บท 8: Disgusting Scent

"We need to hurry." Victoria looked at the head of the knight that accompanied them on this journey.

"Where are they?" She asked for the umpteenth time.

She had sent two people to find Rosalind earlier, but Rosalind is already back. Judging from her not looking hurt, Victoria concluded that traveling through the forest wasn't that hard after all.

Sadly, the knights that she sent out had yet to come back.

"Madam, I already sent someone to find them. However, I was informed that the terrain is dangerous. Snow began to cover the area, and they saw some cursed animals. However, they were lucky enough to have come back alive."

Victoria said nothing. If it was that dangerous, then what about Victoria? She came back with just a few scratches on her clothes.

True, she looked disheveled, but was alive nonetheless. Are they trying to tell her that they are weaker than a seventeen-year-old girl?

"We need to leave as soon as possible," Victoria said. The Duke of the North is already on his way to the Empire and they needed to have Rosalind at the mansion before he arrives at the capital.

"Grace," Victoria called out. Almost immediately, her maid, Grace, approached her, bowing. "What did you hear?" she asked.

"She has been crying and blaming her maid, Madam."

"Anything that needs our attention?"

"No." Grace shook her head. "She — She just sounded like a whining child. It felt like she was the same child we have brought her all those years ago."

Victoria nodded. Just as she expected, Rosalind grew up with no manners. To be fair, no one was there to teach her, but that was an intentional oversight. There was no point in wasting everyone's time on a woman like her.

The woman might be someone from the family, but everyone always treated her as if she was cursed and abominable existence. After all, the descendant of the Lux Family always had light blond hair, and she — she was born with hair as dark as the night.

"Ask her to change into the dress." She can't have the ignorant Rosalind looking like a maid, can she? Victoria needed to prepare Rosalind for the Duke. At least that's what she thought she should do.

The patriarch had been furious after Dorothy's failed Awakening ceremony. He had been holed up in his room for days. If they didn't receive the news of the Duke's visit, he would never have talked to his own wife at all!

Victoria felt a tug in her chest.

For some reason, a part of her felt that the Patriarch is blaming her for everything.

Was it her fault that Dorothy didn't receive any Blessing on her eighteenth birthday? Victoria understood that the one who will receive the Blessing wouldl become the new head of the family. As someone who had expected her own daughter to receive the Blessing, she had felt extreme disappointment about the failed Awakening too!

But she was forced to deal with her emotions and move on with her life.

However, her husband was different.

And his reaction caused a huge rift in their marriage.

She waited for Grace to come back and, just as she expected, the maid had an exhausted look on her face.

"Madam… that little maid and the young miss look really ignorant. Watching them was embarrassing. May I suggest something?"

"Go on…"

"Perhaps an etiquette teacher would be useful. Someone needed to teach her how to act as a woman."

"There is no need for a teacher," Victoria said. What was the use of exposing this fact to other people?

If the Duke asked the King for a bride, the King would surely pick someone useless and therefore it is highly likely that Rosalind will be chosen. Rosalind will then leave the Empire and go to the Duke's Kingdom, never to darken the Lux family again..

To some, that might not sound like something that a family would do — especially not from a family who had received the Blessing of the Goddess. However, Rosalind was not only useless, she was born with black hair! This had been akin to a speck of black in the middle of the snow.

All the descendants of the Lux Family had white hair. Why would someone like Rosalind exist?

Naturally, they suspected the maid was pregnant with another man's child. Except, the initial testing that they did in the past using Rosalind's blood came back positive. She was her father's daughter. This result felt like an enormous blow to the family.

They had become the laughingstock because of Rosalind's birth!

Until now, Victoria couldn't seem to forget the bullying that she had gone through because of Rosalind. Even Dorothy, the little Princess of the Lux family, wasn't able to escape the torment, as many believed that Rosalind's appearance was the end of their Blessing.

She could still recall the nights when Dorothy would walk into her parent's room crying because of the rumors that she heard about the family.

So, the moment Rosalind turned twelve, they immediately sent her here and told everyone that she had gotten ill. They used the excuse that Rosalind had a very weak body and needed the cold of the north to relieve her pain.

Eventually, it worked.

The capital had forgotten Rosalind andfor the last five years, their lives had been very peaceful. But that all changed when Dorothy didn't receive the Blessing on her eighteenth birthday.

"But— "

"There are no buts— " she glared at her maid. "Clean her thoroughly. We need her to look decent. Ah… Grace?" she looked at the maid. "Prepare a change of clothing for me. I cannot stand the smell of that woman in my current dress." It was filthy and it smelled. It was as if Rosalind accidentally fell into some animal's fecal matter.

Just recalling the woman's crying face as she hugged her made Victoria shiver.

"A bath," she uttered. "Please prepare a bath for me." She needed to remove the disgusting scent away from her body.