Chapter 166

Chapter 166: Ch. 165: Eat Your Veggies

“Woah there, Angel! My hair is not food! Same with you, Devil.”

I set down my overeager bunnies and they run across my bedroom floor in circles, more hyper than 5-year-old me on sugar.

“Is this what children are like?” I ask Marie as she instructs a maid to bring them carrots.

She shakes her head ruefully. “Children are much a little worse but just as delightful.” There is a wistfulness and affection in her eyes that I can attribute to her nephew. As someone who is well in her middle-aged years, I’m happy that there is someone participating in Marie’s life to a degree that I cannot.

“How is Lief?” Fluffs of rabbit fur float off of me as I give myself a good shake.

“Oh, he’s marvelous,” she gushes. “Quite taken with Radovalsk. I think he wants to settle down permanently in the city and never return to our village, no matter how much I’ve urged him to do so.”

But I can hardly spare a thought on Lief as I think on an earlier exchange between myself and the best dressmaker in all of Radovalsk...

.....

EARLIER THAT DAY...

“I’m delighted that you are here,” I cheerfully tell Lady Arabella as she curtsies in my presence.

“The pleasure is all mine, your highness.” Her fingers drop her skirt and I can’t help but notice how thin they’ve become, how weary she looks.

It’s like plucking a flower and watching it die prematurely, the lush petals shriveling and tumbling off. Its strong stem covered in thorny armor runs and withers, snapping within a matter of days so that the bloom hunches over like a senior citizen. It’s a tragic sight, especially when magnified on the young Arabella who is a few years my junior if we are going by my real age.

“You are well?” I inquire, leading her to take a seat with me on the cushioned ottoman at the center of my dressing room. She nods but her hand feels ice cold.

“It’s not good to lie, Arabella. Lying is a sin according to the Holy Church,” I remind her, quoting the abominable place in the hopes that it will encourage her to be honest. Ever since Sir Berrick, pardon my French, Lord Berrick now, returned from slaying a dragon much like his late father-in-law, he has been venerated and exalted by the people.

In the past, there seemed to be a layer of immunity surrounding Lady Arabella once she’d settled into her horrible marriage. On top of her father being a famous and praised knight, she also ran a luxury couturier beloved by the imperial family and the top echelons of nobility. But now, with both husband and wife of them on equal societal footing, he’s been exercising his control even more than before. I cannot begin to imagine what she goes through living with that beast of a man. Every time I see her, her under eyes grow more hollow and her dresses grow looser faster than she can tailor them to her diminishing size.

That animal she’s been married to against her will deserves to be locked up in a cage and drowned. But unfortunately, like most of the worst beasts in society, he was lucky enough to be born rich and noble. The kind of people that are forged in the finery, opulence, and exclusivity of nobility are rarely the good sort I’ve come to learn, no matter how many fairytales there are about gentle princesses, charitable duchesses, and valiant princes.

Arabella opens her mouth a few times, but no sound comes out. Her bottom jaw trembles and it seems for a moment that she will cry. But nothing comes out of her eyes. She just shakes and shakes, like a leaf caught in a fierce wind named Berrick.

“I’m fine, your highness. Just fine. Thank you for asking,” she whispers.

I place a hand on her knee. “You don’t always have to be fine. I know no one else may wish to see the truth of your marriage, but I am here for you. Truly.”

“I-” Her voice hitches, stick-thin fingers digging into the fabric of her dress. “I was with child but... I lost it. That is it. Truly. It happens to many women, your highness. Although, I’m sure t-that such you are in such good health you will easily carry to term.”

“I’m sorry, Arabella,” I say sincerely, warming her hands with my body heat while simultaneously checking her for injuries. She did indeed lose a child, a faint pain rippling through my lower stomach in a way that is reminiscent of a period cramp from my last life. But I also feel the terrible bruise that sits atop the skin of her belly, the culprit no doubt of her miscarriage.

I’m filled with rage, a tea kettle about to blow. But I don’t feel it would be right for me to try to wring the truth out of the despondent woman, especially when I just felt it on my own flesh.

“You know,” I begin to urge her, “I meant it when I said that there is a way for you to leave. I am a princess. I do not lie. Most of the time.”

Lady Arabella giggles softly at my joke.

“Lady Arabella,” I plea, taking both her hands so she can only look me in the eye. “I want to help you. You don’t have to agree, but, you don’t have to condemn yourself to this forever.”

“You are so young... how are you so wise?” The older girl shakes her head in disbelief.

Because I’m actually older than you. “Because I eat my vegetables,” I quip without missing a beat.

She chuckles, giggles, then bursts into a flood of tears. The dam has burst.

“Leave?” Lady Arabella hiccuped, her wave of tears slowly ebbing as hatred fills her eyes. “More than wanting to leave, I want revenge. I need revenge.”

“Revenge?” I parrot. Such a delicious word, it tastes better than chocolate as I savor it on my tongue.

But my good friend mistakes my repetition for hesitation and withdraws from my touch.

“Forgive me, your highness. I overstepped,” she hastily says, growing pink with embarrassment.

“That sounds brilliant,” I finish my sentence, a gleeful grin overtaking my face.

“Your highness?” Lady Arabella blinks rapidly, confusion marring her rounder features that have lost some of their softness over the years.

