Dream of Me/Believe in Me

loyalty of your Saxon bride that worries you, although I don't really see why. She seems to have settled in well enough.”
    “Seems … aye, I suppose she does, but it is scarcely a month since we wed, little enough time to know her heart.”
    “Is that why you have yet to send word to the Hawk?”
    “Are you so eager for battle?” Wolf countered.
    “There won't be one. Hawk will come, Cymbra will tell him she is well and happily married, and, indulgent brother that he is—you can hardly deny he is
that
—he will accept what has happened and you will have the alliance you have wanted all along. What could be simpler?”
    “Nothing,” Wolf agreed though his voice held doubt. “Provided Cymbra plays her part.”
    “You doubt it? You think she means to play you false,betray her marriage vows and slay her brother in the process? That seems the far side of unlikely to me.”
    Put that way Wolf's concerns sounded even more outlandish than he himself knew them to be. Yet still he had hesitated, letting the days—and the nights—pass without summoning the Hawk.
    Now in high summer when the fields shone gold with grain it was difficult to accept that before too long winter would descend over the northlands. Ice would clog the sea channels and savage winds would destroy even the sturdiest vessels. Men would stay to their hearths, counting up the bounty of the harvest, telling stories around the fires and planning the adventures of the coming year.
    If he did not act soon, not even the Hawk in all his fury would be able to come for his sister. The matter would have to wait months, well into the new year, until the world gentled once again.
    Wolf was tempted to let that happen. He could gain more time to bind Cymbra to him in every way possible. But to put off the day of reckoning meant leaving her to worry over her brother's fate. He had seen that worry in her eyes too often to pretend he didn't know how real it was. When all was said and done, he could not do that to her.
    “Only a little while longer,” he said, and added, lest Dragon be disposed to discuss it further, “she is not yet fully to my hand, but she will be and soon.”
    “If you say so.” Dragon hesitated but he loved his brother too much not to speak his mind. “Yet do I ask you to consider that loyalty and obedience aren't necessarily the same thing. One is freely given, the other too often forced. It is for you to decide which you truly want.”
    “I want both. I expect both.”
    “Ah, well, then perhaps you should have wed a
docile
Norse maiden.”
    Wolf arched a brow in blatant doubt. “Is there such a thing?”
    “Not on this earth,” Dragon conceded. “Which is why I'm safe from matrimony. The only wife I'd take would be a soothing little woman to bear my sons and rub my feet, and never give me a moment's worry.”
    Wolf stared at him for a moment before shouting with laughter. He couldn't help it, the specter of Dragon with such a creature undid him. And, not incidentally, went a long way toward restoring his good humor, which he suspected was the actual intention.
    “Pray you never find her, brother. She'd have you dead of boredom before the bridal flowers wilted.”
    Dragon flung an arm around Wolf's shoulders. “Enough talk of women. I say I can throw a javelin ten paces farther than you can.”
    “Not even with Odin passing wind at your back.”
    They went off to settle the matter, but later, as he swam again in the river and watched the day's long twilight creep over the land, Wolf remembered what his brother had said. He frowned, considering the possibility that Dragon might be right. Perhaps it was impossible to have both Cymbra's unquestioning obedience and her loyalty as well. Perhaps to win her loyalty, he had first to give her his own trust.
    It was a hard thought and one he did not accept readily. He was still considering it when he dried off, dressed in clean apparel, and made his way to the great hall.
    H E DID NOT, AFTER ALL, NEED A FOOD TASTER. Cymbra greeted him with impeccable courtesy and no lingering sign of her earlier anger. Looking ravishing— and highly ravishable—in topaz silk, her hair set back from her face with jeweled combs but left free to tumble to her knees, she inclined her head slightly as he approachedthe high table where she awaited him. Firelight glinted off the petal-smooth curve of her cheek. He inhaled the faint lavender scent of her bath still clinging to her and felt himself harden