The Warrior's Proposal (Celestial Mates Book 7)

by Marla Therron

  Her headache grew worse as the day wore on, and by the time the sun began to set, she felt exhausted, like all the energy had been drained from her body. Her sinuses were swollen till she could hardly breathe through her nose, and it hurt to swallow. She tried to hide it from Amranth, but she was too tired to do a very good job.

  "I'm almost done with repairs," Amranth said as he put away his tools and came to join her by the fire, "I think we'll be able to leave tomorrow. I almost wish we could-Lily? Are you alright?"

  Lily was massaging her temples, wishing her head would stop throbbing with every beat of her heart. Her lunch, more tasteless rations, sat uneasily on her stomach.

  "I'm fine," she reassured, "Just a small headache. It'll pass."

  "Is that the headache you've been ignoring all day?" he asked, and she looked away, cursing his observance.

  "I just need some rest," she said with a tired smile, "It's been a stressful few days."

  He nodded in understanding and kissed her forehead.

  "Go and lay down," he said, "I'll join you in a moment. Let me take care of the fire."

  She wanted to argue, but she was too exhausted. She thanked him gratefully and trudged away to the bunk to curl up and hope for sleep to come quickly.

  It did, only disturbed a little later when Amranth climbed in beside her, his presence warm and reassuring.

  She woke in the early hours to the sudden and terrifying realization that she couldn't breathe. She wheezed, struggling to cry out, and pulled in a tiny amount of air, as though she were breathing through a straw.

  Amranth was awake in an instant, scrambling to his feet as she flailed and struggled to keep air going to her lungs. Her skin was marbled with scarlet rashes and sweat plastered her hair to her face. She stared at Amranth with wild, pleading eyes, knowing she was dying. She saw the moment Amranth's face changed, shifting from fear to cool resolve, to the face of a man who could do anything ordered of him.

  "Don't be afraid," he said, calm and strong as steel, "I won't let you die."

  He lifted her out of the bed and carried her in his arms to the pilot's seat, powering up the ship in a few seconds and flying it through the trees with inhuman skill while his free hand rubbed her back, trying to soothe her as she fought for every breath, darkness creeping at the edges of her vision, her thoughts full of nothing but panic.

  The thirty-minute walk to Elder Keeler's cabin was only a few minutes in the ship, and the old man was hobbling out of his house as the ship was landing.

  "Help her," Amranth demanded, carrying Lily out of the ship, "She can't breathe."

  "It's some kind of allergic reaction," Keeler said at once, "What kind of antihistamine regimen was she on to prepare for moving here? Quickly, bring her inside."

  Amranth followed the Elder into the house and laid her on the old man's bed.

  "She said she was taking pills during the trip over," he said, "She was supposed to finish the regimen with the palace doctor, but..."

  "Good Garden, you should have said something earlier!" Keeler snapped, "You never quit a pill regimen half way through! Instead of adjusting to the local allergens, she's just made it worse, and built up a resistance to the treatment. She needs a hospital."

  "They'd take her back to Turlabon," Amranth said, shaking his head, "Who would watch her suffocate for the sin of refusing him."

  "It may be a matter of watching her suffocate there or here," Keeler sighed, "I will do my best for her. But for the most part, she will have to fight through this on her own."

  Lily's lungs tightened further and darkness swept over her vision entirely. She fell into unconsciousness with no confidence that she would ever wake again.

  But wake she did, over and over, into what felt like a medieval torture, the only respite from which was to pass out again. There was something down her throat, around which she choked and sputtered and cried until she realized it was the only thing forcing her windpipe open far enough to breathe. But even then it was literally breathing through a straw.

  She felt like something massive was sitting on her chest, crushing the life out of her, like there was cotton up her nose and in her eyes. Nothing was confusing and distressing, except for Amranth's constant presence, his touch cool and soothing as aloe, helping her hang on.

  Graduallym she began to be able to stay awake longer, catch snatches of conversation through the haze of her pain.

  "...that she made it through the night at all is a good sign. She'll pull through but it's going to take time."

  "We don't have time. Turlabon could be searching the forest now. I have to get her off the planet before he finds us."

  "If you move her now, she will die. That's all there is to it. The best thing you can do for her is remain patient and stay with her. She won't survive otherwise."

  Darkness again, and the soothing touch of Amranth's hand on her cheek.

  "...seen them out there looking. We aren't going to have much longer."

  "I have lived out here for more than a hundred years. I know how not to be found if I don't care to be. If you will calm down, I will teach them to you. It will buy us some more time."

  She felt his hand in hers, the gentle and reassuring squeeze, before she slipped down into drugged sleep again.

  "Elder Keeler?"

  She could feel the cool air of night on her skin, and Amranth's voice was quiet, calmer than she'd heard him in a while.

  "Yes, sapling?" Keeler answered. She could hear someone stirring the fire and dimly see the flare of light.

  "What are you? I've seen what you can do. You're no monk."

  A few minutes ticked by in silence as Amranth waited patiently for answer Keeler was clearly reluctant to give. Lily thought she might pass out again before she heard his reply.

