"What the hell were you thinking, following me like that, Natalya? You could have been killed." He knew the moment he uttered the words, how ridiculous he sounded. Natalya might easily have taken care of the vampires and that just upset him more. He wasn't even certain why he was so distressed. Maybe it was the smear of blood along her shoulder and the bruise on her face from the earlier battles. He swore under his breath and rubbed a hand

over his face.

Natalya smirked at him. "Just say thank you and we'll call it good."

He looked at his hands, held them up for her to see. "Look at this. I itch, actually itch to shake some sense into you." His palm slid over the top of her head, down her hair to the nape of her neck. He pulled her closer, bent his head and kissed her. It was brief, electric and not at all satisfying to either of them. "You terrify me. You make me feel things I do not want to feel. You are so courageous you terrify me." He took her mouth again. Hard. Possessive. A little brutal.

She tasted his terror. She tasted his need. There was so much hunger. So much resolve. Vikirnoff could be gentle, but he wasn't feeling gentle. She had scared him and that wasn't a good thing. "Let's get out of here, Vikirnoff. This place gives me the creeps. Can't we go somewhere and talk?"

"I do not feel much like talking."

She took a deep breath, let it out slowly and looked him directly in the eye. "Neither do I."

His body tightened at her words, but more than that, his heart turned over. He reached for her without preamble, gathered her close and took to the air. Deliberately, Natalya wound one leg around his thigh, allowing the damp heat of her body to tease him as he took them across the night sky.

"Are you afraid?"

"No." She tugged at his earlobe with her teeth. "Yes. I don't know. Maybe a little."

"You know what you are doing?" His hand was low on her spine, fingers spread wide, palm burning her right through her clothing. His voice was harsh with hunger. So much hunger. Her womb clenched and her nipples hardened into tight peaks.

"You're asking me if I'm committing to you." Her body ached. Felt empty. She turned up her face to his, her arm circling his neck and kissed him, tongue licking his lips, her hand sliding down his chest to brush the thick bulge pressed so tightly against her.

"Be very certain. Because once you do, I will not let you go, Natalya. Even if you somehow managed to undo an ancient binding ritual as old as time itself, I will not let you go once you are mine." His beast was roaring for his lifemate. Save me. Choose me. Be forever to my heart connected. She was his. His.

She liked that he didn't close his mind to her. She wanted to feel the possessiveness of his thoughts. She wanted to be swept away so the small scared part of her wouldn't be able to think too much and she could just take what she wanted. Do what she wanted. Have someone for herself. Someone to talk with, share laughter, be angry, be frightened for. She

wanted it all. Vikirnoff was offering all of those things.

"I am not an easy man to be with-"

She kissed him again, stopping him in midsentence. He tasted hot. Carnal. He tasted sweet and close to love. "I'm not an easy woman to be with either-" She broke off to kiss him a third time, her fingers sliding beneath his shirt to feel his chest. She was careful to avoid his still tender wounds, not quite healed from his earlier battles. "I think I'm going to be addicted to kissing you."

She circled his neck with her arms as he made the descent with dizzying speed into a small chimney in the mountain, closing her eyes and hiding her face against his shoulder. The entrance was narrow and long. They plummeted straight down into a wide chamber with cathedral-like ceilings. He set her on her feet, holding her steady until he was certain she wouldn't fall after their flight.

Natalya tossed her pack into a corner and surveyed the large chamber as Vikirnoff waved his hands to light the candles. Instantly the air was filled with the scent of soothing lavender. "Wow. This is wonderful. Our own hot tub." She pointed toward the natural pool surrounded by flat rocks.

"I used to come here when I was a fledgling. I spent a lot of time here studying. I covered the entrance before I left, but never expected it to still be intact."

She nudged him with her shoulder. "So you said, you have to see to my happiness. Didn't I hear that when you so rudely married us without my consent?"

He groaned softly. "I can see this is going to be one of those difficult days."

She tossed her head so that her tawny hair fell around her face in waves doing things to his heart he didn't want to examine too closely. Even her rude noises were becoming endearing and that was just plain frightening.

