The X-Men Just Had Marvel’s Strangest Wedding Ever

Warning: spoilers for Excalibur #14 below!

Marvel’s mutants have a very rocky history with weddings, but the X-Men have just set the record for the most bizarre marriage ceremony in Marvel’s pages to date. Some of Marvel’s marriages have made perfect sense, like Spider-Man and Mary Jane’s, or Hulkling and Wiccan’s. Some have been disasters, like the notoriously botched union between Kitty Pryde and Colossus in 2018. But the couple in Excalibur #14 is so unexpected and new that it’s too early to say what they’re even like together. Still, it’s fortunate for the groom, because the alternative would have been getting cut in half.

Excalibur #14 is written by Tini Howard with art by Phil Noto and lettering by Ariana Maher. The issue is chapter 15 of the epic “X of Swords” crossover event, which billed X-Men heroes in duels to the death against the mysterious warriors of Arakko, whose leader wants to invade and conquer Earth. This week’s chapters – Marauders #15, Excalibur #14, and Wolverine #7 – finally kick off the battles, but they’re much stranger than anyone expected.

The most long-shot combatant by far is Cypher, the New Mutants hero whose power is understanding any language. While he gets a power boost from a shape-shifting alien that acts as his sword, the X-Men are facing incredibly powerful mutants descended from Apocalypse himself, so even his best friends thought there was no hope of him winning a battle. He was matched up against Bei the Blood Moon, a masked warrior woman whose powers and character have remained a mystery until this issue.

But X of Swords isn’t interested in honoring expectations. Cypher and Bei get dragged off to separate chambers, where Cypher puzzles over Bei’s voice. Because Bei has a Black Bolt-like ability to destroy everything around her with a single word, she speaks in psychic waves rather than words. Since those words aren’t a language, they confuse Cypher’s power, rendering him the only person who can’t understand her and her the only person he can’t understand. Before he can get to the bottom of that mystery, and possibly save his life before he fights a foe who disables his power, he’s dressed up in a white poncho and flower crown and shoved off to the match. That’s when he discovers that this matchup is a matchup – he and Bei aren’t battlers, but betrothed.

This is an awkward proposition starting off, but both contestants catch on quickly. Bei finds Cypher more than worthy to be her beloved, pledging to fight for him “like the force of the wave that swallows the shore.” The X-Men hero finds her fascinating and confounding enough to agree, only to discover she’s gorgeous under her mask. In true superhero tradition, the ceremony is cut off as soon as they’re wed by a battle with a dragon. But Bei doesn’t leap into the fray until after she passionately kisses the groom.

This “X of Swords” duel is, notably, the only match between the X-Men and Arakko that the X-Men haven’t lost so far. The wedding was ruled a victory for both teams, giving both a point. This also seems to be the only one of these nonsense tournament contests that has significance. If the X-Men are to win this seemingly rigged tournament, a peaceful union between the mutant teams might be their only chance.

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