Chapter 5
Suspicion
Timeo, having approached the bed, picked up the large pillow lying beside Marcel. He began pressing it gently against Marcel’s face. Any doctor witnessing this would have been horrified. Yet Marcel’s tenacious life force did not fade easily; instead, the faint contours of Marcel’s face pushing against the pillow were visible in places, quickly irritating Timeo. Soon, Phyllis stopped him, and he lifted the pillow, staring at Marcel’s pitiful and ugly face as if mocking it for a long while.
“Ugh, ‘this one’ is really stubborn.”
“If I… die… you intend to marry this bastard? Changing the partner… You… you’re a woman who would gladly leap for any Vollreban man…”
A silence fell over the bedroom. Phyllis was already entirely accustomed to hearing such harsh words from Marcel. Moreover, Marcel was by nature a severe mental case. Yet hearing these words directed at Timeo, whom she had not seen for years, made her feel a strange sense of guilt toward him.
“If you weren’t a patient, I would have torn that mouth of yours apart. Stop playing the pitiable act in front of the doctors. Today, for the first time, you may actually die, I won’t give you any false hope.”
“You… you will marry the lowest man in Conpher. Someone utterly ordinary, poor, and ignorant, unlike me, who has spent my whole life on the bed of the Vollrebans, treated with utmost nobility.”
Phyllis’s gaze softened as she looked down at Marcel. He was laughing mockingly at his fiancée with an intent so clear it was hard to believe he was a patient. Slowly, she raised her hand to cover his face. With her fingers over his eyes and palm over his nose and mouth, she wondered if this would finally kill him. At that moment, she sincerely wished for Marcel to die.
Marcel, breathing heavily, barely acknowledged Phyllis’s murderous intent. With his diseased tongue, he licked her palm long and slowly. The feeling was indescribably disgusting.
“Ph-Phyllis… I, I’ve lost! I suppose I must finally admit… how little time remains…”
“Great progress.”
“In return… your child… will be born to me.”
Marcel, feverish and shivering, was no longer in his right mind. Phyllis, compulsively rubbing her sullied palm, might have even spat on his face if Timeo had not been present. When alone in the same space, such abuse from Marcel was routine.
“Imagine, the child you carried for ten months, suckled and raised, thinking of me as… something to despise. Amusing, isn’t it? Your son will tear his new husband to pieces with his own hands!”
The bedroom door opened. The physician had apparently summoned Duke Vollreban and the relatives. Phyllis moved calmly away from the bed. Marcel’s cruel laughter had long since turned into hollow coughing.
†♥†♥†♥†
The elderly servant who had nursed both Vollreban brothers alternated his gaze between Marcel and Timeo, tears falling freely. In contrast, the Duke spoke not a word to Timeo. Yet the relatives, extremely human, could not resist sneaking glances at the now-grown younger son of Vollreban, even as they fussed over Marcel. Though dressed in priestly robes, Timeo stood out most in the room.
“What are you doing here?”
The Duke, quietly observing his dying eldest son, muttered this without even looking at Timeo. Timeo, hands clasped behind his back, was staring at the countless portraits of Phyllis in Marcel’s room. Phyllis spoke.
“I am here because a priest is needed for prayers. He is the most capable priest in Aljazz.”
“So it was your doing. Is he really that skilled to be called all the way from there?”
“Perhaps. What prayer could a devil of a man require?”
The renowned physician, caretaker of the Vollreban family for generations, along with the relatives, had already surrounded Marcel’s bed and begun prayers. With each recitation, Marcel’s face twisted slightly. Frowning at prayers… as Timeo had said, Marcel was undoubtedly a devil. Phyllis kept her distance, watching the three members of the Vollreban family quietly. It had been nearly ten years since they had gathered like this. Five years ago, Timeo had been urgently summoned, but the Duke refused to let him enter the mansion, keeping him standing in the rain. Unlike then, Marcel’s condition was not yet severe. In the interim, the Duke had aged, and Marcel’s illness had deepened. Marcel’s coughing gradually slowed.
Death approached him as well.
The Duke looked at Phyllis. She forced a neutral expression and moved closer to Marcel by a span. Marcel’s pale face seemed peaceful, unlike his earlier fits of rage.
Marcel opened his eyes for a moment. His empty blue gaze wandered to the ceiling before focusing sharply on Phyllis, hiding behind the Duke’s frame. If anyone else had been in the room, Phyllis might have driven a candlestick through his eyes. Though unable to move without the servant’s help, Marcel’s desire was clear. Phyllis wished to erase his gaze from her.
Summoning unknown strength, Marcel raised his frail, log-like fingers and pointed directly at Phyllis. His dry fingers, nails nearly torn off, clenched and unclenched as if to grasp her face. When he breathed heavily, he uttered his final words:
“If I die, bury this with me.”
