[ There's a hiss of sympathy for it - she could only imagine.

Well, perhaps not imagine, she knows. She, after all, was a widow, and widow's had but one fate, most often unless their families begged to otherwise. ]

Then their failure is my great fortune. [ Firmly, she does not look to him, her eyes are forward and her word is sure. It means as little or as much as he likes, they're strangers as he has his fingers running against her hair, and he tells him of his families attempt at infanticide.

She waits a moment before she continues. ] In my home, when a husband dies, a widow is often not wanted, and it is expected she puts herself upon her husband's pyre. [ A pause, there's no grief in her, not anymore. ] I refused such a fate.