8. The Villain is Punished  

“His Grace, the Grand Duke, has arrived.”  

“Your Highness.”  

I turned away from Caitlyn and greeted my fiancé—no, now my husband—with a bright smile.  

“We’re leaving now, Annette. It will be difficult to return here. Are you sure you’re not leaving anything behind?”  

The roughness in his voice had disappeared, replaced by a low and refined tone showing his concern for me. Though his words were formal, they carried a hint of worry.  

“Since Your Highness says so, I suppose I should check once more.”  

I glanced at Caitlyn. Her face was filled with frustration and indignation, her fists clenched tightly as she trembled.  

Her expression seemed to say, ‘No one told me the Grand Duke Inkheart was this handsome!’

I still vividly remembered the expressions of the Poche family when Darius first removed his silver mask and attended breakfast.  

The Marquis had gaped with his mouth wide open, my younger brother wore a bizarre expression, and the Marchioness and Caitlyn were so flustered that their faces turned beet red, unable to speak properly.  

〈W-Who are you?〉  

〈Darius Inkheart.〉  

When Caitlyn realized that the dashing young man before her was the fiancé of the half-sister she had always looked down upon, her expression was priceless. Just remembering it made me want to leap out of bed laughing—it was that delightful.  

I called a maid to check my belongings one last time. There wasn’t much I was taking with me: a few newly tailored dresses, Annette’s diary, and the jewelry I had taken from Caitlyn…  

“Huh?”  

As I sifted through the sparkling red rubies and glittering diamond rings, my hands began to move faster.  

My face hardened as I examined the jewelry box.  

“My mother’s keepsake is missing!”  

Soon after, one of the maids screamed in shock.  

“Miss Annette’s necklace is gone!”  

* * *  

Hot tears streamed down my cheeks as I cried out in sorrow.  

“Of all things, how could it be that? My late mother’s keepsake!”  

The estate was thrown into chaos. On the day the eldest daughter was to marry, the late Marchioness’s keepsake had been stolen. The wedding ceremony was immediately halted.  

The entire household was turned upside down as everyone searched the estate, and eventually, the culprit was caught.  

It was the nanny.  

“Nanny, how could you do this to me?”  

I shouted in grief, my voice trembling with emotion. To anyone watching, it would have seemed like my late mother had died all over again.  

“W-Why is this happening all of a sudden?”  

The nanny, dragged out by the arms by the servants, looked around in fear. She had been nowhere to be seen while I was preparing to leave the house. On the day of my departure, the nanny had also been packing her belongings.  

〈Since Miss Annette won’t be here anymore, I should leave the estate as well.〉  

It was a plausible excuse.  

“You don’t have anything to say after seeing this, do you?”  

Huffing, I thrust the blue sapphire necklace in front of the nanny’s face.  

“That’s…!”  

The nanny, restrained by the servants, widened her eyes in shock.  

“Of all things, I can’t believe you stole my mother’s necklace!”  

“What are you talking about? That necklace was given to me by you, Miss Annette!”  

“I gave you the necklace?”  

I shook my head as if I couldn’t believe it.  

Gotcha. I barely held back my rising smirk and forced a tearful voice.  

“What did you ever do for me that I would give you my mother’s keepsake? Did you think I was such an easy target? Stealing valuables and blaming it on me?”  

Everyone in the estate knew that the servants hadn’t treated Annette well. Thus, the excuse I fabricated using Annette’s circumstances sounded convincing to everyone.  

“To think we’ve been feeding and housing a thief in our estate.”  

Caitlyn was the first to turn her head away coldly from the nanny. Though she had been in perfect sync with the nanny when it came to tormenting Annette, Caitlyn didn’t utter a single word in the nanny’s defense now that trouble had arisen.  

“Miss Annette!”  

Sensing that things were taking a strange turn, the nanny cried out.  

“You told me yourself, Miss Annette, that you were grateful for everything I’d done for you! You gave me the necklace and money, telling me to use them to live comfortably for the rest of my life! Why are you doing this now?”  

“Since it’s the day I leave my family home, I wanted to leave only good memories behind. But since it’s come to this, I have to say it. Do you really think you’ve done enough for me to deserve anything from me?”  

Even the nanny, who had been asserting her innocence, was at a loss for words at this point. In truth, she had never treated Annette well.  

“My father was worried about me leaving for a faraway place and wanted to send you with me, but you flatly refused, saying you didn’t want to go to the cold North.”  

I shed tears incessantly, pouring out my resentment toward the nanny.  

