RGBR 04

Chapter 4

[Oh, right! His Highness is waiting in the dining room, Miss!]

[It’s already so late. Mother hasn’t had dinner yet?]

[No. His Highness said he wanted to have dinner with you, Miss. Goodness, what is wrong with me? I completely forgot!]

Upon hearing the news, Elenor hurriedly changed her clothes and went outside. Although a long time had passed, her room—which she had never once forgotten—was exactly as it had been in her hazy memories.

Elenor was excited.

At the same time, her heart swelled with emotion until the tip of her nose tingled.

After marrying Joshua, Elenor had immediately entered the Imperial Palace, and after that, it had been difficult for her even to leave the palace grounds for a brief outing.

Only after begging Joshua over and over had she barely been allowed to return home once a year. Joshua had disliked her keeping in contact with her family from the very beginning.

Elenor was overwhelmed with emotion.

She had thought she would never be able to return to her family home again.

And yet, here she was.

Tears began to well up in her eyes once more.

But she soon pulled herself together. Now that she was certain this was not a dream, her reason was gradually returning.

This really is a chance given to me by God. But there are still things I don’t understand.

“Miss, please raise your arms.”

Elenor obediently lifted her arms. As she stood before the mirror while Hin helped her into her dress, a sharp light gleamed in her eyes.

How did I return to the past?

She could not understand the reason at all.

Suddenly, the final scene she had witnessed in the mirror flashed through her mind.

The half of a ruby necklace that had fallen from Charles’s arms.

There had definitely been a burst of light from that necklace…

“Miss?”

“Yes?”

“Are you all right?”

“Yes. Mother will be waiting. Let’s hurry.”

“Yes.”

Hin rescued Elenor from her thoughts as she gazed around absentmindedly. She nodded and led the way.

When Elenor descended the stairs and entered the dining room, she saw the Grand Duchess of Frihosen already seated there.

She was wearing a blue A-line dress, with a few strands of hair naturally falling beside her neatly pinned-up hairstyle. Pear earrings as pale as her face swayed lightly from her ears. At a glance, she looked every bit like an elegant and beautiful noblewoman.

The moment Elenor saw her long-missed mother’s face, her eyes quickly reddened.

I always thought Mother didn’t consider me her father’s true daughter… but that was all a misunderstanding on my part.

In the past, Elenor had distorted her mother’s true feelings and refused to believe them.

And yet, until the very last moment when her mother’s own life was in danger, her mother had told her that she absolutely had to live.

The image of the Grand Duchess she had seen for the last time overlapped with the mother standing before her now.

She should never have believed the rumors circulating around the Grand Ducal household in the first place.

The Grand Duchess, who had been watching the maids carry the dishes with an expressionless face, turned her head at the sound of someone approaching. Her gaze landed on Elenor as she entered the dining room.

The Grand Duchess looked Elenor up and down from head to toe before her gaze finally settled on Elenor’s flushed face.

Her expression became slightly strange.

Unable to understand why, Elenor blinked and met her gaze.

Ah!

She had cried her eyes out just moments ago, overwhelmed with joy at having returned to the past.

Her eyes must have been terribly swollen.

Elenor hurriedly raised both hands and gently pressed the backs of them against her eyes.

The Grand Duchess’s eyes lingered briefly on Elenor’s reddened eyes. They narrowed for a moment before immediately relaxing again.

After watching Elenor for a while, the Grand Duchess spoke in an expressionless voice.

“You’re only coming now?”

Elenor continued staring at her mother as if she still couldn’t believe this was real, then hurriedly lowered her head.

“Yes. I’m sorry for being late, Mother.”

“So you do realize that you’re late.”

Even though the Grand Duchess lightly scolded her and clicked her tongue, Elenor wasn’t offended in the slightest.

Instead, bitter regret surged inside her.

Because unlike the neat and elegant noblewoman standing before her now, she remembered the Grand Duchess wearing a tattered dress, kneeling at Joshua’s feet and begging him to spare her daughter.

Elenor’s face twisted.

She felt as though she would burst into tears again at any moment, and she struggled to suppress them.

I was powerless back then, but things are different now. I can set everything right!

The Grand Duchess sensed that Elenor seemed strange today, but she deliberately swallowed her curiosity.

She soon stopped observing Elenor and pointed toward the seat across from her with her chin.

“How long are you going to stand there? Sit down already. I already reheated the food once. Surely I can’t keep reheating it.”

As she said this, the Grand Duchess bit her lip tightly and watched Elenor’s reaction.

But Elenor obediently took her seat as though it were nothing unusual.

“Yes, Mother.”

The Grand Duchess glanced at Elenor as she sat across from her.

For some reason, Elenor seemed different today.

Normally, she would barely answer her and would make excuses to avoid sitting down for a meal whenever the Grand Duchess called for her.

