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Chapter Five: After the Party
“Well then, my dear wife Wellmy, aren’t there things you wish to ask me?”
The party restarted after Wellmy accepted Aides’s proposal, and a small group of people had moved to another room: Aides and Wellmy, but also Iora, Prince Leoniel, Attorney General Kilrane, Spellmaster Clartes, Karla, Gordley (who hadn’t been at the party but joined them in the room), and Orea, Iora’s maid, two years her elder.
These must’ve been the people who had played the biggest part in that evening’s affair. Well, Kilrane had only come to sign Wellmy’s acquittal, so he left right after.
“We’ll draw up a formal record later,” he had said as he stepped out of the room.
“Not really,” Wellmy replied to Aides’s question. “I don’t have anything to ask you.” Sitting on a sofa, she turned her face to the side with a huff.
Ẁ eb̊ n о vе̇ľ Ê ń ümа
Seemingly unable to contain herself anymore, Iora suddenly threw her arms around Wellmy from her seat beside her.
“I-Iora?!”
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“I’m so sorry, Wellmy! I’m sorry I couldn’t save you earlier!” Iora exclaimed, her eyes full of tears and her frail shoulders trembling.
Wellmy noticed that Iora had gained some weight and seemed much healthier since the last time she’d seen her. A sense of relief filled her. Then she shook her head, slightly perplexed by her sister’s words. “I wasn’t the one being abused by our parents. You don’t have to apologize.”
Iora shouldn’t let this bother her. In fact, Wellmy should have been the one apologizing; she had taken much too long to rescue Iora from that dreadful environment.
Iora gently stroked Wellmy’s undereye, where her makeup had smudged a little when she’d cried. “The dark circles under your eyes look terrible. You’ve lost some weight too... You and Gordley had to manage Savarin’s territory in his stead after I left, right?”
Е̇ n ǔ ḿа̀
“I couldn’t do it as well as you...”
Unlike Iora, Wellmy wasn’t particularly talented. The most she could do was ensure that their subjects wouldn’t suffer from her father’s actions, and she’d had to sacrifice quite a lot of sleep over it. She was absolutely no match for Iora, who had supported House Ernest on her own for several long years.
“Besides, I did horrible things to you.”
“You didn’t, Wellmy. You just did what you could to help me. You made me hide my appearance and sent me to live in the detached building to keep me hidden from our parents, didn’t you?”
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Wellmy stayed silent.
“You even called for the doctor and made me bread porridge when I was ill. Right, Orea?” Iora looked at her maid, the only person in that house Wellmy had trusted besides Gordley.
Еn ú ṁ а̀. ī d
Orea lowered her head in silence.
“I did call it ‘trash,’ though,” Wellmy muttered.
“I had received orders not to give Lady Iora any food on that day. I was surprised when Lady Wellmy handed me the bread porridge,” Orea said. Her face was usually devoid of expression, yet at that moment, a small smile had settled on her lips. “You also gave me expensive jewels and accessories to keep on hand—including the necklace that belonged to Lady Iora’s mother. That way, Lady Iora wouldn’t have found herself with nothing to her name had your plan failed. Right?”
“No! That was just a way to bully her!”
“Sneaking expensive accessories with my name engraved on them into my luggage was your way of bullying me?” Iora asked with a chuckle.
She had seen through Wellmy’s lies.
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“I-I just didn’t know your name was on them!” Wellmy argued. Even with the knowledge that her sister knew the truth, Wellmy couldn’t so easily change the behavior she had forced herself to adopt all these years.
I wanted her to hate me.
Wellmy had indeed inscribed her sister’s name on the accessories with magic. That way, when she accused her publicly of having stolen the precious jewelry, the mage lord could easily refute her claims, and Wellmy would look like a fool.
Having Iora show her gratitude felt wrong, and she felt her face flush.
To make matters worse, Gordley, the family’s butler, added, “Lady Wellmy sold her own accessories to buy new ones for Lady Iora and engraved them all herself. I had surmised as much.”
Wellmy gasped at his words.