“I tried to understand, thinking you might not want to go because of your age… But to think the real reason was that you planned to steal my belongings, thinking I wouldn’t notice once I was gone! And even money on top of that!”  

“Miss Annette! Why are you lying like this? I didn’t steal your necklace! The money was given to me by you!”  

The nanny’s face turned pale as she desperately pleaded with the Marquis, the Marchioness, and Caitlyn. But the Marchioness and Caitlyn only looked at her coldly.  

“Take her to the dungeon. Make her confess the truth!”  

The Marquis coldly delivered his verdict.  

* * *  

Because of the theft of the sapphire necklace, the Grand Duke and I stayed at the estate for one more day.  

“I’m sorry about what happened with your nanny.”  

“I’m sorry, Your Grace. I need a moment to rest. It’s been quite a shock.”  

Darius tried to comfort me, but I maintained a sorrowful expression, as if I were devastated by the betrayal of the nanny I had trusted.  

That evening, I quietly left my room.  

My destination was the dungeon beneath the Marquis’s estate.  

“Miss Annette.”  

“I want to talk to my nanny about why she did it.”  

Hearing my request to be left alone, the guard stepped aside with a sympathetic look.  

“Ugh…”  

“Nanny.”  

In just half a day, the nanny had been harshly interrogated and was lying on the floor of the cell, groaning.  

“You! Do you even know where you are right now?”  

“Where else would I be? This is the dungeon, and you’re locked up here because you committed a clear crime.”  

The moment she saw my face, the nanny screamed.  

“You! You gave it to me! I said I didn’t need it, but you forced it into my hands!”  

“Yes, I gave it to you.”  

I admitted it cheerfully.  

Rustle. I pulled Annette’s diary out of my pocket. Poor Annette. With no one to confide in, she had written all her thoughts here. Thanks to that, I knew everything that had happened to her.  

“You wretched thing, you wicked creature! After everything I’ve done for you!”  

“‘It rained today. Rosalyn was severely scolded and sent away. The nanny said Rosalyn stole something. But I know the truth.’”  

Hearing me suddenly read the diary, the nanny’s face twisted.  

“Rosalyn?”  

“‘Rosalyn didn’t steal anything. Someone else definitely did. Even as she was being kicked out, Rosalyn worried about me. She said she could find another job, but I had to stay in this house.’”  

Rosalyn had been a young maid who joined the Marquis’s estate around that time.  

She was only a year or two older than Annette and treated her like a younger sister. To the other servants, who all conspired to bully Annette, Rosalyn must have been an eyesore.  

“Don’t you remember? You grabbed Rosalyn’s wrist yourself and accused her of stealing valuables like a sneaky rat.”  

“I don’t remember! That little thief must have done something wrong to deserve punishment!”  

“You must have committed so many sins that you can’t even remember them all.”  

I clicked my tongue.  

People who think they’re the only ones who can set traps always end up falling into their own.  

The Marquis had wanted the nanny to accompany me to the North. Not because he was worried about his daughter traveling far away, but because he wanted someone to gather information about the North.  

But I didn’t want the nanny to come with me.  

〈Father seems to want you to go to the North with me. What do you think, Nanny?〉  

The nanny reluctantly said she would go if I increased her wages.  

〈There’s no need for that. How could someone who’s lived in the South their whole life survive in the North? You’re not in good health, either.〉  

So, I had taken the blue sapphire necklace the nanny had been eyeing and placed it in her hand.  

〈You’ve raised me all my life. Consider this a token of gratitude.〉  

I also gave her money and told her to inform the Marquis that she was leaving the estate due to poor health. I assured her that with the money and the sapphire necklace, she could live comfortably for the rest of her life.  

“Guard! Miss Annette confessed! Is no one there? Miss Annette admitted she lied!”  

“Nanny, who do you think would come here?”  

I chuckled and reached through the bars to lift her head, now in complete disarray.  

“There’s no one here who’ll listen to you.”  

Just as no one had cared about Annette trembling in her shabby room.  

In the end, life always comes full circle.  

“If you had even a shred of conscience, you wouldn’t be here right now. Did you really think you deserved to receive such a precious item?”  

Ha-ha-ha. My laughter echoed through the dungeon. If she had known her place, she wouldn’t have accepted it. If she had known what she had done to Annette, she wouldn’t have dared to take the necklace out of fear.  

The nanny being in the dungeon was her own doing.  

“Is anyone there? Anyone at all! Please, come and hear what Miss Annette is saying!”  

The nanny’s desperate voice echoed through the dungeon, but it was futile.  

If Annette were here, I would tell her this:  

‘Even though you’re not here, I’ve avenged you.’