The Vampire & Her Witch

For a moment, Jocelynn sat absolutely still, unable to move or draw breath as Bors Lothian looked at her with beseeching eyes.

Now she understood. She’d thought that he’d made some kind of decision about her, perhaps even deciding to have her betrothed to Loman when he announced Loman as his heir. Or perhaps, now that he intended to install Loman as his successor, he was willing to let go of whatever worries he’d held about her and Owain since she wouldn’t become the next Marchioness.

But she’d been very, very wrong. Bors’ resistance to her presence and her ideas hadn’t come about because he accepted her, it had happened because, when he looked at her, he wasn’t seeing Jocelynn Blackwell. He was seeing his fallen wife, Isla.

The thought of it sent shivers down her spine. She’d misread him from the first moment things changed. The gentle, reassuring touches weren’t the touches of a potential father-in-law for a person he saw as a daughter, they were the casual gestures of affection directed at a woman who had burned on a pyre seven years ago. He wasn’t comforting her, he was finding solace in the company of a ghost!

The fire burning in the hearth in the corner was far too feeble to ward off the chill that seized her at the notion, and the rain mixed with hail drumming against the window suddenly felt more ominous, as if skeletal fingers were tapping on the glass and begging to be let in. Still, she couldn’t let fear paralyze her or she might shatter the delicate state she found herself in.

”You’re certain about Loman?” Jocelynn asked hesitantly, swallowing the lump in her throat and thinking of something relatively neutral she could say while she tried to decide what to do now that she understood at least a little bit of what was happening.

When he touched her, he didn’t feel feverish, and he didn’t look feverish either. In almost everything he said, he was very rational, even if he was gentler and kinder than he’d been in her past encounters. And yet, when it came to her, he didn’t seem to see her at all… So if it wasn’t a madness brought on by fever, what was it? And, more importantly, could she rely on it now that she understood it?

For a moment, she considered calling out to Confessor Eleanor in the sitting room outside Bors’ bedchamber. While she wasn’t a member of an order dedicated to healing, she still knew far more about sickness and treating it than Jocelynn did, and she could beseech the Holy Lord of Light to cleanse illness.

But Jocelynn dismissed the notion almost as soon as it occurred to her. If she called out for the Confessor, who knew what kind of reaction it would provoke from Bors? The old Marquis’ relationship with the Church was strained, after all, and involving Eleanor might provoke something she couldn’t predict. No, she thought, it would be better to keep going as she had, play along with his delusion and see where it led.

”Owain won’t take it well if you strip him of his position as your heir. He might lash out at his brother and the wedge it would drive between them…” she said softly, allowing her voice to trail off suggestively at the end.

”Owain is certain to lash out,” Bors said as he shook his head. ”He inherited too much of my temper and not enough of your grace. But Loman has Sir Tommin at his side now, and Sir Tommin is at least as good a swordsman as Owain is. He also has one of those Holy Light Blades, so I doubt that Owain can overcome him until the Church arrives to take Owain into custody.”

”The Church will take Owain into custody?” Jocelynn repeated in surprise. ”Why?”

”It’s that whole mess with the eldest Blackwell girl,” Bors said as he picked at the food on his plate, eating nothing but moving the bits of beet and chicken around his plate aimlessly. ”The Church found no evidence that she was a witch. I’ve spoken with the High Priest about it, and they’re willing to arrange protection from the King’s justice for him if he’ll take the oaths of a Templar to fight against the demons in their Holy War.”

”I never imagined he’d be so violent and foolish over a birthmark,” Bors said with a heavy sigh, followed by a bout of coughing that left him short of breath. ”It’s his own fault for starting this mess. I’ve given him chances to clean it up ,and he’s failed to produce any results of value. The only thing he’s managed to do for us is to keep the Blackwells from breaking off our agreement and turning their attention to one of the other Marches.”

