One wedding took place in early summer, one in late summer, and our own in autumn

Taran and Cody's wedding came in late June. Dad, Sally, Charity's two families, and the Jangoral-Narais were the people I knew there. Laconia being the odd community it is, Cody turned out to be Rarin's piano teacher, they only one they'd managed to find who was willing teach her how to play using four hands simultaneously. Edofine and Dianne wanted to come but they were tending their spouses and refused to get someone to take their place even temporarily.

I didn't get to meet Cody until just before the ceremony. He was putting in his cufflinks in front of a hall mirror - we were in a local hotel. "Are you…the other one getting married?" I asked, not knowing what term to use.

He was at least six foot five in my estimation, golden-brown hair and blue eyes, appearance and build like an artist's rendering of the Archangel Gabriel. "Yeah. You're one of the vampires?" He had a soft, pleasant voice.

"Yes."

"I thought so - you're very pale. Also, you don't show up here." He tapped the mirror and finished.

"You're very…tall. Does Taran come up to your shoulder?"

Taran came out of a room, grinning. "We've found it to be a good height ratio."

Cody suppressed a smile and nodded. "Mmhm."

"For what?" I asked, uncomfortable.

"Cody, is my eyeliner good?" Taran asked, in a red shirt and black tie, more relaxed than Cody's tuxedo.

"You're going to look very girly with that on," Cody said, putting an arm around him.

"I just want to emphasize them."

"I could punch you in the face. That would do it." He made a fake draw back for a blow, then took Taran's hand instead.

"You're so abusive," Taran said. It didn't sound like a complaint.

"You didn't answer my question," I murmured, deciding to leave them to their moment and not sure that I wanted to know the answer anyway.

Charity and Wylfber officially signed all the papers handing over their children the day before, and the twins were flower girls. I hadn't seen them before, much less baby Felicity who rested in Taran's arms with complete trust and comfort whenever her birth parents put her there. The twins were seven years old, but being Elves they looked just over three. They acted much more polite and mature than human three-year olds, though.

They had identical, delicately pretty features and matching purple dresses. Hope walked with the basket in one hand and held onto Faith with the other, who wore sunglasses and used her spare hand for a tiny cane -

"Wait a minute," I whispered to Sandi, sitting next to me. Sandi is Dad's biological granddaughter and Charity's adoptive mother. "Faith is blind?"

"Didn't someone tell you? It's the only way we can tell them apart. Hope has appointed herself as her eyes."

I found out later that besides being near extended family, Charity had wanted her daughters to grow up in Laconia for the disabled services in the school system, along with Helena being able to train Faith an unusually good guide dog. She trained different kinds of dogs as her after-school job. I also learned Faith wore sunglasses because she had no iris or pupil, just whites, and most people found it unnerving.

Charity and two women I had never met, one dark-skinned and quiet and the other one light-skinned and obviously-after-a-few-minutes autistic served as…something…partner-maids? Groomsmaids? Best women? Wylfber and two male strangers were up there too in some official capacity.

The two now-newlyweds both wore rose boutonnieres, and at the conclusion of the ceremony they unpinned them and very pointedly chucked them at Val, who wasn't even standing with the crowd trying to catch them. It must have been Taran's idea. "She's already engaged!" Jai shouted after he stopped laughing. Val, blushing happily, put the flowers in her hair.

I found out at the dinner afterwards that Hope and Faith - Felicity didn't talk yet - called Taran "Daddy", Cody "Papa", and Wylfber "Aban" (Elvish for "Father"). Charity was "Mommy" when they spoke English and "Mani" in Elvish.

Val made a beeline for Hope, who was staring at the chocolate fountain and describing it, and Faith, who was feeling the carpet, curtains, and occasionally a person's foot by accident.

"There is a lady coming up to us," Hope said. "She is a Eudemon but the gentle variety."

"How close is she?" Faith asked. They spoke Elf-style English under their parent's influence. Over the coming months this form would weaken and grow more humanized, though with a bigger vocabulary than "normal".

Val touched her on the shoulder. "This close." She sat beside her, not caring how this impeded traffic.

"You have fine hair." Faith stroked it. "What does it look like?"

"It is the color of low notes on a cello," Hope said.

"That's an interesting way to describe it," Val said.

"It helps me see." Faith inhaled deeply. "There is watermelon nearby."

"Want me to get you some?" I asked, having been on the way over to them during the conversation.

