Sunset and the wedding

The eastern sky is stained crimson with the light of the setting sun as you bounce along the streets towards the shrine. You can't remember the last time you used a carriage, but you aren't about to ruin your wedding dress by walking the streets. The moon is visible in the east, near the sun and stained crimson by its light. Tonight is the first of the five nights of the full moon, the beginning of the period when Ama's blessing is in full effect and her daughters are fertile. For obvious reasons, it's a popular night for weddings, and you know you were lucky to find a shrine that was not already claimed for the night and a priestess who could be spared to perform the rites. Especially as neither your family nor Rose's is especially wealthy.

Around you, you see the streets alive with people bustling to and fro. Many are going home after a day's work, while others, the "moonwatchers" like yourself who work under Ama's light, are just heading out to work. It isn't far to the shrine you will be using tonight, even with the crowds clogging the road and slowing up the carriage, and you soon arrive. The shrine is an open-sided pavilion, with an altar to Ama set slightly off- center.

The sun slowly creeps towards the horizon, shadows elongating as friends and family arrive. You know that Rose is around on the other side of the pavilion, but it's considered bad luck to see your bride on your wedding day before the actual ceremony.

Finally, the sun dips below the horizon, and the guests scatter to their seats. The silver notes of a trumpet sound out over the shrine, and you begin to march down the aisle towards the altar, crossing in front of the seated guests. As you approach, you see Rose coming down the other aisle to meet you. She is clad in a dress of pale pink that contrasts nicely with her large blue eyes. She is in many ways the opposite of you, pale skin to your olive, delicate and petite to your tall and muscular, short-cut blonde hair to your braided black. In the wedding dress, she indeed resembles the flower of her name, delicate and fragile and utterly beautiful. The two of you come to a halt in front of the altar, and the priestess begins to speak.

The ceremony blurs around you, Rose's beauty too transfixing for you to pay much attention to the words and prayers of the priestess. Finally, she moves aside an ornately carved silver lid, revealing a recess set into the altar and lined with clear crystal. At first glance, the recess appears to be shallow and empty, with crystal sides and a flat bottom of silver only an inch or two deep. But a second glance would reveal that the metal in the bottom of the recess is just slightly off in color. It is not silver that is held in this recess, but the living metal, the sacred metal of Ama herself.

The priestess spreads her hands over the recess and begins to chant in the Divine Tongue, the lyrical words flowing between her lips to a musical beat. Her normally-dark eyes bleed to white, iris and pupil alike, and begin to glow faintly, as with soft moonlight. And under her hand the silvery metal flows like water, rising up and shaping itself into a beautiful chalice wrought with images of women entwined in love, and of Ama looking down in blessing upon them.

Eyes still white and luminous, she dips the chalice of living metal, held to a shape by her will and Ama's magic, into the cask of wine that had been earlier placed behind the altar. She then picks up the small knife that had likewise been laying upon the altar this whole time, and steps out from behind the altar, knife in one hand and chalice in the other. She circles around to stand between you and Rose and the altar, facing the crowd, then turns slightly to face you.

Your heart is pounding in your chest. This is the moment, the point that everything has been building up to.

The priestess begins to speak, and you have no trouble at all focusing on these words.

"Lila, daughter of Zoe, daughter of Mari, do you take this woman to be your lawful wedded wife, to have and to hold, to love, honor, and provide, for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health, forsaking all others, until **** do you part?"

You swallow, throat suddenly dry. "I do," you say.

The priestess offers you the knife, hilt first, and extends the chalice slightly. "Then may your blood stand in token of the life you pledge."

You take the knife, your hands shaking slightly, and press the point against the ball of your thumb. There is a sharp stab of pain, and blood wells up around the blade. You return the knife to the priestess, extend your thumb over the chalice, and squeeze a few drops of your blood into the chalice.

You press your bloodied thumb against your forefinger as the priestess turns to Rose and asks her the same questions. Rose says "I do", her delicate voice firmer than you can remember hearing it in a long while, and adds a few drops of her blood to the chalice.

The priestess turns again, slips the knife into her sash, and offers you the chalice with both hands. "You have pledged your lives to each other," she says, "and offered your blood in token of that pledge. Now, beneath Ama's light, drink of that blood from her chalice, and be made one."

You take the chalice, and take a single deep draught from the contents. It tastes exactly like normal wine, sweet and fruity, the taste of the blood unnoticeable.

You return the chalice to the priestess, who offers it to Rose with the same words. Rose likewise drinks and returns the chalice to the priestess, who pours out the rest of the contents on the ground. She then carefully sets the chalice back in the recess within the altar, and it suddenly melts, the living metal reverting to its natural liquid state.

"By your pledge of word and blood, I pronounce you wed," the priestess says. Her eyes suddenly go from luminous white back to their normal dark brown, and she smiles. "You may now kiss the bride," she says.

Amidst cheers and shouts of joy, you lean in and kiss your wife full on the lips.