A Court of Silver Flames - Sarah J. Maas Page 0,216

last year. Another person entirely. She didn’t laugh freely like Mor and Feyre, or smile sweetly like Elain, but she spoke, and engaged, and sometimes smirked. She saw everything, heard everything. Even the fire, which she seemed to ignore. Pride filled his chest at that—and relief. It had only increased when he’d noticed that she’d cared enough about Az’s aloofness to go up to him to chat.

Only Amren ignored her, and Nesta ignored Amren. The tension between them was a living band of lightning. But no one said anything, and they seemed content to pretend the other didn’t exist.

No one offered gifts for the baby, as it went against Fae tradition to do so before a babe was born, fearful of calling bad luck by counting one’s blessings too soon. But Feyre’s birthday gifts were bountiful—perhaps glaringly so.

Cassian’s gifts were the usual odd medley: an ancient manuscript on warfare from Rhys, a bag of beef jerky from Azriel—I literally couldn’t think of anything you’d enjoy more, Az had said when Cassian had laughed—and a hideously ugly green sweater from Mor that made his skin look jaundiced. Amren had given him a travel set of spices—so you don’t have to suffer whenever you’re in Illyria—and Elain gave him a specially designed ceramic mug with a lid that he could travel with, bespelled against breaking, to keep tea warm for hours.

Feyre gave him a painting, which he opened in private, and had to fight back tears before he hid it behind the chair. A portrait of him, Azriel, and Rhys, standing atop Ramiel after the Blood Rite. Bloody and bruised and filthy, faces filled with grim triumph, their hands linked as they touched them to the monolith at its peak. She must have looked into Rhys’s mind for the image.

Cassian had kissed her cheek, her shield down for the moment, and murmured his thanks—as if that would ever cover it. He’d cherish the painting for the rest of his life.

He and Lucien did not exchange gifts, though the male had brought a gift for Feyre and one for his mate, who barely thanked him after opening the pearl earrings. Cassian’s heart strained at the pain etching deep into Lucien’s face as he tried to hide his disappointment and longing. Elain only shrank further into herself, no trace of that newfound boldness to be seen.

Cassian could feel Nesta watching him, but when he looked, her face was unreadable. No one had gotten her presents except for Feyre and Elain, who had together given her a year’s worth of book-buying credit to her favorite bookshop in the city. It was capped at around three hundred books, which they seemed to think would be more than she could read in a year. Five hundred books’ worth would have been a safer bet, he knew.

But then Azriel approached her. Nesta had blinked at the gift the shadowsinger set in her lap. “I didn’t get you anything,” she murmured to Az, her cheeks turning rosy.

“I know,” he said, smiling. “I don’t mind.”

Cassian tried to focus on the present in his hands—the silver comb and brush set he’d gotten Mor, engraved with her name—but his gaze snagged on Nesta’s fingers as she opened the small box. She peered at what was inside, then looked at Azriel in confusion. “What is it?”

Azriel plucked up the small folded silver wand within and unfurled it. One end held a clip, the other a small glass sphere. “You can attach this to whatever book you’re reading, and the little ball of faelight will shine. So you don’t have to squint when you’re reading at night.”

Nesta touched the glass ball, no bigger than her thumbnail, and faelight flickered within, casting a bright, easy glow upon her lap. She tapped it again and it turned off. And then she jumped to her feet and flung her arms around Azriel.

The room went silent for a beat.

But Azriel chuckled and squeezed her gently. Cassian smiled to see it—to see them. “Thank you,” Nesta said, quickly pulling away to marvel at the device. “It’s brilliant.”

Azriel blushed and stepped back, shadows swirling.

Nesta looked over to Cassian, and that light was once more in her eyes. Enough that he almost gave her his gift there and then.

But considering how last year’s attempt had gone, considering that since the ball she’d stayed out of his bed … he held back.

In case she shattered his heart all over again.

By one in the morning, Nesta’s eyes ached with exhaustion. The others were