But today, for some reason, she had decided to sit across from her and eat together.

How strange.

Not long after the Grand Duchess had married, there had been a day when her husband suddenly brought Elenor home from outside.

He had merely told her that Elenor was his daughter.

He had never mentioned who Elenor’s biological mother was or under what circumstances he had brought her there.

Because of that, the Grand Duchess had been forced to suppress her curiosity.

Elenor had been exceptionally beautiful from the very first time she saw her.

No, there wasn’t a single part of her that wasn’t beautiful.

When she was young, their relationship as mother and daughter had been quite good.

But at some point, Elenor’s attitude changed.

It was after she learned that the Grand Duchess wasn’t her biological mother.

The Grand Duchess had done everything she could to keep the matter secret, but apparently someone within the Grand Ducal household had told Elenor.

At first glance, Elenor seemed gentle and obedient toward her, but the Grand Duchess knew.

As time passed, an invisible wall had begun to form between herself and her daughter.

That wall had gradually become more solid and impenetrable until there was no opening left at all.

That had certainly been the case until yesterday.

But today felt a little different.

The Grand Duchess, who had been cutting into the tender meat with her knife, suddenly stopped and discreetly raised her eyes toward Elenor’s swollen ones.

She hesitated for a long while, her lips moving as though she couldn’t decide whether to speak.

Eventually, she said quietly,

“Staying up late isn’t good for you.”

Elenor paused and raised her head.

Then she obediently nodded.

“Yes. I’ll go to bed early from now on. Don’t worry.”

“Who said I was worried about you? I was merely stating the obvious. Don’t misunderstand.”

“Yes.”

“……”

Normally, Elenor would have pushed back her chair and left.

But today, she simply continued eating with a calm, expressionless face.

Unable to think of anything else to say, the Grand Duchess fell silent as well.

The only sound filling the dining room was the faint clinking of cutlery.

Then, when Elenor took a bite of steak, the Grand Duchess spoke again.

“There is something I need to tell you.”

It seemed her mother intended to get straight to the point before they finished their meal.

Elenor chewed and swallowed the meat in her mouth before speaking.

“Why don’t we finish eating first and talk afterward? Perhaps while having some tea.”

The Grand Duchess’s eyebrow twitched.

The girl who normally tried to leave as quickly as possible whenever she was dragged to the dining table was suggesting that they sit across from each other and have tea together?

What on earth had gotten into her today?

“Aren’t you curious about what I have to say?”

“Mother would never say anything that could harm me, would you?”

“……”

“And I want to spend time with you, Mother.”

The Grand Duchess’s hand stopped again as she was cutting her meat.

Elenor felt as though a cold sweat was running down her back under the Grand Duchess’s intense gaze, which seemed capable of seeing straight through her.

Even now, just as in the past, whenever her mother stared at her like this, Elenor had no idea what to do.

Her mother’s gaze practically screamed that she wanted to open Elenor’s head and find out what she was thinking.

It made Elenor’s throat dry.

The Grand Duchess calmly lowered her gaze and soon placed a neatly cut piece of meat into her mouth as though nothing had happened.

“Do you have anything else you need to do today?”

Elenor blinked in confusion.

How could someone who had only just returned from the past possibly remember what she was supposed to do today?

And it wasn’t as though she could answer, ‘Well, I died and then came back, so I don’t really know.’

Elenor subtly turned her head and glanced at Hin, who was standing behind her.

Sensing her gaze, Hin lightly shook her head.

Elenor swallowed nervously and shook her head.

“No. I don’t have anything planned.”

“I see.”

“……”

“What are you doing? Eat.”

“…Yes.”

Whether she had nothing more to say or whether she truly intended to continue their conversation after the meal, the Grand Duchess did not say another word.

Eventually, after finishing her meal, the Grand Duchess elegantly wiped around her mouth with a napkin before looking at Elenor.

The two women, who looked alike in some ways and yet not alike in others, stared directly at each other with expressionless faces.

The Grand Duchess was the first to avert her gaze and casually tossed out a remark.

“I have a social gathering today.”

“A social gathering?”

“Yes.”

When she had been living in the Grand Duchy in the south, the Grand Duchess had rarely attended even simple tea parties, let alone banquets.

But after following her husband, the Grand Duke of Frihosen, to the capital, she had begun regularly attending one particular social gathering.

The only social gathering she attended, Rirangttli, was well known among the nobles of the capital.

It was famous as a traditional, intimate gathering attended only by noblewomen of count rank or higher.

Was Mother telling me because she wanted me to know that she was attending a social gathering?

“I heard they’re holding a family gathering there today.”

“…A family gathering?”

“Yes.”

Confused, Elenor pointed to herself with her index finger and asked hesitantly, hoping she had misunderstood.

“Does that mean… I’m supposed to go there with you too?”

“If that weren’t the case, why would I have gone out of my way to tell you this?”