Page 118 of The Kingdom of Flames

A Promise of Crimson

They rode to Calendar on the last day. The terrain changed, and they came upon a great and long hill leading them down and then up. The impossible structure waited at the center of all things. At the center of seasons. The center of worlds.

Calendar.

The road bisected the lands of Summer and Autumn. Above the great castle, she saw again the four slices of the Seasons. Sunshine, leaves falling, snow, and pollen twirling.

The Seasons waited.

“Your declaration is tomorrow,” Aidric said. They had never addressed what had happened the evening prior. They didn’t need to. They rode to the front gate. Where she had once been carried, she now took herself there. There was solace in that, at least.

She remarked upon how changed she was. Different than the terrified girl first coming here. Even now, the magic of this place was confusing. Formidable. Intimidating.

Calendar was a lynchpin, she decided. A single stake was driven into the flesh of the world and reality—where the powers of a plane were so large and vast that they were reflected in the skies of her own world.

Would she ever see home again? Would she want to? Every coupling, every courtship brought her closer to never returning.

But I do want to. To see my father one last time. To see the Painted Realm Saved.

The hungry desires of twelve gods waited for her. Beings who called themselves Lords, who ruled courts of season.

“You may dismount, Lady Celestine. Court is tomorrow, and your declaration.” Aidric held a hand out to help her down from Garo. She patted the horse.

“We will see to him,” Aidric assured her and left her there at the same steps she had once climbed.

Inside, the attendants of Calendar, both guard and servant, welcomed her with silent mirrored faces. After being in the Blue Bannered Realm for so long, she quickly stepped back outside, feeling the freedom of the sky above her.

Celestine walked between shades and slices of winter, spring, autumn and summer in a long garden. She held her hand out, feeling the kiss of the different seasons, the cold bite, the burn of the sun. How many brides had ever had the chance to walk here? How many of the Unspoken back home, sitting in their damned silence, had had their souls ripped apart by these gods?

That night, she dined at a long table alone, save for the mirrored servants of Calendar.

The food was exquisite, but Celestine barely tasted it. She found herself lost in thought. Eyes moving from seat to empty seat, staring at where women had once had their last meal.

Among Azure’s people, he said brides lived and had children. In Tristien, she had seen the remnants. In Encarmine, she doubted many remained, dying of widowhood and old age or in wars and battles if they took to the field.

Celestine sat and ate, though she didn’t feel like it. She did what so many women had done before her and would long after, nourished themselves for what was to come. As she looked upon those empty seats, she knew something for certain and had decided.

That evening, Encarmine came to her, as she knew he would. It was in her chambers, and when she opened the door, the first man who had ever touched her stared at her with eyes so needful, so haunted.

“Celestine,” he whispered. When he spoke, it was as if a soldier dying of thirst finally found a spring well.

And that was his need, as if it gave him life when he fell upon her, and she embraced him. As her clothes were wrenched away, she wanted him, his strength. There was nothing like the first. As he cast her clothes aside, the god of battle and war took her fervently, tunneling into her, breaking her lines.

He fits so well.

No circlet donned his brow, but he was more powerful than any living man. He had saved her.

Their embrace was a tragic one, and when he took her among the soft expanse of her bed, kissing and feasting on her neck, her legs wrapped around him, locked in union, he said her name again.

When Encarmine’s seed spilled inside her, she responded, rocking and writhing towards him, taking all of him, never wanting to leave. But in that moment, she broke, and what had been beautiful was now a spear of sadness that struck her heart. She broke into tears with him inside her, and he embraced her, drawing her close, as if he was trying to mold her into his flesh, to have her forever. To be with him was to know strength, challenge, and such righteous, hard-won victory. He had saved her from Vermilion, Tristien, and herself. Now he was here.

Encarmine, her scarred god, touched her tears.

“I love you, Final Bride.” Encarmine stared at her, holding her. If she chose him, she would be safe from everyone and everything except what he was. He was victory and defeat, and to love him was to be a widow married to a window she would stare at, waiting for him. Sometimes days, sometimes centuries. How many times would she bury him for him to rise again?

“I love you, Encarmine.” Celestine choked back a hoarse sob. “I’ll never not love you. War has no wives, only widows. Would you make that of me?”

Say yes. Say yes and I will subdue myself to tragedy, if only for this evening.

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