🔊 TTS Settings
Chapter : 2
Did That Death Seem Funny to You?
Even she hadn’t expected to pass out like that.
Bringing her mother to the Windsor estate had gone well enough, but once the tension drained from her body, that was what did her in.
“Looks like the kid suddenly collapsed.”
An unfamiliar voice reached her ears.
“Who are you? I don’t recognize you. Did you do something to the young lady?”
Cold metal touched her skin. Annoyed by the sensation, she weakly swatted it away.
Maybe it was from exhaustion. Drowsiness kept washing over her. Her body was still heavy, but better than before.
“I’ll check her temperature first.”
Someone murmured, “Just a moment, miss,” and pressed the cold metal to her again.
“Her temperature’s high. Was there a young lady like this at the Windsor estate?”
“She’s not one of ours. Cosette’s child… I suppose she takes after her mother—fearless. She came here alone at this hour, and now she’s passed out on her own. If anything, I’m the one at a loss.”
It felt as though she’d turned into a speck of dust. Her consciousness sank once more.
“It seems like accumulated fatigue. You said her complexion looked bad when you first saw her, didn’t you?”
The unfamiliar voice came again. Her body felt much lighter now—almost fully recovered.
“Awake?”
When she looked around warily, the man explained belatedly,
“This is the Windsor estate. I’m Aster Windsor. I suppose that makes me your maternal uncle.”
As if to prove he meant no harm, Aster raised both hands.
He was the second son of the Windsor family, and Cosette’s younger brother.
The family physician standing beside him introduced himself as well.
“I’m Linton, physician to the Windsor household. Indeed, she looks just like Miss Cosette. Even from afar, you can tell she has Windsor blood.”
Though it was their first time seeing each other, they instinctively knew they resembled one another.
Those of Windsor blood were born with crimson-red hair, and Sharlophe was the same.
Her dark, black-tinged red hair looked somber, yet its presence was unmistakable.
“Where am I…?”
“The Windsor estate.”
Sharlophe slowly surveyed her surroundings—the pale pink wallpaper, the fluttering canopy, the soft bedding.
Only then did it sink in that she really was at the Windsor estate.
When she blinked in a daze, Aster sat by the bed and called out,
“Look at this, Linton.”
Linton stepped closer.
“What’s wrong with her? If it’s not her head, why is she acting like that?”
“Please watch your words, Lord Aster. She can hear you.”
Sharlophe let out a quiet sigh. The moment she escaped the Tuteur house, her tension must have snapped and she blacked out.
“What about the urn?”
Aster asked Linton again.
“You still think this is overreacting? She just woke up and the first thing she asks for is her own mother’s urn. You call that normal?”
“She’s simply mature for her age. Please, she’s right here—mind your language.”
With a dismissive gesture, Aster sent Linton back and turned to Sharlophe.
“Given the state you came in, it’s not like this is a situation where you can explain anything.”
He recalled her collapsing in front of the estate gates. Her face had been deathly pale then; now, color had finally returned.
She’d looked as if she might die at any moment. He couldn’t very well ask why she’d come in such a state.
One careless prod and she seemed like she’d crumble right away. So Aster swallowed the question that had risen to his throat.
‘Cosette, you fool…’
Ruffling his hair, he finally forced out a single question.
“What about your father?”
What had her father been like around this time? The memory was distant—too distant. Counting even her past life, more than a decade had passed.
“Sharlophe.”
She barely managed to meet Aster’s eyes.
“He’s not home.”
“He left you alone and went out again? Off chasing some damned useless business venture? Even after the funeral?”
They had already heard the news of her mother’s death. They’d tried to visit, but had been refused.
“So he told us not to come and just left you by yourself?”
Aster gripped the armrest of the sofa, slowly reining in his anger. In the meantime, Sharlophe looked around the room.
The urn wasn’t there. She couldn’t remember anything after collapsing at the gate. Her mind was growing emptier by the moment.
“I’ve kept your mother’s urn separately.”
Aster spoke with a sigh.
“So stop looking around.”
Only then did Sharlophe relax.
Pressing at his temples, Aster averted his gaze.
“Don’t you think you should explain that urn?”
“……”
“No. If this were a situation you could explain, you wouldn’t have come to me in that state in the first place.”
She had dug up her mother’s grave herself and taken out the urn. That dark night, she’d forgotten even fear.
Her eyes had followed only the empty air. Those vacant eyes had held an ambiguous look—neither smiling nor crying.
Clutching the blanket, Sharlophe whispered in a languid voice,
“Please let me stay here just for tonight.”
Like a child, she tugged at Aster’s sleeve.
“Just one day.”
She lowered her head, staring ahead emptily. The hollow in her eyes went cold. There was no warmth left.
“Let’s talk again when morning comes.”
Aster slowly withdrew. After making sure everyone had left, Sharlophe raised her head.
She brushed back her long crimson hair and got out of bed.
Trailing her fingers along the wall, she went to the window and pushed it open.
