“Life was rich and full. She couldn't have asked for more.Well... actually... she amended with a little inner flinch, she could have.Though most of the time she looked at Adam and just felt awed and humbled that this big, wonderful man had given up so much to love her, sometimes she hated that he didn't have a soul, and sometimes she wanted to hate God.And she had a dream, a silly dream perhaps, but a dream to which she clung.They would live to be a hundred, until long after their children and grandchildren were grown, and one day they would go to bed and lie down facing each other, and die like that, at the same moment, in each other's arms.And this was her dream: that maybe, just maybe, if she loved him hard enough and true enough and deep enough, and if she held on to him tightly enough as they died, she could take him with her wherever it was that souls went.And there she would do what was in her blood, what she now knew she'd been born for; she would stand before God, a brehon, and she would argue the greatest, the most important case of her life.And she would win.”

“In her dreams the Hawk would be waiting for her by the sea's edge; her kilt-clad, magnificent Scottish laird. He would smile and his eyes would crinkle, then turn dark withsmoldering passion.She would take his hand and lay it gently on her swelling abdomen, and his face would blaze with happiness andpride. Then he would take her gently, there on the cliff's edge, in tempo with the pounding of the ocean. He wouldmake fierce and possessive love to her and she would hold on to him as tightly as she could. But before dawn, he would melt right through her fingers. And she would wake up, her cheeks wet with tears and her hands clutching nothing but a bit of quilt or pillow.”

“Although Jillian had known what Grimm was before that moment, she was briefly immobilized by the sight of him. It was one thing to know that the man she loved was a Berserker-it was another thing entirely to behold it. He regarded her with such an inhuman expression that if she hadn't peered deep into his eyes, she might have seen nothing of Grimm at all. But there, deep in the flickering blue flames, she glimpsed such love that it rocked her soul. She smiled up at him through her tears.A wounded sound of disbelief escaped him.Jillian gave him the most dazzling smile she could muster and placed her fist to her heart. "And the daughter wed the lion king," she said clearly.An expression of incredulity crossed the warrior's face. His blue eyes widened and he stared at her in stunned silence."I love you, Gavrael McIllioch."When he smiled, his face blazed with love. He tossed his head back and shouted his joy to the sky.”

“She'd assumed she'd be married and have kids by this age, that she would be grooming her own daughter for this, as her friends were doing. She wanted it so much she would dream about it sometimes, and then she would wake up with the skin at her wrists and neck red from the scratchy lace of the wedding gown she'd dreamed of wearing. But she'd never felt anything for the men she'd dated, nothing beyond her own desperation. And her desire to marry wasn't strong enough, would never be strong enough, to allow her to marry a man she didn't love.”

“She glanced rapidly between them, blinking and hoping her double vision would go away. They were glaring at each other. Would they fight? If she saw her own double she probably be tempted to punch it once or twice. Especially today. For being so stupid.”

“Her eyes narrowed, and her lips parted around a knowing laugh. "Oh. It's you.""Pardon?" He was taken aback. "Do we know each other, lass?" He was quite certain they didn't; he could never haveforgotten this woman. The enticing manner in which her lips were currently pursed would have been seared into hismemory."The answer is no. I don't know you. But every other woman in this room does. Duncan Douglas, isn't it?" she said dryly.Duncan studied her face. Although she was young-perhaps no more than twenty-she had a regal bearing beyond her years. "I do have some reputation with the lasses," he conceded, downplaying his prowess, confident of her impending maidenly swoon.The look she gave him was far from admiring. He did a double take when he realized her gaze was downright disparaging."Not something I care for in a man," she said coolly. "Thank you for your offer, but I'd sooner dance with last week's rushes. They would be less used. Who wants what everyone else has already had?" The words were deliveredin a cool, modulated tone, shaped by an odd accent he couldn't place. Quite finished with him, she presented herback and resumed talking to her companion.Duncan was immobilized by shock.”

“She wondered whether there would ever come an hour in her life when she didn't think of him -- didn't speak to him in her head, didn't relive every moment they'd been together, didn't long for his voice and his hands and his love. She had never dreamed of what it would feel like to love someone so much; of all the things that had astonished her in her adventures, that was what astonished her the most. She thought the tenderness it left in her heart was like a bruise that would never go away, but she would cherish it forever.”