Sitting on the edge of the bed, blanking out, Ella let her eyes wander back and forth across the ceiling.
Whoever had planned the room had left it without a single window, and the stuffiness set her nerves on edge.
"Look on the bright side. It's a bit humiliating, but life's probably going to get a whole lot better, right?"
She was the wife of a duke's young lady, after all.
If she remembered right, this ducal house had only the one daughter.
She stayed lost in it until hunger cramped in her stomach, and then Ella couldn't wait any longer.
She went to the door and slapped it hard a few times.
"Hey! Is anybody out there?"
She shouted herself hoarse. Nothing answered from outside.
Ella frowned.
"Tsk... What is any of this, seriously. Sss..."
Mid-complaint, the door was shoved open.
The panel swung straight into her face. She flinched back on instinct, but her forehead still met solid wood.
Dull pain, a wave of dizziness, and Ella went over backward onto the floor.
"You're awake?"
Golden hair was the first thing to break into her vision.
It was Elos, the young lady of House Beaumont.
"Sss... Oh. It's you."
Holding her head, Ella got unsteadily to her feet.
After sitting alone for so long, she was finally looking at another person.
"So how did I end up like this? And you're clearly a woman, right? What the hell is this 'taking a wife' business?"
Ella had plenty of other questions. Why she'd been chosen, why she was shut in down here, and what there was to eat today.
But she asked the ones she wanted answered most first.
"You don't need to know that much. All you need to understand is that from now on, you belong to me."
The golden-haired girl blinked.
"...Tsk. Boring. Who'd listen to you?"
Ella had no intention of taking orders from the stranger in front of her.
She was the protagonist!
Certain of it, Ella tried to squeeze past Elos.
"?"
Her wrist was caught. Ella found that her strength had shrunk; she couldn't break free of a little girl's grip.
Something cool and silk-smooth pressed against her wrist. Elos was wearing gloves.
"Mm-hm? You're on my ground now. That isn't up to you anymore."
There was not much of a smile left in the pale blue eyes.
"Luo Chen, wasn't it? I know you."
"Hm?"
So how, exactly, did this woman know the name from his past life? Ella still couldn't come up with an answer.
"...You forgot me?"
The last syllable tilted up. What was in Elos's eyes now went well past the simple absence of a smile.
Some disbelief. And some of the fury of a person who has been insulted.
"Who are you? Do we know each other?"
"You—! That is simply unforgivable."
Gripping Ella's wrist for dear life, Elos's eyes went wide.
How could she! How could she have forgotten her, when she herself had remembered her this whole time?
"Hoo..."
Elos drew a deep breath.
"Nine years ago. In front of that grain shop. Remember now?"
"...?"
Ella sank into memory.
Her thoughts drifted back years. She had been six then, tagging along with her father to a meeting in the ducal territory.
While her father was at the meeting, she had wandered the town alone.
In front of a grain shop, she had seen a little girl being beaten by several others.
"You lot! Don't you dare pick on her!"
She was the protagonist, so protecting the weak was surely part of the job. Holding that thought, Ella had charged in—and gotten beaten black and blue.
"Ahem..."
Ella coughed twice, a little embarrassed. It was mortifying, stepping in to protect someone and then losing the fight.
She remembered her plan at the time: make one of them cry first, scare off the rest. She had in fact made one of them cry. The result was that the others hit her harder.
"Anyway, that's got nothing to do with you! The one I protected went home with me and my father."
The girl who had been beaten was called Sephone. She was an orphan, and Ella had begged her father to take her in.
"..."
Silence. A long silence. Maybe it was a trick of the eye, but a few veins seemed to be popping on Elos's forehead.
"I'm the one you hit."
"Hah?"
Ella's eyes went wide again.
The one she'd hit? Wasn't that one of the bullies, then?
"Heh heh... Luo Chen, was it. Did you think it was cool, beating someone up and leaving a fake name behind?"
The young mistress smiled a smile that never reached her eyes.
"..."
Ella stopped talking.
She didn't know what to say.
"Got beaten up by me and picked me anyway. You're not some kind of masochist, are you."
After a long moment, she muttered it under her breath.
Elos said nothing in return. Probably past the point of speech, the young mistress reached out and pinched the back of her hand, hard.
"Ssss! Is there something wrong with your head?"
The flesh on the back of a hand is thin. Pinched that hard, the sting was something else.
Ella couldn't help swearing. She was no delicate little girl who swallowed her anger when someone pushed her around.
"Since you're awake, come with me. You're filthy. Go bathe and change."
Elos turned and hauled Ella off after her.
Only after a long flight of stairs did Ella realize the place she had been in was a cellar. No wonder there were no windows.
"From now on you're my wife. Look forward to regretting that you ever came here."
To Ella's ear, the line came out a little childish.
Who declares their own villainy that bluntly?
"Wait. Do you like me?"
As the words landed, Elos stopped walking in front of her.
Ella didn't notice and kept going, straight into Elos's back.
"Mmf!"
She grunted. The bridge of her nose throbbed. Ella halted, frowning steadily, rubbing at her nose.
"..."
Elos turned around and looked at her, expressionless.
"Hey, hey, what. Even if I got it right, you don't have to stare at me like that. It's fine. There's no shame in falling for the protagonist."
Ella was grinning.
"Moron."
She had been stupid nine years ago. She had gotten stupider since.
If she had recognized anyone else in that line, Elos would have wanted nothing to do with picking this moron as her partner for the years ahead.
House Beaumont tradition: the heir chose a partner at fifteen. Of course, the partner would not be for life. The reason was a secret.
"Someone."
Elos called out.
In the time it took Ella to rub her eyes, two maids had appeared behind Elos.
"Take a whip to her for me. Until she cries."
By rights, a partner was not to be treated this way. But as Elos saw it, what she had chosen was no partner at all. It was a toy.
"...You're— you're joking, right?"
Ella's grin froze.
"Milady?"
"Did you not hear me? Whip her. Until I'm satisfied."
Arms folded, face arrogant, Elos leaned back against a pillar in the corridor.
"Yes."
From somewhere, the two maids produced whips.
A chill went down Ella's spine.
"Wait... wait, I'm sorry, don't, don't."
She was starting to regret it. Protagonist or not, she shouldn't have run her mouth like that. This was going to hurt.
Elos raised an eyebrow and said nothing.
One of the maids gave Ella a pitying look. The girl in front of her clearly had no idea what her milady was really like.
She was an existence that fully earned the word "villainess." She struck the servants, cursed them, dismissed them, at the slightest provocation. Whether it was a hunting hound of the house, a warhorse in the stables, or a newly arrived guard, nothing that crossed Elos ever ended well.
She would even walk up and kick a commoner in the street for having a face she disliked. No reason. She simply wanted to, so she did.
She was born evil.
"Hey... Ngh!"
Ella still had something to say, but the whip was already coming down.