“...Kaian?”
Bianque blew a peck on the envelope that had the seal of Lord Rowen on it.
“It’s not bad?”
She went to the room and swung it open.
The maids who should have been standing outside the room with their heads bowed were gone.
Only then did she remember the maids who had been nagging her, chasing her around and nagging her for going against royal etiquette, and had shaken her off as she returned from the hanging garden to her room.
‘You don’t miss a moment.’
It was surprising that there were still people Kaian had planted in the castle.
When he brought Claudel to the palace, Valquiterre had sorted them all out as if he had received a list from somewhere.
If not, there was no way that Kaian would have missed the news until Claudel gave birth several months later.
He cut off the errand boys and informants he found, and he disturbed the ferry that was communicating with them by spreading false information that there was nothing wrong with the palace. It was a method that was faithful to the basics.
Bianque closed the door and went to sit on the sofa.
She stared blankly at the envelope on the table for a moment, resting her chin on it.
“Should I tear it up?”
Why had Kaian approached her like this?
It was clear that the contents of the not-so-thick envelope were not the ‘proposal’ she had been hoping for.
There were many opportunities when he could have taken her away from the palace neatly and safely, but there was no way that a half-mad man who had jumped into the Shen River with a woman by a few ropes would do that.
“Love.”
Emotions were like a yoke to Bianque.
It would be nice if they were there, but it didn’t matter if they weren’t.
Before that, she had never felt the excitement of being attracted to someone, making her heart pound and paralyzing her reason.
She once found the answer in a worn-out, shallow-looking book on one side of the royal library.
It said that human love is an emotion that comes from 'imbalance'.
It says that you fall in love because you admire someone superior to you, or you pity someone inferior to you and hold them in your heart.
'Is that so? I don't think either mother or father is particularly superior or inferior.'
Grand Duke Luxen often talked about his feelings about the ball where he first met Queen Sylvia at first sight.
Judging from that, it seems that her father, as the heir to the duchy, also admired her mother.
There were no men around Bianque that she admired. However, she felt sorry for herself if she accepted the courtship of the many men who approached her and held their hands.
Where would a woman be able to show compassion to those she considered inferior?
Bianque loved herself too much to do that.
In that way, she gave up and became obsessed with herself, insisting that if a man wasn’t going to love her anyway, she wouldn’t want anyone else in the kingdom but Kaian. In that case, I thought that she was on the right level so that she wouldn’t feel like she was being taken advantage of.
“Maybe if he hated Kaian, he would have sent me to Rowen a long time ago.”
These days, after Valquiterre told Bianque, “I hate you,” she felt like I had such extreme thoughts.
Knowing something doesn’t always bring you benefits.
If you pretend not to know something even though you know it, you might feel guilty or end up sympathizing with the harm.
If it was a letter from Kaian, she thought there must be some clear intention, so she didn’t reach for it.
Bianque picked up the envelope and tried to tear it vertically.
However, she soon changed her mind, tore off the wax-pressed seal, opened the envelope, and took out the letter inside.
Bianque’s eyelashes twitched as she read the words.
“What the heck...”
Embarrassed, she folded the letter on the table and covered it with her hand.
It was a story that no one should know, and that she would rather not know.
“Ha.”
She had never dreamed that Count Makie would be watching her through the open door as she sighed with a frown.
I was very busy every day.
Before the baby was born, most of the time I spent at Rowen was spent recuperating.
I usually woke up late, around nine or ten - the reason being that Kaian didn’t let me sleep all night - and washed, changed clothes, did something light, and had lunch.
In the afternoon, I would go swimming in the backyard, take a walk, chat with Hannah or Madame Marcel, drink tea, or spend time learning how to embroider or sew small items, and so on.
Overall, it was a quiet life.
However, each day with Julien was very different.
When I heard the baby crying because it was hungry at dawn, I would wake up and take care of the baby instead of the nanny.
My body, which had found my motivation, recovered quickly day by day.
My skinny arms and legs regained their weight and muscles, and I was finally able to hold the baby, who was gaining weight quickly, and properly.
When I was able to hold the baby with one arm and wipe the milk flowing from the corner of his mouth with the other, I was so happy that I almost cried.
