Cultural Exchange Ch. 02

Looking at it, I remembered something I had always wanted to do and asked, "Can I ask for one more ring aside from that? A ring with a blue spherical stone, together with another one in white, but smaller. It's a present for Ralya."

Oner seemed ready to jump with one of his jokes, but right at that moment the carriage stopped and a group of servants came to open the doors and guide us inside the Fortress. To my amazement, it had been carved directly on the face of the mountain. There were no seams between the walls and the ground or between the ladders and the breast wall at the top. The door to the inner Fortress was open, what gave me the chance to see that it was completely made out of thick metal plates and very few pieces to not leave weak points in its building.

We entered a hall full of people and I instantly felt insecure at the quantity of faces looking at me. In the Arena I had been able to more or less control my panic because the size of the crowd didn't let me see actual faces, but here we were very close and I could really feel their gazes on me. I knew more or less what was expected from me, and I tried my hardest to swallow my nervousness while smiling and trying to memorize the unending list of names and titles of the important people I was being introduced to. Given my state of nervousness, it took me almost half an hour to notice that all the people I had been talking until now were men. The women were talking at the other side of the hall until Errom went to the staircase that divided the room in two and stepped up to call everyone's attention.

When the silence finally fell in the hall he started talking. "First of all, I want to thank you for accepting our invitation to the party tonight. At first instance, you had been invited to a welcoming party, but circumstances have changed and the planning with them. Yesterday, while on their way from the World Tower to our city, the party dispatched to accompany Van'Brandon into the city was attacked by a group of Orcs. We lost one of our brothers, and my own daughter was in the verge of being Bonded to an Orc. But Van'Brandon fought and killed in single combat the chief Orc and one of his guards. For that I want to give him my sincerest gratitude." He raised his cup in my direction and everyone started applauding me. Great, making me the center of attention didn't help my awkwardness.

Oner patted my shoulder and whispered, "You are supposed to raise your cup and answer him."

When I did raise my cup everyone went silent again. Knowing how much they valued righteousness and honor, I tried to say what I thought would leave a good impression in them. "I don't need to be thanked. Letting a crime happen in front of you makes you a criminal as well." Everyone started applauding again and I sighed my relief.

Errom went on with his speech. "As I said, this was supposed to be a welcoming party, but our new Brother has proved himself against a foe not everyone is capable of defeating. Even with that he is a humble man and states it was just luck. As we had discussed before his arrival, now that he has proved himself a man according to our traditions, he has to take a partner. We had a list of candidates ranked according to the status of each family, but in the end, the chosen one is my daughter Ralya." Opening his arms he said to us, "Come here, children."

Ralya and I walked to him and stood in front of each other, separated by the distance Errom marked with his arms. My heart was beating furiously because of my emotions: my nervousness, hope, fear and other things not even I could identify were trying to overwhelm me. I grabbed my hands in front of me just to prevent them from visibly trembling.

All sights were on us when Errom looked at me in the eyes and said, "Van'Brandon Cooper, in this ceremony I am going to put in your hand the hand of Ralya, my youngest daughter and last of my unmarried children. What do you have to say to that?"

I looked at Ralya in her eyes for a moment before looking at him to say, "On my name and rank I swear I will pursue her happiness and well-being before my own, and I will do my best to live up to the honor of having her as my partner in life."

He nodded before saying, "I take note of your oath. As her father, be sure that I will punish you personally if you break your word." He turned to Ralya and said, "Daughter of mine, I have chosen Van'Brandon Cooper, Human Ambassador from The Earth as your partner. Do you wish to say something before I put your hand on his?"

Without looking at me, she answered, "I accept his oath, and I also give my word of doing what I can to become the kind mate he wishes me to be." That was all? Didn't it sound a bit forced, like a memorized answer?

