Greetings {{firstname_title | Valthakai}}…

Today is a very special sort of Deep Dive.

As you know, I spent last week in Birmingham, Alabama, celebrating the wedding of two of my closest friends.

Their venue, decorations, and outfits were like something out of a fantasy novel.

Which, naturally, got me thinking about the ideal venues you may find across our myriad little worlds.

So today, with the help of the Crone, we’ve gathered locations, packages, and highlights for your big day!

Don’t worry, birth control is included.

Let’s get started!¹

Venue: The Thief Kingdom

Planet: Aadlior

Services: Live Music (Fatal), Exotic Catering (Potentially Fatal), Uninvite a Guest (Nonfatal), Uninvite a Guest (Fatal)

Risk Factors: Wedding crashers, being driven insane, death, dismemberment, disappearing into the night, limited parking spaces

Depicted In: The Mousai Series

Highlights

Do you pride yourself on your open-mindedness, quick wit, and general capacity to handle danger?

Are you, perhaps, looking to make your more pearl-clutching relatives a wee bit uncomfortable?

Would you like an intimate, smaller reception protected by magical safeguards, all but guaranteeing that your weird uncle won’t be able to find it?

Then look no further than the Thief Kingdom.

A hidden gem set within the planet of Aadlior, the Kingdom is famous for providing every vice, service, and sin imaginable to those cunning enough to find their way inside.

Featuring exclusively magical accessibility methods, enjoy a wedding free from your more snobby relatives while ensuring that your loved ones can find their way in from land OR sea.

Feeling kinky?

The Thief Kingdom is not the place to show your face, so plan your disguises accordingly. There is no such thing as too much on your wedding day.

For the final event of the evening, treat yourself and your guests to a performance by the mysterious Mousai, our resident musical sorceresses who are sure to leave you sated… if you survive.

If you and your partner(s) are looking to enjoy life to the fullest and crave the razor’s edge where you may not see tomorrow, you and your guests will fall in love with the Thief Kingdom and every part of this deadly, desirable venue!

Packages: Hair/Makeup + Disguise Tailoring, Catering + Poison Tasting, Honeymoon Cruises, Nonmagic Mousai Enjoyment Bondage

Venue: Purelake

Planet: Roshar

Services: Maib’s Fine Dining, Lake tours, Holy Grotto tours (exterior only), Tidereading

Risk Factors: Crab apocalypse, twisted ankles, everything running late, highstorms

Depicted in: The Stormlight Archive

Highlights

For those who need nature surrounding them, the Purelake remains one of our most desirable venues across the realms.

With hundreds of miles of gorgeous, calf-deep waters, don’t worry about sharing your special day with anyone you haven’t invited. There is plenty of space for you and your loved ones in this Cosmere gemheart.

Many guests have raised valid concerns regarding the presence of highstorms in this region, but don’t let its Rosharan identity fool you.

The Purelake’s western positioning subjects it to far weaker highstorms than the east, and locals are famous for riding out these storms in their boats!

Of course, we also have accommodations for those who prefer to stay dry in more intense weather, but do not let fears of a bit of rain stop you from booking this incredible location!

Enjoy exotic fish caught daily, wander the endless shallows, and share a moment of true intimacy and love with your partner(s) as the sun shines across your skin, Vorin propriety be damned!

While not guaranteed, you may catch a glimpse of Roshar’s famous Surgebinders!

Witness women dance across the sky or men with mental health disorders turn smoke to glass.

There is magic all around Roshar.

Why not bring some of it to your wedding day?

Packages: Windrunner Protection Detail, Alethi Wargames (Discontinued), Proper Vorin Tailoring™, Proper Reshi Tailoring™, Gon Chouta Catering

Venue: Ninecloud City

Planet: Cradle

Services: Ninecloud Soul Wedding Planning, Thousand-Mile Cloud Tours, Uncrowned King Livestreaming, Martial Preparatory Training

Risk Factors: Dreadgod attacks, the ire of a Monarch, general disdain for the weak, aura storms, rabid sacred beasts, rabid sacred artists, deities from beyond

Depicted in: Cradle

Highlights:

If the one thing you need in your wedding is color, then the Abidan-controlled planet of Cradle has the ideal venue for your special day.

Under the protection and guidance of the honorable Sha Leiala, Ninecloud City represents the heart of the royal Sha family’s power.

While the city’s floating structures, opalescent architecture, and nine-colored clouds already make it a truly unique visual spectacle, Ninecloud City is currently hosting the 18th Uncrowned King Tournament, bringing in the most talented sacred artists from around the world for your viewing pleasure.

Relax after your ceremony with to-die-for seating as the greatest minds of our generation pummel each other in the name of their Monarchs!

