Chapter 36
From the very start of that new season, the Empire’s capital began to simmer with gossip.
“Is it true?”
“Oh my goodness!”
Sightings of the Grand Duke and his wife began spreading like wildfire.
“That poor man. How could someone like him end up with her?”
“Well, they’re married now, so I suppose he’s doing his duty.”
At first, people pitied the Grand Duke. But when they saw him out on what looked suspiciously like a date, with that mad dog, their sympathy turned into uneasy disbelief.
Worse still, she appeared to have come straight from a high-end jeweler, decked out in extravagant gemstones.
“How utterly lavish.”
“I heard she even asked him to rent out an entire restaurant.”
The most famous dining hall in the capital was entirely reserved for them. The couple dined together in seclusion, then strolled along flower-lined paths like lovers on a spring outing. But when the Grand Duke leaned in and kissed that woman, people were horrified.
“To think he fulfills his husbandly duties that devotedly…”
Yet despite the whispers around them, the Grand Duke wore a charming smile. Enough that even some skeptics began to question what they were seeing.
“Could it be?”
‘Could the Grand Duke truly… be taken with the mad dog?’
It was an absurd thought. Embarrassing even to consider. And yet, watching him buy her sherbet, gently wipe the cream from her lips, the unease only grew.
But perhaps most shocking of all…
“You must rein in a wild mare like her, Your Grace, before it’s too late!”
Nobles who had approached the Grand Duke to ‘rescue’ him found themselves snarled and shredded by Kyrie’s teeth instead. And through it all, the Grand Duke had simply stood there, smiling.
“They say the mad dog made Countess Holley cry!”
“Good heavens!”
“And she humiliated Marchioness Devon not long before that!”
“What is the Grand Duke doing, letting his wife run wild like this?”
“She insults other noble households and he rewards her with jewelry and dresses!”
“Isn’t that the same as giving her a prize?”
“He must’ve been bitten hard by the mad dog himself.”
“He used to be so reliable, so intelligent…”
“Well, perhaps he still is. But once you get tangled up with her…”
Every appearance they made together caused a stir, another scandal, another whispering crowd. One day, it would be the two of them strolling openly down the boulevard.
The next, they’d be seen at a fancy café. The next, embroiled in yet another spat with a noble family.
With every passing day, the capital churned more and more furiously in the wake of the mad dog’s unpredictable behavior.
𓂃˖˳·˖ ִֶָ ⋆🌷͙⋆ ִֶָ˖·˳˖𓂃 ִֶָ
[EXTRA! After the Scandalous Wedding, The Grand Duke and His Wife’s Shocking Public Displays!]
Anyone in the Empire would surely remember what happened not long ago.
Forget the unrest from the minor kingdoms in the South, or the military talks stirring in the West. The event that had stolen the attention of the entire nation, was that.
The marriage of the First Grand Duke, the Empire’s most eligible bachelor, who had famously remained unattached for years. The man whom no one believed would ever wed, until he suddenly did.
Now, with rumors spreading that even the Grand Duke had succumbed to the mad dog’s charms, eyewitness accounts were pouring in to support the theory.
This reporter’s own investigation uncovered scenes of affection between the two in restaurants, parks, cafés, even at the city’s racetrack…
CRASH!
The sound of a porcelain cup shattering rang out, followed by the splash of tea spilling across the floor.
The attendants who had been fitting Elise’s gown froze in place.
“Your Highness…”
Elise called to him gently.
Lexion raised his head.
The shards of the broken cup and saucer gleamed where they lay scattered across the marble floor. He had flung them with a single flick of his hand.
“Are you hurt, Your Highness?”
Veron, who had been watching Elise’s preparations, leaned in with concern. Johannsen, lately absent, was nowhere to be found.
“If you’re injured, ”
“Spare me, Veron,” Lexion snapped irritably, throwing the newspaper aside.
Even as tea stained the pages, some headlines remained painfully visible.
An entire front page devoted to the Grand Duke and his wife’s explicit public displays of affection. And not from a legitimate paper, either, this was one of those disreputable tabloids.
The Crown Prince’s teeth ground audibly in the silence. Servants moved quickly, trying to read his mood.
