Sanctum Noctis

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SANCTUM NOCTUS

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The Sanctum smelled of polished stone, floral perfume and expensive magic, all of it mingled into something saccharine and faintly cloying for the German man. The kind of scent one could only associate with large gather and formal lies. Samuel stood among the neatly arranged sea of bodies as he worse a royal blue suit pressed so sharply, the very fabric seemed incapable of wrinkling. His white shirt underneath remained stiff and untouched by the candle-glow around them. His silver wristwatch, enchanted to tick in complete silence glinted faintly beneath half his cuff. The tinted glasses stayed on, even here.

The procession had already begun.

He checked the time again, not out of impatience, but Edith was late.

Or perhaps she was simply arriving on her own terms, as she often did. Samuel had long since stopped expecting punctuality from people who moved through the world with grace rather than urgency. Still, the absence of her presence was notable in its own right. Not inconvenient, just noticeable.

If anyone had the gall to approach him, they chose not to act on it. His expression and mannerism made certain of that.

He resisted the urge to look toward the doors again. Instead, he simply adjusted the cuff of his suit jacket, allowed one breath to exit through his nose, and resumed.

The ceremony pressed on.

The priest had begun speaking. Samuel noted the cadence first. Low, worn and persistent. The words came from his mouth carried deliberate weight, brushing along ears like dust laden leaves. They echoed as if they came from a place far older than affection or sincerity. And that made sense in the grand scheme of things. From the beginning, this ceremony, despite its flowers and skills did seemed like it was never meant to be gentle.

He didn't know the bride personally. Harper. She'd been a student. Sharp in certain ways, emotionally volatile in others. He hadn't expected to see one so young under a veil already, certainly not like this. He had Known Mathias Pride even less, perhaps Athanatos was a name whispered within Ministry halls during his time. But names meant little to him these days. Titles even less. His ministry days were long past him.

Still, something about the way the preist intoned each word unsettled even his usually static disposition. This did not seem like a celebration but transmutation.

A vow, the priest had said.

A sacrifice.

Samuel's gaze didn't drift toward the altar, not directly. Instead, he studied the runes around the room. Then geometry carved into the very stone, some intentional while parts eroded into meaning by time itself.

No matter how eerie the vibe had become, it wasn't his place to interfere. That was always the temptation with young people, wasn't it? To intervene, to warn. To suggest undoing choice they made with hearts too tender to understand consequences. But no one's life was his to shepherd. The kids had grown or were close enough that it would make no difference to him.

The Priest spoke of old gods, of blood and of the soil remembering. Of Judgement.

Samuel folded his hands neatly in front of him, his thumb brushing the edge of his wristwatch. He had once worked with a seer in the Department who said similar things before going mad. The woman drowned herself in ink, convinced how her own prophecies were attempting to suffocate her. He wondered if this priest had similar ghosts whispering to him or worse if the man welcomed them.

He let his gaze move to the guests. There were so many of them. Faces he recognized, some he didn't. It had become less a wedding and more a census of magical power at this rate. The kind of gathering where affection was armor and smile was negotiation. What exactly had the poor girl wandered into?

He observed as the silence fell over the hall, like the priest had commanded, like a veil woven from candle light and expectation. His fingers flexed once at his side. Edith hadn't arrived and he would have preferred not to be alone there. Not because he feared being seen alone, but because he disliked the idea of someone counting him as a lone man and striking up a conversation.

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Leaving with Edith after her next post.

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Speech: #1d5758 ◇ __

__◇ Thoughts: Italic	Mentions: N/A ◇__
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Elisa clutched her father's hand tightly, feeling incredibly small under the looming towers of the cathedral. Her grandparents had insisted the whole family attended the wedding - 'out of respect for the Athanatos family' - but her father had made sure seven year old Tommy wouldn't have to come. If old Mrs. and Mr. Wagner had grudgingly agreed, they didn't let Elisa slip away from this occasion as well. They had argued that this was a chance for Elisa to witness a wizarding wedding and, though they did not say it explicitly, to get into closer contact with other pure-blood families.

Elisa had agreed to go, but she was already regretting her decision.

The church was somber, its gargoyle statues frightening to say the least. It seemed more like a place for funerals than for weddings.

