Ella stood at the windowsill with her hands at her sides, patting around for a while without finding any pockets, so all she could do was pick awkwardly at the hem of her dress.
The bitterness of the leaves was still in her mouth. Face screwed up with it, she looked over at the stunned Elos a few paces away.
"You..."
Elos started and stopped several times, her brow furrowing and furrowing, and finally smoothing out.
"Fine. No problem."
She called a maid, and soon someone brought bread and jam.
"Phew... Thanks."
Ella thanked her quietly. So caving in was all it took to get fed.
Humiliating. But it was only expedience.
Thinking of the bright road ahead of her, Ella smiled again.
Elos watched her smile, and her feelings tangled.
This person wasn't genuinely an idiot, was she? Was bullying an idiot a bit much?
The thought was gone as fast as it came. She bullied whoever she wanted to bully and killed whoever she wanted to kill, because she was the Duke's daughter.
Cleared up on that, Elos handed Ella the tray the bread sat on.
Ella went back to the bed, sat down, and set the tray on her lap.
"Mm..."
She picked up the bread and, without a thought for anything else, took a savage bite out of it.
The bitterness of the leaves mixed with the wheaty smell of the bread. Odd, but unexpectedly not bad?
Elos watched the girl wolfing it down, and was speechless again.
"You're a noble, whatever else. Have a little decorum."
Carrying a stool over, Elos sat down facing her.
The girl's pink hair had dried, hanging at the sides of her face and looking rather fluffy. Elos absently gathered a strand of her own hair and rubbed it between her fingers a few times, then set about working out how to get back at the person in front of her.
"Mmf. Thanks. The bread's good."
Ella swallowed and got the words out with difficulty.
Her mouth never stopped chewing, one cheek slightly rounded, those golden almond eyes fixed on the bread in her hands with complete seriousness.
"..."
Elos pressed her fingers into her palm.
The way she ate was... actually rather cute.
"You're not really an idiot, are you?"
The person in front of her was unbelievably stupid, considering she had been beaten not long ago.
Still, stupidity of that kind wasn't unpleasant.
"I'm not stupid."
The chewing paused, and Ella glanced at her.
Elos neither agreed nor argued. She could tell stupid when she saw it.
Still, Ella made the bread look so good that Elos was starting to feel hungry herself.
She stood up, meaning to have a maid bring more food, and then remembered what she had come here for in the first place.
Bully Ella. Get back at Ella. She really couldn't imagine what this one had been thinking back then. A baron's son, daring to lay hands on her.
Confidence back on her face, Elos caught the hand holding the bread.
"?"
Ella looked up at her blankly, still chewing, dull-eyed, rather like a large dog.
"That's enough of that."
Unhurriedly, Elos drew the bread out of her hand.
Ella's chewing slowed.
"What are you doing?"
With the weight gone from her hand, Ella swallowed what was in her mouth. She had eaten half a loaf.
"Nothing at all. I simply don't want you eating any more."
Soft and sweet-voiced, Elos waited for the hurt to come into Ella's eyes.
She failed. All that was in the idiot girl's eyes was a measure of distaste.
"Is House Beaumont that poor?"
"You—! I am targeting you specifically, all right?! Is there genuinely something wrong with your head?"
"...Tch."
Ella knew perfectly well she was being targeted. She was only hitting back.
A proper ducal house, and it couldn't part with a piece of bread.
Ella's attitude made Elos feel as though she had thrown a punch into a bale of cotton. No pain, no itch. Her temper flared again and she clenched her fist.
She shoved Ella down and came down on top of her.
Ella didn't react in time. Her arms lay flat, and she stared up at the face that had suddenly come close.
Elos's golden hair fell down around her. This near, Ella could smell the faint scent of mint on her.
Strands of it landed on her cheek and tickled.
"Hey... You, what are you doing?"
Ella turned her face aside, flushing a little.
Elos was very pretty, and Ella, in her past life and this one both, was an innocent little virgin boy.
She wasn't actually an idiot, when it came down to it.
Things churned over in her head, and it struck her that she was currently Elos's wife.
"Ahem. We're both girls now, and we're still young, so that sort of thing is out of the question!"
She had lived two lives. The one in front of her had not.
Ella shook her head.
"You—! There really is something wrong with your head."
Elos ground her teeth.
Why was this one not afraid of her at all?!
Looking at the girl's innocent face, and at that slender neck that looked as though one hand could close around it, she felt the urge to bite someone for the first time in her life.
In the end, though, she didn't.
Pinning Ella's shoulders, it took Elos no time at all to arrive at a punishment. She had noticed the arm lying flat on the bed.
So she brought her fist down hard on Ella's right arm.
"Ugh—?!"
The whip wounds on that arm had never been treated, and at the sudden punch Ella cried out.
The pain tore through her. She had never hurt like this.
The gauzy sleeve seemed to have fused into the flesh. Ella's body shuddered.
Her eyes stayed open, and two involuntary tears ran from the corners of them.
"...?"
Having gotten exactly what she wanted, having seen the girl cry, Elos went still.
The girl's mouth was pressed flat, and on that pretty face a single clear tear caught the sunlight, her eyes veiled in a soft mist. It was exquisite.
Elos thought: this idiot is damned alluring.
Elos closed her eyes. She wanted so badly to go on tormenting her, to make her cry, to take the bastard who had once chased her down swinging and turn her into steel wound soft around a finger.
After the daze came the satisfaction.
"Mouthy little idiot. You needed a proper lesson."
"Are you brain-damaged?! That really hurts!"
Unfortunately, Elos's enjoyment did not last long. Ella had already come back to herself out of the sudden pain.
She balled her other fist and brought it down hard on Elos's head, then shoved her violently away.
Nursing her hammered right arm with one hand, Ella backed away across the bed.
"Sss... You— you actually dared to hit me?"
Dizzy and seeing spots, Elos took two steps back. Looking at the girl on the bed, she couldn't believe it.
Years ago was one thing. Why would she still dare raise a hand to her now?
"You started it."
Ella was indignant.
Bide your time, bide your time. Had she not bidden enough? She had taken two lashes and gone hungry a whole day, she had complained twice, and now the damned villainess young lady in front of her was having another episode.
"Wife of a ducal house, my foot. Whoever wants the job can have it. I'm done."
Ella got up, ready to leave.
She genuinely could not put up with Elos's temper.
What kind of duke raised a daughter like this? Even if her discount dad had sold her, she hadn't come here to be a plaything. How could anyone treat her this way?
"..."
Elos's gaze went cold, and she watched Ella walk past her.
No. She couldn't. She could not let her leave.
"Vine Art."
Her body moved faster than her thoughts. She opened her hand and used magic.
Vines appeared out of nothing and wound around Ella's calves. Her stride was forced to a halt, and her body tipped forward.