A Mad Lady’s Confession - Chapter 17

This isn’t a gentleman’s manners.

His hand moved in the exact opposite of his thoughts and pulled open the drawer.

Inside was a palm-sized notebook with patterns drawn on it that looked like some kind of insect. As expected, the woman’s tastes were rather unusual.

He should’ve stopped there and closed it. Why did a curiosity he’d never felt in his life suddenly rear its head? His index finger lightly flipped the notebook open.

“…She really is a strange woman.”

There were no words in the notebook. Just hundreds of neatly drawn square boxes, with a few of them marked with slashes. His brows faintly drew together as he tried to interpret their intent or meaning.

He counted the boxes with slashes. Realizing something, he paused for a moment, then counted every single square one by one to confirm it.

“Ha….”

There were a total of 365 squares. The number of slashes was easy enough to estimate. It likely matched the time from the day they completed the marriage vows until today.

The woman was counting the days until she would leave. Carefully marking each day like this, counting only the day she would depart.

“If you treat me this well……. What if, a year from now, I don’t want to leave?”

She had said that, shamelessly.

Matthias was also waiting for the day they would part in a year. He was the one who had emphasized more than anyone that their time together was only one year.

And yet, at this moment, an intense sense of displeasure burned fiercely in his heart.

From the beginning, the woman was someone who had sworn this marriage to shed the stigma placed on her. She was the one who stood to gain the most from it. Realizing something he had already known, he felt, absurdly, as if he’d been betrayed. It startled even himself.

What about her had he trusted? What was she, to dare make him feel this way?

“Pathetic.”

Matthias snapped the notebook shut roughly. He left the study with steps different from when he had entered, leaving nothing but a cold presence behind.

***

As always, Lady Jules was not someone who spoke carelessly. Just as she had lived her entire life, her execution was swift as well. The moment she mentioned assigning a lady-in-waiting, someone immediately came to mind.

“Young lady!”

“Lady Jules!”

The two greeted each other warmly, as if they were meeting a blood relative.

Eleanor stood there with her hands gathered together, watching the two affectionate women with an awkward expression, like an outsider.

“You’ve bloomed like a flower since I last saw you, Miss Sorelson.”

“You flatter me. …I was worried I might look unhealthy since I’ve lost some weight.”

“Oh dear.”

When Miss Sorelson touched her cheek with a strained smile, Lady Jules immediately looked sympathetic.

Mariette Sorelson. The daughter of a marquis family who had once been discussed as a potential fiancée for Matthias. In fact, she had been personally chosen by Lady Jules.

Even before it could begin, the engagement had been dropped without the parties even meeting. Yet for some reason, Miss Sorelson wore an expression as if she had been broken off from an engagement. Lady Jules, who pitied her, wore a similar expression as well.

Eleanor, the very cause of all this, simply waited for Lady Jules to introduce her.

After the two had chatted back and forth for quite some time, their gaze finally turned to Eleanor.

“And so, today, I would like to introduce Miss Sorelson as your lady-in-waiting.”

It was customary for a lady’s lady-in-waiting to be the daughter of a lower-ranking noble. On rare occasions, they were chosen from among the daughters of wealthy merchants or collateral relatives.

The important thing was that she had to be of a lower standing than the person she served.

From Eleanor’s perspective, Miss Sorelson wasn’t of a status that could be made into a lady-in-waiting.

She was the daughter of a marquis family whose standing had once been enough to be considered for marriage with Nielsen, and her father was someone trusted within the Noble Tribunal.

By every measure, no matter that she was now the mistress of House Nielsen, it wasn’t appropriate for someone who had just entered the family to use her as a lady-in-waiting. As if she had read that thought, Miss Sorelson opened her mouth.

“I’m still an unmarried young lady, after all. And I’ve heard we’re about the same age. If I can stay by the mistress of House Nielsen’s side and teach her various things while we get along like friends, there could be no greater joy or honor for me.”

Like friends.

Eleanor Brynhill had never formed any friendships or exchanges with young ladies her age. No matter that they were both nobles, the idea of a lady-in-waiting daring to speak of being friends with the mistress she served made no sense, but more than anything else, Eleanor was drawn to those words.

Like friends, with a young lady her own age.

“You and I are the only ones who are friends. Nothing else is needed.”

No one in the world had ever said something like that to her. And so, Eleanor had not a single friend.

“…Then, will you do that for me, Miss Sorelson?”

