There is no unforging the bond between us now, but our marriage won't be legally official until tomorrow morning. As we step through the ballroom's grand entrance, a pair of bone-white Synthes hands each of us an ornate lantern aglow with blue flame. The crystal chandeliers and flower lights have all gone out, leaving our lanterns the only illumination in the otherwise blackened corridors. Our guests receive lights of their own as they follow, and I imagine us from a bird's eye view-blurring together into a river of cerulean luminescence that snakes through the night-dark palace, flowing upward.

Upward, to Aidon's chambers at the top of North Tower.

With each step we take, my excitement and anxiety escalates, building into a conflicted storm of emotion. As we step off the stair onto the landing just outside our destination, my knees suddenly feel as though they've turned to jelly—and for a half a heartbeat I'm certain they'll buckle.

Sensing this, Aidon releases my hand at last to link our arms together, squeezing me close. Briefly, I envision him sweeping me up off my feet and carrying me the rest of the way like they do in some of the ancient Earth films I've seen. But of course, he can't—it's an important part of the ritual that we both step through of our own free will.

The door whirs open on Aidon's command and we pause a few steps before it. My groom looks down at me as I take a deep, steadying breath. Four Variants break away from the others that crowd the landing and stair behind and around us, taking their places to either side of the door. Chosen for their neutrality, they settle in to stand vigil for the night.

Glancing up to meet my new husband's eyes, I give him a tiny nod. Then, as one, the two of us cross the threshold together.

The door closes behind us, silencing the cheers and shouting of the crowd while our Guardians hover off to make themselves inconspicuous. Following my husband's lead, I hang my lantern on an ornate hook to one side of the entrance.

Like the rest of the palace, Aidon's chambers are dark—dimly illuminated by the cool light of our lanterns, the ambient glow of the river Styx and the glimmer of city lights and stars outside his enormous windows. From somewhere off in the shadows, the rhythmic trickling of flowing water whispers over the otherwise total quiet.

It smells of ozone and rain-washed stone...but thicker than any scent in the air is the electric hum of our mutual desire and the shared apprehensions that clash with it.

"Please don't be frightened," murmurs Aidoneus from beside me.

"Why would I—"

Something moves from off to my right, emerging from a pool of darkness as a broken silhouette against the scattered light streaming in through the windows. There's a sound like stone clacking on stone as it moves closer, stepping into the light of the twin lanterns. Its three spiny necks twist, angling each of its skulls in their own way as it regards me from the black pits of its empty eye sockets.

I'm dimly aware of my jaw going slack as I make sense of what I'm looking at. A creature-or what was once a creature-three heads taller than me at its shoulders alone. Six legs. three heads. One slowly thrashing tail. What were once its bones have since transmuted to blue-gray stone, shot through in places with veins and chunks of opal.

"Wha-what-"

"This is Cerberus," says Aidoneus. "My familiar."

"But how?"

"My control over the dead extends beyond flesh and bone. Whatever spark it is that I tap into, its left behind even when all organic cells are gone and turned to stone." He smiles with his eyes as he gazes up at the fossilized beast. "This world wasn't always the way it is now. Once, it turned. Once, it thrived. But not all of the treasures of that time are lost."

"He's beautiful," I breathe, breaking away from Aidoneus at last, freeing my hand to reach out to the magnificent creature, unable to resist. He extends its middle skull to meet me halfway, and I run my fingers across the cool planes of his jaw. "Amazing."

Taking another step forward, Cerberus's leftmost skull ducks down to nuzzle my face, while the other seems to sniff at my hair.

"He likes you." Aidoneus sounds almost shocked.

"Were you worried?" I smile over at him, trying to catch his eye from beneath his familiar's massive skull.

"Terrified. I'd have had to divorce you on the spot otherwise." His lip quirks upward.

I laugh, and Cerberus makes a low rumbling sound somewhere between a roll of thunder and several large stones grinding together.

"Don't worry, that's a good sound."

"I can tell," I say as the massive creature gives my head a final nuzzle before loping off the way he'd come, sending some of my flowers drifting to the floor. In a few fluid movements, Aidon strides forward, stoops to pluck up the largest and most beautiful of the fallen blossoms, and rises to his full height once more to tuck it back into my hair. Our eyes lock for a heartbeat of searing intensity. Then, like stars colliding, we converge on each other. His lips crush against mine as my tongue teases at his, flickers across the edges of his fangs. His hands move up into my hair and mine wrap about his neck.

His lips travel downward, kissing and teasing at my skin with his teeth in turns. The scent and feel of him overwhelms my senses, and suddenly the memory of his blood is crashing over me in waves of temptation. My fangs extend further as my mouth fills with saliva.

