And she knows it is more than the unfamiliar heat that fills her. She has withdrawn from men, but she still knows the allure of them. Her desire is dead, not her body. He sparks that heat with his angry, serious gaze, uncertain even if the men at his back are friend or foe.

Yet, even with his hard, sharp command, she sees that the men listen to him. They give him a grudging respect bred in lives spent taking orders and carrying them out - risking death to avoid the sure thing.

It is the heat of battle with him, as much as the heat of desire. Every acquiescence is a small war won or lost, and each surrender is exactly that to him He gives when pushed, but it costs him something. She is not sure if it is honor or pride or something else, but she can see it cut him as sharply as a sword.

She watches him as he surveys his men, wondering what it is that his eyes see. She knows that these are chosen men, the ones who never miss; but she wonders if he sees anything more than disorder and disobedience. It makes her smile that what she sees is discipline. These men never miss, and yet they also never raise their rifles to him. There is a code of honor here that she understands and also does not. Perhaps they see in Sharpe the same things she does.

"Richard."

He doesn't glance up, sliding the oiled cloth cleanly along the neck of his rifle. She smiles and moves closer to the fire, sinking down across from him. Her smile is unfamiliar to her these days, as foreign as the man who causes it.

"You are not speaking to me now?"

"Nothin' t' say."

"I think perhaps you have much to say, but are too much a gentleman to say it."

"No one's ever going t' accuse me of being a gentleman."

"Not gentle-born, perhaps." She runs her thumb along her knee, smearing the grey ash into the dark cloth of her trousers. "Your men, they see you differently now."

"Doesn't make me different. Only means I've not gotten them killed yet, though that's likely t' change fighting for your bloody flag."

"We all fight for the things we have to, though they may not be the things we necessarily believe."

"If you don't believe in it, you shouldn't be fightin' for it."

"You and your men only fight for causes you believe in? For King and country? You do not fight because you were pressed? You do not fight for food and money? You do not fight because it is easier to choose the way you die than to simply accept death? To escape prison?"

"Whatever the reason we got here, we're here to do a job. And we'll do it. We follow orders, me and my men."

"And yet you are to lead them, Richard. Can't always follow orders, can you? When your job is to lead?"

"There are always orders to follow." He gets to his feet, his rifle gleaming in the firelight. "Always someone higher to tell us what to do. Someone who's a true gentleman." He does not salute her, though his nod serves the same purpose. "Or a true lady."

"I was a lady a long time ago, Richard." She shakes her head and glances at the stars, refusing to remember long ago days and long ago promises. "I am not a lady now."

He offers her his smile, brittle and as sharp as his name. "And I, Teresa, I'll never be a gentleman."