Chapter Text
“In addition to your promotion to Major, you are to be married.”
“Married?”
“Yes,” Lady Boil states, a sniff in her voice as she looks down at Captain- no, Major Hob from where she’s seated.
“Why… to whom?” Major K.P. Hob asks, confusion laced in his voice and showing on his brows.
“Her name is Lady Sylmenar, of the Seelie Court,” Lady Boil tells him, the excitement and self-satisfaction showing on her own face and through her voice as well. “We must forge this alliance. They will start to take us seriously.”
“Oh… okay,” Major Hob says, still clearly puzzled. “I. Yes. Okay. Of course.”
“Good. You will be at the rehearsal in three days time.”
“Three days?”
“And the wedding in six!” Lady Boil says. “We must move fast. You know what a disaster it was last time this… an opportunity like this arose,” Lady Boil says, and Hob raises his brows.
“Of course, your Ladyship,” Hob clears his throat.
“Here,” Lady Boil says, holding out a hand with a piece of paper in between two fingers. Hob reaches out from a distance, and takes it. “The vows. Be practiced.”
“Right,” Hob says.
“That is all,” Lady Boil says, and Hob bows deeply, then sees himself out.
He finds himself pacing for the next three days. He reads the vows, again and again, and commits them to memory.
It is not a position he ever thought himself to be in. He confides as much in Grabalba, who rolls her eyes and tells him to “take the win.”
Is it a win, though? K.P. wonders.
“It will be a more cushy lifestyle, least when you’re not in the field,” Grabalba says, feet up inelegantly on an ottoman, tapping her ankle back and forth.
“I have… I have no reason to need that,” Hob says, cracking his knuckles where he holds them under his chin. He hasn’t wanted for that. Had not realized it was a possibility. “Why me, my Lady?”
“Why not?” Grabalba asks, breaking a toothpick between her teeth. “You expect me to be able to understand what’s going on in Boil and Blemish’s heads?”
“Certainly not,” Hob mutters.
As they ride into the Seelie territory, where the wedding will be held in a beautiful and delicate building, Hob listens to his superiors as they chat.
“Everything must be perfect- none of our usual bullshit. Forget the Goblin code,” Lord Blemish says, and Hob nods slightly.
He has never been good at the Goblin code anyway.
Maybe that is the reason, he thinks. If anyone is to marry a proper Seelie lady, it best be him, who knows a downright shameful amount about good manners and polite society. He straightens his shoulders.
“Good,” Lady Boil says, though she pinches her brow as she stares out of the window in their carriage. “It must go according to plan... It’s all so disgusting.”
“It will be well worth it,” Lord Blemish tells her. Hob breathes in, steadily.
They exit the carriage and Hob stands tall and proper as they walk into the grand building.
He is introduced to the parents of Lady Sylmenar, and the Seelie Countess who is overseeing their union.
Hob is perfectly cordial, and they eye him carefully. Blemish and Boil don’t say too much, offering only slightly backhanded compliments on the décor. The Countess does not show a reaction, and waves them in to show off the location of the wedding in three days time.
Hob stands back for just a moment, trying to steady his hands. They don’t shake on the battlefield, but in such a location- he is overcome with tremors.
There is a grand piano in the entryway, and so he plays a few keys, then starts on a song- just to occupy them, to focus on something so that they might stop shaking so terribly.
“Hello,” he hears, and he turns towards the soft and delicate voice. A beautiful fey woman is approaching him.
“Oh! Hello,” he replies, holding his hands behind his back.
“That was beautiful,” she says, giving a little nod.
“Oh- it was- that was nothing, my Lady,” he says. “Do you play?”
“No,” she says. “I was not ‘musically inclined’, my parents did not see fit for me to waste my time on things I would not excel at.”
“Oh,” he says, glancing down. “Lady Sylmenar?”
“Major Hob,” she says, coming close.
“I wish to just- say- it is nice to meet you, and I want to be clear. Um. I am aware, it is no fine Lady’s dream to walk towards me, down the aisle. But I am committed to making whatever life we will have together the best I can give you.”
“Please, Major Hob,” Sylmenar says, a small smile on her face, “I will be honored to have you on my arm, once we are…”
“Wed,” he whispers, and she nods.
“Ahem,” they hear behind them, a Lady-in-waiting walking back with Sylmenar’s father and Boil. “Need I remind you the two of you are needed in the Chapel?”
