The Dinner at Solenne

The celestial church had emptied slowly, the way a room empties when no one wants to be the first to leave a happy moment. The choirs had folded their song into a low, humming silence. The windows still poured their color across the floor, and the petals that had been thrown in the aisle still lay where they had fallen, soft and unswept.

Amin stood at the doors of the church in his white three-piece suit, and around him stood seven brides in seven gowns, each a different shape of white or silver or ivory or gold. None of them seemed to know where to look. They looked at him, and then at each other, and then at the rings on their hands, and then at him again.

Nur Azizah Parker held her left hand up in front of her face and turned it slowly, so that the ring caught the light of the New Heaven. She had said her new name aloud four times since the ceremony, quietly, to no one in particular, and each time she said it, her smile grew.

“Nur Azizah Parker,” she whispered again. “It sounds even better in the open air.”

“You’ve said it four times,” Cassolina said. She said it flatly, but she was standing very close to Azizah’s shoulder, and she had not stopped looking at her own ring either.

“Five, now,” Azizah said, smiling. “You are counting, so you must like it too.”

“I am not counting,” said Cassolina Parker, in the voice of someone who was absolutely counting.

Amin laughed, and the laugh rang against the pale stone of the church steps. He held out both his arms, and the women stepped in around him without needing to be asked.

“Ladies,” he said, “my wives,” and he paused, because the word was new in his mouth, and he wanted to taste it. “My wives. I have a surprise for all of you. A honeymoon.”

Chihiro gasped and covered her mouth. Ronada’s eyes went wide. Sachiko folded her arms and raised one eyebrow, the way she did when she was pleased and refused to show it. Liora clasped her hands under her chin, and Imani, who had spent the entire ceremony scanning the doorways out of habit, finally relaxed her shoulders and let out a breath.

“A honeymoon,” Imani said softly. “Where?”

“First, dinner,” Amin said. “At a place I’ve heard about since my first week at my new post. Then, a room, for all of us. One room, one bedroom, one big bed. I asked them to arrange it that way, and they said it was no trouble at all.”

“One room?” Cassolina repeated, and there was a very small, very private smile at the corner of her mouth. “Good.”

A carriage was waiting for them at the bottom of the church steps, a long, graceful one drawn by two white horses whose manes seemed to shimmer with their own light. A driver in a pale blue coat bowed as they approached. He had a warm, weathered face, and he seemed to be trying very hard not to grin.

“Congratulations, Sir Parker,” he said. “And to the seven Ladies Parker.”

Seven pairs of eyes turned toward him at once.

“Ladies Parker,” Liora breathed. “He said it so easily.”

“I could get used to that,” said Ronada.

“You will,” Amin told her. “You’ll hear it every day for the rest of forever.”

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