“It is not safe for a woman to be traveling on her own.""I was perfectly safe until you crossed my path.""Well may you see it that way,but if I hadn't come along,someone else would have and you could be in great difficulty right now."If she hadn't known it would hurt, she might have laughed. As it was, she had to content herself with a grimace. "Oh, you mean I could have been chased over a cliff?”

“You are the third bride wed for peace," Cymbra said with a smile. "And to be frank, it has not been an easy road for the two of us who went before. Yet knowing what we do now, neither Krysta nor I would ever have chosen a different path.""How much choice did you have?"To Rycca's surprise, Cymbra laughed. "In my case, none." She sighed in mocking languor. "I still remember Wolf's deeply romantic proposal. He told me that if I did not wed him, he would kill my brother.""He what?""Oh,don't worry, he's gotten much better." She laughed again, fondly. "Much, much better.Besides, Dragon is the one who was always good with women."Rycca could not dispute that but neither could she ignore what she had just been told.Shocked, she asked, "What did you do?""Do? Why,I punched him,of course. What else could I do? He went to our wedding worried that the blow still showed.""You...punched him?" The ethereal beauty beside her had struck the fierce Wolf?"Rycca,dear sister, something you must learn at once.Wolf and Dragon are both wonderful men but they are also overwhelming. It is part of their charm. Nontheless,with them it is always best to be firm. For that matter, the same can be said of my brother, as Krysta learned readily enough.""She and Lord Hawk seem devoted to each other.""As are Wold and I. That doesn't mean one should be a meek little woman rubbing feet.""What a horrible notion! However did you think of it?""Oh,didn't you know? That's the kind of wife Dragon always said he wanted."Too many more shocks of this sort and she was going to turn to stone right where she stood. "He said that? Whatever could he have been thinking? Any such woman would drive him mad.""Which is more or less what Wolf told him, only he said she would kill him with boredom. No, Dragon needs someone who can match his spirit, which I am now reassured you can do. Come, let us seek out Magda, who will serve us cool milk and cakes and give us a snug place to talk while the men amuse themselves.""Dragon has a sword for his brother.""The Moorish sword? Perfect, they will be occupied for hours.We won't see them again until they are satisfied neither is stronger or more agile than the other.”

“Don't you think Rycca would like to hear about Hadding, the warrior Odin rescued from his enemies? Indeed, so would I for as I recall, the last time I asked about him, you told the story in great haste without the scantiest details." There was a gleam in her eyes that Rycca had come to understand meant she was up to something, but she had no idea what might lurk behind so seemingly innocent a suggestion.Dragon grinned and looked at his brother, who leaned back in his chair and laughed. When Rycca appeared puzzled, Cymbra said, "I confess, when I noticed how attentive you are to Dragon's stories I was reminded of myself. At Wolf's and my wedding feast, I persuaded Dragon to tell a great many tales. He was the soul of patience.""He was?" Wolf interjected. "I was the one with the patience. My dear brother knew perfectly well I was sitting there contemplating various possibilities for doing away with him and he enjoyed every moment of it.""Now how could I have known that, brother?" Dragon challenged. "Just because the wine goblet you were holding was twisted into a very odd shape?""It was that or your neck, brother," Wolf replied pleasantly. He looked at Rycca reassuringly. "Don't worry, if I hadn't already forgiven him, that sword he gave me would force me to.""It is a magnificent blade," Dragon agreed. "They both are. Every smithy in Christendom is trying to work out what the Moors are doing but...""It's got something to do with the temperature of the steel," Wolf said."And with the folding. They fold more than we do, possibly hundreds of times.""Hundreds,really? Then the temperature has to be very high or they couldn't pound that thin. I wonder how much carbon they're adding-"Cymbra sighed. To Rycca, she said, "We might as well retire.They can talk about this for hours."Wolf heard her and laughed. He draped an arm over her chair, pulling her closer. Into her ear, he said something that made the redoubtable Cymbra blush.She cleared her throat. "Oh, well, in that case, you might as well retire, too." Standing up quickly, she took her husband's rugged hand in her much smaller and fairer one. "Good night, Rycca, good night, Dragon. Sleep well." This last was said over her shoulder as she tugged Wolf from the hall.Her obvious intent startled Rycca, who even now could not think herself as being so bold, but it made both the Hakonson brothers laugh."As you may gather," Dragon said in the aftermath of the couple's departure, "my brother and his wife are happily wed.”

“For once in her life, the thought of being on the back of a magnificent horse did not command Rycca's attention. She was far too busy looking at her magnicifent husband as he removed his sword belt and blithely shucked off his trousers. Naked, he walked straight into the pool, submerged completely, and came up a few minutes later, tossing streams of water from the thick mane of his hair."Hand me the soap,would you?"Such a simple task, yet to fulfill it he would have to come closer.Or she would."That's a lovely gown," he said, smiling."All my gowns are lovely thanks to the Lady Krysta and your own generosity.""It would be a shame to get it wet."She looked at him in alarm, wondering if he would actually do such a thing. His answer was a look of pure innocence, which immediately confirmed her suspicions."Do you have any idea how any women must have labored so long to make this gown?""No,do you?""Well,no,not actually because I never had a gown like this before, but even so, surely you wouldn't do anything to damage it?""Just to be safe,why don't you take it off?"Oh,yes,that would certainly be safe. Indeed,never was she any safer than when was she naked and in his arms. Except, of course, from the danger of her own emotions."I bathed when I awoke.""The day is warm.""The pool looks deep.Recall, I cannot swim.""Recall I mean to teach you.”

