Alliance of Unity I – Rite of Purification is about the run up to the wedding, mainly from Marion’s point of view. Kristoph is in meditation. She can’t see him for twenty-six hours. She spends the time with her friends. The bath house scene, of course, is very similar to the sauna scene in the first part of Rose and The Doctor’s Alliance in the Unfinished Business series. Marion has very much the same concerns, not so much about the ceremony as what comes after. She is a Human, marrying a Time Lord. She has heard some rumours about their virility. She isn’t sure if she can measure up to her soon to be husband’s expectations. It’s what every new bride thinks. And for all we know, Kristoph is having the same qualms about satisfying his Human wife.

Of course, Hillary isn’t present in the Bath House.

The Bath House was a strictly female establishment, and Hillary wasn’t strictly a female.

But she is present later, helping Marion through the night. One or two readers thought there was a lesbian element to Lily and Hillary keeping her company, to say nothing of the Bath House scene. Honestly, people, there was nothing of the sort. Don’t get over-excited. All this story really conveys is the whole nervous the night before the wedding motif. That’s all.

Alliance of Unity II - Pazzione Gallifreya is the third wedding ceremony story I have written with the same title. The first was a Theta Sigma story in which Chrístõ devises a short form of the Alliance and marries his four friends, Cassie and Terry, Bo and Sammie, in the cloister room of his TARDIS. The second was Rose and the Ninth Doctor’s wedding, which was the first to include a detailed account of the running order of the ceremony. I also did Jackie Tyler marrying Christopher, the Ninth Doctor’s son, which went over some of the same territory, and in the far future there will have to be a major event when Chrístõ marries Julia in the Panoticon. That will be a real big story, but quite how I make it different from this one, I am not quite sure, yet. I still have a year or two to think about it.

But Marion’s Alliance had to be pure romance, pure beauty and perfection from start to finish. There was no doubt about it. I think I might have stated it before, but for me the most fabulous looking wedding is the one in The Sound of Music when Maria finally gets her Captain. The wedding dress worn by Julie Andrews in that scene is absolutely divine and Captain Von Trapp in his dress uniform and his medals is the perfect groom. And of course, he has an archbishop to conduct the wedding. What could be more perfect? Only a dress laden with diamonds and a groom dressed in the full regalia of a Time Lord, a Panopticon covered in silver rose petals and the Lord High President himself to conduct the ceremony!

Lily as Marion’s ‘mother’ pledging her loyalty to Kristoph’s House was a late touch, but I think it perfectly fitted. Lily has been a mother figure to Marion, despite one being Kristoph’s sweetheart herself. It felt right.

Oriana being prevented from making a fuss in the ceremony by Thedera and Aineytta is a small moment of humour and a variation on that ‘stopping the ceremony’ moment that has never really been done as well as it was done in Jane Eyre. Every time it has been done since in fiction it has been just a pastiche of that scene.

Calliope catching the bouquet, of course, is a presage of a future romance! Watch out for that.

And so to the honeymoon, which I wanted to make as romantic and as sensual as possible without being prurient. And I hit on the perfect analogy with which to cover the moment of the consummation of the Alliance of Marion and Kristoph.

“Look at the sky. In a few minutes the moon, Pazithi Gallifreya will be eclipsed by the shadow of the planet. It happens once every ten years. All over this hemisphere of Gallifrey amateur and professional astronomers are waiting in anticipation of a very beautiful and natural event. And you and I are going to experience something beautiful and natural, too. Just look at the moon, Marion, my love, bathe in her light as she, too, prepares for her wedding night.”

Can anyone else think of a better way to describe a man making love to his wife for the first time without actually describing sex? If so, I’ll keep it for when Chrístõ and Julia have their wedding night.