Page 30 of Castle of Refuge

“I see.”

There was silence again. If she could ask questions, he could as well. “Do you have any sisters or brothers?”

“I have one sister. No brothers.” Her expression changed, clouding over.

“Is she older or younger?”

“Older.”

“Were you and your sister close companions?”

“She is not the kind of sister one becomes friends with.”

“I am sorry to hear that. My sister is a very kind and good person. I can’t imagine anyone not liking her.”

“You are fortunate indeed.”

“Why is your family so small? Did your father die?”

“No, he is alive. My mother died.”

“And your father did not remarry?”

She shook her head, looking down again.

“Forgive me if I am dredging up bad memories.”

“Do not worry. I do not remember my mother.”

“Was your sister cruel to you?” He said the words as gently as he could.

She did not answer right away. She took a breath and blew it out noisily, staring down at the rock she was sitting on. “Yes.” She looked at him with a crooked smile. “Yes, she was.”

They were both silent for a minute or two before she went on.

“Something bad happened to my sister when we were both very young. Our mother died in childbirth, so we needed a nursemaid. My sister was mistreated for several years by the woman, who was very cruel to her while doting on me. And my sister blames me. She’s also blamed me, on occasion, for our mother’s death.”

Edwin’s heart ached for Audrey, as a heaviness was evident in her voice and the way her shoulders drooped.

“I used to feel such pity for my sister that I would excuse her behavior by remembering all she had gone through. But she became jealous of me because our father planned to marry me off first and threatened to never allow my sister to wed. I believe Father thinks she is mad.”

Edwin took a step back, almost colliding with Shadow. “Is she so bad?”

She looked down again. “She purposely tripped me so I would fall into the fire. That’s how I got my scars.”

Edwin drew in a breath. How could anyone be so heartless, especially to her own sister?

“I used to think there was something wrong with me that she would torment me so, telling me things that weren’t trueto try to confuse me and get me to doubt my own senses. Once when I was too little to know any better, she told me there was snow outside and I couldn’t see it because I was bad. She constantly told me I was ugly, that no man would ever marry me, that my father only felt sorry for me. Then she caused me to get burned . . .” She shook her head and looked the other way, pulling on her hair to make certain it covered the scars.

The poor girl. He knew what it was like to have someone saying things about you that weren’t true. His stepmother had done the same, though Delia had suffered her cruelties the most.

“Your sister was only jealous of you. That is why she told you that you were ugly.”

She shook her head. “She found a way to make her words true. She made me ugly,” she rasped in a whispery voice.

Surely she did not truly think she was ugly. But perhaps he knew what she was feeling, the sense that no one could ever see anything about you except your scars. He would always be the man with only one arm. And she would always be the woman with the scars.

Eight