“Make me a beautiful dress, Arabella. While you do that, I will tell you the best way to ruin a man. You have to attack his manhood,” I begin to lecture as she pulls out a tape measure in bewilderment. “Both the literal one on his body and the figurative one embodied in his livelihood and reputation...”

“Your highness!” But measuring and dressmaking come second nature to Lady Arabella. Even as she gapes in shock at my barely veiled allusions to the male anatomy, her hands are still busying about her kit.

“Yes?” I drawl, hopping up from the ottoman and slightly startling her. She has become so jumpy over the years.

“Your highness...” she stares down at her hands. “I’m not worth your effort. Although I will treasure your care forever in my heart and work for you as long as I can. But I cannot in good conscience drag a princess into my family matters. On my dead father’s honor, I cannot do such a thing.”

I stepped up onto the elevated footstool I am always measured on. “I’ve grown haven’t I?”

The edge of my skirt, which is noticeably already a few centimeters higher from the ground than it should be even though I had this dress made at the start of spring, is brought to center stage as I kick it up in delight. My days of being a pocket-sized princess are coming to an end.

“P-Pardon?” More rapid, confused blinking ensues to my delight. If you cannot already tell, I do love keeping people on their toes during a conversation.

“Don’t you know, Arabella? I’m not the same child who could easily disguise herself as a street urchin, hoping and praying that you wouldn’t laugh at a child revealing herself to be your endorser, Pandora, and being left to the whims of everyone in power.”

It’s partially a lie. I am still left open to the whims of some people in power. But the list is considerably shorter than it was back then and most notably, no longer consists of Peppermint.

“Besides I want a little revenge too. Lord Berrick has... wronged me in many ways,” I murmur, not wishing to share with Lady Arabella just how psychotic her husband is.

She holds a few samples of fabrics to my bare arms to check how they would suit me. “He has wronged many,” she agrees, thankfully not picking up on the darker undertones of my response. “It is because he is aligned with the Duvernay family, so they shield him from many of the repercussions. They also arranged his marriage to me.”

The corner of her lip curls. “My father, he was not a very good father to me. But he gave me his name and brought us to a life not available to most commoner knights. But now that man,” she says of Lord Berrick, not daring to call him her husband. “Has taken advantage of my father’s good name to establish himself in the military and he is more than happy to discard it now that it has finished serving its purpose.”

An arm curls around her belly protectively and I inadvertently gain a little context into how her child was lost.

“So you will accept my aid then?” I offer once again, the serpent offering Eve an apple. I can tell it is against her better nature, but I can also see that she has been hurt and stepped on one too many times. One simple yes and I will be able to enact my own vengeance through her as well.

A common misconception people have is that if you turn the other cheek often enough, the person harming you will stop. But that is simply not true. My youth taught me that. This marriage has taught Arabella that. If you want that person to stop, you must make them. By any means necessary. Short of murder, of course.

“I-” her voice hitches, her confliction literally choking her. But she rubs her stomach again and makes up her mind. “I will. Thank you, your highness.”

“No. Thank you, Lady Arabella. It is a little selfish of me to push you towards a decision that is very hard for many women to make,” I sheepishly reply.

In this era, it is quite commonplace to suffer through an unhappy marriage rather than withdraw from it. I’m sure Lady Bryce has been shedding many tears since her daughter sailed off with the rest of the Aidelish contingent across the Moor not long ago. But she is still living with the man who was happy to sell off his daughter in place of me for the favors he received from House Duvernay in gratitude. I can’t help but wonder if would she leave him if she knew of his bastard.

“If I don’t do this, there will only be one way for me to leave this marriage. Out the door, through a coffin,” Arabella spat with a hollow look. I have a sinking feeling in my stomach that she is not saying this to be dramatic, but as someone who has borne witness to such a travesty.

“That won’t happen,” I say firmly. “Shall we go with the yellow?” My finger points at the swatch in question.

“You said that wearing yellow with your white hair makes you look like a giant daisy.”

“Hmmm. I did say that. Blue?” Her memory is just as sharp as her talent.

“You choose blue often.”

“True.” I mull over the remaining colors.

“Pink?” Lady Arabella offers.

“No pink. I’m too old for pink now.” She not so stealthily swallows down a laugh, I can see that twinkle in her eye that people always dole on younger children but for once I am not vexed by the sight of it.

“What’s left?” I indirectly request to see the rest of the swatches, only for my eyes to be snatched up by a color I’m most familiar with. “That one.”

“Are you sure, your highness?” Uncertainty swims in Lady Arabella’s warm brown stare.

“Yes. As sure as I am that when we are through, you will walk away from the Berrick estate with half its fortune and your good name intact, while Lord Berrick will be reviled and spat by the commonfolk,” I respond, effortlessly returning to the main conversation at hand.

Even as I speak, I can’t stop admiring the pretty amethyst color, a rare shade that somehow manages to resemble a certain someone’s eyes.

Arabella’s lips press together with fervent excitement. “I hope so, your highness. I certainly hope so.”

“Don’t hope. Hope doesn’t exist here,” I lightly scold, placing my hands on her shoulders. “Only your willpower and however badly you want something exists. Your father managed to become a knight against the odds. And not only did he do that, he also became the first to slay a dragon in hundreds of years and won his family a seat amongst the nobility.”

I smirk to myself, already imagining the way the stunning color would contrast against my icy locks. “A bastard could become a princess, a maid could become a countess. Anything is possible so long as you want it enough.”