Despite the shiver running through her body, Elisa walked on, closer and closer the open mouth of the cathedral, her father's hand still wrapped around hers. She was dimly aware of her grandparents greeting another family merrily, and instinctively she plastered what she hoped was a convincing smile on her lips. Her father seemed to have sensed her anxiousness and bent down, his warm brown eyes looking steadily into hers. "Nothing to be so nervous about, honey. This is just a wedding after all... even if the church is a bit intimidating. But it's nothing more than a building, Elisa," he murmured, grinning. "Shall we go in?"

Elisa gave a stiff nod and tried to school her features into something relaxed. They went inside the cathedral and took seats, soon joined by Elisa's grandparents.

The inside of the church was... rather strangely decorated, Elisa thought quietly. There was pink everywhere, and though the young girl appreciated a change to the somber black, it seemed ill-fitted to the dark demeanour of the church.

Glancing around, Elisa recognised some people from Hogwarts. She was fairly sure a few of her professors were there, as well as some of her peers.

She was dragged back to attention by the quieting of the chatter and the sudden change to the music. The bride was walking into the chapel, her dress pink like the rest of the decoration and her veil long over her red curls. Elisa had seen Winnie Harper at Hogwarts a few times, and though she wasn't aware of the exact year the upperclassman was in, she knew well enough that Miss Harper was marrying very young. And so was the groom, she thought, her gaze shifting to the young man wrought in velvet black. From afar, Elisa could still distinguish the solemn look on his face. This must be an important day for them.

A priest began speaking, his voice echoing in the domes of the cathedral. The rattling gravity in his tone seemed to suggest to a eulogy instead of a wedding vow.

Elisa shivered. She did not like the atmosphere of this place, not at all.

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sta 5 | eva 7 | str 3 | wis 9 | arc 8 | acc 9

...Yet even now, his gaze softened when she appeared.

Winnie Harper, in all her fractured radiance, stepped into the Sanctum like she had been summoned by the faceless gods. The contrast of her against the black-stone church was jarring, dressed in white. The gown was made of the finest silks, the grandest tulle which billowed with every breath of magic in the room. Her features delicate as they always had been, her long, thick, fiery tresses hung long. She was luminous, out of place, and utterly herself. He would have it no other way. If he wanted a girl like any other, he would have suffered another.

She had always been out of place. That’s what made her his.

The officiant stood behind the narrow podium. More a structure meant to define placement on this strange stage than a furnishing of true utility. His weathered featured seemed utterly ancient beneath a silver half-veil. His name was Nepenthe, he was one of the church's three remaining Archivists. Their voice echoed not from their mouth, but rasped from somewhere distant. His eyes had this look as if he had seen the beginning, or perhaps considering where they were, the ending of the universe.

Mathis had met with Nepenthe before.

Reducio

"You have come to bind future to future." His voice on that day sounded just as ancient, the intonation neither male nor female.

"Yes."

"You have come before those who cannot see your faces, but can taste your fate. Do you offer your name, the one that they may echo?"

“I do.”

"The fates pull at you, but you pull back. The threads are tangled. Snarled. Some of the threads have been twisted, broken."

"I have come to bind my fate to a chosen outcome."

The old man's eyes frosted over with this statement and he nodded thoughtfully. "Indeed, what is and what might be... You seek the name that replaces your mother's sin." He let out a strange cackle. "Does she even know?"

No, of course not... but some words did not need to be said.

Winnie's procession gave him the time to appreciate her. He had at some point forgot where his ambition ended and his heart began. He smiled. Was it for the cameras and the guests or was it for her? Even he was not certain.

"Hi", he reached for her hand. The flash of a camera. Perfect. "You are doing great," he assured her.

He felt the eyes of his family on him. Those polished shadows in the pews, their blood colder than the stone beneath his feet. He would climb through all of them. This wedding, this moment, was not a surrender. It was a throne in disguise.

The priest would start the binding.

"We have all gathered here today beneath sky and spell, bound by ancient rite and common yearning to witness a joining older than any one name, older than even love. Today two souls stand at the threshold: Mathias Pride and Winnie Harper, are at the precipice of making an irrevocable bond. They are here to not merely declare affection but to offer themselves willingly to the solemn alchemy of union. And though we call this a celebration, we dress it in music and perfume and flowers, let none of us truly forget what this truly is. This is the witnessing of a promise. A vow. And a vow is not a gentle thing. It is a contract, a binding, a sacrifice.

In other times, other places, centuries before now; those that stood where you stand on this celebrated day were not adorned in silk and standing upon crushed petals. Rather they were marked in ash and bone. The joining was not of affection but rather an omen made tangible. It was about power. A prophecy fulfilled, fate written.

