[He holds her hands tightly, leaning against her forehead with his eyes closed. Her mouth is so close; they share the same breaths now, if one is truly breathing in the Horizon. He nearly kisses her -- wants to kiss her, moves his mouth to do it -- but stops himself in time.

When he speaks, his voice is low, hardly above a whisper, and his lips are almost against hers.]

In Nocwich. I want to see you in the flesh. If we both still want it, if you haven't changed your mind, if I can know in my heart that I am with my own woman and not some other man's, we will see each other there.

[He ought to move to leave, as tempted as he is, but he doesn't. It had been hard not to call her his wife, but she is not, not right now.

Sitting here with her like this, nearly kissing her, almost holding her, it's a taste of what he wants. All that really stands between them now is his worry that this desire is wrong -- that giving in to it might dishonor them both. Even so, it's all right to stay a while longer... all right when it's a beginning, and all right, too, when it might be a farewell.

Isn't it?]

Before then, there's something I want you to know. A few years before they brought me here, there was a mutiny. My own men stabbed me -- I don't know how many times. I have scars, ugly things, all over my chest and my belly. You haven't seen them.

[In their hundreds of years together, his face had been scarred, lines over each eye that were faint or deep depending on the day, but his chest had been smooth and uninjured.]