The Celestial Kiss (21 page)

His face lit up in an expression of awe, as if I had just performed some incredible act of magic.  James offered him a swift nod before turning away in search of someone else.  I hurried after him, not wanting to be left to the wolves.  “He wasn’t expecting that.”  James said, fixing me with a bemused grin.

“What is that supposed to mean?”  Without anyone to perform for, I found it hard to hide my irritation with him—particularly when I was also irritated with myself for letting it bother me in the first place.

“Well, he didn’t expect someone as beautiful as you, for one thing.”

I swallowed my surprise.  “Is that... a
compliment
?”   

James turned, allowing me to search his face for any indication that he meant it.  Despite the stone facade, his voice was soft.  “It’s fact.” 

“These people...”  I ventured.  “Do they all know that I’m dying?”  I crossed my arms, trying to ward off the feeling of sudden exposure.

It clearly took him by surprise, and seemed to be one of the last things he wanted to discuss, as he offered no answer.  I realized I’d never said it to him, and certainly not so plainly.  His father had been the one to tell me my life was slipping away because James was too ashamed or cowardly or disgusted to do it.  I thought he was on the verge of saying something, but instead James nudged me ever so lightly and whispered in an undertone, “Put on your happy face.”

I looked up in time to see the queen sweeping toward us, her long red curls tumbling elegantly down her back.  It was the first time I had seen her since her husband’s death, and though she still looked beautiful, I could see the lines webbing around her delicate skin, an indication of her exhaustion.  Stepping back, she observed me, her lips just a little less tight than I remembered, her green eyes lighter than the first day she had approached me.  “You look stunning.”

For a moment, an untouched silence lay between us. Janna seemed to be attempting to send me some kind of signal over her mother’s shoulder, but whatever it was, it was going over my head.  I turned to James as surreptitiously as possible, hoping his message would be a little more obvious-something more along the line of smoke stacks.  All he did was smile, as if he were enjoying my discomfort.  I had no doubt he was.

“Thank you.” I finally answered.  This was obviously a part of the game, something else designed to trick these people into believing the lives that they saw here were truly blessed, not smoke and mirrors.  But it was exceedingly difficult to play it cool when the queen hated me, Julius wanted to kill me, and James and I had barely even been able to say two full sentences to each other since our meeting.  To pretend that I fit perfectly into this family was like pretending that I was normal, which I, of course, was not.

The queen disappeared into the maze after kissing her children goodbye. Janna popped up at my shoulder.  “Come on, Lilith, let’s go take our seats for the ceremony.”

We walked together through the dark paths of the maze, following the outline of the torch light every couple of feet until we emerged in a large, open area crammed with chairs. 

My preoccupation with not tripping became secondary as we moved towards the front, and nearly every pair of eyes turned to trail us up the aisle.  The guests were packed into rows that looked too close for comfort, craning their necks around one another in an attempt to look our way.  They were looking at Janna, admiring her beauty.  I told myself that they didn’t even see me there and focused on the space left vacant near the front of the courtyard.

Janna led me to the very front before slipping into an empty seat next to her mother. I was grateful to be distanced from the queen—until Julius took the seat to my other side.  He looked at me mildly.  I wanted to ask what his problem was, but he looked away soon enough. “I shouldn’t be sitting here.”  I leaned into Janna just close enough to conceal the whisper.  “Look at all those people standing in the back.” 

Janna turned to look at the crowd of people ringing around the outside of the chairs and leaning against the wall of the maze.  She didn’t say anything.  Instead, the queen spoke, leaning around her daughter to address me.  “You belong here, Lilith.  It’s what the king would have wanted.”

A lump formed in my throat.  Thankfully I didn’t have to try and speak around it because James suddenly appeared before us.  I took in the altar that he stood upon, which I’d previously paid no mind.  It was like a stage, carved of the same concrete that composed the rest of the courtyard, bearing a table with a single vase, flanked by two thick candles.  James stopped before this table and allowed himself a moment to look at it, reigning in the silence that had fallen at his entrance.

“Tonight is a night for joy and sorrow,” His voice was so strong and powerful that I almost didn’t believe this was the same man who’d stood before his father a week ago and professed that he’d had no choice in bringing me here. “Tonight the bitter and the sweet unite as we mourn a death, but celebrate a life.”  He looked down at the ground, and I feared that he would lose himself in his sorrow until I looked to Janna and realized her head was down too.  A sneaky glance at Julius revealed similar circumstances.  They were bowing, I realized.  I followed suit, hoping they didn’t notice my delay.

James began speaking again and I looked up to see that his head was still down, as if he was talking to the ground. He very well could have been, because his words made no sense to me.  I wondered if my brain were merely unhinged with all of the events taking place, and then realized I understood nothing because he was speaking an entirely different language.

I listened carefully, attempting to decode the words based upon his body language and context.  I knew enough of other languages to know it was not French, or Spanish, and unless James was making a highly inappropriate reference to the bathroom, then it wasn’t German either.

His words may not have given me even a faint understanding of what he was speaking of, but as I listened I felt myself falling under a spell of sorts.  The words which had immediately struck me as nonsensical gibberish took on new meaning, transcending vocabulary.  The inflections of his tone as he enunciated words here and there began a sort of metric that offered me peace. It was almost like maybe I did belong there... Not just there in the front seat, but there as in with James.  It was absurd, but the magic of his words was beginning to convince me it wasn’t. 

When he finished speaking, the silence was ugly and harsh.  I wished he’d keep talking.   I raised my head to see goose bumps all over my arms, peeking out from under starched sleeves.

I felt fulfilled and yet I longed for him to continue.  James seemed to have nothing more to say, however; He reached for the ornate vase before him and upended it.  The wind caught the contents, which I realized were the King’s ashes, and scattered them through the air.  A shudder racked me as James set the vase back on the table upside down, then proceeded to blow out the candles.

