Ivnia took Ranelli back to the detached house and spoke firmly.
“Don’t ever go near the duke again, Ranelli.”
Ranelli, looking dejected, pursed her lips slightly and nodded. Then she said as though making an excuse,
“But Mom said the duke was a kind person. So……”
“The duke was kind to us, but he’s also a very frightening person.”
“But the duke gave me delicious things, and he even made clothes for my doll.”
“Clothes for your doll?”
Ivnia doubted her own ears.
He made what?
“The duke said there was nothing he couldn’t do. So I asked him to make clothes for my doll, but he didn’t seem very good at it. Ranelli taught the duke how to thread a needle.”
“……”
“He wasn’t very scary……”
But when Ranelli saw Ivnia’s expression becoming strangely stiff, she pursed her lips again.
Ivnia tried to imagine Arad making doll clothes together with Ranelli. She couldn’t quite picture it.
She remembered what Arad had said moments ago.
[I just wanted to do something for the child. I wondered if there was anything I could help with. That’s all.]
Ivnia’s eyes trembled slightly.
But soon, she once again put on a firm and cold expression.
He wanted to do something for her? He wanted to help?
‘Now?’
Wasn’t he the one who had turned away from her in despair when she had been so frightened and struggling?
When she was young, she had been abandoned alone in a foreign land while pregnant. The helplessness and fear she had felt back then had been like being pushed off the edge of a cliff.
‘I don’t need his help.’
Ivnia spoke to Ranelli very coldly.
“He’s a very frightening person. Promise Mommy that you won’t go anywhere near the duke again, Ranelli.”
“Yes, I understand……”
Ivnia let out a small sigh and pulled the dejected child into her arms.
“Ranelli……”
She buried her face in the child’s head, which smelled of sunlight, and squeezed her eyes shut. Nightmare-like memories kept flashing through Ivnia’s mind.
The expression on his face as it had gone cold the moment he heard she was pregnant, his sharpened gaze, and the lips that had told her without the slightest hesitation to kill the child.
Her arms tightened around Ranelli.
The way he had suddenly changed, as though all the loving words he had whispered and all the love they had shared had been nothing but an illusion, still sent chills down her spine even now.
How could a person have such a double-sided nature when he had treated her so tenderly, as though she were the one and only love he would ever have in his life?
‘I was just an innocent toy.’
Even after all these years, she still trembled with betrayal. That was how sincere she had been toward him.
There had been days when her heart ached so desperately that she couldn’t sleep.
She had loved everything about him wholeheartedly and believed everything he said. His voice whispering words of love had been so sweet, and the gentle curve of his eyes when he looked at her had been enchanting.
She had been so innocent. So foolish that she was ashamed of herself.
And she hated him. A fierce hatred that had not faded in the slightest over seven years was still writhing inside her.
‘I won’t let him touch even a hair on Ranelli’s head.’
He had no right to laugh together with Ranelli. He must not enjoy the happiness Ranelli gave him. She wouldn’t even share Ranelli’s sorrow and pain with him.
She didn’t know why he had suddenly begun treating Ranelli kindly. But one thing was certain: she would never be deceived by his shallow kindness again.
Beneath Ivnia’s normally quiet and composed gaze burned a fierce anger that had not cooled for even a moment.
When Ivnia returned to the laundry room, Olivia scolded her harshly. Then that night, she had to continue working in the laundry room until dawn to finish the remaining tasks.
For several days, Ivnia worked herself to the bone in the laundry room.
Because Olivia deliberately tormented Ivnia, she had to skip most of her meals and worked until nearly dawn almost every day. Each time, Ivnia had to rely on Hartland.
Hartland knew very well why Ivnia had to be separated from her child for such long periods.
Whenever Ivnia left Ranelli in his care and disappeared, he would spend a long time alone muttering curses toward the main building of the mansion.
The servants there had been placing bets among themselves over how long Ivnia would be able to endure.
As the stakes of the betting grew, more and more people came after Ivnia in an attempt to torment her and drive her away, causing her to become visibly thinner.
But her eyes alone never lost their clear strength.
‘I need to take on a different job that will let me escape the laundry room. Something that will allow me to move around the mansion without arousing suspicion.’
There were three places she was targeting: the library, the duke’s office, and the bedroom once used by the former duke.
Somewhere in one of those places, there would be research materials hidden by the former duke. They were the most difficult places to access, but the fact that the number of possible locations was limited was encouraging.
‘I’ll have to come up with a way somehow.’
Fortunately, the workings of this mansion had barely changed over the past seven years.
Through experience, Ivnia knew when and how the servants moved around and how they were promoted.
“If you keep working on things like that, you won’t be able to eat today either.”
Sana, the apprentice maid who had once been caught placing her own laundry on top of Ivnia’s, grumbled sullenly.
It was because it was already dinnertime, yet she had seen Ivnia rummaging through her sewing kit.
Ivnia always set aside old and worn laundry and repaired it whenever she had some free time.
“Why don’t you just let someone else do it?”
Sana lingered around Ivnia without leaving, grumbling.
Ivnia gave Sana a quiet smile.
“I like doing it. Thank you for worrying about me. Go ahead and eat first.”
“I-I wasn’t particularly worried.”
Sana blushed as though she had been caught being embarrassed and hurried out of the laundry room.
Left alone in the laundry room, Ivnia blinked her eyes widely. Her tired eyes gradually managed to focus.
She began embroidering beautiful patterns onto the torn and worn pieces of fabric.
‘I’m glad I have at least this skill.’
Ever since Hartland began looking after Ranelli, Ivnia rarely went anywhere near the dining hall. The things that had happened to her there in the past had left her emotionally traumatized, making her reluctant to go near it.
