ELND Chapter 59

Chapter 59 

An Irresistible Possessiveness

I leaned against the window and stared down at the garden for a long time before finally stepping outside alone.

Sunny days like this were rare in the North, so my spirits were lifted from the start.

Sunlight spread broadly over the Garden of Darkness. I wandered alone through the garden for some time. Habit drove me toward the flowerbed called “The Demon King’s Gift,” and I absently toyed with a violet petal — then I jumped back with a start.

“W-what is that?”

It was a northern queen bee, the name alone was terrifying. The thing was no bigger than a thumbnail; it had been hiding in the petals and suddenly attacked me aggressively.

It looked threatening enough to suit its name.

“No, no… ugh!” I couldn’t help but scream. Insects were absolutely poison to me — I would rather face a faceless straw doll. I flailed my arms and kept shouting.

At once, the gatekeeper’s servant who had been standing by the main gate of the Dark Manor came running over, breathless. He looked to be in his early twenties, with a youthful face.

“Your Grace, Grand Duchess—what’s wrong?” he cried.

“A b-bee… and a huge queen bee…!” I could hardly finish the sentence. I must have looked deadly pale as I kept waving my arms.

The gatekeeper’s servant suddenly grabbed my wrists and whispered urgently, as if warning me, “It’s sitting on Her Grace’s hair right now.”

“What? On my head?!”

“Shh. I’ll take it off; please remain still, Your Grace.”

“Ugh…”

I closed my eyes tightly and gripped my trembling hands together. He approached with extreme care. Just as the two of us were closing the distance between us—

Smack—!

A sharp sound made me open my eyes.

“Got it?”

But when I looked up in haste, I found an unexpected figure.

“…Cedric?”

Cedric had appeared out of nowhere. He was staring at the servant, holding the man’s wrist tightly.

“For what reason would you lay a hand on the Grand Duchess?” Cedric demanded. There was deadly intent in his voice.

A chill grew in his blue eyes; the servant’s face drained of color.

“G-Grand Duke…!”

The servant trembled with fear. When he relaxed the hand Cedric had been holding, the dead bee’s corpse dropped with a soft thud.

“I-I was just… trying to remove the bee from Her Grace…” the servant stammered.

Cedric kept him under a hard, watchful glare. Then, whatever else irritated him, he tightened his grip on the man’s wrist once more.

“Ugh…!” the man groaned in pain. I hurried forward.

“That’s right, Cedric! I was just looking at the flowers and that huge bee suddenly appeared.”

“……”

“So this fellow here helped me!”

While trying to separate Cedric and the servant, I said that. Cedric glared at the servant for a long moment, grinding his teeth, then abruptly released him and stepped back.

‘He really is in a foul mood lately,’ I thought, finally taking a proper look at Cedric’s face. The dark shading under his eyes made his already sharp expression even keener, lending him a kind of decadent look that was at once familiar and strange.

I watched him open-mouthed for a moment, then slowly forced my lips into speech. “Have you had something unpleasant happen lately?”

Cedric studied me for a long time without answering. Though his lips were firmly pressed together, countless unspoken things flickered through his blue eyes.

“…So it was,” he said finally.

“……”

“But fortunately, I felt a little better just a moment ago.”

He spoke, and his gaze lingered on my face without straying. After a long while, he turned his attention back to the servant. His tone, far colder than before, slid out of his mouth.

“And then I saw ‘someone’ and my mood soured again.”

At those words, the servant’s cheeks trembled.

“I-I was only… trying to help Her Grace…”

The servant seemed to instinctively realize that the ‘someone’ Cedric meant was himself. Cedric’s mouth twisted into a wicked smile as he looked down at the man.

“Oh? You say you were helping the Grand Duchess…?”

“……”

“I’d want to thank you properly — maybe even give you a reward.”

Cedric’s manner was languid yet menacing, like a predator eyeing a herbivore. He broke the suffocating silence and said with force, “Follow me to my study at once.”

The air inside the study felt even colder than before. Cedric — the source of the chill — sat at his desk with a hard, icy face, flipping through papers one by one. Each time he turned a page, the gatekeeper’s servant standing before him trembled more.

