I ya agreed to perform the ceremony, even though we’d dragged him away from the scant rest he could steal while he still could. We had no time to
go anywhere, no time for any fanciful celebration. So we simply went downstairs to the Palace’s courtyard gardens.
We did, however, take the time to grab Sammerin on our way out. I pounded on his door and cut off his irritated greeting with, “I know you’re exhausted. But, we’re going to go get married before the world goes to shit. Do you want to… come watch, or something?”
I honestly wouldn’t have blamed him if he told me to fuck off. Alas, he did not.
Tisaanah and I took no time to prepare—having the ceremony before our attackers arrived was more important to us than looking the part, so we had settled for scrubbing the dirt off our faces and throwing on clean cloaks that we had found in the Palace. As we walked to the gardens, I picked a few red blossoms from the bushes that lined the path and tucked them into Tisaanah’s hair. When she grinned at me in response, there were no gowns or makeup or magic in the world that would have made her more beautiful than she was in that moment.
Iya stood before us, a book perched in his hands. Despite our circumstances, he was in remarkably good spirits. Aran weddings were notoriously long and convoluted affairs, so as he opened the book, I was expecting a long, dry reading.
“You can skip all of that,” I said. “No one actually listens to any of it anyway, least of all in times like this.”
Iya gave me a knowing smirk. “I agree. I thought perhaps you might appreciate something different.”
He tipped the book forward to show us its pages—pages written not in Aran, but in Thereni.
Tisaanah drew in a tiny gasp. “You know Nyzrenese weddings?” “Passably, if you’re tolerant of my mistakes.”
“I have never even seen one myself. Only when I was very, very small.” “Then I suppose we can be creative and none of us will be any wiser.”
He reached into his pocket and withdrew a white ribbon. He instructed us to touch our hands to each other’s, palm-to-palm, fingers splayed.
“A Nyzrenese wedding consists of five gifts in the form of promises,” Iya said. “Two from the bride, two from the groom, and one from the gods.” He looped the ribbon loosely around our little fingers and looked at
Tisaanah expectantly.
Tisaanah reddened slightly. “I am… not prepared.”
“That’s alright.” He gave her a kind smile. “It will simply make your words that much more genuine.”
She was silent for a long moment. Then she looked at me and said, “Max. For my first gift, I give you my future. Our future. I promise you that we will build it together. And I promise you that I will always fight for it, as hard as I need to.”
My throat felt thick. I was going to have a hard time speaking.
Iya tightened the red ribbon around our little fingers, then looped it around our ring fingers. He turned to me. “Maxantarius?”
It wasn’t that I didn’t know what to say. It was that I had too much to say, and none of it seemed like enough.
“I give you my partnership,” I said, at last. “I promise that whatever road you walk, I will walk it beside you. Whatever challenge you encounter, I will face it with you. You will never fight alone again.”
The ribbon tightened around our ring fingers, then looped around our middle fingers.
“I give you my heart,” Tisaanah said. The rest of the world had faded away—it was only us, as the flowers, and our words. “Fully and completely. There is no part of myself that I will hide or shield. I promise you my love, in good times and hard times. You will always have an embrace to return to.”
Two streaks of silver ran down her cheeks, and I wanted more than anything to stop and kiss them away—happy tears or not.
A knot. A loop. And another silence, as I grappled with my final gift.
“I give you my soul. It’s not a perfect one. It’s a little messy. You inherit some scars. But… all the good parts are for you. From the minute you showed up at my door, all the good parts were for you.”
And even when I hadn’t realized it, it was true. Even then, on that first day, she made me want to be a better version of myself. Even when I didn’t even know her name.
And every day after, she helped me make it true.
Tisaanah let out a choking laugh. “They are all good parts, Max,” she said, cupped my face with her free hand, and kissed me.
It was easy, to fall into that kiss. She tasted like oranges and salt from both of our tears. Distantly, in a world I didn’t care very much about anymore, Iya said, “Well, I was supposed to do one more about the gods or some such, but I suppose it’s better that we skip it anyway since I’m not sure if I remember it. As far as I’m concerned, the deed is done. You are married.”
We parted, and my wife grinned at me, and I had never so badly wanted to capture a single image and preserve it forever.
We shook the ribbon off our hands so Tisaanah could hug Iya, then Sammerin. When Sammerin released her and turned to me, my brows lurched.
“Ascended above, Sammerin, look at you.”
There were no tears in Sammerin’s eyes—I’d never seen him cry, and to be honest, I’d be a little disappointed if this was where he chose to start— but the raw emotion across his face still stunned me.
“I just… There was a long period there when I really thought we would lose you, and the idea of a thing like this happening was…” He shook his head and pulled me into a rough embrace. “Congratulations, Max.”
“Thank you, Sammerin.”
I was thanking him, as always, for so much more than the congratulations. I owed my life to him. I owed a life worth living to him even more.
Under normal circumstances, this was when we’d all devolve into debauchery and celebration, gorging ourselves on food and wine and carefree joy.
Instead, a gust of cold wind cut through the gardens, rustling the leaves. It snatched the red flower from Tisaanah’s hair, sending it spiraling up into the sky to be consumed by rust-grey clouds. With it came the sound of bells, echoing in a mournful call.
We all went silent. The warning came from the eastern lookout tower.
No one had to ask what it meant. It meant the celebration was over.
It meant, They are here.
