Chapter 53

  Ael let herself be led away by a pair of sirens. Her mind was absolutely reeling. She could not think straight because of the magic in the air, on her skin. The water had been magical too, she suspected, given how her stomach turned. Or perhaps that was the sudden nerves. They were married. Her heart and her mind warred with each other spectacurly. She had wanted this, this had been their goal of course, but on their terms. It had been stolen from them. And there had been so many witnesses! The crew, their children, Basiano! Dragons saggy tits! She could not deny it even if she wanted to. Two hundred witnesses to what should have been a big political affair, instead done on an isnd far from any court either of them belonged to. She thought about the words. Blessed ones. Worse than political, her marriage was now religiously significant!

  But she could not let her own feelings drown her. Nereida was shaking, and Ael couldn’t tell in the dim light if it was because her beloved, her wife, was afraid, angry or something else entirely. She put her hand on the small of Nereida’s back.

  “I’ve got you,” she whispered. Nereida smiled at her, tears in her eyes. Ael squashed her anger at the sirens, at the Keepers, at the Council, and concentrated on Nereida. One of the sirens turned toward them, and handed Nereida a lit torch. The princess took it woodenly, as if she were a puppet on strings. Her face held no emotion, just a bnk, terrible far away kind of look.

  “Follow the path,” he suggested. “About an hour’s walk from here is one of the ruins. We believe it was once a fortress. It is still sound, still safe, and we took the liberty of preparing the first room to the left with a bed.”

  “You what?” Ael echoed ftly. The young man flushed.

  “We had heard, Blessed One, that you would be coming tonight, and it was the opinion of one of our merchants that nd-living folk might prefer a bed stuffed of fresh straw to the sands or the grass.” He bowed. “My apologies if we overstepped.” Ael blinked at him, unsure of how to process his words. He thought preparing a bed was overstepping but marriage without their prior knowledge was not? She opened her mouth, closed it again, and before she could open it a second time, Nereida spoke, her voice shaky.

  “It is appreciated,” she said diplomatically. “Thank you for your thoughtfulness.” Nereida took a deep breath, seemed to straighten her back, and lifted her chin. She held her arm out for Ael to take, and together, Ael shouldering a pack full of bnkets, and Nereida carrying the torch, they headed for the path. She tried to be relieved that Nereida was moving, talking, sounding like herself. But the buzz in her head did not fade immediately, the magic swirled under her skin. Had they been ensorcelled? Impossible… Nereida would have fought it off, would have thrown magic about that would shame the other sirens.

  They were five minutes up the path when Nereida stopped walking and leaned against a tree.

  “Take this,” she said, shoving the torch at Ael. The buzzing had faded so that she could only feel it if she looked for it. The Grand Admiral grabbed the torch, trying to project her strength to her lover, her wife, watching helplessly as her princess sank to the ground and simply sobbed. Nereida was not a pretty crier, and her face went blotchy as snot ran down her face.

  “How dare they,” Nereida managed, anger and grief in her tone. Ael dropped the back pack, and sat next to the siren as she wept, her whole body shaking. The princess wiped her nose on her sleeve, her wedding dress. Ael took a breath.

  “They had no right, love,” she carefully wiped the tears from Nereida’s hand with her handkerchief that had been stuffed in a pocket in her trousers. “If you… if you want, we can sit here, and not…” she felt heat rise to her cheeks, and tried to remember that you were supposed to talk about these things with your lover. “We could not consummate. We could tell the crew it was a siren thing, that we never agreed, that…. That it’s not what we wanted.” She felt like she wanted to sink into the earth, but Nereida needed to hear that she had options.

  The princess sniffled indelicately. She leaned into Ael’s gentle touch, seeking strength or reassurance.

  “It’s not the wedding I would have wanted,” Nereida whispered. “My parents weren’t there, Ango and Leevan weren’t there.” Seeing her confusion, Nereida ughed a broken little ugh. “My other brothers. Dragons above, I’ve never even told you their names, and now we are married and I…” She closed her eyes, breathing shallowly. She was shaking so hard that she could barely sit up.

  “Deep breaths, love,” Ael said softly. She had seen fits like this before, several members of her family suffered from being moon-touched in times of stress. “Feel the earth under your fingers, dig them in if you must, get them dirty. Smell the sea. Hear the crickets. Hear me.” She watched as Nereida responded to her voice, her breathing slowing to a normal rate. “There, love. Don’t drown in your thoughts.”

  “How are you so calm?” Nereida leaned in, wary of the torch Ael still held.

  “Oh, love, I’m positively murderous,” she replied lightly, kissing Nereida’s cheek chastely. She pushed the feelings deeper even as she spoke. “But the people I am angry at are not here. You are. And you need my strength not my fury.”

  They sat in silence, holding each other on the dirt path. In the distance they could hear crickets. The sounds of the blessing ceremony had faded. They felt truly alone now, except for the bright moon that was directly overhead, shining down on them.

  “I love you,” Ael told her beloved, her wife, kissing her on the cheek. “If you say we burn down this isnd, and spend the rest of our lives hunting down the Council, then that is what I will do. If you say that I need to return to the ship alone, so that they annul the marriage, then that is what I will do.” Nereida smiled a tearful little smile.

  “Those options might be a touch extreme,” she said, wiping the tears that threatened to return. “I… I don’t…” She closed her eyes, took a breath, and then looked directly at Ael. The stormy eyes were a thunderstorm of emotions. Ael wanted to drown in her eyes. “I don’t regret being married to you, Ael.”

  The heaviness that had sat on her shoulders lifted, and Ael could finally breathe again. She reached out and took Nereida’s hand with her one free one.