However, I was very sorry that I could not breastfeed the baby even once. The baby's body care right after birth was very important.
There was no way that my body, which had lost its vitality and was drying up to the point of death, could produce milk, which would be the baby's lifeline.
'There are many things more important than feeding the baby.'
Madame Repel said casually that she would start baby food soon, but I was so sorry that I remembered all the things I had not done for the baby.
The sight of a baby who couldn’t be fed directly sucking milk and gulping down was so admirable that I always tried to join the nanny when she was breastfeeding. The nanny who was breastfeeding the baby patted his heavy buttocks.
“Oh my. You’re getting fatter day by day.”
“Is that so?”
I, who had never been able to hold a baby properly, perked up my ears at the unbelievable story.
Then Madame Repel quickly explained, finding me cute.
“He doesn’t seem like a baby born early.”
“He must have grown a lot since he was just born.”
“He’s definitely a little smaller because he didn’t reach his full term. But who would think Julien was a four-month-old baby now?”
Julien was definitely different.
“He looks like Kaian.”
At first glance, you might not notice it because of his red hair and eyes, but when you look at his shoulders that seem wide open even though he’s a baby and his thick-boned and strong legs, you think he looks a lot like him. He had such strong legs that when he was changing diapers, he stretched his legs out in a good mood and got a bruise on Madame Repel’s arm.
“Kaian, you know. Today, Julien kicked me and there was a round bruise on Madame Repel’s arm.”
“Really? Isn’t it because Madame Repel is old and has a hard time taking care of the baby?”
When I told Kaian about it, he said it was because of Madame Repel’s age and didn’t care.
“Our baby is amazing. He must be strong. Just tell me. How dare you say that.”
The man who once seemed like a bomb would explode whenever he opened his mouth hadn’t changed at all.
When it came to me, he tried to apologize first, worried that he might hurt my feelings, but when it came to the baby, Madame Cronach, or other things, he didn’t seem to care that much, so it seemed like he hadn’t changed at all.
However, I hadn’t changed either.
“First, we have to get out of the patient.”
I had counted the days with Hannah recently.
“Oh. Madame. Didn’t you know? Here, you spent seventy percent of your time lying down. Was it really that bad?"
Hannah confidently said that it included the period when I had been groaning right after returning from the capital due to morning sickness.
It was something I heard when I asked Hannah, whose belly was swollen to the point where she couldn’t hide it, how she could hide the fact that she was pregnant, and if she had a hard time with morning sickness.
At first, he was angry at Vermont, but after curing Herzol, he didn’t stop treating me as his wife.
The reason he didn’t leave the household affairs of the lord’s castle entirely to me was because of my health problems.
‘I want to be a strong mother to Julien.’
To do that, I had to be able to exercise my power as a hostess to a degree that no one could easily overlook.
Usually, when noblemen kick out their beloved wives, they secretly hand over their power to the mistress who brought them in. Things like inviting guests to family events, setting the budget for events, and decorating the event hall.
The nanny placed the baby in my arms.
Julien, who was full and in a good mood, opened his mouth wide and smiled brightly as soon as he saw me.
Looking at the baby’s smiling face, all the hardships I had endured were forgotten as if they were worth enduring.
Knock.
There was a knock on the door and the butler came looking for her.
“Madam. The Lord is looking for you.”
“Kaian?”
After having lunch together, there was little chance to see him until dinnertime.
“He asked you to come to the office now.”
The butler, who had observed the atmosphere of caring for the baby, urged me again.
“You can go right away.”
“Yes. Sure.”
I handed the baby over to Madame Repel and tidied up my clothes.
I wore a cotton dress that was soft and comfortable to hold the baby, but the comfortable clothes didn’t fit me well and I felt a little shabby.
“I can’t help it. But what could it be?”
I was escorted to Kaian's office by the butler.
The man sitting in the office was, as always, radiating the majesty of the head of the household.
“He looks even better here.”
I felt a thrill involuntarily.
On the other hand, I realized that even when I spent time with Kaian recently, I had been busy looking at Julien together rather than looking at each other. When I see a new eye of a nice man's appearance.
Bianque blew a peck on the envelope that had the seal of Lord Rowen on it.
