Ascendance of a Bookworm (LN) - Volume 4.5 - Chapter SS2

Reaching a Crossroads

The time at which guard knights of the archducal family were able to return home depended on the day—sometimes they wouldn’t finish work until sixth bell, while those on night watch wouldn’t finish until the following morning. In most cases, my husband Lord Lamprecht would return before seventh bell, after I had eaten dinner and bathed.

“Lady Aurelia, Lord Lamprecht has returned.”

The announcement came from Riadina, the attendant who had accompanied me to Ehrenfest. I would go without my veil when she and I were the only two in my room, usually when I was lounging around after my bath, but I always put it back on when there was even the slightest chance of someone else seeing me.

“It truly is a shame that you hide your perfect golden-blonde hair,” she continued. “Your dark-green eyes too, a little sharp and raised though they may be.”

“I would not wear this veil so obstinately were I not married into a Leisegang’s family,” I replied. “It would be unthinkable for me to remove it when Lady Elvira is already far from welcoming of me. I can hardly imagine how much her mood would worsen if she knew my face.”

I suppose the only people in this duchy who have seen beneath my veil are Lord Lamprecht and Riadina...

Lord Lamprecht and I had shared very little time together in the Royal Academy, owing to the fact he was a few years above my own, and nobody else from Ehrenfest had seen my face. Nothing good would have come from it.

After all, my resting expression is identical to the one Lady Gabriele would make following her marriage into Ehrenfest, when she would craft vicious plots. My face is going to be despised here.

Lady Gabriele’s appearance was preserved only in a few portraits in Ahrensbach. It had not been until Lady Georgine mentioned my likeness to her grandmother, based on pictures her mother had, that I was made aware of my plight.

Ever since I was a little girl, people had told me that I looked as though I were scheming something awful and that my eyes carried the cruelness of some base villain. That was bad enough, but now I had married into a family who reviled and cursed my likeness—a fact that had only been revealed to me during the tea party before my wedding. How could the gods be so cruel, truly?

There is no doubt that I will be subject to even more awful misunderstandings than before. I would never take the risk of removing my veil.

There was a magic circle sewn into my veil which prevented the material from obstructing my vision, and only once Riadina had aided me in putting it on did I permit Lord Lamprecht and his attendants to enter the room. Lord Lamprecht sat down next to me, took out a letter of invitation, and then handed me a sound-blocking magic tool.

“Aurelia, this here is an invitation from Mother,” he explained. “Rozemyne and Lady Florencia are holding a tea party at the beginning of autumn to advertise some newly dyed pieces of cloth. Seems like they want you to join. Riadina will need to stay behind, unfortunately. Mother is going to be selecting your attendant instead. So, what do you think?” He checked that I was holding the magic tool and then added, “Mother’s deeply involved with this event, what with Rozemyne being her daughter. If you refuse to attend, it’s going to be a lot harder for you to get into the Florencia faction.”

I was following my mother-in-law Lady Elvira’s instructions and refusing any contact with the former Veronica faction, who held deep connections with Lady Georgine, but I had not yet socialized enough to enter her and Lady Rozemyne’s faction.

“It seems that Mother intends to give you some time to get used to living in Ehrenfest and then invite you to tea parties and the like once you’ve taken off your veil, but—”

“I could never,” I interrupted, reaching to secure the fabric that covered my face.

Lord Lamprecht smiled. “I won’t force you to remove it. Mother wants you in the faction no matter what, but if you don’t think you can handle this, I don’t mind if you decide not to participate.”

“But my relationship with Lady Elvira would...” I began, but my words failed me. It was a suggestion that felt as though it would destroy not only my relationship with Lady Elvira as her daughter-in-law but Lamprecht’s relationship with her as her son.

“Well, at the very least, I’m prepared to leave home,” Lord Lamprecht said. “You don’t need to force yourself if you think you won’t be able to handle entering Mother’s faction. I’d rather hear your decision sooner rather than later, though, since I’ll need to find a new home for us.” He spoke with a joking smile, but his light-blue eyes were completely serious; he seemed genuinely prepared to leave his home.

“Lord Lamprecht...”

“I mean it. Now that Lord Wilfried is engaged, he’s in place to be the next archduke. And with you being wed into the duchy, the nobles of the former Veronica faction are rising up. You saw how many letters of invitation you’re getting, right? Even if we end up running from home, the former Veronica faction will welcome us with open arms. I... I’m not going to force you to live locked up like this, with your face hidden forever.”

“But is Lady Elvira not on guard against the former Veronica faction because of all the dangerous people it contains?” I asked. “There are those who attacked Lady Rozemyne and the other archduke candidates.”

Before my marriage into Ehrenfest, Lady Georgine and my father had made it sound as though the duchy resented Ahrensbach solely because of a wrong committed several generations ago. Lady Elvira had explained that there was much more to it than that, however, so I was hesitant to approach the former Veronica faction.

