For some reason, the image of Queen Anne’s Lace—a flowering weed that grows up here along the ridge of the hill between the cabin below and the mansion up above—sticks in my head.
That’s it. I want my wedding dress to look like that; a delicate lace that leaves little flashes of my skin visible beneath, not unlike the stars Rory painted up above my bed. My mind wanders into the forest just as I do, imagining how I’ll look to Rory, Marlowe, and Kaleb when they see me walking towards the altar.
I’ll leave my hair down long so that it cascades over my shoulders and weave the most beautiful colors of wildflowers into a few tiny braids that will encircle around the crown of my head. I don’t want to feel like a demur princess being handed over to her prince. I want to feel like a wild maiden being handed over to her wolves.
I let myself get lost in the fantasy as I walk deeper and deeper into the woods. By the time I realize that the light of day is almost fully gone, I’m further than I had intended to go.
But as soon as I turn to head back towards the cabin, I find I’m not alone.
For once, however, it’s a welcome surprise.
“Don’t you know that you should be careful of wolves in the woods?” Rory says with a broadening smile as he steps out from between the darkening shadows. His head tilts down seductively as I see him emerging through the tree line, Kaleb and Marlowe melting out of the shadows behind him.
“I guess I strayed from the path a bit,” I say, happy to see them here to walk with me on the way back. “But what did I say? I knew you’d be close.”
“Or maybe you’re just lucky that we knew you’d come out here on your own anyway,” Marlowe scolds gently, “even after you promised to stay inside.”
“Yeah,” I laugh. “I guess I did say that, but the temptation to wander a bit was too great.”
At the word temptation, all three sets of eyes begin to glow a golden amber.
I feel it too, the longing and burning desire that I can see manifest on their faces. I might not have glowing eyes yet, but I can definitely feel it.
“What are you guys doing here?” I ask as we walk together in the growing darkness of nightfall.
“Watching over you,” Kaleb says with a slight smile that curves the corner of his mouth up on one side. “As always.”
“I got lost in thought,” I say, in an attempt to let them know that I wasn’t just purposefully defying their request for me to stay safe inside the cabin. Even though part of me knows I was.
“Oh?” Rory says. “What were you thinking about?”
“I was thinking about what to wear to our wedding.”
“I vote for nothing,” Kaleb quips, only half teasing. “We should all wear nothing. It would make the rest of the night following the wedding much easier if we had less clothes to take off.”
I hear Marlowe chuckle beneath his breath, and I’m immediately consumed with thoughts about how this will all work again. Rory picks up on the uneasy look on my face.
“What’s wrong?” he asks as he threads his fingers between mine and holds my hand for the rest of the walk. I can feel our pulses intermingling where flesh meets.
“There’s nothing wrong,” I say. “I just have so many questions still.”
“What kind of questions?”
It’s Marlowe who asks.
I’m a little embarrassed to ask them all, but my curiosity wins out.
“Where do I even start?” I say with a little laugh before I spout the many confusing questions that have been overwhelming my brain these last few days.
Are the guys going to get jealous when I’m with one of them and not the other? And what will happen if all of us are together at once? More than that … does the turning ritual happen at the same time as the wedding ceremony or do I have to wait longer for that too?
“And I know Romulus has described the ceremony to me before … but I’ve been reading up on it a lot, and it seems like there’s actually more than one way to go about it. I just … I want to make sure I know everything. I want to know what I’m getting into before it’s all … you know … too late.”
“Wow,” Kaleb says with a smirk, once I finally have to stop to catch my own breath. “That’s a LOT of questions.”
I feel my cheeks heating up, and know the
y’re most likely turning beet red.