Chapter Thirty #2
“I know there’s more to talk about and apologize for. I know I’ve made too many demands of you already, but I want my best friend, Fliss. I want you with me.”
Cardamine offers his hand. I want. I need. How many times have I heard him say that to me? This is different. This time all he’s asking for is me. Myself, as I am. I place my hand in my best friend’s, and he helps me up, my legs thin, unsteady stems.
The wedding guests are seated once more, having organized the mess and ensured no one was badly injured.
Finishing a handshake with Bash, Pigeon slinks down the stairs to the front row where Mum and Ruth sit beside a paralyzed Fern.
The king takes an empty tonic bottle from the queen’s hand and thanks the court physician.
Nearby, Godfrey has his broken leg propped up next to Nettle and Ava.
Then there’s the baker, the apothecary, parents, friends, neighbors.
A room full of people who love me, who endured a painful blast of magic to liberate me from Morgana’s chains.
Onstage, Merit sorts out Bastion’s hair and brushes his suit. Card motions me toward the center of the stage, to take my place opposite Merit on either side of the grooms.
“I’ll be just over there,” Will says, the light brush of his fingers leaving my back. He gets halfway down the steps when he pauses. He clicks his tongue. “Actually—”
Will spins and strides toward me with a single-minded smirk.
My heart has time for one pounding beat before he grabs my jaw and kisses me.
A whimper of delight ripples from my throat.
I throw my arms around his neck, and he dips me back, locking our lips together—I’m certain that I hear a whoop from Pigeon.
His hand trails down between my shoulder blades, to my waist, over my hip, and beyond the taste of him, over the fluttering in my chest, the fabric of my skirt changes, my blouse shifts to chiffon, and when Will breaks away, a cocky smile on his face, he eyes my transformed dress, and says, “That’s more like it. ”
He plants me on my feet and twists his hand to conjure a bouquet of white wedding flowers.
I’m dazed, trembling in the brand-new dress.
It’s a gorgeous pastel pink, with half sleeves that puff like a drooping petal and a sweetheart neckline above a corset with white boning and intricately laced satin ribbons.
Pale chiffon flowers dot the bodice and decorate the dress, both on top and under a tulle skirt that floats in waterfall layers like the head of a bell flower. It’s beautiful.
“Princess,” Will says, and holds out the bouquet.
The hall could disappear, could erupt with chaos once more, and I wouldn’t notice. I take the flowers.
In the quietest voice, husky with nerves, I say my first uncursed words: “Thank you. My prince.”
He grins, radiant.
“Even on my wedding day!” Bash snaps. “Does he always have to one-up me?”
Card laughs and kisses Bash’s knuckles.
“Shut up and marry me.”
The ceremony ends with no more interruptions, and it’s a sigh of ease when the guests can finally filter out toward the banquet hall just on the other side of the main entrance.
Bash rests his forehead against Card’s and intertwines their freshly ringed fingers around the bouquet I’d been holding.
It’s a solace, a sanctuary after a turmoil that ended lives and injured more.
My own sanctuary waits by the front row.
He hasn’t taken his eyes off me once, and it stains a blush across my cheeks as pink as the dress I’m in.
“Please help yourself to food and drink in the banquet hall,” Bastion says to the flow of guests. “We’ll be with you shortly. Celebrate and rest easy, friends.”
I hurry off the stage toward Will and hug my arms around his waist, under his jacket, so I’m shrouded in his warmth. He slings an arm over my shoulder, not a moment before Pigeon launches herself at the both of us. She squeezes us in a tight hug then steps back, Lark hovering at her shoulder.
“Am I glad to see you two!” Pigeon beams.
“You survived!” I say. “We tried looking but— What happened?”
“Of course I did. They threw me in a cell overnight, though. I really should talk to someone higher up about the human rights in this damn citadel. The food was worse than the scraps I steal,” she says, then gives Lark a teasing grin.
“Blondie here clearly missed me and broke me out just now. You should have seen his face when we bumped into his captain on our way here.”
Lark tuts and turns away.
“You broke her out?”
“She…saved my life,” he says, a muscle in his jaw standing out. “It was only fair.”
“Oh, yeah, he was almost gone for good,” Pigeon chimes in. She digs her elbow into his arm, and if I’m not wrong, the faintest of blushes appears on Lark’s face. Oh. I see.
“I would have been fine,” he shoots back, still not looking at her.
She snorts. “Hilarious. Anyway, we had to walk back to the citadel through the fields, so I used that long road wisely—meaning I told him all about the conditions in our villages. Apparently I can paint quite the picture.”
Beside me, Will barely restrains his laugh.
“She had some…good points,” Lark says, and rubs the back of his neck. “I’m trying to do the right thing.”
There’s a hint of Howell in his tone. A recognition of the lessons Howell drilled in him.
“Did you talk with Bash about what to do next?” I ask Pigeon.
“Yeah, the prince said he’d arrange a room for me here while we discuss things further.
Apparently, he’d already drawn up a bunch of plans, but his parents had been keeping him on a leash.
I was right about them being uptight, wasn’t I?
