Avistym, 402 V.C.

Alm knelt down and allowed the crown to be placed atop his head. It had a curiously light weight, considering the weight it actually entailed. He would've scarcely noticed the feeling had it not settled uncomfortably against his hair. He stole a glance over his left shoulder and found Celica beside him, her eyes straight ahead. Fearing notice of his indiscretion, Alm turned his eyes forward, too, and listened as Massena and Mycen conferred the highest authority vested in them unto the two who now stood before them. The rightful heirs of Zofia and Rigel stood up separately, but embraced one another to a raucous outpouring of cheers, and then the night truly began.

Cask after cask of wine and mead was flung open to satiate the liquid mob of spectators. An onlooker wouldn't have known for even a second that the new One Kingdom of Valentia was still in dire straits indeed.

A table, as well as drinks and plates of food, were prepared for Alm and Celica with all due haste. They both sat down gladly, and Celica strained to keep her mouth closed as she looked down at her plate. Almost immediately, members of the crowd approached them.

"Queen Celica! Queen Celica! Won't you please bless my baby boy!" one shouted above the others.

"I'm a woman of faith, but I'm not a saint," Celica replied, trying to maintain a smile. "You ought to pray to the Earth-Mother and care for him yourself if you really want to ensure his happiness."

"King Alm! What'll we do about the Archanean pirates invading the eastern coasts?" came another cry.

"We'll deal with them however we have to. We won't be intimidated by skullduggery, but if we're going to use force, we have to manage it carefully to make the most effective use of our resources. We can't be spread too thin."

"Queen Celica, tell me, will our marriage hold together?"

"What? I'm a priestess, not an augur."

"King Alm, do you reckon we'll go to war with one of the nations squabbling over in Archanea?"

"The first time I meet an Archanean who isn't a pirate, I'll be happy to let you know."

Celica cast a miserable look over at her new husband. Her eyes dropped to the food and tightened.

"All right, I think that'll be quite enough questions for the king and queen for right now." Alm looked across the table and had never been more grateful to see Clive in his life. "There's plenty of food and refreshments for everybody, so why don't you enjoy some and let the king and queen do the same?"

The announcement of available free food and drink was enough to cause most of the crowd to disperse. As they cleared out, Clive, Mathilda, and Clair found their way to the king and queen's table and took their seats.

"You're a lifesaver, Clive," Alm told him.

Clive gave a short laugh. "I was just delaying the inevitable. It's only going to get worse from here."

Alm's smile flipped immediately. "You sure know how to give a guy hope."

That was also apparently funny to Clive. "I don't know what you thought nobility was going to be like, but this is the essence of it. A lot of people asking for answers and actions that you can't provide."

"I always knew people would be eager to beg something of royalty," Celica began before realizing she still had a piece of meat in her cheek as she spoke. She finished chewing, swallowed it, and went on: "but I didn't expect it to be so immediate and… voluminous. Surely we'll have some sort of private time reserved."

"A few hours, if you're lucky," said Mathilda, stroking her husband's cheek.

"Don't let these two fool you with their simple views, Alm," Clair said, casting a disapproving glare at her brother, "If you've no stomach for the peasantry, you need only shut them out."

"If I want to go around calling myself Lima V, if guess," Alm replied. No sooner had he thought about what he said than did he turn to see that Celica was indeed glaring at him. "Er, sorry, chalk that up to a little indiscretion of built up enmity from an ex-farm boy. Celica rolled her eyes and chewed on another hunk of meat.

"You'll have to watch out for that sort of thing, too," Clive added, "Now that you're king, your fighting days are over. You'll be in the business of making nice from now on."

"Not exactly a specialty of mine." Alm's voice was resigned.

"I think I can take care of that," said Celica, now finished with her food, "I had to listen to all sorts of talk in the priory, and I was never allowed to speak up. It takes a will of iron, believe me. There was one day that I was asked to manage confessional, and—well, actually, I don't think I'm allowed to say anything about that, but… suffice it to say… oh, boy."

Alm looked at her with an eyebrow cocked. "I don't think there's anything sufficient about saying that."

Before Celica had a chance to respond, a man with silver hair had approached the group at their table. He extended his hand to Alm, proclaiming, "I'm glad to meet you, King Alm, and to have the pleasure to be the first to introduce myself. I am Lord Vernon of House Rose."

Alm tentatively shook the hand before him. Clive nodded. "Lord Vernon has provided the Zofian royalty with financial support for many years. It'd be in your best interest to establish your relationship with him early on."

"No pressure, of course," said Lord Vernon, who proceeded to laugh uproariously. Alm made an unconvincing attempt to laugh, too, as his arm was jostled up and down. He turned his head to Celica and mouthed "Help me."

"Lord Vernon," Celica cleared her throat, "if you've been working with Zofian royalty for so long, you must have known my father. Do you think you could share any stories about him?"

The Zofian nobleman noticed the queen's presence as if all at once, and bowed deeply. "Your Highness, Anthiese… of course! Poor girl, bereft of the memories of her dear father that a girl ought to carry long into adulthood…! Oh my! Yes, let me tell you all that I can!"

Celica put on a smile. Alm looked at her to project his thanks and slowly put his arm around her back.

Alm took several steps into his bedchambers before collapsing quite roughly onto the bed, face first. He groaned tremendously.

"All this after only a single day of being the One King of Valentia?" Celica's voice came from behind him. "It's going to be a long, arduous lifetime for you."