He said nothing more, looking out at the surrounding crowd.
 
His eyes fell on his family in single succession.  I looked down the row and saw the queen with her head still down and Janna with tears streaming down her cheeks, glinting silver in the passing light of the moon.  My chest swelled with some kind of natural desire to comfort her, but upon feeling James’ eyes on me, I turned back to him.

It may have been a trick of the light, but I almost thought he smiled at me...a small, comforting sort of tip on his soft lips.  Turning back to Janna, I pushed that thought away.  Janna laughed.  “You’re crying?”  She informed me, as much a question as it was a statement.

That was what I had intended to say to her, but I put my fingers to my face and brushed away tears.  I hadn’t realized they’d fallen, and hopefully neither had James. 

“That was it?”  My voice trended towards disappointment.

“Of the ceremony.”  Janna nodded.  “I meant to translate for you, but...”  She sighed, letting the thought go.  “I’m sure you didn’t understand any of that.”

“No,” I agreed, looking over her shoulder to recall James standing there, the words drifting like snow flurries off his tongue, blanketing me in peace.  “But I didn’t need to.  It was...”  I groped for words to do the speech some fraction of justice, “It was hauntingly breathtaking.”

Janna smiled her agreement and stood, her eyes fixed on someone behind me.  Following her cue, I stood up as well and turned to see James.  He said something to his mother still in that silvery foreign language and then turned to Janna.  There was such a familial intimacy between them that I felt like my very presence was an intrusion. 

James must not have felt the same way, though, because his gentle voice called me out of my thoughts.  The warmth of his hand resting upon my shoulder matched the warmth in his eyes, as though he could sense the shift within me.  My walls had begun to crumble just the slightest bit, but James seemed to sense that.  I wanted to let him know how beautiful his speech had been, but suddenly the entire English dictionary seemed inadequate so I found myself watching him, wordlessly. 

James leaned into me, and I felt my breath hitch as his sent chills down my neck.  “Are you ready for this?”  With his lips so close to my ear, we surely looked like the lovers we meant to portray, and I looked up at him with eyes full of unspoken question.  “We’re going to be under a lot of scrutiny tonight.  You, especially, seem to have piqued the interest of our guests.  Can you handle it?”

I flashed a smile and moved closer to him, so that no one could hear when I said, “You almost make it sound like I have a choice.”  He smiled, offering up a genuine reward for my wit.

I had never been to a funeral before, but my idea of them must have been a misconception.  There were no pictures all around, no weeping women clutching a box of Kleenex, and thankfully no depressing music.  Following James’ speech, the tempo of the gathering jumped up from solemn to lighthearted as the guests clustered into groups and broke into conversation.  Nobody cried after that.  Instead, they laughed.  And danced.  And drank.

As it turned out Delilah had an incredible voice.  It was melodic and sweet, the polar opposite of herself.  She sang words that, to my untrained ear made no sense and harmonies that I didn’t recognize.  They were beautiful anyways.  Everyone danced and moved in time with her, moving more quickly and fluidly each time Delilah finished a glass of wine.

The confusion was overwhelming, so stark in contrast to what I had anticipated, that I was more or less lost in a swirl of action all throughout the night.  I shadowed James, moving when he did, laughing with him, and looking at him for direction in the moments in between. We answered question after question about everything from how we’d met, how remarkably I was adjusting, and even a few of a political nature.  James was always quick to remind the guests that they would have all of tomorrow to learn of the plans he had in store.  Whenever anybody spoke they did so in English, but they made it known that their queries were intended for James.  Every once in a while, somebody would get too comfortable with the exchange and look to me to start answering questions, tired of James’ explanations.  So occasionally I would chime in, attempting to rescue some of my dignity.  I would give the same answers as James, usually truncated for brevity, and smile a lot.  When they shot questions at me rapid-fire, one after another, James—coming to the rescue—would assure them that we had to go speak with someone else, but that we’d be more than happy to share stories at dinner.  The night went like that, over and over again until Janna showed up after what felt like ages, but was invariably only a couple of hours. 

“I’ve come to whisk you away,” she whispered, placing a light hand on my arm to steer me the opposite direction before James could realize I was gone. 

“Thank God.”  I muttered once we were free from the group of middle-aged men who had been either avidly listening to James talk about his plan for the vampire relocation or intently watching me like something amazing would happen. 

“No, thank Janna.”  She corrected, flipping a sheet of dark hair over her shoulder.  She handed me an intricate, gold-rimmed goblet from a nearby table and grabbed one for herself.  “Toast with me.”

“What’s in it?”  I asked nervously, peering down into the chalice.  The dark pewter of the glass made it hard to see the color of the liquid within it.  The fact that Janna had just picked them up from the table was disconcerting to me, as most discarded glasses at my father’s home were laced with blood and other drugs.  Janna seemed not to share the same concern.

“Champagne,” she said, as though it were fairly obvious.

The grapey smell was pretty telling, now that she said so.  Though I was accustomed to harder liquor than that, when I took a tentative sip, it burned my mouth.  “This is disgusting,” I placed my goblet down upon the table again and looked up to see Janna giggling.  Her cheeks were flushed, and I didn’t doubt that this wasn’t her first taste of champagne that night. 

“Not if you keep drinking it.”  She giggled.  “I do have to say, you’re doing very well at this whole pretend thing.” 

“What do you mean?”

“I almost believe you two are actually star-crossed lovers.  The doe eyes are particularly convincing.”

I laughed, but whether it was because I was glad I was capable of spinning a convincing picture or because Janna was just naive enough to hope it was actually true, I didn’t know.  “I hate to force you back to reality, but you must be deranged if you’re actually falling for our charade.  How much have you had to drink?”