“Now that Lord Wilfried is guaranteed to be the next archduke, the archducal family will probably start trying to absorb the former Veronica faction again,” Lord Lamprecht said. “Lord Wilfried will lead the former Veronica faction while Lady Rozemyne leads the Leisegang faction, and when they are married, the two factions will fuse together.”

His eyes sparkled as he spoke of the future, but I remained skeptical. Perhaps it was due to me being fundamentally pessimistic or my own marriage situation having changed so many times, but I could not imagine the future Lord Lamprecht envisioned actually coming to pass. The future was always unexpected.

“If you’re finding life hard right now or you’d rather socialize with the former Veronica faction than with Rozemyne and my mother’s, tell me. We can pick either faction right now. I... I don’t want to disrespect my first wife like Father did,” Lord Lamprecht said, eyeing me closely. His feelings were no doubt honest. He had always been a bit clumsy with personal matters, ever since the first time we met, but he was not one to lie or attempt to deceive others.

“I am not opposed to remaining here; I was exposed to such malice in Ahrensbach that I am quite used to staying within the confines of my home. However, Lord Lamprecht... If you are so strong in your faith, why did you agree with Lady Elvira’s request for us to move here and avoid contact with the former Veronica faction?”

“Mother’s faction is in power right now. Rozemyne’s churning out one trend after another, and everyone in the Royal Academy knows it. I thought you’d find it easier living here if you joined her faction too, and if you can adjust to things here, I think that’s for the best. But there are some things that just can’t be forced. We have a choice, so I think it’s best for you to make your own decision.”

I had spent my entire life following orders from Lady Georgine and my father, seldom making any decisions of my own. But now, whether I liked it or not, I was faced with an exceedingly important crossroads. I quaked as I realized that I would need to make a choice.

“I should mention—since Rozemyne is heading this event, I’m sure it will be safe. Why not try socializing with Mother’s faction and then making a decision after that?” Lord Lamprecht asked. I was quite grateful to have an opportunity to socialize before choosing a side, but it was still possible that attending would cause me great suffering.

“I am told that Lady Rozemyne was once attacked by an Ahrensbach noble,” I said. “Is it not possible that she would vent her frustrations on me?”

Lord Lamprecht shook his head. “Rozemyne would never be mean to someone who’s innocent. She’s a really kind girl. She showed compassion to the temple’s orphans, and she saved my lord when he was a breath away from being expelled from the archducal family.”

He had seized this opportunity to brag about his little sister, as he so often did, so I took a moment to recollect my thoughts. I recalled the small figure I had seen at the border gate, chastising her guard knights at the Starbind Ceremony and granting a wondrous blessing.

“I will think it over carefully,” I said. “I shan’t keep you waiting for my response.”

“This’ll be a big decision for you, Aurelia, so think about it as much as you need to. I’ll see you later,” Lord Lamprecht replied. He retrieved the sound-blocking magic tool he had given me and then lifted my veil just enough to kiss me on the cheek, near my lips. He held up his cape a little such that his attendants could not see the slivers of my face he exposed in the process.

Going that far will only make people even more curious about my appearance!

I would normally scold him whenever he teased me like this, but I was so relieved and overjoyed that he would protect my wish to hide my face that my frustrations quickly washed away. Once again, I simply could not be angry at him.

I watched Lord Lamprecht leave with his attendants and then let out a sigh. “What do you think, Riadina?” I asked from where I was seated. “I was told that I may choose a faction on my own, but as you know, I am not well accustomed to making decisions.”

Riadina had lost her husband in the purge following the civil war, and as a second wife, she had been unable to return to her family or stay in her current home. My mother had taken her as an attendant, saving her, and when my mother passed, Riadina was assigned to me instead. She had been with me ever since I was a child, so she knew me better than most.

“To think you were not even permitted to select your own course in the Royal Academy...” Riadina reminisced. “You had wanted to be a scholar or an attendant, but you were ordered to take the knight course, since Lady Alstede was lacking in apprentice guard knights.”

“Indeed,” I replied. “It all worked out well in the end, though. Had I not taken the knight course, I would presumably not have met Lord Lamprecht. Fate truly does work in strange ways.”

I had met Lord Lamprecht while Lady Veronica still maintained power in Ehrenfest; he had been instructed to marry a woman from Ahrensbach, as the guard knight of the next archduke. Retainers of the archducal family were required to spend a great deal of time with the one they served, leaving their homes unattended, and this was especially true for guard knights. Lord Lamprecht had known that marrying someone from another duchy who could not understand this would only cause problems, so he had socialized specifically with apprentice knights from Ahrensbach.

Around the same time, I was taking the knight course at my father’s behest, all so that I could serve Lady Georgine’s daughter Lady Alstede. I still remembered how empty those days had made me feel.

