Chapter Text
Anathema tilts her head, and slides the dagger into Aziraphale's fingers, metal skin-warm. "What are you thinking?"
Aziraphale tips the dagger so the flames dance over the gold. There's a patchwork of thoughts in his mind, all of them tangled. He knows there are things he isn't seeing, fragments missed in his memory during his time with Crowley.
Some of the heartache has vanished. Has morphed into dread. Into a fear sharpened by the biting cold coming from the open window.
Aziraphale can't forget Crowley's eyes. The bent line of his body, as if hunched down under the weight of Damian's accusations. But there had been grief too in the gleam of amber, some kind of deep-carved rage in the lines of his brows all pulled down. Not at Aziraphale. No.
At Damian.
His thumb follows the coil of the metal snake, the open snout with tiny fangs.
Snakes. Swirling on vermillion.
Where has he seen something like that?
The silence inside the parlor is tomb-like, broken only by the swishing rustle of his own cape brushing on the velvet of the seat when he shifts.
Swooshing, hissing fabric.
Anathema cups his cheek. "Oh, sweetheart. You should go see him. Know the truth from his own lips. Whatever they sold you at the hall isn't the full tale." The look she gives him is full of understanding. "You deserve to know from him. Don't you love him?"
She's right. He can't waste time to sit and wallow, to be prudent. Not when Crowley needs him. When Aziraphale's already squandered minutes, wretched breaths pondering over something that should've been clear from the beginning.
That Crowley would never harm him.
Aziraphale isn't sure how he knows, in which moment it became a fact of his life, same as the crown, same as the throne room. It's rolled off him unexplained and uncontested, insidious like the memory of a stroke of soft lips on his temple, instinctive like the desire to thread fingers through a skein of red hair tipped over his pillow.
"I do. You're right, god, what am I doing here?" Aziraphale is already trudging to the door, trying not to collapse under the fear of his own words. His voice has gone bewildered, all wild.
"Wait, Aziraphale! At least let your guard know! Let your mum know!"
The final words catch him in the hallway. There isn't time for that.
There's a lone guard at the door, snoring with his head thrown back against the stone wall. He doesn't move or budge when Aziraphale fetches the heavy iron keyring of the dungeons from his belt and unlocks the weathered door. Who knows. Perhaps he's sleeping due to too much wine.
Aziraphale dashes into the prison, squinting at the low, flickering light from the torches in their sconces. It's a grotty place. One Aziraphale hasn't visited before. He doesn't think there has ever been a king who has stepped a foot into the dungeons.
This is the only place in the castle that Aziraphale doesn't know intimately, the dark turns into the keep and down, almost throwing him off.
There's an upswell of bile in his throat when he thinks maybe Crowley doesn't really want to see him again. That all Aziraphale will get of him will be a harsh dismissal. Still, Aziraphale can't leave him here. Even if the worst comes to pass, he owes Crowley safety.
His breath plumes in front of him, heat having no place to cling to on the damp, hand-hewn stone. As he treads forward, Aziraphale can hear the echoing plink of wayward drops in the silence, probably from a leakage.
All the cells are empty except one.
A bundle of white on a corner behind bars, with stripes of crimson all over.
Aziraphale's heart feels as if skewered.
"Angel?" It's a tentative, unsure sound, as if the word was being tested and slowly pushed out against reality. "Aziraphale?"
Aziraphale moves slow-bodied. His feet glide over the gritty flagstones, and he tumbles forward until his hands curl around the iron bars. "Y-yes, it's me."
Crowley unfurls from his seat like greenery after a crude winter, looking for the sun. His eyes are red-rimmed, mouth thin, but he edges closer, until he's within Aziraphale's grasp if he'd thrust a hand through the bars and pulled. "Why are you here?"
It's the break of the hoarfrost in Crowley's voice, equal parts hopeful and skittish.
"I- I came here for you." It sounds so little, so dismal, and insufficient. An explanation of his own, already too delayed.
But Crowley inches forward a step regardless, frowning, chapped lips so close. "Aziraphale, whatever you think of me, you should- you should know that's all a lie. What Damian told you- I wasn't-"
Even in the darkness, his eyes gleam brightly, and it's impossible for Aziraphale to look anywhere else.
"Tell me. Tell me what happened."
