Rose Marie stared deeply into her cup and the wine she hadn't so much as sipped, swirling it around for several breaths before she set down her cup and began to tell her tale.
"I sold herbs," Rose Marie said when she was ready. "In a market stall in DuCree City. Remedies. Teas for fevers, salves for burns, the things grandmothers have known for a hundred years. I wasn't rich, but I owned my cottage and my garden, and my rent for the stall was never late," she said, sounding almost wistful for the simple life she'd long ago left behind.
The simple life that had been stolen from her, along with all the simple joys that life brought. Simple joys like the summer days she spent at tournaments, tending to the injured knights, and the one who'd captured more than just her eye when he started visiting her shop long after his bruises had faded away.
"That was before Count Wren's son took a liking to me," Rose Marie added as her tone turned bitter.
