Page 34 of The Knight
I cupped her face in my hands. I had held nothing more precious in my entire life between those hands of mine, not until that moment. She was every single thing in all of Terra I would ever need.
"Especially not here," she whispered.
"The vows I make to you, to be yours forever, are the most important and most sacred that I will ever hold," I said, and my voice was low and gravelly as if I hadn't used it in a while. I was sure that she could read the feelings in my voice. She smiled a crooked smile, eyes glowing like lightning. Her memory not returning also meant we didn’t know why she had no melody. She also had to relearn life here, from wherever she had once been. She said words and things that did not make sense to me, nor her, but the new life she carved out for herself was incredible. She was such a strong person. It was also a strange thing to have to ask what she is thinking, and not being able to sense anything within her, like I could with a normal person.
"You know why?" I brushed a strand of hair off of her cheek and softly touched her velvet skin, which I had exposed. She trembled in my arms, and I knew from her movements, even without a melody, that she wanted more, needed more. It was satisfying that I could read her, without a melody. I wondered if she thought about our lips touching. My thoughts made it hard for me to not do that very thing. Instead, I pulled away.
"Our love, nothing can break it," I whispered into her ear, finally finishing what I wanted to say.
"I will love you even after my last breath," she whispered.
Blackness surrounded me, and an echo of another memory came into focus. I couldn't stop those memories from attacking me.
“I love you, Rykerian.” I smiled at my Ana. Lamont stood beside me, and I held both of Ana’s hands in mine. Her beautiful storm-sea-grey eyes reached into my soul.
“I love you, Analiea.” I looked back and forth between her, and then at Lamont. “What now?” I whispered. I heard her giggle, and I looked at her mouth.
“Now, Lamont will do what I asked him to.” She nodded in his direction. I stood and watched Lamont come between us.
“Rykerian Dallard, do you vow before the Ancients and Ana to be hers?”
“Yes, of course,” I said with a smile. The rest of the ceremony had always been a blur in my mind until the part where Lamont smiled widely, and his melody sang out to me with the same joy I was feeling.
“You may claim your vowed!” he said, and I leaned in and kissed her. The electric flow between us was so strong and so powerful that she melted into my arms. She was mine, and I was hers; forever, she would be with me forever. It was a first kiss—the promise of beginnings and of possibilities. As I deepened the kiss, and her lips matched and moved with mine with just as much passion, I knew what true happiness really was. I wanted to keep it forever—keep her forever.
Soon after the little ceremony, we entered the door of my home. It then became our home with Ana cradled in my arms. She touched my cheek.
“Kerian, I am so sorry that I do not have a melody like everyone else.” She called me by that name, too: Kerian. I knew, suddenly, that I never had been concerned with her lack of melody as I had gotten to know her more. I knew that she was worried about it, people often made her feel less than for shielding her soul, because of course that is what they assumed. She had mentioned it more than a dozen times after I asked her to be my companion, my wife, my everything.
“I do not care about that, Ana. Please stop feeling bad about that.”
“It's just that you are blessed by the Ancients, and you have powers and are basically like—” I put my hand over her mouth to stop the craziness spilling from her lips.
“I will tell you every day for the rest of my life if I have to, but you, Ana, are everything to me; nothing else matters.” I kissed her lips, and she leaned into my mouth. Her hands held the back of my neck. I made our way to the main room, and she slid from my arms. I still kissed her, leaning over to capture our lips together again and again, I knew I would never get enough kisses from that girl. No other thoughts other than of Ana flitted through my head, and my melody swirled around us like a fire.
I woke to blackness, and for a few moments, I wondered if I was still inside the cave. Something was beeping, and there were voices talking. The pain in my side and head was too much to bear awake. Ana called to me, and I wanted to be back with her, back in my memories of her—the memories that for so long I had kept hidden away, kept tightly tucked inside a box. I had found her again, and I smiled, letting the memories free. Going back to her.
“You are home!” Her smile lit up her face in a way that I had never seen before. She pulled me from the doorway and laughed, her feet were barefoot as they always were.
“What is happening? Are we under attack?” I laughed at her urgency. I leaned down to kiss her, and my lips found her neck, and I quickly traveled to her throat. She leaned into me, herhands in my hair. I lifted my head and rubbed my chin on her soft cheek, which she hated when I hadn't shaved. She laughed and tugged at a few strands of my hair so I would stop. I looked into her eyes, pulling away from her. Her smile was so bright. I wanted nothing more than to take her and hold her in my arms for the rest of the afternoon and evening. She leaned closer to me and kissed my lips softly. My lips reacted like they always did when hers touched mine, electric fire flamed inside of me. She pulled away abruptly as I tried to deepen the kiss, and I pouted at her.
“There will be plenty of time for that, Kerian,” she whispered, moving herself even farther away from me. I frowned, and she smiled.
“Hurry, it's been a long day, and I need you.” I winked, and she ran.
“Come catch me, knight!” she called over her shoulder as she ran her dark brown hair falling in waves down the back of her blue dress. Blue always looked beautiful on her. I laughed, chasing after her. I would always catch her, always find her, and always follow wherever she went.
She reached the back door to the small estate home I had received after being given the guardian knightship over Lamont of the kingdom of Haleston and didn’t stop as she opened it to the outside. She smiled so wide, looking back at me, and I watched the sunlight glistening off of her hair. Her hair was hanging down about her face, and her breath was a bit labored. We ran, and finally, when we reached a small grove of trees, she stopped, and I wrapped my arms around her waist as she giggled. This was the only time of year in Haleston when there was a season of melting. Usually Haleston was covered in snow and cold, but it had been melting for days and seeing greenery was a welcomed sight.
“Here we are,” she smiled. We had been married for six months. I had never known a more blissful time in my entire existence. I looked at a blanket and some juice drink that she had no doubt bought from the market in the village sitting tidily on a blanket on a patch of newly exposed grass.
“What is all this?”
She pulled me down, and I sat. She was across from me, but I reached over and pulled her onto my lap.
“Kerian, you are—” She didn't finish as I began to kiss the back of her neck. “Let me down, for just a moment.” She was laughing, and I moved away as she poured the drink into two glasses and handed me one. She still sat on my lap because I insisted, but I didn't tickle her or kiss her like I wanted to.
“We have been together for six months, Kerian.”
