When The Count’s Illegitimate Daughter Gets Married

Chapter 3

Now, food and shelter were settled. It would have been quite embarrassing if Laritte ran into Rose and the Count after she’d thrown herself at them like a maniac. But Laritte would never regret what she did that day.

To reach the nearest village, Laritte would have to walk along a one-way road on her tiny feet. She considered disassembling her furniture and returned to her spot beside the fireplace.

Before she’d even realized, the potatoes were emitting a strong aroma, announcing that they were ready to be eaten. Laritte used a skewer to grab one of her cooked potatoes.

“Ack, hot.”

While waiting for the potatoes to cool, Laritte cut the steaming potatoes in half. She watched as the soft inside dribbled out of the golden, baked skin.

After starving all day long, her parched mouth finally felt sweet relief. The well-seasoned potatoes kept Laritte occupied for quite a while.

Coming back to her senses, Laritte realized that the potatoes she had prepared for tomorrow were no more.

“When have I ever eaten this much?”

While living with her birth mother, Laritte considered herself lucky to even eat one meal a day. But usually, those meals her mother fed her were bad and left her sick and throwing up for the rest of the day.

“I’m fed up with this disgusting leech!”

Laritte’s mother screamed those words the day before she disappeared and abandoned her to the Brumayers.

She’d been abandoned when she was eight years old.

Although she didn’t have the Brumayers’ signature red hair or freckles, the Count had still recognized her as one of them. The younger Laritte believed they were good people who accepted her.

But they weren’t good people. They took her in simply because the nobility had a means of identifying illegitimate children and their fathers.

But at least, from the moment Laritte entered the Brumayer household to when she left, she had never gone hungry.

On special days or when Rose was feeling generous, she’d get to sit at the table. However, most of the time, she ate alone in her small, secluded room. Sometimes, if the Countess was in a bad mood, Laritte’s meals were their wasted food. She had stolen food from the kitchen once as well, avoiding eye contact with the servants.

But it hadn’t been all that easy. The servants were no strangers to seeing Laritte with a stomach ache, but helping her was inconvenient for them, and so she would be ignored.

Laritte ate with the Brumayers only because those meals were her only chance to be served fresh meat. She would have no other opportunities to eat anything as nice.

Laritte patted her stomach, too full from eating today’s and tomorrow’s potatoes, and got up to go find water. It was her first relaxing and full meal in a long time.

The last few weeks had been the most peaceful time of Laritte’s life, despite her sore feet from trekking to the nearby village.

She wasn’t too bothered lugging her wares down to the village, and felt the same way about today.

Laritte hummed while she walked back to the villa with her newly purchased vegetable seeds, planning to grow around the house. If the soil doesn’t freeze, these seedsy might grow some roots. Laritte decided to give it a try as a past-time.

Laritte felt like she’d aged wonderfully when she opened the door to her villa. She was greeted by a burning candle illuminating her house. Gone were any traces of cobwebs, dirt, and bugs.

This was the result of her constant cleaning.

Though the villa was quite large and spacious, Laritte had already given up on the second floor early on in her stay. While the first floor was inhabitable, she couldn’t say the same about the rest of the house.

She hastily and skillfully checked around the house before preparing for the night.

“Winter is approaching quickly,” Laritte murmured as she opened a window to ventilate the villa.

Before Laritte knew it, fall was nearly over. This meant that she would finally be able to put to use the firewood she’ds been collecting over time.

She tossed some firewood into the fireplace and decided to make herself some stew to celebrate the long day.

The cooking method was simple. Taking out a rusty but still functional pot, she removed all the blood from meat she recently bought.

Laritte shook her head when she thought of how many potatoes were sacrificed to buy this piece of meat. After peeling the potatoes and carrots, Laritte took out her secret weapon.

She believed that the most important thing in beef stew was the spices.

While taking out the bay leaves and the pepper, she remembered what the market lady had told her.

“Listen up, newly-wedded lady. If you add this, it’ll taste real good. Ya gotta stir-fry the meat and vegetables and add in this bay leaf…”

So she took the lady’s advice and plucked some of the leaves.

Kwang! A knock sounded at the door.

No one besides Laritte ever came to this house. She was so surprised her heart nearly stopped. She wiped her hands clean and ran to the living room.

“Who is it?” She murmured, it was an old habit she couldn’t let go.

It couldn’t be someone from the Brumayers, right? At this time, they must have believed she already died and sent someone to clear her dead body.

Unfortunate for them, she was still breathing.

Not too long ago, Rose had yanked on her silver hair for a good amount of time. Today, her hair was as shiny as a gland of honey.

And Laritte’s arms? She finally gained enough weight to be considered human. Thinking of the Brumayers erased her current healthy image of herself, bringing back memories of her once bony self.

If the Count were to find out how well she’d been living, he might take away her house. Laritte placed her dishcloth on the table as she agonized over the situation.

“Do I need to mess up my hair?”

Suddenly, Laritte noticed something.

While she worried, there had been no additional sounds coming from the front door. Perhaps it was just a mountain animal passing by.

Laritte approached the door with trepidation, pressing her ear against the crack of the door. There wasn’t a single sound to be heard, but her thoughts did not calm in her happiness.

“Maybe a sparrow lost consciousness after hitting itself against the door?”

Actually, that might be it! She didn’t know whether or not she could help the bird though, because she really just owned potatoes. Cautiously, she opened the door.

And in front of her was… a man.

Her first impression of the man was ‘big and tall.’ So tall that even if she were to lift her head, she would barely be able to see his face.

Then, the smell of rusty iron penetrated her lungs. The man was covered in a mixture of fresh and hardened blood.

Is he alive? Is he dead?

He stood there unmoving, and even his fingers were completely still. It was as if he was a knight standing in the middle of a battlefield.

After a few seconds, he opened his mouth slightly.

“……”

A small, scratchy sound came out. Laritte narrowed her beautiful eyes and listened closely to catch what he was saying.

“……”

At that moment, Laritte saw the dark and gloomy man’s eyes.

Golden eyes! Those were one of the traits of the Iyasa Empire’s Imperial family. Before her was a man with golden eyes, dark eyebrows, and thin eyes. Laritte had a feeling she knew just who this person was.

He might be her husband. Just like the Imperial family, Duke Reinhardt also had a long lasting history–

He was a figure who stood on the battlefield as the Empire’s very few swordmasters. His reputation had been tainted when evidence of him staging a rebellion was brought forward at the time of his death…

‘Traitor.’

“Nanny…?”

While she was thinking, he spouted out this word. His voice was husky and he sounded like he hadn’t spoken in weeks.

The man’s eyes were blurry and seemed out of focus. He was certainly looking at Laritte, yet muttered a name for someone else.

His body, which had been standing tall like a tower, suddenly stumbled. The man slowly fell forward.

Without thinking, Laritte caught him. His body felt frozen, perhaps due to the late autumn night. She was only able to keep him upright by holding onto him with all her strength. Then, he murmured

something in her ear.

“I…”

A strange sensation came over her.

Though his voice felt so dry, he sounded like he was crying.

“I didn’t do it… nanny.”

By the end of his sentence, he was completely unconscious.