Don't know what you want to do exactly, but WPF has a cool GlyphTypeface Class that is quite abstract and quite independent.

This is how you can start with:

GlyphTypeface ttf = new GlyphTypeface(new Uri(@"c:\windows\fonts\verdana.ttf"));

There are also the GlyphRun Class and the GlyphRunDrawing Class.

Otherwise, if you're looking for the big picture, open-source, you can also check the FreeType Project, available here: http://freetype.org/