The week before the ceremony was very busy and hectic, with us doing a lot of work on the Wedding Garden, and Kaoren’s parents, brother and grandparents arriving, and also Nenna and her family – all of whom were to be guests on Arcadia. I was very relieved that things weren’t as awkward with the Lents as they could have been – Nenna’s enthusiasm (and her sister’s shrieking over bugs) smoothed over a lot, and Sen thought Nenna great fun.
Arden brought along the most impossible girl as his guest. A model he’s using for something he’s working on at the moment, who is gob-smackingly gorgeous and totally awful – obsessed with herself and tremendously bitchy, like she’s trying to be a caricature of all the bad things people say about models. Ellema. I couldn’t work out how Arden could stand being near her, no matter how good-looking, given his Sights, but in the end the whole thing made me understand him a little better – he was kind of torturing himself to get a certain result in his art, and also amusing himself at Ellema’s expense. The main piece he’s working on is something called "Hollow" which about says all of his opinion of Ellema.
She spent her time annoying the hell out of me, cross-examining me on my guest list and being obviously disappointed that it was mainly Setari, no-one important, and wanting to know why I hadn’t invited this or that celebrity, acting like the cats were a rodent infestation, and being generally infuriating to everyone. Plus she tried to seduce Nils practically in front of Zee – and then stormed off when Nils murmured something he says would be impolite to repeat in her ear. In the end I mostly just made sure to keep her away from the kids – and wasn’t quite able to resist calling her "The Llama" every so often and had the greatest difficulty stopping Lira from calling her that to her face.
I think maybe Arden was trying to annoy Kaoren with her as well. They have a difficult relationship – they care a lot about each other, but they’re kind of at odds.
I was feeling more than a little stressed the day before the wedding, and wished I could just abandon all my guests, and that everything would be over and done with – and seriously not looking forward to another dinner keeping an eye out for simmering arguments.
Just on sunset, as I was working on putting dinner together, Zee and Nils sent me off to have a shower, taking over the cooking duties, and when I was unenthusiastically getting dressed to go down, Kaoren sent me a message to come up to my eyrie.
My eyrie is one of my favourite places in the universe, especially just on the ends of sunset, with a light breeze and the sky fading to midnight-blue as the colours creep away. Kaoren was standing before one of the big windows, looking out over the lake, the sheer gauze curtains swelling around him.
"You won’t mind if I beat up your brother will you?" I asked, wrapping my arms around him from behind and snuggling into his back. "Just a little. All this combat training has to be good for something."
He let out his breath, one of those little snorts, but wisely didn’t comment on the likelihood of me succeeding in beating up even someone who left the Setari program before his teens. Then he loosened my hold on him enough so he could turn, looking down at me in the half-light.
"Arden was hoping for tantrums," he said. "You’ve been too tolerant for his tastes."
"Improbably sweet." I laughed, but broke off when Kaoren reached down and scooped a hand under the back of my thighs, lifting me easily. "We’ll be late for dinner," I said, not particularly firmly.
"Taken care of," he told me, then turned and flew out the window.
Once outside we flew straight up, so that in seconds the house was visible only by the patio lights, and I could clearly see the bright gems of Pandora and the far smaller clusters on Siriath and Lenecki. We flew away from all of these, heading briefly toward Nurenor and then leaving the lights behind us, zooming west and then south until the lake’s main southern bank had curved to hide anything but the night and the stars.
Then we began to drop, and I looked down, tightening my arm around Kaoren’s neck instinctively, and saw that instead of black water there were barely visible balls of light, little muted moons. They rose around us as Kaoren gently touched down and lowered me to grass-covered ground.
We stood at the edge of a circle of trees on an island not twenty metres wide, completely alone except for stars, and the hush of water, and white paper lanterns the width of two cupped hands suspended in the branches.
Kaoren is much better at keeping secrets than I am. And psychic space ninjas can totally take sweeping a girl off her feet to new levels.
He’d curled his fingers through mine, and I had to grip his hand tightly and take a breath not to ruin the magic of the moment. I took a step forward, and found an edge of a blanket, a little nest he’d made for us beneath the lanterns.
What do you say to that? How do you put into words any kind of response to a perfect gesture, to a thing which fills your heart and makes your throat ache, and your eyes shimmer with tears? There wasn’t a song, or poem, or story I had ever read which could express how I felt then, beneath stars and lanterns, holding the hand of the person I love.
I touched him instead, brushed fingers across his cheek, his lips, knowing that his Sights would tell him everything that I could not.
And then, well, lots of sex.
In his ever-efficient way he’d thought of all contingencies, from the sumptuous picnic basket to a spicy-scented insect repellent. We spent half the night there, touching and talking, swimming in dark star-studded water, then curling chilled and damply together to make every kiss count. A few hours before dawn he flew us home, and one day I guess I’ll tell Taarel that Kaoren is indeed capable of being romantic.
Absolutely.
Fortunately we had enough sense left in our heads for a quick hot shower and some semblance of clothing so that when our kids woke us mid-morning for breakfast in bed we didn’t have to dive beneath the sheets. They made a very sweet procession, Ys and Lira carrying a tray for each of us, Rye with a jug of juice, and Sen coming last with a big vase of flowers. Which she promptly dropped, her hands flying to her mouth.
Kaoren caught the vase with Telekinesis and set it out of the way. He’d anticipated her reaction, having seen the same thing Sight Sight had shown her, and thus was prepared for Sen leaping onto the bed to strangle me with a hug, shrieking "My Baby!".
I stared at Kaoren, whose eyes were almost closed because he was very happy. He said: "A boy" and I got very overwhelmed by that and kind of understood how Alay had been so off-balance even after preparing for a month for the possibility of having a baby. I asked Sen if she’d enjoy being a big sister but she was busy rubbing her cheek against my stomach and going "My baby!" so I looked at Ys, Rye and Lira and said: "I think I need a group hug," and waited as they somewhat stiffly put down their plates and came around to hug me. Kaoren rested his hand lightly on Rye’s head, but waited until they’d let go to hug me.
I said: "So efficient!" to him and laughed, and then made sure to turn my attention to the treat the kids had brought and to try and make clear without being clumsily obvious that they were by no means less important just because Kaoren and I were having a baby. It’s not public knowledge yet, though not precisely a secret (with so many Sight Sight talents in the house, there was no hope of that). I think the kids are okay about it, but I do feel the need to watch my tongue, and not talk about "our first child" or anything like that. Of course it does feel different to me to actually be having a baby, but this is our fifth child and I made sure to be very clear about that.