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had seen something she had not even known existed . . . die. The sorrow that ruled her heart was so deep it seemed to blot out the sun, even on a bright day. Something was perishing here. Something more important than any mere human who shared it. A thing greater than the sum of its human parts.
    She was frightened not only by its destruction, but also by her inability to comprehend what her deepest instincts told her was happening. She was not an intellectual, but a warrior, a person of action. So the feelings of grief threatening to drown her soul in a tidal wave of pain caused her to lash out in fury at these two old fools—the few surviving remnants of a class of thinkers and teachers who had shaped the only world she knew since the beginning of time.
    She drew a deep, shuddering breath and covered her eyes with her hand. Then she felt on her other hand the dry touch of Mir’s fingers. He patted it softly, gently, as he might comfort a child.
    Tears leaked out from her eyelids and, when she opened her eyes to look at his face, she saw an understanding, a weary comprehension deeper than any she thought possible.
    Her fury and sorrow faded together, leaving her drained and feeling slightly foolish for having taken so much wine on an empty stomach.
    “Are you then refusing to help us?” Blaze’s question carried the full freight of outraged authority.
    Dryas turned toward him, anger beginning to flush her face again.
    Mir clasped her hand. “Wait! Wait! I pray you both. Consider, Blaze: you have little of your former power. We are more than ever dependent on each other’s goodwill. And you, girl, think. With most of the strongest warriors gone, I must, as the shepherd of an almost defenseless flock, preserve them from a scourge that can destroy them as surely as the Romans.”
    Dryas subsided. She snatched up the cup and swallowed more of the vintage there.
    “All right,” Blaze snarled. “You’ve made your point. I should say you’ve both made your respective points.”
    Dryas leaned forward and spoke in a very low voice and in another language, the tongue of her own people. “Yes, I’ll help you.” But her gaze shot to the door and walls. “
He
doesn’t need to know that. Do you understand me?”
    Mir simply nodded, but Blaze replied in the same language. “God! It’s been years. My command of the language is . . . flawed and I’m cursed slow, but yes, I do understand simple sentences.”
    She nodded. “Tomorrow. In the sun . . . in the open.”
    Both men nodded, and she finished the wine in one pull. Then she kicked back her chair, walked over to the corner, shouldered her pack, and turned toward the door.
    “Wait!” Blaze cried, “he—”
    Dryas stepped toward him and spoke again in Caledonian. “Don’t help me. Shut up! I know what I’m doing.” Then she turned and vanished into the night.
     
    She was a lush, forbidden fruit to the wolf A mature woman, redolent of an almost incenselike confusion of fragrances. Soft, yet tight openings and velvet surfaces.
    As he took her, she communicated an exquisite and unknown sensation to his mind and body as he invaded hers. He could tell, as she fell first to her knees before him and then as he pushed her backward to sprawl on the pine needles, that she both feared and desired him. And that she felt both sensations deeply.
    “Don’t hurt me,” she pleaded.
    He didn’t.
    It was growing dark when he released her, allowing her to scramble to where her clothing lay. He slipped into the shadows and realized she was trembling as she donned her few simple garments and began her run to the village.
    Wolflike, he was puzzled by her reaction to him. He knew he’d given her pleasure, ecstatic pleasure. And more than one time. He understood that her fear lent a sharper edge to both of their desires. But what he couldn’t understand was the reason for that fear. Did she think he would attack, harm her during an act that brought so much mutual