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"I lost the duel, I lost the promise of her hand, and in losing, I failed the one person who had trusted me above all others."
Eliza remained silent, her fingers still resting over his heart.
"I found her afterwards and begged her to leave with me. I told her we could disappear that very night, that I did not care if I lost my title, the estate, and every penny to my name, because none of it had mattered as much as she did. I was prepared to become the poorest man in England if it meant she would be my wife, because I truly believed that if we had one another, we would never want for anything else."
His voice faltered.
"But when she saw me. When she looked at what the duel had made of me, she refused."
Eliza felt his heartbeat slow beneath her hand.
"She touched my face..." His own hand unconsciously rose to the scar that crossed his cheek. "...and she said my scars would haunt us for the rest of our lives, that every morning she looked at me she would remember what loving her cost me.”
The room fell silent save for the crackle of the dying fire.
"She left the following morning. Her father took her north before dawn, and I never saw her again."
His jaw tightened.
"I wrote to her once."
A pause.
"Then twice."
Another.
"And then so many times I eventually lost count."
His laugh carried no humour.
"I begged her to come back. I apologised. I promised I would spend the rest of my life making amends if she would only allow me the chance."
He stared into the darkness beyond the bedchamber ceiling.
"She never answered a single letter."
Another long silence settled between them before he finally spoke again, the words sounding less like a confession and more like a verdict he had lived with for eleven years.
"I let her down."
His voice broke almost imperceptibly.
"I failed to protect her when she needed me most."
He turned his head just enough to meet Eliza's eyes.
“I ruined her reputation, got her beaten and bloodied, and in the end, I still failed to win her hand. All because I believed love would be enough. It was not. So I do not make promises unless I am certain I can keep them.”
Eliza's heart ached for him. He loved so fiercely, so completely, that even eleven years later he could not see what she saw so plainly. He had condemned himself for the shortcomings of a nineteen-year-old boy and had carried that sentence every day since, convinced that one lost duel had somehow made him unworthy of loving another soul.
"You did not let her down," she whispered, her fingers tracing absent circles across his chest. "Arthur, you were scarcely more than a boy yourself, yet you stood between the woman you loved and a dishonourable man. You gave everything you possessed that night, and love cannot ask for more than that."
She lifted her head just enough to look into his eyes.
"You challenged her father when most gentlemen would have turned away. You offered to surrender your title, your fortune, your home, everything you had ever known, simply so she would never have to fear another blow. That is not the story of a man who failed her."
She smiled sadly.