“It’s not bad?”
She went to the room and swung it open.
The maids who should have been standing outside the room with their heads bowed were gone.
Only then did she remember the maids who had been nagging her, chasing her around and nagging her for going against royal etiquette, and had shaken her off as she returned from the hanging garden to her room.
‘You don’t miss a moment.’
It was surprising that there were still people Kaian had planted in the castle.
When he brought Claudel to the palace, Valquiterre had sorted them all out as if he had received a list from somewhere.
If not, there was no way that Kaian would have missed the news until Claudel gave birth several months later.
He cut off the errand boys and informants he found, and he disturbed the ferry that was communicating with them by spreading false information that there was nothing wrong with the palace. It was a method that was faithful to the basics.
Bianque closed the door and went to sit on the sofa.
She stared blankly at the envelope on the table for a moment, resting her chin on it.
“Should I tear it up?”
Why had Kaian approached her like this?
It was clear that the contents of the not-so-thick envelope were not the ‘proposal’ she had been hoping for.
There were many opportunities when he could have taken her away from the palace neatly and safely, but there was no way that a half-mad man who had jumped into the Shen River with a woman by a few ropes would do that.
“Love.”
Emotions were like a yoke to Bianque.
It would be nice if they were there, but it didn’t matter if they weren’t.
Before that, she had never felt the excitement of being attracted to someone, making her heart pound and paralyzing her reason.
She once found the answer in a worn-out, shallow-looking book on one side of the royal library.
It said that human love is an emotion that comes from 'imbalance'.
It says that you fall in love because you admire someone superior to you, or you pity someone inferior to you and hold them in your heart.
'Is that so? I don't think either mother or father is particularly superior or inferior.'
Grand Duke Luxen often talked about his feelings about the ball where he first met Queen Sylvia at first sight.
Judging from that, it seems that her father, as the heir to the duchy, also admired her mother.
There were no men around Bianque that she admired. However, she felt sorry for herself if she accepted the courtship of the many men who approached her and held their hands.
Where would a woman be able to show compassion to those she considered inferior?
Bianque loved herself too much to do that.
In that way, she gave up and became obsessed with herself, insisting that if a man wasn’t going to love her anyway, she wouldn’t want anyone else in the kingdom but Kaian. In that case, I thought that she was on the right level so that she wouldn’t feel like she was being taken advantage of.
“Maybe if he hated Kaian, he would have sent me to Rowen a long time ago.”
These days, after Valquiterre told Bianque, “I hate you,” she felt like I had such extreme thoughts.
Knowing something doesn’t always bring you benefits.
If you pretend not to know something even though you know it, you might feel guilty or end up sympathizing with the harm.
If it was a letter from Kaian, she thought there must be some clear intention, so she didn’t reach for it.
Bianque picked up the envelope and tried to tear it vertically.
However, she soon changed her mind, tore off the wax-pressed seal, opened the envelope, and took out the letter inside.
Bianque’s eyelashes twitched as she read the words.
“What the heck...”
Embarrassed, she folded the letter on the table and covered it with her hand.
It was a story that no one should know, and that she would rather not know.
“Ha.”
She had never dreamed that Count Makie would be watching her through the open door as she sighed with a frown.
***
I was very busy every day.
Before the baby was born, most of the time I spent at Rowen was spent recuperating.
I usually woke up late, around nine or ten - the reason being that Kaian didn’t let me sleep all night - and washed, changed clothes, did something light, and had lunch.
In the afternoon, I would go swimming in the backyard, take a walk, chat with Hannah or Madame Marcel, drink tea, or spend time learning how to embroider or sew small items, and so on.
Overall, it was a quiet life.
However, each day with Julien was very different.
When I heard the baby crying because it was hungry at dawn, I would wake up and take care of the baby instead of the nanny.
My body, which had found my motivation, recovered quickly day by day.
My skinny arms and legs regained their weight and muscles, and I was finally able to hold the baby, who was gaining weight quickly, and properly.
When I was able to hold the baby with one arm and wipe the milk flowing from the corner of his mouth with the other, I was so happy that I almost cried.
However, I was very sorry that I could not breastfeed the baby even once. The baby's body care right after birth was very important.