“Their gazes locked,he said,"I made a mistake.""Confusing your wife with a goat?"What was that he had thought about the difficulty of having a wife who was a truthsayer?He took a breath,let it out slowly, and sent with it a prayer. "There was a time-a brief time-when I considered you might be guilty."Truth.Rycca smiled. She freed her hands, cupped them to his face,and rose on her toes to touch her mouth to his."What is that for?" he asked, caught between relief and bewilderment. Likely she would always keep him so off balance and likely he would always be glad of it for truly fortune smiled upon him. A great knot seemed to be untangling in his chest."For believing me.""I only briefly didn't," he repeated."No,I mean for believing I am a truthsayer.""And you know that because-"She laughed and took his hand again. "Because you are a wise and canny man, Lord Dragon. You could as easily have insisted you never even flirted with the thought that I might be guilty and thereby saved yourself what must surely have been an uneasy moment for a husband."He was slightly stung but not too much, for her ready forgiveness was as a balm over all else. "Generally speaking, I do tell the truth for its own sake.""I never thought otherwise. And I would be as truthful with you. Last night, I realized suddenly that I was not afraid. All things considered, that was rather ridiculous but it was how I felt nonetheless."The knot was definitely gone. Indeed, a great warmth seemd to suffuse him. If a woman who had every reason to fear Vikings could be tied to a punishment post by her own Viking husband and not be afraid, that could mean only one thing."You trust me.""And you trust me."At that moment, looking down at her, his face held nothing of the mighty warrior and jarl. He looked instead like a boy handed the world. She wanted only to give it to him again and again."I would say," Rycca murmured, "that for a rocky beginning, we are managing well enough."It was an incongruously happy note upon which to discuss a dead man.”

“You want to control me.” She spoke dispassionately as though observing the plight of another woman far distant from herself. Dragon looked up, surprised. “You are my wife.”“Say rather possession for so do you think, do you not?”He shrugged, wondering why she stated the obvious. “All wives belong to their husbands.”“I wanted to be free.”His eyes darkened. There was greater challenge here than even he had thought. “You wanted to be safe from Wolscroft and the rest of them, even from me when you though misguidedly. That is why you fled.”She shook her head. “Oh, no, safety was a convent from which not even my father could have forced me. But it was not to one such that I fled, was it? I wanted freedom, and having tasted it, however briefly, I want it still.”His hands tightened on her, driven by the sudden, piercing pain her words brought. Did she think to leave him again? To flee as she had done and leave him once more bereft. No, by heaven, she would not! “No one is free,” he said fiercely. “We are all enmeshed in duty and responsibility.”“Your duty is of your own choosing, for you did not return here after many years away and willingly take up your inheritance. Your destiny is of your own making and you the master of it as much as any man can claim to be. I want the same myself, no more, less.”“But you are a woman . . .” His bewilderment was genuine. Such yearnings as she described belonged to the realm of men. Women were for hearth and home, the nurturing of children, such ordered security of days as could be wrested from uncertain fate. A man in the thick of battle, in the fury of adventure, in the depths of night had to be able to count on that, for without it, of what purpose was anything?“You are a woman,” he repeated firmly. “And my wife. You have been too long apart from womanly ways with no proper influence to guide you. I applaud your strength and your courage; both will breed true in my sons, but—”“Your sons? Your sons? They will be my sons, Lord Vanity, and my daughters as well, mayhap only daughters, for by heaven it would suit me to thwart you so!”

“Lord,I love you truly with all my heart. Every moment with you is precious to me but I would give up even that if it meant peace between our peoples. Nothing else can be allowed to matter so much as that."Dragon did not reply. He was staring at her very oddly. Of the others, she had no awareness at all. Only he existed for her just then.She felt as though there was no ground beneath her but this time instead of falling as she had off the cliff, she soared frantically, desperately,not knowing if at any moment gravity might reclaim her but soaring all the same."What did you say?" he demanded."Nothing else can be allowed to matter so much as the peace between our peoples! I understand full well how angry you are. The insult done you was profound,but I beg you,think of what you do.Do you go against my father,he wins!"Slowly,Dragon shook his head as though trying to clear it. His gaze locked on Rycca's like a man holding fast to the rudder in a mighty storm. A dull flush crept over his high-boned cheeks. "Insult? You think I want to kill your father because he insulted me? For pity's sake, woman, I damn near lost you! Don't you have any idea what that means to me?"Her eyes widened, never leaving him as he stalked across the stone floor of the Saxon's king's great hall and took firm hold of her by her shoulders. He dragged her up against him even as he near yelled, "Dammit to hell, woman, I love you! What care I for insults? Nothing matters to me save keeping you safe and-""Love?" Rycca repeated in a daze."Loki take you, lady, you are not the easiet woman in the world to get along with, you know! You are strong, spirited, stubborn, not a meek bone in your body! Your body...Never mind that, the point is you have stolen into my heart and I lack any will to get you out, so do not dare you think of dying! I absolutely forbid it! Did you say you love me?"Oh,my,Rycca thought, she truly did have wings after all.Strong, sturdy wings that would carry her as high as she wanted to climb. And that was very high indeed.A smile crept over her clear to her toes.She cupped her husband's face between her hands and took his mouth with hers.Well and thoroughly did she kiss him right there in front of everyone. That took some time, and when she was done she was rather breathless. Yet she managed to say, "I love you, lord.More than life,more even than freedom.You are dearest to me above all."And for just a moment, there in the hall of the king,Rycca of Landsende saw the sheen of tears in her Viking's eyes.”