Are you sure we can just leave her here?” Bastian asked, trying not to sound as hopeful as he felt. He’d heard of nightmare in-laws, and even suspected he came with some, but nothing had prepared him for the casual, condescending cruelty of Saina’s grandmother.

“My Voice will have no trouble finding whatever she needs here,” Saina assured him. While they watched, a pair of deckhands leapt to their feet to gather Gita’s luggage, practically tripping each other to follow close at her heels. Further down the dock, a man who’d been stacking crates abandoned his task to sweep the deck in advance of her approach.

Bastian could hear the faint strains of her song as she walked away -- for good, he could not help but hope.

“Oh gosh,” he said insincerely. “I don’t know how we’ll get in touch to invite her to the wedding.”

Saina looked at him sideways. “There’s going to be a wedding?”

“We did promise to get married,” Bastian reminded her.

Saina blinked, heavy eyelashes over sea green eyes. “I guess I figured we’d just do a walk-in wedding somewhere. They have those in Costa Rica, don’t they?”

“We could go through a wedding lawyer,” Bastian said, feeling oddly disappointed. “Fill out some paperwork, show your passport and birth certificate. He rounds up some witnesses and it’s done. Er, do you have a passport or birth certificate?”

Saina shrugged. “I can wave a piece of paper in front of him and convince him it’s one.”

“You don’t… want a real wedding?” Even Bastian could hear how wistful he sounded.

She smiled at him, her true, crooked smile full of warmth and amusement. “Do you want a real wedding?”

Bastian scuffed a foot in the sand. “I do. I want to watch you walk down an aisle towards me. I want all our friends there to witness our vows. I want a giant reception with every fancy dish that Chef knows how to make.”

Saina narrowed her eyes. “You want to outshine Tex and Travis’ double wedding.”

“I guess there’s a little dragon competitiveness in me,” Bastian admitted. “They’re planning to marry early next summer after their court stuff is settled, and I was sort of thinking about an early spring ceremony.”

“We’d have to invite your parents,” Saina reminded him.

Bastian froze, imagining his parents at Shifting Sands. It was almost as horrifying as the idea of her grandmother. “I’ve changed my mind,” he said swiftly. “It was a terrible idea. Wedding lawyer it is.”

“I don’t know,” Saina teased. “Now I really like the idea. I could throw a bouquet and we could have a fancy dance. Everyone would know I was yours, and boggle at our elegance and beauty.”

“Hrm,” Bastian said, unconvinced.

Saina moved closer into his arms, sliding her curves along him. “You could peel me out of a fluffy white cupcake dress afterwards.”

Bastian swallowed, his imagination doing plenty to fill in the picture. “I’m not sure…” he said.

“Maybe your parents wouldn’t come?” Saina suggested, slipping her arms up around his neck.

Bastian kissed her, hands at her waist. “Is that a chance we’re willing to take?”

“I’ll risk it,” Saina purred in his ear.

When he put her down at last, drawing away with bruised lips, Bastian remembered something she’d said. “My parents said that they had a story that sirens used to be dragons, and you said that you had heard a similar origin story.”

Saina laughed. “It has significant differences. We say that dragons came from sirens. They were sirens - siren men - who preferred war to love. They could not reconcile their natures, and changed to shifters with two forms, one of scales and violence and one of humankind. I don’t have a mermaid voice within me, not like you have a dragon. I am a siren, it’s just who I am. Sometimes I have legs and sometimes, I don’t.”

She tapped the middle of his forehead. “It must be crowded in there.”

“That’s not where my dragon is,” Bastian corrected, catching her hand. He pressed it against his chest, feeling the flutter of his heartbeat against her palm. “He is here, deeper, and it still felt empty before you came.”

She looked at him with glowing eyes.

“Marry me,” Bastian said, falling to one knee.

“We’re already engaged,” Saina reminded him, showing him her ring.

Bastian slipped it off her finger. “Pretend we’re not,” he suggested.

Saina left her hand extended. “Bastian, my love, I will marry you. I pledge my life to you.”

Bastian eased the ring back onto her finger. “I love you, Saina,” he said, standing up and sweeping her into his arms.

When he’d kissed her breathless, he set her back onto her feet. “Let’s go home.”