the idea of getting away from Orytnh had already started to lift her spirits. The night before she left she vowed to video call at least once a week, and so far she had stuck to her word.

The night she met Rowan, something changed. Aelin couldn’t put her finger on what it was, exactly, but somewhere between their banter and his determination to make her appreciate soccer, something was thrumming through her veins again. It was like he had shaken her awake, a new clarity settling into her mind. For the first time in years, she felt like herself.

And it scared the absolute shit out of her.

“Hey. Where did you go?” His voice pulled her mind back to the present as his finger hooked under her chin and guided her face to look at him. Rowan’s brows were pulled in tightly together, worry written all over his face as plainly as if he’d vocalized it.

“I’m sorry,” she said quietly, trying to look away from the intensity in his gaze. He didn’t let her.

“I’m not going anywhere, Aelin. I can be patient. I can and will give you whatever you want, whatever you need. I’ll be here.”

She wasn’t sure when tears had started to slip down her cheeks, but they were damp. Rowan’s face softened as he leaned forward and used his thumbs to wipe the tears from her face one by one. When he leaned forward and pressed the softest kiss against her forehead, then her temple. A desperation to melt into him rose within her like a wave, but anxiety about her past wouldn’t let her give into the temptation.

“One more question,” Rowan said once her tears were dry, pulling back until just their noses were touching. The idle pattern his thumb traced below her ear felt so lovely she couldn’t bring herself to open her eyes.

“Hm?”

“If you’re calling me your boyfriend, do I get to call you my girlfriend?” It wasn’t what she was expecting, and she had her suspicions that he was asking partially as a distraction. Either way, a surprised laugh slipped through her lips as she looked up at him.

“You can call it whatever you want to, Ro.”

When he smiled, broad and unrestrained before pressing another sweet, lingering kiss to her temple, a thought clanged through her like a bell. Maybe it was a warning. Maybe it was a celebration. She couldn’t be sure.

What Aelin knew was that she wanted to fall in love with him. And that was the single most terrifying thought she’d ever had in her life.

~*~

A while later, everyone was showered and dressed to go out for dinner. Aelin had emerged from her room in a simple, oversized t-shirt dress, and Rowan was struck once again by how beautiful she was. It wasn’t the first time it had hit him that day, but the little smile she gave him was enough to make his stomach flip almost violently.

Aelin drove, and despite Rowan insisting Aedion sit in the front, he rode in the passenger seat beside her. The drive to the heart of the city was quick, the two cousins arguing over music choices almost up until she parked the car. The way they ribbed each other reminded Rowan so much of Enda and Sellene, and he was absolutely positive that she would perfectly fit into his family with ease.

Though the restaurant was busy for a Monday evening, they didn’t have to wait for a table. Aedion called ahead before they left the apartment and they were quickly ushered back to a table in the back corner. Apparently, this was one of Aelin’s favorite places and she often ordered soup for lunch on days she wasn’t feeling well at work.

“Are you feeling okay?” Rowan asked once they were seated. Ever since the orange juice incident, he was hyper-aware of how sensitive she was to smells. The delicious aroma of pasta and garlic didn’t seem to bother her, though, because she nodded eagerly while opening her menu.

“I’m fucking starving.”

“I’m pretty sure you’ve eaten more in the last few days than I’ve ever seen you eat in your entire life,” Aedion joked, and Aelin gave him a flat look.

“Clearly you don’t remember dance competition season very well.” Rowan’s eyebrows went up, eyes snagging on her face again.

“Dance competitions?” He asked.

“I danced competitively until I graduated high school. Rehearsals were intense leading up to it, and even though my instructor was constantly harping about watching my figure,” she paused to roll her eyes, “I ate damn near constantly.”

“She used to eat us all out of house and home,” Aedion agreed, to which Aelin snorted.

“Don’t even start with that shit.” Aelin shook her head as she looked at Rowan, pointing at Aedion with her arm stretched across the table and a finger in his face. She was quick to pull her hand back onto their side of the table when her cousin moved to grab it. “I know you’ll be able to relate to this, but our moms had to double every recipe we ever had for dinner because this asshole would eat enough to feed a family of four in one sitting.”

“My mom did the same thing. If there was ever anything leftover I would wind up eating it later in the night,” Rowan confirmed, and Aelin laughed.

“I feel like you don’t eat quite that much anymore, but you get pretty close. I always wondered why you ate so much after coaching a game. Things made so much more sense when I found out you were a dirty little liar.” Rowan didn’t have time to wonder if it was a genuine jab or not– her brilliant smile told him she was teasing. He shrugged his shoulders as he looked back at the menu, fighting back a grin of his own.

