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Snow could see the outline of the two men, but it was their mounting anger in their warring voices that she feared would cause far worse problems.
She spoke up, hoping to make Lord Polwarth understand. “I have explained over and over that I have no wont to leave Tarass. I love him and he loves me.”
“So he says now, but he will discard you when he is done using you and cast you out as his father did to my sister?” Polwarth said, an ugly sneer spreading across his face.
Tarass shook his head, scrunching his brow. “What are you talking about?”
“Your father didn’t have the decency or perhaps he had been far too ashamed of what he had done to my sister, Fay, to speak a word about it.”
Snow caught the turn of his head toward her.
“I never meant you harm, my dear. My sole purpose of marrying you was to protect you. After hearing that you had been forced to stay with Lord Tarass for a few days, I feared he would destroy your honor as his father did to my sister. When I met with your da last, he was lucid, of sound mind, and he told me he didn’t believe he’d live much longer. I asked if there was anything I could do to help and he told me that he worried the most about you. Sorrell and Willow, he believed would do well, but you being blind and it being his fault, he feared what would become of you and asked me to be there to help you if ever needed. I was not only pleased to keep my word to him, but thought to redeem myself and save you when I couldn’t save my sister.”
“What is it you think my da did to your sister?” Tarass asked, unable to believe a word of Polwarth’s tale, his da having been the most honorable man he had ever known, far more honorable than he was himself.
“Marriage arrangements were being discussed between your grandfather and my parents for Fay and your da to wed. Fay visited here often and when she returned home,”—Polwarth shook his head—“I had never seen her so happy. My parents believed they were making a perfect match for her. Then your da returned from that trip with your mum, his new wife, and my sister was utterly stunned and heartbroken. She took to her bedchamber and wouldn’t leave it.” His eyes flared with anger. “She grew ill and my family was shocked to learn that she suffered a miscarriage. She had been carrying your father’s bairn. She begged for confession so her soul wouldn’t suffer endless damnation, and I brought Abbot Bennett to her to absolve her from sin. She confessed all to him. How she would sneak into the keep through the secret passage and meet with him, fornicate with him, and how they planned to wed and have a life together. Worse, she told Abbot Bennett that she didn’t want to live. She was glad she was dying.”
“My father would have never done that to your sister,” Tarass said.
“Ask Abbot Bennett. He heard the confession and told me about the secret passage.”
Snow’s heart broke for the young lass, she had never met. Loving Tarass as she did, she couldn’t imagine the pain the woman must have suffered being betrayed. Yet just as she couldn’t believe her da would ever hurt Tarass’s parents, Tarass believed his da couldn’t be so heartless and shameful. Were they both blind when it came to their fathers or was there something else to both tales?
Tarass sent for Abbot Bennett and he didn’t waste time in ordering the man to tell him everything that Polwarth’s sister had confessed to him.
His tale was the same as Polwarth’s and he seemed to enjoy telling it.
“My da would have never been so ignoble. I don’t believe you,” Tarass said, defending his da as strongly as Snow had defended her da.
“And well you shouldn’t, since it’s a lie.”
All eyes turned to see Twilla standing in the open doorway.
She shuffled in, closing the door behind her, and made her way to Tarass and laid her aged hand on his arm. “It’s a secret your da swore me to keep, but with what went on here today, it’s time the secret was revealed, at least to those in this room.” She turned an accusing glance on the Abbot. “Though Abbot Bennett already knows it.” She turned to Polwarth. “And it’s time you knew it as well.”
Tarass’s silence gave Twilla permission to speak.
“Fay and Winton, Tarass’s da, were good friends, but it wasn’t Winton she loved. It was another man and Winton helped her hide it, since the man was one of Winton’s warriors, certainly not an appropriate husband for the daughter of a noble.”
“Fay would never—”
