Ritual Magic

mouth went dry.
    “Then we’d best get in position,” Isen said.
    Rule walked to the path at the front of the grove. His family arranged themselves behind him.
    He and Lily had wanted a mostly traditional wedding . . . but not entirely. Neither of them liked the symbolism of the bride being handed over to the groom like a parcel, but they didn’t want to leave family out, either. They’d decided that instead of the usual processional of the bride, they would both walk forward to meet in the middle, accompanied by their attendants. Their families. She had her father, her mother, her sisters, her brother-in-law, and Cynna. He had his father, his brother Benedict, and Nettie, plus his newly found brother Jasper and Jasper’s new fiancé, Adam.
    It had been harder to come up with the answer to another question. Who did they want to officiate? Neither of them were traditionally religious. In the end, though, there had been only one person who was exactly right. Fortunately, California made it easy for nonclergy to officiate at a wedding.
    Cullen waited for them now, standing on the small, arched bridge in the middle of the lawn, wearing the flowing white tunic and trousers he’d worn for his own wedding.
    The string quartet, positioned slightly east of and behind the bridge, started playing. The crowd—all five hundred of them—began to quiet.
    “You forgot your mike,” Benedict said.
    “Oh. Right.” Rule couldn’t look away from the spot where . . . and then there she was. Lily. Standing opposite him in a long shimmer of satin silk.
    Benedict chuckled and fastened the small microphone to Rule’s collar. “Don’t forget to turn it on.”
    “Right,” Rule said again.
    “Or I can,” Benedict murmured and moved back behind him again.
    The violins soared into the crescendo of “Gypsy Airs” . . . and Rule stepped out into the sunshine.
    He walked slowly. That was what they’d planned, but now he cursed himself for an idiot. Slow was hard when he wanted to be there
now
. But he was a Lu Nuncio and a Rho and he understood control. He forced himself to hold to the pace they’d practiced.
    He stopped on his side of the bridge. Lily stopped on her side. He could barely see her, what with the arch of the bridge and Cullen standing right in the middle of it.
    “Friends,” Cullen called. His voice was picked up by the mike he wore and carried through speakers along both sides of the lawn. “We are here to witness the union of two people, who today will blend two families—and two sets of customs. This ceremony is a human custom, but in keeping with the lupi belief that important public observations are most complete when they are kept simple, the rite itself will be short. Rule Turner, Lily Yu, come forward and marry.”
    Rule stepped up onto the bridge. Across from him, Lily did the same. And now at last he saw her face clearly, and gods, but she shone so brightly . . . his heart hurt with love and joy.
    As planned, they met in the middle. They’d flipped a coin to see who would go first. Rule had won. He started to reach for her hands—and remembered the mike. Hastily he fumbled with it. Lily laughed at him with her eyes. Finally he got it turned on. This time, when he reached for her hands they were held out, ready for him. “I, Rule Turner, take you, Lily, for my mate, my partner, my lover, and my wife, in sickness and in health, for richer and for poorer, cleaving only unto you.”
    “And I, Lily Yu, take you, Rule, for my mate, my partner, my lover, and my husband, in sickness and in health, for richer and for poorer, cleaving only unto you.” Lily pulled her right hand free. Cullen placed a ring in it. Lily’s hand shook ever so slightly as she slid the ring onto the third finger of Rule’s left hand. “With this ring I thee wed.”
    Rule held out his right hand. Cullen supplied the other ring. He concentrated hard and managed not to drop it before he could slide it on Lily’s finger. “With this ring I thee wed.” And then he just looked into her eyes, a smile starting from his toes and spreading all over him.
Mine.
    “And I,” Cullen said, seizing their joined hands and holding them high, “declare the two of you well and truly married!”
    Fire burst out on their joined hands—fire as green and joyous as spring, a warm, laughing fire that didn’t burn—the
ardor iunctio
, the joining fire, used in the ceremony when a newly adult lupus was brought fully into the clan.