Chapter Thirty Six.

Guest: Thank you for letting me know that the link didn't work. It should be fixed now.

The links to the bridesmaid dresses, and suits for Dimitri and the groomsmen are on my profile, along with the link to Rose's dress for Dimitri's coronation.

Thank you all for your reviews! :)

"Yes!"

Rose's shriek echoed throughout the ballroom and she threw herself into my arms heavily, knocking us both to the floor as she grabbed the ring box out of my hands.

"Yes! A million times yes!"

I laughed, the sound a mixture of relief and joy as I sat us both up and gently pulled the box back from her. "I need to do this properly." At her confused glance, I carefully removed the ring from the box and then, after kissing her palm, slid it onto her ring finger. "There, now it's perfect. Seni seviyorum, Roza."

She grinned. "Ya lyublyu tebya, Dimitri."

Furious muttering had spread throughout the room, but Roza didn't seem to remember the guests or hear any of their whispers. Instead, her eyes flickered down to the ring I'd just placed on her finger, and I smiled at the awed expression on her face before I cupped her cheeks in my hands and brought her lips to mine. "I love you so much."

"I love you too."

oOo

Of course, asking Rose, a Dhampir, to marry me the same day I was coroneted caused some alarm amongst the older Moroi, and gave them suitable cause to try and have me ousted yet again. They'd come up with a new reason every day in the two weeks between me being elected and coroneted, and the same thing happened in the two weeks after that.

However, with the new Quorum, and the heavy public scrutiny from the non-Royals and Dhampirs, none of their complaints ever got much further than their dining tables. With Ivan as my advisor, and also a lot of help from Priscilla Voda, a seasoned Quorum member, I was learning quickly how to put plans into motion and get my own way, while making the elder Moroi think that it had all been their idea in the first place.

Neither Rose nor I wanted a long engagement, and since my mother had decided to stay indefinitely to 'help me adjust', she and Rose spent every minute Rose wasn't in school or grading papers making wedding plans.

"So we were thinking two to three months' time, Dimitri. Sometime in March or April. A service at sunset, small, intimate, just close family and friends. And then the reception can be full and we can invite anyone and everyone."

"What about color schemes?"

"Belikov family colors are blue and tan, and the Lazar family colors are green and silver."

Rose frowned at my mother. "Maybe we can incorporate both, with something else to represent me? Blue, silver and red? What do you think, Dimitri?"

"Huh?" I glanced up from the stack of reports I was reading through to find them both watching me expectantly.

"Wedding colors and the date. What do you think? It's your wedding too."

I grinned, and motioned Rose over from where she'd been pacing so I could pull her onto my lap. "I'm fine with whatever you want. And I'm not just saying that to get out of making any decisions. All I want is to marry you, and soon. Tell me the time and the place and I'll be there." I pressed a kiss to her temple as she relaxed back against my chest.

"Okay. Oh and just so you know I'm not taking Lazar as a surname. I knew you as Dimitri Belikov so that's the name I'm taking. Anyone who has a problem can go suck it." I grinned; strangely proud that Rose wanted to take my name and not my fathers.

"I have absolutely no problem with that."

"Good." Rose nodded to my mother who began taking notes as I went back to my reports. "We'll go see the priest tomorrow; I want this wedding date sorted within the next two weeks. It's going to happen before Easter. The color scheme - red, blue and silver. Let's have silver and ivory be the main colors with red and blue embellishments. After we see the vicar, I'll get Lissa and the three of us can go and see about dresses. I know what I want, it's just a case of finding it. Dimitri can sort his suit…"

oOo

"This is absolutely preposterous!" Tatiana shouted, to lots of murmurs of agreement. "A Moroi, our King, no less, marrying a Dhampir! It's absolutely ridiculous!"

I eyed her calmly, well aware that a lot of people's opinions hinged on how I would react, rather than what I would say. Over-reacting and getting angry would mean that they thought I was becoming too impulsive, too reckless, while not reacting enough would imply that I just didn't care.

"I cannot believe that you would risk your family name, King Dimitri, so soon after you'd ascended to the throne. Marrying a Dhampir means that your family line will be lost! You should be looking to prolong and bolster your line, to have many, many Moroi children so that your family name does not die out!"

"Believe what you wish, Lady Ivashkov. But it makes no difference. I am going to marry Rose. I have to give everything I am to my people as King. But one thing I will not give up, not even for God, is my morals. I am in a committed relationship. To give that up now, just to go into a loveless, unhappy marriage with some Moroi Lady would be a sham and dishonest, not only to myself and to her, but to the people as well. They respect and admire Rose. She is a great Guardian, an amazing teacher and a wonderful person. She is all but adored by the public. Marrying her does my family proud and finally brings some honor back to it, and if it doesn't, then maybe it's time that the Lazar name did die out. It's become twisted, associated with abuse and violence and corruption. I am trying to shed that stain. I cannot do that by entering into a false marriage. And regardless of what you think, I would be glad and proud to have Dhampir children with Rose. If we value the Guardians, truly value them, we should not be ashamed of them. They are a part of our race. They are our children, our neighbors, our family. My family name can be carried on by my children." I shrugged. "Rose and I haven't decided on children yet. But even if we choose not to have them, there are other distant Lazar family members in Romania. They can carry the name forward."

More shouting rang out from Quorum members and Royalty on both sides of the issue, and I raised my hand, waiting patiently for the noise to subside.

"I will not argue any further about this. I am marrying Rose and that is final. This meeting is dismissed." My Guardians moved into place as I started to move away from the podium in the center of the stage. I'd almost reached the steps when another thought popped into my mind, and my Guardians had to backtrack quickly as I headed back to the podium. "And just to let you know," I spoke very clearly into the microphone so no one could mistake my next words. "I have no intention of ruling as King Lazar. With all this talk of recognizing and honoring family, it's about time I did that, to the family who has always supported and strengthened me. I will from here on be ruling as His Royal Majesty King Dimitri Paul Belikov-Lazar. This subject is not up for debate."