A soft sigh escapes Crowley's lips, his face doing something complicated that might be melancholy, or another emotion equally difficult to pin down. He peers down to the ground and when he speaks, his voice is gritty. "I'm- I'm a bastard. A son that my father never wanted."
Aziraphale barks a dry laugh. "That's why the dagger had your name. Serpents. The Daemons' coat of arms."
Crowley nods. "Only thing my father ever gave me. Royal blood, though? S'pposed to be sacred. So, he didn't kill me, but he made damn sure I knew what my place was."
Crowley's beautiful in a way Aziraphale is only now realising, comes from the hardening edges of a tough life. The lines around his mouth and his eyes, the scars on his back, the calloused press of his palms and his lean muscles. His knuckles are roughened up and his body holds hard lines that speak of strain. They're all the threads of a tapestry he's only now seeing whole.
"They whipped you, didn't they?" Aziraphale wants to snarl, to yell until his tongue is sore, angry at Damian, at himself. At the king. "They- they starved you. They-"
The assumptions die in the anger-hot bundle pressed at the back of his throat.
Crowley's lips tilt up in a sad smile, but his fingers find Aziraphale's over the bars. Curl tighter over them. "When my father sent Damian to marry you, they gave me the task to… to off you before the wedding. I knew it was an easy way to get rid of me. See, there was no way I was walking away alive whether I succeeded or not."
Aziraphale swallows back words, urging Crowley to continue.
"But I couldn't- I couldn't do it. Yesterday, when I heard my father was arriving, I knew it was now or never. I don't know what I was expecting. I just wanted to confess to you. To tell you the truth no matter if you tossed me into the dungeons. Brought the dagger as evidence and everything." Here, Crowley's face scrunches in a snarl. "Because I couldn't bear the idea of Damian placing his filthy hands on you."
"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry I believed them even for a moment," Aziraphale says, through the glass in his throat. The echo blasts the ardor in his voice, amplifies the truthfulness of it. "I'm here because… because I…"
He can't say it here when his hands can't grasp Crowley. When he can't fold arms around him. When all he has under his fingertips is the unyielding solidity of iron. When all he can smell is the salinity in the walls, the mineral rust of metal.
And perhaps time has been an illusion in the past few days, but Aziraphale has tightened his grasp around the reins of his own life. Refuses to let go, to allow anyone else to mark the tempo of their coming together.
Crowley deserves slow, they both do. What Aziraphale feels is too detailed and vast to explain only in words. It requires the warmth of palms along skin, the tip of mouths together, the twine of breaths and the inescapable anchor of a space for both of them alone. It requires Crowley to claim Aziraphale's bed with his clothes strewn over his sheets, in a conquest without bloodshed. To finally acknowledge that he's the one that holds Aziraphale's heart, has won it without meaning to.
So, he settles for the next best thing.
Aziraphale tucks his face closer between the bars, the cold kissing his cheeks. Breathes out, shivery, and hopes it isn't too presumptuous.
"Because I intend to make you my husband."
The lines between Crowley's brows deepen, something wild lining around his eyes. "Have you lost your marbles? I'm a criminal, am I not? Hardly fitting for a Prince. Or- or for someone as good as you. I'm wicked and selfish and- and a liar. How can you trust me?"
Those aren't Crowley's words. Aziraphale studies him and sees it's probably the dregs of whatever Damian has drilled into him during all this time, trickling through.
He reaches in, finds the line of Crowley's jaw and cups it. Feels him leaning in just so. "Darling. You aren't any of those things. And I can bet my circlet that you wouldn't hurt a fly."
Crowley's eyes fall close, but a corner of his mouth slants up in a smirk like the ones that live now secret in Aziraphale's memory. "I can definitely hurt a fly." He sighs, blinks open. "How do you know that I didn't-"
"Because I know you." Aziraphale slips fingers up Crowley's cheek, trails them back up to his nape to dip them in his tangled hair where he's still warm. "Because ever since you crossed the threshold of my home, my heart has been yours. Perhaps I didn't know it quite then, but it has seeped into my bones. And I trust you. I don't need anything else other than your words."
Aziraphale doesn't expect the scrunching tug of a hand on his chest, until Crowley's mouth is closing warm and sweet over his own. Aziraphale thinks he could drown in him. A quick, desperate push over the always-teasing curve of Crowley's red lips, that holds something agonising in the broken whine that rends Crowley's throat. Pain. The throb of split lips.
