Looking at the name on the envelope with a sullen grimace, I picked up a letter opener to slit it open. Isabel’s characteristically flowing, pristine penmanship spread out before my eyes.
[Dearest Scarlett.]
Perhaps finding the very greeting grating, Celine, who had been glancing over my shoulder, screwed up her face. I gave her a look asking for a bit of space, and once she moved to sit a short distance away, I read the letter calmly. Surely there wouldn't be any pointless drivel in it? There had better not be. If there was, it wasn't like I could march over there and beat the daylights out of her.
[By the time this letter arrives, you will likely have concluded the negotiations. Though I don’t know how the results turned out, I am certain you handled it brilliantly. You have always been that way.
The reason I am writing to you like this is that there is something I must tell you. I truly wish you to be at ease, even if only a little. To be honest, Scarlett, after visiting you that day, I felt so very guilty. But Scarlett, I really never wanted to hurt you. That is why, after parting with you, I went to Elliot and broke things off. He shed tears at my goodbye, but thinking of you, I simply could not—]
“What? Has she completely lost her mind?”
Unable to bear it any longer, I sprang up from my seat. I could feel Celine staring at me with wide, startled eyes, but fury surged through me too fiercely for me to care about her reaction.
“Breaking up with Elliot? Because of me?”
Then why on earth did you two date in the first place!
God, she was unbelievable. Anger boiled up before I could even stop myself. I never took relationships lightly. Even if our time together was short, that didn't mean my feelings were shallow. Nor did the fact that I hadn't grabbed that serpent by the hair and thrashed her after she stole my lover mean I loved Elliot any less. I poured my focus entirely into each and every person I dated, giving them my genuine, passionate devotion while we were together.
When Elliot and I parted ways, the negotiation assignment had just landed on me and I was struggling under the crushing pressure. We ended things cleanly because of that, never because I cared for him any less.
And now Isabel was claiming she dated my man and then broke up with him for my sake.
At this point, what… what was she? Was she an idiot, or just playing the fool? Wh-what a terrifying creature.
My body trembled at the sentences plainly dumping all the blame onto me. For my sake, for my sake. I could feel through the parchment just how bitterly Elliot must have resented me as Isabel broke things off. He undoubtedly hated me and regretted ever dating me. He would deny that time together, forget those memories, and strive to erase every trace of it. Thus, the time we spent together would be stained with black ink, scattered into fragments, and ultimately reduced to an era he'd rather wipe away entirely.
Congratulations, Isabel. You really handed me a massive middle finger.
Pretending she broke it off for my sake while ensuring I got all the blame in the end. Stealing him away and then claiming she dumped him for me. I became the wretched villainess who stood in the way of their true love. True love? Well, aren't they just the tragic lovers straight out of a romance novel.
There was a long, tedious ramble written beneath it, but sick of looking at another word, I crumpled the parchment in my fist. Yet my left hand, tightly bound in bandages, refused to obey, and trembling with rage, I recklessly curled my left fingers and squeezed with all my might.
A flash of searing pain washed over me. The blade had sunk fairly deep, and the doctor hadn’t been lying when he warned it nearly chipped the bone, as a sharp numbness rushed through my hand. Back when I got cut, my mind was too fixated on the negotiations to notice, but now that my senses had cleared, the pain was intense enough to make my entire body shudder. Dropping the crumpled letter to the floor, I doubled over and sank down.
“Lady Scarlett! Are you all right?”
Startled by my uncharacteristic outburst, Celine hurried toward me. Agony and fury mingled so fiercely that I couldn't utter a single word, and the wound felt as if it had torn open. A sharp, stinging pain radiated along the slash. Before I knew it, I was clutching my injured hand tightly. The pain shot upward, traveling straight into my arm.
“Lady Dirnant!”
A voice called out. I looked up to see a dark figure wrapping an arm around me. Ah, gathering me up so roughly was going to make me look like I’d completely lost my mind. What did that wretched girl even matter?
Before I realized it, Duke Prodiad was down on one knee in front of me. As I tilted my head slightly to look at him, his face was filled with utter fluster. The moment he met my eyes, he asked in a thoroughly trembling voice,
“Lady Dirnant, are you… crying?”
“Pardon?”
No, I wasn't crying. Why on earth would I cry over Isabel?
A tiny tear must have leaked out because it hurt so terribly. Tearing up from sheer pain happened all the time, so I simply shook my head. Even so, pain was still pain.
Duke Prodiad looked at the arm and hand I was clutching to my chest, then carefully extended his hand toward me. His fingertips trembled faintly with immense gentleness. The moment his touch brushed my hand, I flinched.
“May I see your hand?”
Knowing he wouldn't treat it roughly, I cautiously held out my left hand to him. And the moment Celine caught sight of it, she let out a shriek.
“The wound has burst!”
“Lady Sarvin, could you fetch the doctor? He is on the third floor.”
“Yes!”
Answering in haste, Celine hurried out of the room, leaving only the Duke and me behind. The worst of the agony had receded somewhat, yet a stinging sensation lingered. Only then did I realize what a pathetic spectacle I had made of myself, and embarrassment flooded in.
