Page 90 of Grave Flowers
Inessa cared not for our sisterhood. Aeric was poised to arrest me. Prince Lambert strove to wed me. Yorick … Yorick hadn’t cared for me at all. I wished to flee to our garden in Radix and curl up among the grave flowers.
I understood nothing, and even more so, I didn’t understand Inessa.
I was alone. Truly alone.
Why would she ever wish such a thing for herself?
Chapter
TWENTY-SIX
Iarrived at the cathedral for the wedding right on time and was escorted inside to wait for the ceremony to begin. In honor of her position, Gwenllian would lay my train out before I walked down the aisle. She hovered behind me as I made my way into the narthex, whispering, “Step slowly! No! Don’t look down—look ahead. Daughter forgive you! Don’t you dare lift the skirt.”
Father waited there for me. My steps quickened at the sight of him, and I hurried to his side. With everything colliding, I was almost relieved to see him. He was my ally, a Radixan and a Sinet, and the closest bit of home I’d had since arriving.
He was the same: his weathered face, his overly alert, colorless eyes, his twitchy, impatient hands. Today, he kept adjusting his sword. It was a regal weapon only for display, and it was clear how much he loathed it. My gaze traveled over his broad shoulders and chest, knowing that beneath the thick layers of his clothes lurked his drapery cord and a dagger, if not two or three.
I’d lived years of experience in the past month, yet Father was a stone in my past, immovable even with time, taking me back. I felt young standing before him. Not just young but like a child, one not afraid of the dark but afraid of her father, even as she needed him.
“Good morn, Daughter,” he said, as though we were meeting for breakfast and not the wedding that would precede our assassination plot.
“Hello, Father,” I replied.
The choir began to sing, meaning the ceremony had started. The voices swelled as one and poured into the narthex. It was time for me to progress down the aisle. I glanced desperately at Father.
“May you swim in salt,” he said. Hearing the saying from home spoken in Father’s familiar voice nearly undid me.
Impulsively, I held out my hands to him, and he took them both, his own so big, firm, and strong. He cocked his head to the side, regarding me carefully. One eyebrow quirked slightly up, asking if I was all right, if I would do my duty. I remembered who I was and who he was. We weren’t merely daughter and father. We never had been and never would be. We were Sinets, and if I failed, he’d enact punishment. I lifted my chin and smiled. He stepped forward, still holding my hands. Desperately, I tried to pull back, but he held me in place. He simply kissed the top of my head. Then he released me.
Next, he awkwardly lowered the blusher over my face. It misted over me. He gestured for me to pass by him. As the father of the bride, he’d observe from the back, representing the house I was leaving behind. Gwenllian lifted the train and released it in a final fluff. A gush of air rushed around my legs, and the silk gently settled behind me.
“You’re perfect,” she murmured. “Go make me proud and bless all who behold you with your beauty.”
She was talking to the wedding gown, not me.
I stepped toward the cathedral entrance. Deep breaths eluded me. I was so nervous, I could manage only shallow ones, and they made my chest strain against the gown’s confining bodice while mypulse beat wildly against the choker piece. The veil pressed against my lips. It was so delicate and thin that it didn’t obscure my vision and certainly wasn’t thick enough to impede my breathing, yet it seemed to suffocate me. Every inhale pulled it to my mouth. I cast my gaze forward.
At the betrothal ceremony, I hadn’t been able to view Aeric clearly from the narthex. This time, he was right within my view, a solitary figure at the end of the aisle. It was my first time seeing him wear a crown—at least one that wasn’t made of tin. My shallow breaths almost ceased entirely. Just as the tin crown had sat slightly askew on his head, this one did as well. It slanted across his brow and flashed brilliantly, making it appear as though he were crowned with sunlight, not gold. I saw him shudder slightly, though I wasn’t certain why. I processed down the aisle to him, my gown sweeping back to reveal my legs, my veil streaming back from my hair like water.
He stared ahead, his eyes fixed somewhere over my head. I reached his side, and we turned to the altar. Still, he didn’t look at me. Perhaps he’d made a deal with himself not to engage with me, his enemy, any longer. I understood. I’d made the same deals with myself over and over too. But I wasn’t used to his inattention. I was used to commanding him even in silence, even in secrets, even in scorn. Standing next to him, I missed him deeply.
I glanced once more at him. His profile was strong, his chin lifted, his attention fixed stubbornly on the monasticte. Anger sparked in me. He would look at me, even if only one last time. I lifted my hand and brushed my fingers against his, though we weren’t supposed to touch yet. It was enough. His head turned to me. Strange, volatile awe filled his eyes, and he leaned slightly back to one side, regarding me as his bride. Then he straightened and his jaw squared. I thought he’d remain this way—steadfast, noble, newly crowned king—for the rest of the ceremony, all vulnerability and openness firmly locked away.
Unexpectedly, though, he whispered, “You’re beautiful.”
It was one of the simplest things I’d ever heard from him. He said it with such passion that somehow the two words seemed to encompass an entire ode. Regret filled me, and I saw it in him too. Even though we stood side by side, an aching, endless void stretched out between us. It snatched away every kiss and every moment and left us with nothing.
The ceremony unfolded. We knelt at certain points, lit candles, and held hands at others. As in Radix, there wasn’t one moment between not wed and wed. Rather, every turn of the ceremony drew us further into the land of marriage, and at some mystical point known only to the Primeval Family, we became husband and wife. Its beauty and poeticism were lost on me. My dread grew, as though the ceremony were a tightening cord around my neck, a thought that made me think of Father. I glanced over my shoulder. He rocked back and forth, watching.
“And now, the kiss,” the monasticte intoned.
I faced Aeric, my husband.
Gently and with utmost care, he reached for the veil to pull the blusher back. Symbolically, the action was supposed to be a revealment. According to the faith and lore, the bride was given a divine dispensation and, as the veil was lifted from her eyes, she could see reality clearly—not just our temporal reality, but the divine one said to encircle us like air. She might say a prayer then, and the Mother, who was closer to her than ever before during this consecrated moment, would hear it.
Aeric raised my veil. A flash of gold blinded me for a moment, and I thought perhaps it was true—I was granted the divine sight—but it was his crown, a sunbeam bouncing off its band. It dwindled and I saw him. Nothing truly connected our gazes, yet it felt as though they were compelled together by the same forces that bound our feet to the ground, turned compasses north, and kept the celestial bodies pinned to the sky.
Most couples simply joined hands and quickly kissed, but the same compulsion that united our gazes drew us to each other. I settled into his arms as he pulled me close, dipping me so far that my hair nearlybrushed the floor. I thought briefly of the vial, but the corset and bodice were structured enough to hide it. Our lips met in a kiss of passion, but it was a tormented passion, one that had no true home, making the kiss even more desperate. My hands clawed into his neck and hair while his own curved desperately around my waist. A frantic thought shot through my mind, and it had the same unbounded, suffusing power as the sunbeam that had flashed in my eyes.Don’t make me kill him.It was the only prayer I’d ever said in my life. I tore free from Aeric, mind whirling. The vial dug into my skin.
