One of her spies reported seeing me in the library with a mouse on my shoulder. She came to me, suspicious at first, until I explained my plan. She stared at me like I’d sprouted a second nose, then burst into laughter.
“Oh,men,” she chuckled.
She sent for a member of the army’s mage division who was godkissed with the ability to communicate through art across any language. Apparent, that even goes forsqueaks.
The young man pulled out a slate tile and a horsehair brush. He dipped the tip in water, then painted on the slate in quick strokes that soon evaporated, leaving room for another set—buthis skill was so keen that within merely a few gestures he could convey an entire scene.
The mouse dipped her paw in his water pot, then swept it over the slate, communicating back to him in a way that made no damn sense to me. But the artist could read pages in those paw prints.
Luckily, Captain Tatarin and her mage also understood the word “discrete.”
So, here I am in the middle of the Volkish woods, about to do the craziest thing of my life.
But, fuck it.
There isn’t a crumb of doubt in my heart. I’ve wanted to marry Sabine since the first time I saw her. Or, rather, the first—new—time seeing her. When I entered Drahallen Hall in chains, and she had her lips all over that bastard Artain’s navel, and she looked at me with those big sea-blue eyes so full of surprise.
I fell for her all over again.
Hard.
So hard I haven’t recovered from the fall.
I wade to the bank, scrubbing the towel over my hair, and then climb out and wrap it around my waist. The mouse bobs on the river rock, knitting her little paws together in excitement.
“Moving as fast as I can here, furball.”
I throw the towel aside, naked to the world, and take a deep breath.
My last breath as a bachelor—if fate is kind to me today.
As I reach for my trousers, a pair of goldfinches land on my knapsack, inspect the silver comb, and then fly off as if on a mission. I dry my ass and pull on the trousers, doing up my belt. Then, I tug on the fancy embroidered cotton shirt Captain Tatarin insisted I pack instead of the loose linen ones I’ve worn forever. It’s not my style—black with golden threads woven inthe shape of antlers over the shoulders—but I suppose I can be uncomfortable for a few minutes.
The mouse watches as I button up the shirt, wrinkling her nose as her head turns this way and that. As soon as I reach the top button, she leaps onto my trousers, digs in her tiny claws, and crawls right up the fabric.
“Hey! What the hell?” I hop from one foot to the other, tickled by the pinprick claws poking through my clothes.
She finally settles on my left shoulder, then begins combing her tiny paws through my hair. I flinch and grumble, but she seems determined to fix what the comb could not.
The goldfinches return with a stem that they unceremoniously drop on my head. I duck from the floral assault, snatching the stem. It’s a thistle. So dark purple it’s nearly black, wild, and as coarse as me.
“Sure, sure, I’ll admit it,” I mutter aloud. “Good choice.”
How wildlife knows that I’ve planned today as our wedding, I have no fucking idea—but I’ve learned to shut up and accept the impossible whenever Sabine is around.
So, I slip the thistle stem into my upper buttonhole, twisting it about a dozen times to get the best side showing.
The mouse’s claws still pluck at my hair, and I grumble, my voice rattling with nerves, “Done yet?”
Fuck me sideways. Between flower-delivering birds and a mouse’s preening, I’m like a gods-damned storybook princess.
My chest rattles like a dice cup. I’ve never felt nerves like this, not even on the battlefield. I tell myself to calm the hell down. Sabine said she’d marry me. We’re engaged. She still wears that frayed bit of twine like it’s gold and diamonds.
Which ought to reassure me.
Except I don’t remember giving it to her.
It was before.