"Both parties have stated their promise. As a father and as a governor, I declare you both betrothed in marriage. Van'Brandon, please present your hand with the palm up." He came to us and took Ralya's right hand to deposit it in my own hand and keep both hands together between his. "It is done. According to custom, four days from now we will have a private dinner for the exchange of wedding gifts. Five days after that, the day the Moons join, we will celebrate their definitive union in the chapel of El'Dara. Let's celebrate for the rest of the night!"

The first thing I could hear was the sound of a glass breaking. In one of the front rows there was a young Elf with brown hair glaring at me with blazing eyes. The sound of broken crystal had come from the broken cup in his hand. He had gripped it with enough strength to break it and now his hand was bleeding from many cuts. In reaction to his stare, I moved my left hand to the sheath of my knife by instinct. He just turned and left the hall.

I jolted when I felt a hand on my shoulder. It was Ralya. Now that she could speak to me directly, she told me, "Don't worry about him. That was Dodger, an idiot that has been desiring me for seven years now. I bet he doesn't take well the fact that I will never be his. Come, dear. The dinner will start soon."

Like in the Arena, I was sitting by Errom's right, but now that Ralya and I were officially engaged, she was seated at my side. To be true, there were so many things in my head at that moment that I don't even remember what we had for dinner that night. Ralya was chatting with her brother, Errom with Yalgir and Zirilla, and I felt as lonely as I ever had since I arrived in this world.

After the dinner, everyone stood up and the servants swiftly cleaned the tables and changed their arrangement in order to leave space in the center of the hall for those who wished to dance. Also, each table was served with a variety of sweets and liquors. To my delight, there was chocolate in this world. I decided to pick something that looked like the chocolate sticks I used to eat when I was a kid and a cup of Blackberry liquor. The sweet was perfect, but the liquor was stronger than I had expected. Ralya was standing by my side, with a cup of some kind of purple liquor but nothing to eat.

After several minutes of awkward silence, she took a step to the improvised dance floor and asked me, "Do you want to dance?"

Just what I did not want to do. I am very bad at dancing, and even worse, when I try to dance I have the uncomfortable feeling that everyone is looking at me and mocking me. So I tried to escape with a joke. "Sorry, pretty, but I have more or less the same grace dancing as a drunk duck with a wooden leg. I think I am going to need lessons if I want to fit in the high society."

She had no chance to answer me because we were approached by a pair of Elves who wanted to congratulate us. Ralya did almost all of the talking, and I only answered when someone spoke directly to me. Most of the conversation was guided towards the wedding gifts we were expecting from the guests to the wedding celebrations. Both the groom and the bride had the right to ask for one gift, and it was a custom to keep in secret who had granted that particular wish. Normally those secret gifts came from the family, but sometimes expensive or exotic gifts could be afforded in groups. I said that as I had been a very short time in this world, I wasn't sure of what I could ask, and the man looked at me with a friendly smile and spoke to me with a somewhat soft voice. "Well, many people ask for daily-use items, others ask for artworks or jewels. But if we sum up that you are good at fighting but have no proper gear with the social standing you are about to reach, I think you could even opt to ask for a weapon or an armor forged by Dwarves. As long as you don't ask for something almost impossible like a tamed Unicorn as my daughter in law did, you will be fine," he said the last phrase laughing.

Maybe it was the liquor, but I felt light enough to answer, "Now that I think about it, with my lack of combat equipment my fiancee would feel much more relieved if I were to choose a full set of armor." The men around me laughed at the joke.

"Well, this is your perfect chance. Four days from now we will receive a caravan of Dwarves who are bringing wares to sell. I can arrange for you to meet their leader and get your measurements. I will send them word that you will be at the Western Gate by the middle of the morning. Two hours before lunch to be precise."

I thanked him the gesture and then I noticed that we had been separated again in groups of men and women. I was starting to feel fuzzy in the head so I excused myself, "Gentlemen, I beg you excuse me, but this liquor punches harder than I thought, or maybe I am not used to drink and I need to get some fresh air." Even so, I still took my cup with me when I got out through one of the doors that lead to a spacious balcony. I left the cup on the balustrade that protected people from falling down the mountain and stood there, looking at the moons and mulling over my worries.

