Chapter 30 Relationships are a Disaster, Do Not Recommend
MAY’S SHOCKED EXPRESSION IS ONE for the books. Specifically, for comic books. It doesn’t belong here, in this royal fairy wedding, which needs to proceed without a hitch.
“Bran!” she exclaims.
“Bran?” I ask the air. “Like Game of Thrones? Or the cereal?”
“Bran,” says Rochester darkly.
Hanry’s more lost than ever, but I understand: Bran must be Bulan’s true name. Same as Princess May is truly hime-sama, or something else, and I’ve gone by Sabby, but I’ve stayed Samantha, the witchy-enough inheritor of the Spük family name, beneath it this whole time.
“Bran, Bran,” the crowd murmurs. Close to me, I hear a few “Surely nots!”
So, I’m guessing Grandma’s pet head has been epically involved in this fairy family’s drama. Damn, I really should have let him tell me his story.
Reveling in the attention as always, Bulan throws his arms—arms!—behind his back and rips a facade of skin and hair off his face in a move stolen from Scooby-Doo. The moment he’s unmasked, his face transforms—like it’s been under a glamour, I suppose—returning to his more familiar features.
Also, his head pops off his body.
“I was merely in disguise!” Bulan’s rolling head announces to a collective gasp. Even Gustavo releases a breathless “ooh” while continuing to record with delight. I push his equipment away and cut ahead of the front aisle to where Bulan’s fiery-red head has rolled in ecstatic, chaotic bliss.
“What are you doing?” I growl as I pick him up.
He has the audacity to beam at me. “I’m stopping the wedding!”
“No!” I hiss. “I need this wedding to happen!”
Which is why I’m going to draw attention to myself. I have to if I’m going to save this thing.
“Apologies for the interruption,” I announce to the watching room, putting Bulan behind my back. “This was a prank! Everyone, carry on, as you were!”
Unfortunately, Mab isn’t falling for that excuse again. She’s risen from her seat, apparently in competition with May to show the most astonishment. A hand over her forehead, she’s bending backward—kind of like a spring-loaded jack-in-the-box.
“Bran!” she screams with furious drama. “What is the meaning of this?”
“And how did you get your body back?” May chips in. “I checked it was there before leaving my room!”
“You did what?” says Hanry from her side. He’s visibly revolted. Which is fair.
“I will tell you all!” booms out Bulan/Bran. He wiggles from my arms, then bounces back onstage, ascending several steps so he can be viewed by the entirety of the wedding guests, including the tree staircase.
“A long time ago,” he intones, “many centuries past, I was a young man. A burgeoning beacon of masculinity! And I made friends with the loveliest young creature—this Lady May.”
Bulan’s body, though separated from him, makes a spasmodic gesture at the Japanese fairy princess. She fans herself.
“Now is not the time,” I say for easily the thousandth time. But I’m shushed by the entire wedding party and audience.
“Thank you,” says Bulan, overwhelmed with gratitude.
I throw up my hands, because I know I’m supposed to protest. Even if I’m glad to finally be getting answers too.
“May and I promised ourselves to each other on a beautiful solstice eve. She promised me much favor in battle, and granted it to me manifold—I became a great king, with a fascinating entourage—but I did her a terrible disservice. I allowed my head to be severed from my body. And buried for centuries.”
“What does that have to do with anything?” asks Hanry.
Bulan’s voice is tragic: “It is what kept us separated. It meant we could not marry.”
“It sounds like you were separated by…” Hanry gestures at Bulan’s body. Seriously? Is Hanry actually arguing with Bulan right now? Why? This is the perfect out: if Bulan wants to marry May, then Hanry can step aside and retain his dignity—and avoid his mother’s anger.
“Since Bran had promised himself to me, I performed magic to ensure he would not die,” says May. “I’ve been keeping his body for years in hopes I’d see him again.”
“It’s one thing not to be in love, but hiding a body!?” Hanry exclaims.
Rochester steps rigidly between Hanry, May, and Bulan. “My Queen,” he says to Mab, “mustn’t we pause the ceremony to untangle this?”
I can’t hear Mab’s response over one of the groomsmen.
“I concur!” he calls out. “It is impossible for the wedding to proceed with two suitors!”
“Indeed, that is my point,” Rochester says.
But there’s no sign the wedding is ending. If anything, the energy is… intensifying. Mab un-accordions herself to regale her audience with an overplayed, considering expression. The Throne Room begins to reverberate with primitive whoops and calls.
Shit, shit, shit.
Seeing how the situation is slipping out of my control, I approach Rochester from a crouch. “Hey! What’s going on?”