It was late dawn—still dark beneath the pre-dawn sky.
“Ah… ah…”
Her chest began to ache. I’m angry. This is all such garbage.
Leandro Windsor—
the head of the Windsor family, and her maternal grandfather.
Though his hair was thick with white, he wasn’t frail, but solid and unyielding.
“So this is Cosette’s remains.”
Leandro gently touched the urn before him, taking in the last trace of his daughter with sunken eyes.
“Cosette… Cosette… Did that child resent me?”
Sharlophe thought carefully. Her mother wasn’t someone who harbored resentment.
“I’m not sure. She missed you, but she never said she hated you.”
“Do you know why she cut ties with us?”
Sharlophe bit her lip.
“Was it because of me?”
“No, Grandfather.”
She didn’t know all the details herself.
Her parents’ marriage had been arranged.
Both families had grown on business, and their marriage was a pledge for a joint venture.
That was how their relationship began.
But her father was authoritarian and failed one business after another. In the process, the two families clashed often.
In the end, her maternal family cut off their support.
It was after three failed ventures. Around that time, Sharlophe was born.
“They said if Mother wanted to go back to the Windsor family, she’d have to give up custody of me.”
In the Empire, there was a law that gave priority of child custody to the biological father.
Whether or not he was fit, custody always went first to the father.
Unless the father relinquished it, the mother couldn’t claim it first.
Either she gave up custody, or she cut ties with the Windsor family. Those were the only two choices.
“Mother didn’t want to show me that kind of life. I think she chose to give it up herself.”
That had been her mother’s final decision.
“I’ll step out for a bit.”
Leaving the urn in Leandro’s study, Sharlophe went out.
‘It’s fine if I’m ruined.’
It’s fine if this life falls apart. Even if the road ahead is a dead end. I have no regrets, no lingering attachments. I’ve thrown them all away, down to the tiniest speck.
“How was Cosette at the end?”
Aster asked from behind her.
“She passed away peacefully.”
Now she couldn’t even remember her final expression.
If only she’d been allowed to see the body—then at least she might remember something.
Why, why did it have to be this time?
I was the one who dug up the grave and took out the urn. I was the one who stayed by her side at her last breath, and yet—
‘I don’t remember.’
Not even her last face.
Sharlophe clenched her fist. Her nails dug into her palm.
“When will the urn be buried?”
She asked, sensing someone behind her.
“Tomorrow morning.”
Aster followed her back with a complicated gaze.
“Yes. Thank you.”
She turned her head away and walked on.
Sharlophe held a single chrysanthemum in her hand.
She had come out to buy flowers to offer her mother when they buried the urn.
After paying, she cradled the bouquet in her arms. The pure white chrysanthemum nestled against her long crimson hair looked strangely beautiful.
“This morning I saw that Miss Sharlophe’s room was empty?”
As she brushed her hair back and tapped the petals with her fingertips, a familiar voice reached her.
“They said she went out somewhere? She’d been crying for days like her head was about to split, but the house was so quiet I wondered.”
“Did you see her that day? When the girl woke up, she was strange. She asked where her mom’s grave was, then laughed like she’d lost her mind when she saw the portrait.”
Sharlophe turned toward the voices.
They were maids from the Tuteur household.
She ran her fingers through her frizzy red hair. They were walking this way.
“She looked kind of crazy.”
“Kind of? She was crazy. Did you see her laughing in front of her own mother’s grave? Kneeling there, laughing like a lunatic. I was too scared to get close.”
They were people with not a shred of loyalty to their household.
Look at them, snickering and mocking their mistress’s death.
Disgusting. Vile. Was that death nothing more than a joke to you?
She pulled her shawl over her head and hid herself along the side of an alley.
‘Did that death seem funny to you?’
It was a death that should never have been funny to the likes of you.
As she hid there, someone entered the alley.
“Let me pass first.”
She shifted aside, but the man moved faster.
Her shoulder hit the wall. As she stumbled and curled in on herself,
something suddenly wrapped around her.
The man had caught her in his strong arms and was looking down at her.
Rustle—
He stepped on fallen leaves.
“Are you all right?”
“Yes. Thank you.”
After confirming she was standing properly, he went on his way.
His back grew more distant. As she tried to take her eyes off him—
“Miss Sharlophe…?”
A maid’s eyes turned this way. Ah. Their eyes met.
“Hey, you there! Wait a moment!”
If they caught her, it would only get more troublesome.
Sharlophe pulled her shawl tighter and followed after the man, but he stopped.
“Why are you following me?”
His robe fell open, revealing his features, a few loose strands of hair falling across his face.
And there was the metallic smell of blood. Drops trickled down from beneath the back of his hand.
“…Help me.”
Just as Sharlophe lightly grabbed his sleeve, he looked straight down at her. Then his gaze shifted behind her.
“What is it?”
His low voice spread through the alley.
“Let go.”
Startled, the maid released her hand.
“Get lost.”
That was all he said.
