Everything had been merely to use her.
And yet Lea herself, not knowing even that, had worked so hard to polish the qualities of a lady, her heart fluttering and rejoicing at the occasional praise they gave her.
How stupid she must have looked.
How laughable she must have seemed.
Despairing under a fresh sense of betrayal and disappointment, she tore the embroidery apart, scattered even the five-colored threads and sewing basket across the floor, and smashed the round table and chair where she had been embroidering.
Crash!
“What in the world do you think you’re doing!”
The baron and baroness rushed out at the same time, about to rebuke Lea.
But before they could open their mouths, Lea shouted through her tears.
“You liars!”
“How dare you, you wretch!”
“It was all lies! All of it!”
The baroness glanced down at the scraps of embroidery fallen at Lea’s feet.
The Bashport family’s symbol, the monkshood, lay torn with long threads dangling from it.
It was the embroidery they had praised only last night, saying she was doing well.
It had been obvious to anyone that Lea was making it with the intention of giving it to the baron and his wife once it was finished, and they had been secretly looking forward to it.
“You said if I did this, I could be loved! By Her Majesty! By Seorin!”
“What would a woman do with being loved by another woman? Bear a child? How?”
“You said if I received an education as a lady, I could be loved!”
The baroness stepped forward in the baron’s place.
Without blinking an eye, she snapped coldly.
“The ones a lady may be loved by are, of course, men.”
“You said I would be loved by my spouse. You said there would be a happy future where my children came looking for me!”
“You fool. You are Learie Birensha. You are not Earei. Learie is an unmarried woman. Naturally, you must go into society and find yourself a husband. That is why we told you to become a lady.”
“My spouse is Seorin! I am the queen’s husband!”
“Then why did you never once question it while receiving an education as a lady until now? Why did you stay silent?”
“Because I trusted you!”
They were the only baron and baroness she had trusted and relied upon.
She had believed there was a reason and a plan behind the teachings they gave her.
But Lea had misjudged.
Because she needed somewhere to lean, she leaned on the two people who showed her a path, even if it came with violence before her eyes.
She should have questioned them, but with her soul torn apart, exhausted and weakened, she chose blind obedience like the puppy Yuri.
In truth, she did not even have the strength to judge anything, so there had been no choice at all.
This was the result.
Without even realizing it, she had been made into a tool to bring down her spouse, the queen.
Lea brought her hand to her waist.
But there was no sword there.
That provoked the baron and baroness.
“Learie Birensha. Our purpose is to turn you into a lady, debut you in society, and then gather supporters for His Highness Prince Yurien’s rebellion.”
“How is that a path to being loved!!!!”
“Do not raise your voice at my husband, you wicked thing. If you are perfect as a lady, do you think there will not be a single man to love you?”
“Madam! You clearly told me you would make me be loved. Stop playing word games like this and tell me at once how I can be loved by the person I love!”
“There is no such way.”
The baroness was a woman even colder than her husband.
“Even if you were a man, there would be no way for you to receive the queen’s love.”
“What?”
“If she had truly loved you in the first place, she would have come at least once to see the face of the husband who gave his life to win victory for her and make her king.”
The baroness’s words sank in like a dagger.
“S-surely she was busy with affairs of state….”
“How is it that the subjects of one so busy with affairs of state grow hungrier and more emaciated with each passing year? The only thing the queen has done for three years is endlessly share beds with her other husbands to produce an heir. All while leaving aside the husband of her youth, who devoted his entire life to her.”
“How do you know that? Whether she really only s-shared beds, whether the people are only starving….”
“Among the forces currently supporting His Highness the Prince, the two largest houses are we, the Cleaners of Bashport, and the Salt Striders of Nerasmun. You would not dare spout nonsense that our information is lacking or inaccurate, would you?”
The Cleaners of Bashport were like daggers that handled the royal family’s dirty work.
The Salt Striders of Nerasmun had risen through the salt trade, but in truth they were trumpeters in the shadows, carrying out vile behind-the-scenes schemes with information obtained through Sanghaewi.
In other words, they were the families most outstanding in espionage and backroom maneuvering.
Because of that, they were also houses despised among the nobility.
“You, too, though you fell into despair, shut yourself inside that mansion and did not look upon the lives of the people. You two, who rose up saying the people were weeping, have in the end neglected those people for the sake of your own problems.”
