Chapter 31

 Marie was embroidering a handkerchief. She smiled brightly as soon as she saw Ella and patted the seat beside her. Ella sat next to Marie and looked at the gold thread in her hand. Her belly was round, and in contrast, her arms and legs were pitifully thin.

 “Marie, you know how to do this too?”

 “Huh? You can do this too, Ella.”

 Marie answered. Saying that because you can do it, I can do it too wasn’t an appropriate answer. But Ella smiled broadly. Marie had an expression of not understanding.

 “Because you can do more things than I can. You can play instruments and write poetry.”

 Ella replied. Marie opened her eyes wide. Ella just smiled faintly at that sight. Dancing to music, writing poetry, and playing instruments…… These were noble accomplishments. Only women from noble families touched instruments and learned writing from teachers. A lowborn servant girl might make clothes and embroider, but couldn’t do unproductive things like reading and writing poetry. But Marie was familiar with all those things.

 “That’s because the master taught me.”

 Marie’s cheeks reddened. Suddenly, the curtain was pulled back. Ella raised her head and looked at Anita coming in with her daughter. Red auburn. She was a woman with intense and beautiful curly warm-colored golden-red hair. Ella looked at the daughter who looked exactly like her. Her name was Hermi, wasn’t it? Her toddling walk made her look like a living doll.

 “Hello, Ella. Hello, Marie. Everyone’s here.”

 Anita’s face was slightly twisted. Ella remembered her friend singing that she didn’t want to go back to the tiresome countryside from the middle of the battlefield. Anita’s face was even worse than then.

 “Hello, Anita. You don’t look well. Is that your daughter?”

 Marie asked while fiddling with the corner of the handkerchief. Anita nodded once and then plopped down on the sofa. The layers of her pearl-colored dress skirt were crumpled unsightly. Anita’s daughter blinked her round eyes a few times and then grabbed her mother’s crumpled dress skirt and buried her face in it. She seemed shy. Ella remembered Anita’s two young sons. The two sons terribly resembled only their father, but the daughter took after only Anita.

 Do all daughters resemble their mothers and all sons their fathers? She was curious. If she had a daughter, would she inherit only from her? And whom did Ella herself resemble? Suddenly, she missed Sarah. It was suddenly, but there were many days when she abruptly missed Sarah. Especially after giving birth to Eselmund. She would lie in bed, sniffling and mumbling about Sarah, and on days when she fell asleep crying like that, she would meet Sarah in her dreams. Yet Sarah was the person who said her own daughter was dead and told her that her mother was someone else.

 “Hermi, you should greet the aunties.”

 “Leave her alone. She seems shy.”

 The child had her face buried in Anita’s skirt. The puffy sleeves that rose roundly and the apple blossom-shaped hairpin were completely disheveled, but as befitting her young age, she didn’t seem to mind. Anita tried to make her greet them, but the child shook her head. Ella told her to stop at that sight.

 “Daddy. I miss Daddy…… Mommy, let’s go to Daddy.”

 Suddenly, the child raised her head and whined. Anita frowned and tried to detach her daughter. But the child wouldn’t easily let go.

 “Go alone. To Daddy.”

 “No. No. Mommy. Let’s go to Daddy together.”

 Hermi cried. Anita pushed the child away as if she didn’t want to see her. Ella’s heart sank, even though it wasn’t her child. The child, pushed away by her mother, immediately burst into tears.

 “Anita. Stop it. She’s still young.”

 Anita didn’t answer. She didn’t know what had happened, but she seemed thoroughly twisted. Ella looked at Anita, who was slightly grimacing, and then approached the child. Anita didn’t love her children. Since Ella wasn’t familiar with mothers who didn’t love their children, all this was just surprising to her.

 She lifted the sobbing child and held her in her arms. Anita just stared at the sight without saying anything. Marie, who had been watching cautiously, whispered to Ella.

 “I think you should take her to the Count.”

 Ella nodded. She told Anita that she would take the child to her father. She still didn’t say anything and just looked at the child. Ella held the child in her arms and moved. It was noisy outside the curtain. Ella looked at the curtain she had come out from.

