Page 175 of Shadowborne: Reckoning

She pulled me into another hug, then stepped back to wipe my cheeks for me, smiling. “I knew he was a good one,” she whispered, her eyes welling again. “I’m so glad, Bren. So glad you chose him.”

“I didn’t,” I said honestly, shaking my head. “He chose me.”

“Then, that’s even better,” she said softly, then held my face as she kissed me on both cheeks. “May God smile on your marriage and bless you every day of your life together.”

She whispered the benediction so only I would hear it, and my heart swelled. New, fresh tears falling, but the music was beginning in the chapel and Ronen stepped forward, offering me a handkerchief so I could wipe my cheeks one last time.

“If you’re ready, I’d like to walk both of you,” Ronen said with a sweet nod at my mother.

“Yes. Yes, I am now,” I said, hurriedly blinking.

Then my mother offered me the bouquet, and then we faced the doors together. Ronen offering me his arm, and my mother linking her elbow with mine on the other side.

Then the doors opened, and we walked forward into my new life.

~ DONAVYN ~

When the doors opened and Ronen proudly walked Bren towards me, I almost wept like a child.

She was a vision. I couldn’t stop staring. Saw nothing but her.

When she reached me and Ronen passed her over, I barely registered the warning in his eyes, desperate to pull her to me the moment her mother had laid a final kiss on her cheek.

‘Are you well?’ I asked her, hoarse even in the link.

Her eyes were wide and reddened, but she smiled as if I’d handed her the world. ‘Donavyn… you’re shaking.’

‘It’s anticipation. And gratitude and…’

When the cleric began to speak, I didn’t hear a word, just stared at her. Drinking her in—until he turned to us and said the time had come for vows. I had to clear my throat and take hold of my balls, because these words were important, and they all needed to hear me. So, I gripped Bren’s hands and spoke to her with every ounce of authority and power ever bestowed upon me.

“Before all gathered here, and any witness hereafter, I take you, and bind myself to you,” I said, clearing my throat again because it was gruff. “My body is yours and yours alone. My soul yours, shared only with God and our dragons.”

Bren’s tears spilled over, but she beamed at me. I squeezed her hands and kept going.

“You will have me as counsel in trouble, an ally in battle. We will share the table at feast, or in famine.

“All that I am, I give freely to you. What I become, I will become beside you.

“Where you walk, I will not stand behind you in fear, nor before you in pride, but at your side in strength.

“If darkness hunts you, it will find me also.

“If glory finds you, I will lift the first cup in your honor—and be last to let you boast of it alone.

“From this day until my final breath, you are home. You are love. You are fire in my veins.”

I took a deep breath and locked eyes with her, leaning in. “Brennan Kearney… I Choose you, as surely as any dragon. You are mine.”

~ BREN ~

Donavyn stood over me, red-eyed and solemn. And so handsome. His voice was hoarse, and he’d had to keep clearing his throat through the vows. It made my vision blur, but I couldn’t stop smiling. I almost kissed him when he finished and leaned over me, but I knew it wasn’t time. So, I nearly bounced on my toes with eagerness to claim him, forcing myself not to speak over the Priest so I wouldn’t embarrass either of us.

Then he said, I Choose you, and those words broke my heart a little bit—with the beauty, and because I knew they were true.

I clung to his calloused hands and wanted to throw myself into that broad chest, but I had to give him everything he’d just offered me. So, beaming, with my voice cracking, and without hesitation or fear, I told the world.

“Before all gathered here, and any witness hereafter, I take you and bind myself to you. My body is yours and yours alone. My soul yours, shared only with God and our dragons.