“I….”
“Do you know how much the people search for you? Every year at the Restoration Festival, they look for you. And yet the queen does not look for you, and you do not look for the people. How are you and the queen any different?”
“What exactly did I do wrong…?”
Lea poured out her resentment with her tears.
“That mansion was a prison too, so how was I supposed to come out…. I’m a fool. A fool who knows nothing but swords and war… What exactly are you telling me to do….”
Her sobs grew louder and louder, and at last Lea howled.
“You were the ones who made me a woman. You cowards! Since you made me like this, either make me able to be loved or turn me back into Earei!”
“You are Learie. Learie Birensha! Now pick up the embroidery you tore apart and threw away with your own hands, mend it, and finish it. That is the path to becoming a lady!”
“I don’t want to! I won’t! I said I won’t!”
“You wretch!!!”
The baroness raised her switch and struck Lea with a crack.
Lea did not dodge.
Instead, she endured it and glared at the baron and baroness.
“We praised you a little, coddled you a little, and now you dare climb over us?!”
The baroness beat her without pause.
“Madam…!”
“Let go!”
The baron tried to stop her, worried that the blows striking her face, nape, chest, and stomach without distinction might leave scars, but he could do nothing before the baroness’s fierce momentum.
Lea, too, clenched her teeth and endured the beating without blinking once.
Though her soul had been torn apart, her resentment was greater, so she held on without even letting out a groan.
In the end, the baroness, who tired first, flew into a rage.
“Bring the dog!”
The baron was already dragging Yuri over by the collar.
At the sight, Lea’s face turned white.
The baron drew a long dagger.
Yuri, knowing nothing, stuck out his tongue and looked up at the baron innocently as he sat.
“To be loved, one must do things worthy of being loved. You know well what end awaits those who lose favor and are cast aside!”
“No!”
When the baron raised the dagger, Lea darted forward like an arrow and threw herself over Yuri.
Hugging Yuri’s body, Lea finally clasped her hands together and begged.
“Move aside! I will teach you a lesson!”
“I was wrong. I was wrong! Please, just not Yuri…!”
He was the only being who loved her without conditions.
Sinking into endless fear that she might lose him, Lea fell into panic.
“I told you to move! Or do you want to be pierced through together with this mutt!”
“No! No! Not Yuri! I beg you like this. I overstepped my place.”
At that moment, the baroness shouted.
“What are you doing? I told you to hurry up and kill it!”
“Mother! I really was wrong!”
For an instant, for a very brief moment, silence flowed.
“What did you say!!!!!!!!”
The baroness ran over and kicked Lea, knocking her down.
In her hand was a thick suppression baton.
With that thick club, the baroness beat Lea mercilessly.
“Aaah! Ah!”
“How dare you call me Mother, you wretch! You woman who stole my son from me! How dare you!”
The baron put the dagger away.
Instead, he did not stop the baroness’s assault either.
“Did you think I was your daughter just because we gave you the name Lea! You bitch! Give me back my son! I said give me back my son!”
“Aaah!”
As she was beaten, Lea screamed.
A different sorrow from what she had felt toward the queen rose from the bottom of her heart.
She did not know why the baroness’s words sounded so cruel to her.
Only after Lea went completely limp did the beating stop.
“Wicked thing… How dare you… How dare you…!”
“That’s enough. Let us stop. At this rate, you’ll kill her.”
The baron supported Lea.
“Uuuuuh….”
When the baron took her by the shoulders and raised her up, Lea burst into tears.
Her sobbing grew and grew, and Lea cried piteously as she wiped her tears with her arms and sleeves, her clothes torn from how much she had been beaten.
“Waaaaaaah…!”
As she cried with her pretty face distorted, she did not look ugly so much as pitiful and heartbreaking.
Even as she moved away, that crying sound somehow weighed on the baroness’s heart.
And painfully so.
“Mother! I really was wrong!”
The desperate dependence and plea unconsciously cried out by someone with nowhere to lean pressed heavily upon her chest.
As if he knew it, Yuri leaned his body against the baroness’s leg and sat there.
“My child….”
For both the baroness and the baron, it was a day when they missed, with unbearable longing, the son who had died in the rebellion, having no choice but to uphold his loyalty.