"Daddy says not to let vampires pick your food," Hope told me.

Later on, I found Cody and Wylfber drinking lemonade at a table together. "I would be very grateful if you kept my children safe," Wylfber said solemnly.

"Of course. If anyone hurts the girls, I'll kill him or her."

"Good. Then if I am coming to visit anytime soon, we can resurrect them and I shall kill them again, only more slowly."

"So this is what an Elf is like when you remove the Thought-Music?" I asked, taking a seat. Wylfber was what Elves call "emotion-blind", missing the feeling-ESP as integral to Elves as sense of hearing is to us. Charity complemented him well - her Thought-Music was too strong, so strong that she had to wear a cold iron headband at all times to inhibit it and keep her stable.

"Do not take me for a representation of anything," Wylber said. He was a little under average Elf height but with a wrestler's build, like someone fully capable of overcoming any number of muggers. He spoke in a tone that made it very difficult to tell when he was joking. "In any case, I was thinking you could make the girls wear helmets."

"When riding bicycles?"

"On the street, at school, at home, while sleeping. Crash helmets, you know. I have sustained more head injuries than a person who has sustained that many head injuries can count. Thanks to such mishaps I believe I will never make it to my full potential -"

"Of course you will," Charity said, swooping up from behind and kissing him. Taran came too, dragging an infant chair with Felicity in it.

"PICTURE TIME!" shouted Puffin, Sandi's half-Elf half-Eudemon husband. He popped up from an angle and the camera flashed before we had time to react. His real name was "Pafin", but people pronounced it wrong for so long that he gave up. "That is a very masculine 'EEK' you have there, Rivki," Puffin said while I was still recovering from the blinding light.

"Haha," I said, eyes watering. "Remember that in a hundred years I'll be the only one tending your grave."

"That is a frightening thought," Charity said, "though it does not apply to me."

Everything seemed very pleasant until we heard Opal Narai throw something.

Naturally everyone stared. It was an empty water glass. "Calm down, darling, please," Jai said, holding her. Jack looked shell-shocked and started picking up shards. Rarin, though, Rarin looked like she was either going to cry or start beating someone up.

"I…I feel like I just lost a grandchild," she wailed.

"Keep it up and you'll lose a daughter," Jai said, with a hint of anger, which was unheard of in their relationship.

"It was you, wasn't it?" Opal pointing her index finger at Cody. "You had influence over her!"

Cody looked frightened, enough for me to believe he knew Opal had power over all reptiles and had sent snakes and monitor lizards after people. "What? What did I do?"

"He wasn't involved," Rarin said, very slowly and quietly. "No one was. The only person who knew was Pisces. And her, obviously."

"She speaks the truth," Charity said. "Please, Opal, calm yourself."

"This wasn't the best way to say it," Jai said. "For me it is merely news, but for your mother it can be difficult."

"I just thought, since she enjoyed the wedding so much…"

"They're not my children," Opal said. "I'm sorry about the glass. I'll pay for it."

"You're brother-in-law became your sister-in-law three years ago, and you never batted an eye," Jai said.

By this point the word no one was saying had dawned on most of the people present. And given the crowd and the purpose for which we were gathered, Opal was rapidly becoming the evil lady, which saddened me, as I had always loved her.

"My sister told me when I first met you that the children would be gender-confused," Opal moaned.

"Hey!" Jack stood bolt upright. "I'm straighter than straight Mom. I only use my powers to take on the appearance of a girl so I can sneak into the girls' locker room -" He noticed everyone gaping at him and hastily added, "Which I now no longer do, 'cause that's no way to make friends."

"How about you go lie down for a bit?" Jai asked.

"I will, thank you."

Rarin crumpled to her knees and cried. People jostled to comfort her.

………………………………………………………………………………….

Between weddings Val and I were fixing up the house she now owned but couldn't stand to live in. I took a career-consideration leave of absence from the tour guide job, basically quitting but with the understanding that I might come back and they were willing to rehire me under identical terms. Val would need lots of help realizing her dream of a shelter for battered individuals - the OMHI had agreed to help back it and organize things - and I could always put my knowledge of Laconia history into books. It would probably be more pleasant than telling the same stories over and over to teenage girls who expected me to be like Edward Cullen (shudder). It also would help more people in a more important way.

