CHAPTER 822: SHATTERED DREAM

"I have other plans for that woman..."

Bors’ statement filled Jocelynn with so much dread that she nearly dropped the embroidery hoop and thread in her hands and blood drained from her face as drops of sweat formed between her shoulder blades. Plans for ’that woman’ couldn’t be good, no matter what they were.

"What, what do you have in mind for her?" Jocelynn asked carefully. "And have you... have you consulted with Count Rhys about it?" As odd as it felt to refer to her father by his first name, at the moment, Bors thought she was his wife, the Marchioness and though she almost said ’my father’, she caught herself and held fast to the script that would conform to Bors Lothian’s delusion.

"After the mess he’s gotten us into, he should thank me for settling his affairs," Bors said gruffly as he started nibbling on small bites of tender beef cheek. Bland food or not, his appetite hadn’t left him, which only added one more thing that didn’t fit with his apparent ailment.

"The Blackwell girl has schemed to elevate the Dunns in the coming war, all but promising them elevation to a County. If she backs them that strongly, so be it," Bors said around a mouthful of beef and sweet onions. "Liam Dunn is still unmarried and his father tells me that he’s given up on finding the tailor’s daughter he was chasing last year. Since the young lord has a thing for blonde beauties, then I’ll reward his service with one."

"Rhys can hardly complain that I’ve done his second daughter wrong if I wed her to the next Count Dunn. It’s a match of equal station and it maintains the alliance between the march and his county," he said, as though it should be readily apparent. "And it keeps her close at hand where we can make use of her cleverness and connections, without exposing our own family to the knife she could plant in our backs."

"But Jocelynn never had any intention of marrying into the Dunn family," Jocelynn blurted out, shocked at the way Bors would just pass her over to another man who fancied blonde women.

If she remembered correctly, Liam had once confided in Owain that the tailor’s daughter he was pursuing greatly resembled her sister in looks and figure. Which meant it was happening again.

Owain had greatly admired her sister’s voluptuous figure with her full bust, slender waist and curvy hips, even if she was a touch on the short side. But Jocelynn had slowly helped him to see her as more than just a younger version of her sister, but a striking woman with her own unique charms and beauty.

Now, Bors was offering her up to another man who fancied women like her sister... because she was ’close enough’ to his tastes. Never mind what she thought about the man, or what Liam might think of her. The stallion needed a mare and she was fit for the task... and that was all that mattered. After days of enjoying warmth and kindness from a man she had started to see as another father figure, hearing the reality of his thoughts about her felt like a knife to the heart.

"I’m not so sure of that," Bors said as he frowned at the pale faced look of fear and revulsion on the face of his ’wife.’ "I told you, she’s a cunning serpent. She’s seeing Owain falling from grace and she knows I may proclaim Loman as the next Marquis. I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s been pushing so hard for the Dunns to rise in order to secure exactly this opportunity."

"I know you think that there’s merit in her ideas," Bors said, pausing as his scowl deepened. Since when did Isla have opinions on Jocelynn’s ideas? No, how was Isla even here to begin with? Something... something was very, very wrong...

Suddenly, the pain in his side pulsed with a sharp, icy sensation that shot all the way down to his knee and up to his jaw, driving the air from his lungs and forcing tears from his eyes.

"Arrrggg," Bors groaned through clenched teeth as he screwed his eyes shut in pain. The fork fell from his hand, clattering against the fine porcelain plate but he barely noticed as icy, stabbing pains pierced his eyes, his ears, his temples.... It was if a claw demon made of ice had grabbed his head and squeezed and he was powerless against it.

"My lord," Jocelynn said, leaping to her feet and dropping the embroidery hoop to the ground in the process as she rushed to his side. "My lord, what, what’s happening?"

Bors’ entire body had gone cold to the touch and his muscles trembled and shook as if he’d been plunged into an ice bath. His breathing was rough, ragged and shallow and he’d bit down so hard on his lip when he clenched his teeth that a thin rivulet of blood spilled down his chin.

"Confessor Eleanor!" Jocelynn shouted, hoping her constant companion who was awaiting her in Bors’s sitting room would hear through the closed door. "Confessor, something is wrong!"

The instant Jocelynn shouted, Bors’ dark brown eyes snapped open to a horrifying sight. Isla, his beloved Isla, had vanished, and in her place stood Jocelynn Blackwell. But the Jocelynn Blackwell he saw wasn’t the shaking, deeply concerned young woman who was calling for help.

Instead, to Bors’ eyes, she was a towering figure, looming over his bed with a cloak of darkness spreading out behind her that devoured the light of the world and made it impossible for him to see the door out of his room. Her seafoam green eyes glowed hauntingly and horns curled from her brow, just like the demons he’d fought in countless battles.

"Demon! You demon witch!" Bors screamed as the door opened to admit another dark, shadowy figure who swept into the room like a descending vulture with talons reaching for his chest. "You wore my Isla’s face like a mask," he shouted as his right hand fumbled at the bedside table for the oak-hilted steak knife that Jocelynn had told him he didn’t need. "You deceived me!"

"Lord Bors, no!" Eleanor cried as she joined Jocelynn at the bedside, reaching out to restrain the frantic lord. "Lord Bors, you aren’t..." she started to say only to jump away quickly when the enraged lord grabbed the knife and swung it at the women beside his bed.

Jocelynn, however, failed to see the blade coming in time to move. Bors’ attack was wild and his gaze was slightly unfocused but he was still a man who had been a knight with all of the strength and training that went with it. The tip of the knife met Jocelynn’s pale, delicate flesh just a finger’s breadth below her exposed collar bones, drawing a deep, ragged crimson line across her chest, as the blade sought her heart.

Before Bors could turn his slash into a debilitating stab, the blade tangled itself in the cheap necklace of shells and sea glass that Owain had bought her in Blackwell city. The chain of the necklace pulled taut against her neck instantly, pulling her off balance and cutting into the flesh of the back of her neck as Bors attempted to wrench the blade free.

-SNAP-

The necklace broke almost instantly when Bors yanked the knife back, sending beads and shells clattering across the floor or pinging off the walls while Jocelynn staggered backwards as soon as she was free of the cursed piece of jewelry.

Pain flared in her chest like a hot brand pressed across the entire length of the ragged wound and her body trembled in terror as she realized how close the aging Marquis had come to stabbing into her heart with a single wild swing.

-CRUNCH-

The frame of the embroidery hoop shattered under Jocelynn’s feet as she stumbled backward, just heartbeats before Eleanor’s arms wrapped around her in a steadying embrace.

"HOW DARE YOU!" Bors shouted as he struggled to free himself from the oppressively heavy fur blankets that covered his bed. "Guards! Guards! Demons in the keep! To arms," he cried as he tumbled from his bed before the piercing, icy pain in his side overwhelmed him, leaving him curled up around his old wound as the knife fell from a hand that no longer had the strength to hold it.

"Isla," he cried as darkness consumed his vision and the sound of armored boots approaching filled his ears. "Where have you gone... My love..."