Veron’s eyes drifted toward the crude illustrations printed alongside the article. They depicted the Grand Duke and his wife in lurid detail. The woman in the drawing, grinning seductively as she kissed the Grand Duke, bore no resemblance at all to the Kyrie Veron remembered.
Not the girl with bruises and scratches, climbing into the convent-bound carriage.
“She seems… fine.”
The thought caught him off guard. That he, of all people, might feel relief over Kyrie’s well-being, after everything.
But he still remembered what it had been like to comb through the wreckage of that burned-out carriage, searching for her among the scorched corpses. Just hoping he wouldn’t find her.
That memory alone had stolen more than a few nights of sleep.
He had been afraid.
Afraid Kyrie had truly died.
Afraid of how disappointed his mother would be.
Even though it had been Johannsen’s decision to dismiss the escort, Veron still blamed himself for never checking where or how Kyrie had traveled afterward.
So he’d searched through the charred remains again and again, hoping for proof. Whether it was evidence she had survived, or confirmation that she hadn’t.
“There’s no way she’d die that easily…”
This was Kyrie they were talking about. That fierce, obstinate girl who had always clawed back. She couldn’t have died like that. She couldn’t have.
The pendant his mother had given him rattled in his hand.
But still… what if?
What if one of those bodies had been hers?
Every time the thought came, a sharp headache followed. On nights when the fear took hold, he would dream of his mother, staring at him with disappointment.
Once, he would’ve been glad just to see her again. But now, those eyes felt heavy with accusation.
“Didn’t you promise to be a good brother?”
And with each dream, the guilt grew more suffocating.
“I couldn’t stop that woman from replacing her…”
And now he had failed to protect the daughter she had treasured most.
Sometimes, he thought Johannsen heard the same phantom voice he did. Maybe that’s why he’d vanished, burying himself in pointless errands and avoidance.
“It’s all over now… and yet…”
Veron let out a bitter smile. The feelings were too complicated to name.
Especially after,
“The Grand Duke desires your words and your foal, my lord.”
“…What?”
“Shall I tell him it’s not for sale?”
It had been the day the Grand Duke and his wife visited the racetrack.
Rather than watching the races, they had gone straight to the stables. And there, they had inquired about purchasing a pregnant mare and her unborn foal.
What they probably hadn’t known… was that the mare belonged to Veron.
He had a well-known passion for racing.
“…Sell it.”
“But wasn’t she your favorite, ?”
“Horses can be replaced.”
Veron kept his identity as the owner quiet.
Something told him that if the Grand Duke, or worse, Kyrie, learned the foal came from him, they would refuse to take it.
“The foal isn’t to blame.”
Even as he thought it, he realized how deeply he wanted Kyrie not to reject the little one.
A shocking thing to admit, given how he used to feel about her.
He felt the disgust rise again.
“This is all so stupid.”
With a flick of his hand, he signaled the servants to clean up the mess.
Even as they swept up the shards, the Crown Prince sat rigid with fury. Not once had his eyes wandered to Elise, even though she now stood in a brand-new gown for the upcoming ball.
It was then that Veron realized, he, too, had been fixated on the newspaper, not Elise.
She wore a golden gown that matched her auburn hair, chosen specifically to suit her for the event. The way her soft curls draped over her bare shoulders matched the silhouette perfectly.
“She ran into the Grand Duke’s wife while checking on that dress, didn’t she…”
But the article only mentioned the Crown Prince briefly.
One passing line about how the Grand Duchess had once pursued him. That was all.
The rest was devoted entirely to the scandalous, passionate escapades of the Grand Duke and his wife, and how every place they visited became the most sought-after spot in the city by the following week.
Even the Crown Prince’s own upcoming engagement was being overshadowed by their antics.
“Tch.”
Lexion raked a hand through his hair in frustration. Veron looked toward Elise.
One might expect her to be hurt by Lexion’s reaction.
But her face remained serene. Calm. Smiling, even.
So calm, in fact it felt… unsettling.
“She’s always been quiet, but this is…”
There was something fragile, frightening, about that smile.
“Elise?”
Veron called her name without thinking.
And then she moved.
“…Miss!”
Without hesitation, Elise knelt on one knee before Lexion, right there, in her dress.
