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Soren hadn’t even wanted a wedding. The mercenaries wasted days upon days on outfits, decorations, and refreshments, trying to sneak half of them past him as if he weren’t responsible for the company’s finances. The vows he’d made to Ike on battlefields, on the cusp of facing a goddess, were written in blood and etched in fate. What need did they have of a witness, let alone a cake?
That didn’t stop him from double-checking those lists of supplies, ensuring they were not only affordable but also tolerable to Ike, who disliked sweets and itchy fabrics. Soren even accompanied Mist into town to haggle for her dress and the ingredients for the cake she insisted upon.
“She just wants to spend time with you. You know, since you’re marrying me and we’re leaving soon?” Ike said that evening, after Soren recounted how Mist had gone on tangents and dragged him irrelevant places. “You’re already like a brother to her.”
Soren froze, blotting ink over the list of expenditures. His gaze tugged toward the letter perched at the corner of his desk, degrees away from toppling off, a blight on the desk’s meticulous order.
As he’d requested, it had been delivered with discretion, directly into his hands. Mist, whose senses rivaled Soren’s, surely would have otherwise noticed that the patchouli-scented page was thick enough to withstand claws.
…Of course, Almedha and I were overjoyed to hear of your engagement. She wishes me to write that she is glad you’re being cared for by a strong, dedicated man, and she is amused that you both share an appreciation for—
Forgive me. I have banned her from dictating. I would start this letter over, if I didn’t wish to preserve her initial sentiment.
While we don’t wish to impose, it is serendipitous that our latest diplomatic trip should overlap with the ceremony. In Goldoa, weddings last for days, but it is a blink compared to the lifetimes we share. Alas, I’m too young to have witnessed a Goldoan wedding, but I learned of them during my brother’s engagement.
There, the penmanship wobbled, as if the letter’s destiny was to teeter on an edge.
Goldoans can feel the joy of their loved ones across mountains. Even if we remain within Castle Crimea, Almedha and I will be toasting to your happiness.
The rest of the letters, including the initial one that had both shaken up his world and changed nothing, were hidden under a floorboard. It was where he used to stash food, until he learned to trust that through wars and revelations, Ike would never let him starve. Even now, with the apocalypse behind them and a journey into the unknown ahead, Soren clung to his secrets. He had no desire to get dragged into an iota of what Pelleas had, nor did he wish for the mercenaries who he’d finally begun to share cordial, if curt, meals with to see him irrevocably differently (no matter how Ike insisted they wouldn’t).
The only reason he had replied to the letters was that his relations seemed to understand this.
Perhaps it was for the same reason, or perhaps it was the knowledge that soon enough, nothing in Tellius would interfere with him and Ike again…or perhaps it was that, though Soren had laid out his path and had no interest in pining for what might have been, there was a child within him that had once yearned to know.
Perhaps it was just in a mage’s nature to be curious.
Regardless, his reply balanced on that same edge, waiting for him to take the plunge.
Honored king and princess of Goldoa,
You are cordially invited…
The excuse he fed the mercenaries was that given the longevity of Goldoan lives and marriages, having one attend a wedding was considered a good omen. Considering a Goldoan had not attended a beorc wedding in centuries, this surely meant Ike and Soren’s marriage would be blessed beyond all others—worth the fuss of a foreign king, princess, and advisor attending a small occasion at the mercenaries’ fort.
If the tome he cited didn’t exist, the mercenaries wouldn’t dig through Begnion’s archives to verify it. The more blatant evidence against his claim, Ena and Almedha’s own fates, would have to stand unacknowledged.
Regardless, no one would assume the dragons were there for Soren; Ike could make friends with anyone, including the royal family of a reclusive reptilian nation. Soren’s attempts at cutting down the guest list had been less successful than his attempts at cutting costs. At least the bird tribes were busy keeping the peace amongst themselves in Serenes, so Tibarn and Reyson had simply sent the world’s largest gift basket, rivaled only by the gift sent by Gallia’s new king, who Soren had been relieved would be too busy to attend—enough to accept that Ranulf would attend in his stead.
The news Ranulf brought that Skrimir had rearranged his schedule to bound across the border for the reception was another matter.
“I wish Goldoans truly did bring good fortune. It would balance out the curse of Skrimir thwarting my plans one last time,” Soren muttered as he adjusted the mantle of his wedding robes. For all he had insisted fancy outfits were unnecessary, he had spent a good hour trying to put every hair and accessory in its place. A tidy outside begets a pious inside, the priests who raised him had insisted, and he…he was presenting himself to Ike, after all. Not that Ike cared for such things, but…
Ike pulled Soren’s hands away, keeping them in his palms, the only place where they could settle.