Еṅ ū m̂ å. îd
Knowing that House Ernest’s wealth would eventually be seized by the kingdom, she had sold most of her dresses and accessories—keeping only a few for parties—and used the money to purchase expensive jewels for Iora.
She glared at Gordley for his unnecessary remark, but couldn’t stop her cheeks from reddening further. She did not like the warm smile he offered her.
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“Your Highness, Lady Iora’s friend, when did you realize Wellmy’s true intentions?” Gordley asked.
Karla and Leo looked at each other. As if to tell him to go first, Karla shrugged, her usual self-assured expression on her face.
“The first time I felt that something was off was when Wellmy discovered my identity. It came as a big shock to me,” he said.
He likely had put the pieces together when Wellmy had called him a “coward.” When Wellmy thought back on it, he had indeed looked surprised during their confrontation.
Ẇ еbño v́ е̃ l̈ Е̃ n̄ ù m à
“I learned through sheer coincidence that Iora has purple eyes,” Leo resumed. “So I looked into her family and discovered that she and Wellmy were sisters, which only added to my sense of unease.”
That was understandable. Anyone would have been surprised to learn that the emaciated and visibly unhealthy Iora, dressed in tattered, out-of-fashion garments, was related to Wellmy, who always flaunted showy dresses and spent her time publicly flirting with Arvine.
“Given Wellmy’s questionable boyfriend and the gossip-loving crowd she usually associated with, I was convinced that the secret of my identity would soon be revealed to the entire school. But to my surprise, there were no rumors whatsoever. I figured she must have been scheming something, and that’s when I started to piece everything together.”
He’d made his conjectures and then discussed them with Karla. But Iora had stopped him before he could expose Wellmy’s intentions.
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“‘If you make your move now, you will put Wellmy in an awkward position,’ she said. I couldn’t believe my ears. Iora was in a way worse situation, so why would she even say that?”
That was when Leo and Karla had decided to change their plan: Instead of exposing the Ernests’ crimes to the world to save Iora, they would secretly protect Iora. To that end, they had renovated a room connected to one of the school’s emergency escape passages—the one accessible only to the royal family—and turned it into a salon of sorts. That way, Iora would be able to have access to proper food, as her family refused to feed her.
Ӗ n̈umа̄
After that, they had carefully selected a handful of trustworthy individuals and invited them to join the salon and spend time with Iora during lunch break and after school.
Now Wellmy understood why she had stopped seeing Leo and Iora interact.
Leo had also spent some of his own money to purchase clothes and materials for Iora to make the detached building she lived in slightly more pleasant. He’d even asked for his father’s permission to assign a shadow (one of the royal family’s bodyguards) to Iora. Gordley and Iora had gladly helped him lay the groundwork, welcoming any help they could. They knew that Wellmy hadn’t been able to use much of the family’s money for Iora out of fear that her parents might discover what she had been up to.
He did all of that?
Under these circumstances, Leo must have been quite dissatisfied with Wellmy’s opinion of him.
“I really struggled to convince my father to let me do this.” He sighed. “He eventually agreed to let Savarin roam freely for some time, but told me that I had to do everything on my own within a certain budget, with the shadow he’d lent me as my only help. He also forbade me from revealing my identity and proposing to Iora until after graduation.”
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Iora pursed her lips. “With all due respect, Your Highness, we were still minors at that point. Besides, we weren’t prepared to save Wellmy yet. You could have helped me leave that house, citing abuse as the reason, but without Wellmy disclosing Savarin’s crimes, we wouldn’t have been able to secure her safety. She wouldn’t have qualified for witness protection otherwise. Too rash a decision would have put our subjects in dire straits as well.”
“Fair point. Savarin and his wife treated her well, after all.”
“I understood her intentions when I tried to talk to Savarin about his fake account book, and she stopped me,” Iora explained. “I realized she had a purpose, which was why she arranged for me to discover that he was committing fraud.”
Not only would it have been impossible for Wellmy to escape from her parents using “abuse” as an excuse, but if she hadn’t revealed her father’s crimes to the world, she could even have been charged for helping him commit tax fraud. Even if she hadn’t, she would have had her noble status revoked and been sent to live in an orphanage.
