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“Your aunt and uncle have a love of the letter h?”

“My cousin Hugh was named for my great-uncle who met God just before he was born, thereby establishing the pattern for naming. My sister and I were born just one year later, and not to be outdone, my father insisted on naming us Rory and Rylee to continue the new tradition of naming all Waryn siblings with the same letter.”

He loved her laugh. “He really did that for such a reason?”

“If you knew my father, you’d not ask such a question.” At her look of confusion, he clarified. “He is . . . an interesting man.”

Freya reached for the pitcher of ale the serving maid had left for them. Apparently finished already, she refilled her mug. “As is his son.”

“Flattery? From Lady Freya Hathawaye? Surely the world has gone mad.”

She ignored him. “Tell me of your sister.”

“My twin sister.” How did one describe Rylee precisely? “One must meet her, experience her, to truly understand that which I’ve had to endure for so many years.”

“Your words do not match your expression,” Freya said. Rory refilled his own mug then too. “They tease, as a brother might, but your smile clearly conveys your love for her.”

Rory leaned forward, looked to the left, and then to the right. “Do not tell her,” he whispered. “She will use the knowledge to torture me.”

Again, that laugh. “I am certain she knows of it already.”

“Hmm, I would not be so certain of that.” He turned the conversation back to Freya. “And what of you? What of your brother?”

Immediately he wished to take back the words. But Freya waved his concern away.

“’Tis necessary to speak of him. Eustace,” she sighed. “Before he fostered in the South, he was distant. Even as a child. So often I defended him to our father, even during times I did not agree with his actions. But I think, looking back, my father knew long before me what I never wished to admit.”

The idea of a sibling doing what Freya’s had to her, to her father . . . Rory simply could not reconcile it. But he’d also learned long ago not to judge what he could not understand.

“What did he know?” Rory prompted.

Freya’s full lips pursed together. “That he was not a kind man. Hadn’t been a kind child. ’Twas no fault of his bearing, I can assure you.”

“I can see that clearly, Freya.”

She seemed to understand his meaning. “I do not believe he intended for Father to be killed. Indeed, when he realized what Edward’s men intended, Eustace seemed as surprised as any, but . . .” She hesitated.

“Tell me,” he prompted. She wished to say something of import. “Freya?”

Drinking deeply, she replaced her mug on the table. He quickly refilled it. ’Twould be a long night indeed.

“He threatened me by grabbing a fistful of my maid’s hair, the very night you arrived. I’d been refusing to dine in the hall. To appear as if nothing ill had happened and Edyington simply had a new lord. As if so many men, including our father, had not been slaughtered.”

Rory leaned forward. “And still you refused to come with me?”

Freya opened her mouth and then closed it. “I wish only to protect the people of Edyington.”

Rory’s nostrils flared. He imagined the bastard in Freya’s bedchamber, his cowardly abuse of her maid provoking her to do his will. Rory pushed his chair out and stood.

“What are you about?” Freya asked. “Rory?”

He bid her to stay. Why was he surprised the same man who had brought an army to his father’s hall would hurt a woman to gain his will?

“Where are you going?”

“I am going to kill your brother.”

Chapter Sixteen