“For once, no one’ll die without your strategies. We’ll still be married whether or not things get a little rowdy.”
Despite all of his years studying Ike’s mannerisms, Soren was still getting used to the subtle, yet undeniably goofy tug at Ike’s lips whenever he said such things. He hadn’t thrown himself into wedding plans or bought the most expensive ring, but Soren knew. Marrying him—marrying him, choosing him, staying with him—made Ike happy.
Skrimir could propose to Almedha in the middle of the ceremony without spoiling that.
They held the wedding by the lake, a breeze mellowing out the wildflowers’ aroma, as if the wind spirits that had gathered around Soren all his life were wishing him well. Their tailors had taken care to choose fabrics that wouldn’t scratch or constrain, and even the livelier attendees behaved long enough for the grooms to walk down the makeshift aisle.
Still, it filled him with apprehension to parade past rows of witnesses, let alone the Goldoans. Just before the ceremony, Almedha had caught him alone in his office, fussing one last time over his appearance.
“You look well,” she’d said with a small smile, more awkward than the stories about her would have him expect.
“Thank you,” he’d said stiffly.
She’d held out a dark brooch, its teal gem reminiscent of the arch sage robes he wore when they first met (reunited, he reminded himself). “It doesn’t match, I suppose. I forgot Crimeans wore white at weddings.”
“A morbid choice, in Goldoa, is it not?”
Her eyes, the same bloody warning as his, brightened. “Have you learned much of Goldoan weddings?”
Though he’d hunted down the few scraps of available literature on the subject, he only said, “Studying tactics requires studying history. Goldoa…”
“Is a fossil of a nation, yes.”
He raised a brow at her tone. “I thought its new king intended to alter its direction.”
“At the pace it takes for a mountain to change course,” she said. “But Kurth is doing what he can.”
They lapsed into a silence far removed from the comfort Soren found in his and Ike’s stretches of quiet.
Almedha held up the brooch. “At…at any rate, Kurth thought we should only present the typical wedding presents, meant for both of you. So I thought…while I have you alone, I’d see if you would like to wear this.”
He didn’t ask where it had come from or its significance; she herself never had a wedding. Perhaps it was her mother’s, or part of an ancient Goldoan tradition, or simply something she’d found pretty.
None of which meant anything to him.
“I don’t think I would,” he said.
Though her expression changed little, her disappointment hit him in a wave that almost made him grimace. He’d always been sensitive to the shifts in others, but he hadn’t been prepared to sense the mind of a near-stranger. He wondered if she knew, if she could read him as acutely as Micaiah could. The thought was disquieting.
A part of him must have known, back when she first called out to him, and a rush of curiosity had made his neck prickle.
She closed her hand and let it fall to her side.
“I understand. I wish you good fortune, then,” she said.
As she turned, he blurted, “Hold.”
She followed the command to stay as readily as she had his rejection. He swallowed hard.
“You’ll…be there?”
He wasn’t sure why he asked, or what he was asking, or why his voice had grown small. Those eyes he had called a warning softened.
“I will,” she said.
And she was, standing behind her brother the king, her manner stately and her mind radiating pride.
Ike and Soren made it to the lakeshore that served as their altar. They clasped hands before Rhys, who spoke with a calm that Soren needed but couldn’t quite find soothing. Their vows were simple, traditional. What Ike meant to him could never be put into words an audience could understand.
As Ike had gotten away with eschewing gloves, those warm, rough palms cradled Soren’s, and Ike’s lips kept tugging up—and as he finally got the chance to press them to his groom’s, Soren found he didn’t particularly care who watched.
Since neither Ike or Soren had played along with Mist’s tale about throwing the bouquet, she’d thrown it herself. If it was a coincidence that it had landed squarely in Jill’s hands, the two of them had nonetheless been red-faced and inseparable ever since, leaving Jill useless at any sort of guard duty.
It was sorely missed. Mia and Boyd’s insistence on turning every event into an arm wrestling tournament was one thing; Gallia’s king and Goldoa’s princess joining in made Soren wish he’d added furniture repair to the list of expenses. Titania, who Soren trusted to keep this sort of thing well in hand, seemed strangely insistent upon proving her prowess to Almedha, who excelled at goading others into such things. It gave Soren an excuse to give the whole affair a wide berth.
Unprepared for a Goldoan’s constitution, Shinon and Gatrie had already lost a drinking contest to Almedha, and it had taken the drinks for Shinon to try what Gatrie already foolishly had—make overtures to her that had gotten both of them roundly kicked out of the reception. That should have marked the occasion winding down.