“You should have just let me be judged alongside them,” Wellmy muttered.
That way, Iora could have been saved much sooner.
W̆ĕbǹ оv̊ е̄ l̈ Ė n̈ u m̂ â
“I would never have done that,” Iora chided her.
“I was at a loss when she started crying and begging me to ‘save her sister’ the moment she stepped into my house,” Aides added with a smirk.
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He was sitting with one leg over the other, one elbow propped on the back of the sofa, and his chin resting in his hand.
Iora blushed at his words.
Aides seemed like an entirely different person compared to his usual cold and callous demeanor. Although Wellmy thought his usual aloof air suited his handsome features, this slightly sadistic, amused, and expressive version seemed to be his true self.
And I’m going to marry him...
Ẇ e b̄ nо̀ v ẽ l Е n u̇ m̄а
The realization still hadn’t fully set in, but Wellmy could already feel herself grow irritated at the thought of their future together. Aides was handsome, clever, and talented, but he also seemed to love teasing others. To think that she’d promised that she would do anything he asked... She was already starting to fear what he might demand of her.
I suppose it’s a good thing I’m the one he has his sights set on, and not Iora, Wellmy thought to appease herself.
Well, at least he was handsome, and Wellmy had gotten a positive impression of him the first time they’d met, so she wasn’t that opposed to marrying him, she reasoned.
As she sat there, making excuses to herself, her sister and the others resumed their conversation.
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“Oh, please, Aides, don’t make it sound like it was your problem. When Iora cried, you called me to come console her!” Leo said.
“My, my, Your Highness. Did you hate comforting the woman you love that much?”
W еb ń о̂v е̇ l̃_ E̊ num a
“I didn’t say that!”
“Then it means that I did the right thing,” Aides said with a chuckle, causing Leo to grow even more flustered.
The two of them truly seemed comfortable around each other. Aides hadn’t lied when he’d said that Leo was like a younger brother to him.
“What about you, Lady Karla?” Aides asked. “How did you realize what Wellmy was up to?”
“For the same reason as His Highness, more or less. I initially approached Wellmy to make some connections, seeing as the ladies in her entourage all had good standing. But when I saw her flirting with her sister’s fiancé, I didn’t hesitate to give her a piece of my mind.”
“What happened then?”
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“She told me that if I ‘wanted to play Goody Two-shoes, I should go keep Iora company.’ At first, I assumed it was just a snide remark, but then I realized something: Wellmy never spoke badly of her sister.”
That was the truth. Wellmy hadn’t rebuked Arvine or her entourage when they spoke ill of Iora, but she had always replied the same way: “I don’t want to talk about her.” She’d never even bothered to hide her annoyance.
It hadn’t been a lie; she really hadn’t wanted to hear others talk that way about her sister, lest she risk striking them like she’d done to Aides.
Fortunately, Arvine had believed that Wellmy loved him and assumed she was jealous to hear him mention his fiancée, while the others had figured she hated Iora so much that she didn’t even want to be reminded of her.
“What about you, Lord Ormirage?”
“I had already arranged everything by the time Leo gave me Wellmy’s message. But it was her ardent love letter that made me interested in her,” Aides replied, throwing fleeting glances at Wellmy.
Ẃе bṅ оv̇el Ёn̆ um̌.а̂
She frowned. “I never sent you any love letters.”
“No? To me, your letter read, ‘You are a wonderful person, and I have fallen in love with you. May I please leave my beloved sister in your care?’ Was that not what you meant?”
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Wellmy was speechless. “Talk about self-absorbed! What are you, a narcissist?!”
“Yes, yes, dear. Whatever you say.”
What a despicable man!
Wellmy was outraged by his blatant overinterpretation of her letter, but what infuriated her most was that he wasn’t entirely wrong. Back then, she had been so desperate to catch his interest that she hadn’t stopped to think about how he would interpret her letter. She’d also had no idea how twisted his personality truly was.
Е̌n̈u_m̃ a
Had I known, I wouldn’t have... I wouldn’t...
She let out a frustrated groan, and Iora gently rubbed her back, a bright smile on her face. Meanwhile, Aides’s grin grew even wider.
