Yes. Her father was right—endurance was the wiser path. A man’s heart was light by nature.

Had she not seen it countless times in Sweenia, and even in Aetania? The miserable ends of mistresses. Loves that shattered in disgrace.

“Time resolves everything.”

Repeating those words to herself, she felt a little steadier. She pressed her handkerchief firmly to her cheeks, wiping them dry.

With her face still flushed, Alyona climbed into the carriage and stared blankly out the window.

As the carriage swayed rhythmically beneath her, she habitually let her thoughts drift to her man.

The fateful moment she had first met that cruel man unfolded before her eyes.

***

“Alyona, my sweet little brown rabbit.”

Her father used to call her his “brown rabbit.”

He adored her deep chestnut hair—and the way her front teeth had grown in like a rabbit’s.

“My beautiful daughter has grown so much already!”

The year Alyona turned seven, her father counted her age on his fingers in heartfelt amazement. Then he presented her with a pet rabbit.

Seven years old.

Yes—that winter.

The winter she climbed onto her bed and hurled the pet rabbit to the floor with all her strength.

The maid who witnessed it—Sera—had stared at her in horror.

As though Alyona were something unnatural.

A dull year passed, and she turned eight.

When she pushed the young daughter of a visiting viscount from the top of the stairs, Sera looked at her with fear— as though she were a monster.

Time passed again. She was nine.

When she shoved Sera—who had climbed onto a chair to clean the window—out through it, the maid’s expression finally disappeared.

Only then did a smile bloom on Alyona’s face.

The rabbit that had dared to bite its master deserved to be injured in return.

The girl who had coveted her ribbon deserved punishment.

And the lowly maid who had offended her sensibilities deserved to give up her life.

Everything was perfectly reasonable. Perfectly justified.

Alyona felt no hesitation.

Then came ten.

The last year she could count her age on both hands.

That was when she found new prey.

A child who had neither hurt her, nor desired what was hers, nor stood beneath her.

It could only be called fate.

On a day thick with storm clouds, her father, dressed in black, patted her small round shoulder.

“This is a gathering to mourn the late young duchess. It is a very important occasion, so you must behave quietly. Understood, my daughter?”

“Yes.”

Holding her father’s hand, Alyona stepped into the ducal estate for the first time. But she detested dreary, somber events.

After watching for a moment, she slipped quietly away into the forest.

A sound of crying caught her interest.

“Hic…”

In the middle of a flowerbed bursting with pale purple hydrangeas stood a boy.

He stared toward the forest where adults clustered in the distance, crying miserably.

Only when he noticed her did he ask.

“Who… are you?”

“Me? Why would you want to know?”

Tilting her head to one side, Alyona answered playfully.

The tip of the boy’s straight nose was red. It was adorable.

His damp green eyes and calm blond hair were more beautiful than the flowers.

His plump cheeks and reddened lips looked as though they would snap off if tugged too hard.

The thought came to her suddenly—she wanted to pluck him like a flower.

Without realizing it, she reached out her hand.

Just as her fingers were about to touch him, the boy trembled and shouted.

“Go away!”

Startled, he recoiled from her hand and let out a sharp cry.

He trembled like the puppy she had received as a gift the previous month.

She wanted to grab him by the nape of the neck and lift him. He would struggle like that puppy. It would surely be amusing.

A quiet giggle slipped from her lips as she stepped closer.

“I don’t want to go.”

“Don’t touch me!”

“I don’t want to.”

Tears spilled from his pretty eyes.

In the end, he ran off, crying even louder.

Alyona’s eyes gleamed as she watched him disappear.

From her father, who hurried over to find her, she learned that the boy was the second son of House Strilland.

‘Aiden Strilland. The boy who cries beautifully.’

She liked him very much.

Every summer thereafter, Alyona visited the ducal estate with her father, dressed in black.

Each time, the boy stood in the same place, staring at the forest alone and crying—then fleeing from her.

She wondered briefly why no adult cared for him.

But the thought soon vanished.

The repeated game of chase was fun.

Each time she caught him, he turned deathly pale and sobbed.

When she turned fourteen, Alyona left for Sweenia with her father.

She came of age there and did not return to Aetania until the following year—seven full years later.

In that time, she heard fragments of news about him from her father.

The small, pretty boy had grown into a strong young man.

