What? Kylar untied the ribbon and read the first letter. It had been written by a child, all big letters and disconnected thoughts: “Thank you so mutch. much. I love it here. You are great. It is my birthday today. I love you. -Elene” An adult had written below that. “Sorry, Count Drake, she overheard us talking about her lord benefactor. She’s been wanting to write this letter since we started teaching her how to write. She wouldn’t let go of the idea once she got aholt of it. Tell us if we shouldn’t let her write no more. -Humbly Yours, Gare Cromwyll.”

Kylar was spellbound. There was a letter for each year, each getting longer, the handwriting better. He felt like he was watching Elene grow up before his eyes. She, too, had changed her name, but there was no denial in her of what she had been, no divorce from her previous weakness and vulnerability.

When she was fifteen, she wrote, “Pol asked if I get mad because my face got cut up. He said it’s not fair. I said it’s not fair that I got out of the Warrens while so many others never did. Look at everything I’ve got! And it’s all because of you. . . .”

Kylar had to flip through the letters, just skimming them. He was living on borrowed time. Sooner or later word would arrive about the prince’s death. And damn! the girl could write a lot. He flipped to the last letter. It was dated just a few days ago.

“You don’t know what you’ve done for me. I’ve told you about all the ways your money has saved my family, especially when my adoptive father died, but you’ve done more than that. Just knowing that somewhere out there, there’s a young lord who cares about me (me! a slaveborn girl with a scarred face!) has made all the difference. You’ve made me feel special. Pol proposed to me last week.” Kylar had a sudden impulse to find this Pol and kick his ass. “I would have said yes, even though I hate his temper and . . . other things, too. The point is, just that you’re out there caring about me makes me believe that I’m worth more than a lousy marriage to the first man who will propose to a scarred girl. It gives me faith that the God has something better for me.” Oh, she’s a God person. Great. So that was how she knew the Drakes. “Thank you. And sorry about my last letter, I’m totally mortified by what I wrote. Please ignore everything I said.”