“Oh, pfft,” I said, striding forward with confidence and taking my position behind her, grasping the silver band of the emerald pendant in my fingers. It was easy to know what to say in the face of a crying bride. You say anything. You say whatever you have to, to make her stop crying. “Everyone needs to stop worrying so much about signs around here.” At least I really did mean that. I loved Theon with all my heart, and I felt that our souls were indeed a twin flame… but he would never find me consulting the stars half as often as he did. I preferred to study and labor to ensure an outcome, rather than cast bones or peer into a ball of crystal. “It’s just hard to secure a necklace you can’t see.”
“The necklace of my mother-in-law,” Merulina reminded me sharply, “who hates me.”
“She does not hate you. You love her son. You took care of him when she couldn’t. How much could she possibly hate you? She just doesn’t know you. That’s all.”
“She knows all she needs to know. She knows I’m an ice dragoness.”
I rolled my eyes and grasped Merulina’s shoulders, twisting her in my direction. I couldn’t take any more of this victimhood. “I’m a human and she bowed to me as the new queen. She just needs some time. After a while, she’ll realize the same thing that I did: people are all the same—ice dragons, and fire dragons, and humans. We’re all the same in a lot of ways, and we’re all different, too, in little ways that really count. In the end, what matters is what you do, not what you are and not what you’re told. She’ll see that. She’ll love you.” I took a tender swipe at the teardrops on Merulina’s cheeks. It was insane how beautiful she still was, even as she cried. “And when you give her a grandchild? She’ll… she’ll love that dragon—of fire and ice—so much that any little piece of her left over that thinks you’re different? That little piece of her will die.”
“Or maybe she’ll think that this is all just some ploy to take back the throne for the ice dragons, with an heir of a prince,” Merulina countered.
I didn’t inform her that I was barren. It didn’t seem like the right time; today was about her. But I already knew in my heart that the child who would ascend the throne of The Hearthlands would belong to Altair and Merulina. It would be a dragon of fire and ice.
“Would that be so bad?” I whispered. “A king or queen to unite the people at long last? To end a meaningless feud—based on nothing but assumptions, prejudices—that has lasted centuries, against all reason, all worth?”
Merulina nodded and half-smiled. “I guess you’re right,” she said, her eyes slanted down. “It would be nice to see ice people in the castle, other than myself, alongside the fire people.”
“And we will,” I assured her. “Things are changing in this country. And this is the dawn of a new age. You and I can both be a part of that, if we stay strong and believe in ourselves. We can bear witness to the strongest dragons this island has ever seen.”
Merulina grinned, eyes still shimmering.
When the traditional wedding bells of the dragons clanged loudly together later that morning, and Merulina walked down the aisle, I wore my crown and Theon wore his for the first time. We stood tall together, presiding over their union in some strange ritual wherein we essentially approved of the coupling. It all seemed rather medieval to me, but Theon would’ve been aghast at the notion of an update. Merulina met Altair at the thrones, and they turned to face one another, glowing with excitement and anticipation. Theon’s fingers tightened around my side and I glanced at him with a smile. He smiled back, and together we turned to witness his brother and new sister-in-law pledge their loyalty, and their gratitude, and thank the gods for their luck in finding one another through so many circuitous paths.
Listening to them speak, seeing the way they looked at each other, I couldn’t bear them any ill will, even if an entire baseball team worth of children was born from the two. I could only be proud of them, and hopeful for them. With Theon’s constant heat radiating into me, with his fingers against my back, and with the certainty that he felt the same way—we would belong to each other until the day we died, no matter what the world around us thought of it—I could only be relieved to have everything I’d ever wanted, and to be sharing that elation now with Merulina and Altair. There was no competition, only family. No fate, only the future.
At the reception, we toasted to prosperity, and Theon’s golden eyes met mine with a knowing twinkle before he rose his glass to his lips. We drank deeply and I knew that it would be true.