‘Well, I never,’ Cywen murmured.

‘Idiot boy,’ Brina said from over by another cot.

Maybe it’s not so stupid, Cywen thought. This war has us all standing on death’s doorstep. It reminds us how precious life is, and how much it should be lived.

And of course the joy of victory had swept through Drassil like a summer wind, warm and pleasant, spreading relief and great joy. Cywen could already hear the celebrations beginning elsewhere. It took longer for that to seep into the hospice, where the harsh and stark reminders of the battle’s cost were still all too plain to see.

‘Good for them,’ Cywen said.

‘That’s what I said,’ said Farrell. ‘After I stopped laughing, anyway.’

Brina shook her head, muttering.

‘You haven’t heard the best bit yet,’ Farrell smiled.

‘Oh, and what’s that?’ Cywen asked, going back to her bandaging.

‘Dath wants Brina to perform the ceremony.’

‘What?’ screeched Brina.

Cywen stood with a smile on her face and a tear in her eye, soft spring sunshine breaking through branches above them to bathe the courtyard in sunset’s amber glow.

The closing part of the handbinding ceremony of Dath and Kulla was taking place in a part of the fortress that was rarely used, chosen by Kulla because of the magnolia tree that grew within it. It had flowered early with the first flush of spring, huge pink petals hanging over the couple as they stood hand in hand before Brina.

Dath getting married. The boy who loved collecting gulls’ eggs with my little brother. Seems like a lifetime ago. Guess we’re all growing up.

The courtyard was full to overflowing, people crowding on the steps that climbed the walls, hanging out of windows, standing on flat roofs, every single person who now lived within Drassil come to the handbinding of the Bright Star’s friend.

It had been a long and happy day, the first part of the handbinding ceremony beginning that morning with the first rays of dawn, Dath and Kulla’s hands bound together for them to spend the day intertwined, a taster of the rest of their lives.

Not that it will be much different from a normal day for them; they are never far from each other.

It had been a beautiful ceremony, Brina managing to say words that made Cywen cry, even if the old healer had told Cywen a hundred times that she had no time for ‘the nonsense of youth’, but Cywen was convinced Brina was secretly as happy for Dath as the rest of them were. Cywen had smiled more than she remembered in recent memory, and so had Corban, she’d noticed. In fact all of them had, even Gar. And now they had gathered at sunset for the closing of the ceremony.

Brina raised her hand and the courtyard fell silent.