Dream of Me/Believe in Me

Without waiting for an answer, he turned her into his arms and held her close.
    “Did you have a bad dream?” he asked, stroking her back soothingly.
    Not trusting herself to speak, she shook her head against his massive chest. He tried to lift her chin so that he could look at her but she resisted, burrowing closer to him. With a sigh, he lay back.
    “Dragon didn't really upset you, did he? He was just teasing.”
    That surprised her enough to wring an answer. “No, of course not.”
    “Kareem then? He's a good soul, he wouldn't dream of offending you or—”
    “No, not him either.”
    Wolf was silent for a moment. Slowly, he said, “Well, that seems to leave me. What have I done,
elskling?”
    “N-nothing!”
Her tears broke suddenly, streaming down her cheeks and onto his chest. She sobbed convulsively, unable to stop, as her bewildered husband held her, alternately trying to calm her and demanding that she tell him what was wrong.
    Finally, she brushed the tears away and looked at him. “I—I'm sorry. I don't know what's the matter with me.” She paused a moment, sniffed, took a shuddery breath. “I'm fine, really.”
    He didn't answer, only looked at her before abruptly swinging his legs over the side of the bed and standing. Naked, he strode to the table beneath the window, poured wine into a jeweled goblet, and brought it to her.
    “Drink this.”
    Obediently, she took a swallow, then another. He held the goblet for her until she indicated she'd had enough. Putting it aside, he sat down on the edge of the bed, took both her hands in his, and stared earnestly into her eyes.
    “Now,
elskling
, would you
please
tell me what's wrong?”
    He looked so … so rumbled, and concerned … and endearing with a lock of hair falling over his forehead and a night's growth of beard shadowing his jaw. He was a man others feared, a man of ruthless strength whose name was whispered with mingled awe and dread. Yet he sat there naked on the side of their bed in the middle of a night that had given him little rest and patiently pleaded with his wife to tell him what troubled her.
    No wonder she loved him so much.
    Cymbra gasped. Her hand flew to her mouth. She didn't merely desire Wolf or respect him or like him—althoughshe certainly did all those things. She loved him— passionately, deeply completely. Love that transcended all else, even life itself. Love taking her unawares, announcing itself already fully rooted within her, like a flower exploding to the sun.
    “I love you,” she said. The words spilled out—song, prayer, joyful shout for all that they were whispered. Three small words that said everything of who she was, who she would always be, what would always exist for them.
    “I love you,” she repeated as her happiness welled up, surging free and triumphant. “I love you!”
    “I love you, too,” Wolf said matter-of-factly. “But,
elskling
, I don't see why that should make you cry.”
    But it did, all over again, as she tried to absorb the incredible, astounding fact that
he
loved
her.
Wolf withstood it as well as any befuddled male could be expected to do. He stroked her back again, told her how wonderful she was, tried in every way he knew to calm her. When all that had no effect whatsoever, he gave up and resorted to a different strategy that required no words and worked far better.
    But later still, when she slept at last, the Norse Wolf lay awake, holding his beloved wife in his arms and accepting what could no longer be denied: The time had come to snare the Hawk.

Chapter SEVENTEEN

    A WEEK AFTER KAREEM BEN ABDUL RAISED ANCHOR and sailed out of the port of Sciringesheal, Cymbra was still trying to find places for everything he had left behind. It seemed as though the entire contents of the Moorish vessel's cargo hold had been transferred to the hill fort. She knew that wasn't true—at least not quite. The residents of the town had also made purchases, as had crews on other ships happy to acquire such exotic goods to trade along with their own.
    Yet there was no denying that an extraordinary quantity of fabrics, spices, foodstuffs, and the like were now hers to do with as she saw fit. Her husband, it seemed, was an even wealthier man than she had realized. Several of the chests in their quarters that were kept locked, and which she had never bothered to inquire about, turned out to be filled with gold coin, more than she had ever imagined existed, as well as jewels of every