“Stream? Lake?” Cyrene was momentarily distracted enough by the thought of freshwater sources to shove me backwards so she could peer out of the window. “It does look like a very pure stream. It probably feeds into the lake. I bet the water isn’t too cold to swim in. . . .” She paused and gave me a dirty look. “You did that deliberately. Stop trying to divert me.”

I sighed and made sure Fiat was still ignoring us before I answered in a low voice, “I told you that it’s me Fiat wants to use as a bargaining chip. I’m sure he has some evil plan under way that requires the use of me as hostage to get Gabriel to do whatever it is he wants done. OK? Happy now? Good. Are those mullioned windows? Oh, my, they really are outstanding. Fiat’s taste certainly has improved from that house in Italy. I wonder if he’d consider selling?”

“He wants to steal me for his mate,” Cyrene whispered as we pulled up outside the front doors. I whimpered softly to myself at the sight of the fluted white columns and cut-glass panels on either side of the doors. I wanted this house with an overwhelming need that was almost alien to me, and yet was so familiar I wondered why I’d never felt it before with anything but Gabriel.

Fiat’s two blond bodyguards leaped out of the front to open the car door.

“May!”

The worry in her voice filtered through the house lust that held me in its grip. I shook images of myself strolling through the house from my head, and focused on my distressed twin. “Cy, we’ve been over this several times already—you’re not a wyvern’s mate.”

“I am mate lite. I told you that! And besides, if I wasn’t, why would Fiat want to steal me away from Kostya?”

“Gotta pee. Back in a mo. Don’t go completely wacko until I’m back to see it,” Jim said, leaping out of the car and heading for a shrubbery.

Fiat exited the car. Magoth, still unconscious, rolled off the seat and onto the limo floor, his head thumping like a ripe melon on the floor.

“I can just about guarantee you that Fiat isn’t going to try to steal you for his mate,” I said, patting her on the arm. She was truly worried about such a possibility, I knew, which didn’t ease my exasperation with her, but it did let me temper my voice so it wasn’t quite so obvious.

“That’s what you say,” she said with a dark look at me. “But you haven’t seen the way he watches me! He wants me!”

“Of course he does. You’re very pretty—a lot of men want you.”

“Not that way,” she said, watching him narrowly through the opened car door as he spoke to his bodyguards. “He wants me for his mate so he can take over the dragons.”

I wasn’t quite sure how her reasoning went from stealing another wyvern’s mate to control of the weyr, but I didn’t have time to indulge my curiosity. Instead I simply said, “Stop worrying. I won’t let him take you.”

“Come,” Fiat said, turning toward us and holding out a hand. Impatience was evident in his voice, so evident I half expected him to snap his fingers at us. It was on the tip of my tongue to say something that I was sure I would regret, but I remembered in time that the house was his, and if I wanted any chance at all of calling it mine, politeness would be the order of the day.

I pushed aside the question of why I was suddenly possessed with the desire to own the house. No, “desire” wasn’t the right word—I had a deep, buried need to have the house. “It had once been a home, and it will be one again,” I said on a breath.

Cyrene gave me another odd look, but it was nothing to the confusion I felt over my statement. What on earth had I meant?

“Come!” Fiat said more forcefully, and this time he did snap his fingers.

Cyrene bristled at the gesture, but I grabbed her arm and hauled her out of the car after me, determined to be polite and persuasive. “This is an absolutely stunning house,” I told Fiat, allowing him to assist me out of the car, my eyes drinking in the glorious sight of the front of the house. The afternoon sun caressed the warm red stone, slid along the freshly painted white trim, and settled itself to glitter on the numerous leaded windows, winking little flashes that mesmerized me.

Fiat looked over the house with a critical eye and shrugged. “It is tolerable.”

Tolerable? My mind shrieked at the word, so profane was it when applied to the house.

“I prefer something more modern, but I suppose it is in a pleasant setting. Please remember that your twin will be at my mercy should you try anything.” A smile lit his eyes, but it wasn’t at all friendly. “And mercy is a quality that I particularly lack.”

We entered through the doors, and passed through a reception hall. I breathed deeply the heady scent of furniture polish and lemons, closing my eyes for a moment to enjoy it before feasting on what I knew would be an outstanding interior.

The staircase was a work of art, all dark wood with Corinthian newel posts, an elaborate balustrade, and matching dark paneling on the walls. Tapestries covered much of the walls, some vibrant, but most faded with the passing of time. I stopped before one that looked vaguely familiar, gawking when I recognized a name. “Is that . . . that isn’t William the Conqueror, is it?”

“It is,” Fiat answered.

I squinted closer at the tapestry. It was protected by a wall-mounted conservation case, the kind with special lighting that would not fade the treasure within. “It looks just like something out of the Bayeux Tapestry.”

“It is the Bayeux Tapestry.”

I spun around both at the words and the voice. It wasn’t Fiat who had answered me, as I had thought—the man who stood next to him with his arms crossed had dark brown hair, not blond, with a pronounced widow’s peak, and ebony eyes that glittered like the windows. “Hello again, Baltic. What are you doing with the Bayeux Tapestry?”

He strolled past me to admire it. “It’s only part of the tapestry: William’s coronation. It pleases me to display it, since it reminds me of a happy time.”

“You were there?” I asked.

“Not at the coronation, no, but I did help the mortals fight many times.”

“I was there. It was nothing exciting,” Cyrene said, giving Fiat a hostile glare. He frowned at her in response. “London was very dirty then, and the people were very rude, always throwing rotten vegetables. I much preferred Paris.”