Chapter 1: Young Maid (Part 3)

Lizbeth bowed her head and spoke. Being in the same room as Bieren, whom she had avoided so much, felt like a blissful torture. As she went behind him and quietly opened the window, her heart raced so much she couldn’t concentrate. Even as she swept and cleaned the floor, he lingered in her mind. Whenever she tried to focus, her gaze involuntarily drifted towards him. Lizbeth kneeled down and wiped the floor while keeping her back turned to him.

Swish, swish—

Bieren looked up from his pile of papers at the sound of diligent scrubbing. The maid was wiping the floor on her knees, her long skirt spreading out on the floor. Her red ponytail, neatly tied back into a bun, swayed back and forth as she wiped. She seemed oblivious to how her slender hips swayed back and forth below her thin waistline as she faced away from him. Her ankles, adorned with knee-high socks, peeked out from under the hem of her skirt.

“Why are you wiping the floor with your hands?”

Bieren asked, his gaze fixed on Lizbeth’s swaying body. Lizbet straightened up, looked up at him, and clenched her hands holding the cloth she used to wipe the floor with. It was the first time Bieren had spoken to her directly, so her face flushed bright red. She was mopping with her hands because the other maids had refused to give her a mop. Not wanting to be a snitch, Lizbeth kept her head down.

“Um, I didn’t get a mop.”

“So you’re going to wipe the floor all by hand, crawling under the desk?”

Bieren reprimanded her while keeping his gaze fixed on the folds of her skirt. Lizbeth clenched the cloth tighter as she heard his reproach. She hadn’t considered crawling under the desk where Bieren was sitting, it would have been too rude, too intrusive. However, if he wanted her to…

“If you instruct me…”

Lizbeth belatedly lifted her head and mumbled. If he asked, she would do it. She had come to clean the room, and since the master wouldn’t leave, she would have to wipe the floor around him if he asked. Bieren clicked his tongue when he heard Lizbeth’s words.

“I didn’t know I still had to ask to clean up to this extent.” 

Bieren muttered as he looked at Lizbeth. He knew she was a young maid his mother had brought in, and he knew that her pretty, young face and precocious figure had attracted the attention of everyone in the mansion. He’d also heard that she was an orphan, which meant she must have attracted quite a few men outside the castle. If one did not pay attention to such beauty, it was not a man but a servant. He wanted to ask if she had also cleaned for men outside the castle, or if she offered to clean for them.

“Or perhaps you’re hoping I’ll order you to do more.”

Bieren wanted to taunt her with a smirk as if to ask how far she thought she could go. No, he wanted to mistake those innocent eyes for ambition. He wanted to savor the moment when those eyes would close in despair, or in pleasure, and stare back at him. He reluctantly suppressed various emerging dark desires and finally ordered her to leave.

“Enough, leave. Call the housekeeper.” (The housekeeper is the senior female servant in the House.)

Lizbeth felt unjustly driven away. If she wiped the floor any longer, Bieren would have her head between his legs under the guise of cleaning. He had never been captivated by such intense heat before. He was facing the aftermath of a lifetime of repressed instincts. He had to acknowledge that he was becoming immersed in his own wild nature. Sooner or later, he would push her between his legs.

“Did you call for me?”

Not long after, the housekeeper arrived. The housekeeper, who should have been cleaning another area, felt her heart sink when Lizbeth returned to relay the message. Lizbeth, despite her cleverness, lacked the courtesy expected when dealing with nobility. The maid thought she had somehow offended Bieren.

“Is someone suspected of embezzlement?”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“How can the maid who cleaned my study a while ago not have a mop, unless someone is stealing the ducal belonging?”

Bieren asked coldly towards the maid. He never believed Lizbeth’s excuse about forgetting the mop. The reason she couldn’t immediately answer when asked about the mop was that someone had taken it from her. Bieren had never been involved in such trivial matters before, so when the housekeeper realized that he was offended enough to do such an unprecedented thing, she immediately bowed her head.

“…I apologize.”

That evening, the housekeeper gathered all the maids together with a stern look on her face, and with a whip made of a thin branch, she struck each of them on the calves, except for Lizbeth. Her eyes widened as she saw the reddened calves of everyone but her.

“Confess your wrongdoing.”

“…There isn’t any.”

The maids whimpered and wailed. Then the housekeeper struck their calves again. Some maids couldn’t hold back their tears. Feeling like the punishment was aimed at her despite being spared, Lizbeth knelt down, hands clasped, and begged for forgiveness.

“I-I was wrong.”

“Then leave and think about it.”

The housekeeper spoke coldly. In the room after Lizbeth left, there were repeated cries along with questioning. The maids, their tears drying from the beating they had received, glared at Lizbeth as she passed by them. One of them whispered with tearful resentment.

“How did someone so stupid manage to earn the favor of the young master?”

Lizbeth couldn’t comprehend what the maid meant by her words. From the next day on, there were no more incidents of sand in her teacup. Everything that she was supposed to bring remained intact. No one took the mop, and so she didn’t have to clean the floor by hand. Though there were no direct acts of torment, Lizbeth was now subjected to whispers and gossip whenever she passed by.

“Ha, how long can the favor for a mere maid last?”

“Turning away after one look between her legs, that’s what a man does.”

Listening to the maids, Lizbeth was puzzled. They said she was just a maid, yet the kind young master had returned her mop. 

How thoughtful of the young master. 

She tightened her grip on the mop, thinking that Bieren would have helped even if it had been any other maid. 

But how nice it would have been if such kindness was only for me. 

Such absurd fantasies.