“I’m… I’m all right. It hurt so badly I must have momentarily lost my senses.”
The crumpled letter lay on the floor. I was terrified he might pick it up and read it, but his grave gaze remained fixed entirely on my hand, showing no interest in the paper. Glancing awkwardly around the room under the unnerving silence, I spoke to the Duke, whose expression looked even grimmer than mine.
“I'm really fine.”
“Your wound has reopened.”
“It's fine, it just needs to be treated again. I suppose I was just rather startled. Did I frighten you?”
He was a man who had spent six years on the battlefield. There was no way he would be rattled just because a noble lady's cut reopened. Yet Duke Prodiad, whom I expected would naturally dismiss such a ridiculous question, remained unexpectedly silent. Instead, he drew my hand slightly closer to himself and carefully peeled away the blood-soaked bandages.
His touch was as gentle as if he were handling the most precious, fragile glass, and I couldn't help feeling awkward. Or was I? Was this really awkwardness? A ticklish flutter stirred within me, a feeling a bit, a bit, well… hard to describe.
“…I was startled.”
The reply came so long after my question that I had to stop and think about what he was referring to. But the moment I realized what he meant, a dazed look crossed my face despite myself.
“I was startled. I suddenly heard a scream, and when I arrived, you were in tears.”
Wasn't that skipping over a severe amount of context and exaggerating parts rather drastically?
I swallowed hard. An awkward silence stretched between us. Staring blankly at his face as he kept his eyes lowered on my hand, the words slipped out of my mouth before I could stop them.
“Do you dislike seeing me hurt?”
My words were brief, yet they seemed to shake him to his core, judging by how visibly his eyes wavered. Watching that gaze, a sudden sense of familiarity pulled my thoughts away.
Where had I seen those eyes before?
Ah, I remembered.
When I was young, Father and Mother were the most beautiful couple in my eyes. Strict and cold, Mother was always high-strung and constantly on guard, yet even she had moments when she lowered her defenses and wore a peaceful expression—and that was whenever she was with Father. Conversely, Father, who was always gentle and soft-spoken, gave off an exceptionally cold, razor-sharp aura whenever Mother came under attack.
Father was someone who laughed off almost anything, but he never overlooked any harm coming to Mother or me. And toward Mother, that standard was enforced with far greater severity.
Handling Winchester's affairs naturally earned Mother countless political rivals, meaning she weathered attacks from assassins and spies on a regular basis. To protect her, Father mobilized private soldiers, hired mercenaries, stationed knights, and ruthlessly punished anyone who dared bring harm to her.
The incident that stood out most vividly to my young self was when an unnamed viscount who sent an assassin after Mother was beheaded in the public square. People said Father’s influence from within the Ministry of Justice had been instrumental in that outcome. What would normally have remained a covert feud buried among the nobility was brought into the harsh light of day under the name of the Ministry of Justice.
I had once asked Father,
“Mother is strong. Why do you have to protect her, Father?”
“Well, that has nothing to do with being strong, Scarlett. I simply hate seeing your mother get hurt.”
“Why?”
“Because I love her very, very much. When she hurts, it hurts me too.”
Young and naive, I didn't understand why Father would hurt whenever Mother was wounded, but his expression as he spoke to me was so warm and gentle that I found myself nodding along. Stroking my hair, Father had told me, ‘You will understand soon enough, too.’
And when I was twelve, Father passed away. Shielding Mother with his own body from an assassin charging at her in the street.
I still couldn't forget the sight of that day. The screams of the maids, the shouts of the knights, Mother's pale, tear-streaked face, and Father's smiling countenance. Because the Countess hastily covered my eyes and pulled me away, I never knew how the assassin was ultimately caught, but I remembered it vividly.
The tears and the smile of that day.
That trembling gaze, and the heavy sorrow that bore down upon his entire being.
Duke Prodiad seemed somewhat taken aback by my question. During the week I spent with him, I had revised my assessment of him multiple times. A cold man, a decent man, a frightening man, a warm man, and so on. Among those myriad judgments, he shifted constantly, but one thing had never changed.
“Do you… hate seeing me hurt?”
He hated seeing me get hurt.
Perhaps it was a leap in logic. Who on earth would enjoy watching someone else suffer? Yet his reaction was far too extreme to be mere concern, and he never once stood by and let my feelings be bruised. His consideration was always boundless, and he had lost his composure in front of me far too often for me to call him dispassionate.
I was looking into his eyes once more. Those reddish-brown irises gazed steadily at me, without the slightest hint of offense. As the long silence stretched on, I gently pulled my hand from his grip. Then, turning toward the doctor standing in the doorway, I offered a smile.
“Please, come in.”
Duke Prodiad did not say a single word while the doctor redressed my hand and wrapped fresh bandages around it, warning me never to exert such reckless force or move it about like that again, all the way until the doctor stepped out.
Though I couldn't fathom the precise reason, he had not denied my words.
A man with a clear sense of right and wrong, distinctly divided between cold reason and fierce passion.
He had not denied what I said.
And suddenly, I found myself wanting to take that as an affirmation.
