“The mouse?” Sabine’s eyebrows raise in delighted surprise. Still clasping my hands, she looks around in the grass. “Where is she?”
She falls silent for a moment, the type of pause I know means she’s using her godkiss. A second later, she laughs.
“She says she’s getting herself ready by the stream—bathing before the ceremony because it took so long to getyouin shape.”
I roll my eyes, but there’s a chuckle on my lips, too. I squeeze Sabine’s hands, drawing in a breath to fill every bit of my lungs.
“Are you sure this is what you still want?” I ask, running my thumb over her twine ring. “Marriage, I mean? A lot has changed.”
She lets go of my hands and toys thoughtfully with the twine ring. “When you gave me this makeshift ring, it was in a forest like this. You asked me to be yours forever, and I said yes, as long as you agreed to be my forever, too.”
I smile, but the word she used catches on a fear tucked away so low I’d hoped it would never emerge. “Forever,” I repeat, staring down at my boots. “Yeah. About that. This mortal body of mine won’t live thousands of years, not like yours?—”
“Stop that.” She grabs my hands again, harder this time, lacing her fingers with mine like a vice. “The future—however long or in whatever form that might take for both of us—is far away. Right now, it’s just you and me. For as many years as we have together. I’m ready to commitallthose years to you.”
I shift my stance. “Yeah?”
She grins and echoes my gruff, “Yeah.”
So, I take her hand and lead her to the circle of wildflower blossoms the birds have dropped in the center of the clearing. Fuck, but I feel like I’m fifteen years old again. Nervous as the first time I kissed a girl—only worse, because this isn’t some awkward brush of lips in an alley. This is real. This isher.
My palms are sweating. I keep my grip light, terrified she’ll feel the tremor in my fingers. Gods, she’s so radiant.
And she’s about to be mine.
I duck my head, swallowing hard. I’m half convinced someone is going to burst through the trees and shout that it’s all been a mistake—that she was never meant for me. That a man like me doesn’t get a happy ending.
But she’s still holding my hand—with love in her eyes.
“I still don’t understand how you made all this happen,” she confesses, her hand trembling sweetly from her own nerves. “Even with the mouse’s help.”
“I can’t take credit. It’s these damn animals. They want you to be a perfect bride.” And she is, even dressed in her dusty riding clothes with her hair windblown and tangled. Then, I toe one of the blossoms. “Is it enough? You could use your power, you know. Grow a ring of rosebushes around us. Summon the stones to rise as an altar.”
“No.” Her head sweeps back and forth. Quick, certain. “No, I want it just like this. For us to marry simply, no temples, no altars, nogods. As plain and wild as when we first fell in love. Because no matter what comes next for us, our start was always simple.”
I can only marvel at her. Gods, this woman. This perfect, beautiful woman.
Sabine suddenly perks up, cocking her head as though listening. “Oh—the mouse is back. She says we should stand next to that stump over there.”
Sabine looks amused to be taking orders from a mouse, but we humor the pipsqueak and go to stand by a waist-high chestnut stump, the broken top worn smooth by time, blanketed with moss so vibrant green it nearly glows.
Myst whinnies from the other side of the clearing, stamping a foot. Sabine turns to her for a moment, exchanging silent words. Then, she laughs again. “One minute.”
She slips her hand from mine and goes to untie the horse. Myst falls into step beside her, trailing close. When they return to the stump, the mare plants herself squarely behind Sabine, ears forward, head held high.
“She insisted,” Sabine explains, nodding back at Myst. “Not that she has any concept of what a bridesmaid is, but she knows something special is happening and wants a proper look at the action. Claims her old eyes aren’t what they used to be.”
Myst steps forward just enough to press her nose into my shoulder. As if to say—you’d better take care of her.
“Yeah, yeah, crazy mare.” I scratch her forehead fondly. “I’ve got your girl.”
The forest mouse—looking exceptionally well-groomed for a pantry pest, I’ll give her that—scampers up onto the stump.
A ruffle in the branches catches my ear. My attention is on Sabine, our hands clasped, but my godkissed senses are picking up a litany of tiny footsteps, ruffling wings, even soft hooves approaching from all corners of the forest.
From the corner of my eye, I see owls settling into the high branches. Scent the musky fur of a beaver. Glimpse the warm brown nose of a fawn.
Sabine bends toward the mouse, nodding as she listens, then straightens.
