Chapter 18

Iberin started digging into Elvin.

As long as he was on this estate, he wasn't getting past her, she figured.

"And the rest of the time?"

"When he isn't teaching, he doesn't leave his bedroom. Sometimes when the servants bring his meals, they've tried to strike up a conversation, but it never goes anywhere."

"Thorough, isn't he."

"Yes. It does seem that way."

Iberin's eyes narrowed, and she tapped her cheek with a finger.

"Keep watching him. The second anything unusual comes up, have them report it right away. And tell him I'd like to have dinner together tonight."

"Yes."

Rotte stepped out, and Iberin got up the moment she was gone to track Lyssel down.

If not for everything going on with Ether, she'd have been paying him plenty of attention too—but lately, she hadn't had the headspace, so it had been a while.

Lyssel was still glued to the east wing.

Either way, whatever education Ether was getting, Lyssel must've gotten too, so she figured she could just ask him what he'd learned.

Knock, knock—

No answer, same as ever.

"It's me. I'm coming in."

She announced it more as a heads-up than a request and shoved the door open.

By now, Lyssel was apparently used to it—he set down the book he'd been reading and looked up at her.

"Been a while."

"Oh? Were you waiting for me?"

"That's absurd."

"Just throwing it out there."

That was the end of it as far as he was concerned—his eyes dropped back to the book.

She'd just been showing up to ramble at him and leave anyway.

"Hey, what was it like for you when you were being educated?"

"What do you mean."

"…I mean, was it fun?"

"You expect to find fun in studying?"

"Ether said it was fun."

"He's an unusual child."

"He's your son."

"Why the sudden question?"

"Ether's been acting strange lately. Keeps putting distance between us, doesn't really smile anymore."

Lyssel tilted his head, then said it like he was hearing the most pointless thing.

"That's the normal state."

And then his eyes dropped right back to the book.

Iberin lost her words at this stripped-down excuse for a man.

That is the abnormal state—how is that normal?

She was so floored she couldn't even get a sentence out, just sat there cracking dry laughs for a while before she could speak again.

"What did you study?"

"Imperial history. The theory of monarchy. Theology. Things like that."

"You're being weirdly cooperative."

"You'd just pester me until I answered anyway."

"Ahh, so you've finally got a read on me. Great—that's one step closer!"

"How exactly is that…"

Lyssel started to say something else, then dropped it.

There was no winning a conversation against her.

"Same things Baron Elvin said."

She'd already called Elvin in and confirmed, and the answers were identical.

Honestly, she'd been hoping for a lie so she could nail him to the wall.

"What were you hoping for?"

"Then why is Ether avoiding me?"

Lyssel looked like Ether's behavior wasn't really his concern either way.

Iberin's shoulders sagged—looked like Lyssel wasn't going to be much help.

Lyssel registered, with mild surprise, that he was probably seeing Iberin look depressed for the first time.

Before she'd lost her memory, the two of them hadn't been close enough for him to really have a sense of what kind of woman she'd been.

He did know that the impression she'd given was nasty-tempered and gloomy.

She'd always been a gloomy person, but lately he'd only seen her laughing—the contrast threw him off.

"You find it strange that the child has changed."

"Yes! He was always so smiley and sweet!"

"No. That's who he's always been."

"……What."

"You're the one who turned the child upside down. He took on your color quickly enough. But this isn't new. He's just gone back to who he was before."

"Hah."

Iberin's mouth fell open, and the emotion pouring off her ratcheted up another level.

Her face had gone red with anger, which somehow made her look pitiful.

She wanted to say something, but she had the sinking feeling this man wouldn't be able to follow it, and the bottled-up frustration felt ready to burst.

Lyssel's whole conclusion came back to that's how a Lecashe is.

"Fuck."

Iberin let the low curse out and started smacking her chest hard.

"What are you doing."

"Forget it. Who exactly told you that this is how Lecashe is supposed to be? Are you a parrot? Saying the same thing every single day? Did your dad say so? That'd make him my father-in-law, by the way. If that's the case—I've never even seen his face, but I think I already don't like him."

"…That's just how it is."

"No, where is that 'just how it is' coming from?!"

"I was taught that way from a young age."

"Taught? By your father?"

