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Catherine realized she had not reckoned with his reflexes. She took a wary defensive stance, arms straining at the weight of the candlestick. Ignoring her, he unbuttoned his shirt, pulled it off, folded it ne&tly, and laid it on a carved chest. Wide shoulders and a black-furred chest tapered to a flat belly and slim hips. Clad only in snug breeches, he turned to stand with hip outthrust, hands hanging loosely. "That thing won't stop me," he said almost wearily. Before the words were out of his mouth, he was nearly on her. She swung the candlestick in a wide, lethal arc that he dodged with a swift, twisting side step. He closed on her, caught her wrists on the back swing, and crushed the tendons until, with a cry, she was forced to drop the heavy weapon. Then he thrust her back and around, twisting her arms painfully against her back. Just as quickly, he released her arms; but as she tore free, his fingers hooked in the dress and, with a jerk, ripped it down her back. He was already stripping her as she spun, clawing and stumbling over skirts which had fallen in a tangle about her feet. Wild-eyed, spitting hate, she caught his cheek and raked his chest while he half dragged her, half carried her to the bed. One chemise strap was ripped and hanging, the other slipping down her arm. Her hair swirled like a silken maelstrom as he picked her up and hurled her onto the bed.
    Then; as he stood over her, his cheek clawed and his chest striped scarlet, hie looming figure abruptly merged into a nightmarish haze of blood in her mind. It blocked out reality, tore her away to some other place, another horror from a source deeper than the threat of imminent rape.
    When Sean stripped off his breeches, he knew she had seen a man before. Her eyes were wide, but not with startled innocence. He might have guessed a bitch of Enderly's would be no virgin. She edged away from him like a cornered animal, her eyes great desperate pools fixed on his bloody chest. Creamy skin gleamed in the shadows of the bed as the torn petticoat slipped up, revealing long, slender legs; but it was not desire that drove him now.
    He climbed atop her, caught her hands and pinned them above her head, then threw a leg over her lower body. When she felt the pressure of his sex against her bare thigh, she suddenly went berserk and fought him in dumb, choking terror. Clamping her wrists with one hand, he methodically ripped the camisole and petticoat from her straining body, then lay full length upon her, forcing her to submit to his nakedness until she lay exhausted, heart thudding against his ribs. Sensing the trigger to her fear, he deliberately smeared her breasts with his blood so that her body was slippery under him. Eyes dilated until they were almost black, she lapsed into paralytic terror, lips moving in a pleading whisper, "No, no. . . no," as a litany, as if to herself. Sean's eyes, boring into hers, looked into a midnight void. Relentlessly, he pursued her into the void.
    Rising to a kneeling position, then grasping her under the knees, he backed off the bed, pulling her with him until he stood on the floor with her defenselessly open to him, knees on either side of his thighs and feet dangling. He dragged her thighs wide. As if giving a death blow to an enemy, Sean rammed himself into her body with all the hatred pent in him, felt fragile membrane tear and heard her scream in agony. He thrust harshly, savaging her, fingers biting into her flesh when she twisted as if to escape a knife stabbing into her vitals. His hatred burst into her in a flood.
    When he had done, Culhane stood like a spent animal, motionless but for the rise and fall of his chest. Catherine lay impaled, slack, her face averted and shadowed by her hair. He withdrew, then released her to lie sprawled and broken, like the women the soldiers had left in the ruins of Kenlo.
    He collected the shreds of her undergarments and wiped them with the mingling of her blood and his seed. He crossed to the