Posey
“I don’t think I understand.” I set the letter down and turn to Aris, who’s leaning against the hearth in our bedroom. “My father wrote this?”
“It’s his blessing.” He crouches, inspecting the fire with a poker.
I resist the urge to crumple the letter but set it neatly on the bed instead. “In what world did you think I needed or wanted his blessing?”
“It was not my idea, trust me.”
Aris returned minutes ago from Sapphire Ridge. When he mentioned he’d fix this, I hadn’t realized he meant now, as soon as possible, slipping away in the quiet hours of the morning, leaving me wondering where the hell he was and why.
I spent the morning in the kitchen, mostly playing with the fawn that we’ve taken to calling “Darling,” mostly because Aris calls her that. Then, I wandered the library. Then, I sat on a stool in my workshop twiddling my thumbs. Then, I came here to pace our bedroom, nursing an irrational fear that he’d suddenly developed cold feet and regretted our spur-of-the-moment nuptials and was scouring the Roguelands for a rogue witch who could cast a spell on me to make me forget any of this had ever happened.
Now, this. A letter in my father’s neat, aggressive scrawl, a formally, law abiding contract for my care and well-being.
A passing of ownership of me from hand to hand.
I close my eyes, take a deep, furious breath, and snatch the letter off the bed and toss it into the flames Aris is actively coaxing back into existence.
He says nothing but watches me closely as I pick up my pacing again. Minutes go by. The canopy over the bed rustles as one of the spirits, Isolde, I believe, pops in to see what the issue is before she senses the tension and quickly leaves again to hang from the rafters in the foyer, or whatever she does with her free time.
My phone rings for the first time in what feels like weeks, vibrating in a lazy circle on the dresser. Willow’s name flashes across the screen before it goes black once more.
“You should have answered that.”
“She’s been avoiding my calls for over a week now. I’ll call her back later.”
“She… had a perfectly acceptable reason to avoid your calls recently.”
“What are you talking about?” I try to remind myself that this isn’t about Aris. It’s not his fault my father is a pompous jackass. Aris doesn’t see me as cattle and doesn’t think he has ownership over me. It’s different. He’s different. The look in his eyes right now–concerned–is evidence of that.
“You’re putting tracks in the carpet. You’ll burn right through it if you keep pacing.”
I halt, wrapping my arm around the four-poster. “Aris, what the hell is going on?”
“This is what I know for sure.” He rises, sets the fire-poker down, and edges toward me cautiously, like I’m at risk of exploding. “Your father seemed livid at first, but then he realized his daughter is marrying the future Alpha King of Veiled Valley and quickly bit his tongue. He gave us his blessing.”
“That piece of paper was a contract giving me to you.”
“I understand, and I hope you don’t think I believe I have any type of claim to you. Not like that. You’re my mate, Posey. My wife. I love you. Your father can go to hell for all I care.”
I settle just a touch, but waves of righteous fury continue to wash over my body. “And Roman? What does he have to say?”
My phone rings again. It’s Willow. I grip the bed for moral support.
Aris waits for the phone to stop ringing before replying, “Roman’s got a lot going on right now.”
“Like what?”
“Did you forget he’s getting married in like… three days?”
“No, I haven’t. I was just ignoring the fact. No one will notice if I’m not there.”
“He will notice, trust me. And… so will Willow.”
I laugh, then realize he just said Willow’s name. “What? Why would Willow notice if I’m not there? She won’t be there.”
“On the contrary. She will be. She’s playing a rather important role, actually.” He scratches his head, looking suddenly boyish, trying so hard not to smile it’s almost comical.
“Aris, I swear on the Goddess, if you don’t tell me what’s going on, I’ll cry.”
“You are not going to cry.” He arches an eyebrow, rolling his eyes to the ceiling with a sigh. “Gods, I kind of wish you’d been there, but you looked so peaceful and cute, and I wasn’t going to wake you up.”
“Aris!”
“In three days' time, we’re going to Sapphire Ridge to watch your brother and your best friend get married.”
My stomach dips to my toes.
“I stumbled upon them at your father’s fortress of a house, walked right into the middle of a lovers’ spat.”
“She rejected him.”
“She lied to you. Not with malicious intent. She didn’t want you to be worried about her, not after what happened this summer. She worried about your friendship going forward. Apparently, your friend sleeping with your older brother is totally fine, but staying mated to your brother and putting them both in absolute agony for almost six months is the line she wasn’t willing to cross, so she hid it. From you. In reality, they’ve both been pining and in utter pieces for months, and she just so happened to arrive just before I did.”
He takes another step in my direction, then another, smiling softly.
“And they’re getting married now? But, her job–”
“I have a meeting with the editor of the local news here, in the capital, tomorrow morning. I might have sweetened the deal and made it easier for those two idiots to see that throwing their mate bond away wasn’t the answer by removing the obstacles in their way, which means she has a job here now if she wants it, and I think she was sick of reporting about what brand of trousers my cousin Liam was wearing in his latest paparazzi pictures. Reporting on Maeve’s summit meetings with the fae in Pantharas seems far more up her alley.”
