Chapter 3 Summary

Birle realizes she will die slowly of a broken heart if she is forced to marry the huntsman Muir. The stranger has dark brown hair and eyebrows. His eyelashes are tipped with gold, over eyes the color of blue bellflowers. The stranger has no beard, only light brown stubble on his face. Birle knows well that only Lords are clean-shaven. This stranger must be a member of the highborn caste. As soon as she sees the man in the light, Birle falls in love with him.

The Lord says he has no choice but to take Birle back to the village. He considers her a child, although she protests that she is 14, and about to be married. Birle distracts him by proposing that they spear a fish for breakfast before departing. After they cook and eat the fish Birle has speared, Birle proposes...