  "Many centuries ago," he said, "I was something like what you were to King Turlabon. My king was a very different man. But in his youth, he shared much of Turlabon's ambition, and his lack of foresight. And because he was my king, I obeyed him.

  Until the day he gave me an order I couldn't follow. I went to him, and I told him about what I'd seen, about the pain his orders had caused, and he told me that the ends justified the means. That he was building a better world. I'm certain your king told you similar.

  So I asked him how he would rule this better world when he made it. And I asked him, how would he know when his better world was here if he continued to rule as though he still lived in the old one.

  And because he was not Turlabon, because there truly were the seeds of good intentions in what he was doing, he listened. He changed. And I retired, determined never to spill blood again. I watched this world flourish for a time until the roots of entitlement and greed began to choke it again.

  There was a new king by then, younger, unfamiliar with the strife of ages past, who thought the way things were was how they should and always would be. When I tried to tell him what was growing in his garden, he told me I was out of touch and he sent me away.

  So I watched evil grow, strangling the world. I watched those in power secure their power by slowly and systematically classifying everyone different from them as less than people, arbitrarily declaring this trait or that one a sin for which the punishment was removal of personhood.

  And vines grow the way they are trained, so they raised a new generation of flora to believe that some of them were people and some of them were not and that was how it had always been. And that's the place where good things die, sapling. So I became a refuge.

  When the violence began, and the violence began long before Turlabon was a spore, I made myself a place that people could run to. I dedicated my life to it, determined to save as many lives as I had taken in the service of that young king, now forgotten by time.

  That is what I am. That is what you may be too someday. I see your path ahead of you, and the many ways it may diverge. This mountain is one of the places that path might end, if you chose it."

  "And the others?"

&
nbsp; "Many and strange, my sapling. You will know the right path to take when it appears before you."

  Lily slept again, and her dreams were filled with ancient kingdoms, grown over by ivy that slowly year by year tore down every stone.

  Chapter Eleven

  The first time she woke feeling clearheaded, she'd been unconscious for more than three days. She felt weak as a newborn kitten, trembling with the exhaustion of days spent fighting an internal battle.

  "Is it safe for us to leave now?" Amranth asked as he offered her water, "Can she be moved?"

  "She needs time to rest and recuperate," the Elder patted Amranth's shoulder, "If you over exert her now she may relapse. The fight isn't over just because she's begun to win it."

  Amranth glanced over his shoulder at the window uneasily.

  "But Turlabon's searches..."

  "I have evaded them all these years," Keeler said, "I will evade them a few days more."

  "I don't think I could get out of this bed if you paid me." Lily confirmed with a tired groan. Amranth smiled at her and brushed her hair back from her forehead.

  "I just want to keep you safe," he said, and Lily's heart ached in her chest, knowing it was true. He could have left while she recovered. Keeler would have found her another way back to Earth when she was well.

  They both knew Turlabon would rather chase his traitorous Sword than his runaway bride. He might have doomed himself by choosing to remain with her and the thought made Lily want to cry.

  For another day, she slept, regathering her strength. Amranth was with her most any time she was awake, but she knew when she slept he was out in the forests on some mysterious business of Keeler's, slowing the progress of Turlabon's search teams. He often came back exhausted and bloodied.

  "You should leave," she told him in the night, "Without me. He'll forget about me, but he'll hunt you forever. You need to put as much distance between you and this planet as you can."

  He took her hand, running his thumb over her knuckles, looking at them with the same stoic thoughtfulness with which he'd looked at her that first day, like he was wondering what manner of creature she was.

  "Whatever path I end up walking," he said, "I want to walk it with you. That's all that matters."

  Lily's cheeks bloomed with color and she swallowed hard, wondering if he was saying what she thought he was.

  "I love you, Lily," he said, making it clear, "I wish we had more time. I would devote a hundred years to courting you if I could. You deserve great acts of devotion and declarations of love made after acts of great heroism, not at your sick bed. But if fate will conspire against us and make that impossible, then at least I want to die knowing I was yours for even a little while."

  "What are you asking me, Amranth?" Lily's voice caught in her throat, wanting to hear the words in case she was wrong.

  "Marry me." Amranth replied, "Become bonded to me as you would have been to Turlabon. Even if he wins, even if he takes us both, we'll never belong to anyone but each other. It's a small victory, but it's the only one that matters to me."

  "Yes," Lily felt tears running down her cheeks, and she pulled him down to kiss him adoringly, "Yes. I love you too, Amranth."

  They had their bonding ceremony the following evening.

  "You are certain this is what you want?" Elder Keeler asked her as he helped her choose a dress from his little collection of cast offs, "A bonding ceremony isn't the same as human marriage, you know. Your lives will be intertwined forever, even beyond death."

  "It's a rash decision," Lily agreed, solemn in her quiet joy, still weak from her sickness but too happy to care, "It's not something I would be doing if not for the situation we're in. There's no point in pretending that. But there's also no point in waiting if this might be all the time we have left together."

  "And what if you survive?" Keeler asked, "What then? If you escape and live, will you regret this decision?"

