Chapter 8 Do I Not Deserve A Moment Of Peace?
Currently, the Countess, Guinevere Montague looked perfect as she rose her teacup to her lip for a sip, but the only thing that seemed out of place was was the very slight way her hands kept shaking— and that was all because of the evil glare that was coming from her daughter.
Or what she thought was her daughter.
Her husband, the traitor, on the other hand, had presented as many snacks as he could, including something she called a… ‘smoothie?’ after she gave him orders to make it and was now currently fanning her with a leaf branch so he wasn’t suffering under this gaze.
The woman had been in the presence of many cutthroat business women, and never had she felt a glare like this. It was almost like the girl was right next to her, staring into her soul like a vulture ready to feast on her remains.
The Countess slowly set her cup down, clearing her throat as she said, “We had… we had a back up plan—”
“‘A’ plan? That insinuates that it is just one,” Maeve said. She sat down the extremely delicious smoothie in her hand as she leaned forward, putting her hands together with her fingers interlinked— she had on glasses now. “But surely, you will not be thoughtless with my relaxation— I mean inheritance,”
Guinevere sighed. “You must understand that we did have a plan, Isabella. You had to have the best that we could offer. The best clothes, education, tutors, gifts, doctors. So if we had to expend all our resources—”
Maeve shut up from her chair, her hands slamming into the table. “ALL?!”
The system glitched above her, \[😝\]
… it could even use emojis?
“S-Sweetheart, I don’t think that you should be standing—” The Count, Leander Montague stuttered, though he didn’t complete his statement as Maeve’s glare refocused on him and increased the intensity of his fanning.
“Your Father is right, my dear. You look…” Guinevere’s eyes swept over her daughter's features, trying her hardest on not commenting about the fact that she looked like she crawled out of a swamp and also smelled like it. “A little unwell? I have tried coming to pay you a visit in your rooms but you’ve been adamant about your… hibernation? Is that it? Is that the right word for this?”
“What about the acres of land? The estates? The literal mines that you had in the family name?”
“They were all inconsequential to the actual thing in our lives,” Guinevere said, softly, “You,”
Maeve felt like she was having a heart attack. Her retirement plan… her days of laziness and absolute gluttony seemed to be slipping out of her grasp. She fell to the chair, raising her hand to stop Leander from coming any closer as she said, “And ‘I’ didn’t stop you from wasting these resources?”
“You were… uncomfortable with every expense, but you knew it was important,” Guinevere said, riding from her chair. “You are the light of this family, a rare gem. It has been a very long while since a high class nobility like your father and I produced a girl. We all knew you were born to do great things and when that moment came, you would bestow our family riches that we are well deserving of,”
Ah. “But that is not what happened, is it?”
She felt Leander’s hand on her shoulder. “And that is alright. The Queen does adore you, and she says she can’t wait to see you again. We aimed only for the gifts and titles we would be ordained if you turned out to be an S rank but this is even better,”
“Your father and I even feared that you becoming an S rank would incur the wrath of the Queen as she’s known to be very… strange with otter S rank women,” Guinevere’s face pulled into a soft smile as her hand reached out for her daughter’s face and cradled it gently, “But she adores you.”
“It means you’re safe, my angel,” Leander, of course, used this opportunity to latch himself onto Maeve, his arms wrapped around her as he pressed his face hard onto the left side of her face. “And that means more to me than anything,”
Maeve wanted to snap at both of them, tell them that they were blind and silly and stupid… but she couldn’t seem to do it. There was something starting in her chest. It hurt at first, like a wound, then ever so slowly, a warmth spread through her chest as she found herself back in a memory when she was far younger and her mother who was still alive was pregnant with the second child.
“Will you stop loving me?” She had asked.
Her mother had laughed and pulled her in for the tightest hug. “You are the first of my blood. I will always love you more than life itself.”
Maeve used to think that her hug was the safest place in the world. The way her mother smelled like casserole and always held her so close—
\[WARNING. WARNING. BREACH OF REALITY OF THIS WORLD. MAINTAIN NARRATIVE STRUCTURE. YOU HAVE ONLY THESE PARENTS\]
That was the wake up call she needed.
Maeve quickly withdrew herself from that memory, wiping away any semblance of a tear that had treacherously escaped her eyes before standing up again, “I doubt I’ll be safe when I’m living in the street ready to be… deflowered by any man that comes across me,”
Guinevere’s face changed. “No man would dare touch a Montague without an express request for your hand in marriage,”
‘You should have seen a certain bastard a while ago,’ Maeve thought she said instead, “Let me understand this. Is everything sold? Everything? What about business shares? Is there anything left at all?”
Guinevere raised an eyebrow, suspicion clouding her eyes. “Well, yes, but… but Isabella, you were never concerned about the state of affairs no matter how many times I tried to teach you,”
… this Isabella character was beginning to look quite useless.
“Wait. All of this started ever since you took that… walk of yours,” Guinevere’s face suddenly changed. That calm disposition flashed something nearly threatening. “Did someone threaten you? You seemed solemn when you returned. And you have been different ever since then. Is there something we should know about?”
NACE appeared right above her head, flashing a new message that I hadn’t seen before, \[GUINEVERE MONTAGUE. HEAD OF THE MONTAGUE FAMILY. RANK- A. AFFINITY: KINETIC ★★★☆☆\]
Maeve took note of that. The men didn’t seem to have their affinity spelt out by the system, or having ranks like that. Her Mother seemed to have stars… but the Queen had… question marks. And what were these affinity? What had she written for heaven’s sake.
“Wait,” Maeve looked at the woman, “I went on a walk?”
“The night before your Presentation Day,” Leander quipped. “You said you wished to go alone with no guards and when you returned, locked yourself in your room and didn’t even have dinner with us. We worried what might have happened since you never go anywhere alone but we knew not to question you,”
The last night of life from Isabella.
‘Ah, what did that mean? Did Isabella have a secret? Who could she have gone to meet? Did she have friends? Enemies? A secret lover? Was that the person who harmed her or caused her death? Do I have to draft up an investment report to stake my retirement position deeper into this world so I can chill in peace?’
Those were the questions swirling through Maeve's head. Questions she didn’t even want to entertain because it was beginning to give her a headache and was reminding her too much about the fact that she was supposed to use her brain when all she wanted to do was sleep.
She needed to wrap this up. And wrap it quickly. There were other important things she needed to do. “Arrange every asset we have currently, the ones you can find. Every paper, every ledger, I want to see it back when I return. Don’t file anything, just leave it, I’ll analyze our poverty myself— ah, saying that word makes me feel another headache coming up. I’ll be going down to the stables to see Lucien,”
“Lucien? Oh, oh dear, he didn’t tell you?”
Oh, sweet mother of Jesus Christ. “What didn’t he tell me?”
“He will be leaving for the knighthood tests that start the day after tomorrow tonight,”
Maeve closed her eyes. Ah, the universe was a petty, hateful place. “Do you people have any access to tranquilizers by chance?”