This time they did not sleep afterwards or dress as they left the cave to join the throng waiting outside at the thermal pools.
Cheers and laughter greeted them from the people and animals in the springs' three pools. Overhead the stars and moons, real and man-made, lit the sky while the candles planted along the sides of the pool garlanded it with ribbons of light. The big cats sported rather clumsily in the water while the dogs fetched various things thrown by their masters. The smaller cats sat disdainfully on the edge of the pool. Yana laughed when one of the curly-coats took a running jump and dived into the pool making a whale-sized wave that swamped the shore and wet several disgusted felines who began furiously to lick themselves dry.
Then Sean pushed her in and a moment later, a seal appeared among the splashing, laughing, naked company. This activity continued till daylight and was the merriest, raunchiest festivity she had ever attended. Periodically, someone would hoist themselves out of the water and run bare-assed to the baskets beyond the candles to fetch something to cram into their mouths before diving back into a pool. Fortunately, all the food had been prepared in bite-sized portions, was easily chewed and swallowed, or was fruit that wouldn't be harmed if it got wet.
At daylight, everyone went ashore and dressed and walked limply home except Sean and Yana, who rode double on one of the curlies while Bunny led the village girls who spread flower petals and seeds on the path before them.
‘I'm starving,' Yana muttered up into Sean's chin.
He nuzzled the top of her head. 'Good, you'll like this part then. The feast was prepared before we left. But don't eat so much or you'll be too full to dance with me afterwards.’
‘Dance? You have to be joking! My legs feel like noodles. Umm, noodles. Do you suppose Clodagh made hers? The ones with the smoked fish and dried tomato sauce?’
‘I have it on good authority that she did. Is all you think of your stomach?’
‘I'm eating for two!’
‘So you are. Forgive me,' he said, lifting her down from the curly-coat's back.
During the feasting, she had ample chances to rest and gaze into Sean's eyes and messily feed him and receive food from him, also part of the wedding protocol. The food was arrayed in the middle of the meeting house, and Sean and Yana as well as the other adults sat on benches along the wall while Bunny led the youngsters of Kilcoole in offering them food.
Meanwhile, everyone occupied themselves by singing the songs they had written for Sean and Yana. Bunny sang of her first meeting with Yana and their wild ride down the river. Sean's sister, Sinead, told how she knew Yana would be one of them from the time she went on her first hunt. Adak sang of the hiding of Sean in the snocle shed with Yana, and making frequent clandestine trips which the powers that be did not know anything about.
Even Steve Margolies, now residing in Kilcoole with his partner, Frank Metaxos, and Diego, sang of how Yana and Sean had reunited him with his family. And Yana's neighbour across the street had a hilarious pantomime song about Yana throwing Colonel Giancarlo out of her cabin with the burned fish. That was one of the few songs rhymed and sung to an old Irish air instead of chanted to drums. Clodagh said she believed the tune went originally to a song called 'The Charladies' Ball'.
As the other young people began to clear away the empty serving plates, Diego took his newly crafted guitar and joined the drummers, Old Man Mulligan on his whistle, and Mary Yulipilik on her handmade concertina. All together, they wheezed up a quite respectable dance tune.
Sean took Yana's hands in his, led her out onto the floor and then swung himself opposite her at the top of the cleared hall. Two by two came Dr Whittaker Fiske, who had returned especially to dance at the wedding, partnering Clodagh, followed by Sinead with Aisling, Moira and Seamus, Bunny and her sister Cita, Frank Metaxos and Steve Margolies, Liam Maloney and Bunny's cousin Nula to form a complete reel line. Captain Johnny Greene, who had extended his shore leave for the occasion, had Captain Neva-Marie Rhys-Hall from SpaceBase as his partner for the dance in another reel line while his fellow copter pilot, Rick O'Shay, gallantly led old Kitty Intiak on to the floor. Orange cats tiptoed daintily to the food which had been put on the side for them, while the dogs went home to their kennels to eagerly await scraps from the feast. Track cats lounged by the doors and on top of the roof and the curlies grazed in the last of the green fields left by the unusually long, warm summer, now turning to fall.
Somewhere in the middle of the third dance, Terce, who was minding the snocle shed, tapped Adak on the shoulder and he in turn tapped Johnny on the shoulder and whispered something in his ear. The two men left, accompanied by Captain Rhys-Hall, and returned in time to rescue Yana from a fifth dance.
Marmion de Revers Algemeine and two Company corpsmen in dress white uniforms were with them.
Yana and Sean stopped dancing to greet their friend, elegant as usual in a royal blue tunic with a purple underdress, the top heavily embroidered in jade and silver, matching Marmie's earrings and rings.
‘Marmie! How wonderful that you could come!' Yana cried and Marmion kissed both her cheeks, then Sean's.
‘Yes, and in addition to your wedding present, I'm afraid I've come to take you away from all this. The CIS court is reconvening a week from now and your testimony will be necessary to augment Commissioner Phon Tho Anaciliact's decision on Petaybee. I thought you'd want to do it yourself, since going off-planet would be lethal to native Petaybeans.' She glanced down briefly at Yana's middle and a look of consternation flowed over her classic features. 'Oh, my. Time flies, doesn't it?’
Yana smiled. 'It does indeed. But I see no reason…’
‘I don't think it's wise for you to go off-planet this far into your pregnancy, Yana,' Sean said, his hand on her shoulder tightening protectively.
Others in the room had joined them by now. Clodagh and Whit Fiske also greeted Marmie with kisses on the cheeks and Bunny pushed her way through to them, trailed closely by Diego, who had stopped playing and slung his guitar across his back as soon as he saw the newcomers arrive.
‘How long does she need to be gone, Marmie?' Clodagh asked.
‘Not long, I should think. Counting the journey, two weeks your time, three at the most.’
‘Huh,' Clodagh said. 'I'd never last that long. Sean neither.’
‘I mean to be there too, Yana, though as an Intergal board member,' Marmion said, 'my testimony is assumed to be biased and self-serving in one of those peculiarly bureaucratic fashions that people can't really explain anyhow. It's too bad there's no qualified native Petaybean to testify.’
‘I qualify and I think I could go too,' Bunny said, pulling at her sleeve. 'I'm young enough to go off-planet without any ill effects and I know everything that's happened. I could sing them the song I made about it. Though Diego's songs are better.’
‘If you're going, I'm going,' Diego said. 'Now's my chance to show you all those technical things you keep telling me couldn't possibly work! Besides, I wouldn't want your head getting turned by all those guys in uniform. And I could see my mom,' he added with a glance at Marmion, as if the more conventional reason might sway her where his desire to be with Bunny might not.
‘We need Colonel Maddock - or is it Shongili now?' Marmie asked with a twinkle.
‘I think for courtroom purposes I'd better remain Maddock for the time being,' Yana said.
‘Yana, you're four months pregnant,' Sean said. 'With my child.' The emphasis, Yana knew, was not merely possessive. Because of Sean's dual nature as man and seal, he was concerned just how many of his traits his children would inherit and how deeply an off-planet experience would affect them.