"Crowley, your lips-"
But Crowley isn't listening. "You are worth every pain, every hurdle. Fuck, angel. From the moment I met you, I loved you."
It's a short kiss that seems to stretch when Crowley sways in, all warm hands that catch on layers and infinite tenderness. It's sharper than the kisses shared on Aziraphale's bed, new with Crowley's freedom. A first kiss in a way for both of them to test the tide of this new beginning. Aziraphale knows he can't let go. Won't ever again let a moment like this dissolve between his fingers. There are soft noises fading in the air, hot gasps and stuttery huffs, and Aziraphale can't have them any longer halved by an iron-barred cell, when he could give them a soft place to land. He pulls back, panting and smiling.
"Come, come with me."
He quickly unlocks the cell door and throws his cloak over Crowley's shoulders. Sees him visibly shudder.
A clank rips through the silence at the back.
Aziraphale twirls half expecting to see Anathema and his mother.
Crowley's growl should've tipped him in.
"But look at that." Damian is smiling, unsettlingly wide, flanked by two servants. "Your highness! Are you aiding and abetting a criminal? On the eve of our wedding day?"
Aziraphale isn't really in the mood for this. "I think we both know that marriage isn't going to take place. Now, move, Damian." He doesn't miss the glint of a dagger in Damian's hand that disappears too quickly when Damian sets eyes on Aziraphale fully. On the arm he has around Crowley's shoulders.
Crowley hisses a curse. "Fuck off, prick."
"Do you have any idea how badly this will look if your people find out?" Damian ignores him, moving forward, fixed on Aziraphale. "A king that risks war for a servant, and one from an enemy land on top of everything."
He must know he doesn't have the upper hand and Aziraphale isn't sure if Damian's just reckless, a fool or if, realising Crowley's slipping from his control, he's trying to haphazardly throw whatever accusations in order to make Aziraphale relent.
Right this moment, he can't care any less.
His mouth pulls in a snarl. "Get out of my way, or I'll make my own guard take you prisoner for lying to me."
For the first time, the veil slips. Damian's face cracks in terror, before shifting into rage. "You can't touch me! I am a Prince!"
"Not here in my kingdom."
Silence spreads and fills in the crevices between flagstones. Blooms like an infection.
And then Crowley steps forward, slipping away from the grasp Aziraphale has on the edge of fur. "Damian, give up." It's said without bite, almost tired, and Aziraphale isn't sure what to do, so he curls fingers round Crowley's shoulder. Lets him do as he thinks it's best. "Father won't love you more if you succeed, in fact- you know what he'll do when he finds out you failed. No matter what you do, he'll punish you for it. You'll never make him proud."
Even now, after everything, Aziraphale's shocked into silence by the wisps of what lays at the core of the Umbris' court. Jarred out of his anger by the truce in Crowley's voice.
And in the midst of it all, his kindness. A gift Aziraphale hopes Damian can take.
But Damian sucks in a breath, teeth bared. "Shut up!"
Another step forward, and Crowley raises his hands. "Just- draw back. Go to your chambers, pack your things and leave. Escape before he gets here. Surely you see you can't possibly win in any way that matters." The servants at Damian's sides scamper away. From where he's standing, Aziraphale can see the fierce line of Crowley's shoulders and the shrinking figure of Damian that seems to flounder in doubts that melt into fear, spinning back to anger but less sure than before. Until Crowley has his hands on Damian's arms. "Damian, listen to me! Leave before the guards get here. What do you think they'll do if they find you threatening their Prince? With a blade in your pockets! Look around you! This isn't Umbris. You're no one here!"
It's easy to fall into pity for Damian seeing him damp with sweat and desperation. But Crowley's face is still spiderwebbed violet across a cheek, and his lips bloodied. And beneath his clothes there are still marks of cruelty that will take months to fade.
Aziraphale watches Damian, half-wanting to toss him into a cell, though he now is aware that for all his crown, Damian is nothing but a pawn. Willing exile would suit him best.
There's doubt there in the turn of Damian's mouth and the glint of his eyes. Before he slumps, tilts his head to peek over Crowley's shoulder, at Aziraphale,
"And all of this for a bastard?"
It seems foolish that they can tie themselves into knots by man-made titles that play no part whatsoever in defining a person's heart.
