This fic is inspired by ManaMadeleine's wonderful story Fracture, and my wish to give Lucien's story more room. And by obsession. Never forget the strength of one's obsession over a book :)

The story is in Lucien's POV, and he's having troubles and should see a therapist, so what he thinks about himself and events is a product of that.

There is actually some talking in the last paragraph. And action in later chapters :)

Things were going down the drain with a speed that left my head spinning.

Feyre flashed me a smile, that viper who had once been my friend, and she could as well have hissed as a snake for the message it conveyed. Feyre, my friend turned enemy.

Passive as I had let the world go by lately, I let Feyre and Tamlin enter the Spring Court manor, arm in arm, a picture of serenity but for that look in Feyre's eyes. As the doors swung close behind them, I remained frozen on the sun-flooded gravel drive, surrounded by light and the scent of roses in the air, and deep and all-consuming emptiness.

The feel of Hybern was still clinging to my skin, the sense of coldness and cruelty sticking to me like a smear of black oil. The new mating bond was shooting through me, the beats of my heart alternating in pumping ice and boiling water through my veins.

Instinct was screaming at me to go get my mate, get her and never let her go. She was mine. She was mine.

Reason was screaming at me to fight instinct down. I had no right to her. I didn't know her. I didn't want her.

Gut feeling was screaming at me to remove Feyre from my home, to eliminate the knife that Tamlin held to his own heart.

The heavy blankness that had taken possession of my chest smothered it all.

I turned and stalked down the wide rose-bordered lane. For on one point, all those screaming voices in my head could agree on: I could not be in a house with the two of them. Not right now. Not so soon.

I had a mate. A mate. I had a mate.

Wet hair, wide doe eyes, a tear through my soul as it recognized that of a kindred one…

Down the lane, almost running now, through the beautiful iron gates, out, out, out.

War was coming. It would be thanks to Tamlin and his blind rage. It would be thanks to me, because I had been too weak to stop it.

The feeling of uselessness I'd been pushing to the edges of my mind ever since I found out about Feyre's true allegiance threatened to overwhelm me again.

I pushed harder.

Back in the Night Court, seeing Feyre with wings and death in her eyes… She would have shot that arrow. She would have killed me. My friend would have killed me.

There had been no mistaking it. No one who had seen her in that moment could have believed her to be under someone's thrall. The strength radiating from her, the determination… There was no way anyone, not even Rhys, could have the power to control that.

Rescuing Feyre had been all that had been holding me up these past few months. The hope of getting Feyre back had kept me going all through Tamlin's gradual descent into madness, the hope that she could stop him from going over the edge.

She hadn't come back, and Tamlin had gone over the edge. And the picture of her training an arrow on me remained very vivid in my inner eye.

I'd left the estate behind and was now brushing through the eternally lush, young forest of Spring covering the sprawling lands. So different from the woods of my birth court, where my red hair blended into the fiery explosion of colored leaves, where the sound of birdsong surrendered to the playful crackle of leaves under feet and the anticipatory scent of renewal made way for the rich aroma of life that had been lived.

It still wasn't prudent to be anything less than a hundred percent on your guard in this forest; Tamlin and I had badly neglected purging the Court of the filthy remnants of Amarantha's rein. Right now, though, I couldn't even be bothered to check my immediate surroundings as I trudged through the greenery.

I'd done okay during all those Amarantha years we'd lived a cursed life in Spring Court. I'd been ravaged by her, sure, but losing an eye was nothing to losing one half of my soul. I'd been able to get back up from it. I'd tried to keep the Spring Court functional, even as its numbers diminished with every High Fae who left for the Mortal Realm in search of death at the hands of a human girl. I'd slowly given up hope along with everyone else, even before Tamlin stopped allowing people to go. I'd never had much hope to begin with, just because I'm an insufferable pessimist, so that hadn't been much of a change.

Then Feyre came, and for a little while, hope had hit me over the head with a club. I had truly believed that things might take a turn for the better yet.

And then – Under the Mountain.

Bit by bit, parts of me had been chipped away, until there was barely anything left of myself. I'd been at my brothers' mercy once again, each time I'd looked into the eyes of those who had murdered my beloved scraping off a layer of my soul. I had watched Tamlin endure Amarantha's taunts and jokes and more, powerless to come to his aid; I'd seen Feyre willingly enter capture to fight for her love, my contribution to her struggles limited to one single healing –shards after shards broke off. A big chunk went missing when I was reduced to a tool for Amarantha to torture others – when she had Tamlin whip me not for my pain, but for his, when she'd put me in a death trap not to taste my fear, but Feyre's. The rest of me had shriveled away while I had been lying on a bed with my back open and bleeding, perfectly aware that Feyre was injured and dying and unable to even do so much as lift my head to look her way.