While I was finishing my cup, Ralya joined me. She didn't look as confident as always, but even with that she approached the topic that worried her directly. "I hope this is just my imagination, but you seem to be keeping your distance with me. Have I made something to offend you? Or could it be... could it be that you are somehow angry at me because my father has decided that we have to marry?" During the last part her voice had started to tremble.

Could it be? Could it be that we were having the exact same worries? "What about you? During that ceremony you looked like you were reciting some kind of traditional greeting instead of speaking your feelings. I have been worrying all day if you hate me for putting a beautiful Elf in a situation where she has to marry..." I opened my arms and said, "me."

At first she looked surprised, but then she kicked the floor and answered, "First, stop underestimating yourself, and second..." she mocked my gesture of opening the arms, "do I look in your eyes like a woman who can be talked into doing something she doesn't wish? You are an Ambassador from your world, which means that the family who adopts you by marriage will get inconceivable advantage in commerce and other fields when the lines of communication get stabilized. Because of that there was a list of families offering their daughters to marry you, some families even offered more than one woman. My father's position gave him the right to put me the first of that list, but that didn't mean I was going to obey quietly. I went as far..." Ralya looked aside while grabbing her hands over her belly while her voice faded into silence. Maybe she feared saying something that could be very hurtful or rude towards me?

I felt curious at her attitude and pressed the matter. "You went as far as... what?"

After thinking about it for almost a minute, she answered in a lower voice, as if she was regretting what she was going to say, "I went as far as to threaten Father saying that if he forced me into marriage with someone I didn't approve, I would take the Path of the Outcast."

"You know I arrived in this world yesterday. You will have to explain what that means." Without noticing, I was getting closer to her.

"It means that I would no longer be counted as an Elf. I would lose my name, my rank and all of the material possessions I could not bring with me in my trip to the Ownerless lands." She pointed to a patch of land with a windmill near a river. "Do you see that valley? There I own a field of wheat and a Genga farm. You will be Lord of all that when we get married, but I was ready to leave it in my brother's hands and live in poverty in case I didn't get to like you."

That brought tears to my eyes, but now that we were solving all the issues I had to get rid of as much doubt as I could. "Well, that solves part of the problem. But we still have to talk about our compatibility."

"Yesterday night by the river I felt we had a good compatibility." For a moment, she had let herself use a playful tone.

I groaned, annoyed at her try to direct the conversation another way. "I was not talking about that, although that is part of the problem I'm trying to point out. You are an Elf and I am a Human."

She got angry hearing that. "Don't tell me you are one of those racists."

"No, I am not. What I am trying to say is: what happens with the physical differences between our races? In my world, there is this story called 'The Lord of the Rings' where in the end, the King Aragorn marries Arwen, the Elf he has loved for many years. They are happy together for decades and they even have a son. But in the end, Aragorn is a Human. He ages and dies while Arwen keeps being young like the first day because Elves do not grow old. In the end, Arwen spends years roaming alone in the forest where her mother lived, until she gets tired of living and decides to just lay on a stone bed in the forest sleeping until the end of times. She can't even find comfort in her family because she was forced to choose between staying with her husband or going to the other side of the sea with all of the Elven Race."

Ralya was looking at me dumbfounded with her mouth and eyes open, but I didn't give her the chance to retort. "So what will happen with us, Ralya? Will I grow old while time doesn't pass for you and you end up being a widow who goes to bed with anyone without care, like my maid? Will we be able to have children? And if we can, will they be like you and live centuries losing the memories of who their father was? Or will they be like me and you will be forced to suffer the torture of watching your family aging and dying while you stay fresh and young? I prefer jumping over this balustrade before tormenting you that way."

