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CHAPTER 38
Small stature.
The only things she had ever done were kitchen work, a bit of farming, and raising children.
It hadn’t taken much effort to imprison Anne Clark.
Besides, the Abner estate was currently in complete chaos after the assassin’s intrusion.
Every soldier who could still move had been scattered throughout the estate, combing every inch of the grounds for traces of the intruder.
As a result, there was no one left to guard the prison cell where a small, frail woman had been locked away.
Knowing that, Sharon Abner strode forward in silence, her face terrifyingly grim.
“She’s nowhere in the east wing!”
“There’s no sign of anyone in the west wing either…!”
The soldiers hurried frantically back and forth.
Biting down on her lip, Sharon looked toward the distant horizon where dawn was just beginning to break.
The question that had been swirling inside her mind became painfully clear.
What… is going on?
How had everything come to this?
She had met that child by chance.
One unbelievable thing after another had happened.
The family’s finances had become incomparably more prosperous than before.
Then there was their connection to the Crown Prince.
Somehow, the child had won the Crown Prince’s favor and even brought the Empress Dowager onto the Abner family’s side.
Of course, Sharon had never once voiced the thought aloud.
But to her…
Everything that had happened…
And that peculiar child’s behavior…
Had always felt strangely trustworthy.
“I think birthday parties are really nice…!”
The child had run over after playing with children her own age, twisting shyly as she spoke.
“Thank you, Duke!”
The memory of the little bird-like laugh that followed lingered vividly.
“…I-I’m okay.”
But that voice had been cruelly extinguished.
Right before Sharon’s eyes, the child had collapsed unconscious, covered in blood.
“What exactly… what part of this is okay…?”
Remembering those words the child had repeated over and over, Sharon’s face twisted in anguish.
When she clenched her fist, the cuts from the shattered glass she had grabbed earlier throbbed painfully.
But injuries like these meant nothing.
Not compared to the wounds across the child’s back.
Not compared to the pain that tiny body must have endured…
Sharon Abner’s eyes grew even redder.
Was this Anne Clark’s doing too?
Was all of this part of her escape?
But when Annelia had been attacked, Anne had been with Wendel.
She might not have been alone.
There could have been two attackers.
Or three.
Or even more.
Her chest tightened as though a stone had lodged in her throat.
“Damn it…”
Everything else was fine.
Sharon Abner had always lived a life filled with enemies.
After becoming the head of the family, attempts on her life had become practically a daily occurrence.
Facing assassins every day meant she needed a weapon she could always carry, so she had chosen a compact crossbow.
Eventually, she had grown so fond of it that hunting became one of her favorite pastimes.
If someone had to be targeted… it should have been me.
Instead…
They had gone after a defenseless five-year-old who couldn’t even wield a weapon.
Sharon knew she would never forgive whoever had harmed Annelia.
She wanted to capture them somehow…
Then skin them alive, piece by piece, like an animal.
Just as she squeezed her eyes shut against the overwhelming fury—
“Master!!”
A frantic voice echoed from the distance.
She opened her eyes immediately.
One of the servants was sprinting toward her.
“M-Master! In the main manor…! In Lady Annelia’s bedroom… that woman is there!!”
“Hngh…”
Anne held tightly onto the pure white blanket, suppressing her breathing.
The white fabric slowly turned crimson with the blood seeping from her hands.
Yet Annelia, who lay sleeping as though dead, refused to wake.
Her breathing was so shallow it seemed as though it might stop at any moment.
“You…!”
A wary voice rang out behind Anne.
But Anne never took her eyes off the sleeping child.
Annelia’s condition was terrible.
Bandages wrapped much of her body from tumbling down the stairs, and her complexion was deathly pale.
“L-Leave at once! If you don’t—!”
One of the Abner servants shouted from behind her.
Anne slowly turned her head.
Her bloodshot eyes fixed directly on the servant.
“And what about you?”
The icy voice made the servant fall silent.
“What about the one who stood by and let Annelia end up like this?”
Tears streamed uncontrollably from Anne’s wide-open eyes.
