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Chapter 8
“You memorized all the books?”
It was dinnertime. Caron, dining with El, set down his knife at her words.
El, who had been trying to eat as neatly as possible, soon gave up and began shoveling food in with a spoon, mumbling her reply.
“Yes. Ah, but I still don’t know how to read.”
“Lady Emillern must have been shocked out of her wits.”
Caron casually slid his neatly cut steak over to El and pulled her messily hacked-up piece toward himself.
Every time Caron showed her such small considerations, El felt as though her heart would burst and kill her on the spot.
They said that when you prayed and truly met God at the temple, tears would fall endlessly—El’s feelings were exactly like that.
“Was the teacher surprised?”
“Very. It was a rather amusing sight.”
Caron let out a short breathy laugh. The corner of his mouth curved up smoothly on one side.
El stared blankly at his smiling face, then quickly lowered her gaze, afraid their eyes might meet.
She wanted to ask him why he was letting her stay at the mansion, but she was too scared that if she brought it up, he might send her away. So she kept her mouth shut.
The meal passed in silence.
Caron wasn’t much of a talker, but neither was El, which made it all the more quiet.
Only the attendants and maids, standing by to serve, found the atmosphere oppressive.
After dinner, El returned to her room and noticed the enormous moon hanging above the window. She opened the door.
A cool breeze wafted in, carrying the faint scent of grass.
“…I’m happy.”
The words slipped out before she realized, and El gasped, covering her mouth with both hands.
If she grew used to a happiness that could disappear at any moment, she wouldn’t be able to endure even the smallest misfortune.
El hastily grabbed a cloak and slipped outside. She could faintly see the ridgeline of the mountains under the night sky.
She headed for the forest where she had lived until not long ago. Inside, it was dark and chilling. El crouched down among the trees.
Yes. She could return to this life at any time.
She could do anything to stay longer in the mansion, but there wasn’t much a worthless person like her could actually do.
“People’s hearts change so easily.”
Just like her parents, who abandoned her. Like the tavern owner, who pretended to help but only tried to harass her. Like the orphanage director, who acted as if he cherished her, but when she wasn’t sold to nobles, started beating her.
People’s outsides and insides were always different. Even good people could change at any moment.
That was the kind of world El had lived in.
So she sat there for a long while, enduring the biting cold, the terrifying dark, the hungry eyes of beasts watching her.
Because her current happiness felt too much like a dream, something she could never have earned by her own efforts.
She needed to remind herself again that she could always fall back into her miserable past.
At the same time, she resolved herself—she would do anything to never go back to that past.
While El shivered in the pitch-black forest, her impulsive action naturally reached Caron’s ears.
For in Peyros, everything eventually reached Caron’s ears.
“My lord, the guest has gone out,” the butler reported.
Caron raised one brow.
“Where to?”
He casually stacked the papers he had been reading, showing little interest.
“That is…”
The old butler glanced worriedly toward the window.
Following the butler’s gaze, Caron cast a sidelong look out into the darkness beyond. It wasn’t hard for him to guess where El had gone.
“I don’t understand. Didn’t she want to escape?”
“People seek out what is familiar, do they not? Perhaps the guest is the same.”
“Perhaps. Though I, for one, am used to this place, I doubt I’d return if I ever managed to leave it.”
Caron answered cynically, pulling on his jacket. The candle blew out with a whoosh, and darkness fell.
As he left, the butler bowed in farewell, failing to notice that Caron’s eyes lingered for a while on the shadowy mountain beyond.
If nobles are human, then all beneath them are ants—ants who live only to work and then die.
Just as humans cannot understand the struggles of ants, nobles cannot understand the struggles of commoners.
And just as a person walking down the road doesn’t notice stepping on an ant, they cannot perceive our pain.
It had been more than two weeks since El began living at the mansion.
“How many today?”
“Twenty-four.”
“Lift your skirt.”
Since that day, Lady Emillern had changed. The mocking smiles, the cold, dismissive attitude—all were gone.
Now she treated El harshly, like a trainer trying to break a wild dog.
Whenever lessons began, everyone was dismissed and the door locked.
Then it would start. Lady Emillern assigned impossible amounts of work, and for every mistake El made on the tests, she was whipped.
