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As it happened, Moire the Prophetess had a favorite garden, the primary feature of which was a solid square hedge of yellow, multi-petaled blossoms called sun-chimes. In the autumn season, as it was now, those blossoms were both edible and sweet. Though in Moire’s garden, tasting them was forbidden to all, except for very young children…

This was the garden of my memories.

It took ten days to plan the ceremony. If she’d been alive, the king said it would have taken two.

All of Hestia was abuzz with the news that the blue dragon had brought to Hestians only mortality and not death, and people were celebrating enough on their own. But when their revered prophetess and her royal husband had been two of the first to suffer mortal death, they became heroes. And all the world mourned them.

As for what had happened in the royal living quarters that night, the truth never had a chance to gain purchase in the imaginations of the romantic-minded. In general, they believed the couple sacrificed themselves for each other, for their deep and abiding love, though the particulars changed from one retelling to the next.

Griffon and Lennon decided not to wait for the funeral and with the help of one of the DeNoy from The Soundless prepared to go home. Bidding Bain farewell started as a horribly painful conversation that ended with a dozen empty bottles and all of us dredged, except for the DeNoy and her dragon.

The king’s health had improved slightly, though we often found each other sitting by the fire in that small room under the royal quarters. He only asked me once what I thought about replacing him on the throne, but my answer wasn’t what he wanted to hear.

“Hestia is working on its next iteration, and I doubt royalty will be part of it. They’ll want brave souls to lead them into the new world. They’ll need rules and medicine, and I won’t be surprised if they start digging beneath the mountain for whatever is left of the old technology. To boost things along.” I wagged my head sadly. “They won’t need anything from me but Demius’ library.”

He was delighted when I pulled the dragon key from around my neck. “You had it all this time?”

“I did.”

“I’m surprised it didn’t light up when we met.” He sighed wistfully. “I created it, you know. I couldn’t enchant it myself, but the crafting was mine.” He sighed again and shook his head. “I made so many mistakes?—”

“I am not surprised. Given that much time, anyone would make the same.”

“Demius wouldn’t have.”

“Oh, he already did. Immortality? What was he thinking?”

* * *

Well back from the hedge of sun-chimes, a pyre had been constructed twenty feet off the ground for the royal couple who would be remembered in recent history as the greatest love of all time.

Tearloch chuckled at the suggestion. “Little do they know, the greatest love in Hestia is right here.” He raised our entwined fingers and kissed my knuckles. “But it’s a pity we won’t have more time together.”

“More time? Who knows how much time we’ll get.”

“I doubt it will be enough?—”

“For what?”

“For me to save you properly. After all that trying, you ended up saving me again. And now?—”

“Tearloch.” I turned to face him, beckoned him close for a long kiss, then whispered against his cheek. “You have saved my heart and saved my soul every day since we met. Every single day. And it will take me our lifetime, however long that may be, to repay you.”

He smiled into my eyes.

“What?”

“Griffon was right. We don’t need eternity to find perfection.”

Just as one of the druids carried a torch up the steps of the pyre, one of his fellows started coaxing music from his bowls. A half-dozen still-loyal Ard Draoi knelt nearby, humming.

I was tempted to kneel with them and absorb that sound into my bones again. “I wonder what they’re praying for now.”

A guard within hearing stepped closer and explained, quietly. “They are praying to the Kind God, asking for guidance for our new mortal lives.”

Ground lightning rumbled through the garden soil and rocked the pyre. The druid with the torch ran down the steps without doing his job, torch in hand, his robes hiked to his knees. The bowls rocked and bounced, the music lost.

When it settled, Agrios stood at the top of those steps looking none too pleased.

“Uh, oh.” Tearloch and I hurried forward and stopped at the bottom of the wood steps. “Did you forget something?”

The younger Demius made a face. “Will you please get back to your studies?”

“Why?”

“So you can educate these fools, teach them to translate correctly?”

“What have we missed?”

“It is not two gods, one kind and one severe. It is one god in two parts, one kind, one severe. One god, two halves. Agrios and Caldemius. And tell them to stop being hasty. Had Aristaeus been more patient, I might have answered his first prayer, but then he quickly prayed to whom he thought was someone else. You understand why my response was severe.”

“Yes, Demius. We understand. We are unworthy.”

He nodded sharply, placated. Then he allowed a hint of a smile to curl one side of his mouth before he winked…and was gone.

THE END