Chapter Text
Two things became clear the second they hit the water.
The furry little creature couldn’t swim.
And that monstrosity waiting in the tank only wanted one thing: Alexis.
Feyre gasped, her slender, tattooed hands flying to her mouth as she stared in horror. The small, furry creature thrashed in the water, helpless, plump limbs flailing in a desperate bid to stay afloat.
Rhysand's face blanched, his lips pressing into a grim line as he slipped an arm around her, drawing her tightly to his side. I could feel it—the flicker of helpless rage in him. If he could, my brother would have shattered that Orb himself, just to erase the anguish written across his mate's face.
Heart thundering, I rested my forearms on my knees, leaning forward and staring unyieldingly at the scene before me.
Blood clouded the water as Alexis sank, half-conscious, air bubbles spiralling from her lips as she choked. But even as death closed in, Alexis Quinlan kept fighting. It was as admirable as it was fucking infuriating.
With a hand pressed to the wound at her torso, and what I knew to be the most agonising breath of her life, Alexis clenched her jaw, forced her golden eyes open, and kicked hard beneath her—driving herself upward.
Not to save herself. But to save her friend.
With a strength I could barely fathom, she cut through the water, kicking and swimming up, up, up —
The vile thing waiting at the bottom of the tank grinned, showcasing a thousand razor-sharp teeth, and lunged for her.
“Meet the Nøkk,” Alexis muttered from before us, taking a long sip of water from the canteen in her hands. My water canteen. “Isn’t he lovely?”
We all shot her an incredulous look, even Amren.
My fists curled as the Nøkk exploded from below, faster than anything I'd ever seen. My nails tore into my skin as its jagged ivory claws ripped into Alexis’s calf, punching straight through flesh. She screamed—raw and guttural—but the water swallowed it whole. Her body jerked, blood pulsing from the gash in thick, dark ribbons.
Something almost akin to joy lit in those milky ancient eyes as it dragged Alexis down, pulling her along as if she were a gift from the Gods themselves.
Perhaps the Nøkk was used to easy prey, or perhaps life as the apex predator had made it idle. Big mistake when said prey was Alexis Quinlan. Big fucking mistake.
I watched as Alexis twisted free, tearing her calf from the beast’s grip. Her teeth bared beneath the water, and in her feral eyes, a flicker of fire sparked. The Nøkk didn’t stand a chance—she drove the heel of her boot into his face.
Into its eye.
“Fucking hell,” Cassian muttered, grimacing—maybe even gagging—as the Nøkk shrieked and thrashed, the heel buried deep in its eye socket.
A sharp burst of magic ricocheted off the glass beside them, where Bryce and Micah were locked in their own battle just outside the tank. But my focus stayed on Alexis.
With her other foot, she kicked off the Nøkk’s body, launching herself upward. My stomach churned as its milky eyeball tore free from its head, clinging to Alexis’s heel for a heartbeat before slipping off and vanishing into the murky water.
Alexis didn’t spare a glance for the monster thrashing beneath her, didn’t flinch at the eyeball drifting from her heel or the shredded mess of her calf. She just kicked—again and again—her face carved in grim determination as she forced her way upward.
“Oh, thank the Mother,” Feyre breathed, her face half-buried in Rhysand’s chest. Relieved as she watched Alexis’s hand close around the limp, unconscious creature drifting in the water.
I could see the air slipping from her lungs, the weight of every brutal injury etched into her movements as she pulled her friend tightly to her chest. But the feeding platform had begun to lower. And there was a head peering over the edge of the tank, red hair like a shining beacon.
Bryce.
And that was enough hope for her.
With one desperate kick, Alexis gripped onto the chain link of the platform, looking like she was sobbing through her teeth as she hauled the unconscious creature atop it, just about holding on as the platform rose through the water up to the open air.
I sucked in a sharp breath, my lungs expanding with sheer relief as they broke the surface. Alexis gasped for air, coughing blood and water before shoving her unconscious friend over the ledge and to her sister.
