"D... do what?"
Marilou couldn't quite make sense of Viya tonight. She really was too strange.
Viya kept a hand pressed to Marilou's temple. "You genuinely don't know? My arm is dirty, and you're the one who did it."
"I'll go and find some paper to wipe it clean for you."
Marilou started to get up and was pressed back down by Viya.
How could Viya let slip an opportunity like this to test Marilou's state of mind? Following what she'd read in the book, she set about trampling Marilou's dignity a little at a time.
"You did it. Get it clean."
"I haven't got any tissues. Am I supposed to use my clothes?"
Marilou's face went red all at once. Viya was being rather unreasonable.
"You'd dare dirty the clothes I gave you?"
Viya sealed off every retreat Marilou had, her fingers scratching at Marilou's chin.
"You've eaten my food and you've made a mess of me, and now you don't want to take responsibility?"
Marilou: !
Good grief. So this was a feast laid as a trap. Sure enough, Viya was still the same Viya, only wrapped in sugar-coated artillery, and by the time Marilou realized it, it was too late.
"I didn't. But you have to give me something to do it with, don't you? Surely I'm not supposed to use my bo..."
"You may."
The corner of Viya's mouth curved. "Marilou, my patience is limited. Hurry up and make the correct choice."
"This..."
Marilou was completely lost for words. She should never have opened her mouth.
If all else failed, she could pretend to faint.
Marilou considered performing a neat little vanishing act, but Viya seemed to have realized something and pinched her arm until it genuinely hurt, enough that a feigned faint would have been jolted awake.
After a long stretch of deliberation, Marilou pushed her hair back, closed her eyes, lowered her head and touched it once, quickly, with the tip of her tongue.
Then she hurriedly coughed to cover her embarrassment.
"Marilou, you find me dirty. Look, I don't find you dirty at all."
And with that, Viya did the same thing back.
Marilou's pupils quaked. It seemed she'd come off worse twice over.
"Unwilling?"
Viya hooked a finger under the soft flesh of Marilou's neck, rather like stroking a goat's beard.
Marilou puffed out her cheeks and worked her jaw a few times, and found there seemed to be nothing at all she could do.
All she could do was shake her head against her own heart. "No. My lady, have you finished eating? I'm rather sleepy."
Marilou was like a ball with the air let out of it, stripped of all strength and every tactic.
Now she had only one thought: curl up in her own bedding and sleep off every indignity she'd run into.
Out the door she couldn't beat anyone anyway, so all that was left was sulking under the covers.
ε=(´ο｀*)))
Things being as they were, sleep first.
"Very well."
Viya didn't stop Marilou. She had noticed she'd gone a bit too far a moment ago, and Marilou was looking somewhat ded.
So she simply moved aside and let her past, without pressing her any further.
What she wanted was for Marilou to leave because she couldn't take it, not for her to die.
Letting her escape and then hauling her back was the point.
Anything else was better without complications. From what she knew of Marilou, the girl was probably back under her own covers right now, sulking over her own helplessness.
When Marilou first arrived, Viya had often been able to hear her crying from the attic. There was no telling what she cried about; sulking and then curling up in her room to cry was simply Marilou's normal state.
And yet, why was it that today, seeing Marilou look so dejected, she felt some ache herself...
***
Marilou went back to her room alone. She did feel rather wretched, and then she saw the banknotes laid out under the covers.
And she didn't feel wretched any more.
Having money felt wonderful. However hard it got, she'd earned money and she could eat her fill.
But every time she thought about how that money came from selling her body, it stung a little.
How was this any different from going on the game?
Marilou felt this money counted as the fruit of her own labor and she ought to be at peace with it, and yet she also felt the sweat of that labor was a bit on the heavy side.
Counting the notes, Marilou slowly swallowed the resentment in her chest. Never mind. Earning money: there's nothing shameful in it.
Marilou rolled over, set her pride aside soon enough, and dug out of the pile of money that card with the falling sun painted on it, the item Raven had given her earlier that would let her attend the Witches' Assembly.
Two days until the next Assembly.
Should she go?
Marilou gripped the card, an unspeakable bitterness in her chest.
If she didn't go, then in all likelihood her whole life would look like today: dependent on someone else, going soft the moment she was squeezed.
Today it was cream on her hand. In a few days, Viya wasn't going to take her shoes off in public, was she?
That... that absolutely could not happen.
Then again, striking back at Viya was no reason on its own. Wanting to grow stronger couldn't come from a mindset that childish.
More than anything, she was curious about a question as old as time itself.
Who am I, and where do I come from?
By Raven's manner, she clearly knew Marilou's origins and where she came from, and back at the academy, the director's gaze had been heavy with meaning too.
Her origins were very possibly extremely strange.
That was the reason to go. Equally, going meant danger: what if the other side were a cult, and seized her body, or something else went wrong?
No. She had to get hold of some means of staying alive.
If she went straight there and had her body seized, what then? Would they use her body to flirt with Viya?
Fudge!
Why was that the first danger that came to mind?
It absolutely had to be because it was too disgusting. That was the only reason she'd thought of it. It wasn't that she cared about Viya; she was more worried about her own safety, that was all.
To be safe, Marilou went straight back without stopping, and when she reached the manor she didn't find Viya in the dining room.
"Have any of you seen Her Holiness?"
Several servants, seeing that it was Madam who had come, pointed toward the lawn in the distance.
"The young mistress should be on the swing by the bench. If you want to see her at this hour you could also try the study, though when the young mistress goes to the study she usually asks us for coffee, and we haven't heard any such request yet."
"I see. Thank you."
Marilou thanked them aloud and then set off toward the garden.
In the garden, Viya set her feet against the ground, leaned back, then gripped the ropes tight and swung herself high.
Turning Marilou's reactions today over in her mind, she couldn't shake a hollow feeling in her chest.
Viya wasn't the sort of person who liked making excuses for herself or papering things over, and equally she rarely apologized for her own mistakes.
It was only that Marilou's reactions today had given her not the faintest sense of satisfaction.
If you compared Marilou to a button, she wanted a press to produce some reaction from her; only then was it any good. Otherwise, what was the point?
Viya knew her own view of love was twisted as well. But by the same token, from her position there was nothing she couldn't have.
In this world she had no shortage of women willing to wobble their fat little rumps for her.
"Hmph. If that girl asks me for a favor next time, I absolutely will not agree to it."
Viya went on swinging, and a voice came closer from behind her.
Marilou arrived at the swing under the pear tree out of breath, drawing out her words.
Viya's expression shifted slightly, though she kept her face stern. "Weren't you going to sleep? What are you doing here?"
"There's something I'd like your help with."
Before Marilou could even raise her head, a cold, clear woman's voice went off beside her ear.
"No!"