"I think you're going to have a lot of those."

"Difficult days? I think you are right."

"So answer the question. You have to make me happy, right?"

"I can do no other," he agreed.

A slow, wicked grin curved her mouth and set her eyes sparkling. "I need lots of things to make me happy. And keep me happy. I'm that kind of girl."

"What kind of girl?" Suspicion crept into his voice.

"Needy. High-maintenance."

"I do not doubt that for a minute." His gaze drifted over her face and something in him shifted. Stilled. "Come here."

Natalya backed up. She meant to hold her ground, but his eyes had gone to a smoky gray and darkened with intense heat. With desire. A shiver of excitement went down her spine. She licked her lips and wasn't certain whether it was necessary or deliberately provocative.

"You heard me, Natalya." His voice was low. Utterly soft. A whisper of velvet stroking her body, stroking nerve endings. "Come here to me."

Excitement surged through her. He looked grim and forbidding, his face etched with lines from the battle, his hair flowing like silk and his body so hard with his need of her. But it was his eyes, the deep hunger, the way he looked as if he were starving for her body that set her pulse pounding. The way he looked as if nothing could or would stop his possession of her.

She needed that look. She craved a man who wanted her so much nothing could stand in his way. She didn't care if that made her strange, it was who she was, who the tigress was. She wanted that implacable resolve. She wanted that possessive mouth commanding hers, his hands rough and his body hard and painfully full.

She stepped closer. Just out of reach. Tantalizingly out of reach. She wanted to prolong the moment. Heighten his desire. She wanted to see his eyes glaze with the same brutal hunger clawing at her.

Vikirnoff felt lust rising sharply, mingling with something far more potent. He caught her arm, pulled her the scant feet separating them so that her body fell against his. Her heat nearly melted him. Her skin was satin soft. Her breasts pushed into his chest so that he felt her hard nipples rise and fall against him with each breath she took. His fingers fisted in her hair, pulling her head back so his mouth fused with hers.

Natalya was certain electricity crackled in the air around them. Liquid heat poured through her body, through veins and muscle, nearly catching her on fire. She felt the harsh tug on her hair, his mouth crushing hers, eating at hers with a wild abandon and she needed more. Demanded more. She caught at his shirt, tore at it, desperate to get at his skin. All the while she devoured his mouth, kiss for kiss, exploring with teeth and tongue, making her own demands, deliberately pushing his need higher.

He brushed aside his clothing in the way of his people, with barely a thought other than he wished them gone. Catching the front of her camisole, he stripped it away, baring her breasts to his hungry gaze, the primitiveness of the action heightening his pleasure. She was beautiful, spilling out of the material, round and firm and good enough to eat. He bent his head and took her nipple into his mouth.

Her hips bucked hard against him, her belly contracted and a hot moan escaped. He held her there, suckling at her breast, her body on fire and her needs swamping him. With each

swipe of his tongue and tug of his teeth, he felt her body rock, her muscles contract; he knew her body was wet and slick and welcoming. Her mind was wide open to his deliberately. She shared her desire, fed his needs with her own open abandon. Whatever he wanted, she was there to fulfill for him and she expected the same.

His hand slid down her belly to the little ring that had intrigued him so much. He touched it, slid lower to find her pants.

"Take them off of me," she ordered, bending forward to lick at his nipples. "Hurry, Vikirnoff. Get my clothes. They hurt my skin."

He stripped her, deliberately rough, arousing her further as he walked her backward until she was against the cavern wall, took possession of her mouth again as he pulled her naked body tightly against his.

She cried out, unable to stop the small sound, uncaring that he knew she wanted to sob with so much pleasure running through her body. She ground her hips against him, wanting more, seeking more. His hand cupped her breast in reward, thumb teasing her nipple, stroking and caressing so that waves rippled through her body and tightened her womb. "More," she whispered, greedy for it all, every experience.

