"Famine ravaged my village when I was sixteen," she said softly. "There was no work, and when the crops failed, the youngest and the oldest began dying. Then the Lady of Sherwood sent her men to collect the youngest and prettiest girls and bring them to the castle. When she chose me to serve as her maid, I thought I had saved my family. I did not know what she was, or what she meant to do with me."

"I remember you." He smiled when she stared at him. "I served the lady as her fool."

"That was you?" She took a step back and looked all over him. "Oh, my God. It was."

"The last time I saw you in your human life was the morning you were taken down into the dungeons. Like the other girls, you never came back." He hung his head. "When my turn came, do you know I fought him? Valiantly, I might add. Three days later I dug myself out of the ground. I went at once to the lady, to warn her that she had imprisoned a monster in her dungeons. I was a consummate fool, you see."

Her face turned wooden. "How did you escape Sherwood?"

"Farlae," Rainer said. "He came to make a gown for the lady, and he took a fancy to me. She agreed to let him have me in exchange for a new wardrobe. The bitch traded me for a handful of gowns and petticoats. How did you attain your freedom?"

"I helped him escape her." Viviana raised the dagger, and then offered it to him. Her hand shook so much it appeared as if she were waving it at him. "Will you do it?"

He looked down at her steadily. "Let me fetch another one, and we can kill each other." He lowered his voice to a whisper.

"Imagine the fun. Harlech and Farlae will go mad, thinking that we were secret lovers who chose death over them. They would never recover from it."

The dagger slipped from Viviana's hand, and she fell against him, sobbing. He held her with his one good arm, and let his own tears run from his cheeks to her hair.

The sound of wings drew his gaze upward, and he watched a flock of birds flying across the lake as they made their way south.

There, he knew, they would stay until the ice and snow in the northern country melted and it was safe for them to return.

"Viviana." He drew back and took her hand in his. "I think I know another way."

Alex's chills subsided as soon Michael made Nottingham leave the ball, although it took a few minutes for the numbness to recede from her hands and feet.

"That feels better," she told him as he chafed her hands between his. "Nothing quite like vampire-induced hypothermia." She smiled up at Phillipe, who offered her a mug of steaming mulled bloodwine. "This won't make me puke, I hope. I'm wearing white. You'll never get the stains out."

"Try a sip first," he suggested.

Alex did, and the hot, spiced wine covered the taste of the blood that had been mixed in with it. When her stomach didn't reject it, she sighed. "Better. Thanks, Phil."

"I looked for an electric blanket," the seneschal told her, "but all I could borrow was this." He held up a small heating pad covered with short, tawny hairs. "Lady Harris brought her favorite terrier with her, and it seems that Sookie dislikes sleeping on stone floors."

Alex almost choked. "Sookie? Who names something they like Sookie? Isn't that the word you use to call pigs?"

Michael leaned close. "Would you like to know what Lady Harris calls Lord Harris in private?"

"How would you know that?" When he only gave her an enigmatic smirk, she shook her head. "Never mind. So what turned on Nottingham's ice machine? Robin breathe on him?"

"I gather he did not care for Scarlet's ballad," Michael guessed. "No doubt he has listened to gossip and discovered that Locksley was once an outlaw. Robin has had a difficult time gaining acceptance among the European Kyn."

"Ex-cons are hard to trust," Alex said, nodding. "Was the song true? Did Rob break up his girlfriend's marriage?"

"Some say Marian did come to Robin to beg him help her flee before she was made to marry Guisbourne," Michael said.

"Others claim that he kidnapped her."

"The king wasn't too thrilled about all this, I take it."

"Marian's father paid the king a handsome amount of gold to approve the match," Michael said. "Robin had titles and land, but no money. There was no contest."

"So you had lobbyists screwing up your government, too. Interesting." Alex finished the mulled wine and set the mug on the table. "Robin got Marian to the convent, right? How did she die?"

"Guisbourne killed her."

Alex looked over her shoulder at Scarlet. "Well, that wasn't in the song."

"He didn't run her through with his sword, my lady. He used other, more brutal means to end her life." Scarlet knelt down beside her. "Guisbourne forced himself on her. He wished to disgrace her and shame her into marrying him."

"It was common practice in our time, I fear," Michael said. "Marriages that had not been consummated were easier to prevent or annul. Few women went to the altar virgins."

"Possession being nine-tenths of the law, I suppose." Alex glanced at Scarlet. "It gets worse, right?"

"When Lord Robin delivered Lady Marian to the convent, she was with child." Scarlet ducked his head. "She never told him or anyone; perhaps she had hoped to conceal it. As soon as my lord returned from the Holy Land, he went to the convent to retrieve her. The nuns could offer him only dreadful news: Both Lady Marian and her baby died during the birthing."