And so dear guests, when you throw your grains of rice, crush those petals underfoot, smell that sweet scent of dying roses and raise your glasses, know this: something is being given up today. The selves that they once were will be left behind. With this union they become one and will be seen. Their ancestors known and unknown are listening. The stones beneath our feet are old and they remember every name spoken here, even in tongues we have long forgotten. The basalt remembers every vow whispered or broken. And in that rememberance there is judgement and that is our legacy.

As well as our blessing, Our fate.

For those that offer themselves fully. That bleed willingly into the chalice of devotion and honor, they may find something rare. Not safety or even fidelity, but the truth. And so we draw this circle on stone-built earth around these two souls and we prepare the threads of fate that shall forever bind them.

I must ask us all: are we bearing witness to only love, the illusion of it? Or are we holding true to fate. Perhaps both. But now, we must let silence fall like a veil over us, mere observers to the fate and let the vow begin."

Mathias would reply with a confidence that belied his future status in the wizarding world. “I, Mathias Pride, bind my future to hers. I offer not peace, nor safety, but truth, and fury, and loyalty carved in bone.”

He looked at her then. Not with warmth, but with something far older.

“You are the only thing I do not wish to ruin.”

Soft whispers rippled through the crowd as vows were exchanged, but Thaddeus remained unmoved. The head of the Athanatos family knew what sort of man his son Mathias was. The sort of man his son could and would become. A monster worthy of his family's name. Thaddeus also knew that others saw it too, society feared the very potential the Seer wished to cultivate.

For now, every bow, every blush-petal, every loving sigh that drifted through the cathedral air merely reinforced the narrative Thaddeus had engineered: that the noble House Athanatos, seers of old blood and deeper intent, had evolved. That they had opened their ranks. That even the most unassuming half-blood girl, in this case Winnie Harper, could rise to their ranks if chosen, if useful enough. It was a clear message to wizarding society and it only cost him a son he had not even valued to name until today. He would be rewarded with the praise and trust of the magical denizens of the wizarding world and Mathias would gain the honor that would make him worthy of rank. And when the muggle girl betrayed them, failed to meet their standard in spite of their mercy and consideration, the Athantos family would be pitied, lauded for their tolerance and never questioned again when they made decisions for 'wizard's sake.'

So yes, let them believe this charade. In a matter of months, the bride would crumble under the rigors of her role, the weight of their name and Thaddeus' son would remain at his side, a bit scuffed but no worse for the wear.

With the quiet snap of a finger, the whispers would silence.

RP Element: After the vows were exchanged, a silencing spell is cast on the Sanctum that effects everyone but the bride, groom and priest. Remember, this is a scripted encounter until the reception, but there are RP hooks and hints as well as a brief opportunity for interaction.

Vladimir slipped in through the double doors when the wedding march faded. The cathedral was standing room only, he considered waiting in the back where he might linger among the guests. The heavy cloak clung to his shoulders, sweat soaking into the heavy yet fine fabric. The cowl was drawn low over his face as he side stepped with all of the grace of a man who stood nearly a foot taller than most of the other guests. His stride steady, purposeful. His heart hammered a bruising rhythm beneath his ribs, not from exertion, but from dread as he ambled past the statues of the faceless gods.

He knew that he should not be here.

Vladimir was a fugitive now. A name whispered in the corridors of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement as a suspect in the death of a Ministry associate. There would not be a trial. He knew how that sort of thing worked. Just an accusation, a flood of owl posts bearing warrants, and the sudden closing of every door he once thought open. “Murder,” they would say. “Conspiracy.” “Athanatos.” That name alone was proof enough for some and for those who had faith in the man rather than the name knew him as somewhat broken. "Challenged" the polite ones would say out loud forgetting he could hear what they

RP Hook This is not IC known yet but will be known very soon. This happened earlier today.

But none of it mattered. Not today. Today was his brother’s wedding. Mathias Pride, his younger half-brother. They were never close, but they were family.

At the far end, near a trellis of deep green vines and blush-colored blossoms, stood Aamon. Vladimir’s breath hitched. His brother looked every inch the man their father had once hoped Vladimir would become. Composed. Proud. Clothed in the traditional ceremonial robes of the heir. Aamon had not been named heir apparent yet, but Vladimir understood how his father worked. Aamondeep black lined with spell-woven silver, a single onyx clasp at the throat shaped like an eye. Aamon’s hair had been combed back. The light caught his features just right, making him seem impossibly distant. Elevated.

