She was deep in dreams, her inner eyes open and tracing the miraculous patterns of the Tapestry’s weave. Her mind found rest as her body healed. It would be days or weeks before she’d wake.

Hungry for news that Magpie couldn’t give her, Bellatrix had sent Snoshti to Dreamdark to learn what had happened. The lady’s voice sounded peaceful as she sang, but her eyes darted anxiously to the windows, watching the sky shapes for one that might be Fade ferrying the hedge imp back across the canyon to her. But Fade didn’t come, and Bellatrix began to think that in all the desperately slow years she’d passed in this timeless place, these moments were the longest.

Her head was throbbing with anxiety when suddenly Snoshti bustled through the door.

“Good-imp,” said Bellatrix, surprised. “I didn’t see Fade coming. Did he carry you?”

“Neh, Lady, I’ve had a lift from another,” said Snoshti, and Bellatrix saw that her black eyes were sparkling.

“What is it, Snoshti? Have you brought news?”

“Aye. The Blackbringer is captured.”

“Blessings be!”

“And the Magruwen has returned to Issrin Ev.”

Bellatrix fell silent, eyes gleaming as a rush of emotion swept over her face. “He has?” she whispered, and when the imp nodded, she clenched closed her eyes to hold back tears. A single shining drop escaped and slid down her cheek. “Then there is hope,” she said quietly.

“And Lady Bellatrix?” said Snoshti.

Bellatrix opened her eyes. Snoshti stepped aside and through the door came a faerie. The spoon in Bellatrix’s hand clattered to the floor.

The Ithuriel’s champion was an Ifrit prince, tall and beautiful and dark as ebony, with immense white moth wings and black braids crowned with a circlet of silver. In the doorway he stood absolutely still and stared at his bride.

A sound—a laugh, a sob—escaped Bellatrix’s lips, and Kipepeo cried out. They met in the air and clung to each other as the force of their flight spun them up toward the ceiling of the vaulted room. They laughed and sobbed and their wings fanned and held them aloft and spun them as their cheeks pressed, tears mingled, and lips met.

Snoshti beamed and chortled. Circling the spire, Fade peered in through the moon windows and exhaled a cascade of fireworks. And in the vault of the sky the seraphim gathered to watch, and even such souls as they who had gone beyond all earthly concerns were moved by the embrace and began to weep.

Kipepeo wasn’t the only one who came to the Moonlit Gardens that day. The elders of Dreamdark had managed to explain to all the gathered souls what had befallen them and had welcomed any who chose to stay. Some did, but many more chose the Gardens, unable to face a world from which their loved ones had been gone already for thousands of years.