How nice it would’ve been to thaw out beneath the flow of hot water when she’d spent so many days freezing!

Of course, the boys had been diligent about bringing fuel for the fire and keeping it up, but the fireplace was far from effective at heating the cavernous room! The only place that was close to comfortable was the hearth area. The warmth barely penetrated a yard into the room.

What was the anatomy of affection, she wondered?

She hadn’t allowed herself to think about her grandmother for a very long time, but she summoned her memories, trying to dissect her feelings even though she’d never tried, before, to figure out why she loved her Grandmother. She just accepted that she did.

Was it feelings and emotions that defied definition? Or was love based on need?

She realized abruptly that it probably was and that that didn’t detract from the love in any way. She’d needed her grandmother to survive. Her grandmother had provided everything she needed—including affection. Food, warmth, shelter—and emotional support—advice, guidance based on her own experiences. Her grandmother had been mentor and caregiver and protector. Love had sprung from those things. They were the food that fed it.

So maybe it wasn’t as bizarre or unreasonable as it had seemed on the surface that she might have developed some affection for the barbarian Prince? From the moment he’d captured her he was her lifeline—her survival was completely in his hands.

“I don’t suppose either of you guys know how to make the damned shower work?” Noelle asked when the boys arrived with the tray of food and the fuel for her fire.

Both boys stopped in their tracks and stared at her as if some beast had suddenly displayed an ability to talk.

Annoyance flickered through her. “What? You thought I couldn’t talk?”

The youngest of the two snickered. “We don’t bathe in winter.”

Noelle wondered if she looked as horrified as she felt.

The older boy drove his elbow into the young boy’s side. “Ain’t true! We don’t shower because this is the only one that still works. Father says we have to bathe at least once a week! And I do and if you aren’t he’s going to be angry.”

Oh that was so much better!

Actually, she supposed that was a death defying act considering how freaking cold the castle was and she doubted they did much to get dirty or sweat in the winter ….

The young boy paled, but then his expression set angrily and a jolt went through Noelle. This child, obviously, was also Drak’s son. There was no mistaking the resemblance when the child was feeling obstinate! “That’s what I meant,” he muttered. “No showers ‘cause this is the only one that still works.”

“Well, it isn’t doing me a bit of good,” Noelle pointed out irritably, “because I don’t know how it works.”

Shrugging after he’d stared at her suspiciously for several moments, the older child set the tray he was carrying down and headed into the bathroom. The younger boy unceremoniously dropped the sticks he’d brought in and followed.

Curbing the urge to tell the youngest to clean up the mess he’d just made, Noelle followed both boys into the facilities.

It became clear fairly quickly that they had no more idea of how to make the plumbing work than she had. They were game to search, however, and Noelle hadn’t had a great deal of luck figuring it out by herself so she was perfectly willing to have them work on the problem for a while in the hopes that, between the three of them, they might resolve the dilemma without her having to resort to asking the Prince.

The cooperative attitude of the boys, unfortunately, degenerated fairly quickly to squabbling between them, which gave Noelle more insight about the two than she’d expected.

They hadn’t grown up together. They had not, in point of fact, been together much more than a year as far as she could determine. Since at least some of the comments had to do with their mothers, she discovered they also didn’t have the same mother—which seemed to be more typical than not.

The older child was a bully. At least, he bullied the younger—which meant it might be an integral part of his personality and might be no more than sibling rivalry.

That was certainly apparent—the sibling rivalry—although she was a little confused about the source since the older boy was his father’s second heir and the youngest didn’t seem to care.

He just wanted to go home to his mother, Noelle discovered when the older boy began to taunt him about it.

“Now that’s just plain mean!” Noelle said tightly, although she’d struggled to stay out of their business up to that point. “And not at all the kind of behavior one should expect out of a … Prince! He’s not even half your age!”

At that point the boy, Kadin, whirled to glare at her. “What would you know of it?” he snarled. “You’re just the Prince’s whore! He didn’t even want you to breed you!”

Noelle thought it was the venom in the declaration more than the statement itself that shocked her.

Well, it was also the prejudice he displayed when he had no reason to dislike her that she was aware of, let alone hate her, and the ugly insight into the general attitude of these men toward the women they took as captives.

She shouldn’t have been surprised at it. She shouldn’t even leap to the conclusion that the boy’s speech reflected the general attitude, but then he’d had to pick it up from somewhere, hadn’t he? And she didn’t think they would capture and use the women as they did if they had any respect for them.

She had to wrestle again with the urge to lower herself to argue with the child. It was fortunate that she did because the three of them had been so focused on tossing insults around that none of them had heard the Prince enter the room and cross to the door. It wasn’t until she heard the scrape of his boots on the stone floor, quite close, and sensed his massive presence looming over her, in fact, that she realized he was there.

His expression was … unnerving.

Noelle was more cowed by the anger she could see simmering just below the surface than she had been at any time since she’d been captured.

Because, she realized, she hadn’t actually seen him angry before.

His gaze moved from her to the boys and Noelle instinctively followed that look.

The youngest child had turned paper white with fear and Noelle’s heart clenched painfully at the look on his face. She could no more have ignore it than she could’ve simply commanded her heart to stop beating. Without even stopping to consider the possible consequences, she gathered the child close, sheltering him protectively.

If she thought she’d seen the full brunt of Drak’s anger before, she discovered she’d been dead wrong. The look he gave her that time made her go weak in the knees.

“My sons are under my protection,” he said through clenched teeth. “They do not need your protection!”

He transferred his attention to the boys. “Wait for me in the solar.”

Both boys immediately ducked their heads respectfully and fled—abandoning Noelle to face Drak’s wrath completely on her own. He glared at her for a long moment and finally pushed past her. Striding across the bathroom, he slammed his palm against a small, square tile that was protruding slightly. Instantly, steaming hot water began to pour from an opening above the bathing alcove. Turning, he met her gaze for a long moment and then strode from the room.

Noelle went limp when she heard the outer door slam. For a few moments she debated following him and leaping between him and the boys if he had it in mind to do harm to them, but then she dismissed that insane and totally useless idea.

The oldest, at least, had been with his father for a while and showed no signs of ill treatment. And, she abruptly recalled, she’d never seen any sign in either boy, before, that they were afraid of their father. Their reaction had been because they weren’t used to seeing his temper and they knew they were in trouble because they’d done or said something they shouldn’t.