Page 129 of Alien God

Thank the cursed snows of Sionnach.

“But I don’t have a ring for you,” she added.

“I don’t need your ring,” I breathed. “Just your vow.”

I knew from Aiko that there were vows in a human ceremony, though I had no idea what the actual words were supposed to be. I tried to form sentences, but they turned to ash and dust in my head, burned away by the sheer relief of seeing her here. Of having her standing before me, lovelier than starlight, happy with her ring, her groom, her life.

Luckily, I did not need to find my own words. Because my bride shared hers.

“I, Torrance Hayes, take you, Wylfrael, to be my lawfully wedded husband. In sickness and in health, for richer or poorer, for as long as we both shall live.”

She gazed at me expectantly, and I repeated the words back to her.

“I, Wylfrael of stone sky and Sionnach, take you, Torrance Hayes, to be my my lawfully wedded wife. In sickness and in health, for richer or poorer, for as long as we both-” Torrance inhaled unsteadily, and my voice cracked, “-shall live.”

“I promise to love you.” Her voice had lost its solidity and a waver crept in.

“I promise to love you,” I echoed.

“I promise to cherish you.”

“I promise to cherish you.”

“From this day forward. ’Til death do us part.”

“From this day forward. ’Til death do us part,” I vowed. I could no longer stand there and merely hold her hand. I dropped her hand, my fingers rising to cup her delicate jaw. She sighed through a thick throat and turned her face up to me as I pressed my forehead to hers and closed my eyes. I found myself speaking, my own words finally forming out of the darkness. “For this day and all days. For this night and all nights. I will love you, Torrance. Every moment. Every breath. Every heartbeat. Even if it’s only half of one.”

No doubt Aiko and the others wondered what I meant by half a heartbeat. But it didn’t matter if they understood or not. Because Torrance did.

Her hands went to my waist, then slid upwards, palms resting against my chest.

“I promise you the same.”

We stood locked in the embrace, and everything else disappeared. There was only Torrance and me and the choices we’d made. Her face in my hands, her breath on my skin. Husband and wife. Perhaps not fated, but mated anyway.

“Now what?” I asked her, unsure if there was anything else left to do.

She smiled, drawing her hands up high to wrap around my neck.

“Now you kiss me.”

Finally, a human custom I could appreciate. My smile mirrored hers as I bent down to kiss my wife for the very first time.

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