“More a scratch, really.”

“Then get some blankets from upstairs, some towels. Hoyt.” Glenna moved to him, knelt, then just took his hands and buried her face in them. However much she wanted to fall apart, it wasn’t time. Not time yet. “I felt you with me. I felt you with me every moment.”

“I know. You were with me. A ghrá.” He lifted her head, pressed his lips to hers.

“I wasn’t scared, not while it was happening. I couldn’t think to be scared. Then I reached that girl, that young girl, and saw what she was. I couldn’t even move.”

“It’s done. For tonight it’s done. And we proved a match for them.” He kissed her again, long, deep. “You were magnificent.”

She laid a hand over the wound on his side. “I’d say we all were. And we proved more than being able to hold our own. We’re a unit now.”

“The circle is cast.”

She let out a long sigh. “Well, it wasn’t the handfasting celebration I was looking for.” She struggled to smile. “But at least we... No, no, damn it, we didn’t. We didn’t finish. Just hold everything.” She shoved at her dripping hair. “I will not let those monsters ruin this for us.” She gripped his hand as Moira rushed down with arms loaded with towels and blankets. “Are you all listening? You’re still witnesses.”

“We got it,” Blair said as she cleansed Larkin’s wound.

“Your head’s bleeding.” Cian passed Moira a damp cloth. “Go right ahead,” he told Glenna.

“But Glenna, your dress.”

She only smiled at Moira. “It doesn’t matter. Only this matters.” She clasped hands with Hoyt, locked her eyes with his. “As the goddess and the god and the old ones... ”

Hoyt’s voice joined hers. “Are witness to this rite. We now proclaim we’re husband and wife.”

He reached down, took her face in his hands. “I will love you beyond the end of days.”

Now, she thought, now, the circle was truly cast, strong and bright.

And the light glowed warmer, a wash of gold when their lips met, when their lips clung in hope and promise, and in love.

“So,” the old man said, “with the handfasting complete, they tended to their wounds and began the healing. They drank a toast to the love, the true magic, that had come out of dark and out of death.

“Inside the house while the rain fell, the brave rested and prepared for the next battle.”

He sat back, picking up the fresh tea a servant had set beside him. “That is all of the story for today.”

The protests were immediate, and passionate. But the old man only chuckled and shook his head.

“There’ll be more tomorrow, I promise you, for the story’s not finished. Only this beginning. But for now, the sun is out, and so should you be. Haven’t you learned from the beginning of the tale that light is to be treasured? Go. When I finish my tea, I’ll come out to watch you.”

Alone, he drank his tea, watched his fire. And thought of the tale he would tell on the morrow.