He looked like a king. Vladimir should have been happy for him, but he felt something else. A pang of fear, guilt even. A sentiment that did not make sense, so he tried to shake it off as he made his way to the first pew where he would try to stand alongside his father, Thaddeus. His presence quiet and unannounced. A ghost in black amidst a garden of pink petals.

He sat with his hands clasped tight between his knees, willing himself not to be noticed, not to breathe too loudly, not to tremble. The stone beneath his feet was cool, but his back prickled with sweat. A single wrong move could summon wands. But that was not what made him feel uncomfortable, it was the scent that the roses failed to mask. Blood.

RP Hook: Dhampirs and Werewolves will smell old and new human blood.

Vladimir looked at the bride standing at the altar. Her dress like spun moonlight, face radiant as she met his brother’s eyes. The guests sighed. Vows began. But the voices in his head had many things to say. Some saw this as a love story. Others thought the girl was a gold-digger, being a half-blood of no appreciable status, it was not a surprising conclusion for some. Others, seemed to scream in chorus that the girl should run, flee from the wretched family before it was too late. Vladimir shifted uncomfortably in his seat, the legilimens could not pick and choose who to listen to. There were so many voices, so many opinions. It was overwhelming and one of the many reasons he did not care for crowds.

He could not hear what his father had thought. That secret was still his. He tried to shake away the noise but couldn't.

When they asked if anyone had something to say against this union, considering the dark thoughts being screamed into his head. No voice rose above the uncomfortable hush. Perhaps some rose to their feet, intending to utter some warning, but nothing was said and suited wizards would quickly escort the flailing stranger out of the cathedral.

For a moment, the world narrowed to just that image. Light. Love. Family. He had not come to stop the wedding. He had come to honor it. Even if he had no place in this new world they had built. Even if his presence was a silent risk to everything the ceremony stood for. And despite the weight of law and magic, of betrayal and suspicion, here he was. Because blood remembered.

Interacting with: @Dylan Astor, @Mikey Forville Mentioning: N/A Date: 08/10/25

Word Count: 232

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A wedding. The union between two people where they pledged their faithfulness and willingness to be together through everything. Avery couldn’t remember the last wedding she attended. She was probably too young to remember it anyway. As she walked in, her dress flowing, the scent of strawberries filled the air. But that didn’t relax Avery. Something felt off. She couldn’t place it, but she knew that something wasn’t right. She would just have to tread carefully. One wrong step and her entire life could go up in flames. Her father had warned her to be careful. He had left her and Dylan there to await their fates because even weddings weren’t always safe. She had read plenty of stories where things went wrong. She took a deep breath. She had to get her act together and focus. She was supposed to be a pureblood representing her family when her father couldn’t. It was terrifying. She just hoped that Mikey would come soon. She needed to see him. To hear his voice. Maybe he could help settle the nervous energy flowing through her veins. Avery stood at attention as she watched the bride go down the aisle. The last time she had seen her was when she was lying on the ground. Bones broken and barely breathing. She sucked in a breath at the memory. She would never be able to unsee it.

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Then there was Matthew Campbell. Third year, Slytherin, almost-murderer.

Aamon’s eyes landed on the upper classman across the rose-petalled aisle with all the enthusiasm of someone spotting a rat at a garden party. How did he even get an invitation? Matt's suit looked... adequate. Clearly there was an attempt to press it, but his house elves were far from capable. Did they try to iron cheap polyester with a curling iron? The suit was clearly borrowed. Possibly from a cousin or a charity bin, depending on the lighting and perhaps the scent that he could not experience from his vantage point. "Muggle tailoring, how quaint," the absolutely not-bitter Athanatos mused. Boxy shoulders, lapels that tried to scream I belong here but whispered off-the-rack at a likely steep discount.

So with this revelation of invasion, Aamon's smile faltered almost imperceptibly. Matthew had tried to kill him at least once. He only wanted to die with the poison ivy. Bt the problem was, Aamon had no proof, not really. But the boy felt it in his blood. Aamon knew that Matthew was behind the corridor collapse that had nearly killed him. Even he did not think the reckless teen was that cruel until the crushing stone shattered his legs. Aamon hadn't said anything to anyone besides Finnegan Conner yet. People expected more than accusations, even certainty which Aamon had in spades. Without proof, it was merely maddened obsession undermining the truth he already knew. But the idea that Campbell might still be circling, waiting to finish what he started, made the inside of his mouth taste like iron.