So, Aziraphale smiles, wraps an arm around Crowley's waist.
"Better be said… all of this for the only one I will ever love."
Explaining things to the queen is a far easier ordeal than to decide what to do with King Daeva's entourage, less than hours away. The Queen's first reluctance towards Crowley dissipates after Anathema's story, to whom Aziraphale has told everything. Where Aziraphale is far too anxious to be precise, she's detailed and clear, voice calm to untuck every doubt and smooth it out. The dagger is brought as proof, as it's also the testimony of Himmelberg servants that say Damian left in a hurry, and the guard of the cell sharing exactly how some Umbris' servants had bribed him with wine shortly after tossing Crowley into the prison. Probably to ease Damian's path to dispose of Crowley without witnesses. Anathema even manages to bring forth a deserter servant from Umbris, asking for asylum, who confirmed Crowley had been a forced part in all the charade.
Damian is long gone when soldiers are appointed past the castle's main gate to wait for King Daeva. Ordered to strike if there's even a shred of sign of animosity against Himmelberg after the Queen's advisor surrenders her message: a firm threat to escalate into war if the King dares cross the Styx Gorge at the southern border ever again.
"I should've known Daeva wouldn't surrender as easily," the queen says. "But if it's war what he wants, then it's war what we'll give him."
Aziraphale is sure it won't come to that. The king has already lost two sons and knows Himmelberg now has prime knowledge of his own forces' weakness through Crowley. It isn't his style to attack frontally, but to wait for soft spots that they won't give him.
When midnight rolls in, Aziraphale has already pulled Crowley aside, forcing him to eat and drink. He's still tense without news, and it's only when advisor Penn comes back, stating the king has retired with silent acquiescence, that Crowley finally allows himself to breathe.
Aziraphale sweeps off the cloak from Crowley's shoulders, kissing the edge of his mouth. They're back in his chambers, that will be theirs from now on. Everything has gone so quick he hasn't had time to level with their new reality. That they'll stay together. Won't ever be forced to part.
He isn't afraid anymore of having to renounce Crowley, cupping his face, feeling those rough hands holding his, while Aziraphale pays attention to the details he almost lost. The stark curve of a long nose, the dark splash of pupils on amber, and the riotous fall of that hair that still holds traces of lavender from their shared bath. A shared story.
"Come rest with me now, darling. We deserve some rest."
Outside the crystal window, the sky is inky dark, a pale glint of moonlight kissing the oak mullion. But here, winter is at bay, braziers all lit waiting for them.
" Angel ." Crowley sounds plaintive and awed all in one, running his thumb across the curve of Aziraphale's lip, his chin, as if making sure he's real. "I can't believe what you just did."
Aziraphale shakes his head, slipping down hands to the dip of Crowley's waist to hold him closer. Just as desperate, as eager. "I should've been quicker, faster. I was too naïve."
"Nonsense. You did what you could and that's that."
He's so easy to forgive him, to let Aziraphale fold into his arms unrestrained. Already pushing the hot pressure of his mouth against the quivering sweep of Aziraphale's throat and up.
"Oh, but- but I did not, I should've believed you. I should've fought harder at the hall." Aziraphale's voice wavers, but Crowley's fingers start to trail up, holding bunches of his clothes, doffing them untidily. It's fitting, to bare themselves with words and fingers, to leave nothing between them but honesty. Aziraphale rucks up Crowley's ruined tunic up and off. Feels his narrow chest and trail of ribs, all his gorgeous shape, and the hot jut of their cocks pressed together. Heat sizzles across him and clutches at his belly. "I should've remembered your breath in my mouth, your heartbeat under my palms. Oh, my darling."
A sound catches in Crowley's throat and he kisses him. Mouth generously open like all of him has been since the very beginning.
It's a gift.
Undeserved, unrestrained and unmeasured. Limitless like the time they can share now.
The day fades in the taste of him, on his touch, the plush crush of his lips, and the curl of Aziraphale's own hands around Crowley's waist. On the push of the pads of Aziraphale's fingers just in the divots of Crowley's hip bones, where they fit so perfectly.
Crowley gives a thready little moan, eases Aziraphale on the bed, splaying on him. "You came for me, and that's what matters."
He's gorgeous writhing atop him, swaying with the tiny, pecking kisses he's leaving along Aziraphale's face. But this time Aziraphale isn't entirely a blank canvas. There's a nudge inside him of what he wants. How he wants this to go.
