Chapter 264
Rumelisa smiled brightly.
“Well, you know how capital noble kids are. They pretend to be kind on the surface, but in the end, their own gain always comes first.”
“That’s true enough.”
“But Erylotte Astra wasn’t like that. Far from trying to steal the spotlight, she actually shielded me.”
“Shielded you?”
“Yes. She said the former princess lashed out because she was tired. And that even though she was exhausted, she still came all the way here because I’m just that adorable!”
‘Sharp little thing.’
It really did seem Erylotte Astra was the reason their daughter had escaped humiliation.
Rumelisa beamed.
“She’s a good girl. I want to be friends with her. Mother, couldn’t you invite her to your salon?”
Marchioness Paanté’s salon was where the giants of high society gathered.
Only the top ten percent among the great nobles could hope to be invited.
People often said, After the Empress Dowager’s tea salon, there is only Paanté’s.
The Marchioness smiled.
“How could I refuse when my daughter asks?”
“Yay~!”
As Rumelisa threw her arms around her mother’s waist, the Marquis and Marchioness shared a warm smile.
Then the Marchioness said to her husband,
“We’ve received a favor from them. We shouldn’t just leave it at that. Why don’t you invite her father, Daymond Astra, to your club?”
“Our club? But the other Astra men will throw a fit… it’ll get troublesome.”
“Let Valdrich, Hernan, and Gustav say what they want. The rising sun of Astra now is Daymond Astra.”
“Well… true enough.”
“And besides, are you going to just sit still when our daughter likes someone this much?”
Rumelisa looked at her father with bright, shining eyes.
The Marquis flushed and rubbed his cheek against hers.
“How precious you are, my little one. Of course! My child’s been shown grace, so how could I not repay it?”
Laughter burst from the Paanté family, warm and merry.
Yet even as she laughed, the Marchioness’s eyes glinted cold and sharp.
‘Former Princess… I won’t let this go.’
A beast whose cub has been threatened becomes fiercer than anything alive.
* * *
A few days later, at the Empress Dowager’s Palace—
Anatoli, the former princess, hunched her shoulders, nervously gauging her mother’s mood.
“Um… Imperial Mother…”
Thud.
The Empress Dowager closed the book she’d been reading.
The air turned deathly cold.
Anatoli’s voice quavered as she rushed to plead.
“The other day, at the Lily Garden Party… I didn’t mean it, it’s just that sly little brat—!”
The Empress Dowager’s sharp gaze cut across her like a blade.
Anatoli flinched and clutched her skirt tight.
“I-Imperial Mother—”
“Do you know who it was that spared you when you caused that scandal at the Astra estate?”
“L–Lord Daymond, he…”
The Empress Dowager let out a dry laugh.
“The very one who first demanded the Emperor punish you was that very same Daymond.”
“……!”
“In forty years, I have never seen Duke Astra rage as he did that day.”
“T-Then…”
“It was Erylotte Astra. That child clung to her grandfather and father, begged and pleaded, just to keep you from standing trial.”
“……”
After the Imperial Family arrived in the capital, the Empress Dowager had already grilled Anatoli’s maids to the bone.
As a result, she knew everything, including how Anatoli had tried to claim Daymond by using Erylotte’s monster.
Anatoli stammered weakly,
“I… I’m the Emperor’s sister. If Astra doesn’t want to break with the Imperial Family, they can’t truly harm me…”
“Yes. For most things, the Imperial House can smooth matters over. But the Harvest Festival incident—!!”
The Empress Dowager’s voice crackled like a whip.
Anatoli had never seen her mother so furious.
She went pale, and every maid present sank instantly to their knees.
With eyes blazing, the Empress Dowager glared at her daughter.
“How dare you use such corrupt herbs at the Harvest Festival.”
“M-Mother…”
“You summoned a monster and tried to ruin the festival.”
“T-That was, that was just…”
“And then you tried to pin the blame on Astra!”
“……”
If Erylotte hadn’t called forth her dragon when she did, both she and Anatoli would have ended up dragged to trial side by side.
Humiliation aside, no one could predict what Astra’s reaction would have been once the truth broke.
Anatoli lunged to clutch her mother’s arm.
“Please, listen to me! I was only trying to make things work out!”
“To make what work?”
“Huh?”
“You thought you’d secure a marriage with Daymond like this?”
“……”
“I even endured it when you threatened to kill yourself if I didn’t wed you to him.”
“……”
“When you kept planting spies in Astra to dig up secrets on Daymond, I covered it up, time and again.”
“……”
“And now, you drag his daughter into your schemes and cause this—!”
The Empress Dowager hurled a stack of letters into Anatoli’s face.
Smack!
They struck her and scattered to the floor in a flurry of parchment.
“See with your own eyes.”
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