CH 119

“Your High…ness.”

Carynne said, her voice stifled. She felt so suffocated that she didn’t need to act as if she was. Her voice resembled Donna’s.

She recalled the serial murders and numerous disappearances of women in the capital. So many people had disappeared like that, and yet why was the investigation not going well? Why were the articles in the newspapers about these incidents always just written about so sparsely?

Baron Ein should have been the culprit, so why.

Carynne thought of the reason.

Baron Ein was supposedly caught as a suspect after he gambled away his money, lost to Carynne and went bankrupt. His trial got dragged on strangely, but he was eventually released due to lack of evidence.

She speculated that Baron Ein had prepared money elsewhere to create witnesses to his defense, but in the end, this was not the case.

Crown Prince Gueuze gave money to Baron Ein.

“Baron Ein isn’t the kind of man who’d kill.”

Raymond was right.

She made eye contact with Donna. Tears were streaming down the maid’s eyes.

Carynne should have brought Donna’s hand here—so she could connect it back to her.

No, no. Come back to your senses.

However.

“May I scream?”

Even to Carynne, what she said just now sounded so idiotic.

Shit, what did I just say? Carynne wants to cry. No, a few teardrops were already escaping in the first place.

“I would… like … to scr…eam. May I…?”

Please, please.

Crown Prince Gueuze, generous as he was, allowed it.

And so, Carynne screamed.

It was a scream that she herself could not even comprehend. She felt that she wouldn’t be able to endure any longer letting out this scream.

Crown Prince Gueuze laughed, Carynne screamed.

They were in each other’s arms, laughing and screaming, as they danced a waltz, going round and round.

The royal dance instructors might be proud to see Crown Prince Gueuze at this moment. Even with a screaming woman in his embrace, he danced adeptly. There was no music, and yet he led her to perfection, never missing a beat.

Perfect, yes, though the instructors would still be ashamed of him nonetheless. There was a smile so undignified and so distorted pasted on his lips. He couldn’t control his glee, looking as if he was almost drooling in his riotous laughter.

“Hehehehe!”

As the female lead who had rejected her happy ending, was this what she deserved to receive?

Carynne had this fleeting thought.

“You must have been very shocked.”

“…I’m alright now.”

In the end, no matter what happened, she couldn’t possibly scream all day.

Carynne regained her composure. Just in her mind, of course. Perhaps the situation was too frightening for her body to be calm as well.

In any case, Crown Prince Gueuze stopped laughing just as Carynne stopped screaming. It was a relief, too, because his smile looked horrendous.

Even so, the dance continued. Carynne kept being dragged around by him.

Leading her, Crown Prince Gueuze asked.

“Did you like my gift?”

So the gift was from him, too. Carynne felt the urge to retch as she imagined how Crown Prince Gueuze himself might have carefully and attentively wrapped the chest, tied it with a pretty ribbon and even added flowers.

She felt sick because this old man seemed to be imitating young women. Even the very contents of the chest was a real human body part.

“Your Highness has a bad habit.”

“Do I?”

Carynne tried to explain with composure.

“Yes. The part where the hand had been cut wasn’t clean. Shouldn’t there have been proper preparations first? But seeing the extreme measures done… it see… seems that you don’t quite like going about it artistically.”

“Haha, it seems like I chose the wrong gift.”

Gueuze guffawed cheerfully once more.

It wasn’t a proper laugh, but it wasn’t a clown-like laugh like earlier either.

He halted abruptly.

He stopped laughing, and he stopped dancing.

Previously so close to her, Crown Prince Gueuze slightly pulled away to glance down at Carynne.

“I don’t like girls who pretend to be strong.

“……”

One of his hands gripped tighter. Carynne could feel his fingernails digging into the skin of her hand that he was holding. It hurts.

Crown Prince Gueuze continued speaking.

“It’s ridiculous how people tremble so severely like that, yet pretend to be completely fine. I’ve encountered only those kinds of people. Pretending to feel differently, pretending not to be scared, pretending to be something special.

He grabbed Carynne’s chin. He gripped her tightly. It hurts. He turned her head to the side. She saw Donna’s face. The maid’s face was so bloodied that her expression couldn’t be seen properly.

