CHAPTER 1099: BORS AND ISLA

"Your mother was something special..."

For a moment, the words struck Owain in a way he hadn’t thought anything could, bringing a bit of moisture to his eyes as he remembered the woman who had once sat quietly at his father’s side, focusing her attention on her children while her husband focused on governing his domain.

There weren’t many noblemen who would have agreed that Isla was anything special. She was the daughter of a minor baron in Keating duchy, one of Count DuValles’ vassals, not even someone who directly served the duke. As alliances went, she brought little to the marriage beyond access to the vast reserves of salt in her father’s lands, which, while helpful to the inland march, was hardly reason enough to accept her as the bride of a marquis.

But even Owain recognized that his mother was something special. He might have resented her when he was young, for pulling him away from his lessons on riding, swordsmanship, and war, but she’d been the one to teach him how to read and write, saying that she wouldn’t give over all of her time to be a mother to the gaggle of tutors his father had hired.

Owain had been a stubborn child, but his mother was never a woman to give up easily, and she’d lured him in with books filled with tales of brave warriors, fearsome demons, and the battles to overcome them.

Compared to the dry, dusty approach of the tutors who taught him the history of the Kingdom of Gaal, his mother’s lessons were much easier for him to grasp. He still treasured the days he’d spent sitting beside her in this very office, quietly reading out loud to her while a fire burned in the hearth as his father worked his way through the business of the realm behind his stately oak desk. Even Loman’s presence, crawling on the soft, demon-fur rug and playing with wooden horses, couldn’t tarnish the memories Owain had of the mother who had placed her family at the center of her world.

"To mother," Owain said, topping off his own cup from the fresh bottle of wine and refilling his father’s cup as well, before raising his cup to offer a toast.

"Yes, to Isla, my precious Isla," Bors said, spilling a few drops of wine on the bare stone floor before drinking down half his cup in a single gulp. "She was a better woman than I deserved, and gone too soon," he said. "Much too soon..."

"What was she like?" Owain asked, forcing down the emotions that churned in his heart as he focused his attention on his father. The older man’s eyes were half closed, and his movements were slow and careful as he sipped his wine. His breathing was shallower than it had been, but it was still steady and even, as though he had found a way to relax despite the pain of the poison wracking his body.

"When you met her," Owain clarified when his father didn’t immediately respond. "How did you know that she was the right woman for you? You know I’m no stranger to women," he added with a genuine smile as he considered the number of women he’d conquered since Sir Kaefin had brought him to his first brothel as a young man. "But love like you and mother had... That’s something else."

"I met your mother at one of Baerun Keating’s balls," Bors said wistfully, sipping his wine as his gaze turned inward. "So many lords had brought their daughters to catch the attention of Baerun’s son, and I looked like a consolation prize next to him, but there were only the two of us, and Argidir was still just coming of age..."

It wasn’t Bors’ first trip to Keating City, nor was it his first time attending one of the grand galas that the duke held for the noblemen of his realm, but it was his first time visiting without the protective shadow of his father watching over him. At the time, Bors was still a young knight, but he was riding high after leading a campaign against the demons of the Shattered Hills, a treacherous set of canyons at the edge of Iriso Barony that had been infested by horned demons.

Argidir Keating might be the next duke, but Bors was a hero who had just destroyed a demon nest, and with the same stroke of his sword, revealed a treasure trove of fine granite and even rare quartz. He’d brought a few pieces of the latter with him to attract attention when speaking of his achievements, only to realize that he was attracting the wrong sort of attention.

"There was a question I asked women at the ball that told me a lot about a person," Bors said after spending several minutes lost in his memories. "I asked them if I could give them any of the treasures of the march, what would they treasure most?"

Some of the women, particularly the ones from the easternmost regions of Keating Duchy, had only heard of the frontier as a savage place, filled with demons and the rough men who fought them. Others only knew Lothian March for the timber and furs that flowed down the River Luath by the barge-load on their way to be sold to merchants and craftsmen across the kingdom. He found himself having to explain several times that there was more to the march than just trees, beasts, and demons.

"When I asked your mother what she wanted, do you know what she said?" Bors asked, opening his eyes that had drifted shut to look at his son.

"Your time," Owain said with a faint smile on his lips. "She said that, for a man like you, nothing was more valuable than your time," he said, remembering the story his mother had told several times when he and Loman were still young enough to be enchanted by the idea of finding true love at one of the grand galas thrown by the noblemen of Gaal.

"It’s an easy thing to say, son," Bors said as his eyes drifted closed again and his mind sank into memories that were as warm and cozy as the fire in the hearth. "But your mother was special. She lived it. My mother would never have had a chair in this office," he said, opening his eyes again briefly enough to glance at the embroidery chair near his desk, smiling widely as he beheld the figure sitting there watching over him and Owain, just as she’d always done.

"Your mother kept us all together," Bors said with a voice that was thick with emotion. "Even when she had to entertain the women of the court, she still brought you and Loman along when you were infants, and she rarely visited her home once she moved out here... She couldn’t bear to be apart from her family, and she watches over us even now..."