Edmund should have burned the damned Regalia but realized it would have been futile for his mate (now bonded to him by 23 separate ceremonies under Narnian law – 18 of which had had to be performed naked) had committed the whole of the text to memory and prepared a spreadsheet wherein she laboriously kept track of each and every marital ritual, the species it was intended to recognize, the excruciating details necessary for its successful execution, his substantial “honey do list,” the odds laid down for its completion, and her (now considerable) winnings (albeit mostly paid in shiny wire, thread, hair, and pyrite).
“We’re quite conventional when you consider it,” Morgan mused, studying the Regalia’s pictures and marginalia documenting the ritual bondings of Narnia monarchs going back to Frank and Helen that were truly as varied as Narnians themselves –husband to wife, wife to wife, husband to husband, and multiplicities besides – Edmund suggested having Lord Abnur join them in an official capacity as consort to the King just for the pleasure of stoking Morgan’s considerable jealousy.
As Morgan turned the page to the last entry, the last ritual, the very last one they would do, they studied together the picture of two crowned Queens clasping hands over a smith’s anvil and it again nudged Edmund’s memory, “I am certain I have heard of the Gretna Green before; I don’t believe it is unique to Narnia.”
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Edmund should have burned the damned Regalia but realized it would have been futile for his mate (now bonded to him by 23 separate ceremonies under Narnian law – 18 of which had had to be performed naked) had committed the whole of the text to memory and prepared a spreadsheet wherein she laboriously kept track of each and every marital ritual, the species it was intended to recognize, the excruciating details necessary for its successful execution, his substantial “honey do list,” the odds laid down for its completion, and her (now considerable) winnings (albeit mostly paid in shiny wire, thread, hair, and pyrite).
“We’re quite conventional when you consider it,” Morgan mused, studying the Regalia’s pictures and marginalia documenting the ritual bondings of Narnia monarchs going back to Frank and Helen that were truly as varied as Narnians themselves –husband to wife, wife to wife, husband to husband, and multiplicities besides – Edmund suggested having Lord Abnur join them in an official capacity as consort to the King just for the pleasure of stoking Morgan’s considerable jealousy.
As Morgan turned the page to the last entry, the last ritual, the very last one they would do, they studied together the picture of two crowned Queens clasping hands over a smith’s anvil and it again nudged Edmund’s memory, “I am certain I have heard of the Gretna Green before; I don’t believe it is unique to Narnia.”