CH 67

Lydia leaned against the window and endured the cold as she watched Gareth head back towards the castle. Smiling, she returned to the fireplace when Gareth completely disappeared from her sight. It had already been a week since Gareth had been hovering around Elena like this. It was a well known fact that there had been an argument between the two a while ago; everyone couldn’t help but notice since Gareth had burned a closet in the middle of the night.

As soon as she saw the scar on Elena’s face, Lydia smiled in relief. Lydia already knew whose clothes Elena had been wearing, but she had coaxed a loose-lipped maid to confirm her speculations and had found out that they were from Gareth’s mother. This explained why Gareth’s face had been full of guilt lately, since he had let Elena down and burned his mother’s closet.

“He’s awfully caring about his family…” Lydia muttered to herself. The flames in the fireplace swayed from the wind coming through the tiny cracks between the windows and walls. “I think this will be a good time to start. I hope everything will go according to plan…” Mumbling to herself, Lydia hugged her cold body.

Lydia knew that if she dragged out her plan any longer then it would put stress on her body, which meant that there was a chance she couldn’t see the glorious results of her cunning plan. ‘The only problem is the timing. When would be a good time to initiate it? Should I drive that Elena further into a corner first?’

Lydia had already started spreading a newly fabricated rumor. She had told her maids that Gareth had burned the closet out of nowhere in the middle of the night because Elena wanted him to get rid of the remaining traces of the duke’s family in the estate. Even before Lydia had spread these rumors, the people already thought of Elena as an evil woman who was mean to Lydia. They thought that Elena had mistreated and confined the royal princess Lydia, who was bearing Gareth’s child, in a room. And now, they were going to think of her as a crazy wench who was trying to erase the traces of the late duke’s family.

“Ha!” Lydia scoffed with a cruel smile on her scarlet lips. She knew the power that rumors held in an isolated estate like this. The more isolated people were, the more curious they were about another person’s affairs, their curiosity sometimes causing them to blindly accept speculations and rumors. Lydia had influenced the people’s thoughts without them knowing by providing them something to talk about. These simple but isolated people had become more fond of Lydia as she was the royal princess, as opposed to Elena, the daughter of Count Townsend, despite her being the woman Gareth had brought back. This was why Lydia had arrived at the estate earlier than Gareth—to start a rumor and solidify it into a fact. After all, Lydia’s special ability was to manipulate others’ minds.

During her time at the estate, Lydia had continued to provide the people with topics to gossip about. In addition, an actual argument had erupted between Gareth and Elena a few days ago, which had satisfied the people’s curiosity as well as led them to believe Elena was indeed giving Lydia the cold shoulder. The people’s lord, Gareth, was stuck between two women; it was no wonder why the rumors had spread like wildfire.

In any case, it was Lydia who had the people’s attention first. She was confident that the people of this estate weren’t going to accept Elena as the lady of the household no matter how hard she tried, since they already thought of Lydia, who was carrying Gareth’s child, as his wife. After the incident, the people were only more likely to side with Lydia and be her witnesses.

“It’s about time for the king’s messenger to arrive…” Lydia thought back to her meticulously calculated plan. The king had always picked at Lydia’s brain but was ignoring her now just because she was a woman. ‘He would have never even dreamt that a woman would dare to confront him… That’s why he would spit out all sorts of words when he was drunk.’ Lydia’s lips slowly formed a vicious smile. ‘Just you wait, Halbert.’

Lydia thought back to the summer when she had deliberately thrown suggestive words at the king before leaving the city. It was a time when Viscount Nar had realized the king’s intentions to expand the capital’s borders to his estate and had protested against it. The king had been greatly offended by the viscount’s reaction and Lydia had tried to comfort him.