Darcy's Honor by Victoria Kincaid

Author:Victoria Kincaid
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: jane austen, darcy, pride and prejudice, mr darcy, jane austen fan fiction, pride and prejudice variations, grace burrowes, pride and prejudice variations and sequels, ella quinn
Publisher: Victoria Kincaid

Chapter Ten

A finger of light from the rising sun stole across Darcy’s face, waking him. He jerked upright, appalled that he had drowsed for so long. What if something had happened to Elizabeth?

Standing to examine the patient, he was relieved to see that her color was better; a slight pinkish hue was beginning to replace the terrible gray pallor. Touching the pillow beside her head, he noticed it was drenched in sweat, as were the covers under her chin. The fever must have broken!

Indeed, when he touched her forehead, it was cool under his fingertips. He said a brief prayer of thanks. She might not be completely healed, but now he believed she would recover. “Perhaps we will have that kiss after all,” he murmured to her with a grin.

The door opened just a crack, and Georgiana’s head poked into the room, her forehead creased with worry. “The fever has broken,” he told her in a low voice. “I believe she is much improved.”

“Oh, William!” Her exclamation reminded Darcy that this was indeed an occasion for joy. She hurried around the bed to throw herself into Darcy’s arms, giving him a hard embrace. Darcy actually laughed, whether at her exuberance or his relief, he could not say.

He clutched Georgiana to his chest, burying his face in her shoulder. “She will be well. She will be well.” His eyes burned, and he allowed a few tears to fall onto the shoulder of his sister’s muslin nightrail. When she finally released him, tears shone in Georgiana’s eyes as well.

***

Elizabeth had been drifting in and out of awareness for a while, never quite awake enough to open her eyes. Her world had been a confused jumble of people talking to her, voices saying incomprehensible words to each other, people moving about the room—and a talking stork visiting Longbourn, but Elizabeth thought that part might have been a dream.

She could not discern anything the people had said and was unsure if it mattered. For a long time, breathing had been a chore, as though a pile of bricks rested on her chest. Her thoughts had been consumed with the effort of drawing air. Now her breathing was delightfully unencumbered, although occasional coughs wracked her body. She no longer felt that cold had burrowed down into the marrow of her bones; in fact, she was warm under the softest covers she ever recalled.

This was not Mrs. Haskell’s scratchy wool blanket or lumpy mattress. Perhaps I should find that somewhat alarming. Where am I?

Opening her eyes required concerted willpower. Once she had them open, however, her surroundings were, somewhat alarmingly, unfamiliar. Certainly she was not in the house on Lime Street, nor at Longbourn—nor even at the Gardiners’ house, where she might conceivably have been taken during an illness.

The bed she inhabited was bigger than any she had ever slept in. It was as soft as a cloud with a great excess of pillows and covers, all in a light pink hue. Golden light streamed through a window framed in pink curtains.

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