reaches my knees – it’s nearly a walking robe.
The kitchen seemed huge in the darkness. Flames still danced in the hearth; Summer must not have properly banked the cook fires. He frowned, crossing to the hearth, not sure if he should take the time to settle the fire.
“So my sister isn’t imagining things,” a female voice drawled in the darkness.
Jerin startled backward, almost into the flames of the open fire pit. There was motion, and arms pulled him away from the fire with a low croon of “Careful, careful.”
“Your Highness!” His heart hammered in his throat as he recognized a gleam of red hair and delicate features before his body eclipsed the firelight.
“I didn’t mean to frighten you,” the princess murmured, a dark form with strong arms about him. “My sister claimed a beautiful man carried her up from the stream, but I thought she imagined it. Who would let a man risk his reputation so?”
“A sister who will soon be in deep trouble with her mothers and older sisters.”
“Sister?” One arm lifted from his hip to run fingers through his waist-long hair. “You’re not a husband?”
He bit his lip. Husbands were more dearly protected by the law than brothers. He shouldn’t have spoken- each word he said was a danger to him.
‘’Come, come,“ Princess Rennsellaer coaxed gently, ”I’m not going to carry you off like some husband raider.“
“I’m a brother. I’ll be of age in two months.”
The princess turned him slightly so the fire was to her back, the light a gleaming halo about the nimbus of her shadowed hair. Her fingers touched his cheek, trailed down to cup his chin. “Your family runs to good looks.”
“Our grandfather was an exceedingly handsome man,” Jerin admitted, aware suddenly that he wore only one sheer layer of cotton, that she wore nearly the same, and then her left hand cupped his buttocks, pressing his body to hers. “I came down for a bite of something.”
“I have something here you can nibble on,” she murmured, catching his hand, guiding it under her sleeping shirt. Her skin was soft, warm, and firm. His body reacted to the touch while his mind floundered in panic. How much force could you use denying the crown princess without bringing trouble down on your head?
“Your Highness, please.” He tried to sidestep, but she moved with him.
“You desire me,” she noted, running her hand over his body.
“I desire to marry well,” he murmured hoarsely. “For fifteen years I have stayed chaste and pure. I would not like to fail two months shy of the goal.”
She chuckled. “I’m amazed that you’ve seen any women besides your sisters.”
“They take me to social events.” He was babbling now, unable to stop. “How else would families know we seek a marriage alliance? We go to fairs, festivals, and such. The girls compete in races and wrestling, and the boys talk about how their sisters make them crazy and how lonely it is, being the only man among so many women.” He moaned softly now, as her hand had not stayed idle. “That is nice,” he admitted,
“but I wish-” Truthfully he didn’t really want it to stop. “I wish-”
She stepped him back, pressing him against the stones of the hearth, and kissed him tenderly. Her mouth was sweet, and warm, and electric on his. He couldn’t find anyplace safe to put his hands; they tended to flutter like birds looking for a roosting place. He whimpered partially in delight of the many sensations bombarding him, partially in the helplessness of his situation.
“Highness-um-I don’t think-we shouldn’t be-oh, gods-I-” While his mind raced to form some sentence, any sentence, he stumbled on an awful thought. If not for this once, the only intimacy in my life will be with the horsey- faced, heavy-handed Brindle women. Who would know what we’ve done? Who would guess? Who would tell? Certainly not my sisters. With those thoughts, he allowed his hands to alight on her hips, then explore upward, under her nightshirt.
In the last year of his life, Jerin’s father had told him how one man could keep ten women happy. It had been a frank, embarrassing, sometimes mystifying set of discussions. There hadn’t been an opportunity for Jerin to try any of the techniques outside of his increasingly erotic dreams. It was somewhat satisfying, judging by the princess’s reaction, to discover he remembered a goodly portion of his father’s lessons.
They could have taken the last step. They lay on the warm flagstones before the cooking fire, glistening with sweat. She reached for him, his body responded as before, but this time, the edge taken off his desire, he was able to stop her.
“No.” He kissed her to soften the refusal. “To go this far was foolish. To go on would be stupid.”
She gazed at him, her hair reflecting back the flame-red firelight. “It was wonderful.”
That pulled a wry smile out of him. He caught her hand before it could cause more mischief, and kissed her palm, nuzzling the sensitive spot on her wrist. “We can’t do more. It would ruin me.”
She looked away, watching instead the dance of firelight on the whitewashed ceiling. She was silent for many minutes, to the point that he was afraid he had angered her. “You are right. You are not yet old enough to marry, and I seduced you in your mothers’ kitchen. It would be best that I don’t take your virginity on your mothers’ Hearth.”
She gave it the old name. Jerin vaguely remembered that there were ancient rules of hospitality tied to the Hearth, remnants of days when starting a fire didn’t mean just using a match, and homes consisted of just one large room.
“Please”-Jerin reached for his abandoned nightshirt-“let me go back to my room and you go back to yours?”
“I could come tuck you in,” she murmured.
“We’d wake my brothers.”
She startled. “There are more?”
He told her his brothers’ names and ages. “Please don’t tell my sisters that I’ve told you. They’re afraid that you’ll carry me off.”
“Or seduce you in the kitchen.”
He blushed. “Well, yes.”
She giggled and then sobered. “Run up to bed, love, and be careful not to wake your brothers.”
He slipped reluctantly out of her arms. “It’s my sisters that I worry about.”
Chapter 3
The black, bitter cold snow tasted of soot, mud, and blood. Ren slowly levered herself up, spitting out the tainted snow, puzzled by the odd flickering shadows, the endless, shapeless roar that beat on her ears, the heat across her back. Why was she facedown in the slush-covered street? A loud crack made her turn, and she gaped at flames towering up into the night sky, consuming the broken timbers of a building. The theater! What had happened? She had been standing on the theater stairs a moment before – had it been just a moment? But surely it must have been longer
– the whole building was engulfed. Then realization struck her. The others were still inside. She opened her mouth to scream when the shape of a crumpled human finally found meaning in her mind. Her sister Halley lay at the top of the steps, half in the doorway. Ren tried to stand, but something was wrong with her legs. She struggled on anyhow in a haze of pain, crawling, frantic.
She had to get to Halley. Had to get Halley away from the fire. No matter how hard she tried, though, she could not get closer. The doorway itself was on fire now, about to collapse in burning timbers onto her sister. Oh, merciful Mothers, let her save Halley!
Ren snapped awake, whimpering in fear, the smell of smoke thick under her nose. She sat up in alarm, instantly disoriented by the placement of the window, the low rough-timbered ceiling, and the plain lines of the furniture.
Oh. yes, the Whistler farm!
The events of the last few days must have triggered her old nightmare about the explosion at the theater.
On impulse, she had decided to visit the armory upriver at North Branch. It had been a leisurely six-day trip
