The Deepest Blue(5)

Her wedding dress.

It was ready.

And it was perfect.

He’d taken her grandmother’s simple wrap dress and, without destroying its simplicity, sewn a mosaic of mother-of-pearl into the fabric so that the entire garment shimmered as if it had been dipped in the light of a moon rainbow. Mayara felt tears prick her eyes.

She’d never cried over a dress before. Or even cared about what she wore, so long as she could swim and climb in it. But this . . . He must have spent hours and hours on it, sewing on each tiny shard.

“Do you like it?” he asked.

She gave him a look.

He laughed. “You love it.”

“And you.” Throwing her arms around his neck, she kissed him. He kissed her back, and she began to slide out of her diving gear. As she loosened the straps of her top, she heard a whistle then a shout from the path.

“Mayara! Kelo!” It was her aunt Beila, her mother’s sister. Mayara’s mother had four sisters and two brothers, and Beila was both the eldest and the loudest. She wouldn’t object to Mayara and Kelo “playing” while they were supposed to be preparing for the wedding, but she would make plenty of embarrassing recommendations. Really rather avoid that, Mayara thought.

Quickly, Mayara retied her straps. “Later,” she promised Kelo.

He hurried to the door. “It’s your aunts.”

“I know. I heard . . . Wait, did you say ‘aunts,’ as in . . . ?”

He nodded soberly. “All of them.”

“Can I hide?” She eyed the worktables. If she tucked herself into a far corner . . .

Kelo’s lips twitched. He was laughing at her. “You wouldn’t leave me alone with them, would you? That would be cruel.”

“Maybe I’m a cruel and terrible person, and you just never noticed.” She backed up to one of the tables, then had a better idea. I could leap out a window. Back into the sea. Take my chances with the spirits. . . .

Unfortunately, Kelo had the idea first. He catapulted himself out the window, calling, “You’re a beautiful and brave person!” over his shoulder. And then she heard: “Freedom!”

“You—”

Cutting herself off, she plastered a smile on her face as her four aunts barreled through the door into Kelo’s studio. Shrieking like gulls, they swarmed her, wishing her a happy wedding day, fussing over her bruises and injuries, gushing over all the preparations for the celebration, chiding her for not being dressed yet, exclaiming over the beauty of said dress . . . until Mayara’s head began to ache.

“Don’t look so pained, my dear,” Eyara, one of her aunts, said, patting her shoulder. She was Mother’s youngest sister, and she was clearly enjoying Mayara’s discomfort. Last year she’d had to suffer through the village’s excitement over her own much-anticipated wedding. “You know you love us.”

“Of course I do,” Mayara said. Just maybe not all at once.

But Mayara didn’t have much choice. Before she could object, her aunts stripped off her swim clothes, bathed her with the traditional perfumed sponge, and dressed her in the mother-of-pearl dress. Two of them were brushing her hair at once, often bumping into each other and accidentally—or not—yanking her hair, while the others cleared space on one of Kelo’s worktables and laid out a tea set.

The traditional wedding-day tea was supposed to be between mother and child, but Mother hadn’t come with her sisters. Mayara felt her heart lurch. Mother had barely left their house since Elorna’s death, only coming out when Papa coaxed her with the promise of a perfect sunset. Mother can’t resist a perfect sunset.

But she could resist her own daughter.

For the second time that day, tears almost came as Mayara realized she’d be sharing the tea with her aunts instead of with her mother. She’d hoped that today would be different. . . .

It is different. It’s special. And Mother will join me . . . when she can.

Until then, Mayara wasn’t going to let anything mar the new, wonderful memories she was making today. She was going to treasure every second of specialness.

She walked across the studio in the mother-of-pearl dress. It clinked as she moved so that she sounded as if she herself were one of Kelo’s wind chimes. Sitting, she poured the tea for herself and her aunts and then sweetened it with spoonfuls of rare sugar.

Aunt Beila said kindly, “You know your mother wanted . . .”

“It’s all right,” Mayara said, willing herself to believe it. “As Aunt Eyara said, I love you all, and I am honored to share this moment with you.”

Her aunts all sighed happily at that.

Each of them raised a teacup. Aunt Beila began: “May the warmth of this tea keep you safe from the bitter wind.”

Aunt Leera: “May the sweetness of this tea keep you full of joy.”

Aunt Gelna: “May the bitterness comfort you in times of pain and sorrow.”

Aunt Eyara: “May the . . . Oh drat, I’ve forgotten.” She improvised. “May your tea taste good, your life be long, and your marriage even longer.” She then chugged a great gulp of the sugared tea.

Laughing, Mayara drank too, as did the rest of her aunts.

And then they all bustled her out the door to her wedding.

ONE SIDE EFFECT OF HAVING A LOT OF AUNTS AND UNCLES: MAYARA also had a lot of cousins. Eighteen of them, and that wasn’t counting her cousins’ children. And absolutely all of them seemed to be determined to make Mayara and Kelo’s wedding into the most celebrated event on the island, or even all of Belene.