When his choking fit was over, he let his gaze travel over her, intimately, and he told her, "Too

aggressive? There is no such thing in loveplay." "Then you are not upset with me?" "My warrior princess, I think I have died and gone to Viking heaven." Tyra exulted that she could affect a man so... nay, that she could affectthis man so. She felt as if she'd crossed some important line in her life, and not only because of the incredible pleasure she'd just experienced at Adam's wicked fingers. She fought through the fuzziness in her brain to understand just what it was.

Pactor no pact, Iam going to make love with this man.

He still held her hand and stared at her, as if understanding her inner turmoil. Perhaps it was an important step for him, too. As the effects of the ale began to wear off, she hitched her bodice up till she was decent. She prayed that sanity would return... not so that she could change her mind... just long enough for her to understand the implications of this momentous decision.

"Tyra?" Adam inquired.

"If I do this thing..."

"If...?"

She smiled at the distress in his voice. "After the taste of loveplay you have given me, I would be a fool

not to want to sample the full meal. But I am not an impetuous person. I need to think things out. To

study-" "Oh, nay, nay, nay! The worst thing you can do when in a l.u.s.tsome mood is to think. Thinking is a sure l.u.s.t killer."

She smiled at him. "Are you saying I am l.u.s.tsome?"

"Hah! If you or I were any more l.u.s.tsome, we would be drooling."

"What I'm trying to say is you have convinced me to make love with you, but there still must be some

rules."

"Rules?" He groaned.

"Just because I choose to couple with you does not mean I consent to marriage."

Adam turned three shades of purple before he said, very carefully, "I do not recall bringing up marriage. Not even once. And, really, Tyra, men are the ones who are supposed to fear that dreaded word, not women."

"I am not like other women. You already know that." "So, aside from scratching your crotch and spitting, you have other masculine traits... such as aversion to marriage?" She could tell he was trying to make light of what she considered a very serious subject. "You already know that I am being pushed from all directions to wed. Well, you will be subject to the same pressures if anyone suspects our naked bodies have touched."

"Naked bodies?" He grinned at her.

"Do not try to change the subject."

"All right, so we must be secretive. And we must avoid pressure to wed. Agreed. Any other rules?"

She nodded. "I intend to leave Stoneheim soon... definitely within the next month. I cannot wait till the

fjords freeze over. Then it will be too late."

"To Byzantium?"

"Yea, it is the best thing for me. My mind is made up, regardless of my father's fate. Rafn is ready to step

into his shoes if the worst should happen."

"I cannot say that I approve. It seems a hard life for a woman." He raised his hands in surrender when he

saw she was about to protest his characterization of females as being softer than males. "But if that is what you want, that is your decision."

"Will you be leaving Stoneheim, or will you stay the winter?"

"Hah! I'm not staying here if you aren't. Actually, no offense intended, but even if you are, I have no

intention of wintering in this land of ice."

"Perhaps you could travel partway with me... you and Rashid. He speaks often of a yearning to return to the warmer clime of his homeland."

Adam shook his head. "Nay. Rashid might go with you, but I am for England. The only home I have is

there."

"One last thing," she said, and took a deep breath for nerve. "If there should be a babe, you give up all

rights."

He dropped her hand and stared at her incredulously. "Nay!"

At first she was not sure she'd heard him right. "Nay?"

He stood and glared down at her. "You heard me. Nay! My lady, you offend me deeply. How could

you think that I would abandon my child?"

She tilted her head and studied him as he clenched and unclenched his fists with anger.

"My sister Adela and I never knew our father. We were adopted by Sehk and Rain, who opened an orphanstead in Jorvik. I saw over and over what the lack of a father does to a child. That will never happen to mine. Never!"

"But, Adam, you are not making sense. You have said you do not want to wed."

"I don't." He gave her a direct look, which carried some hidden meaning.

When understanding seeped into her brain, she stood, too. "You would take my child from me?"

"I would. An unwed mother who fights for a living? Please, Tyra, even you must see how unsuitable that would be."

"You think I would be an unfit mother?" All her life, Tyra had been subjected to criticism. She was too big. Too rough. Too unattractive. But this was the harshest blow to her pride she'd ever been dealt. It struck at the very heart of her.

"That is not what I said." He tried to take her hand, but she shoved him away, so hard he almost tripped against the chair and only righted himself at the last minute. "Tyra, there are ways to avoid having children."

"There are?" Now, that was a surprise. Why did men and women, especially those with more offspring than they could feed, not practice these "ways."

He nodded. "They are not foolproof, of course."

"Aahhh!" she said. "So, in the end, making love is still a game of chance for the woman. In the end, your seed could take hold in my womb?"

He hesitated, then nodded.

"And you would take that fruit from me?"

"If you are serving in the b.l.o.o.d.y Varangian Guard, yea, I would." He was as angry as she was now.

She shook her head sadly at him. "Leave my presence now, Saxon, afore I run you through with my dagger." And she meant it, too.