Crown Prince Gueuze slinked closer to Carynne again and led her to Donna. As the distance between them decreased, she could see Donna’s face clearer.

“Most people were like that. They pretended to act strong at first, too. Of course, until one arm gets chopped off. Under normal circumstances, what kind of maid is she? You know, she was so noisy… Though she’s quiet now, after one foot was cut off. Has she always been that talkative?”

“……”

“I asked you a question.”

He held her with a tighter grip once again. Pressed hard on her cheek. Carynne must answer.

What was Donna like? What kind of girl was she? Carynne did not know Donna all that well. The Donna who Carynne had met before was just normal. Moderately nice, moderately sincere. She frequently made mistakes, but that’s not so strange because she had formerly been a laundry maid.

“She was just… normal.”

For some reason, he did not kill her. And for some reason, he just kept her around.

Carynne looked at Donna. She was covered with blood. It wasn’t that hard to imagine what must have been done to her before Carynne came here.

Would it be Carynne’s turn next?

“What a very insincere answer. Child. You, young maid. It seems like your master doesn’t care about you. Doesn’t this make you sad?”

Carynne continued to look at Donna. Their eyes met.

Carynne genuinely felt upset when she saw Donna. She didn’t feel this terrible when she had chopped up Thomas’ body, or even when she watched the man’s body go rotten.

It felt so strange to see a woman, still alive, have her body be mutilated like this.

Did the difference lie with their genders, because one was a man and one was a woman? Or was it because Carynne herself was still soft? As expected, she seemed to have a weak stomach.

After observing Carynne’s reaction, Gueuze turned back towards Donna.

“In fact, your master had killed the Fief Lord—her father. I wonder how you feel now that you know about it.”

Gueuze brought a hand under Donna’s chin, and as she looked up, her eyes went wide and she opened her mouth. Uh, uh… there came the terrible sound of her voice.

“…Uh.”

She had no tongue.

No, scratch that. She still had a tongue, but it looked like it had been crushed. Carynne almost bit her own tongue.

Staring at Carynne’s face, Gueuze patted her back as if he was feeling sorry for her. He did it ever so gently, just like how he had patted the head of the maid.

Then, he spoke softly.

“I didn’t do it on purpose. I value communication. Being able to talk to one another is an invaluable gift and privilege that God has bestowed upon us. She had bitten her tongue on her own.”

Gueuze shrugged and grabbed Donna’s cheek. This time, it was a rough gesture that was different from the touch he gave Carynne. Donna let out a pained groan.

How had she kept silent since earlier when she was suffering so gravely like that? Did she faint? Carynne wished that the maid just remained unconscious. Carynne did not want to look at Donna.

Observing Carynne’s face, Crown Prince Gueuze spoke once more.

“Anyway, I’m curious about what this child thinks of you now. Hm?”

“…Ah.”

An afterimage of Tom flashed through Carynne’s mind. It felt cruel to see someone not being able to speak. And it was miserable for one to give up on the words that could never be said.

However, Crown Prince Gueuze spoke on behalf of Donna with a smooth voice.

“This child sold information about you.”

Carynne looked at Donna. Donna looked back at Carynne as well. The two women did not talk. They just looked at each other.

“What time you sleep, what time you wake up, what kinds of dishes you like eating, what kind of worries you talk about, which people you like… All those things.”

Donna would have thought that it would be alright to divulge those things. She’d have thought that it wasn’t a big deal. It’s just Carynne’s daily life.

Carynne looked at Donna. And she thought of her own rough hands, of the days when she had to live alone in the mansion.

All sorts of thoughts tend to pass through anyone’s mind whenever they’re alone. And while Carynne was working for Isella Evans in her mansion, she had lived a harsher life than Donna.

Dear lady who needed to be protected, dear lady who lived such a pitiful life, dear lady who had lost her parents and was being abused by her enemies.

Even so, Carynne had Raymond.

The knight fell in love with the pretty lady, defeated the villains, and lived happily ever after with her.

Happy ending.

The lady was beautiful, pitiful.

The knight was brave, valiant.

The lady’s maid, too, would have received a higher wage. She would have become a better paid maid.