His teeth nibbled at her chin, teased her throat and nipped the swell of her breast. He lifted her easily, his strength enormous, holding her pinned against the wall while he laved her belly button and pressed little kisses on her stomach.

Her breath came in gasps. She tried to wrap her legs around him, so hot and wet she needed relief, but he lifted her to a ledge, so that her bottom sank into a groove there. His hands were hard on her knees jerking her thighs apart. The cool air hit her hot core, but nothing could cool her, nothing could make the ache stop.

She heard her own heart beat. She heard the sound of her ragged breathing. Then his breath was on her. His peculiar brand. A claiming that would never go away. She felt it deep inside and her entire body tightened to the point of pain. She was nearly sobbing for him. His hand cupped her mound, pressed into her heat. She jerked, twisting with hunger. Her pulse pounded in her ears, throbbed in her womb. His finger slid through her heat, pressed deeper into her.

That easy she came, shattering into fragments, her body so responsive she couldn't hide her reaction if she wanted to. Her eyes met his. She loved his face, the masculine lines etched so deep there, a warrior's face. A lover's face. She brushed her fingertips over the lines, traced his lips, all the while staring into his eyes, reveling in the sheer intensity of his desire for her, the feel in his mind that he was on the razor thin edge of his control.

"I want you, Natalya." His voice was husky. His fingers pushed deep so that she couldn't stop the way her hips rode him, every muscle contracting with heart-stopping pleasure.

"I know you do, Vikirnoff. I want you, too." She could barely manage to get the words out, gasping as his fingers retreated and plunged deep again.

He shook his head. "I mean you. I want you to understand I do not want any other woman. Only you."

She cried out as his fingers withdrew. He caught her hips in his hands, his thighs wedging between hers. "Look at me, ainaak sivamet jutta, I want you to know who you are with."

She met his gaze steadily. "I know exactly who I'm with."

His erection was painfully hard, almost an agony he could no longer bear. He needed to be deep inside of her where he belonged. Where they would be connected for all time. He pressed against her feminine channel, so wet and slick and hot with hunger for him.

Natalya moaned and the sound was almost too much for him, vibrating through his body until it felt like fingers on his too-tight skin stroked and caressed up and down the length of his erection. He kept her gaze captive as he pressed into her, a slow, long stroke that pushed through her feminine folds so that she gripped him like a tight fist. His breath escaped in a long rush of air as he waited for her body to accept him, waited to push a little deeper. Again. And then again. He wanted to be so deep she would never get him out.

She shuddered with pleasure. His fingers dug deep into her hips, holding her into the seat in the ledge. He began to move, withdrawing, a long excruciatingly slow movement that robbed her of her ability to think. She could only feel, could only dig her nails deep into his arm and hang on as he plunged into her, thrusting hard and deep, driving through her velvet folds while she screamed his name. He didn't stop, but kept surging powerfully into her, thick and hard, pushing through her tight folds, tilting her to get a better angle, holding her on the edge of release until she sobbed for relief. The loss of control shattered her when she'd always had so much control. It was frightening to need so much, to feel helpless under the pounding beat of sexual hunger.

"Vikirnoff." Just that. His name. His name. The breathless plea sent him careening out of all control. Every muscle in his body tightened to the point of pain. Every nerve ending in his body was alive and shrieking for release. The sensation built like a volcano, a strong powerful rush that shook him. He had never felt such intensity, such a feeling of need and hunger and possession as he did at that moment. Lust and love seemed intertwined, inseparable. His fingers dug into her skin and fangs exploded in his mouth. He fought back the urge to take her blood as he neared the edge of his control.

Natalya's soft breathless gasps and moans drove him over the edge. Her body was like hot silk, her feminine channel as tight as a fist, squeezing and gripping until the friction and heat burst through him like molten gold.

His release was shattering and took her with him, so that her muscles convulsed around

him, over and over, powerful contractions that kept them both gasping for breath, lungs burning and bodies on fire while the world around them fragmented. Even his powerful legs turned to mush so that he leaned over her, gripping her thighs for support.