He catches Crowley's waist and flips them, bearing him down on the messy bunches of the linens, kneeling between his parted legs. "It is still far too little. You deserve everything, my love." Aziraphale kisses the ridge of his collarbone, pressing the words to his skin, near his heart. "You've always deserved my unreserved trust, because… I love you."
Looking up, Aziraphale feels his heart bursting. So much of Crowley to touch and commit to memory. He wants to brush fingers along his throat, and ease them down to the flare of his hips and the gentle curves of his thighs. Aziraphale wants to take the time to pinpoint if it's feverfew and bluebells the scent in the strands of his hair, if he can skim a hand down the pathway of his spine and hear him gasp in answer.
But Crowley frowns, and searches for Aziraphale's fingers, unsure when he threads them together. "I was sent to harm you… even entertained the idea for a second on the first night, just to be free." He sounds remorseful, and Aziraphale doesn't understand why. His own heart is pounding, shaking his ribcage, and he can't stop giving passing sweeps over Crowley's waist, kissing the dip of his throat.
How can the past even matter when Aziraphale has his hands spread over him, entirely? When Crowley hasn't done anything wrong?
"Was it ever your choice?"
"You know it wasn't." He grasps Aziraphale's face in his hands, locks eyes with him. "Damian made sure to keep all cloaks away from me so I couldn't escape. Reminded me in manners you can imagine."
" Darling ." Aziraphale's stomach twists. He wishes he hadn't let Damian go so easily, had punished him for his cruelty. But Crowley bends his spine up to kiss him and Aziraphale sinks barely, their foreheads touching, forgetting all else. "You saved me in the end."
"No, I lied to you," Crowley says, and it's vicious, every word sharp and heavy.
Aziraphale leans on an elbow, his free hand curling round the cutting edge of Crowley's jaw. "Lying implies a will and an agency they never gave you, my darling. In everything but the facade they made you present, you've been nothing but honest."
Courage, in the face of the danger.
Because Crowley's never been allowed to just be . Because cowardice is also a privilege. The choice to not do, to not be, to not say and not feel, stripped entirely when your life isn't entirely your own.
How many years has Crowley spent being brave for himself?
"How can I fault you when you've been honest with your heart? With your kisses? When you risked yourself for me?"
Aziraphale tucks himself closer into Crowley, kissing him again and allowing himself to take. To pin him down with their hands entwined, tongues hot past lips and the breadth of Aziraphale's hips safely nudged between Crowley's shamelessly spread thighs. Aziraphale can feel the shifting pushes of Crowley's hips, their erections rubbing wet together into the creases of their thighs, over their thatch of curls, and Crowley's hands sliding down to Aziraphale's middle, anchoring on his buttocks to pull him in. Crowley groans thickly, draws back for a second to say,
"Aziraphale. Angel. I- I couldn't say anything before. And I'm sorry. I just- I want you to know, I'm not like them. Like my family… gosh . They've never been anything to me."
A squeeze of hands. "Crowley-"
"Since my mother died, I've never truly belonged anywhere, and with you…"
With him . It spreads in the room and gains substance, until Aziraphale can feel it in each pulse of his heart.
"With me, yes, my love. This is where you belong." Aziraphale finds the back of a warm thigh and brushes a kiss over Crowley's chest, before kneeling back. "Let yourself let go, let yourself be ."
Aziraphale knows Himmelberg. The gloam over its valleys, and the glare of the sun of the desert far south. The pink-winged shadow of a morning across the vineyards, the frothing lap of the sea and the angles of the cities that resemble the luscious panorama of the whole kingdom. Aziraphale knows it with his heart, with the stark awareness of having lived it.
As he spills oil on his fingers, draws them between Crowley's round buttocks and inside him, he wishes for a day to come in which each of Crowley's little breaths of pleasure and rippling shakes of muscle will be a familiar landmark. A turning point in the jerk of his stomach, in the quiver of his long throat thrown back when Aziraphale nips at his collarbone. And when Aziraphale, hot with need, eases his cock into Crowley, whining at the stretching tightness around him, he wishes there would be a day in which he would know Crowley so well, he could undo him without even trying.
