She was so wonderfully, painfully in love with her Aeden now: he was her warmth, her heart, and yet her still unspoken love... and he was also the source of such impending heartache it ripped at her. She had not told him, perhaps she never would, how could she, she loved him and if he loved her, she couldn't bear to break his heart - as well as her own.

They were together now, and it sufficed for her, but she had yet to give him the ring; she had no reason, it just seemed as if she had to wait for the right time. Odd, she was always so practical, so determined in the past to simply see the opportunity and... what was he doing?

He had wrapped his arm warmly, yet firmly, around her waist as they stepped into the Dwarven tavern and the sound of soft lute music drifted in the air, along with the stench of ale. He held her body close, as close as when they made love - strange how easy that was to say that now, how right it was to say, how painfully true - and began to move his hips against hers in rhythm to the music.(Madness)

"What are you doing?" she asked in mild alarm as her arms reached around his hips as his hands were to hers.

"Dancing," he sighed into her ear and once more practiced his mouths sweet magic upon her slender neck as he held her tighter still.

"Dancing?" she moaned as she closed her eyes and drifted, her body weightless in his strong arms as he moved them both around the room, her long legs moving in step with his hips.

"Don't tell me you never danced before," he sighed, as his hands caressed her back, sending ticklish shivers through her body.

"Never dressed, and never with a man, let alone one dressed in armor. But it has its... charms," she gazed into the warm white/blue of his handsome eyes as if staring into the open sky and was lost once more in him. 'I love you, I love , I love you.' so easy to think, to know... to be broken by. She gasped as he smiled at her eyes as they once more betrayed her secret - as they dilated at him. "You're a foolish man," she sighed as he lifted her and swung her about joyfully.

"And you are a beautiful, remarkable woman, and an amazing warmer of tents."

She loved his attempts at humor, "is that all?"

"No, your also incredibly...," he gently sucked her neck, "tasty... Morrigan."

She gasped and sighed as she raised her arms to his thick, muscular neck and wrapped herself around the man, pressed herself into his armor as if she could somehow penetrate the shell and they could be as one as they moved across the stone floor, their bodies moving as if they were holding each other as they floated in open space, alone, lost in one another. She felt her tears welling as she realized she never wanted them to stop this 'dance' and dreaded having started it because they would; soon the others would come... Behlen would want to see him. She smiled sadly at him, and almost said it, "My lo... lower leg hurts a little, can we sit down for a moment?"

"Of course," he said kindly and guided her to a table which she sat on. She adjusted herself for the sake of modesty, hating herself for breaking the connection with him. she moved her right leg as if in pain, and let her tears fall from her eyes.

"Are you ok?" He asked as he caressed her tears away.

'NO, I'm not ok, I'm far from it! I love you, and it is tearing me apart because I will have to leave you, and can only think of that time, and mull fantasies of this tiny iron ring to keep us together; maybe, hopefully...' she gripped the ring in her hand, "I will be, thank you." and clung to it as her means to assure that; but first, a test. "Aeden?," (my love).

"Yes," he answered softly, his hand lightly touching her knee, "Is it feeling better?"

"I think I have a way to heal it faster. I have a ring that can speed up the process, but I think I can increase its potency, and healing attributes, it just needs a special refined lyrium. I saw some in that shop we rescued from the Carta, could you take it there for me? It should glow in the presence of it. It's how you'll find it."

He took hold of it, coated in a thin silver sheath that she would remove once he returned it and felt the heat of her body rise as the ring was held in his hand. He walked out of the tavern, the heat diminished as he got further away from her.

She focused on the heat, and closed her eyes.

An hour passed as she waited for his return, and suddenly felt her heart race in her chest, panic, then anger, rage, release, calm, then the heat once more, growing, warmer, warmer...

"Here you go," his voice sighed as he kissed her cheek, "You weren't kidding about glowed, this thing nearly burned me."

She opened her eyes to see his armor dripping with fresh blood, "Are you all right?" of course he was, still she was concerned, odd he wasn't.

"Not my blood...,"

She kissed him before he could finish, her mouth hungry for the taste of his life's breath. "Give it here, I need to add the lyrium. Wash it off your hands, its poisones to mortals."

He washed off the fine silver from his hands that came off the ring as a result of the blood of whatever fool, or fools defied her Aeden, without even noticing it.

She placed the ring back in her pouch and whispered an incantation that made the lyrium glow around the tiny iron circle.

Tonight she would make love to him again; not just out of desire for the moment, but for the desires of the years to come. The ring needed the act of joining to make the bond even stronger, and to unite it to the one she had just purchased just before they entered this den of drink and dancing.

They would have this sweet dance again, and again, and again. She would make certain of it.