“Go easy on him, Fireheart. He had to make sure you weren’t in it for the money.” Aelin cackled so loudly at Aedion’s little quip that she received a few glares from nearby tables. Despite the joke being wholly at his expense, Rowan chuckled, too. Her hand found his knee under the table and squeezed.

The waitress saved him from the jokes going any further, each of them ordering drinks and Aelin requesting two appetizers to start. Aedion had given her a look like she was proving his earlier statement. She merely sat back, patted her stomach and said, “I’m eating for two.”

~*~

Rowan had just finished his second old-fashioned and while he didn’t feel buzzed in the slightest, he was more relaxed than he had been all week.

Dinner was nothing more than scraps and crumbs on their plates, their glasses empty. Aelin had her chin in her hand while Aedion talked about working on the business side of things for Orynth’s football team. Everything he had to do could be done from anywhere, which was why he had dropped everything to fly out to see Aelin.

They had filled Rowan in on his surprise arrival, and while he felt guilty that she was struggling so much, he was happy they were getting time together. Aelin had reassured him that it wasn’t necessarily about what he said to her, and more about having always been surrounded by family, yet his heart still twinged that he added additional stress. The comforting pat she gave his thigh did little to quell his worries, but the fact that she was touching him in a casual way again was a step forward he couldn’t ignore.

Rowan stole the check from the waitress before either of the other two could even reach for it. He had seen Aelin pull her wallet out of her purse and refused to let her pay for anyone. Maybe it was a subtle way of trying to amend things, maybe it was just how his mother raised him. Maybe it was both and he wanted to prove it didn’t matter.

Rowan handed his card back to the waitress and leaned back in his chair, one arm draping over the back of Aelin’s. He toyed with the ends of her hair until she cleared her throat and nodded at Rowan. With an eyebrow raised, he turned to find a boy, no older than seven, with black hair and wide, brown eyes hesitantly approaching the table. A sketchbook was clutched to his chest and his fingers were wrapped tightly around a pen. The shirt was the same color as Rowan’s home jersey, and he was willing to bet the logo was hiding behind his arms.

A big part of Rowan loved fan interactions, especially with kids. Another part of him was nervous about what Aelin would think. Was it off putting that these things tended to happen to him when he went anywhere besides the Neon Moon? They were just starting to make some sort of progress. He didn’t want this to be what chased her away.

Aelin surprised him, though, by leaning forward so she could address the boy directly as she said, “Hi sweetheart. What’s your name?”

“Finn,” he said, twisting his mouth to the side as he looked down at his sketchbook. A few tables over, a woman around his age watched him carefully. It must be his mother.

“Hi, Finn. My name is Aelin. This is my friend Rowan and my cousin Aedion,” she paused while he nodded, but he said nothing else like he was too nervous to speak. “I’m going to go out on a limb here and guess that you’re a big soccer fan.”

“Football,” Rowan murmured to her, and the boy cracked a wide grin as he nodded. Rowan smiled back at him, unable to resist when he was missing his two front teeth. “Would you like an autograph?”

Again, his head bobbed up and down, flopping his hair into his eyes. Aelin chuckled beside him, sitting back while Rowan took the pen and paper from Finn and scribbled his signature across a blank page.

“If you want get your mom, she could take a picture of you two,” Aelin offered, and the little boy looked out of his mind excited as he weaved through the tables to get his mother.

“I’m so sorry,” Rowan said softly, running his hand up and down her thigh. Aedion watched from across the table, a content smile on his face.

“Don’t be sorry. It’s sweet.” A weight lifted off his chest at her words and he nodded in thanks, giving her knee a light squeeze as Finn and his mom approached.

Since they were ready to leave, Aelin and Aedion excused themselves from the table as to not be in the picture. Within a few moments it was over and done with and he joined the cousins at the front of the restaurant, leading Aelin out with a hand on her back.

“Do you have to go back tonight or can you stay another day?” Aelin asked as they walked toward the car. Aedion walked several steps ahead of them, hands in his pockets and whistling a tune as the sky turned from shades of pink and orange to purple.

“I go back Wednesday. Malakai asked me what was going on, I told him I had some things in my personal life, and he told me to take a couple days if I needed them.” Malakai hadn’t seemed upset about Rowan missing two days of practice. He wouldn’t be playing at this week's game, anyway, and his coach was well aware that he never let himself slip out of shape.

“Then I suppose I should call my mother tomorrow and properly introduce the two of you. Dad, too, if he’s around.” She sighed and patted his shoulder as he pulled open the driver’s side door for her, waiting until she was fully inside to shut the door.

Rowan hadn’t formally met anyone’s parents probably ever, unles the girl he took to senior prom counter. Hopefully he made a good impression.