End the evening with any of Ninecloud’s famous eatery locations, or have them catered and never miss a moment in the arena.

A warning to all would-be attendees: it is highly recommended that you and your guests are at least an Underlord prior to arrival, as Cradle tends to find weaker individuals rather… squishy.

Luckily, with our Punch & Sip package, you can receive daily martial arts training right on your cloudship as you travel to your destination.

Allow us to handle your concerns and come out of your wedding journey stronger than ever with the love of your life beside you.

We do recommend our bundled traveler’s/life/medical/Monarch/cloudship/earthquake/aura storm/flood/fire/tornado/hurricane/acts of god/acts of Dreadgod/acts of Sage/acts of Fury insurance package.

Packages: Uncrowned King Meet & Greet, Divine Rainbow Photography, Wedding-in-the-Sky, Rainbow Elephant Gift Exchange, Punch & Sip Drink-Till-You-Drop, Full Coverage Insurance Bundle

Venue: Spring Court

Planet: Prythian

Services: Suriel Spotting, Manor Tours, Hunting Tours, Full Service Guest Stays

Risk Factors: Moody High Lords, Puca, Naga, claustrophobia, literacy tests, riddles, allergies

Depicted in: A Court of Thorns and Roses

Highlights:

Would you prefer endless canopies instead of endless lake views?

Then, we will direct you to Prythian and perhaps one of its most famous locations: the Spring Court.

Renowned for its hospitality toward 18-year-old women, the Spring Court has everything a young princess-to-be could ever desire.

Before the ceremony, stroll through grounds caught in endless full bloom.

Find exotic flora to decorate your wedding arches, bathe in pure starlight, or treat yourself to a horseback tour!

Feeling naughty? Need a gift for your bridesmaids before the big day?

Look into our Calanmai-approved Under the Male-tain performances featuring the hottest Fae the Autumn Court has to offer.

Only on Prythian will you find beauty and danger woven together in equal measure.

Allow yourself and your guests to be taken in by the sheer beauty of unending Spring.

Prefer something a bit less temperate?

Inquire about our Summer, Winter, or Autumn Court venues and packages!

Packages: Paint & Spiral, Suriel Snatch-and-Query, Autumn Male Dancers (Calanmai Only), Seasonal Court Travel Packages, Solar Court Travel Packages

Venue: Zodiac Academy

Planet: Solaria

Services: Elemental Tutoring, Cardinal magic instruction, shifting classes, water sports, watersports, pitball grounds

Risk Factors: Coercion, douchebags, siren emotional manipulation, vampire hunting, tests

Depicted in: Zodiac Academy

Highlights:

Remember how awful high school was?

Do you wish you could go back and prove to all those fuckers that you’re better than all of them?

Do you want to go even further, reliving your college days as the baddest bitch on the planet?

For those with this kind of mindset, Zodiac Academy is the place to be.

Featuring four prominent locations for any occasion, have your dream day among beautiful mountain territories, gorgeous lakes, deep forests, or under a scorching desert sun!

Don’t let the fun begin or end with just the service, as Zodiac Academy features a world-class pitball arena, meaning you and your loved ones can watch a bunch of twenty-somethings professionally maul each other before a live, screaming audience.

Furthermore, allow Solaria’s many celestial events to spice up that wedding night romance; just don’t be surprised if you wake up with more than one person!

Packages: Huge

Tseli’s trial has begun, prosecuted as she is by Dvenya, a Brewitch with a particular disdain for Tseli’s unorthodox Fragment.

It was going well, with Ixsidhe taking the stage to defend her friend.

Unfortunately, Arc ignored her warning to remain away and has instead been dragged before the Incarnates of the Brewitch Guild to answer their questions.

Ixsidhe and Tseli brought an outsider before the Witches’ Font, but surely they’ll think of something?

The courtroom had erupted at Arc’s arrival. Clearly, Dvenya had kept his visit to the Font quiet in the hopes of a grand reveal.

“Order,” Ialine said. She didn’t raise her voice; there was no need.

The Brewitches settled down, a new tension to the room as they all focused on Arc.

The Inkmage shifted uncomfortably, and Ixsidhe couldn’t help feeling a little guilty for praying his glamour stayed in place.

The man’s darkened veins and sclera did not make him less intimidating just because he was flustered.

“Join us, stranger,” the Incarnate waved Arc forward. The Brewitch, escorting him not-so-subtly, dragged him into the center of the room.

Arc spat something under his breath as he ripped out of the man’s grip, leaving the Brewitch blushing behind him.

“I told you to stay at the shop,” Ixsidhe hissed.

“Congratulations on your second Braid,” Tseli said approvingly, though there was a touch of concern in her voice, “I hope you won’t end up having to use it… It’s not a particularly offensive Fragment in that state.”

