Chapter ThirteenLETHAN VALLEY
OCTOBER 1585
My mother, of course, noticed the difference in me since I returned from Tarras Moss. She allowed me a week to think things over, a week in which we lost three cattle to a Veitch raid and the Yorling got to know the men of the valley. A young servant gave me the message that Mother wished to see me.
'Her Ladyship was insistent,' the girl said.
'She always is,' I told her, sighed, and made my way to my mother's chamber.
Mother sat by her spinning wheel. She looked deep into my eyes. 'You are a woman now,' she said.
About to deny it, I knew that would be pointless. 'I am,' I said.
'So now you know.' Mother bent her head to her spinning. 'Was it the Tweedie Passion?'
'It was all of that,' I said. I expected her to ask who I had bedded, but sh
