The Darkland by Kathryn Le Veque.

★★★★★

A wonderful medieval romance, from one of my favourite authors.

Sir Kirk Connaught has arrived to take Lady Micheline le Bec to her betrothed. The contract was signed by her father  before his death . He used her to settle his debts to Lord Edmund de Cleveley. She is all ready to leave but, her slightly younger sister Mara wants to stay behind and is being difficult. There is no way that she can stay because Micheline is her only guardian. 

Kirk must somehow get the very stubborn young woman off the edge and into his care. Kirk is a strong and brave knight but this hellion is trying his temper.

Micheline and Mara have had a strange upbringing for ladies of their rank. 

The keep they are travelling to has a very bad reputation. Several young women have vanished without trace. The Lord and his sister are truly vile people. When Mara finds out how bad Darkland is she is very worried that her sister and her might be the next to die.

Although Kirk is an honourable knight he is sworn to obey his Lord. He has always been away from the keep when the women vanish and does not know what has been happening. He vows to Mara that he will keep both of them safe . That is much easier said than done. 

This is a story with what looks like a straight forward romance but quickly turns dangerous. Our hero is maybe a little too trusting. Our heroine is too headstrong for anyone´s good. She tends to cause trouble when she is trying to protect someone. The villains of the book are worse than any I have read about before. Madness only accounts for so much the rest is pure evil.

A wonderful adventure into the twisted and complicated lives of the people of Darkland. 

I have never read a book by this author that I haven´t loved.