She looked an offering, lying back so that her breasts thrust upwards invitingly, her legs sprawled open to allow him to stand between her thighs. Her hair was in wild disarray and her eyes were half closed, long lashes fanning against her cheeks. "I can't move."

"Neither can I." In truth he didn't want to move. He wanted to stay buried in her for all time. She was a haven, a secret refuge that offered glimpses of paradise. He stroked her thighs with the pads of his fingers, needing to touch her, needing the intimacy of being able to touch her so freely.

"You didn't take my blood." She didn't know if she was disappointed or relieved. In all honesty, the craving was in her veins, in her mind, so strong she felt the lengthening of her incisors and the taste of him in her mouth.

His gaze jumped to hers. Hot. Hungry. The intensity stealing her breath.

"I have not discussed such a thing with you, Natalya." His accent was much thicker than usual and set her heart pounding.

"Why?"

"I will not take that decision from you." He had made up his mind to honor her wishes. He wanted her acceptance of him as much as she wanted it of him.

She was all too aware of his body locked so deeply inside of her. Of his hands stroking her thighs, moving up her belly to brush her breasts. She should have felt vulnerable splayed out as she was, but she felt utterly sexy. Wanted. Needed even. It was in the heat of his gaze and the stroke of his fingers. In the way his body stayed hard and thick and throbbing with fire even through the catastrophic explosion between them.

Natalya reached up to run her fingers through the silk of his hair. "I have to find the book. If I were to make a blood exchange with you, would it affect the way I am able call upon the elements? My magick is a part of me, like breathing. If magick was lost to me, I wouldn't know who I was anymore."

He closed his eyes. He was wholly Carpathian, born a hunter, a shape-shifter, able to command the things of nature. He didn't have to give up his world or who or what he was. Would she still have all her abilities? He couldn't give her an answer. Vikirnoff groaned and bent toward her.

Natalya responded eagerly, fusing her mouth with his, delighted that the action drove him deeper into her and set aftershocks rippling through her body with enough force to start new ones. When he lifted his head, she kept her hands on his shoulders forcing him to look into her eyes. His hips moved in a gentle, almost lazy rhythm, sending spasms of pleasure

through her body. She wanted to be a part of him. Of his life. But she wanted him to want her for herself. For who she was, not because some ancient words had bound them together, or because the universe had decreed they belonged.

"You look sad, ainaak sivamet jutta, what are you thinking?"

"Aren't you sharing my mind?"

"Not at this precise moment. I enjoy watching the expressions on your face. Right now, while we are connected and sharing the joy in our bodies, you are looking sad. I must endeavor to find better ways to please you."

A faint smile curved her mouth. "I think you're well aware that you please me. Stop fishing for compliments."

He moved to adjust his angle just slightly as he pushed deep with a hard stroke, heightening her pleasure even more so that a small gasp escaped and the sadness disappeared from her eyes to be replaced with something altogether different.

"Vikirnoff, what is ainaak sivamet jutta?" Another moan escaped as he plunged deeper again. "The exact translation."

"It means 'forever to my heart connected.'" He shrugged, a slight movement of his wide shoulders. "Or fixed. Forever to my heart fixed. The words are interchangeable."

Her gaze drifted over his face. "Am I? Am I connected to your heart?"

"How could you think otherwise?"

Natalya didn't have an answer for that. She had confidence in her intelligence, her courage and her abilities in most areas, but not that of a woman. Of a partner. She had never thought in those terms and the ideas in his mind of what a lifemate should be were very far from what she was-or could ever be. She wanted to be his ainaak sivamet jutta, but she had doubts he was seeing her realistically. She closed her eyes and gave herself up to the ecstasy of his lovemaking, unwilling to think too much about the future.

She lost herself in his body, in the absolute magic they created together. She craved the feel of his hands on her body, the feel of his skin and muscles, the power of him as he took her. There was an edge to him, as if he could be ruthless in his lovemaking, pushing her beyond any limit she had ever thought she had, all the while heightening her pleasure, keeping her wanting more. Always more.