With a small smile, Miss Sorelson answered as if in response. Seeing the beauty mark at the corner of her lips, Eleanor smiled back at her.

***

“Your Highness, may I apply the scented oil?”

“You may.”

At the words, the attendant brought several bottles of scented oil from a basket. Opening them one by one for Daphne, who lay prone, she lightly brushed them past the tip of her nose and let her smell each scent. When Daphne flicked her finger to choose one, the fragrance soon spread through the bath.

At the touch that gently massaged up from her calves, she grew drowsy for a moment. In the space filled with the humidity of the hot bathwater, even her thoughts were beginning to grow languid when a particularly soft fragrance caught her attention.

“This scent seems new.”

“Yes, Your Highness. It’s an offering sent up from Gammelstad.”

“….”

Gammelstad. A place where thousands of people and goods came and went each day, Matthias’s land.

She recalled Matthias, whom she had encountered a few days ago. It had been a brief meeting, but she remembered it clearly. How dazzling he had looked in his formal uniform with shoulder epaulettes.

Just like that moment long ago when she had fallen for him.

Before she became a princess, Daphne had been one of the many daughters of noble families in the capital. Her grandfather, Count Allendric Fram, had no son to inherit, so he passed the title to his daughter, Harriet, and brought in a son-in-law. From that union came Daphne Fram.

She’d heard that her father died in an accident three years after she was born. As for how difficult it must have been for her mother, who raised her alone while also bearing the role of head of the household, the young Daphne honestly didn’t know.

However, there was someone who had taken notice of that bold and steadfast figure, and that was the current Emperor.

Her mother was beautiful, so perhaps it was only natural. Countess Harriet Fram soon became the Emperor’s mistress.

When the former Empress died of illness, Harriet rose from being the countess of the Fram family to become the Empire’s second Empress. Despite the Emperor already having numerous consorts, it was her mother who obtained the position of Empress.

She’d thought that entire process was the power of love, but paradoxically, Daphne lost her own love because of it. Once she gained the status of a princess, she had to break off her engagement with Matthias Nielsen.

It was because his status, as the nephew of the previous Empress, and her own, as the Emperor’s adopted daughter, became entangled within the web of kinship.

“Then I won’t become a princess. Can’t I just remain a Fram, Mother?”

“Don’t be foolish!”

It seemed that, much younger than now, she had tried to resist in that way. Of course, the life of a princess brought many new things to her.

The strict formalities of the imperial palace, the circumstances where she had to be revered by everyone, none of it was unpleasant to Daphne. Compared to Alicia, who had been born and raised in the palace her entire life, she adapted faster and better.

It was said that the Emperor and the imperial bloodline were arranged by heaven. Perhaps she was the true descendant of the imperial family, born by borrowing another seed, she had even thought such things. But—

“….”

Feeling the pressure of the hands at her waist, she let out a deeper, more weary sigh.

“Shall I massage your arms as well, Your Highness?”

“…You may.”

Once permission was given, one of the attendants carefully began to massage Daphne’s arms. The touch was noticeably more tense than when touching any other part of her body.

Daphne’s gaze fell blankly on her own wrist, entrusted to the attendant’s hands. From her elbow down to her wrist, unlike its original smooth form, there were scars that looked like slashes.

They were from long ago and no longer hurt, yet the attendant was extremely cautious, as if touching a shameful mark.

“…I hear a new mistress has entered House Nielsen?”

Even though she knew that it was she and Klaus who had pushed that new mistress onto Matthias, Daphne asked anyway.

“Yes, Your Highness. Everyone is talking about it.”

“What are they saying?”

“Since it’s none other than the mistress of the Duke of Nielsen’s household, everyone seems quite curious.”

Daphne recalled someone’s face she had seen a few years ago. That desperate face that had held all the despair in the world.

How much does that woman resemble her?

“…Send the scented oil I’m using now to House Nielsen. As a gesture to celebrate the marriage.”

“Yes, Your Highness.”

Since offerings were only presented to the imperial family, even as the mistress of Gammelstad, she would never have the chance to smell this oil.

At that moment, a small woman with nimble movements approached and bowed her body.

As the attendant assisting with the bath stepped back, the woman’s quiet whisper followed. Daphne, who had been listening, rose from her seat. It was time to finish her bath.

Her mother had said she was foolish, but in truth, that wasn’t correct. Daphne Fram, no, von Bernstorff, wasn’t foolish. She was simply tired.

With a robe draped over her shoulders, she headed toward the adjoining room, where a man who would tire her once more was waiting.