If That's What It Takes to Become the Duchess

It was evening, the sun bleeding down toward the horizon.

After dinner, Kalian had been strolling near the garden when he spotted a carriage rolling in toward the manor. It was a family carriage. His mother was laid up ill in bed—who would have taken it out? A servant explained before the question had even left him.

The Duchess had attended a tea party in the Dowager Duchess's place.

Esika.

The moment her name surfaced, the unpleasant memory of their last encounter came with it. That look of cold disregard. The chill that had seemed to blow straight out of her eyes.

It wasn't like Esika Klaus.

The disconnect in her behavior only sharpened his sense of unease. The impression that lingered could be distilled into two words:

How dare she.

He had been withholding his attention, hoping to break her of her habits. He knew that his indifference was what pained Esika most. And yet she had begun acting as though Kalian did not even exist. It was strangely hollow, as if the shadow that had always trailed behind him had simply vanished.

"……."

He could see Esika stepping down from the carriage with the sunset at her back. Unlike her usual shabby attire—the result of his mother's scolding over her table manners—she was wearing a pink dress that seemed made for the evening light. A breeze caught the hem, and the way it stirred drew his eye in a way he could not quite explain. And those blue eyes, so at odds with the warmth of the dress.

"……."

Having alighted, she was gazing at the distant sky.

Had Esika always looked like that?

Kalian's brow furrowed slightly. Her silver hair, falling to mid-back, stirred in the wind. The curve of her forehead and the high bridge of her nose composed a dreamlike profile. Her skin was as fine as a glazed wine cup.

He found himself wondering, suddenly, what was held in those eyes.

For the first time… Kalian wondered what Esika was thinking. And why she was looking at the sky with such a wistful expression. Could it have something to do with the insolent way she had been acting lately? Was it connected to her no longer following him around?

There was no effect without a cause.

"My lady!"

Just then, he saw a maid running toward her. What was that maid's name… He couldn't possibly remember. The maid seemed to be saying something to Esika.

"You know…"

At those words, the corner of Esika's lips lifted, faintly. It was an uncanny thing—like someone had taken a portrait of a girl with no emotion at all and tugged the corners of her mouth upward. Esika looked at the maid with a hint of a smile. Her eyes had certainly been cold, but they no longer seemed so.

The beautiful sunset was held in them. Something brilliant and wistful, as if it might vanish at any moment…

"……."

Kalian's brow furrowed deeply. He slowly raised a hand and pressed it against his chest. His feet did not move so much as a single step, as if he were willfully turning away from his own curiosity about her.

Esika smiled at the maid.

Yes. That was how Esika's smile had always been.

But… when was the last time she had smiled like that?

He remembered.

It had been their wedding day.

"Why has he been staring at me so unpleasantly lately?"

Sella started at Esika's mutter.

"…My lady?"

"Never mind. It's nothing."

Following behind Esika, Sella thought to herself. It was true—the Duchess hadn't merely changed. She seemed like an entirely different person. The way she used to chase after Duke Klaus, a man who hadn't the slightest interest in her, had been so pitiful that every servant in the household would shake their heads behind her back. But the Esika of now didn't seem to care in the slightest where the Duke went.

"Um… perhaps you might consider seeing His Grace, even briefly? Earlier, I overheard that His Grace was looking for you. It wasn't relayed to me directly, but among the servants…"

Esika answered as if the suggestion were a bother.

"Sella. Do you want me to win the Duke's favor?"

Sella nodded without a moment's hesitation. Of course she did. Duke Klaus was the master of this household. The Dowager Duchess's maids might openly snub the Duchess now, but if the Duchess and the Duke became a loving couple, not a soul would dare treat her that way.

Esika's lips twisted.

"Let me tell you something. I can forgive someone who lets me down once."

She thought of a subordinate from her days as Yeong-ryeong—someone who had been forced, by orders from above, to commit wrongs against her.

"Twice… well, if they were people I rather liked, I might forgive them even then. Not that I've ever actually done so."

