Prologue

It was her perfume that used to wake me. Fluttering upon the breeze, as she stood by the open window, shoulder resting on the frame, she would gaze through the pane to the dawning world outside, lashes brushing against her checks. In the pale light she seemed so lovely, so soft, and so simple to love.

I often watched her in those days. The stolen glances between us filled my heart, my soul with such courage, such excitement. Oh, the shamelessness! Our love was made all the more sweet for the secrets we kept, our secrets, playing out our own miniature masquerade under the very eyes of on lookers. On the surface we were no more than close friends, sharing lessons together, dancing, chatting and gossiping like any others. If only they’d known! The wickedness of it all, it filled us to the point of bursting. Our days together were the sweetest of my life.

If only I had known the true secrets that had lurked, the darkness which fed upon her, and soon to be, me. If only I’d known what was to become of us. If only, if only…

Life is full to bursting with that statement ‘if only’.

If only we weren’t so young when we’d met, if only I hadn’t loved so freely, and if only she hadn’t that smothering darkness, if only our tale was one without sadness.

But this is a tale of sadness, of deception, of a childhood forgone. Of pain and of hurting to the point of blindness; this is a tale of how the darkness and shadows of one may infect the other. My name is Imogen, I am one and twenty and this probably isn’t a kind of love story that will leave your heart a fluttering, leave you sighing with your head upon the feather down of the pillow. No. This is one that will leave you, as it left me, with a hollow in your heart, and doubt in your eyes…