“They must fight!” Mab announces at last, her voice ringing out over the ruckus. She pumps an elegant fist in the air. “Fight! Fight! YARE!”
“As Her Highness has indicated, there is a cultural imperative,” Rochester says to me, expression uneasy. “For Hanry and Bran to fight.”
If it weren’t weird enough that Hanry’s own mother wants him to enter a primal mating dance to the death, out of nowhere, Hanry pulls a thin, rectangular object from his pocket.
Bulan’s head, meanwhile, bounces back to its body.
His torso bends down, and his arms extend, reaching for his head.
He places it atop his… neck bone, I guess.
It doesn’t attach there well, as you’d expect after a dozen centuries or so.
He holds it in place with his elbows pointing outward.
Then he turns to Hanry. Hanry, who—while huge—is too kind for his own good.
And most likely lacks the battle experience of an ancient Welsh king.
“The fight commences!” Bulan booms out.
“Bring it on!” cries Hanry.
The two men move to meet each other on one of the wider stairs. I clutch onto Rochester’s arm as the guests call out a countdown from ten. When they get down to zero, Hanry and Bulan rush each other, and begin to… I don’t know what you’d call it.
But basically, Bulan is jabbing Hanry with his elbows.
And Hanry is whapping Bulan’s head with his slender white weapon. Not stabbing. Bapping. Smacking. It is, I can see now, an electric toothbrush.
It is incredibly ineffective.
The crowd’s fervor deflates in confusion.
“This is how humans fight?” asks a fairy behind Hanry’s parents.
“How strange,” says another.
Since all semblance of a typical wedding ceremony has long since been lost, I let go of Rochester and fully ascend the platform to where May watches with a disturbed expression. I place a hand on her gorgeously robed shoulder and lean in.
“You’ve got to stop them,” I tell her. “And choose who you want to marry. Before they hurt themselves.”
The princess closes her eyes, calm overcoming her beautiful, pearlescent face. “You’re right.”
“Thanks.”
Having had enough of this, May leaves the altar and places herself between them in a swirl of silk. I skedaddle, removing myself from the scene in time for her to shout:
“I object!”
The wedding guests absolutely lose their shit. And so do Bulan and Hanry, pausing in their weakly attempted displays of viciousness. And me? I don’t know whether to pump a fist in the air or to cry.
“What do you mean?” asks Bulan, his voice wretched. Overwrought. And frankly, a bit too Shakespearean. “I’ve waited a millennium for you!”
Confused, I watch on.
“These displays have been most pathetic. And so I’ve decided. Today”—May stretches out her arms, and her floor-length sleeves, with grandness—“I am not marrying you, Bran. Or you, Hanry. I am marrying… myself.”
The princess snaps her slender fingers, and the harpist begins playing Lizzo.
“Most theatrical ceremony I’ve ever seen,” comments one of the fairy guests.
“Absolutely fantastic.”
“I want a human wedding someday!”
“Oh yes. I predict it’ll be all the rage next season!”
I’ve finally stopped reeling in the wake of Hanry and May’s disasta-wedding.
Instead, I’m reveling in it alongside the guests.
The reception hall crackles with energy and laughter, in spite of its lack of newlyweds to receive.
A party is still a party, after all—particularly if said celebration is filled with alleged “pranks.” Because that is the absolute best thing the chaos-happy contingent of Fairyland can imagine.
And, frankly, if Mab and Tits are happy—and Mab, at least, seems euphoric; Tits is still nowhere to be found—who am I to object?
Once I’ve finished organizing the catering fairies, I wind through the crowds of guests to the lavishly decorated head table.
Many guests mill about, having long since abandoned their plated meals for dancing.
Overlooking them all, Prince Hanry slumps in his seat, alone.
The place settings for his parents and May remain untouched; the chairs to his right and left, unoccupied.
Until I slip into the seat beside him.
Now that I’m off my feet, I’m unable to hold back a gigantic sigh of relief. I’ve probably done thirty thousand steps today, and my toes prickle as blood returns. My stomach growls even more noticeably. Basically, I’m a bodily orchestra. For better or for worse, I’m too tired to care.
“Mind if I eat that?” I ask, gesturing at Hanry’s untouched steak and potatoes.
“Be my guest.”
“Already am,” I answer, shoveling a fork of buttery goodness into my mouth. I swallow, gratefully, because I am starving. I better add granola bars and snack packs to the emergency kit for next time. Maybe water bottles too, because my breath stinks, and that’s arguably more important than food.
Plus, you never know when you’ll need to melt a wicked witch.
“I know you’re mad at me,” says Hanry.
Oh, does he?