She struck with such force that, by the end, beads of sweat formed on her forehead.
Yet not once did El cry out under the beatings. She only climbed silently onto the chair and lifted her skirt.
She feared that if she refused the punishment, Lady Emillern would speak ill of her to Caron.
El had heard that God listened more closely to nobles. Nobles made great donations to the temple, after all.
So perhaps words from someone like El, who had never offered anything, would never reach God.
And since Caron was her god, perhaps her words would never reach him either.
If she endured the trials in silence, maybe someday that god would save her.
With that foolish thought, El bit her lip hard and swallowed her groans as the beating resumed.
“If you fail the waltz again tomorrow, how will you repay your sin then?”
“…With anything.”
“Then I must think in advance of what reward and punishment to give you tomorrow. You may go.”
With that, Lady Emillern turned gracefully and swept from the room.
El swallowed the pain and sank down slowly, as though collapsing. She bandaged the wounds with a handkerchief and simply waited until the pain dulled into familiarity.
No one must know. This must never reach the Duke’s ears.
She had already received too much. If she received any more, she would never be able to repay it, not even with her body and soul.
“She has finished her lessons diligently and is now resting,” Ena reported.
“Boring. Leave me,” Caron replied.
“Yes.”
Dragging her weary body, Ena headed toward the kitchen. She had been worried lately because El wasn’t eating well.
When she arrived, the servants were all gathered, gossiping.
The maids usually came to the kitchen on breaks to share snacks and chatter. It seemed this was one of those times.
“Ena! You just came from the master?”
“Yes.”
“You must be exhausted. It’s hard enough doing maid work, but you have to report on every move the guest makes too.”
“Watch your tongue. If the guest hears, the master won’t forgive it.”
“Fine, fine.”
Ignoring the silly chatter, Ena gave a warning. Even so, the maids’ eyes sparkled with curiosity as they crowded around her.
“Who is that guest anyway? It’s not like the master calls her at night.”
“Exactly. What did he bring her here for?”
“Lian!” Ena snapped.
But Lian didn’t even flinch.
“What? Did I say something wrong? You saw it too. She came here skin-and-bones, in rags, carried in the master’s arms.”
“Maybe she was just a beggar?”
“Pfft—what if she’s a werewolf or something? I heard he picked her up in the forest.”
“Maybe he’s just fattening her up, she was so scrawny.”
“She looks pretty once she’s cleaned up, though.”
At the crude talk, Ena squeezed her eyes shut and fled the room.
But El’s clear, translucent brown eyes floated up in her mind.
Though she thought the maids went too far, she couldn’t shake the self-loathing—after all, she herself spied on El and reported everything to the master.
But the master didn’t even know El. He didn’t need Ena to curry favor—El already wanted desperately to stay in the mansion.
“I’ll go check on the lady.”
“Don’t overdo it, Ena. The guest hardly ever calls for you anyway.”
“Even so.”
Come to think of it, El had hardly pulled the bell string lately. She handled bathing, washing, and changing clothes all by herself now, leaving Ena no chance to serve her.
“…Did I do something wrong?” Ena murmured, tilting her head. She resolved to ask about it soon.
“El.”
“Ah, D-duke!”
She had slipped out deliberately at a time when everyone should be asleep—only to run right into Caron.
As El bowed hurriedly, the books she had been clutching spilled to the floor.
While she fumbled in panic, Caron calmly picked one up, glanced at the title, then took the rest from her arms.
“Where are you headed?”
“I just… want to learn a little faster.”
“Your face looks a bit pale.”
His long, pale fingers brushed against the corner of her eye. El quickly lowered her gaze.
How could he touch her so casually?
Every noble she had ever met had recoiled from contact with commoners—some even dismissed maids simply for touching them.
The only touches El had ever known were beatings and harassment.
Caron’s touch was neither.
Concern. Everything he gave her was something she had never received before in her life.
So this is what being a mistress was like? But it was so different from what she had imagined.
She had thought it was like being sold to a noble from the orphanage. Yet Caron only dined with her, exchanged a few words, and never demanded anything of her.
That was why El was even more afraid.
Because she had no idea how she could ever repay him.
(To be continued in the next episode)
