章 123: [Chapter 123] Time began to pass
Neris didn't need to wait long. Ellen arrived before she could even catch her breath in front of the Duke's bedroom.
"Miss."
Ellen, who seemed to still be working, was as neat as usual. Dora followed her with a large, sharp axe in hand. Normally, she would have started chopping on her own, but seeing Ellen's pale, hesitant face, she hesitated.
Without responding to Ellen's call, Neris gestured towards the door for Dora to show.
"Chop."
"Yes, Miss."
"Just a moment, Miss."
Dora immediately tried to swing the axe. Ellen stopped her with her hand. Ellen looked at Neris and spoke.
"Miss, this is where the late Duke explicitly ordered not to be opened in the future."
"He is no longer here."
"Isn't that still the late Duke's order?"
"Dora, hand me the axe."
Neris's voice turned cold. Her demeanor was as stern as a drill sergeant during boot camp, and Dora, as if entranced, handed over the axe.
The axe was raised high. In a desperate voice, Ellen asked.
"Miss, are you really okay?"
"It's too late for such words now."
Neris lowered the hand holding the axe for a moment. It wasn't out of fear of Ellen. It was to face Ellen and, if possible, to confirm.
"Why did you ask that in the first place? If you didn't want to show me this place, you could have told me not to come this way from the beginning. You could have hidden the greenhouse's toys without these chains. After all, I have no business going where I'm not supposed to. But you didn't do that. You always made me think there was something more."
The real name of the late Duchess was no longer remembered. Neris was initially drawn to Ellen because of her description.
It was also because of curiosity, due to Ellen's description.
"And recently, it was because of that behavior."
For Ellen, a woman with the same eye color as the deceased Duchess was more important to her than Cladwyn's doctor. Moreover, if anyone was imitating the late Duchess, it should be repulsive rather than normal.
Yet Ellen behaved kindly towards Catherine Haricot.
"You wanted me to know something, didn't you? You wanted to tell me that Catherine is not a woman who acts innocently to gain someone's favor, but deliberately behaves like the late Duchess, right?"
Ellen's eyes trembled.
Neris asked coolly.
"I should ask now. Ellen, what do you know about the late Duchess?"
Ellen was calm and intelligent. If there was something she needed to tell Neris, she had always done so directly and clearly. But this time was different.
And Neris could guess the reason.
'If the late Duchess is a bastard, Cladwyn's inheritance of the ducal title is invalid.'
"The late Duke and Duchess could have loved each other as much as they wanted and held a ceremony under the blessing of a priest in the chapel, but it was all in vain. A child can only become a noble when born within a legitimate marital relationship, and a child born between a non-noble and a noble cannot inherit the title.
If the Marquis revealed what I had done, the authority in the North would have been torn apart. There is currently no one left to succeed Mainduland after Cladwyn steps down.
Would the territory of a grand noble without an heir not be torn apart among the fiercest wolves?
So, this was naturally the greatest secret of the North. No one should speak of it lightly.
Ellen sighed and closed her eyes.
"...I... I wanted you to make the choice. If you knew everything, it would surely be a burden."
A cold determination settled on her face.
"...Do you know that? I was never meant to be close to the grand nobility. I was just a distant relative of the Marquis, never having visited Mainduland before. The person who decided to send me, who knew nothing about the original Lady Edith, to Lady Edith's bridal chamber must have been a bastard. Even if something went wrong and I died, it wouldn't have mattered at all."
Neris heard Ellen use harsh words for the first time this time.
"Madam and I have faced death together several times in Mainduland, and I was proud to dedicate my life to Madam. One day, Madam told me everything. You were not raised as an aristocrat in Mainduland but as a bastard in a small rural village. Even if something happens to you, the Marquis is not someone I should be concerned about, so I asked him to take care of you."
Was it just not caring? Everyone now knew enough about what kind of person the Marquis was. Ellen briefly gave Neris a soft look.
"I may not have been able to protect our young lord well, but fortunately, you were there, Miss."
In her clear affection, Neris understood what she was saying.
Six years ago.
"I vowed to keep the secret until I die. But I can't force you to make that oath."
"But I wanted to know?"
"Yes and no. ...Miss, are you really okay? Our lord doesn't want to hide anything from you. But I think a little differently. If you knew, I acted as if I wanted you to know, but if you didn't want to know..."
Ellen sighed.
"It would be better for you to bear the burden you don't want than to force it on you. If you leave without opening the door now, I will treat you the same as before. How can anyone blame you for not knowing about our lady?"
Indeed, Ellen's concern was justified. Knowing information that could easily drive out one of the most likely nobles in Vista was more than just knowledge.
Even though Neris already knew everything that everyone present knew, Ellen's confirmation was truly a kindness. Concerns about more people knowing the secret were futile at this point...
'It's telling me to run if it's uncomfortable.'
She would believe that the secret would be kept, so if she didn't like it, she shouldn't get involved. It was Ellen's way of showing consideration and at the same time drawing a line between Neris and the people of this castle.
'So are you really okay?'
...It was amusing. She wouldn't care even if he was born from the devil of hell.