"May I-" I whisper, my lips brushing against his ear.

"Yes."

A thrill runs down my spine as he breathes the word across my skin. My lips part, my fangs plunge into his flesh, and his blood flows into me-lighting up my entire being in a supernova of golden ecstasy.

Dimly, I'm aware of his hands untangling from my hair, following the curves of my body as they travel downward to my hips, my thighs—lifting me up. I wrap my legs about his waist, fangs sinking even deeper as my arms lock about his shoulders. Then we're moving, but I don't see where. Already drunk on his essence, my eyes are closed, every bit of my attention riveted on the feel of him, the taste of him.

Softness embraces me from behind as we tilt downward onto what I assume is the bed. Laid out over me, his body presses into mine—though I can tell he's being careful not to crush me. Bringing up one of his hands, he cradles the back of my skull-gently at first, then firm as he pulls free of my jaws. With his blood still on my lips, he kisses me, losing himself in the urgency of it so that his hips grind into mine. I suck in a sudden quick breath as I feel him harden, pressing against the insides of my thighs.

I release my grip about his neck as my fingers seek out the clasps to his cloak. Unhooking them, I flick the fabric back so that it slides away to pool like an inky shadow at his feet. He bares a single fang in the lopsided grin I've already come to adore as his hands find my roving ones, assisting in their endeavor to relieve him of his fitted tunic and sleeves. Moments later they fall to the floor atop his cloak, baring his torso in all its hard-edged glory, the wintery light glinting and refracting off his skin. Looking up at him now, it's hard to believe this otherworldly being of frost and ash was ever an ordinary human. That he's my husband and mine to love. Forever.

His brows peak, coming together as I study his magnificence.

"Kore, we don't have to do anything. If this isn't what you want—"

"It's everything I want."

Knowing how in tune with one another we are now, it's hard to believe he could doubt my desire for him. A hot spike of anger strikes me as I find myself wondering who burned these doubts so deep into his heart. I'll make them pay, eventually. But for now the rage only adds fire to my passion.

I reach for him, pull him down into another hungry kiss. Before I even know I've decided to do it, I'm rolling on top of him, straddling his hips, fingers wrapped in the blue-black silk of his hair as my lips work along his clavicle. He exhales slowly in a long hiss, body arching beneath mine.

Freeing my hands from his hair I run them down his torso and the sculpted planes of his stomach, finding the lacing of his pants while his hands wander over my body. When at last I have them undone they pause in their exploration and finish the task for me, dragging off the offending article and tossing it aside. It's all I can do not to balk in the face of his glory. My hand traces the invisible line that leads from his belly button downward until my fingers find the warm hardness of his cock. With the other hand I adjust my skirts, lifting and then letting them fall again to pool around both our hips. But just as I'm pulling my flimsy undergarments to the side, Aidoneus reaches down to grasp my hand, stopping me.

"Not yet," he growls.

In the next instant I've been flipped onto my back again. Aidon leaves a trail of kisses from my lips down my neck and further, until he reaches the bust-line of my dress and makes another low, rumbling sound of frustration. I arch my back as his hands snake beneath it to work at the lacing, until at last its loose enough to pull down over my ribs, past my hips, and off. What little remains of my clothing joins it shortly after. For a few moments he kisses my thighs, teasing the soft flesh there with the edges of his fangs until I think he might just sink them in.

Then his lips find their place between my legs, the agile work of his tongue spinning pleasure like threads of platinum, binding me up from the inside out in delicious, mounting sensation...

But just as its reaching its crescendo he stops, pulling away.

"Do you want me?" His voice is a breathy rasp.

"Yes," I manage, writhing against him, hands curling around his hips.

"Are you sure?"

I moan my frustration, long and low. "Yes."

He's in position in an instant, plunging into me the next. I gasp as the length of him drives deep-pleasure and pain spiraling together until they're one and the same. My hips buck against his, driving him deeper. For a heartbeat our eyes lock, his pupils flaring wide. Then he strikes-fangs driving into my neck. I gasp again, legs locking around his hips as he thrusts into me again and again and my blood courses into him, his pleasure building on mine and mine on his until it's more than either of us can handle. Until my vision explodes in stars. Until my legs tremble and my skin feels like millions of pulsing embers of ecstasy and he spends himself inside me, face buried against my neck, his panting breath cooling my sweat-dampened skin and stirring the coils of my hair.

In the next heartbeat it all becomes too much, crashing outward in an explosion of power. Slender woody vines burst in multitudes from my back, lifting me up off the bed and pushing Aidon onto his knees, eyes gone wide. The vines erupt with blossoms, and the heady scent of lavender fills the room.