The Whipping Maid of House Calley - Chapter 86

「Cedric. Are you in your room?」

It was Sylvia.

Cedric motioned for Sheila not to get up as she started to rise from her seat, then stood up himself. The gesture meant, Just keep eating your snack.

He strode over and opened the door.

「What is it?」

「I have something to say. Do you have a minute?」

Before Cedric could even tell her to come in, Sylvia stepped into his room as if it were only natural. Then she spotted Sheila, standing awkwardly by the table.

Even though Cedric told her to keep eating with a hand signal, Sheila was still on her feet.

Sylvia said to her, “Sheila, could you step out for a moment?”

“Yes, miss.”

Before Cedric could cut in, Sheila answered at once and left the room.

Once the maid withdrew, Sylvia walked up to the table and sat down in the exact seat Sheila had been in.

She recognized without difficulty the pastry made by a pâtissier from her own country.

「It’s mille-feuille. This is Martin’s too, right? I like this one.」

One mille-feuille from the foreign dessert artisan Cedric brought in, not with difficulty but simply by offering a large sum, vanished into Sylvia’s mouth.

「Mmm. It’s good, as expected.」

He could just tell them to bring more snacks up, and that would be that, yet Cedric’s mood turned sour.

To be precise, it turned sour from the moment the woman who was eating snacks a moment ago left as if she’d been chased out.

「You said you had something to say.」

Even though he didn’t have bad feelings toward Sylvia, the words came out cold.

Mocking himself for showing emotion over something so trivial, Cedric walked closer to her. Sylvia looked up at him with moist eyes and said,

「Do you have an ashtray? Can you give me one?」

Cedric brought an ashtray without complaint and set it in front of her.

Sylvia took out a cigarette she’d carried in a pouch and put it between her lips.

Cedric already knew she smoked one or two a day.

After lighting it and taking a deep drag, she let out a soft puff of white smoke and said,

「Cedric, I think I love you.」

Then Sylvia corrected herself.

「No, I love you. I’m serious, Cedric.」

「Love?」

Cedric let out a short laugh.

He didn’t take the love confession from a former play partner seriously. He thought believing a submissive loved their master was part of play.

Besides, Sylvia was a “switch.”

In other words, she had opposing preferences at once, dominance and submission, sadism and masochism, and could play freely as she pleased.

Of course, in a relationship with Cedric, who was a straightforward dom, Sylvia took the sub role. But it also meant she clearly had dom preferences too. It was obvious Cedric couldn’t satisfy that side of her.

「Alex told me. That it can go beyond this kind of relationship and develop into love.」

Sylvia even brought up Alex, the one who shaped her into a practitioner.

But setting all that aside, the word ‘love’ being repeated since earlier made Cedric chuckle.

He knew the concept existed, but it didn’t feel real to him.

「You’re laughing? Does it sound like a joke? Do you think I came all the way here for nothing?」

「So what, you want me to consider you as a marriage partner?」

Cedric asked as if confirming.

「Yes. Just say it. I can do anything you want.」

「I know. That you’re the only daughter of the great House Stacy. And that because of that, your parents are looking for a proper husband to marry into your family.」

Cedric was right.

In Lotas, which had a more flexible way of thinking than Beloica, women could inherit titles as well. Sylvia, the only child of House Stacy, was the sole heir who would inherit the dukedom.

All the duke and duchess wanted was to bring in a compliant husband so the Stacy line wouldn’t end.

But Sylvia refused the obligation of marriage, saying she didn’t want to be treated like a broodmare meant to continue the family line.

If it had ended there, her parents would’ve respected their daughter’s wishes. Even if they couldn’t completely give up the hope that this kind of rebellion was just a phase.

But Sylvia openly revealed her BDSM preferences and explained in detail what she did at clubs.

To the Duke and Duchess of Stacy, it was enough to make them clutch the backs of their necks and collapse.

In Lotas, even between parents and children, people weren’t particularly reluctant to talk about what happened in bed. But to complete vanillas, people with no sexual orientation to speak of, Sylvia’s stories were nothing short of shocking.

If Sylvia had softened her words even a little, or rather, if she hadn’t felt the need to say it at all, the freedom-loving, human rights-minded Duke of Stacy wouldn’t have locked his daughter inside the estate for over a year.

But during that confinement, Sylvia’s resistance was just as fierce.

In the end, there was no miracle where the Duke and Duchess of Stacy managed to break the will of their only daughter, Sylvia.

Faced with Sylvia’s desperate insistence that she would rather die than live without freedom, especially sexual freedom, the Duke and Duchess ended up in tears, begging her to live no matter what she did. And that was how the situation came to an end.

What changed Sylvia’s heart was after Cedric returned to his home country.

For three months after that, she couldn’t steady her heart. Then she began to think that if it was Cedric, maybe being bound by the institution of marriage wouldn’t be so bad.

And at the same time, she could also grant her overly devoted parents’ long-held wish for their only daughter.

「Cedric, it’s not like it can’t be you. You have two grown younger brothers. And you said the second one is only a year younger than you, right? Make him do it. The oh-so-great count.」

At Sylvia’s words, Cedric’s eyes turned sharp. More precisely, it was at the tone that sounded as if she were belittling the title his grandfather passed down to him.

Sylvia quickly added,

「I take that ‘oh-so-great’ back. You know I wasn’t talking about your family specifically.」

Sylvia, who refused to continue the ducal line, went even further and opposed the class system itself. Even at the club, whenever she got the chance, she would passionately argue how absurd it was to divide identical humans by rank.

