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63.
As I finished reminiscing, the phantom pain of those memories seemed to resurface. I squeezed my eyes shut and rubbed my temples.
'Do you have any idea what suffering I endured to reach this point? So it would be terribly inconvenient if you were to die here.'
I gazed coldly down at Zeppelin, who lay unconscious on the bed.
It had ‌‌‌‌already been several days since he hovered at death's door.
I stared at Zeppelin, whose breathing grew fainter with each passing moment.
Today, too, there was no sign of him awakening.
I let out a small sigh and slowly rose from my seat.
From sitting for so long, my gait felt stiff and unsteady.
I tapped my rigid lower ‌‌‌‌back as I surveyed Zeppelin's lavish bedroom.
Expensive ornaments filled the room—the kind where selling just one piece would sustain someone comfortably for a month.
As I toyed with an angel statue carved from jade, my gaze drifted ‌‌‌toward the mirror ‌‌‌chamber with its golden lion-head handles.
With Zeppelin unconscious, I was effectively the mistress of this opulent room.
I lifted my chin.
I mimicked Rebecca's dignified gait as I crossed the bedroom.
Soon, I grasped the handle held between the jaws of the valiant golden lion and pulled.
The mirror chamber slowly revealed itself.
At the sight before me, I gasped and briefly covered my mouth in astonishment.
Flawless mirrors without distortion hung on every wall.
I reached toward the mirrors, and a cool sensation traveled through my fingertips.
A stranger gazed back ‌‌‌‌at me from within the glass.
The fair-haired, blue-eyed stranger ‌‌‌was myself—clumsily imitating Rebecca, whom Zeppelin loved so dearly.
Even the dress I wore now belonged to Rebecca.
Though the fit required complete ‌‌alteration due to our height difference, everything Rebecca once possessed had become mine.
It was an appearance that ‌‌hardly suited my taste, but that mattered little.
If Zeppelin desired Rebecca, then becoming Rebecca would suffice.
Of course, this was nothing ‍‌‌short of a gamble.
When Zeppelin regained consciousness, he might rage furiously upon seeing me mimicking Rebecca.
If fortune turned against me, I might be cast out in disgrace.
But what if he accepted me instead?
Rebecca would never return.
That night when I tried to kill Rebecca, the look in her eyes she showed me was never one of affection for Zeppelin.
Rather, Rebecca harbored a profound loathing for him.
She had crossed a river from which there was no return.
I realized that the position of Countess of Devonshire had become permanently vacant.
Zeppelin would not be able to endure Rebecca's empty place. ‌‌‌‌
It was obvious as day—just look at ‌‌how pathetically he ‌struck his own ‌head and lost consciousness.
Could such a man not yield the position of Countess to me?
This was no mere greed.
It was the rightful outcome of fair competition.
If a new Rebecca was needed anyway, then I, who carried a child, was the more suitable choice.
That cruel ‌‌‌glimmer of possibility set Alicia in motion.
"My place...."
Alicia, who had been glaring at her unfamiliar reflection, returned to ‌‌the bedroom.
And she nursed ‌‌‌Zeppelin with meticulous care.
It mattered not that the position granted to me lacked sincerity.
Until her husband formally acknowledged the child ‌‌‌as his blood, a second wife—even if a ceremony had been held—possessed no rights whatsoever, little better than a concubine.
The law permitting polygamy had been enacted out of concern for the diminishing status of the first wife.
Most first ‌wives came from noble houses.
It was a law born from the resentment of powerful fathers who refused to surrender their daughters' dowries to mere concubines.
Thus, if Zeppelin died before Alicia—fatherless as she ‌‌was—could bear his child, the child would be nothing more than illegitimate.
The title of Earl would pass to his nearest relatives.
"So you cannot die. You must live and save me."
Alicia spooned medicine into Zeppelin's mouth.
He could scarcely swallow it.
Alicia held the medicine in her own mouth and let it flow into his.
For days, she did this.
At last, he awakened.
But he had lost his memory.
He had forgotten Rebecca, forgotten me, ‌‌‌forgotten this beautiful House of Devon entirely.
They said his skull had been nearly exposed, so it was stranger still ‌‌that his mind remained intact.
"Then, Alicia. Are you my lover?"
At his innocent question, so guileless it seemed almost naive, Alicia found herself momentarily speechless.
Alicia held ‌‌‌‌her breath and gazed at Zeppelin.
His unfocused eyes pleaded for her ‌‌‌answer.
Those beautiful eyes of her husband—once so indifferent, never truly seeing her existence—now turned toward her.
Eyes that had always been ‌‌filled with someone else were now utterly vacant.
I ‌‌‌‌wanted to fill that emptiness with myself.
Alicia's eyes widened. ‌‌
This ‌was nothing short of divine revelation. God had finally taken her side.
A fragile smile of ‌hope trembled upon ‌‌‌her lips.
As if seized by resolve, Alicia grasped his hand firmly and spoke.
"Yes. I am your wife. Alicia, Countess of Devonshire."
* * *
"Are you ‌‌not warm?"
Rebecca, who had been reading in the swing, lifted her ‌‌‌head at Kanna's question.
Rather, beads of perspiration dotted Kanna's forehead as she asked.
Rebecca smiled quietly and spoke.
"Kanna, I'm fine, so stop fanning me now. You must be hot too."
"But...."
"It bothers me more that you keep doing that. I've told you countless times—you're not ‌a maid anymore. Come sit here with me instead. Father's grapefruit juice is wonderfully refreshing and sweet."
Kanna hesitated for a moment before setting down her fan and settling ‌‌‌beside Rebecca.
She seemed deeply uncertain whether she truly deserved to sit alongside her mistress.