“It had already been decided that Lady Alstede would marry an archnoble upon her graduation,” I recalled. “She would only remain a member of the archducal family for two years at most, regardless of whether I was in her service. It was upsetting beyond words to learn that Father had decided my future purely to make Lady Alstede’s last couple years in the Royal Academy as convenient as possible.”

“By that time, the archduke’s first wife was already falling ill, and the archduke was planning on raising Lady Georgine to his second wife,” Riadina said. “Your father must have wanted to form as strong of a connection with her as possible before then.”

Father had been pleased to earn Lady Georgine’s favor, even if only a little, but I soon found there was no place for me in any of the friendship groups the other apprentice knights had already formed. I would often retreat to the knight building under the guise of training simply to evade them.

It was there that I found the opportunity to speak with Lord Lamprecht. At first, he had simply asked me to introduce him to the other girls; I was three years his junior and he had not been able to sense my mana, so he had not seen me as someone worth romancing. At the time, however, Lord Lamprecht was already a sixth-year. He was too late to begin socializing, and in contrast to its reputation today, Ehrenfest was viewed as a completely unattractive duchy. Nobody in a greater duchy like Ahrensbach would wish to marry into a bottom-ranking duchy like Ehrenfest.

“You will struggle to convince anyone who is not desperate to leave Ahrensbach,” I had said to him at the time. “Indeed, anyone who does not wish to leave as I do...”

“Well then, Lady Aurelia, would you come to Ehrenfest with me?” Lord Lamprecht had replied. “Lady Veronica would rejoice to have you, and your presence will aid our house in getting closer with the Veronica faction.”

I had smiled and agreed, thinking of nothing but escaping my father. Of course, Father refused the idea outright, stating that he would not permit me to marry into a bottom-ranking duchy like Ehrenfest, and to an archnoble with so little mana. He eventually agreed to allow Lord Lamprecht to escort me at his graduation, to serve as one last memory before our farewell, but even that required a great deal of negotiating.

“Yet, despite resolving to be separated from Lord Lamprecht, we ended up married nonetheless...” I mused.

“That, too, was an order,” Riadina said. “How do you feel about your present lifestyle? I believe Lord Lamprecht has placed this decision in your hands because he cannot imagine that someone on guard enough to wear a veil even in her own room is content.”

I pondered the question. I had always thought that I would rather stay inside forever than be exposed to the malice of the outside world, so the fact that I could not leave my home did not bother me in the slightest. What did bother me, however, was being kept under surveillance at all times by Lady Elvira’s servants. They were watching to ensure that nobles of the former Veronica faction could not contact me, but it was painfully exhausting. In a sense, it was like having hostile enemies all around.

“There is one thing I would change,” I said with a sigh. “I wish for Lady Elvira to accept that I will not be removing my veil. That is all. There are still portraits of Lady Gabriele here, I am told, and the wizened old men of the Leisegangs consider her visage one to be reviled. I could not live in peace as the object of their scorn, so I intend to keep my face obscured.”

I understood that entering Lady Rozemyne and Lady Elvira’s faction was the best move for me, but it was hard to imagine that those who had been abused by Lady Veronica and suffered from Lady Gabriele being wed into the duchy would ever welcome me.

“The dyeing competition is no exception. I am going to be nervous on my own without you, Riadina, but... as long as I may wear my veil, I am willing to participate. For the sake of bettering my own future.”

“Then please inform Lord Lamprecht,” Riadina said. “If you state your wish honestly, he will certainly move to accommodate it.”

“So, how was the dyeing event?” Lord Lamprecht asked upon my return, his eyes tinged with concern. He had requested the afternoon off work to check up on me, and I had returned to my room while giggling about the events of the day—much to Riadina’s surprise.

“Lady Rozemyne is just one surprise after another,” I said. “I was struck with the urge to leave when I was asked to remove my veil, but... when I expressed my resistance, Lady Rozemyne suggested that I simply procure a new veil dyed using Ehrenfest’s new method, to prove my desire to assimilate into the duchy. Lady Elvira even said that, under these new circumstances, she would permit me to continue covering my face.”

It would take some time to redo the embroidery, but that was no issue; I had nothing but time on my hands, and to be permitted to continue wearing my veil, I would go to whatever lengths were necessary.

“The design on the new cloth is quite adorable,” I continued. “Lady Rozemyne said that she will gift some to me.”

“Quite... adorable?” Lord Lamprecht repeated.

“Yes. I am very fond of adorable designs. It was not one I would have picked on my own, as it would have stood out in unflattering contrast to the cruelness in my eyes, but being able to hide my face means this matters not. It was Lady Rozemyne who explained this to me, and although it may not have been the most appropriate thing to say to a woman agonizing over her appearance, I could tell that she had spoken for my sake. The contrast between her standing proud at her suggestion and her retainers floundering in an attempt to stop her from speaking was so amusing that I was barely able to contain my laughter.”

