Chapter 45
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For better or kittens.
"That's it," I murmur, guiding Kassandra into the vast stream of ether that drowns both the human and fae worlds. The very sensation of being here with someone who isn't Andromeda is…freeing, somehow. Every barrier I've put in place to distance myself from those I might hurt crumbles in the presence of my wife.
My fully fae wife.
Here, entire universes held in the minds of people collide. Here, the pathways that lead to dimensions beyond what I've explored take root. Here, in the spaces between, Kassandra can test her abilities without fearing a lasting impact.
Tonight is about teaching her how to feel what she can do.
Tonight is about making sure she feels confident and content with the unexpected stress that coming into her faerie blood has caused.
Asking her to navigate living with me on top of becoming fully fae is never what I would have planned.
Thankfully, though, she's taking all the change well.
Like mine, her barriers have crumbled.
Perhaps this push is what she needed all along.
Perhaps I've been overcompensating for my own fears.
Never mind that she can bring about the collapse of reality as the humans know it…by mistake…if she's not careful… She won't do that.
Probably.
And probably I need to have a touch my wife and die conversation with Cael before he inevitably sees her outside her human form, identifies what she is, and goes all princely precaution on us.
She's fine.
It's fine.
Reality needs to collapse every now and again, anyway.
I'll just help her fix it.
No problem.
It really is times like these that I wish anxiety medication worked on my system…
Kassandra's gaze drifts over the clouds of consciousness that burst and fluctuate around us, drawing realms out of memories and imagination. Finding calm in her existence, I picture the worlds reflecting in every gold fleck that consumes her brown eyes.
Her beauty has no business being this entrancing.
"So this is the dream plane…" she murmurs.
"It is."
She points behind me. "What's going on over there…?"
I turn my attention to…decidedly something. What exactly is a question I stopped asking millennia ago. For my own sanity. "It's best not to worry about that."
Her attention drifts. "'Kay…"
"Are you well?"
"I'm…overwelmed, if that counts for anything?" Her fingers tighten around mine. "Dinner was…a lot. I talked more than I've talked in decades, and I'm tired now."
"I'm sorry that everyone showed up with only an invitation from Meda, and not us. I should have known better than to think she had not memorized her…‘mother's' phone number."
"Meda thought it was a family dinner. It was."
In spite of myself, I can't stop smiling. "It really was."
"I'm glad everyone was there. I mean, what if they hadn't been there to distract my parents from how jittery I've gotten?" Kassandra blows out a breath. "My word. Who knows what they might have thought the reason behind my nerves are? It's not like I moved in with my husband tonight or anything, right?"
I arch a brow. "You…did. I'm sorry. I don't think I'm following. What would they have suspected as the reasoning behind your heightened energy were everyone not there?"
Kassandra presses her lips together and stares at me. "I forgot. You do not look as innocent as you are. You are like a skank conduit made of the purest crystal. It's entirely possible I received all the gutter brain pieces in our two halves of a perfect whole situation here."
"Oh." I understand now. "You were talking about…the things husbands and wives enjoy." I clear my throat. "Dearest, prior to that, I would like to share vows. And…also…claim you without a pretense of expecting more. Just…" I swallow, hard. "Just because I want you to be mine. Because I love you, and I want our souls to be together."
Somehow, the red in her cheeks deepens. "Faeries also share vows? Is that what was supposed to happen after you gave me Chai? But you walked into a bush instead?" She narrows her eyes and drifts closer to me. "Wait, if we never exchanged vows, doesn't that mean we're not actually married yet?"
Confusion niggles its way into my more tender emotions. "We're married according to human traditions, aren't we?"
"What?" she says.
I echo, "Aren't…we?"
"Where in the world did you get the idea that giving me a kitten meant we were human married?"
"It goes as far back as the vikings."
Kassandra blinks. "Are you talking about the viking tradition where men gifted their wives a kitten as a symbol of love because their goddess of love's chariot was pulled by giant cats?"
My mouth opens.
I close it.
Swiping my free hand over my mouth, I murmur, "I believe…perhaps…I've misunderstood something that I have internalized as the truth for a long time."
"Yeah." Kassandra rolls her lips into her mouth, but she can't stop the laugh from escaping for long. "I think maybe that's the case."
"In my defense…" I reference whatever is going on in someone's dream to the left of us.
Kassandra plants her golden fingers over her lips. "That is an excellent defense."
"I also asked Willow for clarification when something I couldn't quite decode felt off." Sighing, I close my eyes, then—in unison—we say, "Willow." I, however, add a curse.