There was no way that my body, which had lost its vitality and was drying up to the point of death, could produce milk, which would be the baby's lifeline.
'There are many things more important than feeding the baby.'
Madame Repel said casually that she would start baby food soon, but I was so sorry that I remembered all the things I had not done for the baby.
The sight of a baby who couldn’t be fed directly sucking milk and gulping down was so admirable that I always tried to join the nanny when she was breastfeeding. The nanny who was breastfeeding the baby patted his heavy buttocks.
“Oh my. You’re getting fatter day by day.”
“Is that so?”
I, who had never been able to hold a baby properly, perked up my ears at the unbelievable story.
Then Madame Repel quickly explained, finding me cute.
“He doesn’t seem like a baby born early.”
“He must have grown a lot since he was just born.”
“He’s definitely a little smaller because he didn’t reach his full term. But who would think Julien was a four-month-old baby now?”
Julien was definitely different.
“He looks like Kaian.”
At first glance, you might not notice it because of his red hair and eyes, but when you look at his shoulders that seem wide open even though he’s a baby and his thick-boned and strong legs, you think he looks a lot like him. He had such strong legs that when he was changing diapers, he stretched his legs out in a good mood and got a bruise on Madame Repel’s arm.
“Kaian, you know. Today, Julien kicked me and there was a round bruise on Madame Repel’s arm.”
“Really? Isn’t it because Madame Repel is old and has a hard time taking care of the baby?”
When I told Kaian about it, he said it was because of Madame Repel’s age and didn’t care.
“Our baby is amazing. He must be strong. Just tell me. How dare you say that.”
The man who once seemed like a bomb would explode whenever he opened his mouth hadn’t changed at all.
When it came to me, he tried to apologize first, worried that he might hurt my feelings, but when it came to the baby, Madame Cronach, or other things, he didn’t seem to care that much, so it seemed like he hadn’t changed at all.
However, I hadn’t changed either.
“First, we have to get out of the patient.”
I had counted the days with Hannah recently.
“Oh. Madame. Didn’t you know? Here, you spent seventy percent of your time lying down. Was it really that bad?"
Hannah confidently said that it included the period when I had been groaning right after returning from the capital due to morning sickness.
It was something I heard when I asked Hannah, whose belly was swollen to the point where she couldn’t hide it, how she could hide the fact that she was pregnant, and if she had a hard time with morning sickness.
At first, he was angry at Vermont, but after curing Herzol, he didn’t stop treating me as his wife.
The reason he didn’t leave the household affairs of the lord’s castle entirely to me was because of my health problems.
‘I want to be a strong mother to Julien.’
To do that, I had to be able to exercise my power as a hostess to a degree that no one could easily overlook.
Usually, when noblemen kick out their beloved wives, they secretly hand over their power to the mistress who brought them in. Things like inviting guests to family events, setting the budget for events, and decorating the event hall.
The nanny placed the baby in my arms.
Julien, who was full and in a good mood, opened his mouth wide and smiled brightly as soon as he saw me.
Looking at the baby’s smiling face, all the hardships I had endured were forgotten as if they were worth enduring.
Knock.
There was a knock on the door and the butler came looking for her.
“Madam. The Lord is looking for you.”
“Kaian?”
After having lunch together, there was little chance to see him until dinnertime.
“He asked you to come to the office now.”
The butler, who had observed the atmosphere of caring for the baby, urged me again.
“You can go right away.”
“Yes. Sure.”
I handed the baby over to Madame Repel and tidied up my clothes.
I wore a cotton dress that was soft and comfortable to hold the baby, but the comfortable clothes didn’t fit me well and I felt a little shabby.
“I can’t help it. But what could it be?”
I was escorted to Kaian's office by the butler.
The man sitting in the office was, as always, radiating the majesty of the head of the household.
“He looks even better here.”
I felt a thrill involuntarily.
On the other hand, I realized that even when I spent time with Kaian recently, I had been busy looking at Julien together rather than looking at each other. When I see a new eye of a nice man's appearance.
I asked with a sense of excitement.
“What’s going on?”
“I’m going to tell you about the things in the safe.”
“What’s going on?”
“I’m going to tell you about the things in the safe.”
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