How quiet the castle was! Did my mother have no premonition on that night? I was more fortunate than she was. I had her journal to warn me. When she was writing was she impelled to do so because it was going to play such an important part in her daughter’s life?

I sat on the pallet and I wondered what the future held. There was a great lifting of my spirits in spite of the dangers I felt all around me. Fenn might love me after all.

Was that a faint sound in the corridor? Had I imagined it. I felt my limbs begin to tremble. I felt courage sapping away.

No, it was nothing, a mouse perhaps? But it was a sound. The latch of my door was being quietly lifted.

Someone was in the room.

I peered through the curtains. The figure was moving stealthily towards my bed.

I drew back the curtains and stepped out.

My stepmother turned sharply to face me. She stared at me blankly. It was the first time I had ever seen her disconcerted.

I took the damp cloth from her hand and said: “You killed my mother.”

She didn’t answer. In the gloom her face seemed impassive. Her surprise had left her. She was calm as she ever was.

She did not speak at all.

She turned away and walked from the room. I stood there, the damp cloth, her murder weapon, in my hands.

I spent a sleepless night. I must make some plans and I was not sure what. In the morning I would speak to my stepmother; I would make her confess how she had killed my mother.

I sat on the chair which the night before Senara had occupied. I tried to sort out my thoughts. I had to take some action. If only I knew what.

During the early morning, the wind had risen. It sent the sea thundering into the caves along the coast and it sounded like voices shouting to each other. The wind whined about the castle walls like the complaining voices of those who had lost their lives on the Devil’s Teeth demanding revenge on the men who had sent them there.

I was up early. I dressed and went down to the hall. I could hear the servants bustling about. There was no sign of my stepmother.

All through the morning I could not find her, but I saw my father. He was alone coming across the courtyard from the Seaward Tower.

I went to him and stood before him, barring his way.

“I have something to say to you,” I said.

He stared at me; this was not the manner in which people were accustomed to address him, but I had lost all fear of him and when he made as though to push me aside, I caught his arm.

“I’ve discovered something … terrible,” I said.

He narrowed his eyes and I thought he was going to strike me. Instead he hesitated and then he said; “Come inside. We can’t talk here.”

I led the way to my bedroom. I wanted to tell him there, in that place where last night I had come near to death.

I faced him fearlessly and perhaps because he had always respected courage his eyes softened slightly. But his expression changed rapidly when I blurted out: “Last night your wife tried to kill me … in the same way as she killed my mother.”

It was horrible, for I saw the look in his eyes before he could veil it. He knew that she had killed my mother.

“I suspected her,” I went on. I pointed to the ruelle. “I was in there watching and waiting. She killed my mother in the same way as Lord Darnley’s murderers killed him. I learned how that was done. A damp cloth pressed over the mouth, leaving no marks … no sign. And so my mother died. And you knew it. Perhaps you helped. Perhaps you planned it together.”

“No!” he shouted vehemently. I was grateful that I could believe that.

“But you knew she did it,” I insisted; and he was silent in his guilt.

“You,” I went on. “Her husband … my father. Oh God, my own father.”

I had never believed I should see him so shaken, for I had never before seen him anything but in command of a situation. I could see, too, a certain anguish in his eyes and because I had read my mother’s journal and knew of that first meeting between them and the attraction which had sprung up, I was aware of the fact that he was looking back into the past and remembering too. He had not been a happy man since her death—yet I could not pity him.

“I loved her,” I said, my voice trembling.

“I loved her too,” he answered.

“And yet …”

He was himself again, the softness passed. “You wouldn’t understand,” he said roughly. “Maria was irresistible … a witch, if you like. She’d put a spell on me.”

“And even though she had murdered my mother and you knew it, you married her.”

“It’s something you’re too young to understand.”

“I understand there is such a thing as unbridled lust,” I said contemptuously.

“’Twas more than that. Try to understand, Tamsyn.”

“I understand this,” I retorted. “You are a murderer, for I hold you guilty with her.”

“It was done before I knew it. There was nothing I could do to stop it.”

“Only marry her and enjoy the fruits of her infamy.”

“You will never understand.”

“Alas for me. I understand too well.”

“You will cease your insolence, girl, or I’ll take you to the courtyard and lash you there myself.”

“Yes,” I answered, “you are capable of that.”

He did not try to stop me as I pushed past him and left him standing in my room.

I did not know what I was going to do. All through the morning I looked for my stepmother but she was nowhere to be found.

It was afternoon when Fenn rode over.

I heard his voice in the courtyard and my heart started to beat madly.

I ran out to him.

“Fenn,” I said, “at last you have come.”

He dismounted.

He took my hands and looked at me steadily. “I’ve wronged you, Tamsyn,” he said; and my heart leaped and in spite of all my indecisions and the horror which was all about me I was happy.

“I must talk to you,” he said. “Where can we be alone?”

“In the burial ground,” I told him.

We went there together.

There he said, “So it is my father who lies there.”

“You know,” I answered.

He clenched his fists suddenly. “The murderers!” he said. “I shall avenge him.”

“I was hurt when you didn’t come,” I told him.

“I was miserable … most of all to think that you had been a party to this.”

“I never was.”

“I know that now. I know that you saved one of our ships. I have spoken to the captain and he has told me that the Paling Light prevented a disaster. And I know now that it was you who lighted the lanterns after they had been put out.”

“I did not know of this foul trade. Not until I read my mother’s journal. She knew. But he was her husband.”

He nodded.

“I love you, Tamsyn,” he said.

I said: “It’s a strange place in which to be so happy.”

“But before I can speak to you of this I have something to do. Your father is responsible for my father’s death. I have sworn that my father’s murderer shall not go free. I have come here today to speak not of love but of hatred. I shall never forget, Tamsyn. I shall kill him. I am going to make him pay for the lives of my father and those innocent sailors.”

“Let us go away from here. I never want to see this place again. The sound of the wind howling round the walls, the knowledge of what has been done here nauseates me. Let’s go right away from here.”

“And if we go away, what then? Shall they be left to ply their hateful trade. How could we go away knowing that they went on luring ships on to the rocks to destroy them.”

“Then what can we do?”

“I am going to stop this forever. He has plundered his last ship.”

“How can you stop it?”

“What he does is a crime against humanity.”

“He is a powerful man in these parts. I know of none who do not tremble before him. Suppose you inform against him. Where would you inform? What would happen? He is too powerful. You would never stop him. He would have means of evading justice.”