There is no answer to her question as she drifts closer to him, drawn like a moth to his flame.  His hand moves and touches her arm.  His fingers are not simply warm but hot, painfully so as they trail along her skin to her shoulder and then her neck, curling along her throat like bands of red hot metal.  His touch reddens her skin and she can feel it growing tender as he holds her throat and traces her windpipe with his searing thumb.<br/><br/>"Yes Niaobe," he says.  And for the first time his lips part and the words come from without rather than within.  The wonderful voice that has echoed along her nerves is but a pale shadow of the real one.  It is the voice of a god and she knows somewhere deep inside that no mere man's voice will ever compare to this sound.<br/><br/>"I will show you what I want."