Kassandra snorts, barely keeping herself together as she caves against my body and rumbles with joy. "I'm so glad she's my friend. I hope she likes me. I want her to like me. Do you think she likes me?"
With a sigh, I hold her. "She does not tolerate anyone she doesn't like."
"That's reassuring." Kassandra's cheek rests over my heart. "So. We're not married. And when you questioned Willow about the situation you believed to be true because you spend too much time in absolute chaos, she lied. Since you're a precious dreamboy, you had no natural defenses against lying, and, therefore, believed her."
"I am torn between an urge to retaliate and a desire to congratulate her on her most effective mischief. For a little human-seelie creature, she acts with the mischief of my kind. I appreciate that immensely." No doubt, she would suggest arson in response to emotions, just like Castor. In no small way, that makes her priceless to me.
"It's no wonder you two get along so well."
I mutter, "She's a precious friend. And… Kassandra, we are not married in any shape or form. Are you still comfortable living in the same house with me?"
"Listen." She pulls back just enough to peer up into my eyes. "The more valid question is: am I willing to leave behind the color-coordinated yarn display you put together? Every single skein has its rainbow place outside of a plastic bag stuffed in my closet. It is beautiful, and I like having room to pace on soft carpet amidst all the pretty skies you painted. Counting the secret bees grounds me. On top of the fact I don't know if I can physically sit still anymore, I think I should stay near you until we're sure I'm not at risk of misfiring magic. We're not doing married people things, so it's all right, isn't it?"
I have a biased response to that question. I don't much care about human sensibilities or morals where this is concerned. I have zero qualms about living in the same house with my soulmate. For me, it will only ever be Kassandra. Whether we say our vows now, or tomorrow, or never.
For me, there will not be anyone else to occupy the place in my heart that belongs to a lover.
For me, from the moment we met, she has been my wife.
Tracing the shape of her cheek, I hold her close and say, "You are always welcome wherever I am. Fae words hold power, so the fae tend to marry one another in the privacy of their oaths. We can swear commitment to one another whenever it suits you. We may even get married on human terms, if that is something you would like. What would that look like?"
Heat draws out the warmth in her skin as the gold in her eyes shimmers. "Usually, it's a big wedding ceremony, and you have to file government paperwork. For tax purposes."
"That sounds awful."
"Yeah, humans are really, really strange. Not get married with a kitten exchange strange, but…"
I puff a breath out my nose. "Am I ever going to hear the end of my error?"
"Does it offend you?"
"It mildly embarrasses me that I trusted Willow, of all people, and did not think to double check online."
She smiles. "You're adorable."
Heat crawls up my neck, and I pull my attention off my wife—whether she actually is my wife or not. Because, yes, she is. "You may be the only person who has ever thought so."
"Well, apparently I hold a power that could change that, so you might want to give me a good reason not to. In five…four…three—"
I drop my forehead against hers. "You're the only person I want to think so." My attention slips from her eyes to her lips. "Kassandra."
She whispers, "Yes?"
"Before I teach you how it feels to remake the world around you outside of your own mind, may I claim you?"
"You want to kiss me?"
"That is not the question I asked, but, essentially, yes."
Lifting her hand, she cups my face in her palm. I go drunk on the touch as she asks, "What exactly will claiming me do?"
"At this point?" I hold her wrist and press the sensation of her deeper into my skin. "You no longer need it to open your eyes to Faerie. At this point, it means we accept the bond between us."
"If we didn't accept the bond, would it eventually die?"
Those words settle like lead in my chest. Eventually, rejection can erode just about anything. However… I whisper, "Not for me."
Without warning, her lips touch mine, and my heart jolts as the soft sensation of them unravel my thoughts and turn me into a puddle of vaguely person-shaped matter. She deepens the kiss, parts my lips with her tongue, and reinvents my entire worldview.
When she draws back, I am speechless. I struggle to gather a single logical thought. I want to do…whatever that was again. Just as soon as my heart stops hammering in my ears.
"Whatever happens," she says, "I want it to happen with you. Whoever I become as I figure all of this out, I want it to be your problem, too."
"That's…" Heaven help me. I have forgotten how to breathe. "That's a very interesting way of putting that."
"I'm saying I love you, dreamboy. For better or worse. For richer or poorer. In sickness and in health. Til death do us part." Kassandra shines—encompassing gold and dreams and horrors beyond my feeble sensibilities; I have never witnessed anything like…her. Smiling, she says, "That's what humans say when they get married."
Ah.
If I'm honest, that makes so much more sense than a kitten.