Arc waved her off, turning to face the Incarnates.

It would have been his first time before the leaders of the Brewitch Guild, but he was clearly no stranger to their kind.

“Speak,” one of the Deathwards said, his words carried through the Ethereality. Not a genuine compulsion but the authority of a man in his domain.

“I am Arc, of,” he paused, gritting his teeth, “Forage. A Gatherer, though I am not here as a representative of my Guild.”

“Strange for the Gatherers to allow usage of their Paths for pleasure,” Ialine pointed out.

“Less strange than a dispensation,” Arc responded.

“And your business with our Guild?”

“Limited, Incarnate,” he said. Dvenya scoffed.

“Your forthcoming would go far in earning our leniency,” the same Deathward spoke again.

Ixsidhe could see the hairs on the back of Arc’s neck stand up.

“Leniency?” He asked, his face stone.

“You have violated our inner sanctum, accessed one of our primary Fragments, and utilized it for your own gain, all the while assisted by two within our order,” Dvenya was practically shouting. But Ialine merely glanced at the Brewitch, and she stepped back with a bow.

“And which of these breaks the tenets of your Guild?” Arc asked, “Is it not your wards that decide who is worthy of approaching the Font? Is it a crime to be invited?”

More muttering around the room, and Dvenya looked around uncomfortably.

“Mila,” Ialine spoke aloud, and for a moment, Arc thought his Mind was failing to translate.

The same Brewitch who had escorted Arc stood again, exiting the room and returning a moment later with a stooped, older woman on his arm.

He was much less polite with me, the Inkmage thought.

This woman did not bear the cloak of a Brewitch, and it was apparent to anyone with Ethereal senses that she bore neither Fragment represented by the Incarnates in the room.

No more a Brewitch than I am, Arc realized, a wielder of a lesser Fragment under control of the Guild or a contractor.

The woman stepped onto the central dias, blatantly ignoring Arc’s attempt at a smile.

She didn’t speak, walking between Tseli and Ixsidhe and gathering the Ethereal about herself as she approached Arc.

Flesh, Arc identified the location of her Braid, the energy pulsing along her skin and about her eyes.

Her Mind would be far better equipped to sense the Ethereal than his, and she inspected Arc like a prize mare, occasionally reaching out to pinch something hovering about him.

Arc stared at Ixsidhe, who waved at him to be patient.

The Brewitches around them watched with interest, though nothing implied they were able to see what Mila was investigating.

“He is pure,” the older woman said with ritual finality, and without waiting for dismissal from the Incarnates, she left, leaning on the same man’s arm as she exited.

“That… is a point in their favor,” Ialine said to Dvenya. The Brewitch was not mollified, instead looking to the doorway Mila had left through, disgust evident on her face.

“You just proved that you approached the Font unaided,” Ixsidhe whispered to him.

Arc nodded, but his eyes were on Dvenya.

A few things clicked together at once; Mila was the final piece.

The Brewitch Guild had lesser members or, at the very least, dealings with non-Brewitches— like those responsible for the protections surrounding their Font.

And Dvenya hated them.

Arc had to roll his eyes at the woman’s back.

It was the most antithetical mindset possible to a Gatherer.

No magic is complete. All Fragments required more. One could not wield every power. One could not Incarnate alone.

Hells, it was why the Guilds were founded in the first place.

“He violated the sanctity of our Guild!” Dvenya was working herself up again, “and his association with Tselitha proves his interests do not align with our principles.”

Quite the leap there, Arc thought. Both his Ink and the Malleus were getting restless. A nascent anger was growing toward the older Brewitch.

On the one hand, Arc was a tad concerned by the developing sapience, but on the other, it was nice to see his Fragments getting along.

“He passed the very test we apply to all acolytes,” Ixsidhe pointed out, “the fact that he did it without training makes him an ideal candidate to join our ranks.”

“Excuse me?” Arc said incredulously.

“It’s unorthodox but no less than my journey,” Tseli agreed.

Dvenya looked like she was facing her own execution.

Ialine was speaking to the Deathward beside her, the other Incarnates no doubt having their concerns heard through the Oneness.

“I would caution against the induction of an Inkmage,” a new voice spoke out.

Arc felt a chill sweep through his body, and the court turned toward a woman as she rose.

Otherworldly barely began to describe her—a rather impressive feat considering the kind of folk that traveled through Lark.

The Incarnates beckoned her forward, and Arc hissed through his teeth.

Ixsidhe frowned as Tseli muttered something under her breath.

The woman was no older than thirty, with a thick scar across one eye and a silver canine poking out along the right side of her lip.

Her clothing was clearly of an off-world make, more tightly fitted compared to the billowing fabrics that Brewitches favored.