“Chest compressions —”
Clawed hands closed around her ankles. The Nøkk was back—down an eyeball and seething with vengeance. Alexis barely drew half a breath before it dragged her back beneath the surface.
“Fuck,” A low growl rumbles in my throat as I watch her body slam into the glass of the tank, so hard it cracked from the impact.
Alexis dodged left, just as the Nøkk snapped its teeth at her face. No longer docile, no longer arrogant, this monster was out for lifeblood. I grimace as its nails skim her shoulder, drawing blood but not enough to stop her desperate flight.
She was weaponless, powerless, and bleeding from so many major wounds that it was a miracle she was still conscious. And even though I knew she would live, I knew she would survive, I couldn't fathom how —
“That reckless girl,” Amren smiled, actually smiled as Bryce launched into the water and stuck a dagger between the Nøkk ‘s shoulder blades.
Alexis grinned up at her sister.
“Reckless girls,” Nesta amended with dry amusement.
And reckless they were. Magnificent they were.
My brows shot up as I watched the two sisters take down the Nøkk—a monster that had reigned supreme for millennia. And yet, here it was, getting its ass handed to it by two young females.
Bryce yanked the blade free from its back, only to immediately stab it straight into the column of its spine.
The Nøkk slashed at Alexis, but she swam down, dodging every claw, and thrust her fist into its lower half. For a second, I was confused, squinting to see what she’d done, but then she twisted her wrist and pulled —
“Ah, fuck,” Cassian flinched, and covered his crotch as Alexis wrenched at the Nøkk’s balls, making the creature buck and arch in agony.
“Lovely,” Rhys muttered drily, shifting in discomfort.
As grim as the move had been, it worked. The Nøkk limpened, falling to the bottom of the tank, giving the sisters the opening they needed to flee.
In sync, they twisted, Bryce gripping Alexis’s hand as they kicked off the cracked glass of the tank, sending them careening upward towards the platform that had been lowered to them again.
Blood swirled from them as they swam, kicking with everything they had. I watched, chest tightening, as Alexis gritted her teeth, the need for breath, for air, likely unbearable now. But still, with her sister, they fought through the water, and each gripped a hand onto the platform.
Down below, the Nøkk had recovered, that one remaining eyeball snapping open, pure hatred in its milky gaze. Dread filled my gut as it bared its teeth and lunged up.
This was the final moment.
The Nøkk closed in on their heels as they broke the water's surface, gasping for air and arms grappling for leverage. I wasn’t breathing as they hauled their bodies up, up, up over the tank’s edge.
But the Nøkk was there.
It swiped for Bryce’s ankle, looking to drag her down. But, in true Alexis fashion, I watched as she pushed her sister up and over the tank to safety, catching those deadly claws straight into the flesh of her hip herself.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” I snapped my gaze to Alexis, who was idly playing with my shadows as if we weren’t watching her fight for her life. “Do you have to save yourself last every time?”
“She’s my sister,” Alexis snarled back, golden eyes narrowed. “Shut up and keep watching, the good part’s coming up.”
“The good part?” I repeated, incredulously. “What part of this is remotely good—”
“I don’t know, Az,” Cassian mused, “She plucked his eyeball out with her heel, that was pretty badass.”
“I was a fan of the whole ‘balls squeezed in her hand’ part,” Nesta added, ignoring my withering glare.
“Shh,” Amren hissed, looking highly entertained.
I begrudgingly snap my mouth shut, eyes locking back onto the unfolding memory.
Good part, my ass.
With its claws embedded in her flesh, Alexis yanked her upper body up and out of the water, elbows locking around the rim of the tank. The sharp movement propelled the Nøkk out of the water, too.
… Okay, I could admit this part was good.
The Nøkk began shrieking, as if the mere touch of the air was melting its very skin.
“How do you like that, bitch?” Alexis snarled in its face and then, with a technique Cassian would approve of, slammed her fist into its vile face and sent it hurtling back down into the water.
She didn’t waste a second before hauling her ass over the tank and to safety.
Alexis turned from watching the memory to me, her lip curved at the corner as if to say, “See? Told you.”
I almost smiled.