Then Rolf snuck more than a taste of Shinon’s abandoned drink, and subsequently lobbied a half-eaten piece of fruit at Boyd’s head—instigating a mess hall-wide war which Rhys of all people encouraged. When a dollop of mushroom sauce found its way into Mist’s hair, Jill broke out of her stupor to defend her honor. Ike similarly shielded Soren, too put out at the waste of food to join in, but refusing to step into enough of a leadership role to stop it.
“I’m sorry about, well…” Oscar tried to extricate a piece of the beef he’d so carefully tended to from Soren’s robes. “Our family.”
Having been unable to refuse anything Ike handed him from the buffet, a feast turned over in Soren’s stomach.
“Ike has enjoyed several helpings of the food,” he said by way of roundabout praise.
Oscar smiled. “It was a lovely ceremony. I’m not a priest or a tailor, but I wanted to contribute in my own way.”
As the company’s staff officer, Soren had managed this group for years. Managing their feelings, which today meant accepting their well wishes with appropriate gratitude, was out of his purview. Oscar didn’t seem offended at his quiet nod.
Ike—his husband—managed to remain nonplussed through the chaos, a boulder who ate and arm-wrestled and rested a hand on Soren’s knee. Ranulf, who had been slipping back and forth between chaperoning Skrimir and cajoling Ike and Soren into displays of affection that they mostly did not deliver on, slinked back from Skrimir duty with the man himself unfortunately in tow. Skrimir clapped both grooms on the shoulder, making Soren wince.
“I should have known that if any group of beorc knew how to throw a celebration, it would be Ike’s mercenaries,” Skrimir said.
“I didn’t have much to do with it,” Ike said. “Glad you’re having fun, though.”
“Don’t be so modest. You’re the one uniting with the world’s smartest little beorc. You should be parading him around on your shoulders, as a proper warrior-groom would.”
Ike spared Soren from having to rebuff that by saying, “I don’t think that’s the best idea after how much I made him eat.”
“Not enough, considering how much of the feast ended up in my fur,” Ranulf said.
“No one made you attend,” Soren said. Ranulf only grinned slyly.
“If I didn’t make sure my best buddies remembered to cozy up after their own wedding, who would remind everyone who the stars of the day are?”
Soren had, in fact, been banking on everyone forgetting him somewhere in the middle of Skrimir and Almedha’s world champion arm wrestling match.
“Little Goldoan king!” Skrimir barked, firing Soren’s nerves. “Come wish the beorc heroes well.”
Kurthnaga, who had been calmly observing the festivities with a drink and a dazed flush, shuffled over from his corner. He shot Soren an apologetic glance, one that spilled over with a warmth Soren had been avoiding.
“I wish both of you all the happiness in as many worlds as you should find yourself in,” Kurthnaga said, his tone too soft for a near-stranger in a loud room. Ranulf looked on, just a bit too keen, as always. Suddenly convinced everyone was putting the pieces together, Soren half-bowed his head, not quite appropriate either for greeting royalty or thanking an ally.
Or an uncle.
Ike held out a hand, which Kurthnaga took with the awkwardness of someone not used to hand shakes, let alone Ike’s firm hold. “Thank you for coming,” Ike said. “I know it’s a big deal.”
“When you first showed up on Goldoa’s shores, I mentioned I wished we could feast and converse. That such an opportunity should come so freely isn’t something I’ll take for granted in all my years.”
“I appreciate it. Though I don’t think you need to worry about immortalizing that food fight.”
“Oh, no. I think the Battle of the Beorc Mess Hall will be passed down as a warning tale for generations to come.”
Ike laughed a rare laugh, and Soren tried to focus on the sound instead of who might be clocking the true significance of all of this. Most certainly Ena, trailing behind her king, her expression unmoved by his mirth.
Kurthnaga’s gaze slid back to Soren. “Perhaps, if I can borrow your beau for a moment, the resident scholar might act as my scribe?”
Dedicated to the application of knowledge rather than its pursuit, Soren didn’t consider himself a scholar, but he understood what was truly being asked. The hand on his knee squeezed.
“Up to him,” Ike said.
“Of course,” Kurthnaga said.
Most of the people in the room, when Soren glanced, were not actually concerned with their table, too busy making and cleaning up their own messes. But enough eyes were on him as he said, “If it gets me away from all this noise.”
It was difficult enough to want to leave Ike’s side, let alone today, let alone for this. But with one final squeeze, Ike’s hand retreated, and Soren rose.
Kurthnaga suggested—in a way that wasn’t a suggestion—that Ena check on Almedha, who was sharing a tale with Titania and Mia that had the former looking mildly scandalized and the latter leaning over the table. If Ena was unhappy to abandon her post, she seemed to trust that Soren wasn’t about to stab her king, as she followed her implicit orders. The remaining two stepped outside.
