"It wouldn't in most people. It does in a Shield. The painkiller the medic used tonight is having a similar effect."

"You mean you're about to faint?" "Not if I can help it," he told her grimly.

"Gryph, tell me what happened." "I got hurt."

"I can see that! How?"

"Sheer stupidity. Stupidity will do it every time."

"Does this have anything to do with that missing prisma cutter?" Sariana demanded with sudden intuition.

"It does."

"I was afraid of that! I had no idea this business was going to become dangerous. We'll have to go to the town guards after all."

"No, we will not go to the guards." The words were carefully and deliberately spaced, each one an immovable block of stone.

"We most certainly will," Sariana declared. "I don't want anyone else hurt just to protect the Avylyns'

reputation. I'm in charge of this matter and I will make the decisions."

"You," Gryph informed her, voice blurred but no less resolute for that, "are no longer in charge. I am." Sariana stared up at him. "Never. Why would you want to be in charge, anyway? You've never been particularly enthused about the task of getting back the cutter."

"Things have changed."

"What's changed?" She pushed open a side door and guided Gryph into the hall that led to his suite. "I'll explain it all later. Right now I just want some sleep. Do me a favor, Sariana, stop snapping at me

and put me to bed. Please." She gave up and did exactly that.

Three hours later when Gryph awoke from a restless sleep he was immediately aware of three things. The first was that his shoulder ached. The second was that the chamber seemed much too warm.

The third was that he was not alone in the darkened room. Sariana was curled up in the depths of an armchair beside the bed, sound asleep. It was the first time he had ever seen her in repose. There was a gentle vulnerability about her that made him want to reach out and gather her into the protection of his arms. It had stopped raining and a watery golden moonlight revealed the green satin slippers on the floor beneath the suspended chair. The frothy skirts of her gown formed a pool of gilded green on the cushions. The toes of her stockinged feet poked out from beneath a fold.

An overwhelming wave of desire and longing swept through Gryph. He was in no condition tonight to control it.

Sariana's lashes stirred and lifted as she sensed his awakening. Her eyes met his and Gryph's body sang an ancient song as he saw the shy, tremulous, sleepy desire in her gaze. She wanted him.

Without a word he held out his hand. If she came to him now she would be his. He knew that with a triumphant certainty.

Sariana's gaze drifted down to the hand he had extended across the quilt and then lifted again to his face. He saw the questions and the uncertainty and the feminine caution in her. All his instincts urged him not to hesitate. He should reach out and take hold of her before she lost her nerve and turned to flee.

But another part of him said that all he had to do was wait. It was like catching a scarlet-toe. The victim was her own worst enemy. Sariana was not going to run from him tonight.

Sariana uncurled herself slowly and it was easy to see that she was poised between the urge to flee and the need to stayand learn the secrets of the attraction she was experiencing. Then she got to her feet and walked slowly over to the bed. She reached down and touched Gryph's fingers wonderingly.

He closed his hand around hers and tugged her down onto the gently swinging bed.

Chapter 6

Sariana had made her decision as she sat watching him sleep. Gryph was sprawled on top of the rheen-feather quilt, his smoothly muscled body bare from the waist up. Earlier, when she had helped him into bed, Sariana had tried to persuade him to slide beneath the covers but he had refused. He had stripped off his jacket and shirt and dropped, clearly exhausted, on top of the bed.

She had sat watching him until she, too, had fallen asleep. She wasn't sure what had awakened her a moment ago, but she had been vibrantly aware that she had reached her decision.

Now Sariana allowed herself to be pulled down onto the gently swinging bed without a murmur of protest. This was what she wanted. She knew it in the depths of her being. She was going to take Lady Avylyn's advice and fling herself headlong into an experience that would be unlike anything she had ever known. Sariana was excited and shocked at her own recklessness, but the reaction only served to heighten her awareness.

Gryph's eyes were holding hers with unrelenting intensity as he pulled her down to lie beside him. The

gleam of moonlight was reflected in his blue-green gaze, creating a thousand tiny shards of light between his black lashes. There was a compelling promise in that gaze, one Sariana could no longer ignore.

This was the man with whom she would explore the boundaries of her own sexuality. She wanted to learn what it would be like to please him and to be pleased in return. She had waited long enough. It was time.

Her senses were filled with wonder and excitement and delight as he settled her beside him on top of the quilt. She was lightheaded with the thrill of it all. Only one thing worried her now.

"Gryph, your shoulder. I don't want you to hurt yourself."

"Forget my shoulder. I can barely feel it. All I want to feel now is you. By the Ship's Fire, Sariana, I've waited too long for this night. Too long for you."

"It's only been a few days, Gryph. We still hardly even know each other." Her fingers drifted curiously across his chest, stirring the crisp hair that angled down to a point that disappeared beneath the waistband of his trousers. He shuddered and she was enthralled. There was a heady sense of purely female power in knowing she could make him respond like this. She touched him again, this time gently grazing his flat nipple with the tip of her silvered nail.

Gryph drew in his breath and his hand tightened on her wrist.

"You don't understand and I can't explain it to you now," he said roughly. "In the morning you will know what tonight means. Come closer, Sariana."

She obeyed with a shy eagerness, the skirts of her gown flowing across the bed as she nestled against his side and put her head tentatively on his uninjured shoulder. His hand twisted urgently into her hair, loosening the brown-gold mass until it was free of the sleek style in which it had been bound.

"So warm and soft and mysterious." Gryph lifted a handful of her hair and inhaled deeply. "I want to know all your secrets, Sariana."

Sariana felt his hard, muscled tension, felt the heat of his body reaching out to envelop her. "You're the one who is mysterious, Gryph. I don't know you very well and I'm not at all certain I