I came up with half the down payment for the home between the ones belonging to Derrick Jangoral's daughters. Val contributed a quarter using the money she had inherited in full from her father's estate. Dad paid a quarter and helped us find a good mortgage.

Val told me we would be having visitors, so I was only somewhat surprised when Rarin, Opal, Percy, and a woman I took to be Percy's mother showed up while Val and I were splattered with paint. Percy's mother looked very young, but as far as I knew real, modern witches could look as young as they wanted. I really needed to research them a bit. I knew shamans and wise-women considered themselves totally different from Wicca, much the way opthamologists hotly argue that they are nothing like optometrists, when to most people they were "eye doctors".

She wore black, with bracelets and earrings and many rings, all of silver and studded with emeralds. "Is this a bad time?" she asked.

"Who's she?" Opal looked uncomfortable, though not nearly as much as Rarin, and Percy beat them all.

"I wanted to choose a place that would be neutral for you and we would not be disturbed," Val said. "Please sit. This is Percy Hollowbrook and his mother Esmeralda. Percy helped save Rivki when my brother's friend attacked him."

"You never told me that," Esmeralda said to her son.

He squirmed. "Didn't see a need."

They sat on the floor, since we had sold the painful-associations furniture and would buy new when IKEA had its annual sale. "All right. Now, Percy hasn't told you the circumstances of him saving Rivki and possibly me for reasons that will soon become clear. Percy, do you think you can tell her?"

Percy took a deep breath. "Mother, I was on a date. With a guy. I - I, well, to tell the truth, I have no attraction towards women whatsoever."

Esmeralda bit her lip. "I see. This is not a happy thing." She spoke with icy calm.

"It's just scandalous what children are like these days," Opal sighed. Rarin looked miserable but remained silent.

"No, no, in other circumstances it would be fine, but he is the last of our family line. We are clan leaders. The magic mustn't die out."

Val smiled. "I think I have a solution. I talked to both Rarin and Percy earlier. Opal, your greatest objection, or at least it seemed so to us, was that you feel like you lost a grandchild who will never be born. Rarin has agreed that when she is twenty-two years old, she will be artificially inseminated with Percy's sperm."

"I'm going to have two children, if that's okay," Rarin said. "One Percy can raise and one for me."

"And she's a Narai," Percy said. "Descendant of Southeast Asian myth."

Opal switched to her true form. "All Narais can also summon Lord Hanuman to assist us thrice in our lives."

Esmeralda's eyes shone. "That would be immensely powerful," she said with wonder.

"This doesn't solve everything," Opal said.

"Does it help, though?" Val asked.

"Can I leave the house now?" Rarin asked.

"Your father's been letting you out anyway, so I guess it's no good what I want in this family."

"I don't like going around your back."

"That's a bit funny, coming from you."

"She's helping me a great deal," Percy said, trying to appease.

Shaking both Rarin's right hands, Esmeralda said, "Goddess bless you, young lady." They left.

"If you have a boy," Opal said quietly, "Can you name him Jasper?"

"If you like," Rarin said. "Why?"

"Name of a childhood friend."

"And by that you mean snake."

"Snakes can be friends."

"I think they're going to be okay eventually," Val said to me as they drove off. "It may be a while, but they should be okay."

"It was a good idea," I said, rubbing her back and accidentally getting some paint on them.

"Actually it was Taran's, but he thought it would be more convincing if I said it, so the mother's couldn't pull a you're-just-defending-them-because-you're-one-too."

…………………………………………………………………………………

We requisitioned the surveillance room at a nearby Marriott (Dad said if it couldn't be in an LDS temple than a Marriott was the next best thing) as the vampire dressing room, male and female taking it in turns. We needed the cameras to see ourselves. I helped Dad brush cat hairs off his tuxedo.

"This is what you get borrowing an outfit from a man who lives in the same house as Felix Jangoral," Dad said. He seemed mildly tense but happy, blue contact shade-lenses letting him screen out light and pretend he was human again. His hair looked good for once. "We get to be best man at each other's weddings. Isn't that wonderful?"

"Dad, there's something I want to tell you."

"Don't tell me you are also homosexual - we're going to overload."

"We live in Laconia, Dad, number three in the nation for such things. Anyway, it's not that. Is - is it okay if I don't go to church for a while?"

Dad looked into my eyes for a few seconds as if measuring what he found there. "You want to spend more time with Val?"

