Chapter 07 The marriage was in early January because that was when Orpheus wanted it to be, and I got onto the carriage without anyone seeing me off.
I had already sent my luggage ahead of time, so I went to the Rosenberg House with just myself alone.
When I arrived at my husband"s home, the butler, Juris, and the head maid, Elze, greeted me.
The other servants were already lined up in the hall, and they bowed deeply and politely as I entered the hall.
A girl came out of the line and named herself Claire. She was the maid who would be taking care of me, and I got the impression that she was innocent and honest from her nervous expression.
――― I think I"ll be able to get along with this girl.
Orpheus appeared from the stairs in the centre of the hall when I vaguely thought that.
He wasn"t alone. He was accompanied by a pet.i.te woman.
"Ah, Lord Orpheus. Miss Diana is with you too," I heard Juris say, and thought, so that"s his cousin.
The woman was adorable, just like a flower sprite.
She had blonde hair which was close to white, dreamy light blue eyes, and a small and delicate face. She had a slender body with thin arms and legs and wore a fluffy light blue dress.
Orpheus and Diana contrasted each other with black and white when they stood next to each other, and, together, they looked like a pair of dolls.
Their linked arms looked as if they were lovers, and I couldn"t help but be suspicious of their relationship, but Diana just said this, "I"m sorry for borrowing your husband"s arm. But, please don"t misunderstand anything. I am just his cousin, and this person is just like a brother to me. We don"t have a strange relationship at all."
Diana"s eyes stared at a place which was a little off from where I was actually standing.
I wasn"t suspicious of her, but she was practically looking at me, and I wondered once again if she really was blind.
As she said, they were probably linking arms so that he could guide her. Unfortunately, she couldn"t walk freely without the help of others.
I pushed the hazy discomfort to the back of my mind and put a tight lid on it so that it wouldn"t come out.
"I"ve heard about it, Miss Diana. Please don"t mind me. I don"t blame you since there are circ.u.mstances behind this."
Diana looked relieved and said, "I want you to call me Diana." I replied, "Then, please call me Ophelia too," and she smiled joyfully.
Orpheus laughed next to her.
However, the servants were different.
Their att.i.tude was strange in a way.
Some looked bitter and averted their gaze by looking down. Some looked at Orpheus and Diana with moist eyes, and some… glared at me with hateful eyes as if they were stabbing me with their gaze.
Juris had a somewhat lonely smile, Elze stared at me with hate, and Claire stood still while looking puzzled.
I suddenly remembered that man"s words because of their reaction. 『I won"t let you be happy. I"ll make you suffer more than I have.』
――― Is that how it is?
There were too many unnatural points with how they laughed and told me it was a misunderstanding, and I stood still because I didn"t know what to do.
After that, we signed the marriage certificate, and I was guided to my room. I broached the topic with Claire while drinking the tea I was served, "This mansion is wonderful. Both Lord Orpheus and Miss Diana are nice. But I don"t seem welcomed here."
I wasn"t good with beating around the bush, so I spoke frankly, and Claire suddenly stopped cutting the cake, "Lord Orpheus and Miss Diana are more than cousins, aren"t they? You and the servants know this, and that"s why they don"t have good feelings towards me."
Claire turned back while looking pale and said, "Madam, I"m sorry. Everyone has gone weird because they adore the Master and Miss Diana. To be presented with such an, such outrageous att.i.tude… you must have felt uncomfortable. I"m really sorry."
"Claire, lift your head. It"s not your fault."
The servants are also humans. Even though they are usually faithful to their duties, they might have been too excessive while supporting the relationship between their master and his lover.
As a result, they lacked calmness and took actions which weren"t appropriate for their positions.
"I"m not blaming them. I just wanted to check the facts. Otherwise, I wouldn"t know how to behave in the future," I said as I thought.
ーーー If that"s the case, then why didn"t he marry the woman he loved instead of me?