“What I wasn’t expecting was you entrusting the documents you mentioned in your letter to Clartes. I was pleasantly surprised by the company you keep.”
“Well, she is my daughter,” Spellmaster Clartes said with a strained smile.
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While he was older than Aides, he wasn’t so advanced in age that it had visibly affected him. Yet, half of his hair had already turned white, as if to document his many hardships. Wellmy surmised that it was largely due to her mother leaving him right after he had relinquished his peerage.
She glanced at him—her real father and the man who had taught her disenchantment.
Е́n ùmа
She’d always had a slight, nagging feeling that the two of them were related. But now that she had been forced to look the truth in the eye, she didn’t know how to interact with him.
“I still don’t understand why Isabella did that to me. After I cut ties with my family and she left me, I had nothing. I had no idea that she had become Lord Ernest’s mistress. I didn’t even know where to search for her. She left no trail and only started appearing in society after she became countess.”
Spellmaster Clartes had become a commoner after abandoning his title, only to be backstabbed by Wellmy’s mother. Despite being a common girl raised in an orphanage, she had managed to seduce both the son of a duke and the second son of a count. Wellmy thought her mother’s abilities were worth recognizing, even though she had used them so selfishly.
Perhaps I inherited my proactiveness from her, Wellmy mused, though she didn’t know how to feel about it. After all, from the outside, it must’ve seemed as if she had done something just as wicked.
“Back then, I often wondered if my family was right when they refused to let me marry her,” Clartes continued. “I do not regret giving up my peerage, though.”
“You always loathed the idea of becoming the next Duke of Liroud, after all,” Aides said.
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“Is that so?” Wellmy asked.
“Yes. I’m not cut out for ruling over a domain. All I ever dreamed of was researching medicine and disenchanting to help others. Though it came with its fair share of troubles, I do like my current life. It does, however, make me a little sad to think that I could have had Isabella and you by my side all these years,” Clartes said with a small smile.
“I... I see,” Wellmy replied.
She tried to picture what that life could have been.
When Wellmy was a child, the way her mother always found reasons to torment Iora had been terrifying to her young mind. Yet, she had always been kind to Wellmy.
If mother hadn’t become Savarin’s mistress, would we have lived with Clartes? Wellmy tried to imagine it, but didn’t give it more than a moment of thought. It was all in the past now.
Еn_u̇m̀ а
Aides didn’t say anything in response to Clartes, as if to silently signal that he approved of his current life. The two of them seemed rather close, at least as close as Aides and Leo. The prince seemed relaxed around Aides, and so did Clartes, despite their difference in status. Wellmy thought that the two seemed much like brothers, with the older being calm and composed and the younger mischievous and bold.
Perhaps these three are kindred spirits at their cores.
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One had once been the heir to a ducal family, but was reckless enough to have thrown everything away to marry the one he loved. The other had proposed to the very woman who had picked a fight with him. Leo would likely have made his move earlier too, if Iora hadn’t stopped him.
They look quite different though, Wellmy thought as she observed the three very handsome men.
Aides suddenly turned to her. “You look like you’re thinking something rude, Wellmy. You’re the most reckless of us all. Then again, you are Clartes’s daughter. Right, father?”
Wellmy grimaced as Aides made her the focus of the conversation. Glancing up, she saw that Clartes was making a similar expression.
Еn ŭ m̀ а́ . і̊d̀
“You’re the one who made this into a much more complicated issue than it needed to be, Aides Ormirage!” Wellmy exclaimed.
“Please don’t call me ‘father’ ever again...” Clartes muttered.
“You threw the first punch after my dance with Iora, Wellmy. And Clartes, since Wellmy is to become my wife, that makes you my father-in-law. It’s not wrong for me to call you ‘father.’”
“Still, Aides, I’d prefer if you didn’t. You’re the most powerful marquis in the kingdom. I may be the first son of a duke, but I spent over a decade as a commoner. I would feel much too awkward to have you call me ‘father.’”
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While it did seem like Clartes truly didn’t want Aides to call him ‘father,’ the second half of his reasoning was likely just banter.
