🔊 TTS Settings
Chapter : 13
“Why are you trying to make distinctions? Why do you still not understand…?”
“What is it that I don’t understand?”
Ray did not usually prefer speaking so directly, but he decided it would be fine with her.
First, she was from Bolton, and second, she seemed like she wouldn’t understand unless things were said clearly.
“There’s no need to separate people. Everyone in Orthura is your enemy. Who in this country do you think would have any goodwill toward you?”
For a moment, Ray thought he saw tears gathering in Rose’s eyes.
When he looked again, he realized it was his mistake. It must have been due to her pale eye color. Her eyes were completely dry.
As always, he thought she was surprisingly not a woman who cried easily.
“…Then what? I should just take it? No matter what they say to me? No matter what they do?”
“I will deal with anyone who treats you carelessly. It would be troublesome if you can’t even trust your husband.”
The woman let out a short laugh.
“How am I supposed to trust you? You just said it yourself—everyone is an enemy.”
Only then did Ray show a satisfied smile.
“You’re smart. Since you understand, I expect you to act differently from now on.”
Rose closed her mouth tightly, stared at him for a long moment, then turned her head back toward the window.
In the finally quiet carriage, Ray was also able to look out the window in peace.
As he looked outside, he once again recalled Archibald Avery’s ridiculous expression. By then, the habitual irritation he felt toward the woman had already faded.
It had already happened, and the matter was settled, so if he looked at it calmly, it was actually one of the most amusing things he had seen recently.
But that didn’t last long. By the time the carriage reached the mansion, Ray’s mood had returned to its usual state—neither irritated nor amused, just flat and empty.
That was until his wife refused his escort.
Ignoring the arm Ray offered her, the woman got off the carriage with poor posture, holding up her dress carelessly. As she passed him, she muttered in Antakan.
It was said so quickly, like someone fluent in her native language, but Ray understood it—and his expression instantly hardened.
“Don’t touch me. It’s annoying.”
That was what his wife had said.
It was better to be angry than to cry. Crying didn’t help anything in life.
Rose repeated to herself the most important lesson she had learned in Bolton.
“Everyone in Orthura is your enemy.”
The cold voice echoed in her mind, and her grip tightened on the comb in her hand.
No. This cannot hurt me.
She combed her hair while repeating it like a madwoman. I don’t love this country, and I don’t love its people, so this cannot hurt me.
“Even Crawford has finally gone mad, calling her a Bolton woman.”
“How did her mother end up living in a place like Bolton?”
“She must never cross the River Tees again.”
No. Please. Forget it.
Rose muttered obsessively.
She was gripping the comb so tightly it felt like it might break. But she couldn’t stop. Even if it broke, it was better than crying. She refused to cry, even if it killed her.
They don’t know anything about Bolton anyway.
She shut her eyes tightly and took a deep breath.
She stayed like that until all those voices disappeared from her mind. Only then did she open her eyes again and continue brushing her hair.
She would just lie down as if nothing had happened. Sleep and forget everything tomorrow.
Just as she was calming herself down, she suddenly heard movement from the hallway—and the man she hated most appeared wearing a robe.
Their eyes met in the mirror.
The moment she saw those terrifyingly cold blue eyes, all the calm she had forced into herself shattered.
Ray Crawford’s blue eyes were Orthura itself.
She shouldn’t be looking at him.
Even though she looked away pretending not to notice, he didn’t care and sat down on the sofa behind her dressing table.
“Go to your bedroom. I have nothing more to say today.”
He had clearly come to scold her again.
She couldn’t understand it.
He had already said everyone—including her—was his enemy, and still it wasn’t enough? There was more to say? Worse things?
Her heart started beating again, whether from anger or sadness she didn’t know, and she tightened her grip on the comb again.
“I do have something to say, and it matters. And you don’t have the right to tell me to leave.”
Right.
The moment she heard that word, her suppressed anger flared up like adding firewood.
Even her own bedroom here was not hers. Everything belonged to this man. Everything followed his will.
“In Orthura, things like your feelings don’t mat—”
His calm voice only made her anger worse. It felt like a dam had broken inside her.
Before she realized it, Rose had stood up from her chair.
As she stood, she threw the comb to the floor. It hit the ground with a loud sound, echoing in the quiet room.
“Then what right do I even have? If I can’t even say this much?”
The man’s expression finally cracked slightly as the comb rolled on the floor.
“I’d prefer if you weren’t so emotional.”
His tone remained dry despite his frown.
Emotional.
If Rose were truly emotional, she would have punched Archibald Avery in the face.
“Do you know what that bastard said to me?”
She realized she had cursed out loud, but she had already lost control.
She had tried to avoid talking because of this.
“He offered me a cigarette. Told me to smoke one! Said I must be a smoker.”
She wanted to explain more clearly how humiliating it was, but Orthuran language felt too suffocating. She couldn’t breathe properly.
In the end, she hit her chest a few times and switched to Antakan.
“And then he even said only shameless women smoke cigarettes.”
Speaking in Antakan made her feel much better.
“And I’m supposed to just stay quiet after that?”
Ray looked at her with a frown, as if she were an unruly animal being restrained. It was unclear whether he disliked her or was simply translating her words.
Probably both.
“I did my best. Instead of telling him to shut up, I spoke in the way your people do!”
The man, now returning to his usual emotionless expression, raised a hand as if calming a wild animal.
“Don’t raise your voice. And stop speaking Antakan. It’s not a good habit.”
His tone was unbelievably calm and indifferent.
That attitude—so easily, so naturally ordering her not to do things—stopped her burning anger all at once.
He simply watched her in silence after saying that.
His gaze felt like a doctor observing a patient after a rabies shot.
Under that cold observation, Rose could feel herself.
Her face was hot. It must have been red. Her chest was rising and falling as she tried to catch her breath.
Even her anger felt miserable because she was the only one feeling it.
She still didn’t understand what she had done wrong.
The people of Orthura insulted her constantly just because she was from Bolton.
Yet when she finally snapped back slightly—just slightly—that was wrong too. Even that was her fault. And she hadn’t even said anything truly harsh.
“…What did I do so wrong?”
The question slipped out before she could stop it. It was something she had wanted to ask ever since coming here.
She knew very well that to someone like Ray, she would always seem lacking.
She had accepted values she did not agree with. After all, she had chosen this marriage herself. She was responsible too.
But agreeing to the marriage did not mean agreeing that “all Bolton people are trash.”
She wanted to ask why they hated her so much.
“Did my father beg you? Did he grab your legs and plead? ‘Please marry my daughter’? Or did he threaten you?”
She had come here without knowing much about Orthura. But it was clear these people had always despised Bolton and still did.
If they hated her country so much, there had to be a reason they married a woman from there.
“If not that, then you must have had a reason too. So why am I the only one treated like a criminal?”
According to her father, this marriage had been proposed from their side first. She didn’t fully believe it, but both families must have agreed.
So why was she the only one at fault?
