They reached the island of Steyra at dawn the next morning. This dawn was sparkling bright, with the sky glowing as the sun crept up over the horizon and the breeze raised whitecaps on the sea. It was a lovely sight, and Blade was glad to be able to make the approach to the island with good visibility. Good visibility for him, though, meant the same for anyone who sailed by or flew overhead. He would not have greatly minded another day of fog.

The island of Steyra was twelve miles long and four miles wide. Because of its poor soil it was uninhabited. Parties of fishermen came from time to time to gather shellfish and seabirds' eggs, but that was all. Most of the island was rock, as bare and lifeless as an army helmet, but on both coasts there were a number of bays where a fair-sized boat could ride safely at anchor-or a submarine enter submerged. Three of the bays were regularly visited by Imperial submarines on patrol in these waters, and it was for one of those bays that Blade set his course.

They made their way close-hauled around to the western side of the island, reaching the mouth of the bay by noon.

Blade lowered the sails while Rilla took the wheel and steered them into the cove under power. By now she handled the boat as confidently as if she'd been doing it for years. The sea breeze and the release of tension had brought some color back to her bleached cheeks.

At last they came to a place half a mile inside the bay where they could moor directly to the rock. Blade sprang from the bow onto the shore and led the bowline around a handy boulder, while Rilla lowered the anchor from the stern.

Blade wiped his hands on his trousers and looked up. The cliffs around the bay rose a hundred feet high on all sides. No one but the seabirds wheeling high overhead could see them now. There was much else that would have to be done before they could safely settle down and wait for the submarine, but none of it had to be done in the next few hours. For the first time since he'd dropped from the Imperial reconnaissance plane into Rodzmania, Blade didn't feel a need to keep alert.

Rilla walked forward to the bow and stood by the bowsprit, smiling down at Blade. The cliffs all around cut off the sea breeze, and the damp air was almost warm. Rilla pulled off her jacket and threw it down on the deck. Then she took two steps out along the bowsprit and sprang lightly down onto the rock. Two more steps, and Blade found her coming into his arms, her eyes wide and her lips curved in a broad smile before they pressed themselves against his.

They had both known this would happen when the moment seemed right. Now that moment was here.

Blade felt desire roar up within him, as vivid and real as the burning planes on the airfield. He held Rilla against him, feeling her warmth, the lush magnificence of her body, the trembling that told of a desire that was rising in her to match his. Then he stepped away from her and laughed, although the laugh came strangely from his dry throat.

«For God's sake let's get something to spread on the rocks, or we're going to look like we've fallen off the cliffs by the time we're through.»

«Ah,» said Rilla, tossing her head so that her hair rippled across her shoulders. «You are right.» She began to unbutton her sweater. «So go and get a sail or a blanket. Do not be slow.»

Blade nodded and leaped back aboard the boat. It seemed that he went from bow to stern in two leaps, then dove below into the tiny cabin to snatch blankets from the narrow bunks. Back on deck, forward again-and he stopped at the foot of the bowsprit to stare and admire.

Rilla stood by the boulder to which the boat was moored, one hand resting on it, the other hand on her hip. All her clothes were tossed roughly over the boulder. She was as nude as she'd been by the cove on the lake, so many days and many miles ago. This time, though, she'd stripped to bare herself to far more than the sunlight and the wind and the water. The look in her eyes made that as clear as if she'd carved it into the rock at her feet. Those eyes were green, and they seemed far larger than before.

Blade did not remember passing from the boat to the shore. He did not remember taking off his own clothes, although he remembered Rilla telling him to do so in a choking voice. He did not remember sweeping the loose pebbles from a patch of rock and spreading the blankets out on it.

He could be sure that all of these things happened. He remembered very clearly how he lay down on the blankets and how Rilla stood above him. There was no urge to dominate in her; there was no desire to submit in him. There was only an overpowering sense that both of them wanted her to ride him and that it did not matter very much, because this joining would be only their first and not their last. They had all the time that even two people thrust forward by a fierce desire could possibly want or need.

Rilla bowed forward, and for a moment she saluted with her lips the thickened rod of Blade's risen manhood. It was only a passing salute, and Blade was glad of that. There was only so much desire that any man's endurance could meet and conquer. The touch of Rilla's lips hinted at their ability to push his desire far beyond that point.

There would be time to test that ability, and much else about Rilla. That time was not now.

Rilla rose from her bow, balanced herself with her long, solidly curved legs spread wide apart, then lowered herself down upon Blade. He twisted upward to meet her and they joined, his thrust surging upward out of sight into the damp dark redness between her tanned thighs. A gasp broke through his lips, and on her face appeared a look not of fulfillment-that would come later-but of satisfaction that they were well and happily begun.

From that happy beginning they moved swiftly onward. She did not rise and fall, but instead writhed around and around and from side to side. Every part of the maddening warmth and the glorious wetness that surrounded Blade pressed against him. He had an exquisite sense of being caught and held in a grip that would never slacken or release him.

What Rilla felt he could only guess from the expressions that tumbled wildly across her face, as wildly as her hair tumbled about with each shake and twist of her head and body. Her eyes flickered open and shut and her nostrils flared wider and wider, as though she were running desperately and could not suck enough air into her panting lungs. Her teeth were clamped tightly shut, although her lips twisted into shapes that seemed to hold strange combinations of both pain and pleasure.

It could not go on this way for long, however determined Blade was to endure, however determined Rilla was to extract every bit of delight. She came to her first spasm, every part of her body jerking and twisting as though it would fly apart, her massive breasts with their solidly jutting nipples doing a strange, impassioned, infinitely provocative dance of their own. She came to a second spasm, and her head went back and a terrible and wonderful cry of release and fulfillment went echoing around the cliffs. She came to a third spasm-

— and this time Blade reached his own along with her. Two cries echoed around the cove, two bodies went through complex and totally uncontrolled movements, two sets of eyes clamped tightly shut, two pairs of hands sought each other and gripped until both cried out in pain as well as delight. Then there was silence and stillness, except for the heaving chests and the gasps as starved lungs tried desperately to suck in air. After a while even that faded away. Blade looked up at Rilla, Rilla looked down at Blade, and they both laughed.

«You know,» he said at last. «I could stay here for hours. And so could you.»

She nodded.

«But there are still things to do before we'll be safe.»