Despite Soren’s company, fresh air went some way to clearing his head. The wind spirits had given up their favored post by the lake to dance outside the mess hall, and now they nipped at his heels as he led Kurthnaga out of earshot. They sat on a bench overlooking the training grounds, the humble patch of dirt where the mercenaries had prepared for the warfare Kurthnaga so despised.
“The steppes of Goldoa allow for such clear skies, but there’s beauty to the way the forest frames it, too, don’t you think? It’s as if the stars are clustering together to watch over the occasion,” Kurthnaga said.
Soren said nothing. Kurthnaga rubbed at a fresh stain in his tunic, courtesy of a misfire from Rolf’s makeshift ‘trebuchet’ (spoon).
“I hope I haven’t been rude, not joining in the festivities. I didn’t want to put you in an awkward position,” Kurthnaga said.
Considering Soren himself had invited his uncle (as new a concept, and one harder to savor, than husband), he bit back his retort that Kurthnaga’s presence made that inevitable.
“Though, I believe Almedha has been participating with gusto for the same reason,” Kurthnaga added.
It hadn’t occurred to Soren that his mother’s antics had been her own way of holding herself back. From…what? What would a mother have done at his reception, had he been an ordinary son?
Unsure how to address it, he replied instead to the first point.
“You don’t need to waste breath on courtesy. Under normal circumstances, a king would never deign to attend anything like this. It can’t even be called the same event as a Goldoan wedding.”
“I don’t know about that. Weddings are a wish for a long, fulfilling future, after all. I think I speak for Almedha in saying that both of us found it quite refreshing. She’s never been one for tradition, or for dragging things out, and I was happy to see such heartfelt feelings on display.” His smile faltered. “Ena—well, these things are rough for her, but I’m sure it brought her peace.”
Though she was the only present Goldoan not tied to Soren by blood, her name was the one that chilled his veins. Despite how Almedha’s tactics had changed mid-food fight, making Soren suspect Ena was sending her telepathic advice, the strategist had comported herself as King Goldoa’s attendant, his silent, stoic shadow.
“I told you not to waste your breath,” Soren said. “If not for me, she’d be the one happily married. What possible solace could it bring her to see an abomination happy in her stead?”
His words carried the acid of the drinks he hadn’t developed his mother’s tolerance for, though beorc still scratched their heads at such a scrawny man’s constitution. It was bad enough that instead of the fabled millennia of happiness that Ena and Rajaion had been promised, Soren would be carrying the hurt of losing his only love for some unknown fraction of that span. The people who’d cursed him with this, and been cursed in return, didn’t have to pretend to be pleased.
Kurthnaga faced him sharply, his bearing almost befitting a king.
“Soren. I’ve tried to keep my distance, but if that’s what you think, I can’t bear for you to leave Tellius without knowing this.”
Soren froze, caught by those eyes that reflected his but had seen an entirely different life.
“On that day, when my brother breathed his last…thanks to the company you and Ike led, he had one more chance to share his heart with his betrothed,” Kurthnaga said. “Goldoans might be known as distant, but we feel so deeply. We love so deeply. We can sense those we care for, even if they’re hidden amidst an army, even if we have not seen them since they were a baby.”
Soren could visualize whole battlefields, but he couldn’t wrap his mind around the implication. He hadn’t watched Rajaion’s revival and demise. That day, already wrung out by the supposed final battle, he’d been overwhelmed by the emotions of that scene on top of it all. The only reason he hadn’t slipped away was that after being unable to help Ike in the final bout against Ashnard (against his…his—), he’d been hard pressed to let anything tear him from his side.
“Ena hasn’t shared everything with me, but I know she felt the moment when all of his regrets ceased.” Kurth’s voice resumed its usual quiet, tapering to a murmur. “How could she not treasure this?”
Soren bent over his hands where they shook in his lap. If he was to derive one comfort, one bit of evidence of a familial bond, it was that he let Kurthnaga witness him trying to hold himself together.
After several shuddering breaths, Soren said, “If you’re so invested in my peace of mind, then please send for my husband.”
“Of course.” Kurthnaga stood. “Thank you for the invitation. Goldoa’s borders will always be open to both of you. Think as much or as little of it as you wish.”
As he slipped away, one of the wind spirits at Soren’s ankles drifting off to follow him, as if sensing a shared power. The implication of that invitation, how it would likely extend so much longer for Soren than for Ike, sat with the rest of the weight in his stomach.
Soren sensed Ike hurrying toward him, that steady mind at the edge of his own awareness, and he didn’t need to be told how deeply Goldoans felt, how deeply they loved. Those vows that had condemned a goddess, the same ones he’d repeated before her priest, would outlast mountains—even those that hemmed in a nation whose king and princess had witnessed them.