Khash threw up his hands and groaned at the sky, as if he were one of those backwater lizard folk preachers. "Close that door all the way, darlin'. It locks automatically. And get that cute little peach over here and give me some sugar."
She had never beenthatgirlfriend. As he spun in his big, upholstered office chair, pulling her across his lap as she stretched up to reach his lips, Lurielle wasn't sure why.Because you never hadthatboyfriend. Because you weren't wanted around the same way. Because you weren't with someone who made you feel beautiful and appreciated. But you are now.It was the very first time she'd ever visited him at work, but she decided at that moment, it would not be the last.You'll bethatwife, instead.
"You'll be very proud of me," she announced as his hand stroked down her back. "I went into that bridal salon, the one on Temple. Just up the street from the building. It wassofancy."
"I hope you bought yourself something, Bluebell."
Lurielle laughed, shaking her head as she pushed off his lap, back to her feet. "I didn't. I really just wanted to take a look at the dresses they had. It seemed like it was mostly styled for human weddings. But I got my measurements taken and I had some champagne. So that's already 100% more exciting than my Wednesday mornings usually are."
"I don't know your plans for the weekend, but I have my opinion on how we need to spend it." Khash dropped his elbows onto the desk, cradling his forehead as she laughed, opening the takeout containers. “Now wait just a minute . . . Lurielle, you did not go and bring me rabbit food and call itlunch. Do I look like one of your friends' skinny little gutterpups? Darlin', this engine is fully grown. It needs real fuel to keep it humming.”
“Your doctor said you need to start eating more greens! Every day! There is an entire 32 ounce sirloin here to put on top of your salad! Half a loaf of bread, with the good salty butter! I do not want to hear it from you, not one bit. The next time you try to get on your high horse about Rourke and his desserts, I'm gonna remind you that —"
She was unprepared for the hand that quickly shot out, gently pinching her lips shut as she giggled against them, once she got over her shock.
"Bluebell, there's no need to go throwin' ole bully boy up in my face. You should've taken the steak out first. Now, do you wanna hear about my plan for the weekend, or do you want to keep kicking my ego like a mule on Sundays?”
"We’re going to revisit the fact that I think you just called me a donkey, but I am all ears."
Khash gave her a look from under his eyebrows, then she couldn't help giggling again. She had ordered herself a miniature version of his salad, crunchy kale and crisp Brussels sprouts, tossed in a bed of leafy greens, with dried cranberries and candied walnuts. She was especially fond of the long, salty curls of fresh pecorino cheese decorating the top. Khash may have been dismayed to remember that elves were vegetarians, but they had managed to balance their individual dietary needs together.
Lurielle didn't think she would ever live down her shocked reaction the night she found out that Silva's boyfriend Tate ate red meat, despite claiming he had been raised in an Elvish enclave. It was one of the few topics of conversation upon which he and Khash had managed to find common ground.
"That's all modern affectation, I hate to break it to you." His grin had been wide and sharp, and despite his words, he had seemed delighted to inform her that elves hadn't always been herbivores. "Spring lamb on the solstice, a goat on Saturnalia. You don't actually have to dig very far in the history of Elvish cuisine to find a right river of blood. Sorry," he added with a laugh, not sounding sorry at all.
He had ordered steak tartare, a small plate covered in a mound of raw, red meat, crowned with the yolk of a raw egg. She would have been lying to say the sight of the dish didn't turn her stomach, but she was not unduly surprised — Tatewasan orc, after all. What prompted her jaw-dropping gasp of surprise was when he offered Silva a bite and she accepted without a second thought.
She watched as Khash covered his bed of delicious, perfectly dressed greens with 32 ounces of the rare cooked steak and shivered, remembering the way Silva's eyes had fluttered closed.
"Do we have to feed people?" Khash's eyebrows raised as he took his first bite. "For the wedding, I mean. We really need to start talking about what we're going to do."
He took his time chewing, dragged his fork through the walnut vinaigrette, adding a bit of garlic butter to the top of his steak before spearing another mouthful.
"Lurielle, it doesn't make a bit of difference to me what kind of party you want to throw, but if my kin will be there and we're not feedin' people, I won't ever be able to show my face again."
Her head dropped back as she laughed, imagining the gossipy clutch of hens she had met at the bonfire party. They would never let him live it down.
"Darlin', I don't know anything about your Elvish marriage rules. Do we need to have a ceremony up here?"
It was her turn to take her time chewing, managing to spear both a piece of the cheese and cranberry along with her kale, tilting her fork until she was able to scoop one of the walnuts as well.Do we need to have a ceremony up here?
She supposed she didn'tneedto do anything. Elvish matrimony was typically a small affair. The bride and groom and their respective families. A reception at the club, but that was more for the purposes of showing off. She was marrying an orc and that alone precluded her ability to waltz down to Cevanorë and join the club to host a lavish, flower-trimmed reception. Even if she could, Lurielle already knew she would never subject her own children to the sort of judgment and hysteria that had colored in the lines of her own childhood.
She already knew that an Orcish exchanging of vows was informal, by comparison. It involved the whole clan gathered before the fire, she and Khash making their unbreakable, lifelong oaths to each other, followed by a boisterous, rowdy celebration. She had already experienced the raucousness of his entire clan gathered as one, and that night had been forsomething as mundane as meeting her. Surely, a wedding would be an even louder, longer party.
"I – I would like to have something I can invite my grandmother to." The words came out in a rush, fast and blurted and nearly without her conscious approval. The thought had been there, shuffling from the forefront of her mind to the background, but still there, ever present. "And my great-grandmother."
"But not your mother?" Khash's voice was sardonic, and he chuckled, shaking his head. "It's not our way, but I wouldn't blame you a bit, Lurielle. She's a real piece of work. I’m not going to tell you what to do, darlin', but I won't stand for anyone bringing you down on your day. Just putting that out there now."
All at once, an emotion she didn't even realize she'd been harboring rushed to the surface, heating her face until her eyes pricked with tears. "Yeah, that makes two of us."
She had spent the last few years of her life setting boundaries and asserting herself, going low contact with her mother, the result of which had led to the unwanted consequence of losing contact with everyone else. She didn't want her mother to come dress shopping with her, picking apart and criticizing everything about her — her body, her life choices, Khash. She wasn't interested in hearing any of it, and Lurielle knew in her heart that her mother was incapable of doing anything but exactly that.
But that didn't mean the absence didn't hurt. She didn't want to do this alone, and it hurtdeeplythat she didn't have her family around her. She was supposed to be picking out her wedding dress with her mother, was meant to be showing her grandmother floral arrangements and oohing and ahhing with her great grandmother over beautiful, elaborate Elvish dessert confections. She wasn't meant to be doing any of this alone,and the fact that she had to was like a barbed thorn within her, twisting every time she considered getting on with it.
And Despina is going to have a field day with that one.
In the absence of her family, she needed her friends. She needed her and Khash to sit down and actually have a conversation about their expectations.Do we need to have a ceremony up here?Yes! she wanted to scream.