Cedric wasn’t unaware of her views. But even so, he treated them as nothing more than the childish talk of a noble young lady who’d grown up pampered. At the time, both she and Cedric were living carefree lives, spending money comfortably thanks to the wealth and status they were born into.

「Sylvia, you of all people are going to choose that oh-so-great marriage? Where did the Lady Stacy who said she’d rather die than live as a breeding mare, that freedom mattered more than anything, go?」

「That was before I realized I loved you. People change once they realize something.」

「You really think you can be satisfied with just me?」

「Of course. No matter how much of a polyamorous person I am, while I was your partner, there was only you. Don’t you remember?」

「You just said it yourself. Polyamorous. Preferences don’t change, Sylvia.」

As free as her personality was, she placed no limits on play or on the number of partners she had. Even when she partnered with Marquis, there were always two or three other men by her side.

But Cedric was an exception. That was how deeply she was taken with him.

「They can change. That’s what love is.」

Sylvia was frustrated that Cedric wouldn’t understand her feelings. If he would just turn his heart, there would be no problem at all.

Sylvia opened her mouth again.

「And your parents as well….」

At that moment, a sharp knock sounded, and Sylvia closed her mouth.

And just like Sylvia had done earlier, before anyone even said to come in, the one who flung the door open was Marquis.

「Your former partner has arrived.」

As if to say that even the way he acted was exactly like a former partner, Cedric shrugged toward Sylvia.

「Former partner, exactly.」

Sylvia shot back without missing a beat.

At their exchange, Marquis asked, “Were you talking about me?”

“No.”

“No.”

Cedric and Sylvia answered at the same time, both facing the bright-smiling Marquis.

“Tch.”

As Marquis approached with a sulky expression, Sylvia said in a low voice without moving her lips, “Let’s talk again later.”

Cedric didn’t respond and stood up from his seat. Then he said to Marquis, “Why are you barging into my room too?”

“What do you mean why? I came all the way here to see you.”

At the familiar way Marquis called him ‘you,’ something Cedric hadn’t heard in a long time, Cedric’s brow twitched.

He’d already told him several times not to do it, but Marquis never listened.

Still, he had some sense. Fearing he might get thrown out of the room, Marquis quickly moved over to Sylvia’s side.

“Huh? There’s mille-feuille here.”

Marquis’s large hand lightly picked up a piece of mille-feuille and brought it to his mouth.

Cedric’s handsome brow creased once more.

Marquis devoured the three or four remaining pastries in an instant.

“Tell them to bring more of this.”

“There isn’t any.”

At Cedric’s icy reply, Marquis dropped the subject of snacks as if nothing happened and reached for Sylvia’s clutch instead.

“Mind if I have one too?”

He’d spotted the ashtray on the table.

“No. It smells.”

Even though she was a smoker herself, Sylvia hated the smell when other people smoked, and she snatched her clutch back.

“You two planned this today, didn’t you?”

To stop Marquis from babbling any further, Cedric walked over to the display cabinet.

Taking out a suitable bottle of whiskey, he called over a passing servant and ordered them to prepare snacks for the crown prince.

At the same time, he let it be known that he was meeting with the crown prince, so at least until the afternoon event, no one would bother him.

Once Cedric sat back down, Marquis deftly poured whiskey into three glasses.

“Are you heading back to Lotas after attending Cedric’s appointment ceremony tomorrow?” Marquis asked Sylvia casually.

“I came all this way. I should play around more before going back. Isn’t there something fun to do?”

“Something fun….”

After turning it over in his head, Marquis said, “I built a casino in a place called Broden. Want to check it out? It’s not that far from here. Cedric, you know it too, right? Peace Valley.”

The casino set to open under the placid name ‘Peace Valley’ was the first royal-owned gambling facility in Beloica, a country that strictly prohibited gambling.

The establishment of Peace Valley was an idea that came from Marquis, who’d lived abroad for a long time and graduated from the academy with excellent grades.

“I know. Isn’t it opening soon?” Cedric asked back. The last time it came up during Judith’s tutoring, it was only said to be preparing to open, without a fixed date.

Marquis answered, “Tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?”

“I matched it to your appointment ceremony date.”

At Marquis’s added words, Cedric, who’d been replying indifferently, froze with a dumbfounded expression.

The one who burst out laughing was Sylvia, sitting beside him.

“Pfft, seriously? You didn’t have to go that far.”

“It’s easy to remember, and it’s nice.”

Marquis gave a reason so absurdly simple it was almost laughable. It was so ridiculous that Cedric didn’t even feel like responding.

Seeing Sylvia unable to stop laughing, Marquis grew even more excited and launched into a stream of words.

“It’s a bit rural since it’s a mining region, but the area where the casino’s built will be lively. The facilities are probably going to be incredible. Honestly, I haven’t even been able to check it out myself yet since I came straight here….”

From the initial idea to the design of the facilities, Marquis continued boasting about how deeply involved he’d been.

Sylvia listened with interest, then asked, “Cedric, are you going too?”

“I’ll pass. It’s foreigners only, so you can go spend some money there.”

If he went together with Marquis, who was there on an inspection, Cedric wouldn’t be barred from entering. Even so, Cedric had no interest in gambling at all.

Besides, the casino was strictly for foreigners. It was built because it felt like a waste to let domestic money flow out to foreign laborers.

And on top of that, it would also increase the royal finances, so it was killing two birds with one stone.

If they even managed to pull in money from the Stacy ducal house, the wealthiest family in Lotas, it would be killing three birds with one stone.

“What are you talking about? I decided to allow locals too.”

At Marquis’s bright, offhand remark, Cedric’s eyebrow, which had remained indifferent until now, shot up.