"Poor girl." Alex recalled all the happy endings she had seen for different movies about the star-crossed lovers. "Robin must have felt like everything he'd done was for nothing."

"He gave her freedom from Guisbourne, who would have made her life a living hell," Scarlet said softly. "It did not matter what it cost him. My master would have moved heaven and earth for Lady Marian." He rose, bowed, and retreated.

"I hate unrequited love stories. They always sound like something Nicholas Sparks would write." Alex got up and sat on Michael's lap. "How about you cheer me up?"

Amber sparkled around the edges of Michael's turquoise eyes. "Is that a personal proposition, my lady?"

"I could do a little lap dance for you," she mused, "but Mom told me that kind of thing was unladylike."

"You have often said that you are not a lady." Michael kissed her temple. "So you have not grown weary of my attentions?"

She knew what he wasn't saying. Since they'd come to the Realm they hadn't had sex. It wasn't exactly unusual for them- being seigneur often kept Michael too busy to have time for fun-but after the almost continuous sex they'd been having since she'd gotten back from Ireland, it seemed off.

No, Alex thought. I haven't had sex with him since the dreams started. In fact, she had gone out of her way once or twice to avoid having sex with Michael.

Avoiding having sex with the best lover she had ever known. She was losing her mind."Alex?" He turned her face toward him. "You do look tired. Shall we go?"

"Yeah." She looked over his shoulder and saw Jayr practically running across the room. The seneschal's face looked hot, and her sleeve had been ripped at the shoulder. "Ah, no. I'll be right back." She stood and went to intercept Jayr.

Nottingham's seneschal stepped into her path. "My lady, may I have the pleasure?" He held out his hand and gave her a modest smile. "I should warn you that I am the finest dancer in all of Florence."

"Maybe another time." Alex went around him and ran.

As soon as the seneschal saw Alex coming after her, she turned around and came to her. "Doctor, something is wrong." She grabbed Alex's arm and pulled her to a secluded corner. "This potion you put into my veins... I fear it is poisoning me. Or perhaps driving me mad. I must have an antidote."

"There's a big difference between being poisoned and having a psychotic break," Alex said, feeling a small, ugly stab of pain behind her eyes. "Calm down and tell me what happened."

"I do not know." She propped her hands against the walls. "I am hot, and then I am cold. My skin wants to peel itself from my body. I cannot even bathe without... I feel strange things."

"I did warn you that your feelings might change," Alex had to point out.

... burn...

"My feelings?" Jayr echoed incredulously. "My body has developed a mind of its own. I scarcely know what I will do from one moment to the next. I gave him leave to do anything to me. I kissed him, as if it were nothing. I cannot stop sweating. My hands tremble so that I cannot grasp a weapon. What has any of that to do with my feelings?"

... burn the...

"Back up." Alex took hold of her wrist, focusing on the girl instead of the pain hammering on the inside of her skull. "You kissed who as if it were nothing?"

"My lord Byrne." Jayr squeezed her eyes shut for a moment. "It was utterly humiliating."

... no, not here...

"I don't see why," Alex said, gasping a little as the pain switched off and the disjointed thoughts ended. "He's the one you're doing this for, isn't he?" She closed Jayr's open mouth with one finger to the chin. "You've been very cagey, kid, but yesterday was not my birthday."

"I am my lord's servant," Jayr said. "It is wrong of me to feel as I do. To act as I did."

"Oh, bullshit." Alex lowered her voice. "Honey, I'm sure it was no hardship for him to be kissed by you. All you have to do is see you two together. It's pretty obvious."

Fear joined the anger in her eyes. "You know nothing about me or him."

"So I know nothing." Alex had embraced denial often enough to give Jayr time to cling to hers. "Anything else you want to bitch about?"

"Only that I asked you to help me change my body," Jayr said through gritted teeth. "Not destroy my life.""Let see if I've got this straight," Alex said, ticking off what she said next on her fingers. "You're experiencing unreasonable irritability, body temperature fluctuations, impulsivity, and unusual sensory reactions, and all that is resulting in unfamiliar behavior. Plus you got to kiss your boss. That cover all the bases?"

"Yes," Jayr all but shouted. She pressed her hand to her mouth, dropped it, and murmured, "You see? This drug is poison."

Alex shook her head. "No. The anger and confusion, the weird urges, the boss kissing, all classic signs of late-stage puberty.

You're not dying, sweetheart, and you're not poisoned. You're becoming a teenager."

Jayr's fingers curled into fists. "I am seven hundred and ten years old, Doctor."

"Chronologically speaking, yes, you are. But physically?" She lifted her shoulders. "Your body has just found out that it's seventeen, and it's throwing a party."

Jayr looked at her boots. "What more will happen to me?"

"The physical changes are the next stage," she assured the seneschal. "Judging by how fast you're metabolizing and responding to the synthetic gonadotropin, it won't take long for the hormone fairy to drop the main shipment. Expect incoming breasts, hips, and curly hair growing in very inconvenient places."