Wellmy looked at them both in turn, anxiety gnawing at her. “Um... Excuse me, but I have a question...”
Ẇeḃ n̈ о́ v е l̈ Е̌ñ ü m̃ ӑ
“Why are you being so polite all of a sudden, Wellmy? Are you trying to play coy to ask me something?”
“I-I was talking to Spellmaster Clartes, not to you! You just happened to be in the conversation. It’s just, um... I will lose my status, and...” She didn’t finish her sentence, but everyone knew what she was getting at.
House Ernest would almost definitely be dissolved, meaning that Wellmy and Iora would become commoners. If that were to happen, Iora wouldn’t be able to marry Leo, even if Wellmy found it in herself to give them her blessing. As for Wellmy, fulfilling her promise to marry Aides would become nearly impossible.
“So we shall get married before you become a commoner,” Aides replied plainly to Wellmy’s silent question. “I have maneuvered to make Iora temporary administrator of the Ernest County.”
“What?”
“She knows best how to manage the territory, and will be able to organize the handover documents much better than anyone else. The title will return to the crown, but it’ll take time to decide if the royal family will administer the territory themselves, or if they will grant it to someone else.”
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As such, Iora would temporarily become Countess Ernest. It seemed that she had already agreed to that plan, as she nodded with a smile. “I just need to get engaged to Leo while I still hold the title. Then, there won’t be any issues.”
“B-But what about me...?”
As Wellmy couldn’t inherit her father’s title due to the lack of blood relation, would she still count as a relative of Iora? Her mother hadn’t actually divorced Savarin, so would she be able to get engaged to Aides as the Countess of Ernest’s younger sister?
Aides breathed out a long sigh at Wellmy’s question, an exasperated look on his face. “Clartes?”
“Yes, yes,” the man said, before turning to Wellmy. “Wellmy, I want to recognize you as my daughter. When I made amends with my family after earning my qualification of first-class disenchanter, they foisted a vacant county on me, making me officially a noble. I have proof that we’re related, so I should be able to legitimize you as my child.”
“As...your child, spellmaster?” Wellmy asked, dumbfounded.
Е̄ n̆ ǔ m̌ а̇
She hadn’t been expecting that.
While she was indeed Clartes’s daughter, her mother was the very woman who had betrayed him.
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“You puzzle me, Wellmy. At times, you seem full of confidence, yet at other times, it’s like you have no self-esteem.” A strained smile on his face, Clartes dropped to his knees in front of Wellmy and placed a hand on her shoulder. “I was curious about whether you could be my child, so I did the magic waveform analysis, and I also took you in as my apprentice. Even if we weren’t related by blood, do I really seem like the sort of man who would abandon my adorable, talented student?”
At this, for some reason, Wellmy felt her eyes fill with tears again.
Unsure of how to reply, she let her gaze roam around the room for some time. She eventually managed to return a timid smile to Clartes. “Th-Thank you very much...father,” she muttered.
The man stiffened for a second before breaking into a smile. “That, I could get used to.”
Е̌n̂u.m̆a_. і̌d
Wellmy looked at him in confusion, unsure what he meant.
Meanwhile, every other person in the room put their two cents in.
“Her bashful smile is exactly the same as it used to be back then. Oh, Orea... Isn’t my sister so adorable?” Iora asked.
“She truly is. I can hardly believe I get to see Lady Wellmy smile like this again. Wouldn’t you agree, Mr. Gordley?”
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The butler nodded. “Indeed. I am deeply moved.”
“It’s so different from her usual condescending sneer. Like this, she reminds me a bit of you, Iora,” Leo added.
Ѐ n̊ u̇m а̇ .їd́
“How strange, considering we are not related by blood. If only she could always smile like this...”
Aides turned toward Wellmy. His lips were curled in a smirk, but his gaze radiated warmth. “See, my dear wife? Everyone loved you all along. Though I must disagree with Iora: I don’t want you to be virtuous all the time. Keep being insolent in front of me.”
They’re all just saying whatever they want, at this point! Unable to bear the embarrassment any longer, Wellmy hung her head, her face beet red.
It... Doesn’t feel so bad, actually.
