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I’d gone back to gripping his arms, and I could feel my light in his, fighting to entwine in hisaleimias much as possible. I took my hands off his biceps only to wrap my arms around his waist, sliding them under his tuxedo jacket.

Gripping his waist tightly, I gave a careful shrug.

“Maybe a little,” I admitted.

“You feel something a little?”

“Yup. I guess so.”

“You guess so.”

He heard my attempt at humor and fought to smile in return. I felt him try to follow me there, to turn the whole thing into a joke, something he could tease me about, but he couldn’t quite get there.

His voice held a faint accusation when he next spoke.

“On our wedding night?” He shook me lightly, smiling that taut smile. “You’re getting ominous, omen-y feelings on our wedding night, doc? You haven’t had premonitions like that in ages, not since before the whole Dragon and Tortoise thing started… and you’re doing it tonight. On ourwedding night,”he repeated with added emphasis.

I wanted to tell him he was wrong.

I wanted to, but I couldn’t.

5

A GIRL’S NAME

Nick stared at the cake on the square, sunset-orange plate in front of him.

His vampire eyes tried to pick out the precise image there.

He realized some part of him was still stunned at how beautiful it was.

Jem had made that.

His boyfriend, Jem, had created that beautiful thing.

Nick’s mate had somehow turned a chunk of cake batter, whatever he’d used in the other layers, fudge, and fondant frosting into an irrefutable work of art. Looking at it, at the insane detail in the eyes, the individual hairs in the image of a dog he saw, likely Panther, the frosted, cresting ocean waves, the stars and glimpses of sun and clouds… it was impossible not to want to preserve it in some way.

He’d already been warned, along with everyone else, that photos of the cakes were strongly (…strongly,Jem emphasized, when he made the announcement over the resort’s PA system) discouraged. Really, they were a big no-no.

The art of the cakes was meant to be temporary.

Something about the nature of existence, the impermanence of all things.

Nick tried to memorize every detail anyway, in awe that his boyfriend had done this.

Moreover, every single cake was different.

Nick’s cake looked nothing like the cakes next to it, which all sat on their own little plates, some sky blue, some desert red, some new-leaf green, some sunset orange or morning yellow. Staring at it, something else occurred to Nick.

“Do you get a cake?” he asked, turning to look at his boyfriend.

Dalejem made a noncommittal gesture, one of those Old Earth seer things Nick hadn’t quite determined an exact translation for.

“What does that mean?” he asked.

“Idohave a cake,” Dalejem said.

“You made yourself a cake?”