Chapter 53

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Translator: Harry Potta

Chapter: 53

Chapter Title: The Dead Forest and the Fairy's Garden (10)

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A month or so had passed since purifying Head Maid Elledrun's garden, but Roxiana wasn't impatient. She took her time conversing with the spirits to learn the location of the Dead Forest while practicing how to better accept them.

Through repeated practice, she felt like she was starting to get a handle on it. Rather than grabbing and pulling them in, it was less exhausting to create a pathway inside her body and gently guide the spirits through.

The low-rank spirits enjoyed being drawn in by Roxiana's power, but they were anxious at the same time.

"We're just existing. Our mere presence there can affect so many lives."

"But when spirit mages like you draw us in, we can use our power more effectively. That's why it's enjoyable."

"It's fine to use low-rank spirits like us, but don't even think about using high-rank spirits, Roti. Using their power requires payment, even for you."

"It's because it consumes your life force, and high-rank spirits don't like that. Use it wrong, and your soul shatters. If it keeps shattering before it can recover, you'll become nothing."

Even so, it didn't matter, Roxiana thought.

This life was only hers until she recovered her family's bodies and made them kneel. After that, her soul could shatter for all she cared.

As long as she could return her family to God's embrace and hold those she hated accountable, she didn't care if her own soul crumbled to pieces.

'I never thought I'd achieve everything I wanted without paying any price from the start.'

If she'd just wanted to die and reunite with her family, she wouldn't have harbored this thirst for revenge. Of course, she did hope for the day she'd reunite with them in God's embrace, but more than that...

'I can't forgive them.'

She simply couldn't leave them be. The mere thought of them sleeping soundly in comfortable beds without a shred of guilt made her stomach churn.

The rage she couldn't confide in anyone was piling up inside Roxiana, hardening like a solid stone.

A tickling sensation on the back of her hand snapped her out of her thoughts. She realized she'd been gripping Lion's front paw too tightly. The little wolf, no bigger than it had been a month ago, sat beside her, licking the back of her hand while she held his paw.

"Sorry, Lion. I gripped you too hard."

Lion wagged his tail magnanimously, as if to say it was fine. Roxiana stroked his back and said,

"I hear wolves live about fifteen years. I wonder if I'll have finished what I need to do by then."

To Roxiana, who had nowhere to form attachments, Lion had become a surrogate family. She could no longer imagine life without this little wolf, so closing her eyes alongside him when his time came didn't sound so bad.

Lion, who had been nestled comfortably against her, suddenly bristled. Worried something was wrong, she checked him over just as Petria announced Floyd's visit. He was waiting in the parlor on the first floor.

"You didn't sense the Grand Duke coming and get tense, did you?"

Roxiana tapped Lion's nose and headed for the adjoining parlor in her bedroom, but the still-tense pup followed. Not minding the young wolf trailing after her, she took him downstairs with her.

Floyd stood by the parlor window, gazing out at the garden.

As Roxiana entered, he turned slowly. Was it because it had been so long since she'd seen him? An inexplicable sense of remoteness washed over her, though she couldn't pinpoint why.

He examined her narrowed eyes closely, then broke into a fresh smile.

"You're keeping your promise well."

Promise?

Puzzled for a moment, Roxiana recalled the promise he'd forced on her. The one where she'd live a full year, eating and sleeping properly.

Her fury toward Lucas and Elise had filled her mind so completely that she'd forgotten the promise. She'd even forgotten the time when all she'd wished for was death.

'Right, back then, the reality of having to live another year felt so agonizing it choked me.'

Her longing for death hadn't vanished, but it had been pushed back a little. She couldn't die just yet.

Floyd stared intently at Roxiana as she lowered her eyes to hide the fiercely burning rage. In the month or so since he'd last seen her, she'd visibly grown healthier.

Color had returned to her once-pale skin, and she'd put on a bit of weight. But the fleeting glint in her eyes troubled him.

