Page 145 of My Dark Ever After

I stood before an arbor of cedar boughs that perfumed the air with their pungent, earth-sweet scent, waiting for my bride to walk down the aisle Ludo had shoveled in the snow and laid with black rock. It had been Guinevere’s idea to walk on the dark stone.

“We walked through hell together,” she said. “I want this to symbolize that.”

Our families sat on rustic wooden benches, bundled up in furs and opulent coats to stave off the winter chill, their breaths clouding the air as they waited for the last addition to our party. Mamma wept softly next to Stacci, already overcome with happiness, and all the kids sat very patiently in their finery except for baby Nico, who had fallen asleep in his father’s arms. The only one missing was Zacheo, who was our ring bearer, walking down the aisle as the string quartet played Pavarotti.

Delfina stood at my side in a black suit as my attendant, and Gemma had already walked down the aisle with Elizabeth as Guinevere’s bridesmaid. Gemma watched Leo where he sat in the second row as if he was a midnight eclipse, something profound and magical she could not break from.

The music swelled through the speakers, and a moment later Guinevere appeared through the open terrace doors.

My heart arrested at the sight of her.

Her long, thick hair was a big, soft corona of curls around her face and down her back, beneath such a sheer veil it seemed woven from the cloud of her breath in the cold. I could still see through to those luminous dark eyes, large and fringed in heavy lashes, filled with love so tangible it was as if her gaze had fingers to reach through my chest, to hold my heart and force it to restart painfully.

She looked ethereal, Proserpina in her white froth of a gown, only lace webbing over her arms and the points of her fingers, a sluice of unblemished silk over her upturned breasts and the slight curves of her hips. Innocence personified but for the slash of crushed-berry red painted on her full mouth, a tantalizing hint of the huntress she could be if the need arose.

John walked her down the aisle, but no one existed for me but her.

La mia stella cadente.

La mia cerbiatta e la mia cacciatrice.

My Vera.

When John placed her hand in mine, I felt as if the earth moved, tectonic plates sliding irrevocably into place.

“Hi,” she said with that sweet, shy smile that had first enchanted me so many months ago.

“Ciao bella,” I echoed, giving in to the urge to tug her indecently close, pressing our bodies together, hips to thighs. “I missed you.”

Her features softened behind the thin veil, mouth a generous moue. We had been apart for one night, but we both suffered from nightmares without the other in our bed.

“I missed you before I even knew your name,” she confessed.

Love filled my chest so full I found it difficult to draw breath.

“You once told mesegui la tua stella,” she murmured, as if there was no audience to our union, “to follow my destiny. I started on the path to my fate, to my soul mate, the day I set foot in Italy, and I would not change a single hardship I have ever endured, because I know it led me to you. I know we earned this happily ever after.”

“‘E quindi uscimmo a riveder le stelle,’” I said, dipping to kiss her through the veil. The effort marked the sheer white with the blood red of her lipstick. “‘And so we emerged once more to see the stars.’”

The final line of Dante’sInfernowas inscribed on the inside of the thick gold band she slipped onto my finger minutes later, when we had finished exchanging our vows.

“What kind of happily ever after does a King Below warrant?” I quipped when Carmine, acting as our officiant, declared us husband and wife.

Guinevere’s grin was wild and wicked and free when she rose to the toes of her heels to bring her mouth close to mine and whisper, “A dark ever after with his huntress by his side.”