My Master's Sweet Maid
Good. Today, I have to dust that spot thoroughly.
With the dust brush gripped tightly in my hand, Emilia stared at the pristine white dust settled on the top shelf of the bookcase with an eager, almost glowing face.
Today was Wednesday—the most wonderful day of the week.
Every single week, Master would disappear to the distant city to buy desserts. Because he possessed such refined taste and discernment, he would only take a single bite of each exquisite treat before politely setting it aside. The rest would always belong to Emilia, and how could a day be anything less than blissful?
This week’s desserts were a selection of the village’s rarest delicacies: a towering Mont Blanc filled with whole chestnuts, a fig cake studded with cheese, and a tart generously topped with baked peaches. None of them could be found in the village—only here, in the capital, did such luxuries exist.
After savoring the paradise that bloomed across her tongue, Emilia floated through a sea of happiness, fork in hand. The moment she set it down, an overwhelming courage seized her: she could do anything today.
So right now, this very moment, she had to do it. Thanks to Master heading out to the garden, the armchair in the study stood empty and waiting!
Emilia pictured herself, perfectly capable and confident, standing on the armrest of the chair and sweeping every trace of dust from the back of the bookcase in one smooth, flawless motion.
The master she served was the only son of the illustrious Sharnach Count family. His name was Cialan Roche Sharnach.
Last summer, right after the war ended, he had suddenly appeared in the tiny mountain village of Obern where Emilia lived. He had taken up residence in the long-abandoned Sharnach villa.
Obern was so small that when he first showed himself, the villagers—including Emilia—had seen the noble class for the very first time.
Unusually, Cialan had arrived with not a single servant in tow. He had come straight to the village’s only restaurant in search of a maid, and it was there that Emilia sat, freshly returned from being fired elsewhere, sobbing and complaining bitterly.
At the sudden sight of such a handsome nobleman, Emilia’s mouth fell open like a baby’s. Before she could even finish wiping her tears, Cialan had finished speaking, and she had already raised her hand, offering herself for the position with fervent enthusiasm. The confidence was almost unbelievable—that someone who had lasted only two days on the job could possibly be hired.
The villagers, who had been keeping their mouths shut out of caution toward the unfamiliar noble, burst into open mockery.
“Baron Lord, how could someone like you possibly be worthy of such a role?”
“If that kind of person starts associating with outsiders, our village’s image will sink straight to the ground!”
“Baron Lord, that girl can’t even tell flour from rat poison—she’s a complete fool!”
It was only natural. Emilia had a reputation in the village for hands that broke everything and a fatal clumsiness that made her legendary.
She had worked hard at every job—dishwasher, postman, secretary, cleaner—without ever refusing anything she hadn’t tried. Yet she never lasted more than a week anywhere. Now that the village refused to hire her, she had no choice but to travel to the distant city in search of work.
Embarrassed before the handsome noble lord, Emilia’s face burned red. She shouted that if anyone had never made a mistake, they should come forward right now.
Soon the restaurant was filled with lively commotion. The villagers’ main argument was simple: no matter how much people make mistakes, no one could possibly be as bad as her.
A normal nobleman would have fled the scene in discomfort, but Cialan had simply watched the entire uproar with bright, childlike curiosity, not a single wrinkle on his brow. Once the noise finally died down, he had smiled like a clear summer sky and declared that he would hire her.
That bold decision had brought deep worry to the villagers, but it had never touched Emilia. The instant he reached out his hand and said, “Come with me,” Cialan Roche Sharnach had become her one and only master—and the center of her entire world.
Watching Emilia jump with joy, the villagers had immediately begun noisy bets about when she would be fired. The idle good-for-nothings had crowded around her, warning her that it was terrifying to be alone with a male master and that she would surely be hurt.
But from the day she had been hired until today, Emilia had never once been scolded by her master. His dazzling platinum-blonde hair, his angelic beauty and holiness, his elegant and noble bearing like a bouquet of lilies, and his kind, gentle nature.
Master had never shown the slightest aristocratic arrogance or looked down on her. On the contrary, he had treated her with astonishing kindness.
On her very first day, when she had broken a luxurious set of teacups, he had smiled faintly and comforted her, saying the broken pieces would look lovely if polished and arranged as garden decorations. When she had burned the stew because she had been too distracted by the beautiful opal tie pin on his necktie, he had even brought her back to the village restaurant and treated her to a meal at the best seat.
More recently, when she had been lost in a radio drama and accidentally creased the frock coat, he had sent it to the capital’s famous tailor, had it redesigned into a stylish women’s coat, and presented it to her as a gift.
How could she possibly not love him?
Emilia knew little about noble etiquette or the ways of the world, but she understood that Master was far more elegant and generous than any ordinary nobleman.
If an angel had descended to the earth, would it not be someone exactly like her Master?
He was a being far too good for her to serve.
Emilia had always believed that, yet she had never wondered how she had somehow earned such undeserved happiness. Nor had she questioned why Master treated her so kindly.
Why this handsome, kind man had never married, never gone out into the world, and had come all the way to this remote mountain region simply to read books and tend to plants as a pastime.
People should only have curiosity up to their station, after all.
The villagers had whispered that something must be wrong with her, that something terrible had happened during the war, but Emilia had never paid any attention to those words. They were probably just jealous. In truth, she had been far too busy making mistakes every single day to care.
But today had been truly perfect. She had burned nothing at breakfast, done the laundry flawlessly, and never once dropped Master’s freshly dried clothes on the floor while folding them.
She had eaten plenty of the world’s most delicious and sweet cake, and she had neither broken a teacup nor accidentally poured hot water from one into Master’s shoes.
Therefore, to perform the deep cleaning today, she needed a day exactly like this one. Gripping the dust brush as if it were a knife, Emilia set off bravely toward the armchair.