Page 71 of Frost Like Night
Nessa’s face comes into focus, but my groggy confusion only intensifies when I see her outfit. Deep purple satin lined with gold trim curves around her body.
“I know we have to borrow things from Autumn, butthis is a bit fancy, isn’t it?” I say.
Nessa spins to fluff the floor-length skirt around her sandals. “Isn’t it lovely? You should see Ceridwen! She looks like a sunset.”
I raise my brows. Nessa waves her hands.
“Oh, right, sorry!” She grabs my arm and yanks me out of bed, my chakram clanking to the floor, my tunic batting loosely at my knees. Only Nessa’s giddy smile stops me from protesting as she hauls me outside.
Conall peels away from the threshold of my tent and drops in behind us, having taken up his task of guarding me again since most of Mather’s Thaw left to escort our final refugee group. Where Nessa leads me isn’t very far down the road, and considering the number of people we pass, I’m grateful. The Winterian queen should be a bit more dignified than to traipse around in little more than a nightgown.
A burgundy tent stands unadorned but for thin stripes of navy that run vertically down its fabric. Conall posts himself outside along with two Autumnian guards, and when Nessa tugs me in, a cloud of rose water and incense greets us. The narrow room houses a few dressing screens, open trunks overflowing with jewel-toned satin and silk, and pillows on which lounge Dendera, Nikoletta, Shazi, Kaleo, and his daughter, Amelie.
When Nessa and I stumble in, Shazi screeches and Dendera leaps up.
“She’s here!”
That elicits a chirp from behind one of the dressing screens, and Ceridwen’s head shoots out so quickly I catch only a flash of gold and a few bouncing red curls. “Finally! Flame, I was beginning to think you’d sleep through it.”
“Through what?” I ask. Dendera holds a swath of blue satin up to my face just as a shoe flies out from behind Ceridwen’s dressing screen, and I start to think I must still be asleep. “You all realize we have a war to prepare for? Unless you think we can settle our differences by throwing Angra a ball—”
Dendera squeezes my shoulder. “Wedorealize we have a war to prepare for, which is exactly why this needs to happen.”
“Whatneeds to happen?”
Ceridwen’s head reappears for longer this time. Her curls are pinned in a gold headdress with dangling leaves glinting near her cheeks, accenting the gold and brown paint that forms curlicues across her dark skin.
“A wedding,” she says, and the way the words come out on a giggle makes me smile. I don’t think I’ve ever heard hergiggle. “My wedding. To Jesse.”
She ducks back behind the screen as Shazi tosses a length of orange silk into the air and squeals when it flows over her head.
“Your wedding?” I echo.
Dendera nods happily. “The latest reports put Angra’sforces five days out from being fully gathered. This”—she waves at the tent—“is necessary.”
But I know what she means. We need this. We need it as much as every blade we will sharpen, every ration we will pack, every breastplate we will strap on.
Every moment of peace we gather here will help us stay sane later on.
I take the satin from Dendera. “I guess I should dress up too?”
She smiles and waves me behind another screen. “I’ll help. Nessa?”
Nessa rushes to join us. The moment we’re behind the screen, they both tug off my gray tunic and start wrapping blue satin in a pattern they must have learned from Nikoletta.
This is what Ceridwen meant a few days ago when she said she needed to follow her own advice. I know very little about her relationship with Jesse, beyond its scandalous beginning, but I do know she’s loved him for a long time. And though a lot of horrible things have come from this war, if it forced them to move beyond their issues and reconcile their love . . . well.
I can think of no better counter to war than a wedding.
Dendera and Nessa finish with me in about half an hour, and when I shuffle out, Nikoletta and Shazi are gone,leaving only Kaleo, stretched out on a pillow, smiling lazily at Ceridwen’s screen.
“Are you ready yet?” he calls.
“Art can’t be rushed, Papa,” comes Amelie’s reprimand from behind the screen.
“You aren’t the one marrying a Ventrallan—you don’t have to talk like that.”
Which comes just as Lekan ducks into the tent. He eyes Kaleo, then Amelie, who pops her head out and blows him a kiss. Lekan gives Kaleo a grin as he drops beside his husband.