Besides, because of the betting taking place over Ivnia, whenever she became noticeable, mischievous servants would inevitably appear and torment her.
Enduring that was extremely difficult for Ivnia.
‘It’s better to starve and work more. That way, my job will change sooner, and I’ll be able to find a way to treat Ranelli and leave this place that much sooner.’
She diligently moved her hands.
She made delicate flowers bloom on various fabrics, spread the wings of butterflies, and created mysterious patterns.
While she was doing so, Sana returned from her meal before long.
Sana clicked her tongue as she looked at Ivnia with an expression that clearly said she couldn’t understand her. Then she casually placed a sandwich wrapped in a napkin in front of her.
“I brought this to eat later, but I’m giving it to you because I can’t stand watching you like this.”
Ivnia looked up at Sana with hollow, exhausted eyes.
“Thank you, Sana. Every time…… Thank you so much.”
After expressing her gratitude several times, Ivnia hurriedly stuffed the sandwich into her mouth without anything to drink.
She couldn’t tell whether the lump in her throat was because the bread was so dry or because her heart was hurting.
Watching Ivnia devour the sandwich ravenously, Sana irritably snatched up several pieces of Ivnia’s laundry.
“Ah, give me those. You could just leave this to the people who do repairs. Why are you making yourself suffer for nothing?”
“You don’t have to help me……!”
“It’s only because I don’t have much to do, okay?”
Sana scoffed.
Then, as though afraid someone might hear her talking to Ivnia, she sat far away, turned her back, and began working.
After sitting with her back turned for a long while and grumbling about something, Sana muttered as though talking to herself.
“Do you know how much you make people worry?”
The ending sounded like a question, so Ivnia raised her head and blinked at the back of Sana’s head.
“Me?”
“Either stop walking around with ‘I’m having a hard time’ written all over your face, or be cruel to people……”
“I’m sorry if I made you worry.”
“That’s exactly the kind of thing that makes people worry.”
“Ah……”
“Why are you agreeing again?”
Sana, somehow irritated, fidgeted in annoyance. Then, this time in a small voice that was unmistakably meant only for herself, she muttered,
“She stays quietly cooped up in the laundry room, so she doesn’t even stand out, but why do those people keep talking about her every time they open their mouths?”
Just then, other maids entered the laundry room, so the two of them pretended they hadn’t been speaking to each other and focused on their respective work.
Ivnia embroidered as much as she could and carefully repaired the uniforms of the servants.
Her efforts soon began to bear fruit.
The head maid, Selby, discovered the embroidery Ivnia had done and called for her.
“Your embroidery skills haven’t changed.”
Selby didn’t even look directly at Ivnia, but the pleasure she couldn’t quite conceal was visible in her eyes.
She handed Ivnia several different types of furniture covers and said,
“Fix these up nicely and bring them back. It would be even better if you decorated them in a consistent style.”
What she meant was that she would move Ivnia to a skilled repair position.
That meant a promotion and a raise.
Of course, what mattered more to Ivnia than that was that she would have greater freedom of movement.
That was why she had worked so hard on her embroidery.
Although she was secretly delighted that she had achieved what she wanted, Ivnia didn’t show it openly and simply smiled quietly.
“I’ll work hard, Head Maid.”
Then, in a calm and firm voice, she made one request of Selby.
“Would it be all right if I worked together with Sana? She seems to have some talent as well, and if I teach her, I think she’ll pick it up quickly. Some of these were actually done by Sana.”
Ivnia pointed to several of the embroidered pieces Selby had been looking at.
Selby, who wore a tiny magnifying glass perched precariously on the tip of her nose, lifted her chin and looked down at what Ivnia had pointed out.
Then she glanced at Ivnia over the rim of her glasses.
“You want to teach her?”
“If you’ll allow me.”
“You’re only to teach her inside the laundry room. If you take that innocent girl and stain her with bad habits, you’ll be fired immediately.”
Selby threatened her.
Hearing such words spoken directly to her face and being humiliated made Ivnia’s face burn and her emotions surge, but she obediently nodded.
“Don’t worry. I won’t do anything improper.”
The next day, Ivnia selected several suitable pieces from among the furniture covers the head maid had given her.
Holding them in her arms, she headed toward the main building with the most natural expression she could manage.
She planned to wander around the main building while pretending to measure the furniture so she could determine the proper places to embroider the covers.
It was break time, so most of the servants were gathered in groups around the kitchen and dining hall, having light refreshments.
‘Arad seemed to have gone out a little while ago, so this is my chance. Let’s search the library first.’
The first and second floors had many common areas, so servants often walked around there, but from the third floor onward, only people permitted by Arad and high-ranking servants were allowed.
The fourth floor in particular was reserved exclusively for members of the ducal family, so even cleaning was only permitted at designated times.
There was a rule that servants were not allowed to be visibly wandering around there at other times.
Therefore, the library at the end of the western corridor on the third floor was the easiest of the three places Ivnia needed to search.
Though technically, as a low-ranking servant, she wasn’t allowed there either.
‘After searching the library, I’ll take the servants’ staircase up to the fifth floor. The maids’ rooms should be on the fifth floor.’
If someone asked why someone who lived in a separate house was wandering around inside the mansion, she planned to say that she was looking for Sana.
Most of the servants lived in the servants’ quarters, but some of them lived in the attic on the fifth floor beneath the mansion’s roof.
Apprentice maids like Sana all stayed on the fifth floor under the head maid’s supervision.
If necessary, Sana would serve as her excuse.
Ivnia proceeded through the servants’ staircase.
There were a few close calls when she nearly encountered people along the way, but in the end, she safely reached the third floor.
‘Phew.’
The library was quite close to the staircase where Ivnia was standing.
After looking around the corridor and confirming that no one was there, Ivnia quietly opened the door and slipped into the library.