The Archangel (Avengers Fanfic)

Chapter Thirty Four

As T'Challa and W'Kabi accompanied us back into the city proper, he seemed to notice that something had changed between the two of us. We were walking hand in hand, both smiling, properly smiling—a rarity, even in our peacetime lives—and not only that but we were both radiating happiness, through every step we took and every sway of our joined hands.

"Are you going to tell me what has happened or am I to guess?" T'Challa prompted.

Bucky responded before I could get a word in, "she said yes."

"Congratulations. I should imagine you will need time to plan a proper ceremony."

Confused, I turned to the king, "wait a second, T'Challa, you knew?"

"Of course I knew, he's been working up the courage to ask for nearly two weeks now." I glanced at Bucky with a raised eyebrow and a little smirk and he responded by looking down in embarrassment, which I found to be incredibly cute. "You have been great friends to Wakanda over these past months. Now that you are to be married, might I suggest you take part in the Wakandan joining ceremony?"

"Joining ceremony?" I questioned.

"Yes, it is a ritual that joins two souls, should the goddess Bast decree it." T'Challa explained. "Don't trouble yourselves yet, we'll show you the press release, then you may decide."

We continued walking on but the comment was stuck in my head. Joining our souls? Was that even possible? And if it was, did we even want to? It was a daunting thought, joining souls. Just how much of us would be shared with each other? How much did we want to share? I loved him, more than anything I could remember loving, but even so, there were some things that I would never wish for him to be subjected to. My memories from Hydra, the darkness that tainted my soul. He had enough of his own, and so did I, there was no need for either of us to add to the weight we carried.

Navigating back through the city, T'Challa led us to what could only be considered a throne room—of sorts. Maybe it was more of a council room, that was the only explanation I could think of for there being multiple chairs. T'Challa chose not to sit, and so Bucky and I decided we would stand also. He used his kimoyo beads to activate a hologram of the press conference.

As soon as I could see the faces of Steve and Tony in particular, my heart began to burn with longing. Weird, how I could know them for so short a time and yet miss them so much that it physically hurt. I guess they had really become my friends.

It was Steve and Tony in the front, closest to the podium with the microphone, with them was Natasha, Sam, and Clint, the others no where to be seen, likely off on their own missions—whatever they were. Steve stepped up to the microphone first, "as many of you have already seen, this image was leaked to the press late last night." Off to the side, I could see Tony pull up the image to display.

The image was low quality and very dark—kudos to the Wakandans for doctoring it up a bit—despite that, it was very obvious who we were, the light reflected off my metal skin and his arm to make it perfectly clear that it was an image of us. I tried to remember what we were doing at that moment, and then it came to me; that was right when I had rushed to the hostages after hearing gunfire. I was shielding them with my wings as I helped them out of the truck and Bucky was ushering them into the tall grass.

"Some of you have speculated where the Archangel and White Wolf have been these past few months, we've had to keep that information confidential for their safety. But now that this image has been released, we are able to say that they were assigned a human trafficking mission in central Africa. We have been in contact with them and neither were harmed last night as they rescued thirty eight hostages. I'm not at liberty to discuss further details of their mission." Cap stepped away and Tony concluded the conference shortly after with a witty remark.

Everyone was quiet for a minute as we processed what exactly had just happened. The silence was broken when Bucky started chuckling, I raised an eyebrow, "what's so funny, Buck?"

"Steve lied, I haven't seen him do that since he was twelve." Bucky explained while still laughing, "I forgot that he always looks like he's uncomfortable when he lies. It's good to know that some things don't change."

I loosely placed a wing over his far shoulder and draped my arms on his other shoulder, whispering against the shell of his ear, "sometimes change is a good thing."

"I would have to agree," he growled back as he captured my lips in a sweet kiss. When he pulled away, he was beaming, literally beaming, "I think we should do it."

If he didn't have any reservations, then I didn't either. "Then let's do it." I smiled back at him, and turned to face T'Challa, speaking in Xhosa, "my king," he turned around and tilted his head to indicate he was listening, "we would be honored if you would join us together, as one."

"Come with me." T'Challa gestured for us to follow him and we did. He led us through the palace, taking so many twists and turns that even with our specialized training, we would never be able to purposely find the place again. Finally, he stepped outside, across a small courtyard was a temple looking building, tall and grand. Before we reached the entrance, T'Challa turned back and with a grave voice, informed us, "you must not tell a soul of what you witness here."

We quickly swore we would never speak a word of it to anyone. This was clearly a very important place to the Wakandans, we didn't know why and we didn't need to. They may have invited us in and treated us as their own, but we were not Wakandan and they had the right to keep their culture from us should they choose to. T'Challa was simply acting as king and protector of his country, even if he was protecting it from those he considered friends and allies, we understood that.

He led us inside and right when we walked in, we could see that this truly was a special place. Wakandans in ceremonial dress were tending to plants that glowed a vibrant shade of purple, the likes of which the natural world had never before seen. He didn't allow us much time to stop and look, we kept to the path as he made his way to the center of the building where the path ended in a pit of red sand.

T'Challa gestured for us to step to the middle of the sand pit, and then spoke in Xhosa, "this is not a complicated ritual, all you need do is stand together and allow Zuri to call the goddess forth."

We nodded our understanding and made our way to the center of the sand pit. Looking into the eyes of my lover, I felt my wings flutter with anticipation, I had no reservations that this is what we were supposed to do. I folded my wings in tight to my back and we clasped both our hands together. Smiling, I raised an eyebrow, silently asking if he wanted to go through with this. He gave a small nod, then copied the gesture. My smile widened and I nodded back. It was heartwarming that we were both willing to give each other an out, and even more so that neither of us took it.

I leant my forehead against his and breathed in his scent, then in unison, we declared, "we're ready."