Aamon's fingers tightened behind his back as he maintained the stoic posture of a groomsman. He would not have to worry about what Matt might do if he got to Campbell first. No-no. He wasn’t supposed to think about such things at weddings. And yet here he was. Pretending to care. Watching a brother he never loved marry a woman he’d never truly known while his mind lingered on what sort of reckless accidents a mudblood could stumble upon. A basement to forget him in. A cliff to slip from. A dangerous potion that fell carelessly into soup. No, he could not think like that. He bit the inside of his lip.

And feeling something strange and terrible bloom in his chest. Not hate. Nor envy. But the slow, creeping knowledge that this polished, perfect world was never meant for him. And maybe never would be.

Then Aamon would recognize Nabi Park.

The Athanatos clocked her immediately. Composed. Elegant. Precisely pressed from spine to hem, as if she'd been summoned into existence by a very bitter tailor. But what caught his attention wasn’t the way the light hit the sparkle of her gown, or the telltale way her fingers rested on her lap like they were guarding state secrets. It was the fact that she wasn’t sitting with him. Matthew Bloody Campbell. Aamon blinked. Once. Then twice, slower. And if he weren’t surrounded by rose petals and love spells and violently expensive hair pins, the Slytherin might’ve laughed aloud.

Trouble in magic paradise? Aamon mused, lips quirking faintly. Did the star-crossed Slytherin-Muggle romance combust under the weight of Campbell’s overwhelming mediocrity? Did she finally get tired of translating every conversation from Pureblood to Muggle for him? The Slytherin felt incredibly self-satisfied with the thought.

Aamon could already picture it: some noble argument in a dim corridor. Nabi, back straight like a blade, saying something cold and devastating. Like his face looked like day old toffee pudding, except anemic. Campbell blinking twice, trying to remember if “emotional maturity” was a spell he’d forgotten to study.

He let the thought linger, warm and petty. Not that he cared. Not at all. They could do what he wants. he was definitely not thinking about either of them!

Jürgen Hess stood beside his cousins, Aamon and Gideon Athanatos. The Gryffindor's robes, though formal, bore the subtle austerity of someone whose bloodline had never been favored, pure enough to be counted surely, but never chosen. It was the main house that mattered. The other families, like his, were like tributaries to the mighty Athanatos river. Genetic resources to maintain bloodline purity and strength to their Seer bloodline. Streams such as his were meant to feed and drain away whatever was no longer wanted. He understood this better than most.

The Church of Sanctum Noctis groaned around them like a monstrous, dreaming thing. The sighing, restless, perhaps even hungry structure was muted by the disembodied tinkle of music. The structure's basalt bones drank in candlelight and secrets both. The veil of rose petals, the trelessed arch over ancient runes, and great floral arrangements did little to hide the truths of the dark binding ceremony. Jürgen had felt it since they entered, that familiar soft pressure beneath his heels, as if the stones remembered every vow ever made.

And now, the priest began to speak. Jürgen knew of him. Master of Records, a sighted Seer. Jürgen knew of him through stories passed down in hushed whispers among the serving staff. He was dangerous they warned. Those that are called to Nepenthe are always forgotten. He was powerful, terrifying, ancient in ways they could not explain even in gossip. Jürgen had never met him, he was not important enough. He could feel his vitality drain from him from proximity alone.

“We have gathered here today beneath sky and spell…”

Jürgen’s gaze drifted upward, not toward the heavens, but toward the yawning arches of stone above. To the faceless gods in the rafters, leering down at them. The sermon was beautiful in the way a knife is beautiful: shaped, deliberate, dangerous, and only meant to cut.

“Let none of us truly forget what this is. This is a witnessing of a promise. A vow. And a vow is not a gentle thing. It is a contract. A binding. A sacrifice.”

That was truth. Not the dressed-up kind his family fed the public, but the real, aching truth. Most wouldn’t hear it beneath the flowers and applause, but Jürgen did. He wondered if Winnie Harper did. Or if she simply heard romance dressed in grand language. If she saw this as the culmination of her love story rather than a tragic ending. What sort of deal with a demon like Nepenthe...?

He was thinking too much. The girl was a shrill... A pang of sympathy. The bride looked too soft for all this. Too human. She wasn’t dressed for sacrifice. But he knew that’s what this was.

“In other times, other places… the joining was not of affection but an omen made tangible.”