“Of course,” Hob says, smoothing out his jacket.
For all his practice, Hob has never been a man of steady words. He is a man of action.
His nerves get to him, and he fumbles badly with the vows, as Boil and Blemish groan and scoff behind him. It does not help.
He does not notice when another member of the Seelie Court slips in the back to simply observe.
Sylmenar tries to help, but it, too, only makes it worse as the words get stuck in his throat.
“With this cup, I will- no,” he shuts his eyes, and the grey-haired Seelie cleric ordaining their vows sighs heavily at him.
“Do you not wish to be married, Sir?” asks, and Hob, holding the ring, furrows his brows.
“No, I-”
“You don’t?” Sylmenar asks.
“No, I mean to say, I do not not wish to be married! That is to say, I very much, indeed, wish to be married,” Hob says, but he hand shakes again and he drops the ring.
“He drops the ring!” the Seelie cleric puts a hand on his forehead as Hob goes to retrieve it. “We must retire for the day.”
“I, please-” Hob says, kneeling as Boil snatches the ring from next to her foot and stares him in the eye in disapproval.
“This man does not wish to be married,” the Seelie cleric states as Hob pockets the ring again. “We will return tomorrow. Major Hob,” he says slowly, waiting.
Hob looks up, jaw set in an amount of sadness.
“Learn. Your. Vows,” he orders,
Then, he closes, “You are dismissed.”
Before he leaves, Hob catches the eye of Lady Sylmenar. She looks sad, and he allows his shoulders to dip further.
He was not meant for this, he knows. Not meant to be a husband. Not meant to try to build a life with somebody else. He has no idea why this is the path that has been laid out for him, or how he’s going to navigate it, but he needs to do better than this.
Major K.P. Hob finds himself trailing over a bridge, and towards another after of dense and lush forest in the Seelie grounds.
It’s all so beautiful. Nothing like the greyish forests of the Goblin territory, or their caves and mountains.
He comes across a river, as he starts to practice his vows again.
“With this hand, I will. Cup your- oh, Goodness, no,” he says shamefully, walking further away.
There are some darker trees here. A feyraven, cawing loudly above. Hob takes another deep breath as he moves into a bit of a clearing.
“You know this, Knickolas,” he says, and picks up a branch. He waves it about a couple of times, missing the heavy feeling of his halberd. He was not permitted to take it along- why would one ever need such a violent object at a beautiful and pleasant occasion?
He slips the branch against his back and still, allows it to feel like it might be his weapon. He looks around, and finds a rock that he places in the crook of a branch.
He turns towards a tree. “Good day, my Lady,” he says. “You are looking lovely, Countess Fenella,” he mimes.
Then, turns, and walks the three step he’s supposed to take, towards another tree. He holds out the right hand, and says,
“With this hand, I will lift your sorrows.”
He pauses, then picks up the rock, to be the cup, “Your cup will never empty, for I will be your wine.”
He breaks off a branch, to mime lighting a candle, “With this candle, I will light your way into darkness.”
Finally, he takes the ring, and eyeing a strangely hand-like branch a bit further down, bends down and slides it on. “With this ring, I ask you to be mine.”
He kneels and sighs, shutting his eyes. How, could he say this all alone, to a bunch of trees and branches, but not to his own bride-to-be?
He is truly so pathetic a man, so unequipped for the task he’s been given- this is not him.
With his eyes closed, Hob does not notice the movement of the branch, and it is too late to move before it reaches out and grips him.
He does feel it, though.
His eyes snap open.
“By the Gods,” he says, as the branch cracks and the bark crumbles away, leaving it an off-white instead, looking like bone. He tries to shake it off, as the ground around him shakes and starts to crumble. “Wh-what?”
He manages to throw the hand? off, and scampers back on the forest floor as the earth opens up and a being emerges.
Another beautiful creature, though they appear to be half-dead.
Wearing a wedding dress and veil.
Hob wastes no time running away, back towards the town, as the creature glides towards him.
He comes to a stop near the bridge, heart racing, realizing that if he is seen with this- this being, it might not be the best idea.
The re-animated fey simply speaks in a melodic and wonderful voice. “Your vows were quite beautiful indeed,” the creature says, as they reach out a hand.
“I…” Hob says.
“I do,” they whisper, “you may kiss the newlywed.”
Hob just stares, as the fey kisses him.
And then,
everything goes black.