Rebecca handed Kanna a glass filled with grapefruit juice. Kanna wavered before accepting it.
A week had already passed since Kanna arrived at the Obelia Mansion. In that time, the estate had been gradually suffused with the fullness of summer.
Rebecca lifted her gaze toward the lush canopy of trees.
The pale green leaves ‌had transformed into a deep, verdant hue.
The freshness of it ‌‌‌drew a fleeting smile from Rebecca's lips.
"Let me do it!"
Kanna drained her juice in one gulp and rushed forward with purpose.
She had spotted Theo carrying a basket overflowing with ‌laundry.
Even from a distance, I could discern the nature of their exchange.
Father earnestly declining, and Kanna stubbornly insisting on helping with equal fervor.
Theo emerged victorious, and Kanna trudged back toward me with empty hands.
But soon Helena and Livia came springing from the mansion like coiled springs.
The spirited girls clung to either side of Kanna, clamoring for her to play with them.
Kanna's expression grew flustered as she glanced between the twins and me.
I waved my hand to signal that it was ‌perfectly fine.
Soon, the laughter of three figures ‌‌‌‌racing toward the meadow drifted to me on the breeze.
Kanna had already woven herself into the fabric of House of Obelia. She felt as comfortable and familiar as family.
'Please, I beg you—keep the promise that we'll never part again.'
I recalled how her hands trembled violently as they wrapped around my back.
The memory stirred something both strange and achingly familiar within my chest.
That tender, fearful gaze—the worry of losing me—was unfamiliar because I had forgotten it ‌‌‌long ago, yet precious because I had once received it.
It was unmistakably different from Zeppelin's.
Julian sometimes looked at me that way as well.
He would gaze at me quietly, his expression betraying words caught in his throat that he couldn't bring himself to speak.
I knew Julian had been on the ‌‌‌verge of saying something similar to what Kanna had said.
The thought of Julian made me snap my book shut with an audible thud.
Now that I thought about it, a ‌‌‌‌‌week had passed since I sent that letter.
Yet the Duke's Residence had sent no reply whatsoever.
This was unlike the old days, when responses would arrive swiftly after I sent word.
Julian's daily visits to the Obelia Mansion had ceased abruptly after that day when the heavy rain fell.
I rested my chin in my palm, my expression turning sullen.
There was no doubt—Julian was deliberately avoiding me now.
It was certainly because of what happened that day.
At first, I too had no face to show him.
The fact that I had mocked and toyed with his sincerity ‌‌‌was undeniable.
Yet simply avoiding each other like this wouldn't do. There was still a mountain ‌‌of matters we needed to discuss.
We needed to begin talking about the wedding soon. ‌‌‌‌‌
So I gathered the courage to send a letter, and not a single reply came back.
Rebecca's blood boiled.
'He was the one who kissed me first, after all.'
If he hadn't done that, I would never have teased ‌‌‌‌‌him like some drunken fool.
Yet it was also true that his kiss had brought me comfort.
Rebecca exhaled a long sigh.
"I can't just sit here waiting forever."
The situation had changed now. I no longer needed to anxiously wait for news to reach me from within these walls.
Rebecca rose slowly from her seat.
"Then perhaps I should make a move."
* * * ‌
Meanwhile, Julian was trapped in a long, agonizing dream.
It ‌‌hurt. It hurt so terribly. My limbs twisted, and every organ felt as though it would burst.
It was pain no child should ever endure.
'Leo...'
Julian sought out the divine messenger who held the strings of my life in his hands.
Was it because I had spoken harshly to him?
Was it because ‌‌‌‌‌I had not feared him as I feared other Dukes of the Duchy of Johannes?
Was that why he inflicted this torment upon me?
Was that why he sought to kill me, to render divine judgment?
One consolation was the thought that my father must be sharing this same agony with me.
The thought of that man writhing in torment made a smile bloom at my lips even as cold sweat poured down my face.
'Still, no one has come to find me.'
In the desolate inn where no one else dwelled, young Julian lay alone, suffering.
One might think it strange for a child to lodge alone in a room, but the innkeeper, having received a month's payment in advance, paid Julian little attention.
Just ‌‌moments ago, fever had raged through me, but now I was consumed by unbearable cold.
A bone-chilling ‌‌‌‌frost descended upon me.
I pulled the tattered blanket ‌over my face and trembled violently.
Would I die like this?
It didn't ‌‌‌‌matter if I died—my father would still exist.
Even if I perished, he would create a new heir.
The Duke of the Duchy of Johannes without an heir could not even die freely.
Only a son could inherit the succession.
I had heard that even when life itself ebbed away, he would remain a hollow corpse capable only of procreation, serving as a vessel of divine power until a son was born.
So perhaps it would be better to die now, young Julian thought, trying to surrender his fading consciousness.
And in that moment, warmth enveloped me.
The runaway Countess had returned.
E-book publication.

January 12, 2022
Author.

Long night sky
Publisher.

Desert fox
Published by.

Woongjin Thinkbig Co., Ltd.
Submissions. ‌‌‌‌

naver.me/54VzzLSn
Blog.

blog.naver.com/wj_fennecfox
Twitter.

@wjt_fennecfox

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Brought to you by Valir Scans! To support our team and enjoy the latest releases, please read directly ‌on our ‌official site: valirscans.org
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