~*~

He wasn’t sure what woke him up, all he knew was that when he reached across Aelin’s to pull her closer to him, her side was empty and cool. The bedroom was bathed in night, the only light squeezing through the gap beneath the bedroom door. Though the apartment was mostly quiet, Rowan was immediately worried that she had found herself sick.

He threw his legs over the side of the bed, not bothering to grab his shirt before entering the hall. The bathroom door was open, but the room was dark. Out here away from the white noise of the fan on her bedside table, Rowan heard crinkling from the kitchen and followed the sound to investigate.

Aelin stood at the counter facing toward him using nothing more than the dim light above the stove to see. All she wore was a sports bra and the pair of shorts she’d stripped down to for sleeping. A chip bag was in one hand and she was staring down into a bowl, using some sort of silverware to poke at the contents within. He paused and leaned against the door frame, folding his arms over his chest and waiting for her to notice him.

When she lifted the utensil to her mouth, something globbed off from the bottom and either fell back into the bowl or onto the counter, he couldn’t be sure. The look on her face was pure joy as she brought it to her mouth and–

“What the fuck, Rowan!” She squealed, fork clattering onto the counter. The chips in her hand fell to the floor and whatever dark substance she was about to devour splattered on the counter. Her eyes darted nervously toward Aedion’s door, likely worry he would wake up from her shouting, but no sounds came from beyond the hall.

“What are you doing in here, love?” Rowan prowled toward her, noticing the blush that took over her cheeks the closer he got.

“I wanted a snack,” she bristled, bending down to pick the chip bag up off the floor. When she righted herself, he saw it was a bag of Flaming Hot Cheetos. Leaning one hip against the counter he stuck his hand in to pull one out.

“What is this?” He pointed toward the bowl with his chip before popping it into his mouth. It could have been the light, but he was pretty sure Aelin was red from head to toe. With her lips glued together it was clear he wouldn’t be getting a direct answer out of her. Rowan leaned down and sniffed, his eyebrows disappearing into his hairline. “Chocolate?”

“Mhm.” She picked up the mess of a blob from the counter, and it was then that he realized what she was doing.

“Are you dipping hot cheetos into chocolate?”

“It’s dark chocolate.” Like that made it any better. His bewildered expression didn’t waver enough for her liking because she frowned at him and pointed toward her room. “If you’re going to judge me, get out of my kitchen.”

“You’re dipping hot cheetos into melted chocolate.”

“Spicy chocolate is a thing!” She cried, smacking at his chest. Rowan’s lips twitched at her defensive nature. Even her fingers had chocolate on them. From this close, he could see the corner of her mouth did, too.

“Where did you even get this idea?” Another cheeto was stolen from the bag in her hand. He hadn’t had these in years.

“Well, I just,” she sighed, brushing her hair from her face exasperatedly. To save her from fighting with her hair, he moved behind her and carefully pulled it into a ponytail. Once it was secured with the hair tie on his wrist, she mumbled a thank you. Aelin looked the part of a five year old getting caught with her hand in the cookie jar, and it was fucking adorable. “I was just laying there and wanted something spicy but then I wanted something sweet. And then I had the brilliant idea of sweet and spicy at the same time and I just couldn’t stop thinking about it.”

“So you–”

“It’s not that weird, okay! I’ve seen and heard other people do worse and it’s so good.” She dipped one half way and held it up, twisting to look at him over shoulder. Rowan shook his head, ready to apologize for not wanting to try it, but Aelin simply shrugged and dropped it into the bowl.

“I’m going to take your word for it,” he teased, rubbing his hands over her shoulders. Aelin leaned back into him, her body warm where their bare skin touched. Her eyes once again focused on using the fork to coat the cheeto in dark chocolate. When she lifted it out, it was a dark little lump. The bowl being nearly empty with half-solid chocolate glued to its walls had him wondering how long she’d been out here doing this. “Why aren’t you just dipping?”

“Because the whole thing has to be covered for the ratio,” she said, like it was the dumbest question she had ever heard. Like it was common sense, and not just a concoction her pregnant brain had made up at three in the morning.

“Right, right.” Rowan agreed like it was obvious. That seemed to satisfy her because she hummed contentedly before putting the little log into her mouth, chewing slowly to savor it.

“Issogood,” she mumbled, half moaning. Aelin moaning while he was half awake was the last thing he needed to hear. It made his body high alert in all the wrong places, and he stepped out from behind her and nodded toward her bedroom.

“Let’s go back to bed. We can clean this up in the morning and then I’ll take you to get all the spicy chocolate you desire.”

“Promise?” She asked, sucking the half-melted goo from her thumb with wide eyes as she looked up at him. Rowan chuckled, leaning in to press a soft kiss to her forehead.

“I promise.”

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