CH 33

“Lady!” 

Brielle grabbed her arm, but Asela struggled and barely pulled her away. 

“Let me go! I’ll tell the Duke everything. Do you think I’ll just let you live in silence?!” 

“Wait a minute, Lady! Lady!” 

Asela laughed at Brielle’s urgent call. 

“Why? Do you still want to deceive him more? You don’t seem to have any conscience!” 

“It’s not like that…” 

“You are the daughter of a maid… no, you’re not even the real daughter?! On the subject of beggars abandoned in the forest! Do you think the Duke would keep you in this position even after knowing this?” 

Unable to control her anger, she raised one hand high.

At that moment, she felt that someone was standing in front of Brielle, who closed her eyes tightly.

“….?” 

When Brielle opened her eyes, Maximilian stood there with a hardened face.

“Du…ke.” 

Brielle called him with a trembling voice.

But she soon turned her head away, closing her eyes tightly, wondering if she could dare to call on him. 

‘It’s… over.’

She could hear him sighing low. Naturally, he would be very angry.

“Duke! In case you didn’t know until now, that woman…!”

Behind him, Asela began to speak in an excited voice.

Brielle bit her lip.

‘At least… I didn’t want to let you know like this.’

Borrowing someone else’s mouth, and even through Asela, who behaves so loudly, to let her truth be known. 

Feeling ashamed, Brielle lowered her head even more.

“I know.”

“Of course, you didn’t know—what?” 

“I already knew that my wife was not ‘Asela Darrington.’

“Yes…?” 

It wasn’t only Asela who was flustered. For a moment, Brielle’s mind also went blank. 

He knows, since… when? How?

“From the beginning.”

Answering that, Maximilian stood facing Asela.

“I knew it from the first moment I saw her.”

“L, lie! Then why…” 

When asked why he forced the marriage, he didn’t answer. 

Instead, he turned to Benson, who had come right next to him and gave orders.

“Take the sinner with you. She is the one who threatened the Duchess.” 

“Yes.”

Benson immediately grabbed Asela’s arm, and she begged Maximilian with her bewildered face. 

“D, Duke! The impostor is that woman! I am your real wife! You can’t do this to me!”

Even with that urgent statement, Maximilian still responded in a calm tone. 

“The word you mentioned earlier that you will kill someone can be punished as a threat.” 

“No, that…I don’t mean to kill that woman! 

“She loves her mother more than anyone else. It’s a crime of intimidation. Take her now.”

Asela continued to scream as Benson dragged her along.

That woman is a impostor. 

Everyone’s just being deceived, and she said she was actually a maid. I’m the real Duchess.

But no one reacted to it.

Brielle watched Asela being dragged away, then quietly turned her head to look at Maximilian’s back.

He stood motionless.

* * *

Brielle thought she must be an idiot.

The incident occurred a moment ago, and there was as much as she had to say to Maximilian.

She had to apologize and thank him, and she also had to tell him the truth that she had been hiding until now.

But what she managed to bring up was.

“Even if a pregnant woman is a sinner, she has the right to be guaranteed a room with a stove.” 

She was only concerned about Asela’s child.

She thought it was something she should say, but wouldn’t there have been something more proper than this? 

“…I see.” 

Just by looking at Maximilian’s slightly distorted face, she could tell that her words weren’t quite right. 

“If it wasn’t for a pregnant woman…” 

“…Yes?”

“…No. I will treat her fairly. according to the law.”

Why does he seem regretful? It was probably Brielle’s misunderstanding. 

“…And.” 

She raised her hand near her heart and took a shaky breath.

“I apologize, Duke.”

Brielle bent down deeply.

“What she said was not wrong at all. I have enjoyed a lot of rights by taking this position as a impostor.” 

“….” 

“I…” 

Brian bit her lip for a moment because it was so embarrassing to say this to the guy she like. 

“…I’m a impostor.”

“Did you not hear?”

“Yes?”

Brielle barely raised her head at his question.

“I have not been deceived.”

“B, but…” 

“I knew it from the beginning.”

