“But do you not see? You believe you are hated; you believe your uncle has complete control of the clan, but no one has challenged him.” He squeezed her hand. “Is he openly vile? Or does he smile and make reasonable choices—generally?”
She wanted to declare her uncle a monster, and so he was. But on the surface, she understood why people followed him. “He makes reasonable choices. Except when it comes to me.”
He nodded. “So that gives others less reasons to overthrow him.”
“But heisvile. He murdered my parents!”
“I believe you,” he said. His tone was gentle, it was also uncompromising. “But does anyone else?”
She shook her head, misery welling up in her. Reuben was going to go soft on her uncle. Just like everyone else. He wasn’t going to kill her uncle. He wasn’t even going to fight him. He would just try and take her dowry and then what? Abandon her?
She pushed up from the bed, setting her feet down on the cold floor. But when she stood up, it was just like every other night after her mother died. She stood there with nowhere to go, no choices at hand beyond accepting and enduring.
“Iseabail—”
“You are just like everyone else. You offer me hope and then do nothing.”
He growled as he pushed up in the bed. “Whateveryone else?Who? Iseabail, you said you didn’t ask anyone.”
She rounded on him. “And what am I to say? I will not set your broken leg unless you kill my uncle? I will not tend your fever-ridden child unless you throw my guardian from our clan?” She stomped her foot, so frustrated that she now acted like a petulant child. But she couldn’t stop herself. “He smiles and acts reasonable, then threatens me when we were alone. He struck my mother repeatedly in places that didn’t show. She complained about him often, but no one would listen. And he never hit me after my sixteenth birthday. I’d taken beatings when I was younger, but not after her spell.”
“Is he cruel to the other members of the clan?”
“He has a mean temper, but…” She shook her head. “As long as he is kept in whisky and women, he is happy and even generous.” She stared at him, her heart breaking. “You don’t believe me.”
“I do believe you,” he said coming to his feet. “But I am not the one who needs to be convinced. It’s your clan—”
“They won’t fight him! They’re too afraid!”
“Or are they too busy trying to survive to bother? At least until someone makes them care.”
She folded her arms. She wasn’t stupid. She understood what he wanted. “You think I should make my case to them. You think they’ll turn on him just because I say so.” She shook her head. “They won’t. They have no love for me. I am granddaughter to the witch who trafficked with Satan. I am child of a doomed father and a mother who so despised me, she ran away.”
Reuben drew back. “You don’t believe that, do you?”
“Of course not. But it’s what my uncle has been saying.”
“And you think they believe that nonsense?”
She nodded, miserable to her core.
“Why?”
“What?”
“Why do you think they believe that? Have they said it to your face?”
She frowned. “No. But they have said nothing against my uncle.”
He touched her face. “Did you ask what they believe?”
She threw up her hands. “What does it matter? They believe it!”
He lifted her chin, his caress exquisitely gentle. “I think you are the one who has believed.”
“I told you, I don’t—”
“Not about your parents. It has been your uncle, I think, who has convinced you that you are worthless except in your dowry. That no one cares for you except in that you nurse their sick and manage the castle.” He wrapped her in his arms, and though she allowed it reluctantly, she still let him tuck her against his body. “What if they are merely waiting for you to demand your due?”