Ralya clenched her teeth, but even with that her chin trembled. The light of moons shone on the tears that started flowing down her cheeks. She jumped at me, grabbing fistfuls of my vest with her clenched hands in her intent to hug me. She cried in my shoulder while trying to speak, but only loose words came out of her mouth, strangled by her sobs. I hugged her and stroked her back, trying to comfort her while entwining my fingers in her hair. It took her several minutes to calm herself enough to speak clearly again. "I didn't know you were thinking so much about us. That you were taking our union so seriously." She sobbed again before going on with almost pleading voice. " But I have my doubts too, you know? Two weeks ago I didn't even know you existed. When I first met you I only knew your picture and a not very promising short resume."

"Wow, that's flattering," I interrupted her, which provoked her to nip me in the shoulder.

She let out an angry groan and said, "Why must it be so hard to tell apart 'Like' from 'Love'?"

It was a rhetorical question, but I answered, "It's not hard at all. If you are fascinated by the good traits of someone, it is 'Like'. But if you are able to see beyond those good traits, and not only see the bad ones, but also understand and accept them, then you have found 'True Love'."

Ralya was almost completely calm now, her voice only trembled a little bit. But even so, she didn't break our hug. "How are we going to find out? We have barely a week before the wedding."

After thinking about it for a moment, I came up with an idea. "Why don't we ask your father to let you stay in one of the rooms in my house until the wedding? Merita can act as a chaperon and living together most of the time will be a good way to get to know each other more deeply."

Ralya considered it and answered nodding her head, "I think it is a good idea. In any case, you are going to need someone to give you lessons."

That intrigued me and I asked, "What kind of lessons?"

Ralya rubbed her cheek on my shoulder and said, "In the mornings, Brother and Yalgir are going to train you in combat. But after lunch you will be receiving classes to learn about the basic mechanics of this world. Additionally, now that you are joining the upper echelon of my race you are also going to take lessons in etiquette, diplomacy and commerce. It could be useful that I stayed the night after the end of your classes, and as you say, we can get to know each other deeply if we spend the morning in the training field and the evening at home studying."

Studying. That posed a problem, because my brain worked in an odd way. When I was in kindergarten, I already knew how to read because I had been paying attention when my mother taught my brothers. I passed an I.Q test and my result was a sixty per cent over the normal score for my age. The psychologist said that the main problem is that I only apply it to things that interest me.

Ralya relaxed her hands and started stroking my back as well. "So, let me answer your questions about what happens when two members of different races join for life. When I knew of the chance that I could end up Bonded to you, my curiosity took me to find what I could about your marriage rituals. My knowledge about them is scarce, moreover when there are so many kinds of different ceremonies, but what I can tell you is that the wedding rituals in this world don't consist of just gestures and pretty promises that the wind can take. There is real magic in the ceremony we will undergo together. Tell me, dear. Do you know by chance the word 'Nue'He'?"

After thinking a second, I could only answer, "I know I heard Silna say it yesterday, but it wasn't in the information I received from the linguistic pill I got before arriving here. I thought I would need someone to review the contents in order to find fails."

Her back shivered when I stroked part of the exposed skin at her nape. "It is not a fail. The word I'm talking about comes from the Ancient Elven, a language we have kept alive since the times when the Five Kinds of Elves were one. Its almost literal translation is 'Half of my Being'. During our wedding, I will receive in my body a fragment of your soul, and that gap in your soul will be filled with a fragment of mine. That will make slight changes in your body and soul. You will age at the same rate as me, your senses will sharpen a little over what is normal for humans, and there also exists the chance that your maximum Spirit reserve increases. Another side effect is that both of us will gain an additional sense that will let us know the general direction to find each other in case we get separated, along with the ability to feel each other's status. You know, healthy, injured, in danger... or when we feel desire."

I was feeling amazed at the repercussions of what she was telling me. "So I'm going to be able to live centuries like the Elves?" That thought was immediately followed by another. "Is that why the Orc tried to... take you yesterday?"

She shivered again at that thought. "Yes, even though Orcs don't have females and don't reproduce sexually like us, he still tried to use his sowing tool to Bind me and force the union."