“It’s a bit like a marriage ceremony. If the queens of other branches of the hyphae make a blood oath to me, it will reestablish the link between us, withourgrove at the center. That’s how Vasileia explained it to me, at any rate.”
Alashiya shrugged. She pushed a spoonful of golden rice and steaming, sauteed vegetables around her plate. “She knows the old stories in a way I don’t. Some things get lost even in the hyphae, and my grandma passed away when I was so young… If she knew it, she never got the chance to tell me.”
Vasileia, the ancient nymph who represented their people in the UTA congress, was full of stories even the hyphae couldn’t tell Alashiya. She had vague details of a ceremony and ancient gifts given, but it had been at least two thousand years since the last oath had been taken. Time could bury even the most important memories, it seemed.
But elders often carried knowledge that would otherwise be lost, and Vasileia had given hers as a gift. It was another form ofteq.Another essential form of love.
If the old woman wasn’t constantly complaining about the fact that Alashiya should’ve taken her grandson as her husband instead of “that swaggering dragon” she would’ve said it was a bit like having her beloved grandmother back. Seeing as Vasileiadidcomplain at every available opportunity, Alashiya viewed her as something like a cross between a meddling aunt and a shrewd mentor.
“It won’t fix everything, but it will help bring us together again. Make us feel like we aren’t all just floating islands being slowly swallowed by the sea.” Alashiya set her spoon down and took a deep breath. Reaching for her mate’s night-darkened hand, she traced the silver scar bisecting his palm with the reverence it deserved. “I’d like to do it at our wedding.”
Taevas’s grin stretched from ear to ear. “You want all the nymphs at our wedding?”
“I do,” she answered, bringing his knuckles to her lips for a kiss. “But only if that’s okay with you.”
A rumble of pure delight emanated from deep within his chest. Tail coiling around her bare ankle, he said, “As far as I’m concerned, the more people there to witness you claiming me, the better.”
Alashiya still felt queasy at the thought of standing up in front of so many people, but she knew how important it was to Taevas. So when the entire Aždaja clan showed up in Birchdale alongside the nymph queens, several alphas from the Shifter Alliance,andthe sovereigns of the EVP, she couldn’t exactly say she was surprised.
Despite all the preparation that had gone into the affair — as well as the renovations that had been done to the house and barn — Birchdale wasn’t prepared for the onslaught. Their wedding took over the tiny town. Every rental property was booked, a fleet of caterers had been assembled, and the wards around her land had been heavily modified to make it easier to find.
The hardest part of the entire process had been convincing the forest to allow so many strange visitors through. In the end,there was nothing to be done for it other than to coax, cajole, and lay out clear signage for all visitors to stay on the designated path.
The night of their wedding, everyone assembled in the lush garden she’d so relied on all her life. Candles hung from glass globes strung in the branches of her fruit trees and fireflies danced along the path to the firepit. Taevas’s blue flame roared within it, ice cold and deadly. Its pale glow limned the man himself as he stood proudly at the end of the path.
When Alashiya emerged from the flower-decked doorway Taevas had once nearly destroyed, her gaze immediately found his through the gauzy film of her veil. She thought she’d be afraid or nervous — and she had been, listening to all the voices outside as the women of her clan and Debbie, to a smaller degree, helped her get ready — but as soon as she looked past the crowd and found him…
There was no fear. There was no reason to hide.
I love you,she whispered through the hyphae as she stepped out onto the green path. Her bare feet sank into wild grass and wildflowers. Her golden anklets tinkled as she drifted toward him, drawn to his towering form wreathed in dragonfire.
Her veil, long enough to brush the backs of her calves, whispered around her. It carried all the memories of those she loved, but it carried the hopes of her future, too. A great purple dragon, wings spread, filled out the once empty space in the back. A curl of blue flame erupted from his mouth and a tangle of vines curled around his tail, symbolizing all that they were and would be. Securing it to her curls was a wreath of laurel leaves — the only crown she allowed Taevas to give her.
Beneath her veil, she wore a dress of air-light, violet silk and her ancient gold arm bands. Every inch of her carried the love and memory of her people, present and long since passed. Behind her, Hele and Alex, dressed in their own purple gowns, carried the sash of Adon’s robe, one hand on each tasseled end. Traditionally, one of her chosen bridal entourage would carry the ritual knife, but since it wasn’t necessary in this case, they’d made a compromise.
When she passed the assembled nymphs, they brushed her shoulders with their fingertips, offering love and luck as her own grove might. It was only a few dozen steps to reach him, but it felt like an eternity before she joined her husband by the fire. He looked regal and almost too striking in his burgundy robe embroidered with gold, his raven hair pulled back in a tight braid. Gold rings glittered on his fingers as he reached for her hands.
Pulling them out from beneath her veil, she slid her palms against his to grip his sturdy wrists.
“I love you,” he rumbled, dipping to touch their foreheads together. Her lashes fluttered as the world shrank to fit the space between them. “I love you so very much,minu metsalill.”
There was no officiant. No speeches or formality. There was only their love and their vows. Alashiya breathed deeply, soaking in the strength he offered her, before she nodded toward her bridal entourage.
Hele moved to one side and Alex the other, until they were facing each other with Taevas and Alashiya between them. Together, they wrapped the sash — already bloody from their first marriage ceremony — around their hands. Their job done, they stepped to the side.
Knowing how much this meant to him, Alashiya shoved down her nerves and summoned the words that had come so easy to her once before.
“Taevas, I swear to carry you. I swear to honor you. I swear to provide for you. I swear to warm you when the night is cold and find you when the days are dark. I swear to love you now and in the hyphae, long after Grim has returned what her father gave us.” Her throat tightened, making it nearly impossible to speak. She had to clear it before she could continue, but even then, her voice was thick with emotion.
“I knew you first as Adon, then as the monster in my barn, and then the bossy dragon sick in bed. I’ve had the privilege of seeing you at your lowest,argaman mlk,and even though I know you’d rather I only knew you at your strongest, I wouldn’t changeit for anything. Because even when you were stripped of everything, you were still kind, patient, compassionate, and so very dear to me. I am proud to claim you, Taevas Aždaja, and to never let you go.”
Taevas’s pleasure was a fierce note in the hyphae, a plucked chord that vibrated through the entire web of her being. A tear streaked down his darkened cheek and glittered in the light of his flame.
“My Alashiya. Mymetsalill.My beloved Chosen,” he rasped, voice almost guttural with emotion, “I swear to carry you. I swear to honor you. I swear to provide for you. I swear to warm you when the night is cold and find you when the days are dark. I swear to love you now and in the hyphae, long after Grim has returned what her father gave us.”
His fingers tightened around her wrists, holding tight as his violet eyes gleamed. To her, to both of them, they were entirely alone as they pledged themselves to each other. “You are the bravest person I know. When you had no reason to and every reason not to, you took this strange, beaten dragon into your home. You nursed me. You eased my pain. You were kind even when I didn’t deserve it. It is the greatest miracle of my life to have been tied to you through happenstance, and it’s one I will never,evertake for granted. I am proud to be claimed by you, my Shiya. I’ll follow you wherever you lead and love you until my last breath.”
It was a good thing the only makeup she wore was Alex’s golden body shimmer. If she’d dared to wear anything more, as Debbie suggested, it would’ve run down her face in rivulets.