Instead of answering, Neris looked at the door. With Ellen, the greenhouse, and the memories of the late Duchess, she had long been asleep with that door.
'I just called it lingering.'
Neris closed her eyes and recalled Cladwyn's voice once. Then, she raised the axe with all her might.
Thud, clang, crash! The axe struck the chain several times, often missing but occasionally hitting the chain accurately. In the process, the door handle and the door were damaged, but Neris didn't care.
His stolen childhood lay dormant here.
He had decided to forget, but the childhood wounds he could never truly forget.
If Cladwyn had truly forgotten the past, he wouldn't have left the Western Palace garden like that. He wouldn't have left the garden empty. He wouldn't have remembered that the toys were there.
The stubborn man had only been suppressing it all this time. Pretending that the pain in his dull heart was nothing.
He wasn't okay.
And if he wasn't okay, she wasn't either.
"I'm going to break it. I'm tired of covering it up."
Thud, thud, crash!
The axe struck the chain attached to the door handle. It wasn't a technically perfect strike, but Dora felt as if her heart was breaking.
It wasn't a bad feeling. Rather, it felt like...
It seemed like time had started flowing in this place.
A crack had finally appeared in the tightly closed box, as if light was beginning to seep in. Even though she knew nothing, Dora instinctively felt that way.
The rusty lock finally made a heavy sound as it fell to the ground.
"Open it."
Neris commanded coldly. Dora looked unsure if she should, but quickly moved her hand. The rusty iron chain that remained on the door was peeled off with a clanging sound.
Neris swung the door wide open and took a step inside.
All the furniture in the late Duchess's room was covered in white linen. Just like the previous anteroom. And the smell of dust was strong.
"First, open the window and remove all the linen."
Dora and Ellen quickly moved according to Neris's command. The furniture was revealed under the candlelight.
Neris recognized that everything in this room was made in the fashion of the time when the late Duchess was alive. The color was all blue. A mix of green and blue.
The eye color of the late Duchess.
Neris instinctively felt that it was an obsessive admiration.
'No wonder.'
After the late Duchess passed away, she must have become reluctant to enter.
When she pulled back the curtain on the fireplace with golden pieces, the portrait of the late Duke and Duchess hidden inside was revealed. Though they had disappeared in the passage of time, they still looked lively and happy in the painting.
The candlelight flickered and illuminated the long-gone figures. Ellen, who had been staring blankly at the painting, weakly said.
"No evidence of Madam's death by natural causes could be found no matter where I searched. So, I thought I must have been wrong, that I was too eager to blame someone because I missed Madam so much."
Ellen also knew. The fate of the late Duchess. Neris glanced at her briefly.
"I was suspicious, yes. But His Lordship couldn't reject the only remaining blood relative in this world due to a misunderstanding. After witnessing what happened to our lord six years ago, I doubted again, and from then on, even though our lord cut ties with that person, there wasn't enough evidence to be sure that Madam's situation was entirely his fault. There were many who benefited from harming our lady."
Ellen's face was filled with venom. If given the power, she seemed ready to tear apart at any moment.
"For over ten years, how did the suspicion I've harbored turn into certainty now? I saw the ring. The ring he's wearing. It's the same as the one the envoy who came to meet our lady that morning was wearing! Unless it was unavoidable, why would any grand noble entrust their ring to a servant? Clearly, he was given a special mission and brought the ring as proof!"
Among various jewelry, the ring traditionally symbolized status, authority, and command. Therefore, nobles never lent out expensive rings that were easily distinguishable to anyone.
And Neris seemed to know what ring Ellen was talking about. The Tiphian Marquis wore many rings, but there was one particularly thick and chunky emerald ring.
Perfect for hiding something.
'The late Duke probably had a mistress.'
Ellen seemed to think that the envoy who brought the mistress deceived the late Duke and Duchess and assassinated the late Duchess. The ring was likely a token to establish the mistress.
But Neris had a different thought.
If the Marquis had given such a ring to the envoy and then taken it back, and if he still wore it now, then the envoy was probably the one who directly handled it. It was likely an item that could extract poison used by the Tiphian Marquis if manipulated in a special way.
Unless it was a special trick of the grand noble family's vision, the Duke's physician would have surely found the problem.
So, the item Neris needed to find in this room became clearer.
She searched the bedposts, wall sconces, and drawers. Various luxurious items emerged, but what caught her eye the most was a ring that came out of the vanity drawer.
"Is this something the late Duchess used?"
It was a ring with a baroque pearl embedded, about the size of a thumb. Ellen nodded.
"Yes. It's something Madam brought when she got married. She used to wear it often in the early days of her marriage."
"And she stopped wearing it at some point."
"Yes. The late Duke gave her many more valuable items."
Certainly, baroque pearls were not expensive gems. It was difficult to see them as gems that a person like the Duchess would enjoy wearing.
"Who placed the ring here?"
"It must have been Madam. She always disliked maids touching things in the room. Especially the drawers, no one except Madam ever opened them."
"Ah."
Neris smiled fiercely.
This was it. The item she had to find tonight.
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