 Durac. Clegar. Gwendel. Roymar. Trotters…… Each family’s emblem was hung like a fluttering flag on the curtain, and the space blocked with thin silk behind it was like a cage without bars. Ella came out, recalling that quite spacious area. The knights didn’t mix their servant girls with other noble women. While the noble ladies tilted their wine glasses, danced, and had their own social gatherings, the servant girls had to wait behind the knights for their calls. That was the etiquette, if it was etiquette, and the internal rule, if it was an internal rule. Ella turned her head. Perhaps this side might be better. Anyway, she didn’t like facing noble ladies. Those women seemed to see something terrible just by the existence of servant girls. It might seem unfair, but Ella couldn’t say anything because she thought that if she were a noble lady, she too would dislike servant girls.

 “It seems Hermi likes Daddy more than Mommy.”

 “Yes. I like Daddy.”

 She spoke to the child while walking. Unlike when she was with Anita, Hermi spoke quite well. Without stuttering, she chattered about the Count and then pointed her finger toward Count Clegar standing with the king.

 “Daddy! Our Daddy.”

 Ella recognized Hermi’s father at a glance. His tall stature and silver-gray hair were quite familiar. He seemed to have heard his daughter’s cry as he quickly turned around. When the royal consort who was with the king turned around, the king’s gaze naturally turned to Ella as well. Count Clegar looked at Ella holding his daughter and approached her with a slightly stiff expression.

 “Ann?”

 Ann was Anita’s nickname. Ella opened her mouth while glancing sideways at Sirena, who kept looking at her.

 “Anita is inside the curtain.”

 At Ella’s answer, Kirion pressed his lips tightly. His frowning expression, as if displeased, was similar to Anita’s. Both had slightly distorted faces that made their cool beauty stand out more.

 “Ann……”

 Kirion trailed off. Ella waited for him to speak with her hands neatly folded. Then suddenly she remembered that he was cousins with the king. Since the man’s mother was the king’s aunt, he was no different from royalty. Yet his appearance was always strangely more similar to Anita than the king.

 “Daddy. I’m hungry. Give me food.”

 Hermi, in her father’s arms, whined. Kirion kissed his daughter’s forehead and patted her bottom.

 “Never mind. Let’s go.”

 Kirion turned around. Hermi in his arms waved her hand toward Ella. Ella took her eyes off the father and daughter and looked at the royal consort. Sirena was still looking at her with gentle eyes. Even though this wasn’t their first meeting, the woman stared at Ella’s face every time they met. As if it were a habit. Feeling somewhat uncomfortable, Ella quickly turned her back.

 “Ella?”

 “Ah.”

 “Could you help me?”

 “What kind of……”

 Ella looked at the woman who suddenly blocked her way. The light green sleeves completely covering the shoulders and the curved, puffy skirt were made of quite good quality fabric, but there was no more splendor than that.

 “I’m short-handed. It’ll be quick.”

 The woman stretched the corner of her mouth. Ella blinked. The memory of the woman buried in a corner of her mind awoke.

 “Will you help me?”

 “……Yes.”

 The queen’s wet nurse asked. Ella answered quietly and then followed her. Her brown hair tied high and simple attire were no different from that day. Yet she followed her. Because she was the queen’s wet nurse. She was of a different class than her lowly self. To some noble and august person in the royal palace, she might be a life worth less than a fly. It was uncertain how defying a woman who worked for the queen would be perceived. Ella didn’t want to stand out more than this.

 ***

 “My eyesight hasn’t been good lately.”

 “Yes.”

 Ella barely answered. Unlike the bustling banquet hall, the corridor was quiet. Though this path was quite familiar, Ella couldn’t easily speak due to tension. The queen’s wet nurse said she was looking for the queen’s small sapphire earring. She said the queen wanted to wear that earring with today’s dress, so the wet nurse had searched the bedroom but couldn’t find it. But Ella might not be able to find such a small piece of jewelry either.

 “Please help me. I won’t forget to reward you.”

 “Please don’t say that. It’s not something that deserves a reward.”

 Ella was humble. The queen’s bedroom they finally reached was a room gleaming with gold and silver. Ella nervously followed the woman inside.

 “I found one earring but couldn’t find the other. It looks like this. Really small, isn’t it?”

 The wet nurse showed a sapphire earring from a small pouch. As she said, it was truly a small earring. Though plain, its quality was top-notch, making it dazzlingly brilliant even alone. Ella nodded.

 “I’ll search the bed. You check the vanity. She wore it yesterday before sleeping, so it might have fallen off.”

 “Yes.”

 Ella readily answered. She examined the queen’s vanity in order. Though it seemed she would need to look for a long time on the long marble table to find such a small earring, there were no jewels as small as the one they were looking for, making it rather easy to find. Before long, Ella discovered a sapphire rolling around in the left drawer.