danced until I couldn’t tell where he ended and she began, the crowns they’d worn gently falling to the floor.
A wind picked up what was left of the queen and her king, carrying them into the twilight. We stood there and watched as they climbed higher and higher, being spread across this plane they’d watched over and ruled with loving hands for millennia.
This was the cycle all creatures endured. We live. We end. We begin again. Nothing is lost or wasted.
The king and queen rode the winds to their next life, to whatever would come now, but I knew what she’d told me was true. Those words she’d said took up residence in my heart and soul.
At the heart of the universe, there is love.
“The sun is going down.” Marcus picked up the crowns and laid them on the oversized dresser. “I feel the change. Night will be here in moments. I’m a daywalker. I do not feel the changing of the sun in this way. At least I didn’t feel it before, but now I can feel it coming, feel the moon and stars waiting for their time.”
I loved the eagerness in his voice. Sure enough, the sky darkened overhead as day gave way to night. Since I’d walked into the Summerlands, I’d felt an energy suffuse me, but now it subsided.
That was the moment the castle changed, white marble giving way to the most beautiful obsidian I’d ever seen. It was as deep as the night and infused with millions of crystals like stars in the sky.
This was Marcus’s time.
I took the dark crown in my hands and faced the love of my life. “This is yours, King Marcus of the Summerlands.”
He lowered his head and let me place the crown. It fit perfectly since it had been made for him.
“And you, my queen,” he said, picking up the gloriously beautiful day crown. It was light and air to his deep night.
He placed the crown on my head and I felt complete. I looked up at the heart of my personal universe. I was ready to begin my life.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Zoey
We spent the night in the Summerlands, learning the wonders of the palace. I’d been sitting with Dev and Danny when the sun had set and the palace had changed from day to night, the stars shining in its very walls. The plants had changed, too. Where there had been vibrant roses on the walls of the palace, at night jasmine and evening primrose took over.
We spent time with our daughter and son-in-law. It was odd to call Marcus that, though it was not at all odd to call him family. After all, he’d been that since the moment he’d decided to take a newly turned vampire under his wing.
We’d been blessed the day Daniel met Marcus, blessed to call him friend and now family.
He was formally family because that evening, Marcus and Summer stood on the massive balcony overlooking the shining sea, their crowns on their heads and hands entwined, and Dev had married them. He hadn’t even fought when Summer had asked him to perform his duty as high priest.
They’d stood under a glowing moon and promised to be together forever.
I’d cried, but they were tears of joy. Well, not all of them. I’d wished her brothers and sister could be here, could know her.
Now it was morning and I had to leave my baby again.
“I can get you to the place where you dropped out of the painting,” Summer was saying as we stood outside the palace. It was a pearl again, shining in the early morning light, vibrant because the queen was in residence. “I don’t like the idea of you using that false door that the wizard created. I wish I could simply open my own door and return you to the Earth plane, but I’m still learning. There are thousands of doors and it could take me a while to find the right one.”
“I wish we had that time.” Daniel put a hand on my shoulder. “I wish we could spend it with you.”
“I know, Dad. But I am well taken care of and my siblings need you,” she replied with a sad smile. “It won’t be forever. When it is safe to come back, I want you to bring them all here. I’ll be able to either send someone to you, or if you have a psychic around, I might be able to speak directly to you. But know that I will