“Where is it now?” I couldn’t imagine a more surreal location for a concert. My fingers itched to capture the idea on paper, with grand lords and ladies dancing against the hazy verdigris windows.
“It sounds like a wonderful idea until you realize how humid it gets in here. The piano was forever out of tune and its innards started warping. It had to be taken apart and removed. Grandpère used it for his prayers—he was the one to add the Burning Heart statue. Father found the climate perfect for some of his more particular specimens.” He pointed to the boxes. “I promise, none of them are dangerous.”
“I’ve never seen anything so wondrous,” I murmured, tracing my fingertips along one of the windows. The glass was inches thick, distorting the view.
A dark form flashed out of the murky depths and struck the window. I let out a startled cry of surprise, jumping back.
“Oh, don’t be alarmed,” Alex said, immediately at my side. “The lake is stocked with fish. The carp can be rather aggressive.”
“They can see us in here?”
He nodded, drawing close. “Of course. Look.”
He took my hand and pressed it back to the glass, holding it in place. Moments later, the carp returned and another appeared. They jostled against each other, each trying to be the one closest to my fingers. Their great mouths bobbed open, scraping their lips against the window, tails wriggling furiously.
They were enormously fat. I hoped it was merely an illusion of the thick glass, but their pectoral fins seemed larger than even Alex’s hands, also now spread out on the windows, drawing more of the beasts to him.
“They used to terrify me as a boy,” he admitted. “Now…I find them fascinating.”
I stepped away, letting my eyes trail up to the center of the dome. The light was brighter there and I could make out the caps of waves at the waterline. Smaller fish swam by, chased by what appeared to be a duck.
“I’ve never seen webbed feet from this angle,” I giggled.
“The heart is up there,” Alex explained, following my gaze. “The dome holds it up. When Father is down here with the gas lamps on at night, you can see the glow of it around the statue, as if Arina is truly here at the shrine, shining her light everywhere.”
“It’s amazing, Alex.” I smiled as the wonder of the room sent thrills through me. “What will you do with it?”
He looked surprised. “Me?”
I nodded.
“I…I’m not certain. I suppose it will have to be something elaborate and grand. It’s such an extraordinary place… It seems destined for extraordinary things.” He swallowed and his eyebrows furrowed together as he shifted about in his seat. “Well. It’s not mine. Not yet. But I think I know what I’d like my first extraordinary act here to be.”
Alex blew out a deep, shaky breath and removed a small velvet box from the inner pocket of his tuxedo jacket.
I froze.
This was it.
It was really happening.
Here, in the most magical and romantic spot I could have ever dreamed of.
“Verity…I don’t know how things like this are done between the People of the Salt, but here in Bloem, when you know you’ve found your love, you act on it. Life is unpredictable, so you need to seize hold of what you love and cherish every moment together.”
He reached up and cupped my cheek, stroking its curve.
“I’ve found my love. I’ve found you and I want to celebrate that, here: in a spot that is both waves and blossoms. It’s you and me. I couldn’t imagine a better place to ask this of you…Verity Adelaide Thaumas, will you let me love you for the rest of my life?”
My breath hitched at his unusual phrasing, catching in the hollow of my throat and stopping any hope I might have had in answering him. After a moment, I nodded.
He took my hands in his, clasping them in the gentlest of holds. “Will you let me cherish you, adore you, respect you, and honor you most earnestly?”
I nodded again, tears pricking at my eyes.
“Will you let my life twine with yours, two threads making up one cord, fine on our own, but so much better together?”
I pressed my lips into a tight line, fighting their trembles. I’d never heard a more perfect ode to what a marriage ought to be.
“And will you promise, from this day onward, to be my dearest, my other half, my…wife?”
Tears streamed down my cheeks. “I will.”
I expected him to open the box and reveal the engagement ring, but he remained still, just holding my hands, my gaze, my heart.
Eventually, he smiled, leaning forward to whisper, “You’re supposed to ask the same of me.”
“I am?” I asked with alarm, a little bubble of laughter rising up. “In Salann it’s such a simple, prosaic affair.”
Alex looked horrified. “Prosaic? How can a proposal be prosaic?”
I shifted my weight to one side, my hands still entwined with his. “Usually the man gets down on one knee and says something perfunctory about how beautiful the woman is or how happy she makes him, and then he pulls out a ring and asks if she’ll marry him.”
His hands flew from mine. “Should I have gotten down on one knee? I…I could try.”
“No! No, yours was perfect. Everything, all of it, was perfect.”
The corner of his eyes crinkled as he smiled. “It’s not over yet.”
“There’s more?”
He opened the box and held out the ring, dazzling me with the amount of diamonds clustered around the band. It was like a garden in full bloom, a night sky filled with stars.
“This was my great-grandmother’s ring but it’s been in the Laurent family for many, many generations.”
“It’s beautiful,” I murmured. The gold band was polished to a lustrous shine and the center diamond seemed to wink at me.
“It suits you.”
Alex took my hand and started to slip the sparkling ring on my finger.
I pulled my hand back. “Wait, you said I was supposed to ask you the questions too.”
He shook his head. “We don’t have to follow that. You’re not from Bloem and you don’t—”
Inspired, I pushed aside the fullness of my skirts and knelt down on one knee, putting us face to face. I took his hands as he had mine, shaky with the overwhelmingly gigantic moment. “Alexander Etienne Cornelius Leopold Laurent…you have too many names but you also have all of my heart. Will you let me spend the rest of my life loving you?”
His smile was pure joy. “I will.”
“Will you let me adore you, revere you, respect you, and make you laugh?” I asked, unable to remember the exact words he’d used.
His grip tightened around my hands, lacing our fingers together. I could feel the ring pressed heavily between them. “Every day, always.”
“Will you entangle your life with mine as my friend, my darling, my husband?”
Alex beamed. “Nothing would make me happier. Now…may I put on the ring?”
I nodded and he slid it over my finger. He held up my hand, tilting back and forth to catch the diamonds in the light.
“Thank you,” he murmured, his voice thick. “This really is one of the happiest moments of my life. I’m in absolute awe of you, Verity.” His fingers brushed along my face, trailing over my lips. “I suppose we ought to seal everything with a kiss, don’t you?”