Chapter 29 #2
All my life I cherished the small, beautiful moments.
The way dewdrops cast prisms of light in the morning sun, the way each blossom carries its name in its scent, and the symphony of sounds when dusk gives way to night.
I have long cherished the beauty of life around me, even beyond my need for peace and solitude.
This is different though. His eyes glow in the candlelight, his smile speaks volumes without a word, and I… I feel alive. Whole. I feel joy.
I never knew this could be possible. Girls my age would speak of love with giddy excitement.
I feel a flutter with Vale like the butterflies they spoke of.
I also feel a pull. As if he is the air I need to breathe.
I am drawn to this new life. To the woman I want to be here.
She stirs within me as clear a part of my destiny as the man whose brilliant chestnut eyes I can’t seem to look away from.
His hand grips my arm, firm enough for me to really feel him.
The velvet shifts across my skin under his touch, smooth and intoxicating.
I bite my lip thinking about how it will feel when he slides it off of me later, the sensation across every inch of flesh, only to be replaced with his lips, his touch.
I take a gulp of wine and smile wide into my cup.
A flush more from my own thoughts than the heady elixir.
I allow its potency to carry me effortlessly through the night.
Far from intoxicated, I lean in just enough to lower my guard.
A dangerous endeavor. One Ace has no qualms leveraging as he asks me to the dance floor.
I raise my hand to his outstretched to me, and we take to the floor.
The music swells, then stops. All eyes turn, and I worry for a moment I may have made a mistake.
Then I realize what they are all looking at. Vale. Standing there. Looking more a king than ever. Commanding the room by merely standing in it.
“Cousin,” he regards Ace, “you shall have your turn. I, however, cannot abide the first dance belonging to anyone else, though.” Then to me, “That is, if I may.” I smile a nod.
As much as he has asked of me, it has always been my choice.
My strength renews even as all eyes remain on us.
Taking his hand, the crowd now fades into the background. The floor is ours.
Music plays, yet I do not notice. Everything falls away.
Everything but him. One hand on my back, mine meeting his shoulder, we glide across the room.
I know little more than what my father insisted I learn so I might be a suitable bride one day.
Little did he know where I would have my first dance.
But just as he had hoped, it is with a man who cherishes me.
I’d never known much in the way of family, yet I feel a sweetness at this thought.
Vale leads with the same command he carries through every action.
And I, I follow. Not blindly, but in concert with him.
We’ve already moved as one in more private settings.
I feel a smile break across my lips as my mind wanders, and I misstep.
His lead does not waver, and I suspect no one sees anything more than their king and the woman in his arms. I hope they see our happiness.
I don’t want to think about how much weight their acceptance might carry.
This isn’t the time for such things. Yet I want them to see us.
I feel it, the love we have; it’s so great it cannot be contained.
It spills out of us. And my new secret wish, my heart's desire, is that they feel it too. Something so sacred shouldn’t be hidden away.
The music fades, and he spins me into a turn.
Quiet applause echoes in the chamber and is graciously swallowed up by a new, livelier tune.
Vale leads me off the floor. I want to melt into him wholly, but I merely lean just so.
His hand over my own locked in his arm. Ace has managed to get Soria to dance, giving me a moment to watch, relieved as I do not think I would be able to keep up with the pace of the moves.
My heart is still racing, less from the dance and more from stepping into this life with my whole heart on the line.
“Keep burning, my flame. They see how brightly you shine,” Vale whispers into my ear.
The rush of his breath stirs a tendril hanging loose against my neck.
My eyes drift closed for the briefest of moments at its caress and the way his words unravel any pretense I may still cling to. I relish in the heat between us.
I look at him, taken aback at the way he sees me. I will rise every day to be the woman he sees. To continue being the one he chooses. For as long as I might live, I will live for this.
I ultimately join Ace in a dance. Somewhere between the sweeping romantic pass Vale and I shared and the jaunty ruckus Soria would later deny how much she enjoyed, Ace’s usual flair for the dramatic allows me to be even more free.
I get lost in the dizzying joy of the evening.
A night of celebration. A night of becoming.
Returning to the tether that never drifted far, Vale’s hand threads my own, keeping me close. A hush falls across the palace as we bid everyone goodnight. Everyone but each other.
Retreating to the corridor we call our own, my eyes linger on the door to his chamber just beyond mine. “Will we share the space?” I ask, eyes not wandering from the door I’ve so rarely ever stepped through.
“We will do whatever you wish, my love. When we marry, I would like for us to join every part of our lives. I’ll knock the walls down and bring the two together tomorrow if you’d like.
” We both chuckle at the absurdity. “I try not to carry labors beyond the council chambers as much as I can, but I will admit sometimes I do work on things well into the night.” I frown at the nights the space beside me in bed have been empty.
The trials of loving a man who carries so much.
“But we will make it our own. As we will with everything.” He hooks the chain around my neck with a single flick of a finger, pulling the ring out. “As soon as you are ready.”
“I don’t want to wait.” The words leap from my lips before I can think them through. “I don’t want to hide. I know it won’t be easy, but I know what I want. You. A life with you. All of it.”
His lips press to mine with a ferocity as he drinks me in.
Hand tangled in my hair, the other pulling me in at the waist, our bodies fused.
Our breaths heave as he sweeps me into his arms and carries me.
Past my chamber door. Past the guard who never breaks from looking straight forward, disappearing into the night.
I reach for the handle, and Vale pushes through the doors to his chamber, kicking it closed behind him in an echoing thud.
The fire roars, the bed’s frame towers. Everything here feels grander. Even the way in which he lays me down feels more resolute. He takes his time. Not hurrying to undress me, letting his hands wander as we kiss. Each move deliberate. Building.
We make love with the same steady power. A reckoning of flesh and promise coming together in every way. As the climax builds in me, it feels as though the mountain sings through every quake. A subtle reverberating hum deep in the core of my body, soul, and this land alike.
I lay in the aftermath, stretched across the bed on my stomach, as his fingers caress every fault line. Shuddering with the aftershocks.
This. This is the solid ground where I will build the life I never knew I always wanted.