She'd died, she'd been revived; we'd returned to the Spring Court, and I'd tried to piece myself back together, but all the parts of me that had cared, all the energy I had once had to defy Tamlin for his own good and Feyre's… that had been left behind.

You gave up. That's what she'd hurled at my head, clad in foreign fighting gear and sprouting wings. You gave up on me.

Yes, I'd given up on her. I'd given up on her, and me, and Tamlin. I hadn't know what to do to help her, I hadn't know what to do when the adversary was my own closest friend, I didn't even know how to get out of bed most mornings. But how much she had expected of me! Feyre had been so convinced of my powers to sway Tamlin that she had actually been disappointed when I couldn't do it. That she had come to hate me for it.

After she'd been taken – after she'd left – I'd lost what little remained of my influence. When Tamlin stormed and raged and trashed the manor, I didn't attempt to stop him. When he'd ceased all efforts of rebuilding the court to focus all resources on finding Feyre, I had said nothing against it. When he allowed his blind rage to lash out on an unlucky servant who happened to be too close, I let him. It was after those instances, when I sought out the victims of his rage to offer healing, that I had discovered that my magic had barely recovered after being released from Amarantha's leash.

Finding Feyre became the only thing that mattered. Only she could put an end to this. Only she could stop the raving madman Tamlin had become. So when he'd vented his feral fury at me, I'd endured it, and when he'd sent me on whatever errant he'd thought conducive to his retrieval mission, I'd fulfilled it.

Right up to the point where I actually did find Feyre, and discovered that she had no interest whatsoever to ever return to us.

Since then, there was simply nothing left. Nothing left of me, and nothing left to do. Tamlin had transformed from a brooding but responsible High Lord to a force of nature set upon an impossible goal, disregarding all costs.

This was why I'd only watched, helpless, incredulous, as Tamlin sold our land to Hybern. Doomed the world, and thought nothing of it, if it brought him back his lost love. I had had plenty of evidence that nothing in this world would budge by my bidding. I had nothing to fight whatever the Cauldron threw at me.

And here we were. I was second in command to a lunatic, who had just led his most dangerous enemy into his hearth and home.

I stopped dead as my energy suddenly left me with a whoosh, and just stood there on the mossy forest ground like a puppet with its strings cut. I didn't even know whether having a mate made my situation better or worse. I was at a total loss as to where I should go from here.

By the Cauldron, I wanted someone to talk to. Isolation was corroding my mind, all the unsaid things swelling and festering from being held inside. I wanted someone to know what it felt like to face my mate, only to have her ripped away from me before I could even tell her my name – I wanted it off my chest. I wanted to share my rage and hurt at Feyre's betrayal, I longed to confide in someone with my concern about what she was going to do with the Spring Court and its inhabitants, my worry about Hybern, and Jurian, and Tamlin. I felt such a sudden burning desire for trust, such an overwhelming need to share my mind with another. Was it the mating bond that was fueling this want? The unexpected existence of a soul mate, my perfect match, who would be the one to turn to, if only she were here?

A mate. I had a mate.

The initial shock had worn off, and with it the ferocious drive to take her, to have her with me, to never let her out of my sight. I must have been crazy to want her here. She didn't know me. I didn't know her. Being Feyre's sister, it wouldn't take long until she would hate me, too. If it wouldn't be Feyre's whispering that would turn her, it would be Rhys'.

Rhys. Rhys was the big unknown figure in the big game I was still refusing to play. Before I had seen Feyre with an arrow trained on my heart, her throwing her lot in with his side would have had me immediately questioning my disdain for him. Feyre had given her life for me and mine, after all… there had been a time where I would have put a lot of weight on her judgement. But what to believe now? I had never seen any evidence of Rhysand being anything but a cruel, twisted bastard. And yet Feyre stood with him.

A scream tore from my throat, and with it, a bout of energy vented itself from my body. I hadn't even known how much rage had swelled up within me until I started pounding the trees around me. Started, and found myself unable to stop.

What to believe? Whom to trust? What to make of this mess? What to do? What in the name of all that was sacred to me was I supposed to do now?

I hit and slashed and lashed out until the forest had a clearing that hadn't been there before. I punched and kicked and pommeled until my hands were raw and bleeding and sported broken bones. Until my body was covered in sweat and shaking and tired enough to give out.

And then I slid down one if the remaining trees, sat on the damp grass and watched the skin on my knuckles knit together, my body tingling with the magic trying to mend the damage I'd done. Slow work.

My mate. I had a mate.

I could no longer stop my thoughts from touching on the matter.

