Total pages in book: 241
Estimated words: 229266 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1146(@200wpm)___ 917(@250wpm)___ 764(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 229266 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1146(@200wpm)___ 917(@250wpm)___ 764(@300wpm)
“Unworthy,” he whispered, and then he kissed me at the exact moment I felt the sharp sting of Jasper’s dagger against my palm. The kiss was as brief as the pain, but so much sweeter.
Casteel withdrew, pressing our hands together, palm to palm. He threaded his fingers through mine as he guided our joined hands to the rings. Air hitched in my throat as I watched my blood—our blood—slide down our palms, to our wrists. A drop and then two fell, splashing the rings.
Jasper was quiet as Casteel eased his hand from mine. He picked up the smaller ring, his right hand still clasping mine. “I’ll put the ring on you, and then you’ll put the other ring on me.”
I nodded.
“Turn your palm up to the sky,” he said quietly. When I turned my hand over, my eyes widened.
The cut had closed, but across the center of my palm was a thin swirl of vibrant gold that shimmered even with the sunlight obscured by clouds. “How…?”
Casteel grinned at me. “Magic.”
It had to be that.
My hand was surprisingly steady as he slipped the dirt-and blood-streaked ring over my pointer finger. It was a little loose, but I didn’t believe it would slip off.
“Your turn.”
I picked up his and held my breath as I fitted it over his finger.
And then I watched in stunned silence as the dirt and blood seeped into the rings. The bands flared an intense gold and then faded, their surfaces now pristine.
“It is done,” Jasper said, rising. “You are husband and wife.”
The day turned to night.
My lips parted as I looked up. The gathering clouds had turned the sky the black of midnight, from the east to the west, to the south and north. Not a single trace of sunlight could be seen, even though it couldn’t be more than an hour or two past noon.
“My gods,” Vonetta whispered.
Casteel rose swiftly, bringing me with him. He pulled me to his side as he stared up at the black sky.
“Is this an omen?” I asked.
“It is,” Jasper confirmed, his voice rough. “I haven’t seen anything like this since…Gods, since your mother and father married. And even then, Casteel, it wasn’t like this.”
Casteel lowered his gaze to the wolven.
“This is an omen. A powerful one.” Jasper shook his head in wonder. “A good one from the King of Gods.” The unnatural clouds started to scatter, and sunlight broke through as Jasper smiled. “Nyktos, even asleep, approves of this union.”
The gold band glimmered in the sunlight cascading through the windows of our bedchamber. Slowly, I turned my hand over. The swirl of shimmering gold followed the line closest to my fingers. I dragged my thumb over the curling line. The heavy dusting of gold didn’t disappear, and I…I couldn’t believe I was married. That I’d gone from being Penellaphe Balfour, to the Maiden, and now, Penellaphe Da’Neer.
“I hope you’re not already having second thoughts. But if so, it’s not going to rub off.”
My head jerked up as Casteel strode out from the bathing chamber. “I’m not trying to rub it off.” I watched him walk around the bed, my heart already tripping in my chest. “And I’m not having second thoughts. I just don’t understand how this is possible—the gold on my hand. How the blood and dirt just…sank into the rings and disappeared.”
“When I said it was magic, I was only half teasing.” He sat beside me, taking my hand. The contact sent a jolt of awareness through me. “It’s the gods. Their magic.” He ran his finger along the mark. “And this is like a tattoo but goes deeper than ink. All married Atlantians have this imprint until their marriage ends.”
“Through death or decree?”
Dark waves tumbled over his forehead as he nodded. “The mark will then disappear.”
That would be a terrible way to discover that someone died. I shivered.
Casteel’s gaze lifted to mine. “Did you not believe in the gods at all?”
I started to say yes, that I did, but it was more complicated than that. “I believed what I’d been taught about the gods by the Ascended. The only magic was the Blessing. Other than that, they were like…silent sentinels who watched over us, and that it was our duty to serve them through the Rite.” I laughed—laughed at myself. “Now when I say that out loud, I recognize how ridiculous it sounds. How blind I’d been.”
“It only sounds that way to someone taught differently from birth.”
“We thought their magic was the Ascension. That the Ascended were proof of that power,” I said as Casteel trailed his fingers to the ring around my pointer finger. I realized something. “It surprised me when you placed the ring on my pointer finger. In Solis, the ring is worn on the fourth finger, but the line the imprint is on is closest to the pointer finger.”