"I meant my mind." Her eyes flashed up. "Will the drug affect my reasoning, my judgment? Would I wish to harm him? Would I try?"

"Jayr, oh, God, no. It isn't going to be like that." Alex tried to put an arm around her, but the seneschal backed away. "If anything you'll fuss more over him and want to be with him all the time. You'll be miserable when you're not, and you won't be able to stop thinking about him until you're together again. You'll dream about him and being with him." She saw Michael approaching, and reality dwindled for a moment as several things clicked into place. "The dreams will be really hot."

"That is all I can have," she heard Jayr say. "Dreams." The seneschal stalked off.

Michael took her hand in his when he reached her. "Why was Jayr shouting at you?"

"Because I deserved it." Alex reached up to give him a quick kiss. "Listen, handsome, I've got to head over to the infirmary and check something out. I'll meet you in the room later."

She hurried off before he could reply.

Byrne tracked Jayr as she made her way from the ball to her chambers, but kept enough distance between them so that she did not detect his presence. He would not frighten her again, but he would explain himself and make peace with her.

And he would, as soon as he worked out why he had kissed her.

Jayr's path ended at her rooms, and there Byrne hovered, unsure of what to do next. He knew he had shocked her by seizing her as if she were human and making free with her body. His apology had been as pathetic as taking advantage of her oath. No, he should go, forget what had happened and act as if it never had. As bruised as her dignity was, she would surely do the same.

It could not happen again. He would keep his hands away from her. He would respect her value to him and his household. He would resist his desires.

He would not kick in her door and seize her so he could kiss her again.

Byrne listened for several minutes, but heard nothing from inside the room that indicated what Jayr was doing. She rarely took time for herself and never took her rest before attending to him. He tried the door and found that it was not latched, and opened it to a small gap to see inside.

Jayr stood in front of the rectangular looking glass on her wall, her back to him, her tunic gone. She turned slightly right, then left, tucking in her chin, studying her breasts.

Byrne's hand slipped from the latch as he looked at the reflection she made. Her breasts were not like most women's, as they had no weight or fullness to them, but they were no longer completely flat, as some assumed. Gentle swells, they rose slightly around her small, flat nipples. Her shirts and tunics completely covered them, and they were what made her seem fashioned like a man.

Above one nipple lay the blurred, raised birthmark he had once heard her call her heart scar. It was the color of blooming heather, the same color her eyes sometimes flashed. He sometimes caught tantalizing glimpses of it when her collar fell open.

He knew how Jayr despised how she was made, and wondered why he did not feel the same. During his human life he had always favored big, buxom women, mostly because they were built to take large, heavy men with relative ease. Thin, delicate women were more fragile, and the thought of accidentally hurting them unmanned him. Becoming Kyn made it only more necessary to avoid them.

Then, too, they reminded him too much of Jayr.

Byrne realized that he didn't care that Jayr's hips didn't flare out or that her breasts were barely noticeable. Compared to the other women he had known, Jayr seemed almost exotic, like a gazelle among bovines. His hands still itched to caress the long lines of her pale neck and back. Among other things.

Byrne's gaze followed the long, gentle curve of her spine down to her bottom. The new trousers she wore were not as loose as most she owned, and lovingly hugged the slim curves of her hips.

The imprint of the velvet whispered its memory against his palms. He had put his hands on her buttocks at some point during the kiss. He was almost sure he had squeezed them.

Her skin was very soft there, he knew from the only other time he had held her so. That day she had worn a full skirt, and he had reached under it to discover only a thin pair of drawers between him and her flesh. He had used the split in the crotch to tear them away from her.

Before he had lifted her up.

Before he had brought her sex to his mouth.

Before he had kissed her there.

A low, wounded sound dragged his attention back to Jayr. Both of her hands pressed over her chest, covering it now, and she was staring higher, at the reflection of the door.

She could see him watching her.

Byrne closed the door soundlessly and slumped back against the wall beside it, breathing in deeply to clear his head. He had taken her once, and had sworn never to force himself on her again. She trusted him to keep his word to her.

But nothing could drive him away from her chamber, not even the shame of knowing he would give up his last coin to go inside and lie with her again.

Byrne slid down, sitting at her threshold as she so often had his, feeling the chains of time tightening around him. If he could not tear himself away from her now, how was he to leave her behind?He could take her with him, he reasoned. She was sworn to him, not the Realm. She would stay with him and keep him from dying of loneliness. If he was patient-if he took time to court her, prepare her-they could be more than master and seneschal. She had told him that she was his to do with as he willed. He had only to make her want such a thing.

And the day would come when something went wrong, when some impossible turn of luck smashed through the fortress of his control, and Jayr would be the only living thing near him. The only life upon which his affliction could feed.