“Nothing is set,” he said. “Nothing has been said that can’t be unsaid. I need you to tell me, Mina. Is this really what you want?”
“I Will End Myself”
Harker
“It’s what I want.” She didn’t look away. She didn’t hesitate.
I took the goblet from her hand and set them both on the end of my laboratory table.
As ever, I was acutely aware of the blood throbbing at her throat. And now, too, of the small holes that would open at the merest touch of my lips. Even sated from earlier, I wanted nothing more than to taste her again, though perhaps the need was slightly less frantic. How vigilant I would have to be from now on.
Have I gone mad? Join myself to her, but never taste her? Nevertouchher in more than the most glancing way?
But there had never been anything easy about my existence. And taking her as my wife ... it would make my life worth living.
I can do it forher.
In truth, I was too selfish to deny her.
I reached out and took her warm hands in mine. “Mina Penrose, will you marry me?”
Her wine-stained lips parted, and I felt her tremble as she answered, “I will.”
“Then let us go.”
I unfolded and smoothed down my sleeves, buttoned the collar of my shirt, and took my waistcoat and coat from the back of a chair.
Returning to her, I offered her my arm, and together we went downstairs and out into the night.
The air was still and damp, but the rain had stopped, and a gibbous moon shone down from the bejeweled indigo sky. It was a night very like the one in my vision.
Mina was still weakened by loss of blood, which showed in the lost gloss of her skin, the shadows beneath her eyes, and the care she took in her movements.
We followed the path along the edge of the oak wood. When I was a child, there were well-worn paths all through the wood, but on my hunt earlier today, I found they’d mostly dwindled to small game trails. Yet there was one slightly wider, perhaps used by the deer, that led to a small clearing. I watched for the trail entrance, and when we reached it, I parted and held back the dry ferns so she could pass.
She was sylvan in the moonlight. In that dress of autumn russet, with her flowing, dark-red hair, she might have been a dryad, or Titania herself.
The fallen leaves limned the path in bronze and gold, making it easier to find our way. The wood’s inhabitants were mostly quiet, either sleeping or hiding from the intruders who crushed acorns beneath their feet. Our steps released scents of decaying leaves, damp moss, and raw, rich earth.
As we neared the clearing, I heard the warning bark of a fox, followed by the reedy call of a tawny owl.
“I think Goosevar is close,” Mina whispered.
I glanced back and saw a low, thin layer of mist filling in the path behind her, like spilled milk pooling, almost to the edge of her trailing skirt. I reached for her hand and drew her closer.
The clearing ahead was washed in the light of the moon that hung almost directly above us now. As we stepped into it, Mina pointed and murmured, “Look, Harker.”
On the clearing’s edge was a dark standing stone. A vine curled around it, moon-colored, trumpet-shaped flowers open toward the sky.
We went to the stone, and I pinched free a length of vine, releasing its bitter scent. I took her hand and began winding the vine around our wrists and forearms, protecting the bright blooms as best I could.
We stood eyeing each other over our joined hands. I had balked at the idea of a wedding that no one but Goosevar would recognize as such. Yet in this woodland chapel, under the watchful moon, regal in her velvet cloak of stars, that notion seemed very small. What need had we of anything more than this ancient rite that had served the inhabitants of this island for centuries?
“Are you ready?” Mina asked. I could feel the quick beat of her heart.
I glanced around the clearing and saw that the mist had filled in to the edges.
“Come, then!” I called out. “This is what you’ve asked of us! Will you bear witness?”
