"Here's the downside," Salem said now. "Patroness wants it in two weeks' time."

"So quickly?" Bettina hastened into her workroom, scanning her jeweler's benches. She was as proud of her workshop as she was of the pieces produced there.

She had collected a master's set of cutters, polishers, burs, and drills. On one bench, old-fashioned swage blocks and mandrels sat beside state-of-the-art, propane-fueled solder guns and hot-air pencils.

On another bench, she had design sketches and a backboard filled with spools of gold chain. Dress dummies stood at intervals throughout the space.

To cheer her after the incident, Salem had occasionally made them dance.

"Two weeks? What am I going to do?"

Salem answered, "Give her the field-tested armlet, if you can clean the vampire funk off it. Still can't believe you got the spring mechanism to work."

Bettina had told him how it had successfully pierced Daciano's hand. "I want to keep that one." Though Patroness was a style setter-and a fearsome female-Bettina couldn't part with the armlet. It symbolized a little victory, her first since the attack.

"Your call, but if I were you, I'd almost be more afraid of disappointing your Patroness than your godmother. Speaking of which . . ."

"I sense her too."

"I'll let you and the womenfolk get yourself all tarted up." With a "Laters, dove," Salem disappeared, abandoning Bettina.

She hastened from the workshop just as the front doors to her spire whooshed open.

The only thing greater than the pull of Trehan's home was his curiosity about his Bride. Yes, he'd decided to return to Rune, but only to fact-find.

Or so he kept telling himself. Yet I packed a bag?

As Trehan ran his fingers down the spines of treasured books, he wondered if his mind was playing tricks on him, misremembering how good it'd been with Bettina.

Those moments of pleasure couldn't possibly have been as sublime as he thought them. Her clever weapon and drawings couldn't have been as fascinating.

However, he'd prepared for any eventuality, packing clothing and other essentials. Inside his coat, he carried an ancient silk standard of red and gray, symbolic of blood and mist-of the kingdom he loved more than anything.

Yet again he surveyed his apartments. If he chose Bettina, he'd be leaving behind a millennium's worth of accumulation-a fortune in gold, his extensive arms collection, artwork, about two hundred thousand books.

He'd be leaving behind his history, his very identity.

After a sleepless span, Trehan still wavered. Of one thing he was certain. I'd kill for another feel of her in my arms.

Instinct rode him hard, an uncomfortable position for a logical Dacian to be in-because instinct was rarely logical.

Yes, his father had told him to be an example. Trehan seriously doubted his father had meant an example of what not to do.

"Uncle Trehan?" a soft voice called.

He traced to the sound, finding his "niece" Kosmina standing by his bag, a troubled look on her face.

She and her brother Mirceo were the last of the House of Castellan, the castle guard. The heart of the kingdom.

Kosmina was such a contradiction. She was completely innocent in matters of love and painfully bashful. Her clothing was always demure-today she wore a traditional gown, floor-length with the collar nearly reaching her chin. Yet at the same time she was a mistress of arms-and a merciless killer.

Trehan had helped train her with weapons. He suspected that each of the cousins had secretly had a hand in raising her. I have so much more to teach her. Yet after today he may never see her again; whereas the male cousins traveled outside Dacia, Kosmina had never been beyond its stone borders.

"Uncle Viktor said you were leaving." She shyly glanced up at him from under blond bangs.

"Rest easy. I might be returning directly. I only go to observe, just as I often do." He frowned. "Mirceo doesn't suspect you've come here?" Dacianos didn't usually meet in private-unless a fight was imminent. The last thing he needed was Mirceo appearing, sword in hand, to defend his sister's life.

Chapter 11

As if I'd ever hurt her. Trehan pinched the bridge of his nose. Distrust and dread marked their family, just like a curse.

If only it were so easy as that. Curses can be broken.

"I keep telling him that you won't harm me," Kosmina said. "Stelian's the only royal you'd truly kill."

"Is that so?" Trehan asked with a hint of amusement at her conviction.

She outlined a pattern of the rug with the toe of one boot. "You found your Bride?"

"I did."

"Will you have offspring now? I'd like to be an auntie."

He exhaled a gust of breath. Offspring. When he'd been younger, he'd longed for his Bride, for a family of his own. As ages whispered past, he'd lost hope.

Now he could mate another female and beget young. But children with Bettina . . .

Would never see Dacia. Would never grow the House of Shadow.

"I don't know, Kosmina. My Bride doesn't care for me at present."

She glanced up, brows drawn. "Then she doesn't know you."

"I appreciate your confidence." He still couldn't believe that his Bride and his niece were about the same age.

If some lecherous, centuries-old male lusted for Kosmina, Trehan would gut him so slowly.

And still I go to Rune?

"I'll keep your home and your collection as you left them, Uncle, just in case. But I hope you make a life out there." Her light blue eyes went dreamy. "Every day, I imagine leaving this place."