Note on Bianca’s household’s title:

In chapters 2 through 80, Bianca’s father, brother, and household are consistently referred to as 남작 (baron/baronetcy). Beginning in chapter 81, however, the raws shift to 백작 (count/county) without explanation. The change appears abruptly in chapter 81 with the line:

“일라이스 백작이 제 누이의 앞날을 위해 용기를 내 나섰다.”

(Count Ilais stepped forward bravely for his sister’s future.)

Whether this is an intentional retcon or an author oversight, I cannot say. Much like the Robert/Richard interchange in chapter 7. I have chosen to follow the raws as written, using whichever title appears in the source at any given point. 

This note is placed here because this chapter is where the term first appears and again at chapter 81 to head off any confusion, because yes, I am confused too.

* * *

Three months passed without incident.

The Bureau of Rites claimed no auspicious date had yet presented itself and refused to set a consummation date, and Felix had not visited even once, seemingly having forgotten Elénoa existed.

“Martha.”

Young maids braided Elénoa’s platinum hair at the vanity, but Elénoa, who had been staring blankly at the mirror with hollow eyes, parted her lips.

“I’ll do it myself. The rest of you, leave.”

“Yes, my lady.”

Three months was a long time, or a short one, depending on how you looked at it.

“It’s been three months since I wed.”

“So it has.”

To Elénoa, it felt like three years. She was kept as the honored crown princess in this vast imperial palace, yet everyone treated her as though she didn’t exist. As a result, she grew thinner by the day, her cheeks now sunken in a way they never were at the wedding.

“And yet everyone seems to have forgotten that fact. As though it never happened.”

Martha swallowed her bitterness and finished arranging Elénoa’s hair, then took out a small silver tin of ointment. With the same tenderness she always showed, she gently rubbed it into Elénoa’s scar.

“That’s enough. Stop.”

Elénoa knocked Martha’s hand away.

“At first I thought it would heal quickly, but now it’s turned into a white scar. No amount of ointment will fix it.”

Martha bit her lip at that bleak truth.

“It was such a small scratch… how could it…”

“I suppose that’s my fate. There’s no rule that says luck must follow me.”

Elénoa was born a princess and lived a peaceful, beautiful life filled with laughter. As she grew, her beauty became renowned across the continent, and there was a time when letters of courtship poured in without end.

And so the beautiful princess from a fairy tale married a splendid and noble crown prince. Only, she did not live happily ever after, the way fairy tales promised.

“Your Highness, don’t lose heart yet. Three months is, in a way, a short time. The marriage ahead of you is far longer.”

Was it really?

Elénoa could not bring herself to voice that frightening question.

“Let’s speak to the imperial physician and find a better ointment. All right?”

“Mm.”

“We’ll also need to have winter dresses made, so I’ll arrange for Lady Hailey to come from the finest salon in the empire.”

“Mm.”

The answers were vacant, but even that was enough to ease Martha’s worry a little. She quietly withdrew, and the moment she moved far enough from Elénoa’s bedchamber, the smile she had forced onto her face vanished entirely.

“You there, attendant. I noticed the lantern at the entrance to the crown princess’s palace was out yesterday. How can you be so negligent?”

“Ah, that would be because the oil ran out.”

Martha was, by origin, the head lady-in-waiting of the royal household of the Kingdom of Lil, who had served Elénoa since before she left home. She therefore noticed even the smallest slights and acts of neglect circulating among the palace staff better than anyone.

“Then you should have refilled it immediately.”

“There’s no one who comes at night anyway, and the Ministry of the Interior told us to wait…”

The crown princess’s palace, which the crown prince never visited.

Elénoa’s position in this imperial court, undeniably present and yet no more substantial than a shadow. The attendant giving careless answers before her was not the only problem. That attitude was a reflection of exactly where Elénoa stood in the eyes of the imperial household.

“Refill the oil this instant, and make sure the Ministry of the Interior is firmly told not to treat the crown princess’s palace with such disregard.”

“Wha… yes, my lady.”

The attendant seemed to know it was pointless to argue, but Martha could not bring herself to surrender the last of her pride.

“Honestly, this is…”

Martha stood alone, exhaling a sigh, when young maid Cynthia came hurrying over with quick little steps. She was a loyal girl who had served Elénoa since the Kingdom of Lil.

“Cynthia, what’s the state of things outside?”

Moving about in the uniform of a head lady-in-waiting drew too many eyes. So Martha often sent Cynthia out to gauge the mood beyond their walls.

“His Highness the Crown Prince is still spending more than half of each week at the Rose Villa, and Their Imperial Majesties have made no mention of our princess whatsoever.”

The Rose Villa.