"I've killed shambling corpses, dragons, and shambling corpses of dragons, and right now, none of those things would terrify me as much as having to introduce myself to another noble family," said Alm. His face was still planted squarely in the bed, so his words were muffled by the blankets resting upon it. He picked himself up and turned around to face Celica. "I've given so many handshakes I think my arm's about to fall off."

"If it's any consolation, I think that's the last time we'll have to deal with a gathering like that for a little while," Celica said, joining him on the bed.

"I sure hope so."

"Of course, our real work is only just beginning."

Alm's expression sank. "What do you mean by that?"

"Zofia and Rigel are merging together, we're all becoming citizens of one kingdom. You and I have to decide what sort of kingdom that's going to be."

Alm pinched his chin. "It's got to be a strong nation. A unified nation. One that doesn't tolerate petty infighting or shameless power-grabs. If we're not all in it together, we'll never make it very far."

"That all sounds nice, but it also sounds a lot like Rigel with nicer window-dressing. More than anything, I think what we need is to have a ruling class that cares about its people. We have to nurture the smallfolk—protect them, give them strength. You never know what sort of person could come from even the smallest village, given the right opportunity."

"Guess you got me there," Alm said with a laugh. "I like everything that you're saying, too, but if you throw yourself at the feet of people who don't know what ruling a country takes, you're bound to end up in trouble. Zofia was a land of plenty for ages, and then, when things took a turn, everybody started pointing fingers until there was no one left to hate, and the problem never got solved."

"I wonder if this is what it was like for Mila and Duma," Celica said, staring into her lap.

"I guess even gods can't come up with perfect answers, huh?"

"But they had the Accord. It was like a promise to let them both try their own thing, and if either failed, the other would know. It was an attempt to find out which solution was better."

"We saw how well that worked out. Eventually, they both lashed out and destroyed one another."

"True… if beings that live that long couldn't decide on an answer, then I doubt we'll know in our lifetimes, either."

"Maybe not. But that doesn't mean we have to give up. Humans might not live that long compared to gods, but we're pretty fast learners. We can take what the dragons learned and find a new way. Our way."

Celica smiled. "What way is that?"

"Duma and Mila had the Accord so that they could each try their own approach separately, right? But, as far as we know, that never worked out. What if we were to try both?" Alm placed his hand over Celica's and wove his fingers into hers. "You know… together."

"Together… yes. A bridge across is stronger than a wall between."

"Yeah, something like that. Although, are we the bridge in that scenario? Or is it something like our love? Because then a bunch of people are going to be walking all over it. Metaphorical people, of course, but—"

Alm was interrupted by Celica's lips embracing his. He surrendered himself as he felt her arms wrap around his back. "We'll start working out the details later. For right now, there's two of us, and one night left before things change forever. Tomorrow, we'll decide what future we want to shape as the One King and Queen of Valentia. But for a few more hours, I want us to just be Alm and Celica."

"No matter how much things change around us, I don't think who we are ever will. Not if I can help it."

"Good to know, because I happen to like Ram Village Alm quite a bit. I always had a crush on him, but I never had the courage to say so."

"Something tells me he'd be floored to hear you say that."

Wyrmstym, 402 V.C.

Alm stood with his arms crossed, staring out the tall castle window. Light reflected off the snow that fell softly outside and cast a pillar of light onto the king as he stood still. It wasn't long before Celica approached him and marked his gaze to see what had him so transfixed. Tracing the angle of his eyes, Celica's own eyes fell on a field outside. Just beyond the castle walls, a modest farm sat, accompanied by a stone house and several wooden shelters for livestock. Horses and pigs retreated into the shelters as snow continued to slowly cascade onto their heads. The field itself was soaked dark brown with the wet snow, and frozen over. White accumulated over the rich brown of the soil. Harvest had come and gone for the first time under the banner of the One Kingdom. People were starving, houses needed to be rebuilt, pirates continued to ravage the eastern coast, fighting had broken out between noble families, and, at the center of it all, food remained scarce.

All from that snowy field, Celica could deduce exactly what Alm was thinking, but she didn't dare mention it. She sidled closer to him, not sure if he would want the company in the midst of those thoughts. Thankfully, he sighed in what seemed to be relief when he realized she was getting close.

"It's going to be a long while before it starts getting warmer," he said.

"Yes, it is," Celica agreed, "so we'll have to make sure everyone's as comfortable as possible."

"Definitely." Alm stared at the snow for a few seconds longer before adding another thought: "The cold's a funny thing, isn't it?"

Celica said nothing but gave him her interest.

"It heralds the end of things—harvests, plants, life—but doesn't it sort of fill you with life, too?"

"I don't know what you mean."

"If you go outside in the cold, you can feel it immediately, can't you? It sort of pierces through whatever you might be wearing and hits right to your core. And then there's this electric feeling—shivers, you know—like as soon as your body feels the threat of cold, it starts violently rebelling against it. You shake until you're warm, or your eyes widen, and you run back inside. The one thing you don't do is freeze up and fall over."

Celica smiled and pressed herself into him. "I think I see what you're saying. The seasons turn…"

"Warmth turns to cold…"

"Life turns to death…"

"And it keeps on going that way. It's a cycle we're doomed to repeat, and yet, it never quite feels like doom, does it?"

"In the moment, it's always just another day."

Alm and Celica clasped each other's hands in their own. "And it's a day I choose to spend with you."