I'd been stupid, so stupid. If I hadn't blurted out the truth, maybe no one would have noticed. With everything that had gone down in that room, who would have noticed that this new High Fae didn't only have the smell of the Cauldron on her, but also that of the mating bond? But I had to go and shout it out for all the world to hear, I had to go and make her a target.

I should have kept it secret. I should have kept her safe.

Memories started flooding my mind, and I couldn't stop the invasion, could shield myself from the onslaught of blood and screams and pain that was the memory of my beloved Isa's death. I covered my face with my hands, but my hands were bloody, just as my brothers' hands had been whilst they cut open her body, made her suffer and relished in both our pain. I had managed to hide the sight behind others over the years, but mating had broken down the walls around my mind, and there it was again, the memory of my life breaking.

I had announced the bond. Who was to say that no one would bring word to my father? Who was to say that my father would consider a newly made High Fae any less of a disgrace to the family than a lesser fairy? Who was to say that my father wouldn't just kill Elain out of spite?

I had disclosed the bond, and everything that stood between Elain and my family now was the tenuous protection of the High Lord of Night's power and grace.

And again, everything came down to that one question: Who was Rhysand really?

I waited until my self-inflicted wounds had closed, then tried to rub the remaining blood off as best I could. When I was decent enough, I retraced my steps to the manor.

The metal gates loomed before me, no longer a sight promising a return home. I braced myself to enter the manor, even though I knew I wouldn't have to face either Feyre or Tamlin for the rest of the day – they would close themselves off until breakfast tomorrow at least.

The front lawn wasn't empty, though; two little figures were darting back and forth between the decoratively pruned trees which Ianthe – I growled at the mere thought of her – had requested be shaped to resemble the Spring Court's fertility symbols, stags. It didn't take me long to make out Alis, too, sitting on a bench in the manor's shade and stitching away at some needlework in her lap, all the while keeping a keen eye on her young charges. She turned her head at the sounds of my approaching steps.

"Lucien." A small smile wrinkled her tree bark skin as she greeted me, but I could discern no joy in her for her lady's return. I sometimes wondered whether Alis, out of all of us, might have been the only one to instantly realize how much better Feyre was faring under Rhys' care.

I returned her smile, but found myself the target of her frighteningly canny, scrutinizing stare.

"Are you all right?"

I started. I wasn't on the receiving end of that question all that often.

"Yes. Tamlin's plans worked to perfection. We have Feyre back, safe and sound."

That didn't appease her scrutiny. "So, we have the lovey-dovey couple back," I added brightly. "I'm so looking forward to being the third wheel again! All the snogging in hidden corners of the manor… The nightly sounds, the silly ogling… "

"Well, you go find a nice charming lady for yourself, why don't you?" Alis countered. "It's not as if there aren't enough girls lining up to be the center of your attention, what, Lucien?"

She meant well, I knew it – she'd been quietly encouraging me to pursue more than just pleasure relationships for ages. She didn't know how hard her jab hit home this time.

"Lucien?"

Alis would never sell my mate for her own benefit. The information would be safe with her, if only I could bring myself to speak the words.

I turned and almost ran, barely avoiding knocking over one of her boys in my haste to go hide in my room and not come out until I had shoved all of those unwanted emotions in a very remote corner of my mind and heart.

Thank you for reading!

A note on reviews:

When I originally posted this first chapter, there was a passage, set apart from the actual story, in which I pointed out some instances in ACOMAF in which, in my view, Lucien was treated really inconsiderately by the book and by Feyre. I used quotes from the books, which, being Feyre's POV, reflect her thoughts and feelings. This incited some angry comments by people in ardent defense of Feyre. It seemed like I had appeared to be holding Feyre responsible for every bad thing that had happened to Lucien. I eventually took that paragraph down.

I know how important it is to heed your reviews, especially critical ones and those who offer suggestions for improvement. People took the time to write long comments, and I could tell that most tried to point out exactly what they didn't agree with. What they didn't agree with, however, were mostly my views and my take on the story, and the fact that the POV from which this fic is told results in a depiction of our heroine that, at this point, is much less positive than what we're used to from the original books.

There are some basic manners that we have to observe in each review we post. One being that no one is obliged to like the same characters we do, even if they're main ones. And some things simply do not belong in reviews. Unwarranted name-calling, for instance. And finally, no one – NO ONE – has the right to tell me me to stop writing because they don't agree with my views.

Thankfully, the general review tune on fanfictiondotnet is so overwhelmingly positive that most writers should survive a few flames. So I want to end this on a positive note: Thank you, readers and reviewers, for a thriving environment of people on book withdrawal who keep up the creative spirit and encourage countless fans to let the imagination flow!

Your LUNAtic