“She told me to take another when she died, after her long life together with us – but I never did. I never partook in any of our harem girls – not one, in all those decades.”
Mia gasps. She’s looking at us in a new light. Maybe it’s the rush of emotions she’s had from nearly dying, but she’s got hope in her eyes.
“Not until I saw you have I ever wanted another, so know this of me: I will be loyal to you. Bonded or not, we will all be loyal to you, and only you.”
She looks up, the disbelief in her eyes. That’s when I did something I never thought I would ever do.
I slowly get down to one knee.
She looks at me like I’m crazy. Maybe I am. Maybe she makes me that way. Cyrus and Varian stand up, shifting in the shuttle to kneel down next to me.
All three of us our on our knees before her – finally eye-to-eye with her.
“Mia,” I murmur. “I believe you are our Fated Mate – but even if you’re not, it doesn’t matter to me. I want to marry you.”
“I too,” murmurs Varian.
“I, as well,” Cyrus joins us.
Mia sits there for a moment, as if she can’t believe what she’s hearing – can’t believe what she’s seeing.
Then, she stands slowly. She’s still dressed in those awful, dirty clothes, and I can smell her fear and sweat on them, still slick against her skin.
I don’t care, though. She smells like her. She smells right.
It’s her, and I want her.
“…and your harem?”
Her voice trembles.
“We don’t need them anymore,” I respond.
She’s almost the same height as us, even as we kneel. Tears well up in Mia’s eyes, and roll down her face.
Finally, she laughs – although it’s almost a grateful sob.
“Get up, you big idiots. Okay, okay…” She wipes her eyes. “Let’s do this.” Then, she giggles. “I feel so stupid…”
But it’s not stupid. It’s the least stupid thing I’ve ever done in my life.
I wish I had a ring for her, but I haven’t had one made. I stand up, and I feel the same stupidity she’s talking about. I feel like a complete fool – and I don’t care.
I grin, and suddenly we’re all laughing – all four of us. We’re laughing in pure joy as she steps forward and falls into my arms. I kiss Mia deeply, and I feel her essence as she kisses me back.
17
Mia
“Holy fuck.”
“What? What is it?”
“You’re fucking beautiful Mia. You’re so beautiful.”
It’s Sarah, standing before me with tears welling up in her eyes.
“Dammit, you’re going to make me have to redo my make-up,” she splutters, and I know she’s welling up with joy.
My own eyes get wet, but I force back the tears, my lips trembling. I can barely recognize myself in the mirror.
My reflection stands in a beautiful, white wedding dress – tailored from the thinnest, lightest of fabrics. It’s fitting for the cool, calm day outside. We chose an outdoor wedding, and the weather drones were hired to ensure we’re not rained out.
Frequent showers aside, Oasis is everything I had hoped it would be.
But even now, so much time and so any miles away from where I’d been, there’s still that tendril of fear, snaking deep through my heart.
I know those three Aurelians promised to love me…
…but what if, after all this, we’re not Bonded?
Fuck the Bond.
The words of those three Aurelians repeat in my head, and I still feel the truth to them.
It will be a difficult life, if we’re not Bonded – but all four of us are committed to doing everything we must to make it work.
“You look better than me,” I say to Sarah, and she just shakes her head and laughs.
“Liar.”
“Okay, I’m a liar,” I say, looking at myself again. Sarah did my makeup. She helped me pick out my wedding dress. I don’t have any bridesmaids other than her, but I don’t care. She’s my best and only friend, and I love her like the sister I never had.
We had a long heart to heart talk about the Aurelians when I’d finally returned to the manor, after being rescued from Darr. I’d been worried Sarah would hate me, but she moved to Oasis with me when I asked her to, starting a salon here with the funding the Aurelians gave her upon leaving the service of their harem.
In just months, Sarah’s salon has become the talk of the capital city. She’s truly an artist.
“One last thing. I made something for you.” Sarah crosses the vaulted room that serves as the private function chamber of her salon, and opens a closet. She pulls out a painting, hidden in the corner, and shows it to me.
“What do you think? It’s my first memory of you – when you first walked into the mansion.”
I stare in wonder at the canvas she’s handed me. It’s beautiful.
It’s a painting of a girl who is so pretty that I couldn’t believe it could be me, if the features didn’t match my own so perfectly. In the painting, the sun is depicted as hanging in the sky behind me, while I’m walking down a pathway I recognize as the one leading to the Aurelians’ towering manor. In the sky behind me is Oasis. In reality, the blue gemstone wouldn’t be visible in the daylight, but Sarah’s skilled paintbrush has managed to make her depiction seem more real than reality; as if the real sky, absent of the binary planet in the full brightness of daylight, is somehow the wrong vision, not her painting.
I look at it and see how far I’ve come from that time – back when I was just a thief, and just a survivor.
“Now you’re really going to make me cry,” I warn, and then burst into laughter.
Sarah puts the painting down and hugs me. I’ve never had a friend before who didn’t want something from me, and I don’t think I’ll ever need another.
“The Aurelians
