Medieval 02 - Forbidden

memory. She saw faces where only shadows had been, heard names where only silence had been, sensed time’s shuttle at work. The pattern which would weave all together was lacking, but it, too, would return. She was certain of it.
    And then she would know the wrath of a proud warrior who had been defeated in secret rather than allowed to fight as he had been born to do.
    It is too soon. Duncan has had so little time with me. A fortnight before we became lovers. Barely a fortnight since we wed. Not enough time to learn to love me .
    Dear God, not nearly enough time .
    Only love could forgive so great a deception. If he remembers too soon, he will never forgive me .
    Never love me .
    And great death will surely flow .
    Amber never knew whether she called Duncan’s name with her lips or with her heart. She knew only that suddenly they were holding each other so tightly she couldn’t breathe.
    “Precious Amber,” Duncan said in a raw voice. “What would I do without you?”
    Tears burned against her eyes and filled her throat.
    “You would fare better than I would without you,” she whispered. “You are the heart in my body.”
    Duncan felt the hot flow of Amber’s tears. Slowly he eased his grip on her.
    “Don’t cry,” he said. “It was but a dream I had, naught to disturb yourself over.”
    Amber knew with Learned precision just how little of what had gone on in Duncan’s mind resembled a dream, and she knew that he knew it as well as she did.
    Yet she said nothing about the gentle lie. She had no more desire than Duncan to search among the tangled, agonizing threads of his memory for the truth she feared more than she feared death itself.
    “Duncan,” she whispered.
    The sound was more a caress than it was a word, for she spoke with her lips pressed against the pulse that beat in his neck.
    Duncan’s body stilled for an instant before he shuddered and tightened with a different kind of tension than that of a warring mind. He felt an answering ripple of sensation pass through Amber and knew how clearly she felt his desire.
    Yet he knew now that it was also her desire. In the brief time of their marriage, she not only responded when he cast the sensual lure, she wanted him whether or not he was touching her.
    She came to him when he stood brooding andwatching the rain through the keep’s narrow windows.
    If she awakened before he did, she curled against him, stroking her slender hands the length of his body and laughing softly when he rose to meet her touch.
    Each day before dinner she rode with him, sharing her knowledge of the forest and fields and the people of the keep.
    In the evenings she dismissed his attendant and bathed Duncan with great pleasure, teaching him the Learned way of purifying the flesh and then shivering with delight when he taught her how the Saracen sultans bathed.
    And always her eyes brightened when he came to her after hearing the complaints of serf and villein in the morning. She smiled with happiness when she turned and saw him standing in a doorway, watching her decipher ancient manuscripts.
    In a thousand ways she came to him, telling him how much she was pleased to be his mate.
    “You are sunlight when all else is rain,” Duncan said.
    More tears seeped from Amber’s eyes to glide hotly over Duncan’s skin. He shifted onto his back, pulling her close against his side.
    “Without you,” he whispered, “I don’t know how I could have survived the battleground that is my mind.”
    “Dark warrior…”
    Pain twisted in Amber, squeezing her throat shut more surely than tears. The words of love she wanted to give Duncan were fire burning within her silence.
    Blindly Amber moved to lie even more closely against her husband’s body. His heat and power were a lure that grew greater every hour she spent with him. The thought of losing Duncan was a dagger turning in her soul.
    “Duncan,” she whispered.
    Amber’s ragged voice and the hot glide of her tears against Duncan’s shoulder sent a wave of tenderness through him. Gently he stroked her hair. She shifted and a moist heat traced the length of Duncan’s jaw.
    For an instant he thought it was her tears. Then he understood that it was the tip of her tongue in a lover’s caress.
    “You tempt me,” Duncan said huskily.
    A ripple of pleasure went through Amber, a sweet echo of the sensual anticipation sweeping through Duncan. He no longer fought the wild surging of his desire when she touched him, for he no longer