"That's a big part of it. It doesn't mean I don't want to go to any church, or that I'm forsaking God, or that I hate what you stand for, or that I'm turning my back on where I came from, or that I'm going to suddenly become a drug addict even though that one trip was enough for several lifetimes -"

"Son, son, calm down." He put his hands on his shoulders. "I found something good some years back. It helped me. I shared it with you because it was, in my estimation, an excellent thing. If you would rather try something else, all the while staying safe, doing good, and loving others, go in peace. You fed from me for the first three years of your life." He pulled down his collar and showed the tiny teeth marks that never faded. "It was not a loan, something to make you feel indebted. It was because you were worth it. It was a gift. I trust you to make me proud, no matter how you choose to do so."

I hugged him. "Thanks, Dad."

"How lovely," Sally cooed, taking pictures. She was still in ordinary clothes, holding her pale blue dress.

"But I’m indecently dressed," Dad cried, hiding behind me to complete the joke. He was actually wearing pants and an undershirt.

"Maybe by Victorian standards," she laughed. "Now, I love you, but I need to shove the both of you out so I can change."

Dianne was Maid of Honor as a matter of course, but Val was right behind her. Sandi, Charity, and Taylor were bridesmaids too. I was Best Man but Derrick Jangoral served as what he called "Next-Best Man", though I believe the technical term is "groomsman".

He'd wanted to bring the entire inventory of the pet shop as a sort of living entertainment and decoration, but Taylor carefully dissuaded him. If Derrick weren't such a fundamentally nice person he would be terrifying - an eclectic mass of childishness, social ineptitude, whimsy, and probably more power at his disposal than any other Magics before him. Charity and another Magics (at that time unknown) later gave him some competition, but that is another story. Also, Taylor could be seen as more powerful though she had precious little magic of her own: he always listened to her. The reasons have been explained elsewhere.

At the conclusion of the service, conducted by one of Luther Tuft's siblings who was a justice of the peace, Sally tossed her bouquet randomly. At Cody and Taran's wedding both unmarried males and females waited to catch, but here we were more traditional and only the girls were there. Val intentionally stayed away from it to give someone else a chance. Rarin ended up catching it, and I saw Opal give a tight, reluctant smile. Jai clapped.

There was no meal provided but people stayed for drinks and to take photos. No flash permitted, even though the room was dimly lit with lots of velvet hangings. I noticed Faith touching every available scrap. I decided to buy her some pleasant-to-the-touch soft animals and clothes for Christmas, vying for a "Best Uncle" position with a new generation.

"Speech! Speech! Speech! Speech!" Derrick shouted, waving his sparkling cider around.

"I do have something I want to say," Dad said, hitting his red-filled glass with a spoon. People quieted down. "First of all, thank you to everyone who came."

Sally added with a grin, "Especially to the person who anonymously gave us a king-sized coffin, don't think we don't know who it was."

"Why's everyone looking at me?" Derrick asked.

I buried my face in my hands. Val giggled. She seemed to have blended her Val and Amethyst selves, with no trace of Jackie since Ikh died.

"Thank you for embarrassing me," Dad said.

"That's what I'm here for, love."

"Helena, are you filming this?" Dad looked about the room.

Resplendent in a red gown, Helena Jangoral gave him a thumbs-up with the hand not carrying a camcorder.

"As I was going to say, there is one person who is not here who deserves our thanks. Many of you have never met him, though I believe you have all heard of him and know at least a little of how, in a perfect world, he would have been best man. He would have been in the photos, entertaining us with his witticisms, ready to help if anything went wrong." Dad swallowed and lifted his glass, speaking in a slightly choked voice. "A toast to Nat Silver."

"To Nat Silver," responded the crowd.

"Hear hear," I said.

"He, as usual, refused to tell us where he's going or how to contact him. But before he left we managed to coerce him into taking a Digi-Album with him, and he'll see this speech within a few hours after the wedding. No person has dealt with so much sadness with so much gallantry as this vampire. He has done foolish, unreasonable things and will continue to do so, but he has always and will always do them for love."

Everyone paid rapt attention, Felicity even ceasing to chew on her teething ring, her baby Thought-Music perception picking up on the importance of this moment.

Dad looked at the camera. "Nat, we will never forget you. Thank you for stitching up my son's heart. Thank you for being my only friend for seven years; for helping Selene as much as was mortally possible; for saving Derrick Jangoral and any number of innocent people; for healing many people here; for your unnoticed good work among unknown hundreds. We love you." He downed his glass. I led the applause.

