Wildfire

Seventy Six

If this is a party, I daresay that I have never been to a proper party in all of my life and can find fault with no one for not introducing me to them at a younger age for it would have ruined any hopes my parents might have had for marrying me off to a respectable family because it is so unbearably hot and stiff in this strained atmosphere that I think I might faint with trying to truly work through the greetings alone...

At first, I was happy to greet one family after the other and accept their pledges of loyalty... And I do not mean to sound ungrateful... But my arm is aching from having to hold it out for so long, and if any more warmth gathers in my cheeks from the wine I think that I may very well have to be carried up to our chambers so that I might undress and cool myself from its fever by pressing myself against my husband and the stiffness that has somehow popped up to join me while I sit in his lap while we work through our guest list as appropriately as possible timing wise... I just never knew that greeting one's guests could ever truly take such an astoundingly long time... But I suppose when you've invited all of your kingdom and the kingdoms surrounding them that the guest list would very well be a long one... 

I am nervous and already tired of smiling when I have so much else on my mind, my eyes trying so very hard to focus on the far edges of the ballroom since they are what remains a mystery to me... I think maybe sitting in the ballroom would be much less of an imposition if I were fully aware of my surroundings... If I could see all of the decorative ribbons streaming from all of the onyx fixtures... If I could make out at least most of the faces once they've walked away from me... If maybe I knew more of the people here instead of just the palace's contribution to my wedding party and my own family... I know that more friendly faces have likely come, but they have been lost to me or have yet to be presented, and it has left me feeling rather isolated at the moment... But then I feel it... Not just the feeling of my husband's body taking notice of how pleasant I feel in his lap... But the way his hand tightens itself where it lay resting on my hip whenever someone approaches... The way that he seems to be dividing his attention between watching the crowd and watching me... The way he lifts the chalice to his lips just to snake his tongue out for a splash of it to check it for poison before lifting it to my own... The gentle smile and soft reassurances he gives me every time our eyes touch... I am nervous... But he does all of these things and I know that while I might be the most nervous one here... I am also, possibly, the most loved... 

...

Emrys

...

  Even with all of the commotion and all of the new faces of the villagers not just belonging to the village that outlines the palace... But many villagers it seems from the village that is lorded over by the Cloud family themselves, the bonds that they've fostered with the town that my father gifted them with their branch title clearly ones that will last a lifetime with how they laugh and make merry as though each of them is immediately at home seeing the stunning young man that I'm sure that they all feel like they've watched grow and mature over the short two centuries that it's taken him to find adulthood... They act as though they've expected nothing less of him than taking the occupant of the throne as his own personal cushion, and I have to say that I absolutely agree with the logic behind their thinking... This is exactly where he belongs, and it has shown his entire life... 

He may not be able to see how brightly he is currently shining... How well he is doing with greeting everyone and using his manners just as he should... He looks like a perfectly formed glass doll with how poised and graceful he is, not that he is not always perfect... Just... At the moment he is so perfectly polished, and even though at the moment he does not see it... Eventually, he will understand that he has nothing to be nervous about... There is no need for him to memorize every name and face right at this moment when the reason all of them are here is to celebrate our marriage... There will be time for that later when we truly step into politics and what it will take to heal the damage caused by Xiang and his spiteful neglect of affairs... He'll get to know everyone and their regions then, and international affairs only after all of that mess has been cleaned... 

And then... I hear it... I hear them before I see them... And I cannot help but smile to know that the invitations that I had thought to have sent out announcing the finding of my bride the very first morning I found myself waking up with my delicate Moon Beam still held closer to my body than any dream I would ever consider myself lucky enough to have...  

Our next guests to enter keep themselves as respectful as they can manage to be, their inner mischievous nature joining the party in the form of artful puffs of smoke that announce their arrival just as well as any court crier might...Though I realize after all the dust has settled, the name not truly made out over the light pounding of the drumming that is as unique to each band of Djinn as the back of each hand in this room, that the band of Djinn that I had invited to help us make merry has not arrived themselves... But it seems as though one of their gentlekin has, and he is currently on the arm of the King of an island country that is not too far from our shores... I had thought to invite King Ashoka out of curtesy, though now I can see that I had no need to worry over the older man stealing any of our specialness from the day or him trying to steal my stunning Queen for himself... The King of the Tigers has apparently secured his own Queen, and I find in myself nothing but happiness for him, the smile we share when he and his wife present themselves to us, nothing more than pleasantries being exchanged between us as careful equals, is completely genuine and not a forced one that lets him know that I am actually happy he could find time in his own schedule to attend instead of just sending a representative... And I have a feeling that my lovely Queen feels just the same with the way he perks up over being told that there is finally another Queen in this castle that he might have a moment to talk with.