Page 118 of Embrace the Serpent

It was not simple. It was fifty times more elaborate and tedious than the festivities they had planned when we first arrived.

“Well, when you first arrived,” Rane’s grandmother explained when I grumbled about it, “you were a strange girl we did not know.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“Now you have saved us all from the Emperor, and from fear.” She tapped the amulet I had made her, of a rare metal that was almost blue. “You will have the best we can give you.”

It was fine, for a while. The preparations took months, and the town grew livelier as people rebuilt in the hopes of having things in good shape for the wedding.

I didn’t even mind the weeks of dinners or bestowing gifts on the townspeople.

But then, before the last ceremony, it all went downhill.

“What do you mean, we have to be kept apart for aweek?” My face went warm as I realized I was admitting to a room of people that I couldn’t be away from Rane that long. Across the room, Rane’s lips twitched. He was standing between my mother and a few of his huntsmen, none of whose eyes I wanted to meet.

“It’s tradition,” Rane’s grandmother said.

Rane crossed to me, and under the cover of a hug, whispered into my ear, “Let’s humor them. We’ll find a way to meet.”

“Fine,” I said.

But the huntsmen and castle staff seemed to multiply overnight, guarding every door I even thought about opening, and I couldn’t walk five steps without someone apologizing and redirecting me.

We’d gotten lucky five days ago, when we’d passed each other in the hall. Rane had run to me and swept me up into his arms for one glorious moment, until his grandmother came brandishing her cane and yelling, “Inauspicious!”

We’d underestimated her. And with each passing day, my mood had darkened, until I seemed to carry gloomy thundercloud everywhere I went.

“You know, most of them have only been married once,” I grumbled to Grimney under my breath. “I’m the one with the most experience here.”

He patted my knee consolingly. My arms were stretched out, as two tiny peri women painted designs across my skin in a dark green paste.

I glanced at the polished brass mirror, checking the reflection to see if anyone was looking at me. My mother had just left the room, Rane’s grandmother slumbered in a chair, and Rane’s mother was speaking with a slim woman carrying bundles of marigolds.

“In my pocket,” I hissed to Grimney. He drew out the folded note, slid it between his teeth, and saluted.

The peris paused to watch as he shimmied down the leg of my chair and concealed himself in a bundle of silk—someone’s shawl, by the looks of it. The shawl slouched across the floor, past Rane’s mother’s feet, and out the door.

My shoulders relaxed. One of the peris wrung her hands. “It is unlucky, my lady. And it is only one more day until the final ceremony, no?”

I eyed her, thinking rude thoughts.

The other peri coughed, sending meaningful looks at her companion. “My lady, what do you think?” She gestured at my arms.

I gasped. It was far finer than last time—far too fine to be made by hands other than the tiny, skilled ones of the peris.

A story unfolded on my skin, in thin, intricate lines. It began above my elbows with a mosaic of jewels and a handful of tools, and then a stylized carriage rolled across my forearm, following a twisting road to little towns, through a curtain of leaves, acrosswaves, and then, on my palms, the road became a serpent at the base of the submerged palace. Delicate ivy twined around my fingers, highlighting my calluses and making them somehow beautiful.

I couldn’t find the words, but they smiled at the look on my face. They bowed and left me, with orders to let the paste dry.

Others took their places. A frog-like woman with bold red lips treated my face to a series of concoctions and goopy creams that smelled so strongly of herbs that I figured I might as well have stuck my face in a shrub. Another massaged oil into my hair, tutting at every knot, gasping at the few locks that ended abruptly where I’d burned them while working.

Rane’s mother spoke to them appreciatively. They were not servants, but divine folk coming to pay their respects and help prepare me.Tomorrow is the final ceremony, they kept saying.Aren’t you excited to see him?

Were they taunting me? I tried to keep a mild, grateful smile on my face, but somehow it kept sliding down into a scowl. As they covered my face and shoulders in yellow goop, I let the smile drop. No one could see anyway.

My gaze was on the door. Grimney was nowhere to be seen. But a jolt of hope shot through me every time the door opened.

The sun set, and my hopes dimmed. They scraped the creams from my face but left the paste on my arms.

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