“You’re from the Xenovah region of the Demon Realm?” Cedric asked.

“Y-yes…? Y-yes! Yes!” the servant replied hurriedly. Cedric glanced over the file and furrowed his brow.

Cedric wouldn’t normally care about a gatekeeper’s personal details, and it certainly wouldn’t be something important enough to summon him to the study. But Cedric’s mood was badly twisted now; he seemed to want to torment the servant even with petty questions.

Smack—. Cedric snapped the file shut as if he’d seen enough, then stared again at the man. What would have been an ordinary, even dull face earlier now, through the lens of jealousy, looked strikingly handsome to him. The man’s plain appearance had become something like a fresh boyish charm: his rustic features turned into youthful attractiveness, the freckles on his cheeks emphasized his vigor and health.

‘Rebecca said my tastes had changed. Now I like men of that image…?’ Cedric thought, and the man before him became even more repulsive in his eyes.

Cedric glared with eyes full of suspicion and secretly ground his teeth. “You should move to a townhouse in the capital.”

“W-what? Your Grace, b-but why!” the servant blurted. He must have realized, bone-deep, that his scalp was crawling. Being reassigned from the household of the Twins to a townhouse in the capital was considered demotion among servants.

“Anything I’ve done, I’m sorry! So… please let me remain inside the Grand Ducal castle, Your Grace!” the servant pleaded desperately.

But Cedric only compressed his jaw further.

“Why must it be here?” he pressed.

“B-because, naturally…”

“Is there someone you want to keep watching here?” Cedric snapped.

“W-what? Watching someone… what do you mean?” the servant stammered. The thought of Rebecca’s face flashed into Cedric’s mind and he ground his teeth again.

“How dare someone like you try to take her from me…” he muttered darkly, then fell silent. The words ‘How dare you try to take the Grand Duchess from me?’ nearly escaped aloud.

Cedric startled himself and was quiet for a time. Why was he acting like this? His brows slowly creased. Memories of Rebecca in a fit of rage and jealousy surfaced, images from the past when she had acted irrationally. Molten jealousy, possessiveness that reason couldn’t contain — and the obsession that grew from it.

Cedric could not deny how much his past self and the Rebecca he remembered resembled each other like two decalcomanies mirrored against one another.

“…All right. That’s enough — go back now.” His voice was a faint exhale.

The servant brightened with relief. “R-really? You’ll really keep me inside the castle?”

Cedric’s gaze cooled for a moment before settling. “…Yes.”

The man bowed repeatedly. “Thank you! Thank you, Your Grace!”

It was ridiculous that he was grateful after being dragged here and needlessly interrogated, but Cedric felt a surge of irritation even knowing the man had done nothing wrong.

“Now go — before I change my mind.” Cedric’s composure tightened; his simmering restraint made his eyes sharp again.

Terrified the duke might change his mind, the servant fled like a frightened animal. After the servant left, Cedric stood in the study for a long while, then finally slumped into the chair at his desk and remained silent.

“Riman,” he called.

His aide approached. “Change that servant’s assignment — move him to the House of Light,” Cedric ordered.

“What? But, Your Grace…” the aide blinked in confusion. “Being assigned to the House of Light is not a demotion; it’s practically a promotion, isn’t it?”

A moment ago Cedric had been in a mood to demote the servant or even fire him. If the Grand Duke personally involved himself in a mere servant’s placement, the aide had expected the man to have committed some grave wrongdoing.

‘And yet suddenly to be promoted to the House of Light?’ Even the veteran aide Riman couldn’t make sense of the order.

Cedric answered as if it were obvious. “No matter. Anywhere but the Dark Manor will do.”

Anxiety tinged his face as he spoke. He tapped his temple twice with a long forefinger, then looked up at his aide.

“You’ve increased the number of knights guarding the castle entrances, right?”

“Yes, as you ordered. They’re checking thoroughly both those entering and those leaving,” Riman replied.

“There must be no gaps. Do not be lax even during shift changes,” Cedric said. “If the Grand Duchess goes out on an unscheduled outing, report it to me immediately.”

Powerful resolve had returned to his eyes. He scanned the papers listing Rebecca’s schedule and added, “Do not let Rebecca leave the castle gates without my permission.”