Bloodshot eyes, reddened from broken vessels, stared as he spoke. His final words were neither gratitude for those who had served him nor requests for the family’s prosperity. It was a curse cast solely on the fiancée left behind. The Duke, physician, and close relatives remained silent. As Marcel drew his final breath, the brothers’ nurse, Marti, fainted. Though Marcel was loved by all, Phyllis had always doubted anyone truly followed him. Yet this frail, elderly woman made even Marcel’s death seem dignified and tragic.
Timeo, who had been staring at Phyllis’s portraits, turned. He pushed past the confused family and coldly looked down at his just-deceased brother. His large, strong hands forcibly closed Marcel’s eyes. Then, making the sign of the cross, he briefly appeared devout, so subtly that no one noticed he made the gesture in reverse.
“To wish for the fiancée’s live burial… anyone bedridden long enough goes mad, I suppose.”
“Watch your tongue.”
“Due to your brother’s illness, Lady Menezes’s marriage was also delayed.”
“Yes, that’s right…”
“Then she will fall under the responsibility of the Vollrebans.”
†♥†♥†♥†
Phyllis remained stunned by the final words.
Ten years had passed since the day they pledged their engagement. Marcel, selfish and foolish, had always put Phyllis in difficult situations. She clenched her hands so tightly that she could barely feel her nails piercing her palms. The rigid Duke would surely enforce his eldest son’s final wish, keeping Phyllis tied to Marcel, not literally buried, but perhaps forced to frequent a damp crypt in the chapel, or prevented from returning to Banole, using every noble, imposing measure. Marcel had certainly lived far too long. Living with the family for so many years, Phyllis never knew how to react at such moments.
The relatives surrounding Marcel appeared, at first glance, to mourn him, but they were also sharply observing what would unfold next in the bedroom. Phyllis could not rely on anyone. She did not know whether to cry over Marcel’s body or collapse gracefully like Marti.
The Duke remained upright, watching his son, as if waiting for him to awaken. Vollreban men had always maintained sharp, precise features. Yet the Duke resembled a poacher, with a threatening physique, broad neck, sharp jawline, and features that revealed divine craftsmanship. His hair remained thick, a man truly born of Vollreban stone.
The Duke and Timeo faced each other across the room.
“If Marcel’s death is overlooked, you would have happily arranged a good marriage. You needn’t concern yourself.”
“You intend to bind an innocent woman here under the pretense of arranging a marriage.”
“Timeo…!”
“I saw everything…!”
The physician’s voice trembled. Everyone in the room, even those moving the body to avoid the damp, looked at the aging physician.
“Confess what you saw.”
“Well…”
The physician trailed off, glancing at the Duke.
“I… I saw it…”
“So, what exactly did you see?”
“Lady Menezes… pressing Marcel’s face mercilessly with her palms…”
“Is there proof?”
“Eyewitness testimony alone is not proof… Yet after Lady Menezes visited, illness was discovered in the young master’s room.”
“Can you explain what kind of illness it was, properly and all at once?”
An impatient voice pressed the physician. Timeo had now blocked Phyllis’s path. The Duke waved dismissively.
“If one suffers from such serious illness, living with painkillers is not uncommon.”
“But…! This was a medicine with no record of dispensing or compounding…! Moreover, its raw ingredients are only found in the sea…”
“If it’s that medicine… could it be…”
The murmurs filling the bedroom did not die down quickly. Timeo looked at Phyllis. She lowered her head. Without averting his gaze, Timeo spoke coolly:
“I am very curious which mad lady would deliberately attempt to harm her fiancée.”
At that moment, Timeo recalled the confession booth. Many who visited the monastery confessed to wanting to harm their lover or fiancée.
“Before we arrive… I hope he’s already dead.”
Sensing familiarity, Timeo suddenly grabbed Phyllis’s shoulder. She trembled. By all appearances…
“So the Vollrebans intend to follow Marcel’s last wish.”
“That’s beside the point, Timeo. Marcel was drunk on death, and we have no intention of performing such a barbaric funeral.”
An uncle suddenly interjected.
“If not, I cannot understand how one so easily slanders a grieving lady, uncle.”
“My child, we have lost the heir suddenly, so we must suspect all possibilities. Then there was the testimony…”
Timeo approached the physician and seized the vial containing the medicine. It was a transparent vial, thumb-sized, with two drops of dark red liquid remaining. Phyllis lifted her head, watching him. For an instant, the moment felt terribly long to Timeo. Without looking away from Phyllis, he poured the vial’s contents into his mouth.
“Timeo…!”
Raising his hand to stop him, Phyllis paled.
“How much would be a fatal dose?”
“Well… it’s a medicine that must be taken repeatedly over time…”
Timeo crushed the small vial with his teeth, sending shards flying into his robe’s sleeve. His gaze met Phyllis’s. Had she… killed Marcel?
Timeo spoke calmly. The Vollrebans in the room exchanged shocked glances at each other.
