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azsazz · 1 year

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Cupid's Chokehold (Part 4)

Azriel x Reader

Summary: You are a Cupid, a nearly extinct creature of Prythian. When you get caught trying to shoot Elain with your arrow, well, it’s a little hard to explain what you’re trying to do.

Warnings: N/A

Word Count: 2,351

[Part 1] [Part 2] [Part 3]

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For an alleged spymaster of the Night Court, the male surely asked a lot of questions.

He’d shone up early this morning to the training ring with your beloved armor and bow to which you’d excitedly snatched from his grasp and examined your possessions for damage.

There’d been a moment during the interaction that Azriel thought you might leap forward and hug him for bringing your weapons back and he found himself wanting to feel your body pressed up against his like that first time he’d caught you, found himself aching for it.

He’d cleared his throat instead, reveling in your excitement because surely no one had ever looked at him like that before. The eyes you gave him when you were finished inspecting the golden bow, bright and a wide smile on your face that made his heart flutter in his chest so quickly that he’d nearly had to gasp for air.

He understood your love for your weaponry, Truth-Teller had not left his person in centuries, no matter what. There’s a pang in his chest as he thinks about what it would be like to have his weapon taken from him by strangers. It would be like standing naked in front of his captors, and as his eyes trail down your glowing skin in the morning sun, he lets his mind wonder, imagining you with less and less on.

You pull the fitted gold breastplate over your head and it snags his attention, cheeks feeling hot as he averts his gaze from the metal that only accentuates your curves.

Mother, why did he agree to this again?

To distract himself he;d begun asking questions about your line of work, and it surprised even himself as he’d never been a male of many words. A part of him just wanted to hear the sweet lilt of your voice, your accent a mix of the lands across Prythian and beyond.

“For someone in so much armor, you were surprisingly easy to catch,” the shadowsinger quips, trailing through the thick brush behind you. Azriel assesses the golden nature of your coverings; the pristine white cloth you don beneath the shiny fitted metal. It would take nothing for him to rip through the thin fabric, maybe slightly more work to rid the breastplate from your body but he’d manage. He shakes his head, scolding himself for his wandering thoughts, forcing his eyes away from your clothing. Your wings are the same, nearly blinding like the snow, brighter than even the Winter Court’s storms.

“Not everything has to have such a blunt explanation, shadowsinger,” you roll your eyes, ducking around a branch that he wouldn’t have seen coming if he’d kept imagining filthy thoughts. “Just because I wear armor does not mean I am a warrior the same as you. It symbolizes the parallels between warfare and romance. How love can be invincible.”

“How love can be death, you mean.” Twigs and rocks grind underneath his boots.

You furrow your brows, halting in your spot, spinning on your heel to face him, “What?”

He nearly runs into you, stopping so quickly he flares his wings out so he doesn’t go toppling on top of you. He blinks once, twice before answering. “To be in love is to welcome death. To have a mate is to be blinded. One would rather die than to have their other half die, and to suffer alone is a far worse fate.”

“Are you not tired of suffering alone, Azriel?” you question. Your voice is so soft and pointed that something cracks inside of him. He hadn’t meant to upset you but that’s all he seems to be good for where you’re involved. You don’t wait for his response, twisting on your heel and stalking through the brush, leaving him standing frozen in his spot, dumbfounded.

He slinks behind you without another word, kicking himself for always seeming to say the wrong thing in your presence. He can’t help his curious nature and you’re more intimidating than he’d ever admit. A dangerous female with the beauty to strike him silly before you pierce his heart.

You duck behind a thick oak tree and he follows suit, watching intently as you draw an arrow from your quiver, hooking it into the string of your bow.

“There they are,” you whisper, and he can tell just how much you love love by the biting smile on your face and sparkle in your eye as you admire the couple sneaking through the forest.

It’s an effort to look away from your smile, and Azriel’s heart pounds so loudly in his chest he’s afraid he might scare the lovers away.

But it freezes in his chest when he sees your target.

The oldest son of Autumn, gallivanting with his secret lover through the woods this early in the morning? From the information he gathers quickly, his shadows hissing in his ears, he can tell that she’s a low-born and Eris should be nowhere near her.

Had he learned nothing since Lucien’s terrible fate?

“What if you miss?” he murmurs but his eyes stay glued to the couple. Eris has that familiar sly smirk on his face, the same one he uses to get under Azriel’s own skin, but the female puffs out a breathy laugh and hits him lightly on the shoulder.

She tries to keep walking but Eris is grabbing her so suddenly that you and Azriel tense. The Autumn heir spins the beautiful female around and dips down to kiss her in a fluid movement that has your breath hitching in your throat.

You ached for something like this, something like the love you’d seen throughout your lifetime. So much of it to bask in; gentle caresses of hands, a fleeting kiss, cheeks tinting pink, but it had never been you, couldn’t be, with your job.

Fingers twitching on the string of your bow you swallow harshly, responding, “I never miss.”

It’s true, your arrows have a slight magic to them to keep them on the path to your victim. Where the arrow would land was a separate issue, hence having shot a few someones in the ass before.

Azriel’s eyes flick to you as you take a steadying breath, raising the weapon into position to strike. It’s like that first time all over again, when he’d caught you in the garden at Rhys’ house, calm and still and no idea that he was behind you until he pulled that blade on you.

His words though, feel like he’s sliding that beloved metal blade right through your heart.

“Maybe you shouldn’t.” He places a hand on your shoulder, his hesitant breath caressing your ear as you scrunch your face up in distaste. Azriel’s touch sends shivers up your spine and you need to re-steady your bow.