“That can’t be true. If you knew…” 

“Did I ever call you ‘Asela’?”

“….” 

There wasn’t.

But she thought their relationship was so distant that they didn’t call their names—.

“S, still, I’m a fake in a marriage organized by the king. It’s a problem.”

Brielle tried to prove her guilt somehow. For some reason, it seemed that Maximilian was defending her.

“Even the king knows.”

“Yes?!”

“The royal family is not a place that can be fooled so easily.”]]

“But how…?”

“I said I’ll proceed with it.” 

“Why…?” 

He thought for a moment and looked away.

Brielle waited anxiously but didn’t get an answer after a while.

“…I don’t know.” 

It was only vague words that he himself was a little troubled.

“Did you sympathize with me?”

“It’s not like that.” 

“Or… did it not matter to you whoever it is?” 

Brielle knew that Maximilian’s fiancee married Lysander, the king, to become a queen.

Could it be that his fiancee’s betrayal had deep scars? 

Enough to marry anyone.

“It was never… good for anyone.”

However, Maximilian immediately denied this.

“You’re not an impostor.” 

“I wasn’t fooled in the first place.  I’d rather ask for forgiveness for deceiving you.”

Brielle stared at his handsome face and finally opened her mouth.

“…this is ridiculous.”

Her voice trembled.

Brielle felt deep remorse that she had even dared to feel “relief.”

Her ungrateful heart beat like crazy, raising her expectations for Maximilian.

Maybe she’ll be allowed to be by his side for a while or something like that—.

‘No, someone like me….’

Maximilian was a Prince. 

He was a man of royalty, for real, not only metaphor. For such a noble man to have a maidservant as his wife.

Brielle’s existence would become his stain.

‘…Even so.’

From his words that he was not deceived and that no one was good, Brielle hated herself for having strange expectations. 

“You shouldn’t cry.”

After hearing his words quietly, Brielle realized tears welled in her eyes.

“I, I’m sorry. How dare I.”

Brielle quickly wiped away her tears with her sleeve.

“I wasn’t trying to buy sympathy. I don’t mean that at all….” 

Brielle quickly added an explanation in case he misunderstood the meaning of the tears. It really wasn’t like that.

Rather, Brielle wanted him to be as strict as usual.

“There is no such misunderstanding. I just…” 

The man seen through the blurry vision of Brielle seemed somehow troubled.

“I was just in trouble because I didn’t know what to call you or comfort you.”

“…Yes?” 

Maximilian held out the handkerchief he had taken from his bosom.

“I wanted to ask your name.”

And somehow, he dropped his gaze elsewhere.

“It… has always been like that.”

* * *

Maximilian was the eldest son of the previous king.

Naturally, he has been educated as a lumber that will one day become king.

However, when his mother died suddenly, and Amelda, the king’s second wife, became a queen, the situation changed completely instantly.

In addition, when the death of the late king followed shortly after, Amelda used the influence of her wealthy parents to make her son ‘Lysander’ succeed to the throne.

On the other hand, Maximilian was pushed out of the position of a successor as it was, as he didn’t have a family that could be called his mother’s family. 

In addition to this, when Maximilian’s fiancee announces her marriage to Lysander, he truly loses everything.

A fiancee from a traditional family must have been his last hope.

However, Maximilian didn’t show resentment towards his fiancee, who unilaterally notified him of the breakup or hatred towards his younger brother. 

On the contrary, he personally attended the wedding of the two and congratulated them.

The relaxed appearance has made people wonder if Maximilian has any other hope.

Such rumors raised Amelda’s anxiety.

Because the son who became king after a long time shouldn’t be deprived of his position. 

She thought of a way to make Maximilian fall even further.

The first was to appoint him as lord of Sheridan, a barren castle to the north.

Also, Amelda instigated her son to marry Maximilian to the Count of Darrington, who had neither wealth nor power. 

There was no response from Maximilian to this marriage. It was a royal marriage.

The couple, who were forced to marry, met for the first time in Sheridan and immediately had a modest ceremony.