"My lady…"

"But three times, and it's over."

Sella blinked. Esika looked at her with cold eyes. It was a gaze that sent a chill down the spine.

"It means they're beyond saving. And the Duke has betrayed my expectations ten times over. Twenty times over."

Before she had recovered her memories as Yeong-ryeong, Esika's wishes had not been large. All she had wanted was for the man who had pledged to spend his life with her to give her a measure of attention and love.

"I trust you understand what I'm saying by now."

Sella, who had been staring at Esika in a daze, nodded. His Grace would never—not ever—be forgiven by the Duchess. And neither would that woman, Yuri Anesis.

And Sella thought: she had already been caught once trying to poison the Duchess's food. If she disappointed her a second time, the consequences could be horrific.

For the first time in a long while, Sella felt her nerves snap taut.

The sound of that day still lingered in Yuri's mind. The sunset sky. The small sprout of hope that had bloomed in her chest…

Esika, once you're gone, the Duchess's seat… will definitely be mine.

And the greed that had swallowed her whole.

Yuri had not given up hope. Not once had she ever thought of Esika as a friend. To a girl who was a lesser noble in name only—poorer than most commoners, a daughter of the Anesis family—Esika had been nothing more than a living reminder of how unfair life was.

That stupid, naive girl had been born into the wealthy Brigate family, raised in luxury, and then married into the Klaus family of the capital Torres—a house so distinguished that even the Brigates who ruled Prihatz were nothing special in their eyes.

If she herself had been born a Brigate instead of an Anesis… it wasn't a thought she'd had only once or twice. If she had been Esika, she was certain she would have satisfied Duke Klaus.

Stupid Esika. You're finished… There's no way you can turn this around…

Thump, thump, thump—

She was grinding her teeth when a knock came from outside. She opened the door to find the maid Emelia.

"What is it?"

Yuri asked, folding her arms with an expression that was anything but pleased. She had taken leave under the pretext of having gone several days without sleep while nursing the Dowager Duchess. The truth was that whenever information came in about Kalian's whereabouts, she intended to follow him and arrange a "chance" encounter.

"The Dowager Duchess has summoned you."

It was an order she couldn't refuse by claiming she was tired.

"……The Dowager Duchess?"

"Yes. It seems she has something to ask regarding the stomach trouble she had last time…"

At Emelia's words, Yuri flinched inwardly. The reason the Dowager Duchess had been groaning in bed for days was that medicine Yuri had stolen from the kitchen.

"Didn't you say she'd already spoken with the physician?"

"She did, but she still seems to find something suspicious. She's never been that ill before…"

"Well, that's true, but…"

"And the Duchess who went to Lady Marshall's party… far from being cowed, she apparently put on quite a display of authority. The Dowager Duchess is in a very foul mood over it."

Yuri's hand twitched. When she'd heard that Esika had gone in the sick Dowager Duchess's place, she'd sneered inwardly. Lady Bolan and Lady Marshall—those spiteful women might as well have been professionals at tormenting Esika. What would happen there was obvious without even looking.

And Esika had thrown her weight around there?

Had she actually been crushed under those vicious women's will, or…

"…Is that so…?"

Yuri left the room with a composed expression. Emelia followed behind her.

Yuri's mind was in turmoil. If that was the case, the reason Leona was summoning her now…

She suspects me…

"…………"

Yuri's clenched fist trembled.

She's going to demand I take the fall. That I fed her the stomach medicine at Esika's instigation…

To Leona, Yuri was nothing more than a pawn on a chessboard. Something to be used for a purpose and discarded when no longer needed—something of no value. These days she couldn't even offer jewels, so Leona would think even less of her.

I did give her the medicine, but… I will never let it go that way.

The staircase appeared before Yuri. The thought that it was Esika who had pushed her into this situation made her rage toward the woman surge even higher. Yuri squeezed her eyes shut, groping for a way out.

"Goddammit…!"