Her arms tightened around him. “Thank the Light! I love you, too, you silly wizard.”

“If only I could stay with you …”

Klia sighed. “Something a soldier quickly learns is to seize the moment.”

Taking her hand, he pressed it over his pounding heart. “This belongs to you, Klia, and always will. But right now your life is in danger and I’m charged with protecting you.”

“Charged by whom?”

“Your brother. And myself.”

She took his hand in hers and pressed it to her heart, just below her gold-chased gorget. “Then I charge you to protect my heart, as well as my person. Will you do that, my love?”

Standing there, hand to heart, and heart to hand, Thero could only nod. There was no romantic flutter of pulse under his palm, only the roughness of the embroidered tabard she wore over her chain mail. All the same, a tingle passed through him. They’d seldom touched before.

Klia kissed him again and he buried both hands in her disheveled hair, something he’d only done in dreams. He ached to simply whisk her back to the Orëska House where he could protect and make love to her, but even if he could have cast the translocation again so soon, he knew what her answer would be; she’d never leave her soldiers, not even for him.

They both heard the sound of approaching footsteps.

Klia released him and stepped back. “This war won’t last forever,” she whispered. “And when it’s over—”

Before she could finish, Myrhini came in. “We have Danos and Caem outside. Do you want them both, or one at a time?”

“Let’s start with Caem,” Klia replied, all soldier again. As soon as Myrhini was gone, however, she whispered to Thero, “We’ll continue our discussion soon, my love.” One last warm glance promised much more than discussion.

Myrhini returned with Caem and Nyal.

Klia eyed the rider. “So this is our letter carrier.”

Caem, a tall young man with a shock of blond hair, glanced at Thero in surprise, then fell to one knee and pressed his fist to his heart. “I don’t know what you mean, Commander,” he replied calmly, and Thero detected the slight accent of the mainland territories in his voice.

“I saw you slip another letter into the one Captain Danos gave you to post,” Nyal told him.

“Another letter? I don’t know what you’re talking about.” A bald-faced liar indeed.

Klia nodded to Thero.

“Stand up,” the wizard ordered. The man rose to his feet and faced him at attention with a look of bland indifference. “Hold him.”

When Nyal and Myrhini grasped Caem by the arms, Thero took out his ivory dagger and set it spinning in the air inches from the man’s eyes. To his credit, Caem did not flinch.