  "Maybe," Lily shrugged, "But a life lived without any regrets is one lived without taking any chances. I want to take a chance on him. If we survive this, I want to build a life with him. I want to at least try. And if it doesn't end in a happily ever after, then at least we had these moments together. And I won't regret being happy, even if doesn't last."

  Keeler smiled, lifting a soft white and pale blue dress from the case. He pressed it into her hands.

  "Then you have my blessing."

  Lily dressed herself with hands that shook not from nerves but from exhaustion. The sundress Keeler had given her was nothing like the fairy tale gown she'd worn for Turlabon, but it was pretty, all lace and fluttering petals, and it felt more honest.

  She put up her hair, and Elder Keeler threaded her dark tresses with white flowers. Then he took her arm and, half supporting her, led her outside to where Amranth was waiting for her.

  "I have been cultivating this grove for centuries," he said as he led her down among the trees, "It is the most sacred place left in this forest."

  The trees here, with strong black trunks, were in flower, their branches a riot of dripping color and soft music. Lily's heart fluttered and as she missed a step a jewel colored winged reptile burst from the branches, scattering blossoms. The caught the air and glowed with sudden warm illumination as they danced slowly towards the ground. As they walked, more blossoms fell, illuminating their path like floating candles.

  A vast an ancient tree sat at the heart of the grove, its black branches stretching out to canopy the rest of the trees, which were almost certainly its offspring. Flowers flowed from it in a curtain like a willow or wisteria.

  "Wait here for just a moment." Keeler said, patting her arm, then let her go, slipping through the flowers on his own. Lily knew Amranth must be waiting for her on the other side and her heart raced.

  This really might be a mistake, she knew. But she couldn't allow that to stop her from doing it. It was a mistake to accept Turlabon's proposal, but she didn't regret that decision even now.

  Without it, she would never have left Earth, never have seen or experienced all these wonderful things, never have met Amranth at all, who might still be doing Turlabon's dirty work despite all the protests of his soul, resigned to a life unloved. However it ended, she wanted this. She wanted him.

  She heard the music of the flowers grow louder beyond the curtain of flowers and took that as her cue, reaching out to brush them aside as she stepped through.

  Alien silk in shades of trembling summer sky sapphire rippled across Lily's dusky copper skin like the brush of a lover's fingers as she stepped through a curtain of a thousand white blossoms that glittered like icy stars and chimed like crystal as they touched. The grove beyond dripped in light and color and liquid sound.

  Flowering trees with trunks of stark ebony were the pillars of this chapel, the walls woven from living branch and bush and budding vine.

  There was no place that was not in bloom, from the hand sized irises the color of a maiden's blush to the jutting violet spears of delphinium and foxglove, to the carpet of plush moss starred with it tiny blue blossoms no bigger than a pinprick. The flowers sang with every breeze or touch, each voice unique, mingling into a divine chorus.

  If the flowers on Earth had a voice, Lily thought, we would never have let them die. The crown of blossoms in her sleek black hair still sung, though softer than their rooted counterparts, soothing reassurance in her ear that she was not making a mistake as she stepped deeper into the grove, the floating candle-bells which illuminated it drifting out of her way, clearing the flower strewn path to the man she loved.

  Amranth stood smiling by the trunk of the oldest tree. He was dressed in the nicest clothes Keeler could find for him, long white robes against which his petals almost glowed. A crown of flowers bloomed in his mossy hair, and he held out his hand to her with pure love in his eyes. Lily didn't hesitate as she moved forward to take it.

  Elder Keeler stood beside Amranth, using his walking stick to tap the branches of the flowering trees above
him, playing the singing flowers with a skillful hand, giving rise to a choir of celestial voices like the stars themselves had descended to sing for them.

  Lily took Amranth's hand, cool in her own, and stood before the Elder as he turned to face them. The glowing candle-bells drifted around them, showering them in light. Lily had never seen anything so magical, and she couldn't take her eyes from Amranth's.

  "This tree which bears the name Linyenwa, is the oldest on this planet," Keeler said, leaning heavily on his stick as he looked down on the two of them, eyes full of fond benevolence, "It has watched lives beyond counting come and go, join and part again. Now you too shall be part of its ancient memory."

  Lily looked up into Linyenwa's vast branches and wondered if it could see her. On a planet like this, she wouldn't be surprised. Maybe it was just as alive as all the other flora on Sahria, just quieter, peaceful remembering.

  "Today you give a part of your life to another," Keeler continued, "Let no one undermine the significance of that. You made a decision today to share your future with another, to support them and rely on them, to build a life greater than the sum of its parts.

  From this day forward you will no longer be two people, but a single soul reunited. Even if in time you choose to part again, you will remain always connected to one another.

  It is my sincere hope that the life you make together is one overflowing with joy and understanding and that you never stop striving to learn and love one another better."

  He turned to Lily then, inclining his head.

  "Do you choose to bind yourself to this person? To become one being, root and stem, for time unending?"

  Lily paused for only a moment, not in hesitation, but in appreciation, wanting to remember this forever.

  "I do." she said, smiling at Amranth. He smiled back at her as Keeler turned to him.

  "And do you agree to the binding?" Keeler asked, "To intertwine yourself, leaf and bud, to never again be parted?"