“Good heavens…”

The Rose Villa was a beautiful and elaborate building not far from the crown prince’s palace. Whether it earned its name from the red roses the crown prince gifted to fill its gardens, or from its mistress, who possessed hair and lips as red as roses, no one could say for certain, but it was often the subject of people’s talk.

“Even if keeping a mistress is common practice in the empire, our princess has only just wed and is left so terribly alone…”

Cynthia murmured, half on the verge of tears. That the crown prince kept a separate mistress, whose existence was openly acknowledged as she lived freely in the villa, was something they only learned after the wedding was already over.

In the Kingdom of Lil, where morals were strict and conservative, such a thing was unimaginable, and so no one had thought to look into it.

“How can Their Majesties be so heartless?”

Martha muttered quietly to herself. Foreign-born or not, was Elénoa not the daughter-in-law they chose? The marriage was falling apart before their eyes, and she resented the higher powers for not intervening with so much as a word.

“All right, go and rest for a bit.”

“Yes, my lady.”

Watching Cynthia’s dejected back, Martha felt it all the more keenly that everyone around the crown princess wore the same drained, defeated look.

And that things absolutely could not go on this way.

“Has it come to this? Asking the Kingdom of Lil for help?”

Kind-hearted Elénoa, not wanting to worry her father back home, had spent three months exchanging only cheerful pleasantries by letter. But someone had to tell the king the truth. Martha felt the time had come for her to act, no longer simply as a lady-in-waiting, but as someone who served Elénoa herself.

***

While the crown princess’s palace stood alone in quiet desolation, Bianca’s Rose Villa overflowed with flatterers coming and going and gifts piled high.

“Ow!”

Bianca struck the maid kneeling at her feet and trimming her toenails across the cheek with her fan. The maid trembled violently.

“Where are your eyes? Do that again and I’ll have you sent to the crown princess’s palace.”

“P-Please, spare me. I’ll never do it again.”

Bianca, with her sharp, cat-like eyes, made a sound of displeasure and waved her hand. The maid quickly dried her feet and retreated.

“My lady, I heard a young maid caused you discomfort?”

Moments later, the Rose Villa’s head lady-in-waiting came and bent her knee. It was Rosemary, who had been with Bianca since her days growing up in a baron’s household.

“I’ll discipline her thoroughly.”

“What good will that do? There’s no one around who truly suits me.”

Bianca blew on the tips of her neatly filed nails and blinked her red eyes with languid allure.

“In that regard, Rosemary, you really are the best.”

Perhaps because they had been together since childhood, Bianca let herself wear an artless expression around Rosemary, and sometimes even spoke with a touch of childish petulance.

“Look at this. She’s made a mess of my toenails.”

Rosemary examined the pale foot with a serious expression, then took out an ointment and applied it.

“This ointment is the finest there is. It’ll heal in a day or two.”

“Exactly. What a pity the poor crown princess didn’t use this ointment. That celebrated beauty of hers wouldn’t have been left with a blemish.”

The corners of Bianca’s mouth curved up in a playful, satisfied smile.

“That scar will never fade now. No matter what she tries. Not ever.”

“It was a good decision to bring the imperial physician over to our side beforehand.”

A mere scratch that turned into a white scar after three months had its reasons, after all.

“But you must be more careful next time, my lady. If the blame had fallen on His Highness the Crown Prince…”

The truth behind the crown princess’s riding accident lay here, in the Rose Villa. Bianca, who had expected to one day become crown princess herself, was ultimately passed over in favor of a foreign princess, and in a moment of lost reason, she moved to harm the crown princess.

The original target was Elénoa, but the crown prince nearly took the blow instead.

“I was terrified at that moment too. To think that assassin I worked so hard to find shot the blowgun at the wrong horse. …Speaking of which, what became of him?”

“Father will know.”

“Then I’m not worried.”

Though the position of crown princess was taken from her, Bianca’s desperate efforts meant Felix had yet to even consummate the marriage. That was also why Elénoa received no respect as crown princess.

“Only three months, still. The crown princess has no idea how cold and inhumane this imperial palace truly is.”

“She was born a princess of a kingdom. Treatment like this must be entirely new to her.”

“I’d prefer she leave of her own accord, but it seems she hasn’t found the courage yet.”

Bianca fanned herself with a look of amusement. Each time she did, her red eyes shimmered with a quiet, floating gleam.

“Perhaps I can plant that courage in her myself.”

Innocence in malice is sometimes the crueler thing.

“Rosemary, go to His Highness the Crown Prince at once and tell him I’m in tears over my injured toenail.”

“Yes, my lady.”

With a smile that mirrored Bianca’s, the middle-aged Rosemary stepped out the door and went to find the crown prince without delay.

“Quickly, not a moment to lose!”

“Yes, my lady.”