“Oh my. That is quite something...” Riadina said, likewise unable to contain her laughter.

I returned my attention to Lord Lamprecht, who was listening with a grin. “However, she had most likely been told to make this suggestion so that she could then acquire information on Ahrensbach,” I said. “She asked me a great many questions.”

His expression hardened in an instant. “Questions like...?” he prompted me, leaning forward defensively.

“She wanted to know about any famous knight stories in Ahrensbach, and she asked me how many books there are in the book room of Ahrensbach’s castle,” I explained, struggling to keep a straight face.

“Huh? How many... books?”

“Yes. She focused entirely on books, as though she were concerned with nothing else. Lady Florencia and Lady Elvira did their best to dress things up and return to more normal topics of conversation, but nobody could stop Lady Rozemyne. I was so swept up in her enthusiasm that I even told the story of a sea feybeast being slain. This manner of story is quite rare in Ehrenfest, it seems, as all those at the tea party—not just Lady Rozemyne—listened in rapt attention.”

It was an exceedingly commonplace story told to me by my wet nurse, but Lady Rozemyne had listened with sparkling eyes, and the air in the room had softened before I realized. The tea party had ended up inviting and peaceful, unlike any I had experienced in Ahrensbach.

“Oh, Riadina. That reminds me. Lady Rozemyne has asked for the fish we brought with us. She wishes to try developing new recipes,” I said.

“She desires the ingredients themselves, not the already-cooked meals?” Riadina asked, sounding troubled.

I nodded. “She said that my desire for Ahrensbach cooking is only natural, and that she intends to couple our ingredients with Ehrenfest seasoning to create a new dish. She was also very grateful, since this is something that has only been made possible by my presence. I had thought of throwing away the fish due to the mana expenditure, but it seems they are going to be of more value than expected.”

It had been quite startling to see Lady Rozemyne lean forward with such interest and passionately rant about creating a new trend using Ahrensbach ingredients. Her enthusiasm had served to heal my emotional wounds from when the meals I prepared were spitefully replaced with raw ingredients, which was my reason for having them in the first place.

“Lady Rozemyne found the good in so many things that I could not,” I continued. “She embraced them with a smile, and it is thanks to her that I realized my mistake in thinking that Lady Elvira was not welcoming me.”

On the carriage journey home after the event, Lady Elvira had quietly said to me, “I see that you are in fact not unwilling to embrace Ehrenfest.” Her tone was no different from usual, and yet she sounded so much kinder that I ended up blinking in surprise. “It seems that you are different from Lady Gabriele, who looked down upon Ehrenfest and made no attempt to naturalize. Today’s tea party has proven as such, much to my relief.”

Only then had I realized how my obstinate refusal to remove my veil had appeared to others. To Lady Elvira, I had seemed exactly like Lady Gabriele, who had refused to adapt to Ehrenfest. It was exactly the opposite of what I wanted. After hurriedly rejecting the idea, I explained that I was almost identical in appearance to Lady Gabriele, and that I wished to continue wearing my veil to avoid the disdain of the Leisegangs’ old men.

“Lamprecht said the same a few days ago, but I simply could not believe that you resemble her enough to warrant taking such drastic measures,” Lady Elvira had said. “May I see your face, even just for a moment? I have seen portraits of Lady Gabriele, so I can tell you how the elderly will respond.”

Now reassured that I meant no harm, Lady Elvira had insisted on seeing my face. I had obliged her.

“And then?” Lord Lamprecht asked. “What did Mother say?”

“She said that she will accept me into her faction once the new veil is complete and embroidered,” I said. “Its similar appearance to the clothing of those in her faction will indicate to everyone the choice I have made. She will encircle me such that members of the former Veronica faction cannot easily approach, and she will provide assistance even when I am speaking with the elderly Leisegangs.”

Upon learning that I did indeed look identical to Lady Gabriele, Lady Elvira had provided me with her full support. Never before had I felt so strong of heart.

“Aurelia, does that mean—”

“Yes. I have decided to join Lady Rozemyne and Lady Elvira’s faction—to live as a woman of Ehrenfest, not as a noble of Ahrensbach with the former Veronica faction. Lord Lamprecht, I hope for your support.”

I had chosen Ehrenfest over my homeland, thereby cementing my fate as a recluse. I was not entirely isolated, however—my newly strengthened relationship with Lady Elvira offered some opportunity to socialize as she began inviting me for tea and meals in the main building and to her meetings with merchants. In turn, the servants assigned to me seemed to grow warmer as well.

Soon enough, the cloth from Lady Rozemyne arrived. I poured my all into embroidering it, embracing the reclusive lifestyle I had always wanted.