Without hesitation, the dowager's hand closed around a jagged shard of the broken vase, porcelain biting into her palm. Holding it, he lunged toward him.
For Osric, time slowed.
He didn't step back. He didn't even raise his cane to block her at first. Instead, he watched her come toward him with the patience of a man who had seen too many lives, too many choices, unfold to their inevitable ends. His silver cane was rooted firmly against the floor, his spine straight despite the years that curved it, his eyes steady, and those icy-blue eyes searched hers.
In those dark, frantic eyes, he looked not for the dowager of courtly power and whispered schemes, but for the girl he once knew: the child who had chased butterflies through the magnolia grove, who laughed with the abandon of spring.
Instead, all he found was fury… fury and the hollow ache of someone who had long since crossed a line she could never return from.