The Lagerfeld House is an old House, but they are now rural n.o.bles on the verge of ruin.
That man might have had a good explanation if he wanted financing, but if so, then he didn"t need to marry me off.
The current Lagerfeld House isn"t appealing enough for n.o.bles in the capital, who have both status and money, to want to connect their House by marriage.
Claire shook her head, "I don"t know."
"Master and Miss Diana both deny their relationship in front of me and the servants. They say that they both don"t love each other. Even though they"re so close."
My questions only deepened, but it didn"t take long for me to find out why.
"There"s something I"d like to tell you." That night, after dinner, I was relaxing on the couch in my a.s.signed room, and Orpheus said this to me while sitting next to me.
He worried about my body since I had been sitting in a swaying carriage for half the day and asked, "Shall I tell you tomorrow?" But, I declined, "It"s okay, please tell me now."
"You must have been curious about why I chose you as my wife," Orpheus spoke as the candlelight swayed.
"Because, this was the last request of my father, the former Earl Rosenberg. He requested that I marry Ophelia, the daughter who Lord Lagerfeld took in, into the Rosenberg House. This happened a year ago. One night on his sickbed, father summoned me and ordered me to make you my wife."
I honestly have no idea what he was talking about.
Why did the former Earl Rosenberg, who I don"t know, know about my existence and want me to be his son"s wife?
The only thing that comes to mind is…
"Lord Orpheus, do you know my mother?"
That man had told me not to talk about this, but Lord Orpheus probably already knew my mother from the way he spoke, so I asked him, and he answered, "I heard about her from my father."
"Did you make me your wife knowing this?"
Did he not resist marrying a daughter of a vile prost.i.tute who was only half n.o.ble even though it was his father"s last request?
However, Orpheus"s answer was beyond my expectation, "Yes, is that a problem?"
He replied as if it was nothing, and I gapped. There is a mountain of problems, though…
Orpheus continued speaking while I remained dumbfounded, "My father was one of the men who loved your mother. He couldn"t get her off his mind even when she disappeared from social circles. Just before he fell ill, he found out that your mother had pa.s.sed away from the epidemic six years ago, and that you, her child, had been taken in by the Lagerfeld House. He secretly went to see you when he found out and saw that you were being treated as a slave."
Orpheus paused and squeezed the hand, which was on my shoulder. It didn"t hurt, it was just hot.
"He couldn"t contain himself when he saw the daughter of the woman he loved, who looked like her mother, being oppressed. He thought about kidnapping you on the spot, but his servant stopped him since that would be bad. He had no choice but to think of a legal way to protect you, and, as a result, came up with the idea of letting me marry you. But, he immediately fell ill straight after and it became his last request. Then, I became friendly with Lord Lagerfeld through an acquaintance and demanded that I will marry you in exchange for investment capital. I tried to hasten it as much as possible, but it still took a month and a half," Orpheus said, and hugged me. He hadn"t hesitated even though he knew I was a prost.i.tute"s daughter.
"I"m sorry you had to experience painful memories until then."
Those words weren"t strange as I buried my face in Orpheus"s neck.
While inhaling the pleasant scent of the forest, I thought about why he needed to apologise even though he had nothing to do with it and said, "It"s not your fault. You let me out of that house."
He freed me from those days of being oppressed and abused. He helped me when no one else even looked back at me.
To the point that he betrayed the woman he loved…
My eyelids got hot as if they were being burnt.
An unbearable impulse swelled up inside me, and I sobbed.
"I"m sorry," I broke down as soon as I said that. It was pointless, even if I tightly shut my eyes.
"I"m sorry. I"ve changed your life. I"ve s.n.a.t.c.hed away your chance to have a happy marriage."
"Ophelia, that"s…"
I pulled myself away from Orpheus and sat on the floor as if I"d fallen down.
I kneeled at his feet and looked up as if I was begging for forgiveness.
Orpheus tried to get me off the floor while being confused. He was as merciful and beautiful as the angels painted on the walls of the church.
