Dream of Me/Believe in Me

that happens often enough, you will be left impotent.”
    Dragon's jaw dropped. He stared at her. “That is not true.” He looked to Ulfrich for confirmation. “It isn't, is it?”
    “Alas, my lord, I am not the healer the Lady Cymbra is and have not her knowledge. Besides, how many men have survived a wound such as this to discover what the consequences of it might or might not be?”
    “Of course,” Cymbra interjected, “perhaps you don't really care. Perhaps prowess on the training field is more important to you than prowess in—”
    “That's enough!” the Dragon roared. He was actually blushing, a sight that delighted Cymbra although she was not about to show it. “I cannot believe my brother married so bold a woman! You were supposed to be a sweet, gentle,
docile
maiden, not some termagant fit to ride with the Norns!”
    “Who,” Cymbra asked although she suspected she wouldn't like the answer, “are the Norns?”
    “The Weird Sisters,” Ulfrich explained kindly. As she continued to regard him inquiringly, he warmed to the topic. “They ride through the sky in blood-flecked armor, their wild steeds dripping hailstorms from their distended nostrils. Over battlefields, the She-graspers of Spears sound their mighty horns, shoot rays of light from their javelins, and select those warriors who will live or die.”
    Cymbra nodded. “Oh,
those
Norns.” To Dragon, she said, “Consider me such if you will but it changes nothing. In a fortnight, you can be free of pain. By winter, you can be fully recovered. If—and only if—you do as I say.”
    “You would be well advised to do so,” a cheerful voice pronounced from the lodge door. With an apologetic smile, Brother Joseph stepped within. “I hope you won't mind my coming by, Lord Dragon, but I found the bloodroot Lady Cymbra wanted and—”
    “That's wonderful!” she exclaimed. “Wherever was it? You must show me the place.”
    “I will and gladly, lady,” the priest assured her. To Dragon, he said, “The Lady Cymbra was kind enough to make a poultice that has immensely eased the aches in my joints. You really can put great store in her cures.”
    “How nice,” Dragon muttered.
    “What kind of poultice?” Ulfrich inquired.
    “Oat, pansy, rue, and rosemary,” Cymbra said. “It is necessary to first boil the oat to a good consistency, guarding against allowing it to become too mushy—”
    Wolf entered just then, in time to see the two holy men listening intently to his wife while his brother lay in the bed and rolled his eyes heavenward. He had come, he told himself, merely to see how Dragon fared. Not because he had noticed his wife's woman near the kitchens and realized that Cymbra was alone with the man who had lured countless women into beds, hay ricks, and who knew where else.
    The man was his brother and Cymbra his wife. He trusted them both. He just didn't like the idea of them being alone together and disliked even more feeling that way.
    Now he felt a perfect fool. First, they weren't even alone, and second, Dragon looked far more inclined to strangle than to seduce her. That cheered Wolf immensely. “You seem in good hands,” he announced.
    “I'm never marrying,” Dragon growled. He shot a pointed look at Cymbra. “Wives get above themselves far too quickly. A man might as well put a ring through his nose.”
    Wolf chuckled, feeling better and better. He wasn't sure how she had done it, but his sweet, gentle wife seemed to have the situation well in control. “So you'll be back on the field tomorrow?” he asked.
    In the dead silence that followed, Cymbra took a step forward. She tipped her chin up until he thought her slenderneck would snap, glared at him, and said, “I think I'll make a tonic for you, too. One with plenty of thyme in it
to clear the head.”
    By which he deduced that Dragon would be a while yet recovering.
    S HE'S THE KEYSTONE OF A SAXON PLOT. ALFREDS AT the bottom of it. He's sitting over there in Wessex right now laughing himself sick.”
    Wolf raised his head from the bench where he was lying naked and sweat-soaked and glanced at his brother. “I thought of that. If she really were, they'd have tricked the Danes into taking her.”
    Dragon groaned. He bestirred himself enough to toss another ladleful of water onto the heated stones, then flopped back down on his own bench and let the steam of the sauna engulf him.
    This day had been his first back on the training field after a fortnight of