nonsense. She wonât listento him. She wonât accept him. She insists that she will not have him. She must be made to realize that Erickson MacPhail represents a tremendous triumph for her. Even her motherâwhen her wits are unclouded, which isnât often nowadaysâhasnât said anything against Erickson.
âPerhaps you can assist us, my lord. Mary Rose must be made to see that if she weds him, mouths will be closed. All talk of what she is will stop. Erickson, as her husband, would ensure that all talk would end. If the lad has to force her, why, then, that is what will happen, and the consequencesânamely, her marriage to himâwill, by far, outweigh the rough-and-tumble methods.â
âOf course I will not assist in this. She doesnât want to marry him. Trust her, she isnât being coy. I tell you, she is terrified of him. Do you really want your innocent niece to be raped? To be forced into a union she fears?â
âYou grow melodramatic, my lord. Erickson wants to marry her. It is a wondrous thing for her to wed with him. To gain that end, I approve whatever it is he must do.â Sir Lyon cocked his big head to one side, frowning until the light dawned. âMy God,â he said, blinking at Tysen, âyou donât fully understand her situation, do you?â
Tysen was as baffled as he was angry. His voice was as cold as his brotherâs when he donned his magistrateâs robes. âUnderstand what? This entire business should be distasteful to any civilized man.â
Sir Lyon threw back his head and laughed and laughed. He took a sip of wine and spewed it out, and still he laughed. Finally he managed to say, âI apologize for not realizing that you are new here and thus do not understand. Ah, it is amusing. Of course Mary Rose is my niece, but here is where you labor under a severe misapprehension, my lord.
âMary Rose isnât a lady. She is as far from a lady asit is possible to be.â Sir Lyon just shook his head at the young manâs obtuseness.
âMary Rose is a bastard, my lord. She is an embarrassment. She has no worth, no value. She is not a lady, she can never be a lady. For reasons unfathomed by either myself or her aunt, Erickson MacPhail is willing to marry her. Since she refuses to have him, I have told him he may do what he must to bring her to the altar. If she does not wed him, she will never have anything, never be anyone, never have respect or recognition or even a civil nod from the local gentry. Nothing. Donât you understand? She is and always will be a bastard.â
âShe will have her mother and her good name.â
âShe never had a good name.â
âOf course she does. Just because her parents were not man and wife, she isnât to blame. Why canât you leave her be? Let her do what she wishes to do? Respect her for the good and honest person she is? Perhaps, if her situation is so very dreadful here, and will grow only worse as she grows older, then she and her mother could live elsewhere, where no one would ever know about her being a bastard.â
Sir Lyon looked at Tysen with pity. âYou are an optimistic man, my lord. You have high ideals. You believe the best of your fellow man. I, however, am not so sanguine. In my experience, some rare men are truly worthy, even selfless upon occasion, but usually men are weak and greedy and brimming with ill will toward those more vulnerable than they are.
âLadies, too, arenât all that benevolent, my lord. They are malicious, they will shred the reputation of any female who strays outside the rules they themselves have set. It would not matter where Gweneth and Mary Rose chose to live. She would become known soon enough for what she is.
âLeave be, my lord. Let Erickson have her. All will be well. She will not be abused. He will treat her kindlyâwhy should he not? He is a good man, I swear it to you. He will also
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