Add way overprotective to that list. Anyway, it sounds like they’re ceding power to him from now on.
Especially while they recover from whatever all that poisoning stuff was about…
” She shakes her braid, baffled by recent events, but can’t keep her attention away from the banquet for much longer.
“We have a lot to make up for on both sides. The prince made it clear that he won’t tolerate any more of my group’s, uh, ‘accidents,’ and I heard Simon’s mother back there…
All apologies are best done on a full stomach, though.
It would be a shame to let that food go cold. ”
Will’s laugh vibrates in his chest. “Yes, you’d better get yourself a plate before they throw you back in the dungeon,” he says, and Pigeon sticks her tongue out.
She throws us a wild grin, her hair a mess, her face burned. Her spirit high. She flicks her hand in a wave and drags Lark away by his sleeve, past Mum, who has her hand tucked in Ruth’s elbow, following the remaining guests out.
“I almost wish I could listen in on those meetings,” Will muses. “Pigeon is going to tear this place apart.”
“Well,” Bash says, coming down the steps holding Card’s hand, “as long as it doesn’t include explosives, I’m willing to hear her out so that no one else gets hurt. Or killed.”
They stop before us—our mirrors, our friends. We face each other, alone in the vast hall, with time enough to talk and space enough to see clearly. Will’s arm around me tightens ever so slightly.
“I’m sure she’d agree it’s about time,” Will says, and Bash fights his high-strung instincts. He forces his shoulders down.
“As do I. I was unaware how bad their conditions were, but my ignorance is my own fault. All I did was complain when my mother told me no. Instead, I should have found another solution.”
“I’ve suggested taking samples of the soil to the Library to have it undergo testing,” Card says. “With their help, we can look for both magical and non-magical ways to encourage life back to the area.”
Bash nods. “I’ve also asked Pigeon to take me around the affected villages and arrange meetings with the people.
My parents have decided to take a long break from their duties while they heal.
My mother says she no longer trusts herself to rule, so I’ll be able to use the full extent of the kingdom’s power to make amends. ”
“Good,” Will says.
The silence that follows feels like a hard-won victory.
“Um,” Card starts, unusually uncomfortable for someone so social. “We’d like you both to stay. For the party. Please.”
“Does this mean I’m not a wanted criminal anymore?” Will asks.
Bash glares. “Of course you’re not. I’ll send out letters to the surrounding areas tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow? How kind of you.”
“What? You want me to do it right now?”
Card clears his throat and Bash takes a deep breath, in balance with each other like a bouquet of lisianthuses, their white petals dipped in violet and adoring admiration. Bash adjusts the cuff links on his purple suit.
“I’m sorry for not listening to you earlier.
I’d hate to blame my…haste on exposure to the poison in my mother’s chambers, but either way, it was a lot to take in,” the prince says.
“To be honest, I’m still confused. How did you two even meet to begin with?
And how did you figure out Morgana’s plan? ”
Will waits for me to answer first, and when I don’t, he decides that a shrug is a decent enough response.
Card watches me, searching and sensitive. In a soft voice, he says, “You don’t have to tell us anything.”
We lock eyes and meet on a bridge of consideration, of courtesy and understanding. Of patience while I decide my next words.
“ ‘Mr. Wolf,’ ” I say quietly, quoting our school play, “ ‘what could I possibly have to offer you, when you are strong and fast and all in our forest know your name?’ ”
Card’s face crumbles, and he works hard to smooth out a smile, tears glistening on his eyelashes. “ ‘Everything, my dear Rabbit, for you are all I am not. I have much to learn, and this time I will not take what is not given freely.’ ”
We break from our partners and Card crushes me in a hug.
“I’m so sorry,” he says, digging his fingers into my chiffon-cloaked shoulders, “for everything. I missed you so much.”
Card leans back and there’s a fragment of space between us, a lingering slice of the betrayals and anger and mistakes we both made.
Something broke here that will take time to mend, but for now, there’s a smile on his face, a future that takes him to the Library, and a husband who stands by his side.
Like a stream that splits in two, we’ve both changed, both gravitated in different directions, but it’s okay.
I want him to be happy. I want us both to grow so our friendship can be a healthy, sunlit blossom.
“I have a crown imperial flower in my garden,” I whisper. “I never had a chance to give it to you.”
“I could come round? Soon? If that’s okay with you, that is.”
I nod. Card smiles. He turns back to Bash.
“Come on, husband. They’ll be waiting for us.”
Bastion’s joy is as vibrant as the Lunarie’s crackling petals. Oh! The flowers. I snap my head to the corner where the Lunarie should be and find it reduced to dust. Crumbled to gray soot. The other three vases share the same disappointing fate. The best flowers I’ve ever seen. Gone.
Will touches my back.
“They’ll bloom again, as all things do,” he says.
“You coming?” Bash calls.
I take a last sad look at the flowers who died for me. The Feiyan, who gave me Will. The Odyssa, who gave me Pigeon. The Lunarie, who gave me a step toward the truth. I whisper a thank-you, as I always do, and lead Will by the hand toward our friends.