“She’s moving to Veiled Valley?”
He nods with another smile. “Are you happy?”
“Oh, my Goddess, Aris!” I lunge for him, my body moving before my brain can keep up.
“Happy Solstice,” he says into my hair. I bunch his shirt between my fingers.
“It’s not Solstice yet.”
“Do you even like Solstice?”
“I do. It feels…. We don’t have a tree yet.”
He chuckles, gathering me close. “We’ll put up a tree. I’ll go cut one down right now and drag it back to the castle with my teeth if I must.”
I pull back to look him in the eyes. “Does my dad know that I’m a…”
“That you’re a fox? Absolutely not. I left that out. He does know, as does Roman, that you’re exceedingly talented in alchemy, and I have a feeling your father knew that the entire time.”
My heart sinks a bit. I try not to let it show, but Aris leans down, his hands braced on my shoulders. “I will never ask you to make yourself smaller for me, Posey. You’re my equal. You’re better than me in so many ways, and I hope you always will be, because I was half the man I am today when I saw you again this summer. I love you. I love everything about you. This situation with your pack? It doesn’t matter now.”
He practically reads my mind when I look down at my toes and squeeze my eyes shut around a nagging thought I haven’t been able to dispel.
He slips his fingers under my chin, tilting my face to meet his gaze.
“Our children will not grow up in the shadows like you had to do. I swear. It doesn’t matter if they’re foxes like us, or alchemists, or giant squids–”
“Giant squids?”
He nods like that's a totally rational thing to say, and I can’t help myself. I burst out laughing, and he kisses me, sealing our fate again and again.
We spend most of the early afternoon in bed, locked together, my hands memorizing every inch of his body while he maps mine with his tongue. In the late afternoon, he finally rolls out of bed with a burst of energy that results in a massive evergreen tree being propped up in the foyer with the help of the male spirit, Levi, while Isolde raids every closet and storage room for Solstice decorations. I sit in the center of the foyer with a few of my alchemy tools, crafting orbs of translucent crystal out of iron that Isolde strings like beads along a length of twine, and by the time the stars are out and gleaming in the heavens, our slightly uneven, towering behemoth of a Solstice tree is up and lit from within with Aris’s powers.
For whatever reason, we end up on the roof, a special place Aris used to sit and watch the stars when he was young. The weather has shifted aggressively back to the Veiled Valley’s eternal summer, and the air is blissfully warm on my bare skin as I lean back into the crook of his shoulder, nothing but the stars above us and the breeze rustling my hair.
We make plans for the future–a warm, happy home here in our Gothic, spooky castle. We discuss throwing a party for Levi and Isolde even though, so far, we’re the only people they talk to. We whisper about our future children that Aris says will have hair like mine and eyes like his, and how one day, when they’re old enough to shift, we’ll go romp as a family in our fox forms, teaching them how to chase voles and rabbits.
We talk about the fact that after Solstice he’ll likely be the Alpha King, which means I’ll be… Luna Queen of Veiled Valley.
Old Posey would be wondering if I was ready. If I’d studied enough, prepared myself thoroughly. If I deserved to be known, seen, and heard.
Now, I feel bad for the girl I once was. She had no idea what gift was coming her way.
Days pass in domestic bliss. I practice new alchemy techniques and gather a satchel of tools, metals, and alloys I might need on the go. Aris and I travel to Sapphire Ridge for Willow and Roman’s wedding, which is a strange, strained, but otherwise happy affair… for the four of us, at least. Our fourth cousin twice removed isn’t nearly as joyous during the nuptials, however, seeing as she now has to marry a less good-looking cousin instead of Roman, but I digress. Maybe Aris will force Sapphire Ridge out of the genetic Stone Age once he’s king.
Three days before Solstice, we stand in the foyer, dressed for a journey that for anyone without Aris’s powers would take a week, maybe longer. The satchel feels heavy on my shoulder as Aris looks at our Solstice tree with a soft, wistful smile. There’re only three presents beneath it. One for Levi, one for Isolde, and one for our fawn, Darling. Levi’s getting a framed, candid picture of Soren, which Aris thought was a hilarious idea. Darling, whose favorite thing is kicking my favorite oversized metal bowl in the kitchen, is getting one of her own, handcrafted by me.
Isolde was harder to shop for.
I wrote her a letter instead. Promises. Vows. I’m stepping into her shoes now. The first true Luna of Veiled Valley in over a century. I know the burden she’s passing onto me, and I want nothing more than to make her proud.
“Do we have everything?” Aris asks somewhat nervously.
“I think so. Are you… worried?”
“Why would I be worried? It’s not like I got married in secret without inviting anyone.” He smirks, presses a kiss to my forehead, and weaves his fingers between mine.
For whatever reason, my last cognitive thought before he spirits us into the aether is the memory of standing on the shore of Gem Lake after I overheard him talking to Roman about me, about being a priestess, and he’d followed me when I took off to make sure I was okay.
I think I loved him then.
Now, I get to love him forever.
“Let’s go.” I smile and squeeze his hand.