He stared at her for a long moment, anger and sadness warring on his face. Then he turned and walked away.

Tyra should have been happy to know that she had just escaped what might have been the biggest mistake of her life. Why, then, were tears streaming down her face?

Adam tossed and turned for many hours. 'Twas not the way he had expected to spend his night.

He lay restless in his comfortable alcove bed while Rashid snored away on the other side of the central hearth where a low fire burned. If Rashid had his way, the fire would be roaring. As it was, Rashid was buried under three bed furs... two of his and one of Adam's.

How could so many things go wrong with his life? How could so many things go wrong between him and Tyra? How could he have come to care so much in such a short time?

He was not entirely to blame, either. Really, if Tyra thought things through, she would have to admit that there was no place for a babe in a soldiering life.

And why were they even discussing a babe betwixt them anyhow? It would probably never happen. Especially since it appeared he would never have the opportunity to do the deed that might produce a babe. Why look for trouble when there was plenty to be found at hand?

The most contradictory thing of all was the way Adam's heart felt, as if a fist were clenching it. He couldn't stop picturing the babe he and Tyra might produce. The child would be tall, of course, and blue-eyed. It could have black hair or blond. Either way, any person formed of the two of them was sure to be comely.

Ido not care. I do not care. Ido not care. 'Tis best that it ended afore it began.

But what if... ?

Once Adam finally started to drift off to sleep, he felt someone slide under the bed furs beside him. At first he thought it might be Tyra... come to ask his forgiveness. Hah! It was Kristin, the little imp, staring at him through big blue eyes, with her thumb planted inside her rosebud lips.

"Why are you here, Kristin?" he growled, or attempted to growl. 'Twas hard to be gruff when he was adjusting the wee mite to fit into the cradle of his arms-just like Adela-and brushing loose strands of hair off her face.

"I had a bad dream," Kristin revealed. A big fat tear ran down her little face.

"Shhh, 'twas just a dream."

"Alrek went away agin. And you went, too. I wuz all alone, and I wuz scared. In my dream." That was a mouthful of words for Kristin. Actually, what she described was not some horrible nightmare; it was reality. Alrekwould go off a-Viking again. And Adam most definitely would be leaving before long.

No sooner did the words leave her mouth than Kristin fell asleep. 'Twas the way of children to go from chatter to slumber in the blink of an eye.

When he awakened groggily at dawn, it was to find not just Kristin in the cradle of his arms, but Besji asleep at the foot of the bed, and Tunni on the floor at his side. Alrek was standing at the hearth, trying to stoke what was already a blazing bonfire.

As he stumbled out of bed to prevent Alrek from setting himself afire, trying not to awaken the other children in the process, he made himself a promise.

Today is the day I take back control of my life. Today is the day I make arrangements to leave Stoneheim.

"Did you bring extra horseradish sauce for the venison steak?" The king licked his lips hungrily as he addressed Alrek, who was carrying a huge, cloth-covered tray into his bedchamber.

"Yea, I did, but I had to hide out in the corridor ever so long afore Father Efrid left yer room to go say matins." Alrek couldn't see why the king didn't just get up out of bed and eat in the hall like everyone else. But who was he to question the secrecy that his master required? After he set the tray on the mattress, Alrek went back to lock the door.

"Did you have any trouble getting the food?" the king asked even as he dug into the morning repast and waved for Alrek to join him.

"A little," Alrek said, biting into a delicious honey oatcake. In truth, he was eating better than he ever had, since the king had taken him into his confidence. "Ingrith wanted to know where I thought I was going with all these pilfered goods, and I told her it wuz fer Master Adam."

"Good thinking, boy. Did it satisfy her?"

Alrek shrugged. "Seemed to. She added the honey cakes for him, special like."

"By thunder! I hope she's not setting her cap for him, too."

"I don't think so. To tell you true, all the ladies seem to be conspiring in some way... Ingrith, Breanne, Vana, Drifa, not to mention the Lady Alinor. Methinks they have some plot goin' to match up the Master Adam with the Lady Tyra."

"Hah! Just like a brood of mush-brained females! Plots and secret doings. As if that would do them any good!"

Alrek started to point out that plots and secret doings seemed to be what the king was engaged in, too, but he bit his tongue just in time. He was following Master Adam's advice... to think afore he flapped his tongue. The healer had given him that bit of wisdom when Alrek had told him that he'd seen Rafn poking his... uh, poker... into Vana's woman-fire one night.

"So, tell me all the news," the king said, having eaten his fill and pushed the tray aside. "And leave nothing out." He reached for the stoppered pottery jug of ale and proceeded to take a long swallow.

"Well, I can tell you one thing. 'Tis a new word I heard Master Adam sayin' to yer daughter Tyra. Mayhap it has some significance. Mayhap not." He frowned. "Or was it my lady speakin' ter Master Adam? I misremember now."

The king waved a hand as if it mattered not. "Get on with it, boy. What word is it that has you flummoxed?"