“True was not meant to be,” he told her quietly. “If he was, he would have had you. And you would have had him. We barely know one another, my princess, but we cannot keep our hands off each other. There is a reason for that. There is a reason you feel as you feel right now with my weight upon you. What I feel, with the softness of you under me, the smell of you in my nose. We were meant to be. This means you are mine, Elena. Do you not see that?”

She did not look at him when she stated, “I will not be cowed.”

“I cannot believe you can even begin to think I wish to cow you, my warrior,” he whispered, and her head turned, her eyes coming to his. “I cannot believe you can even begin to think I’d wish to take away any part of what makes you.”

“And you reconcile this how, Cassius?” she demanded. “Catching me up and throwing me bodily from the fray. That is taking a very large part of me away, my prince.”

She wished this?

She would have it as well.

“My dead wife was warrior,” he returned, his voice gritty.

Elena went completely still beneath him.

“There are different kinds, my princess,” he shared. “And she battled mightily. In a manner, she won. She gave me our daughter. They both did not perish to the fight. She fought, she did it bravely, and she succeeded in her goal. She also died doing it. And she did that happily. I know this because the last thing she did on this earth was smile at me as I held Aelia in my hands but moments after she slipped from her mother’s womb. Now, ponder this, Elena. Do you think I tossed you bodily from the fray because I did not trust in your capabilities? Or do you think in a million millennia that I wish to lose another warrior to a battle beyond my control?”

“Cassius,” she breathed, her face having softened, her eyes having warmed.

And there was his lamb.

But it was too late.

He might not have won the argument, but he won his point.

However, in forcing him to win it, she’d drawn blood.

And she had to learn that was no way to win between lovers.

Thus he pushed up at her wrists, angling from her and taking his feet.

She got up to her elbows but took one look at his face as he scowled down at her, and she made no other movement and said no further words.

“I shall meet you at our horses,” he declared.

“Of course,” she whispered, knowing she’d wounded her opponent, and conceding graciously. “I’ll be down directly.”

With that, he turned and left her chambers.