Time slipped away from her. There was only Vikirnoff and his hands and mouth and body. Each time she thought it was over and they would rest, he was there again, demanding again, wanting her. Hungry for her. She felt the scrape of his teeth and swirl of his tongue. There wasn't an inch of her that didn't go untouched, untasted, unused, but all the while he was wringing gasps of pleasure, moans and pleas for more.

He carried her to the hot springs and settled her on his lap where he could bathe her. Limp with fatigue, deliciously sore, she buried her face in his neck. "Thank you for not taking my blood. I feel the need in you, but you were so careful." His pulse pounded beneath her lips, the strong ebb and flow of life that beckoned and called and tempted.

"I told you I would not."

"Still, I would have let you," she confessed. "I wasn't thinking straight."

"I told you I would not," he reiterated. "If it is important to you, I will always remember, even when I am not thinking clearly either."

She turned her head to lie against his shoulder so she could look up at his face. There was male beauty in the lines etched there as well as other traits she was becoming familiar with. Vikirnoff wore power and dominance as easily as other men wore clothes, yet it was so natural to him, so intrinsic to his personality, she had accepted it in him without much thought, because he tempered those things with integrity and fairness.

"I'm beginning to like you."

His smile was brief, but it flared in his eyes and her heart, as tired as she was, responded with a quick beat. She smoothed her fingertip across his lips.

"That is a start." He tugged on her wet hair. "You could be hard on a man's ego if he allowed it."

She laughed. She couldn't help it. She wanted to spend all night making love every way they could and feasting on each other's body. "I doubt anything could dent your ego, Vikirnoff. The water feels so good."

"I do not want you to be sore. I intend to make certain you are properly healed before you go to sleep."

There was a note in his voice, husky, sexy, a promise of something sinfully wonderful that sent heat spreading through her veins. "I'm all for that. Are we going to stay here?" She didn't want to be separated from him. She couldn't go through another day without him.

"I think it is best. The vampire cannot send human enemies against you and I can better protect us here."

"How is Gabrielle doing? Is she still alive?"

"Yes. I hold her spirit with mine. They have sent her to sleep. Falcon will give her blood on rising. If her body can wait, Mikhail will do the third exchange on the following rising. The wait will give her plenty of time for several healing sessions with the others and a chance for her body to adjust to the ancient blood."

"How will she be connected to you, Vikirnoff?" She stifled the small pang of jealousy she was ashamed of feeling. She hadn't had anyone for herself in so long and she wanted to be his only.

His teeth nibbled at her shoulder. "Not in a sexual way, or in the way of a lifemate, Natalya. She will have a private path to my thoughts, as I will to hers. Our spirits will maintain a connection, as she will have been in my keeping for over twenty-four hours. Gabrielle will awaken as one of us. She will not have a lifemate to turn to for support in her new world. Her sister and brother-kin are returning as quickly as possible to aid her, but she is half in love with Gary, a human. The males will not want her to continue a relationship with him as there are so few Carpathian women and they will hope she can be a lifemate to one of them. She will awaken to many problems and will need aid."

"And you have to be there for her."

"You wished me to save her life," he reminded gently, even as his teeth bit down over the pulse beating so frantically in her throat. "I could devour you, Natalya, and never get enough."

She laughed again because she could hear the truth in his voice and felt the stirring of his body against her. It reassured her when she felt so vulnerable. "I believe you. I'm exhausted. We can't possibly, not again. I need to sleep for a week or two. And so do you."

Vikirnoff lifted her with casual ease and carried her to the far side of the cavern where he had prepared a large bed on the ground. Candles were everywhere, the flames flickering and dancing, throwing shadows on the walls to illuminate crystals and give color to the walls. The spread appeared to be a midnight blue, velvet soft with a host of cushions. He laid her facedown in the middle of them, his hands gentle on her body, positioning her head on a soft pillow and bringing her arms out.

"We're wet."

"We're not." And they weren't.

