Wayward Favor || ONC 2024

Chapter 22: Wedding Gifts

The sun begins its downward drop through the sky. People promenade through the gardens below as the back of my wedding dress is buttoned up. I chew at my lower lip. Orion still hasn't arrived. I wait for Lennette to pop through the door and tell me my friend has arrived. She just went back downstairs to check for me again. 

"There you go, Miss Truvow. It's a bit loose on you, but better than it being too tight. We just need to touch up your hair and your makeup and you'll be ready to dazzle." 

I don't know about dazzle, but I'm certainly ready to panic. There's a knock at the door, and I turn around so abruptly Julie's brush streaks a gash of pink lipstick across my face and she groans in protest. 

"Enter!" I say as the stylists wipe away the errant makeup. 

My father opens the door, stepping inside. His eyes soften and he smiles for the first time all day. "You look beautiful," he says. I want to scoff and say it doesn't matter how I look for this farce of a wedding. All that matters to me is that we break this curse, one way or another. Since there are still three stylists putting the final touches on my dazzling bride wedding look, I can't say anything to that effect. 

"Thank you," I whisper, tears burning at my eyes again. Why am I getting emotional now? With how much I've cried today, the wells should be completely dry. "Has my friend arrived yet?" I ask and he shakes his head. 

"You look so much like your mother," Father says. I'm about to challenge him, but when I glance in the mirror, I catch a glimpse of someone I don't recognize. Julie adds a final sweep of pink over my lips. The wedding dress is a little old-fashioned, simple, and plain, but I like it. The cool white complements my skin tone. Delicate lace trim lines the collar and the sleeves. My black hair is pulled back atop my head, curled, and pinned into place with glimmering paste hair pins. It's been made to look like a bouquet of blooming flowers. 

"I have a gift for you," Father says. "Close your eyes." The stylists move out of the way and I sigh, but acquiesce. Something brushes against the back of my neck. "Keep them closed...alright, you can open them now." 

Around my neck is a delicate gold lavalier necklace. The small pendant sparkles with diamonds and a teardrop-shaped white pearl. "It's beautiful," I say, touching the pearl. 

"After Celine was born, your mother took a pair of her grandmother's earrings to a jeweler and had each made into pendants. One for you and one for Celine. She wanted to give them to you on your wedding days. I know this isn't quite how you or your mother imagined your wedding to be, but I wanted you to have this today." 

I blink my eyes rapidly, fighting tears. If I ruin my makeup again, Julie will strangle me. "Thank you." He could have sold them, and we'd have been none the wiser, but he'd saved them for us. I wish I could be happy about this. I wish Celine was uninjured, and my family wasn't cursed with misfortune, and that I was marrying someone I loved, then this moment would have been perfect. 

My father clears his throat. "May I speak with my daughter privately for a moment?" 

The stylists are not pleased but they clear the room. As soon as the door closes my father whispers, "Magnus said Orion would be here before sundown. There's not much time left." 

"I know."

"I can speak to Reginald, tell him you're not feeling up to this tonight. I'm sure he'd understand, he's a reasonable man, I don't even need to tell him about Orion. Today has not gone to plan whatsoever. We can have a private ceremony tomorrow morning, if Orion doesn't come through and break the curse." 

"What about Celine?" She still hasn't woken. Father's eyelids lower as if they are too heavy for his face. 

"Even if you marry Count Drewmond, it's not going to change anything at this point in time. You've already married Magnus and put a hold on the curse's progression. Nothing worse will happen to us tonight." 

"But Count Drewmond doesn't know that! What will he think of me if I ask him to delay? That I am so selfish, I would rather risk my sister's life than wed him?" 

"He would not think that."

"He would," I argue and press my fingers against the arches of my cheeks, putting pressure under my eyes to stop my tears. 

"What would it matter, even if he did think that?" Father realizes he must have said the wrong thing as my face falls apart. He hands me a handkerchief to catch my tears before they ruin the stylists' hard work. "If you wed Count Drewmond tonight, before that crowd, there will be no going back, even if Orion does appear with the anima heart." 

I bite my lower lip. "Orion said sundown. We'll wait till the last moment, if he doesn't arrive. I'll feign illness. The curse, striking me down before the very union it requires." 

"There is a doctor present," Father warns. 

"And he will claim I'm hysteric and have me retired to a nice, dark room for the night," I say, faking a confident smile. 

"Alright, we'll go with your plan." He holds out his hand to me and helps me stand, gathering my long train so I don't trip over it, then he guides me to the door. As we leave, the three stylists surround me, doing a final check, readjusting a hair pin here, and a strand of hair there, until they say I am good enough and wave me off. 

Together, we trudge down the main stairs. I watch my feet, not wanting to step on my hem. My father tugs on my sleeve. Magnus! He runs up the stairs, three at a time, and comes to a stop in front of me. 

"Orion's here?" I ask. 

"Not yet. Do you want me to set fire to the garden?" Magnus asks. "That should buy us some time." 

"There's been so much rain, I don't think anything with burn," I warn. Magnus smirks, taking my doubts as a challenge. 

"The rain was a good thing. I can get stuff to burn. There are so many flammable decorations out there, and lit candles, no one will suspect foul play, and no one will get hurt, not even the rosebushes. I assure you. The cake may be collateral damage if the flames do happen to get a little out of control." 

"I never did like cake," I say, and Magnus's grin widens. I think he's more excited to light things on fire than be helpful, but the more time we give Orion, the better. "Go for it." 

"You just take your time on these stairs," Magnus says, then rushes back the way he came. Before he's halfway down, he turns, and shouts back to me. "You look beautiful in that dress, by the way." Before I can say anything, he's running off again. 

"Hmm." My father grunts. 

"What?" I ask, heat rising along the back of my neck. 

"Oh, nothing." Father firms his expression. We take a few more steps and then he asks, "Are you sure you want to annul the marriage between you and Magnus?" 

"Father!" I squawk, clutching my hand to my chest. 

"I saw the way you two looked at each other and I assumed..." 

I shake him. "Then you missaw. I barely know him. It wasn't even a real marriage, it's just to stop the curse. Nothing more." 

"Of course," Father says, nodding his head in an irritating way. "It's for the best, he's admitted to me that he's involved with an illegal guild. Wouldn't want you married to a criminal. Even if he is wealthy and set to inherit a sizable estate from a well-connected family, trusted highly by the king." I stomp on his foot. "Ow." 

"Just be quiet and no more talk of Magnus," I hiss, my face flaming red hot. 

"Fire!" Someone screeches from outside, followed by a series of screams. 

"An arsonist as well, it seems," Father adds as I shush him furiously. 

CHAPTER WORD COUNT: 1402

TOTAL WORD COUNT: 32610