You shrug his hand off of your shoulder, keeping your aim locked on the pair before you. “I’m beginning to think that you don’t want me to do my job at all, shadowsinger.”

He hears the tenderness in your voice, the fleeting glance you give him, and he curses himself again for making him seem like an ass, but you don’t know Eris, don’t know of Lucien’s mate or his father or the strained connection with his court…should any of them find out–

“You don’t know him, what his father will do–”

“It’s not my place to know,” you grit, clearly irked by the male beside you. You’ve had enough of this. At first he seemed almost eager to tag along, asking all of those leading questions…maybe it was only to gather intel for his High Lord.

You’ll be damned if he stops you this time.

“It is only my place to shoot,” you whisper tightly. Taking aim again. If you don’t shoot now you’ll lose your target.

“Please, (Y/N),” he begs and you falter for a moment as your breath goes shaky. He’d never said your name before, only calling you Cupid. You’re sure it would sound like absolute sin rolling off of his tongue if he were pleading you for something else.

“This could ruin everything between the Night Court and the Autumn Court, you can’t.”

If Eris’ father found out he was rolling around in the bushes with a low-born he’d surely be chased out of the Autumn Court or worse, killed by the hand of the cruel man.

And if that were to happen there would be no choice for a peaceful treaty between his court and theirs.

“I have to,” you grit, blinking back the tears stinging your eyes. He shouldn’t be stopping you like this, shouldn’t be trying to stop you at all. Gods, you should’ve already taken your shot but you don’t know why the tenderness of his voice has you second-guessing the Mother’s mission.

“There has to be others, we can go on a different mission.” He’s still trying to talk you down, has half a mind to send his shadows skittering off into the woods to make the leaves of the bushes rattle, hopefully it’d be enough to scare the two away.

“No,” you bite harshly. It’s a strain to keep your voice low when all you want to do is scream. “It’s going to be them and it’s going to be now.”

“It’s not,” his jaw ticks, fury blazing in his golden gaze. He acts as you release the arrow aimed straight towards the two, still locked together at the lips, snagging the arrow around its slim body, stopping the trajectory.

“What the fuck are you doing?” you hiss, no longer able to hold yourself back. You push to your feet quickly and he follows but he isn’t prepared for the shove you give him and it sends Azriel stumbling back a half-step. “Do you know how dangerous that is? You could’ve been pricked and–”

He stops listening, your voice going muddled as he bites his lip when he wants to preen, even though you’re angry with him. You care about him in some capacity or you wouldn’t be worried about the possibility of him getting hurt.

“What?” you ask sternly, crossing your arms over your chest when you realize that he’s not really paying attention to anything you’re saying, he’s just looking down at you with those gorgeous honeyed eyes, lip tucked between his teeth.

“Nothing, nothing,” he dismisses coolly, the shadow curling around his ear whispers that the Autumn male and his lover have left. He surrenders the arrow to you.

Knocking the arrow back into your bow is useless, a quick glance proving that you’d missed your chance. Your shoulders droop and you’re shoving the arrow back into your quiver strapped across your back, mood sullied because of this male.

“You’ve ruined my mission,” you huff, tucking your arms across your chest. “You wanted to come with me and now you’re interfering. Why can’t you just let me do what I need to do?”

Azriel feels horrible then, he really does, but you don’t want to hear what he has to say, you just want to return to Velaris and hide away in your room until supper.

“I apologize,” he tries, trailing you like a lost puppy through the woods. His tail would be tucked between his legs if he had one, but instead his wings droop slightly behind him at your gloom. “But you don’t understand what this could mean, if you’d shot them.”

“There are many things that I don’t understand, Azriel.” You don’t turn to face him like he wishes you would and he’s stuck staring at the back of your head as you speak. “And I do not have the time, nor wish to comprehend. Everything happens for a reason. If a couple aren’t meant to be but still share a bond, that is fate. If they are madly in love and something dares happen to one of them, that is fate. If they live happily ever after as mates, that is fate. So please, do not tell me what I do and do not know, because I know what I’ve vowed, and that is the truth.”

“If you’d just let me explain–”

“I don’t want you to explain,” you whirl around, chest heaving so harshly your breastplate moves with each breath. Your eyes are blazing with fury. You’re done with this male and his petulance.

“Well I want to,” he growls, temper flaring in response to yours. His resolve snaps, taking a long stride forward, grasping your arms in his own as he backs you up, pinning you against a tree.

Your temper eddies in that moment. He smells of charcoal and sage, intoxicating your senses with it, mind dizzying from the closeness. Every inch of your body that is touching his is on fire – fitting for the Autumn Court – surely your metal crested breastplate will melt between the two of you.

Maybe if you’re lucky it will fuse the two of you together.

“I don’t even think I can look at you right now,” your voice doesn’t sound as meaningful as you want it to.

All you can think about is his calloused fingers caressing your face, so achingly gentle as he traces patterns into your perfect skin like you’re some porcelain doll teetering on the edge of its shelf. His breath fans across your face and your eyelashes flutter. Good, because you meant it when you said you couldn’t look at him, his awfully striking beauty that had sparked something within you even when he was your captor.

“Then close your eyes, darling,” he whispers just as quietly, just as wavered as your words had been. You’re only a hairsbreadth apart now, his towering figure ever so slowly leaning down into yours. All you’d have to do is inhale and your mouth will be pressed up against his.

“Ah,” a smugly lilted voice startles the both of you. Azriel shoves you behind him and you’re quick to reach for an arrow strapped to the side of your normal ones, smelling of ash and sulfur.

“I knew I smelled a bastard in my woods.”

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