……………………………………………………………………………

The best moment of my life came on my wedding day. That moment was not meeting two elderly Iraqi men named Khalil and Jabbar al-Wahid, though it was pretty good. They wore borrowed suits, cloths around their heads, and nervous expressions. Helena, who had studied Arabic since second grade, acted as interpreter.

Khalil, the elder, was translated as saying: Sorry our flight was delayed by two days. Civil unrest again.

"Was it frightening, traveling so far?"

Jabbar: I would not wish to settle here, though of course we are grateful for you inviting us and paying our way.

Khalil: Indeed. If I were still a youth and could learn a new place, it would be good. Now it is only strangeness.

"I am your youngest brother."

Khalil: You look like a grandson, if we had any.

"This must feel strange."

"Are these your blood relatives?" Val asked, coming out from the hall in her wedding dress. I covered my eyes so I wouldn't see it.

Jabbar: Why are you doing that?

Helena must have told him that it was unlucky in Western tradition for the groom to see the bride in her dress before the wedding.

I sneezed and Khalil gasped. He stammered something to Helena.

Helena said, "I think he's telling me you sounded exactly like your mother."

The ice broken, they kissed me on the cheek and hugged me. They smiled at Val and said she was beautiful.

They only stayed for a few days, insisting that their fields needed them. I asked them what they wanted me to get them and they went home with bags stuffed with multivitamins, candy for the village children, and one new prayer rug and one wristwatch each. They had been saving up for a trip to Mecca all their lives and I gave them enough to make up the difference - 78.

In return, they spent those few days telling Helena everything they could remember about our parents. Mother loved pomegranates. Father gave a lot of money to widows and orphans. Father had assisted American soldiers (back when they were still there) and had moved to the countryside to avoid his enemies. They were parallel cousins, the ideal marriage - she was the daughter of his father's brother - but they had loved one another as children. They used to talk about politics and poetry together. He was an engineer for local irrigation canals; the family had a reasonably high station until some vampire bit Mother while she was pregnant with me. If that had not happened, I would now be human and arthritic, versed in the Koran, and who knows what else would I be like.

Helena wrote it all down in English - her Arabic spoken comprehension was more fluent than her reading, though the men could write fine. I offered to pay her but she wouldn't take the money.

…………………………………………………………………………………….

That was all wonderful, and still to come, but it wasn't the best thing in my life ever to that point. It wasn't keeping a secret from Val, that's for sure, even with a secret such as this. "What was that phone call from the OMHI yesterday?" she'd asked that afternoon. I'd gotten up early from excitement and knocked on Dianne's door to see if Val was awake.

"Nothing, nothing," I'd said.

Our wedding was outdoors in a firefly-filled night. Derrick actually made sure that we'd have maximum firefly-power, and even made them spell out VAL & RIVKI, but didn't repeat the trick because he felt sorry for the insects. "They're just trying to mate in peace, same as you," he reflected.

Taran had made fun of me for asking Charity to perform the ceremony. "And who was telling me that she couldn't possibly be a religious figure?"

"I'm not disputing that she's a religious figure. I just draw the line at believing she's a new Messiah."

Val's bouquet consisted entirely of dandelions, some in the golden-fuzz stage and others in the puffball. The dryad I'd accidentally created, who now called herself Bianca because she'd entered a relationship with another Oak, carried her train. Val wore a long white dress with amethyst earrings, a necklace, and a circlet around her head. As she walked down the path, the music fell silent. People fell silent - only a few knew what we had in store.

Val turned around. "What is it? Is something wrong?"

From behind a tree hobbled out a Eudemon in late middle age, using the sort of crutches not for temporary injury but for permanent disability. In her getaway two years ago, she was caught by vigilantes and badly beaten until passing Elves rescued her and gave her a job. A court acquitted her of all wrongdoing before that, but the hardliners had not been satisfied.

She had lines in her face but her violet eyes glistened with joyful tears. Her graying maroon hair was freshly washed and combed, her dress a dark green.

Val stared, speechless for several seconds. Then she whispered, "Mama?"

And as she ran down, and with all that came afterwards, that word was better than the two we'd exchange in a short while. That look, that cry they gave, that almost desperately joyful and relieved embrace…

That was, unquestionably, the best moment of my life.