”I see,” Jocelynn said carefully, taking a deep breath before committing to playing along with Bors’ apparent delusion. ”Then, if Owain is to become a Templar, he won’t be allowed to marry. Have you, have you found a match for Loman?” Jocelynn asked hesitantly.

Consigning Owain to the Templars wasn’t a bad thing for her. If it actually came to pass, it would remove the greatest threat to her safety, and she wouldn’t have to search for a way to put distance between herself and Owain. It would happen naturally, and even if Owain wanted to lash out, the Templars and the Inquisitors of the Church were more than capable of handling him, despite the impressive sword skills he possessed.

”Loman is still casting his eye about,” Bors said with a deep scowl. ”He understands too little of women to make good decisions, but he understands enough of politics to see a few worthy possibilities. He knows that he should set his sights higher than the women of the march, but he just has no clue where to look without risking offending the princes or the people hoping to wed their daughters to the royal family.”

”I’ve begun writing letters of introduction,” Bors said, gesturing to a stack of sealed letters on his writing desk, each bearing the name of a prominent count from one of the long-established duchies. ”The Blackwells were ideal for securing a path to bring soldiers and supplies across the sea for the Holy War, but there are other considerations we should make when planning our future.”

”Won’t it create problems with the Blackwells if you turn away from the arrangement over Jocelynn?” Jocelynn asked delicately, placing herself fully in the role of the departed Isla as she stood to fetch a bit of unfinished embroidery that was sitting on a table in the corner of the room.

Remnants of Isla’s embroidery were everywhere in Lothian Manor, and the chair that had been reserved for her beside Bors’ desk in his office made it clear that it had been common for her to sit and embroider even while he worked on the affairs of the march. Now, she hoped that by doing something that would have been familiar to his departed wife, she could use that association more actively to understand his plans.

Her skills with a needle weren’t very refined. There were so many net makers and sail masters in Blackwell County that she’d refused to learn more than the basics required to join in ladies’ gatherings in the county. It had been a childish rebellion against her father’s desire to pair her up with one of the many guilds in Blackwell city, and she regretted it slightly now.

Still, she didn’t intend to actually do any embroidery, just holding the piece, sorting the colored threads, and preparing a needle would be enough to help sustain the image of herself as Isla in Bors’ mind.

”Our boys aren’t capable enough to wed a woman like Jocelynn,” Bors said bitterly. ”Owain is too arrogant, and Loman is too naive. She’d have either one of them wrapped around her finger as soon as bedded them, if not before. She’s already got Owain acting as a mouthpiece for her schemes. If I matched her with Loman, it would be even worse.”

”Would it really, my Lord?” Jocelynn said carefully as she tested the waters. She wasn’t truly interested in Loman. At this point, she wanted nothing more than to escape and return home, away from the dangers of the frontier where she was haunted by the ghost of her murdered sister. Still, just because Bors didn’t want to pair her with Loman, it didn’t make her safe from the Lothian Marquis’s schemes.

”From what I’ve seen,” Jocelynn prompted. ”Lady Jocelynn cares for the future of the march. She wants to see it rise just as much as you do.”

”She’s a viper who schemed against her own sister,” Bors said decisively, slamming his fist into the soft mattress beneath him and provoking a fit of coughing that sent a wave of shooting, icy pains through his side. ”She’s ambitious, cunning, ruthless, and willing to sacrifice anything to achieve her aims,” Bors said through gritted teeth as he struggled to regain control of his breathing.

”I won’t deny that she’s intelligent and capable,” Bors said after a moment when he seemed to have recovered enough to speak calmly again. So long as he kept himself calm and focused, it didn’t put any strain on the old wound or trigger the malady that had settled into his chest, but there were some things that it was impossible to remain calm about, and Jocelynn’s treachery was one of them.

”No, a woman like that is a dangerous weapon that takes more skill to wield than either of our sons possesses. No,” he said after collecting himself. ”I have other plans for that woman…”