  “Shortest noble engagement in history,” Ael teased softly. “Did we even make it ten minutes?” Nereida snickered. She made to stand, and Ael had to help the angry, exhausted princess to her feet.

  “Should we follow the path?” Nereida asked, “or shock everyone and have you consummate the marriage in full view? How much betting would that generate, do you think?” Ael stared in horror at her beloved, her wife, the princess. She felt her mouth fp open and closed repeatedly.

  “Oh, please, please don’t tell me that the head of the family doesn’t have to be present for a royal marriage,” Ael choked out, remembering a particurly vivid, wild history book she had read as a child. Her tutor had not read that one, and the younger Ael had questions for the poor woman. Nereida finally let out a ugh that was true, her belly shaking. She ughed hard enough that she wheezed and the tears that fell were tears of mirth.

  “Oh Ael, no. I promise. Some things are left private even for royals.” She wiped at her eyes. “Where would you ever get an idea like that?”

  “History book.”

  “Goodness, I’ve been reading the wrong history books.” Nereida giggled. “Were there drawings too?” Ael felt heat rise to her very hairline and Nereida squealed in delight. “Oh my poor, poor traumatized wife.” Wife. Ael had a new favour word.

  They started along the path again, the worst of Nereida’s wild emotions spent. Ael let hers trickle through her mind, wondering how she would repay the sirens. Or just the council. The moon was bright, so much so that they almost did not need the torch. They walked in companionable silence while both women sorted out their feelings in their hearts.

  “They did us a favour,” Nereida said after almost ten minutes down the path. They were in a pce in the path where the canopy of trees had closed over the path, and it was dark. “We can never let them know, but they did.”

  “What favour, love?”

  “My father and your cousin cannot fight over who marries us, which court. They can both insist on throwing balls in our honour, but neither can gain the upper hand over the other.” She sighed. “If they had asked I would have at least listened.”

  “They had the right to ask,” Ael replied. “They are your people by birth. But even if we can take some advantage from this… I don’t think I will ever forgive the council.” She grimaced. “And I signed up to py nice.” Nereida chuckled in the darkness. Far off, a bird called out, and another answered.

  The dirt road was well maintained. It was retively ft, no pnts growing along it, no wagon wheel ruts. The scent of the ocean was fading but not gone when they finally broke out from the canopy. Ahead was a rge stone… Ael hesitated to call it a building, as it was rather dipidated. The stones were covered in vines, only half the building had anything even resembling a roof. It looked as if it was once two or even three stories tall, but most of it was scattered about. It was impressive, even in the dark. As they approached the ruin, there were more stones to step over, more debris, and so they had to slow their pace.

  “If this building isn’t haunted, Ner, I’m going to eat my hat.” The air was cooler here, for no reason Ael could discern. Her skin itched the way it did when Nereida used magic. It was everywhere here, in the walls, in the remains of the door. Something magical had happened here, had left its mark on the pce.

  “Should we leave?” Nereida asked softly, looking around. The Admiral put her finger to her lip, thinking. She thought about leaving, finding a pce far from where the sirens wanted them to sleep. But despite the strange magic in the air, there was something that felt familiar, the same way she felt returning to her childhood manor. This pce was safe… except maybe from ghosts.

  “No… I don’t particurly want to spend the night out in the woods. This is… better?” She grimaced, as a mouse scurried away from their torchlight. The walls were sturdy here, but the ceiling was open to the air, and the moon shone down on them as they moved to the first door on the left. This door was actually still present, but the hinges had rusted open. There were ceiling beams here, and a section of the room had a partially-finished thatched roof, but they were mostly open to the moon. Ael internally thanked the Dragon of Luck that the sky was clear.

  The sirens had made the room as presentable as possible. It was clear they had swept. Someone had built a bed out of wood, made a mattress filled with straw. There were bnkets, two pillows, candles in a candle holder, a wash basin filled to the brim and two sealed bottles of water. Nereida chuckled, her incredulity heavy in her tone.

  “I’ve seen worse inn rooms.”

  “I’ve seen better too,” Ael replied bitterly, looking up at the sky. Nereida took the torch from her, used it to light the candles, and then pced the torch in a sconce on the wall.

  “It’s romantic, love,” Nereida said, looking up at the moon. “The sky is full of stars, the moon overhead, not a cloud in the sky.” When Ael made a noise of disbelief, Nereida continued, drawing nearer. “No children to potentially overhear us. No crew to have a sudden, urgent need. We’d not know if the ship was on fire.” Her voice was husky, teasing, until she dropped the line about the fire. That she did with a straight face.

  “Not funny love.”

  “A little funny,” the princess countered, her smirk turning mischievous. She moved to sit on the bed. Ael sat beside her wife. The bed was comfortable enough, if not quite what they were used to, and seemed sturdy enough. Definitely not an original piece of this ruin. Nereida leaned in until her nose was bushing ever so gently against Ael’s cheek. Ael moved away, looking into Nereida’s eyes.

  “We can still … not, if you want out of this,” Ael whispered. “But once we start… love if we do this, if we are properly getting married, you are never getting rid of me.” She had to give Nereida one st out. One st chance to avoid this political disaster, to avoid a life with her. Nereida sighed heavily, and reached out, cupping her hand on Ael’s cheek so that her thumb rested gently over Ael’s lips.

  “Ael, darling wife, if I wanted out, I would be gone. I am here because I want you. To be with you, and only with you. Stop pushing me away.” Ael nodded, kissing the thumb offered to her, before she closed her eyes, breathing in Nereida’s scent. Her siren, her princess, her wife. Now they just had to make it official.