“Who do you people think you are?
Who are you to let this child become like this?”
She couldn’t even raise her voice too loudly.
She was afraid she might wake the child.
The words she managed to force out kept breaking apart with sobs.
“You promised you’d raise her well.
Not in some backwater village like Evehill…
But in a bigger world…”
“…”
“You said you’d give her even more support than Duke Longton…
Love her even more…
That you’d raise her properly…
You said you would…”
She clenched her fists so tightly that the ragged remnants of her fingernails finally snapped off.
Between the torn sleeves of Anne’s tattered clothes, black bruises covered her arms and shoulders.
To escape the prison cell, she had forced her arms through the iron bars.
She had somehow grabbed a sharp stone from the hallway and struck the lock thousands of times.
In the process, her entire upper body had scraped against the thick wooden bars, leaving bruises and open wounds.
Her hands were even worse.
Several fingers had been broken.
Every fingernail had been ripped away.
Even so…
She had to escape.
She had to see whether the child she had raised…
The child who had nearly died before her eyes…
Was safe.
“Who do you think you are?!”
Her hoarse scream twisted painfully in her throat.
Fear and sorrow filled the servant’s eyes.
“You were supposed to protect her!
No matter what happened, you should have made sure she never got hurt!
You should have!!”
It felt as though blood might begin flowing instead of tears.
Anne had watched countless children leave her care over the years.
She had raised just as many with her own hands.
And she had never failed to love a single one of them.
She had always tried to love every child equally.
But…
Annelia was such a lovable child that even those efforts became meaningless.
“She was my treasure.
My pride.
The only one like her in the whole world…
An angel of a child…”
“…”
“Who the hell are you to hurt my baby?!
My baby!!”
Her cries dissolved into uncontrollable sobbing.
At some point, even the Abner servant had fallen silent, tears silently running down their face.
Then—
“…Teacher…?”
A faint voice, barely above a whisper, echoed through the room.
Anne jerked around.
Annelia had opened her eyes.
She was looking directly at her.
“Annelia!”
“…Miss Anne?”
The servant covered their mouth in shock.
Only seconds later—
The bedroom door burst open.
A flood of people rushed inside.
Sharon Abner.
Wendel.
The estate’s butler.
The soldiers.
The servants guarding the main manor.
Every one of them.
But neither Anne nor Annelia looked their way.
“…Is it really you, Miss Anne?”
Annelia asked again.
Her voice was still so weak it seemed it might disappear.
Fresh tears flooded Anne’s eyes.
“Yes, Annelia.
It’s me.
Your teacher is here…”
“…”
The child’s dry lips trembled.
Her pale ivory eyes slowly traced Anne’s face.
Then tears gradually welled up in them.
“…Teacher…”
She whimpered.
Large, crystal-like tears spilled from her eyes before streaming freely down her cheeks.
“I…
It hurts…”
“Annelia…”
Standing in the doorway, Sharon Abner watched the scene in silence.
Her gaze fell upon Anne Clark’s battered shoulders…
Her bruised arms…
Her mangled hands.
“My back…
My back hurts so much…”
Annelia finally burst into tears.
“Hic… my tummy hurts too…
My arm…
It all hurts…”
“Annelia…!
What do I do?
What should I do?!”
Sharon Abner.
Wendel.
Soya.
Miel, who had stayed in the room all this time.
And everyone else in the Abner household who had once suspected Anne Clark.
All of them stood frozen, unable to say a single word.
Even after being stabbed in the back by an assassin…
Even after tumbling down an entire flight of stairs…
The child had never cried.
She had simply stared blankly ahead with an eerily calm expression, repeating over and over—
“I’m okay.”
But now—
“Why…
Why did you come so late…?
It hurts…
It hurts so much…
Waaah…”
Leaving the sobbing child behind, Sharon Abner quietly stepped out of the room.
In a low, heavy voice, she murmured,
“…Call the doctor back.”
Without asking why, Wendel nodded.
He immediately ordered an attendant to fetch the physician once more.
This time…
Not for Annelia.
For someone else.