"I can"t give you more than the happiness you would have felt from that. Instead, I"ll give everything I have to you, Lord Orpheus. Both my body and my mind. I don"t care what kind of sacrifices I have to make for you. I"ll do anything for you, and I"ll endure any pain for you."
I couldn"t think of any other way to repay the former Earl Rosenberg and Orpheus except for this.
I am a person of no worth. I"m only useful as a scapegoat.
"So please, please forgive me."
I looked down and could only hear the sounds of sobbing in this silent room.
"You"re wrong," Orpheus finally said in a voice that exuded dissatisfaction.
I looked up in surprise.
"That"s not it, Orphelia. The words you should say now aren"t words of apology."
"Then…" My lips trembled, and he smiled gently through my blurry vision.
"It"s thank you. You should say that at times like this."
I held back the tears which were threatening to overflow again and breathed in to stop my sobs.
"Thank you very much, Lord Orpheus."
Orpheus helped me up and sat me next to him, then said as if he was scolding me, "I told you that you didn"t need to call me Lord." He wiped my tears with his thumb.
That night, Orpheus did nothing to me.
We slept next to each other since it was our first night together, but he was worried that I was tired after my long journey and did nothing but touch me from time to time.
After praising the colours of my eyes which he said "looked like the summer sky", he confessed quietly, "My father made a woman who looked like your mother his wife. He couldn"t forget the Rose Princess, Louise. My father found a woman with black hair and made her, Katherine, the Rose Princess and loved her. But, Katherine found out about this at one point and became depressed. She cheered up again after her child was born. She didn"t look at my father at all and only doted on her child. However, the child, Orpheus, died before his seventh birthday. He fell into the pond."
The gulping sound that I had heard then probably came from my throat.
I had gooseb.u.mps even though I was lying in a warm bed.
"Katherine went mad. She cried, went crazy and weaken because she"d stopped eating. At night, she would wander around the mansion looking for her child."
Until then, Orpheus had been stroking my cheek, but his hand moved to my head. I could clearly feel the warmth from his hands and the stiffness of his fingers.
However, I couldn"t see him well, even though he was next to me. It was as if he had melted into the darkness.
"My father felt guilty towards Katherine and tried to return her back to normal. Then, one day, he searched for a boy who looked like his late son and adopted him. He named him Orpheus. The boy was a year older than his late son, but Katherine was happy that her son had returned and slowly returned back to sanity. But, one day, she realised that the boy wasn"t her son and went mad. Six months later, she ended her life from despair."
Orpheus was still stroking my head.
I stared into the darkness without moving.
Only the sounds of us breathing could be heard in this silent room.
"I don"t have n.o.ble blood. My parents were commoners. A man and a woman who were like trash. I was sold in the red light district or somewhere similar to be a pet doll, and my adopted father bought me. That person, Earl Rosenberg, raised me like a real son. He protected me from my adoptive mother who went crazy and tried to kill me."
"I respect and appreciate him," Orpheus whispered. "So I had to follow his last request," he continued.
"Only Diana, Juris and Elze know about this. I wasn"t going to tell you this… but I wonder why? I wanted you to know about it. I thought it would be alright to tell you."
I exhaled slowly. I wanted to calm down my beating heart.
"That"s why we"re the same." I was still shocked, but I had muttered that by the time I"d realised. I honestly confided what I was thinking to Orpheus, "I knew it the first time I met you. You"re the same as me. We have a similar past, are equally gloomy, and somewhat distorted."
I was surprised by Orpheus"s confession but accepted it somewhere deep down. My impression of him was correct after all.
"We may certainly be the same," Orpheus said and hugged me.
When we hugged like this, I felt a strange sense of security, and all the things that had been ripped apart had finally come together.
For some reason, I felt that I had known the warmth and sensations of his arms for a long time.
Translator: Blushy
Editor: delishnoodles & SenjiQ