As the shouting died down he heard the faint small sounds of the night: small animals rustling in the grass where the hill fell away behind the barrow; the rustle and snap of the fires, the cry somewhere of a bird. And now, excited by her story, he could hear other sounds in the spring night. On the slope behind them, men and women were making love.
He touched Eilan’s cheek, and it was like the petal of a flower. Gently he turned her face towards him. Her eyes were wide and wondering, her lips a little parted. He felt her start of surprise as he kissed her, but she did not pull away. Her lips were sweet, so sweet that he held her against him and kissed her again, and after a moment of resistance felt her mouth opening beneath his like a flower.
Gaius fell into her sweetness. Dazed, every pulse pounding, it took him a moment to understand what had happened when she pushed him away.
"We must not!” she whispered. "My father would kill us both!”
Gaius forced his hands to open, to let her go. To lay hands on the daughter of his host was an impiety of the worst kind. Eilan should be as sacred to him as his own sister. Sacred…he understood abruptly that what he felt for her was a holy thing. He realized that when he let her go he had plunged his fingers instead into the grass, and sat up, wiping his hands.
"It is true.” He was surprised that he could speak so steadily. His senses were still awhirl, but he felt the warmth of certainty within him. Since that first moment when he saw her looking down into the pit where he had fallen, haloed in light, it seemed to him that this moment had been preordained.
"It would shame us both, and there is no dishonor at all in what I feel for you. I love you, Eilan, as a man loves the woman he would make his wife.”
"How can you?” she whispered, staring at the fire. "You are a stranger. You never even saw me until two weeks ago. Have you dreamed of me, too?”
"I am more of a stranger than you know,” he said grimly. "But I will prove my love to you—” He gathered his courage. "Now I will put my life in your hands. I am a Roman, Eilan. I did not entirely lie,” he added quickly as she pulled away. "Gawen was the name by which my mother called me; but my true name is Gaius Macellius Severus Siluricus, and I am not ashamed of my lineage. My mother was a royal daughter of the Silures, and my father is Camp Prefect of the Second Adiutrix Legion. If that makes you hate me, summon the guards and let them take my life.”
She flushed and then went pale again. "I would never betray you.”
He stared at her. My mother did…Suddenly he realized what an odd thought that was, for surely his mother had not wanted to die and leave him alone. Only now, back in her warm and colorful world, was he realizing how painful the shock of being wrenched away from it to the chill discipline of an army camp had been. Was that why he had never been able to reveal himself to any Roman girl as he was doing with Eilan now?
"Tomorrow I must go back to my people, but I give you my pledge that if I leave here unscathed, and if it does not displease you, I shall ask your father honorably for your hand!”
He could feel his heartbeat shaking his chest, but he could think of nothing else to say.
"It would not be displeasing to me, Gawen—Gaius,” she said at last. Her voice was very soft, but her gaze never flinched from his own. "But I do not think my father would consent to give me to a Roman, especially to one born of the Legions. And even if he should agree, my grandsire would not; and Cynric—” The words came in a rush. "Cynric would kill you if he knew!”
"That might not be so easy,” Gaius said, his pride wakening, though the same thought had occurred to him. "But is it really so impossible? Since we came to this island, a number of our officers have married British women of good family to cement alliances. I am half a Briton myself, after all.”
"Perhaps,” she said doubtfully, "but not in our family!”
"Well, my blood on both sides is surely as good as yours!”