The room exploded into even more chaos than before, but I ignored it, whistling happily to myself as my Guardians escorted me out safely. If the Royals thought that I was causing havoc with just a name change and a marriage, I couldn't wait to see how they'd react to the rest of my plans.

oOo

Once we had the confirmation from the priest that we could get married and we'd agreed on a definite date for the ceremony, the rest of the organization was easy. It was tempting to get married away from Court, and the idea of eloping came up more than once, but in the end we decided to stay at Court. It was more central and would enable us to invite more people, which meant there was less chance of accidentally offending someone. Since we wanted to keep the ceremony small and private, we decided to use one of the smaller, older chapels situated on the outskirts of Court rather than the main one which was sized like a Cathedral with extensive grounds. The honeymoon was easiest to solve; the Monarchy owed property in pretty much every country and so all Rose and I had to do was decide on a country and length of time. We'd chosen the South of France since Rose had always wanted to travel to Europe, and once you took out the travel time we would only be there for a week and a half, but it was enough. We would be able to spend some time at the beach like Rose wanted, as well as immerse ourselves in the rich history of the country with a few day trips which appealed to me. Rose wanted to go to Disneyland, but the compromise was that we had to also visit Versailles. A week and a half wouldn't be enough time to do everything we wanted, but this was one of those restrictions we'd talked about during the trials. As King, I was always 'on call'. Even the honeymoon could be cut short if the people needed me, and so, eleven days was all we could have.

The menu would be simple and covered by the palace catering team. Now that I was King, people expected a certain level of pomp and fuss, for it to be an extremely classy affair, but that didn't mean that Rose and I wanted to lose ourselves and fall into the snobbery that was associated with the Royalty. We would have a sit down meal with the ceremony attendees as well as a few select others. Then, we'd move onto the reception venue where we'd have hors d'oeuvres and a champagne reception, followed by the usual routine for weddings, a buffet and dancing with speeches and the bouquet toss.

Rose had found and fallen in love with her bridesmaids dresses the minute she saw them online. My mother had begged and pleaded with her to reconsider and buy them from a proper dress shop, or to even have them made, but Rose had been adamant that the one hundred dollar dresses were the ones she wanted.

"Why pay a thousand dollars for something that I can get for a fraction of the price and still look as good?"

My mother didn't have an answer for that.

Rose's excitement had been contagious and with the express shipping they'd arrived within three days. The dresses were bright red, knee length with capped sleeves. The bodice and sleeves were covered in heavy lace, while the skirt was made of floaty chiffon material and the waist accentuated with a wide red ribbon. Rose had chosen three bridesmaids – Lissa as her maid of honor, and Mia and Lissa's younger sister Jill as her two other bridesmaids. On my part, Ivan was going to be my best man. I hadn't wanted any groomsmen, but Rose had insisted on having some so that Mia and Jill didn't have to walk down the aisle alone. So I'd called in another favour with Adrian Ivashkov, asking him to take part, and I'd swallowed down the bitter taste in my mouth as I asked Rose to ask Lissa to ask Christian, since he was her husband. However, she was to make it crystal clear to Lissa that no matter how civil we all tried to be, under no circumstances was Natasha allowed to be anywhere near us or the event. It had absolutely nothing to do with her, and I didn't want her anywhere near us to ruin the day, even with just a glimpse.

My groomsmen would be wearing navy suits with bow ties that matched the red color of the bridesmaid dresses, and I was going to wear a custom made tuxedo in an even darker blue, with a royal blue waistcoat and long red tie.

Rose was struggling to find a dress that she liked, however, and as the weeks passed, she grew more and more frantic. There were no styles in the shops that she liked, she'd terrorized all of the dress makers in court and scoured what seemed like the entire web.

"We have less than two weeks, Dimitri! Two weeks! And I still haven't found my dress!" Rose was pacing the bedroom in her underwear, gesturing wildly, which made it difficult to concentrate. "I've looked everywhere! And I mean everywhere. I don't know what style I want, what design. I'm looking and looking but nothing fits. When I saw the bridesmaid dresses I knew straight away that they were the ones. And they were perfect with a little altering to make sure they fit everyone properly. But when it comes to me? I have no idea and I hate it!" She threw her arms in the air again and despite my best efforts, my eyes were glued to her chest. "I mean how hard is it to find a wedding dress that's white with some red decoration that doesn't make me look like a bloody meringue!"

"Uh huh…"

"Dimitri!"

"Mmmm."

"You're not even listening to me!" Rose's arms crossed over her chest, breaking me from my trance, and I glanced up, only to cringe at her dark expression. "If I didn't love you so much I'd kill you right now!"

I could only nod in embarrassment at being caught out.

"So what do you think I should do?" Rose flopped down onto the bed next to me, pouting as I rubbed her back soothingly. "Just give up and get a boring, ordinary, white dress that I hate?"

I thought about it seriously for a while, lying down when Rose tugged on my shoulder.

"What about looking for a red dress? And see if you can get the dressmaker to put some white decoration on it?"

Rose quirked an eyebrow at me. "Is that even allowed? I thought wedding dresses had to be white or ivory. You know, tradition and all that."

I laughed. "Roza, what about this wedding is traditional? Just the fact that you and I are getting married shows that we're stomping all over tradition and doing things our own way."

"True," she looked thoughtful. "So go for a dress that isn't all white? You may be onto something there, Comrade.

Next update will be tomorrow. :)