She sat down with her back to him, and he lifted her hair and began to brush it out. She now wore no night robe or anything else, not even the bow she had worn to their bed on the wedding night. (She had heard of the wager, and wanted to see what Darin really would do. He had laughed so that it nearly unmanned him-for a moment or two.)
He was freer with his strength now, but never overbearing. Waydol, Pirvan, the Knights of Solamnia-all who had taken a hand in composing him had not intended to make the ideal husband for an unborn woman when Waydol took in the shipwrecked orphan … but to Rynthala’s way of thinking, they had certainly done so.
She arched her back, until her hair hung straight down, then arched further, until her lips could brush the underside of Darin’s chin.
He laughed-a low, contented noise.
She thought he could not have done much laughing for the first twenty years of his life, and not enough for the ten years thereafter. If she could make him laugh, it was the best gift she could bring him in return for his keeping away the darkness of her memories.
She kissed his throat again, nibbling gently at his firm flesh. He shifted, and his lips came down on hers, while his arms drew her tight against him.