Then Jack kissed her forehead, and the two of them walked toward the altar. This was right, this was wonderful. This was the happiest day of her life.
Somewhere, not too far, Schuyler felt the presence of those who were missing. She felt Dylan smiling. She felt the love of her grandparents, Lawrence and Cordelia. But most of all, she felt the loving presence and guardianship of her mother and father, wherever they were.
*
There was no priest at the head of the altar. Blue Blood unions were made by the bondholders themselves. They only had to consecrate their union by saying the right words to each other.
Jack turned to Schuyler, reaching for her left hand. He slipped a ring on her finger. It was the same one that the Venator had brought. The cursed ring.
“Drusilla thought she could spoil this day for me. But she was wrong,” Jack said. “I should thank her, truly, for giving back what I had once lost.”
Schuyler stared curiously at the ring on her finger. The white metal was gone. She saw now that it was a dark-colored band, threaded with a crimson line, as if it were cast of iron and blood.
Jack held it up to the light.
In all my years on this Earth, I have amassed a fortune of jewels and treasures. I can offer you diamonds and rubies, sapphires and emeralds. Yet there is no jewel brighter than your eyes.
As he spoke, Schuyler realized he was opening a way to the glom, and when she blinked, the two of them were standing across from each other in the shadow world. The church and their friends had disappeared.
Do not worry; to them this is but the briefest of moments. He stood in front of her then, in his true form, his ebony wings arching from his back and his horns on his head.
Schuyler looked at the band on her finger and saw that it was a ring of Black Fire.
Do you know the history of how the angels were made?
She shook her head.
When the Almighty created the world, he made the First Born. The Angels of the Light: Michael, Gabrielle, and their brethren were fashioned from the gossamer stars of the heavens. The Angels of the Underworld were cast from the Dark Matter that holds the Earth. There is no Light without the Dark. I am made of fire and iron, of coal and brimstone.
When we were cast out of Paradise, we lost part of our soul forever. As part of our punishment, we were cursed never to learn to love again. Instead, we were bound to a destiny that was set from the beginning. Azrael and I never chose each other; the choice was made for us. We never knew anything else.
The ring you hold is part of my soul that your mother helped me recover. It was she who saved us from the Dark and led us back to the Light. As her daughter, you too are an Angel of the Light. The fire does not harm you. I lost this ring during the crisis in Rome. But now it has been returned to me.
This ring has been blessed by Gabrielle herself.
I have never given this ring, my soul, to anyone. Azrael has never had any part of this.
This is the only part of myself that is truly mine, and now it is yours.
When they stepped away from the glom, Schuyler marveled at the dark ring in her hand. It looked so plain and ordinary, and yet behind it was a secret history of war and blood and love and loss and forgiveness and friendship.
“I will never take it off,” she promised. “And I have a ring as well.”
This time, her hands were as steady as a surgeon’s as she slipped the ring on his finger. It was a plain gold ring. Inscribed with her parents’ wedding date. When she left New York, she had managed to bring a few prized possessions with her.
This was my father’s ring, she sent. It has a protection in it that my mother bestowed on him when they bonded. I want you to have it.
They took each other’s hands, and in front of a chapel filled with their friends, they said the words that bound them to each other, words that could not be unmade.
“I give myself to you and accept you as my own,” Jack declared, his voice trembling a little. There were tears in his eyes.
“I give myself to you and accept you as my own,” Schuyler echoed. She felt calm and serene and looked at him with so much love.
It was done.
They were bonded.
When she looked at Jack again, his emerald eyes were dancing. He radiated joy and happiness and pride. She swelled with love. Against everything, they were together. Against everything, she was his and he was hers.
Did she feel different? Somehow she had imagined an invisible bond forming between them, a physical sensation tying them to each other. Yet she felt the same. Only better. Only more complete. More at peace.
The small room burst into cheering and applause.
When they walked out of the church to the cheerful strains of Mendelssohn’s “Wedding March,” their friends greeted them with bright sparklers that shone against the darkness and called their names to the skies.
Jack tightened his grip on her hand, and Schuyler squeezed back twice. It was their secret code. It meant I love you.
Tomorrow Jack would leave her. Tomorrow he would return to New York and she would head for Alexandria.
But tonight, they would dance.