'She still wants revenge, doesn't she?'

He didn't approve of revenge, but for now, it wasn't a bad goal. Taking that drive away from her might make her lose her will to live again.

Whatever fueled her fire, the important thing right now was that she had the will to survive.

"Do you have something to say to me?"

"No tea?"

"Oh, sorry."

Realizing her lack of manners, Roxiana flushed and called a maid to bring tea. Seeing the maid respond brightly eased Floyd's mind.

'Looks like she's getting along with the staff now.'

Floyd knew about the servants' dissatisfaction when they were assigned to serve Roxiana in the Lily Palace. At first, he'd been furious and wanted to summon them all for a scolding, but he realized anger wouldn't solve it.

Simply covering it up and reprimanding their attitudes might only amplify their resentment. What mattered was getting them to serve her from the heart. That was something Floyd couldn't do for her.

Roxiana had succeeded in winning them over, and not just by treating those tainted by magi.

-"They say the princess treats the staff kindly. Everyone says they've never seen such a friendly and gentle princess."

Jenail, the steward, had relayed that to him. So even when Floyd learned Roxiana was doing laundry and cooking, he didn't scold her anymore.

Fortunately, she'd stopped those chores lately for some reason, but the staff's attitude toward her hadn't changed.

'What am I even planning to do by keeping this woman in the Lily Palace?'

The question suddenly occurred to Floyd.

He'd never once considered what he intended after she established herself there. He'd urged her to live a year and find the will to survive, but hadn't thought about her future.

'She'll have to leave the Grand Duke's residence someday.'

He couldn't keep Roxiana—who had no blood ties—here forever. Like releasing a wounded wild animal back into the wild after treatment, she'd have to leave this place one day.

It would be for her own good.

'Keeping a marriageable woman around will start rumors.'

If she'd allow it, he'd find a way to remove the slave brand on her shoulder, grant her a new identity, and let her start a fresh life.

He didn't know how Lucas would react once he learned she was alive, but attacks from that scum didn't worry him. He could protect her anywhere.

Like how Elise had received a fief and become a lord, he could grant Roxiana one too.

She was clever enough to rule it well. Send Hexston with her to guard, and Lucas wouldn't be much of a threat.

'Then why does it feel so unpleasant? It seems like a solid plan.'

As Floyd mulled over his thoughts, the gray wolf sitting beside Roxiana glared piercingly at him. The stare irritated Floyd.

'Does this pup see me as prey?'

When their eyes met and the wolf bared his teeth, Floyd was about to say something when the maid arrived with tea. She set the golden tray on the table between the sofas.

After the maid left, Roxiana lifted the teapot and poured. Floyd couldn't tear his eyes away from her as she tucked a lock of long hair behind her ear and poured with elegant grace.

She wasn't moving particularly slowly, yet in Floyd's eyes, every action unfolded in slow motion, etching deeply into his mind like a brand.

"It seems Lucas has joined hands with that woman Elise."

Floyd blurted it out almost impulsively. Expecting her to be startled, he was surprised when Roxiana calmly finished pouring and set the cup before him without a flicker. He thought maybe she hadn't heard.

Only after filling her own cup did she speak.

"Yes, that's right."

"I heard she was your friend."

"She was."

Roxiana replied softly and lifted her cup. She hid her trembling lips behind it and took a sip, pretending nothing was wrong.

'What a great friend she was.'

The moment those two names left his lips together, her heart felt like it was being torn apart. It was as if the organs inside her were churning wildly, ready to explode.

'A friend who pitied my virginity and cried and laughed for me.'

Elise's face, weeping and laughing in the underground dungeon, flashed vividly before her eyes.

'A very kind friend who killed my family, dumped them in a well, and apologized saying she was sorry.'

Those cruel blue eyes watching Roxiana's expression as she spoke that fact.

'When my family was exiled for their crimes, I saved you alone! And you resent me even for that—a friend with such ardent loyalty.'