But it was her ring that drew the eye, a black band studded with subtle white lights shifting along its circumference.

“My Guild has had more than enough dealings with the people of Tevka. Our experiences were… less than pleasant.”

Ixsidhe’s face whitened, Tseli was moving behind her, and Arc was screaming,

“I’ll kill you!”

Ink surged through the air, a dozen stabbing branches ripping down toward the woman.

Tseli tackled Arc, the pair sliding across the floor as the cultist laughed.

The Deathwards cocked their heads in unison, curious to see how this would play out.

Meanwhile, the remaining Brewitches were screaming, Ink beginning to splatter through the room as Tseli wrestled with the enraged Inkmage.

From her own experiences, Ixsidhe knew the older Brewitch was deceptively strong, a result of her strange Braid, but Arc was certainly putting up a fight.

Shadows were crawling from within Tseli’s hood, running down her arms and spilling over along Arc’s flesh.

His control wavered where they touched his Ink, but he would heave, and a fresh branch ruptured from his veins.

The cultist raised her hand, and Ialine shouted above the noise,

“Cover your eyes!”

Brewitches dropped as darkness pulsed in a wave from the ring, followed an instant later by furious light.

Ixsidhe had thrown an arm across her face and still didn’t escape it fully.

Flashes of heat peppered the room, no doubt striking at Arc’s Ink.

It was over in seconds, and Ixsidhe was not the only woman blinking spots from her eyes.

“I believe my point has been made,” the cultist said.

Arc was left gasping, burns peppering his face and gaps showing in his hair where it had been singed away.

“Tseli!” Ixsidhe shouted. The Brewitch was worse off; her Braid practically unraveled in the Ethereal. She was clutching her face and sobbing, hints of her features showing through her fingers.

“OUT!” Ialine shouted toward the cultist, and Ixsidhe barely noticed as the woman swept through the door.

She fumbled within her cloak, praying to find a Brew that would help her friend.

Shadows. I need shadows, she thought. Anything that drew its strength from elemental darkness would help.

Every moment Tseli went without it would feel like she was being flayed.

Arc stumbled to his feet, blinking tears from his eyes as he teetered in the direction the cultist had gone.

Ink continued to burst in jagged ripples across his skin, and more than one Brewitch screamed as his glamour finally dissolved.

“There is no need, sister,” a voice spoke above her, and Ixsidhe barely noticed the red-headed Deathward approaching.

The woman knelt, and the Ethereal seemed to flow around her like a river, pouring over Tseli.

The Brewitch screamed louder, and Ixsidhe almost threw the Incarnate off her friend.

“We prevent death, not pain. Your friend will live, though it will be up to her whether it was worth it,” she explained.

Ixsidhe paused a moment, then nodded.

A scream sounded above the chaos, and Ixsidhe turned… struggling to process the sight before her.

The man who had originally escorted Arc blocked the exit, but rather than the broad-shouldered Brewitch that Ixsidhe had been expecting, she instead saw Arc standing above him, the Ethereality burning as he channeled the Malleus Fragment through his fingers.

Where they bit into the Brewitch’s arm, the flesh melted away, lashed by Ink to reveal bone beneath it.

Arc raised his other hand, stretching toward the man’s heart, and Ixsidhe ran toward him.

Ialine beat her to it, the full force of her presence coming down on the Inkmage like a hammer.

He dropped to his knees, refusing to let go of the Brewitch’s arm.

Rather than make demands, the Incarnate simply put her palms on either side of his head.

A burst of crystal-clear water surged between them. The Font made manifest as an orb around his head.

Arc began to writhe, finally releasing the man before him to claw at his own throat.

But Ialine watched as he struggled, eventually falling limp, held up only by the water she had Braided.

It evaporated instantly as she dropped the spell, and Arc fell to the floor once again.

“Ixsidhe,” Ialine called without looking back. With little to do but stand, she rose, smoothing her apron with a calmness she didn’t know she could feign.

“Ensure Tseli is taken to our medical ward. Glia will escort you,” Ialine pointed over her shoulder, the Deathward having already scooped the now-whimpering Brewitch into her arms.

“He will be isolated in the north ward,” Ialine’s voice was part rage, part pity, “I expect you to call me the moment he awakens.”

Numbly, Ixsidhe moved to obey. The Brewitch Arc had assaulted was moaning, clutching his degloved forearm.

Bloodthorn and stitchroot, her mind spat out the healing Brew reflexively.

Someone would ensure he received it, but Ixsidhe followed Glia from the room, stepping over Arc’s body as Ialine continued to shout orders.

For a moment, Ixsidhe had thought this trial would be the hardest part of her day.

Fool, she laughed.

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