Hess' jaw clenched. That line, the omen, stuck with him. The Sanctum Noctis was cradle of prophetic sin, worshiping old gods that no longer bled. The maids used to tell him stories of the time when magic was young, tales meant to scare him into his bed. Tales that he always knew had a thread of truth, but he was uncertain where the cautionary tales ended and history began. He knew that his family worshiped the old gods, faceless deities that spoke in dreams, saw fates with no light of their own. Zealots he always thought. He prayed to the same ancient gods, but plenty subscribed to faiths they failed to truly practice and hardly understood. It was tradition. It was 'right' even if neither could be truly quantified in a way that was worthy of value.

“The stones beneath our feet are old and they remember every name spoken here… and in that remembrance, there is judgment.”

That line landed hard.

Jürgen looked at Mathias, proud and straight-backed, making his vow with the calm of a man reciting his lineage. He looked at Winnie, likely trembling slightly as she repeated her own, mistaking the warmth in the room and the familiarity of those she loved nearby for safety.

"You’re not marrying into legacy," he thought. You’re being woven into it.

The Athanatos family, if this went beyond Mathias, had not chosen her for her blood. Harper was not descended from seers or hags or augurs. She had no Sight. No gift. No curse. This was a place where blind prophetesses had once fed on memory and bled prophecy from their tongues. Winnie had no memory, not truly. Then it hit the young Seer and his could not help but half-smile with the revelation. "You dirty rat assed bastard..."

That was precisely why he chose her.

She was empty enough to be safe. Her womb would not birth chaos. Too old for the change, now 16. Not a Seer, her dreams would not reveal too much. She was meant to carry the name, not contaminate it. She lacked the gift of sight, the legacy of magic, but that was not something he needed today. Jürgen said nothing. He did not move. But his thoughts churned as the priest spoke of sacrifice and thread and fate.

“Are we bearing witness to love, or the illusion of it?”

Beneath their feet, the basalt stone watched in silence. The sanctum remembered and so did Jürgen.

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Interacting: @

Outfit: ✿

Mentioning: @

English | Irish | Internal thoughts

There was something about the priest that made Winnie's skin crawl and rise with goosebumps... The Ravenclaw could have sworn she had seen a smile like that before. She had to focus on Mathias' face to not think about it. Steady. Sharp.

The ceremony was... Different than how she imagined. He spoke of sacrifice, of ash and bone. It sounded more like they were ready to be sacrificed to some unseen deity rather than be joined in marriage. She had imagined they would be joined together with honeyed words, with soft music playing in the background, perhaps some moments of laughter.

This is... Creepy. She knew she should have asked to attend a meeting with the priest before they had agreed on the location, not that she had much choice in the matter. She had tried her best to slap pink wherever she could to lighten the place up. It's probably just pureblood culture... She had never been to a wizard wedding before, or any wedding for that matter. She had only seen weddings on movies or television shows.

'A vow. And a vow is not a gentle thing. It is a contract, a binding, a sacrifice.' The butterflies in her stomach started to flutter again, her hands squeezing the Slytherin's even tighter. Breathe... Mattie wouldn't bring you here if it wasn't safe. If only she had known better.

'The basalt remembers every vow whispered or broken. And in that remembrance there is judgement and that is our legacy.' Her breath hitched, her shoulders tensing at the pause. Judgement? Broken vows? 'As well as our blessing, Our fate.' She released a shaky breath.

By the time the priest stopped talking, she felt less like a bride and more like a lamb draped in flowers and lace.

She did not have time to react before Mathias spoke. 'I, Mathias Pride, bind my future to hers. I offer not peace, nor safety, but truth, and fury, and loyalty carved in bone.'

Wait, did he write his vows? The priest didn't say repeat after me. Panic rose in her chest as she tried to decide if she should use the same vows or make her own. Everyone was looking at her, waiting for her to say something back.

Then, he looked at her, 'You are the only thing I do not wish to ruin.'

Her breath caught, a pleasant shiver ran down her spine. Those were not the words she expected to hear on her wedding day, but they both terrified and enthralled her.

“I, Winnie Harper,” she began, her hand trembling in his from nerves and the weight of the vows she was about to take. She could feel the rhythm of her heart pounding against her ears.

"B-Bind my future to his." The words stumbled out, forcing her to swallow hard before she continued, "I give everything I was, everything I am—" her voice cracked as her eyes begin to well with tears, "and everything I will become."

Then, a pause with such silence that she wouldn't be surprised if the first row could hear her heart pounding, "You are my mine, and I am yours, in this life and the next."

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