Shield's Lady

speeded up what might be a perfectly normal development process that’s going on in humans already. It might be a long-range trend that would, under normal conditions, take thousands of years to impact an entire population. The scientists who worked on your ancestors concentrated on one small element of that potential, the element they could use as a shield against prisma rays. But who knows how far that basic potential can go? Maybe the environment of Windarra somehow encourages development of that kind of mental ability in human beings.”
    Gryph shook his head in indulgent amusement. “What makes you say that?”
    “I’ve been wondering why that huge prisma ship was left here. You’ve said yourself there’s no record of such a large one being found before.”
    “The records could be wrong, you know. Don’t forget my people have been out of touch with their home world as long as yours have been from theirs. We don’t know what’s been happening with prisma elsewhere.”
    “True. But isn’t it just possible Windarra was special in some way? Perhaps it made a particularly good storage planet for mind weapons because there’s something in the environment here that favors that kind of development.”
    “Close your lovely mouth and eat your food, my love. Pregnancy is obviously affecting your usually admirable reasoning powers.”
    She tilted her head and looked at him. “Are you going to spend the rest of your life telling me to shut up?”
    “Are you kidding? If I devoted my time to a job that size I’d never get anything else done. Now eat up, sweetheart. You need your nourishment.”
    “Yes, Gryph.”

    Two months later little Gryphina Chassyn was born and the entire Shield class went into shock. Births were always an important event, but the birth of a female Shield was unheard of. Sariana and her baby had so many visitors Gryph was forced to hire extra household attendants just to handle the flow.
    Any doubts about the child’s parentage on the paternal side were immediately put to rest when visitors got a good look at the infant. Gryphina had brilliant blue-green eyes; Shield eyes. She also had her father’s dark hair.
    Even if some had questioned the coincidence of hair and eye color, no one could doubt the strength of the bond between Gryph and Sariana. It was obvious to everyone that Gryph was claiming his daughter. He would have been just as certain of that even if she hadn’t had his eyes and hair. He knew her mother too well and too intimately. The bond between Sariana and Gryph was stronger than prisma.
    “I’m exhausted,” Gryph had announced a few hours after the birth as he sat on his wife’s bed, holding his new daughter. “I had no idea it was going to be that rough. And you deliberately blocked most of it from me, didn’t you? I know you were fighting to keep from projecting. I told you to share it with me. As usual, you didn’t follow orders very well.”
    “Yes, I know,” Sariana admitted. “But some things a woman likes to do on her own. Didn’t you get enough of a taste of it there toward the end?” she added with a tired but saucy grin. By that point I had lost all my noble, womanly fortitude. I seem to recall thinking you deserved a sample of what it was like.”
    Gryph laughed. “You’re right. That bit at the end was about all I could take. It was worth it though,” he added as he played with one tiny little fist. “She’s as beautiful as you are.
    “I know it was sort of a shock for you, Gryph.”
    “That we have a little girl? I should have known you would prove as unpredictable in the matter of making babies as you have in everything else. But what does it mean? Why us? Why now? Maybe you were right when you said that this planet was making some changes in all of us.”
    Sariana smiled at him, love in her eyes. “It doesn’t matter as long as we’ll be together to face those changes.”
    “Oh, we’ll be together,” Gryph assured her with the arrogant, unswerving conviction of a Shield. “You can count on it.”
    “Word of a Shield?” she teased softly.
    “The word of a Shield in love,” he clarified as he bent down to kiss her with infinite tenderness.

    THE END

Excerpt from GIFT OF GOLD
    by Jayne Ann Krentz

    Chapter One

    The hunt was over. He’d been chasing her for two months and two thousand miles and he was finally closing in on his quarry. For the first time since the whole thing had started, Jonas Quarrel allowed himself the