Natalya allowed her lashes to drift down as his hands began a massage at the nape of her neck. He murmured to her in his own language, urging her to sleep while he attended to her sore body. He kneaded the muscles in her neck and shoulders, her arms and back, lower still to her buttocks and thighs and calves before turning her over to attend the front of her.

Natalya drifted in a haze of mind-numbing pleasure. She felt his tongue swirling over her pulse. Teasing the valley between her breasts. Her nipples ached from the sweet torment he had inflicted for hours, but this time it was as soothing as it was stimulating as his tongue flicked and laved and lingered. He suckled gently, before attending the undersides of her breasts and spending a great deal of time tugging on the small golden hoop in her belly.

"You like that, don't you?" She didn't open her eyes. She liked the feel of drifting while

he explored her in such a slow, languid fashion. There was something to be said for the slow sensual buildup as opposed to the violence of their earlier hunger.

"Very much." He nuzzled the ring and kissed his way down to the tawny triangle. "I love your body, Natalya, all soft and firm and curved so beautifully." Deliberately he pressed a finger into her wet heat. "Mostly I love how you respond for me. I have had many years to imagine what it would be like. I've studied how to please a woman to be prepared. I wanted to know every way I could bring her pleasure and how she could do the same for me. But the imagination, when one has no feeling, cannot prepare for this."

Natalya lifted her lashes just enough to watch as he dipped his head between her thighs. She had felt every emotion, yet she was unprepared as his tongue stroked and caressed, finding every sore spot and healing her. She was unprepared for the fire racing through her, and the edgy need that spread and built until she was gripping the blanket beneath her and lifting her hips to meet his marauding mouth.

"I thought you were getting me to sleep." She reached for his hair, anything to stay anchored when her body was so ready to fly away with her.

"I changed my mind. Do not move, Natalya. Just lie there and do not move."

"It's impossible."

Immediately her arms were anchored above her head. She couldn't see how he did it, but she lay stretched out on the blanket. He lifted her hips and placed pillows beneath her to make her more comfortable before returning to his ravishment. His mouth and teeth and tongue were everywhere, his hands possessive, demanding as they moved over her until she was sobbing for release. He took her to the edge over and over, but never quite tipped her over.

Natalya could feel the heat of his erection nearly burning against her thigh. He thought he had her helpless, tormenting her to the brink of insanity, but she had other ideas. Deliberately she merged her mind with his, sharing the terrible craving for him, the dark edgy need for relief. She built a picture in her mind of him kneeling above her, her mouth engulfing him, suckling and stroking and driving him to the same fever pitch. All the while she moved her thigh subtly, like a great cat, rubbing back and forth to create a friction against his most sensitive skin.

She heard his soft groan, felt the response as he grew harder and thicker and jumped in anticipation and need. He might think he could dominate and she would be submissive, but she was as fierce and as passionate as any tigress and she was every bit as capable of driving him out of his mind with pleasure as he was doing to her.

Vikirnoff kissed his way back up her body, rubbing his face against her soft skin, unable to get enough of her. He loved the feel of her, satin and silk, fire and flame. The candlelight played lovingly over her body, a temptation in itself. He followed the erotic picture in her

mind, rising above her, knee on either side of her breasts, tight, so he could feel her against him.

Natalya teased him, blowing a breath over him, flicking her tongue, swiping with small curling licks as if he were an ice cream cone. Flames engulfed him, took him to a new hunger. She looked helpless, lying stretched out on the blanket beneath him, her arms still above her head, her eyes like jewels, but there was nothing helpless about Natalya.

Vikirnoff reached down to cradle her head in his palms, holding her to him. Her lips slid over him, the moist heat of her mouth taking his breath, setting his heart pounding hard. Her mouth was a miracle, tight and slick and so hot it seemed an inferno. He lost himself in the mixture of rising lust and power and sheer carnal desire. He knew she was feeding the intensity, deliberately stealing the control. He watched the way he slid in and out of her mouth, the taunting laughter in her eyes, felt the way she wanted him to feel the same pleasure he had given her.