“After spending several years aboard ships traveling the Muwieo route, he is coming to Renan to receive his knighthood.”

So it was in the summer of her twenty-first year.

At an age no longer countable even with both their hands combined, Alyona saw him again.

He stood in the same flowerbed, gazing toward the distant Revenew Forest with sorrowful eyes.

She had nearly failed to recognize him.

Had it not been for that radiant gold hair and those green eyes like the Oakman Sea, she would never have known he was Aiden Strilland.

The boy who once resembled a struggling puppy now stood tall as a mountain.

The distance between past and present stirred something restless in her chest. Her face felt hot.

“Excuse me.”

Her voice, strained and half-broken with tension, called out to him.

At once, a gaze sharp and resolute as a freshly forged blade pierced her.

As though bewitched, Alyona asked.

“Do you… still dislike me?”

He tilted his head slightly. The damp wind carried his splendid voice.

“…Who are you?”

“Alyona. Alyona Matwood.”

“…”

Without another word, he turned his head back toward the forest.

He no longer cried.

That disappointed her.

The wind shifted again, this time carrying his scent with it.

On impulse, Alyona reached out and seized his thick arm.

It was instinct.

Beneath her grasp, Aiden Strilland felt solid as a bronze statue.

Her heart pounded wildly.

Just as she began to trace the line of his muscles—

He shook off her hand.

“What are you doing?”

“Well…”

“…”

“I feel faint.”

“…”

“Could you support me?”

“That would be inappropriate.”

“Why?”

“Does it require a reason?”

She did not know why, but she liked his answer.

In truth, she felt she would have liked anything he said.

In the end, she laughed.

It was improper, she knew—but he had been the one to act without courtesy first.

He looked down at her, head tilted, as if incredulous.

It did not matter.

Each time she met Aiden again, the childhood game of chase continued.

She would reach out boldly; he would shake her off.

She liked that he slipped from her grasp every time.

She liked the quiet astonishment that flickered across his face.

This dignified man, even when casting her a look of disgust, never once punished her.

She liked that.

The man who stood at the highest position in Aetania respected her.

And somewhere within that, knowing the fragile side of this iceberg-like man felt like a form of power.

His mere existence stirred her cruelty and fed her sense of superiority.

“How could I not love you? How could I not want you?”

Alyona loved and desired Aiden.

Ever since that gloomy summer day.

***

“My lady, we have arrived.”

Only when the carriage door opened abruptly did Alyona rise from the mire of memory.

Half as if in a dream, she returned to her bedroom.

The Duke’s cold voice still pierced her chest.

“You have no authority over the matter of succession.”

The more she replayed it, the more she resented it.

But it did not take long for her to detect the contradiction within his words.

‘Nonsense. It is I who would bear a man’s seed. I who would give birth.’

There were many methods.

She could even resort to potions said to inflame desire.

So long as he was a man, there would be opportunity.

And even if, by some chance, his lowborn mistress were to conceive a bastard—

“A bastard child… Whether human or beast, it is not uncommon for them to die before reaching adulthood.”

Sveta Luce.

That harlot had wounded her pride, stolen what was hers, and dared to offend her.

If that low creature were to bear a child, it would only be natural for it to die young.

And for the harlot herself as well.

It was a perfectly reasonable conclusion. Clear and justified.

“Yes. That’s how it should be.”

The corner of Alyona’s mouth twisted upward.

At that exact moment, her eyes met those of a maid who was staring at her in visible fear.

“M-My lady… Shall I prepare afternoon tea?”

“Later.”

“Y-Yes, then…”

“You may go.”

Reclining against the sofa, Alyona began to think of what must be done.

The splendid gowns. The formal engagement ceremony. The period she would spend as his fiancée, and then the wedding. The days she would live as Duchess.

The dignity and responsibility she must possess. The duties of a noble lady.

Among those duties was maintaining the peace of the household.

And peace in a household began with establishing proper order—between those above and those below.

The moment the task became clear in her mind, Alyona straightened her posture.

Sitting upright, she called back the maid who was about to leave.

“You there. Come here.”

“Yes, my lady. Is there something you require?”

“I need to write a letter. Prepare everything.”

“At once.”

The maid hurried to the drawer in the corner and brought parchment, ink, and a quill.

“Hm…”

After considering her phrasing briefly, Alyona dipped the pen in ink and began to write without hesitation.

[To the young lady of House Luce.]