Married life has made Riven kan Ingan a love-struck fool, and he'll be the first to admit it, but he refuses to be a cuckold when he returns from battle to discover his beloved Barbara pregnant with a child he couldn't have sired. In a fury at her supposed unfaithfulness, he risks the wrath of the gods and sends her to her death, only to find himself driven from his domain by a deadly curse. Haunted by Barbara's memory, Riven begins a quest to find the one who cursed him. When he loses his sight, he also loses his pride and must submit to a barbarian girl's gentle mercy to free himself of the Blood Curse.

EXCERPT

"When we get to Aljansur, I'll marry you," he had told her. "You'll be no soldier's minion."

The women he had desired for so long was now his.

He should have felt dishonor in the way he'd won her, buying her from her husband for a silver hunting dagger--but the boy had seen the way they looked at each other, had known for years that, though she lay beside him at night, 'twas Riven's image held in her heart. Rather than fight his friend, rather than risk losing her by killing the man she loved--or by having the man she loved kill him--he chose to let her go, for the price of a knife whose blade had never tasted blood.

Yes, Riven should have felt dishonor in the bargain, in truth, had nearly ridden out of the farmyard without her, but when he saw her standing there, beautiful, confused, not wanting to believe that 'twas actually happening, he couldn't leave her behind.

He held out his hand, and she took it, was pulled up onto the back of the black charger, and they rode away.

He should have been ashamed of how he won her but he wasn't. He was too happy, though what Barbara thought of the bargain, of being swapped like some prize mare by the husband who declared he loved her, he would never know.

For now, he didn't care.

She was his.

That was all that mattered.