Destiny had tied them together, but she was so much more than that. This woman, impossible to tame, had wrapped herself around his heart. He could not imagine any other suiting him, making him laugh, making him crazy with desire, just as he was right at that moment. Groaning, he pulled away from her, to blanket her, waiting a heartbeat as he pushed slowly against her entrance. He felt the initial resistance of her body, as if she might not open for him, and then he was inside of her, surrounded by her, buried deep the way he hungered.

He whispered to her in his language, unable to find another way to express the deep connection and commitment to her. He made love to her, slow at first, watching the way her pleasure built, feeling her body tighten around him until he could only thrust harder and deeper, surging forward to keep that connection forever. She had tears in her eyes when the powerful quakes rocked through their bodies and left them gasping for air, struggling to slow their hearts; they were limp with exhaustion.

Vikirnoff rolled his weight off of her, kissing her neck as he drew her against him. "It is nearly dawn. We must sleep."

Natalya struggled to find a way to talk without proper air. Her lungs were burning and her body still rippled with pleasure. "Aren't you going to sleep underground? Shouldn't you? I'll sleep right here, over the top of you and protect you from all the gremlins," she insisted. "The only thing you have to worry about is the Troll King."

"I have provided intricate safeguards. Even your infamous Troll King would have to pause to unravel them and I would awaken. We will be safe here."

Natalya pillowed her head on his shoulder. "I really don't mind if you need to go to ground, Vikirnoff. I can handle it."

Vikirnoff wrapped his arms around her. "I prefer to sleep right here beside you," he said.

"I like holding you. If you should wake and I appear dead..."

"I know, I know," she interrupted. "You're really asleep. Stop flattering yourself, I'm perfectly fine without you."

"You get into trouble without me."

"Every morning, when I finally am tired enough to go to bed after watching television all night alone, I call up a dream of my childhood with my brother, Razvan. I've been doing it for years. It was the only way I could feel like I wasn't so alone, as if I still belonged and had family. This is the first time in many years I will not feel as if I have to call him to me."

"You do belong," he said. He pressed kisses against the nape of her neck. "You belong with me, thanks to those binding words you disliked so much."

She frowned, snuggling closer. "Don't think I'm giving up on undoing the spell. I'm tenacious."

"It is not exactly a spell." His eyes were heavy and his arms were taking on the leaden feeling of his kind. "But did you figure out the first two lines?"

"Of course." She felt smug; she couldn't help it. She had always had a gift for. languages and she had the advantage of speaking earlier languages before they had evolved into the twentieth century patterns. She was familiar with the way many words were considered unnecessary in the earlier languages. "The first two sentences translate more exactly to something like this: 'you wedded wife-my'. There is no specific word for the word 'are'. The second line comes out something close to: 'to me you belong, wedded wife-my.' I'm not certain of the exact phrasing, but it is far closer than the more modern form."

A slow smile lit his eyes. "Really?" He arched his brows at her.

"Yes, really," she said, undeterred. "I know you think it's funny, but I refuse to be trapped into something whether I want it or not. It's not good for you to think you've got me tied to you. I'm not a passive person and I wouldn't want you to think I am."

His laughter was soft, his breath warm against the nape of her neck. "Passive? You? I cannot imagine anyone, least of all me, making that mistake."

She grinned, closing her eyes. "Razvan said I needed to curb my tongue and that if Shakespeare had met me, Kate wouldn't be the famous shrew, Natalya would."

"He said that, did he?" Vikirnoff was wise enough not to agree aloud. Not when her body nestled so comfortably next to his. "What else did Razvan have to say?"

"He said I needed to learn how to sew, to be more restful and soothing and to censor most of what I say." There was laughter and affection in her voice.

"I cannot imagine."

"I told him I did censor most of what I say. If he could read my mind..." Her voice trailed off, her lashes lifting so she could meet the amusement in his gaze. "Lucky you. You get to know the real me with no censorship."

"Good night, Natalya." He kissed her again and succumbed to the sleep of his kind, feeling very lucky to know the real woman.