Now, though, it's a raw need to curl into him and move between his spread legs. To sink fingers into Crowley's waist and bury words in the warmth of his neck. It's easy to get lost in each indrawn breath, in each slippery press of his cock inside Crowley who takes him beautifully, arching off the bed, sheets tangled in his curling feet. The heady bliss of it makes Aziraphale groan, makes him move to hold Crowley in his arms.
"I need you closer, need you with me," Aziraphale moans a breath, before he kneels, pulling Crowley, his spine curved as he rises, coaxing him to tip his knees outwards, to sprawl his thighs over Aziraphale's own so he can sit on the stiff length of his erection, taking him so deep Aziraphale has to stop from moving only to enjoy the slick grasp, the hot clutch of Crowley's body.
Having Crowley like this feels more intimate, more pointed and aimed. With Crowley's hands curled desperately in his hair, and his own splayed all over that warm back under the red floss of his hair.
The groan Crowley gives at the change makes Aziraphale's belly tighten and his thighs tense. Makes him hitch his hips up, fucking into Crowley until he's bouncing, whining delirious. Until there's a mess of precome droplets between their bellies, their lips buzzing with their kisses, sweat gathering on their skins. It's a pleasure that tastes sweet, that spills like wine and knocks Aziraphale off balance with its sudden wave. He comes in a surge of liquid, a sting of biting delight that has him shaking, crushing his fingers into the ridge of Crowley's hips. Crowley's orgasm is a messy, loud affair, and it takes him half a dozen tugs of his own hand to reach it, to streak their bodies.
In the aftermath, they fall on a heap over the pillows and Aziraphale thinks, even trembling as he is, that this must be how it feels to win a war with the turn of a tide. Improbable and entirely jubilant.
There hadn't been a point in his life when Aziraphale could've imagined receiving his wedding day with such a thrill. That while he was dressed in full regalia, he could be doing nothing else but slipping minutes between his teeth to try to make this all go faster.
Spring flows in warm and lush, carrying the contentment of a love that simmered in the months of winter, finally blooming.
It feels good not to rush. To soak up every second of waiting, every brush of fingers over the ermine and velvet of his clothes and imagine them after. Tossed to the floor by Crowley's pulling fingers, each layer undone.
And when the hour rolls in, Aziraphale feels fizzy, hot all over as if drunk on mulled wine, watching Crowley in front of him at the feet of a dais in the royal hall. He's dressed in dark green silk, hem of white ermine, and glittering with gold that mirrors Aziraphale's own jewelry: the pendant, three rings, and one finely carved brooch. There's a smile on Crowley's face and his hair is braided, though some strands have already been teased out of the restraint by the breeze, tickling his jaw.
It's fortunate really, that after all this ends, Aziraphale gets to curl at his side at night, fall asleep at the rhythm of his heartbeat. Grasp into a future that he knows Crowley will be wise enough to steer into steadiness if Aziraphale falters.
"Last chance to repent," Crowley says, softly, wicked. "We could just grab your mare and run. We could go off together."
"Getting cold feet, darling?"
"Not of you. Never of you." Crowley glances around. At the throngs of people gathered waiting for the Bishop to officiate. At the exorbitant golden tapestries and banners. "Of all this shit."
"It's a bit daunting, isn't it?" Aziraphale acquires his hand, slides his thumb over Crowley's knuckles where the skin is tan from the time he spends in his gardens. "But do not worry, my love. I'm here. We'll do this together."
"Promise- promise you won't let go of my hand."
"Never," Aziraphale says, heart in his eyes.
Tomorrow, they'll start the trip through their lands. North to the cold lands of Ageros and its glaciers, the deep crevasses and green valleys; South to the Gelmen desert where the sand will trap itself into the fold of their clothes; East to the Telmedic peninsula and its vineyards and West, finally, to rest at the shifting line of the shore under the rolling hush of the waves. But now, Aziraphale tilts his head up and rests lips on the summit of Crowley's mouth. Counts himself blessed that he can live here, in him - and know that in the fractious chaos of a royal life, there's at least one constant.
Crowley's rough palm in the clutch of his hand and the adoring crumble of their bodies together. Oblivious of the world outside, if only for a moment.
"Well, then." Crowley lifts Aziraphale's hand to kiss the twin gold band engraved cariad, and smiles . "Let's make you mine in the eyes of everyone, my prince."
Aziraphale can't think of anything better.