"His late Highness and I weren't on the kind of terms to exchange that sort of thing. Obviously, it was from my tutor."

Right. From the tutor.

…Wait. Tutor?

"…Tutor?"

"Yes."

"What tutor?"

"My education tutor. Roto Civelli."

"Sent by the imperial family?"

"Correct."

Of course it was the tutor.

Iberin's face twisted into something monstrous, and she slammed her fist down on the table.

The table shook hard.

Her hand must've been screaming, but she didn't seem to feel a thing—she pounded the desk a few more times in pure exasperation and shouted.

"Those bastards have the nerve to brainwash people?!"

I'll kill every last one of them!

"Brainwash?"

Lyssel asked back.

"The whole education was wrong. Wasn't there some line he kept hammering in?"

"A line he kept hammering in…."

Lyssel murmured blankly, then spoke.

The look on his face was still saying he had no idea what was wrong with any of this.

"He said a Lecashe isn't a human—{a Lecashe is a dog}(#v4a676d0jsa0)."

"What?"

"A smart dog."

"That's sick."

"That if I wasn't guarding the forest, my existence had no value, and leaving this place meant nothing but death."

"……."

The way Lyssel could just reel it off had to mean he'd heard it god knows how many times—Iberin was past stunned, straight into incredulous.

"You realize that's wrong, right?"

"I'm not sure. I don't particularly enjoy thinking back on my childhood, though."

"Not sure?"

"Yes. I don't know."

Iberin's eyebrows twitched.

Ether had Iberin around, so even the tiniest shift in him got caught right away.

But who had this man had?

Butler Hamong had torn into the previous Grand Duchess pretty viciously, so the woman clearly hadn't been a good mother.

The fact that Lyssel called his father His late Highness said plenty—they might as well have been strangers.

Which meant nobody had bothered to check on what kind of education Lyssel was getting.

Even when that education was less education and more brainwashing.

And Lyssel's father would've gone through the same process.

With no one around to know better, he'd lived his whole life never realizing anything was wrong with it.

"When you first heard the word dog, you didn't get angry?"

"No. I didn't."

"Why not?"

"A dog. Mammal, livestock, loyal to humans and intelligent. But humans are animals in the end too, so there's no real difference—that's what he said."

"…Hold on. Can I curse for a sec?"

She had no idea where you'd even start unwiring a head that warped.

"Why are you so upset?"

"…That question itself makes me even more upset."

"Brainwashing. The act of injecting into someone's mind the redirection of their original consciousness or the forced adherence to a specific ideology or doctrine. Is that correct?"

"Yes."

"And you're saying that's what was done to me, and that what was done was wrong?"

"That's right."

"Then what am I supposed to do? Re-learn? From whom? What if that turns out to be brainwashing too?"

"Your Highness. Is it too early in our relationship to talk about trust?"

"Yes."

"Aw, come on!"

Iberin punched the air and stomped her feet.

In a situation like this, who could she possibly be that he should trust more!

Wait, but how does someone this clueless about so many things end up killing himself?

"Your Highness, are you unhappy?"

"…Abstract words like that, I don't really know past the dictionary definition."

"Don't you want to die?"

"If I die, who guards the forest?"

"What about when Ether grows up?"

"Then…."

Lyssel couldn't quite finish the sentence.

Since Ether was only five, adulthood was a long way off, and it seemed Lyssel had never really thought that far ahead.

He furrowed his brow and seemed to mull it over for a moment, then nodded.

"By then… maybe."

"Why? You said you didn't know abstract words."

"By then the child will be the one guarding the forest, so my reason for existing will be gone."

"Wow. Unbelievable. I might lose it."

That bastard, Roto or whatever-his-name was—still alive?

If he was, she was going to kill him.

If he was dead, she'd kill him again.

Iberin clenched her fist so tight her knuckles went white and ground her teeth.

---

Iberin chugged glass after glass of cold water trying to cool the fire in her gut and think.

Lyssel was direct Lecashe bloodline. He'd inherited the title of Grand Duke.

Which meant there was no way he didn't know about the Lecashe secret.

And yet, knowing it, he behaved like that—which told her, plain as day, just how nightmarish the brainwashing must've been across those two and a half years of his childhood.

Why the direct-line secret hadn't been passed on to Ether—she didn't know that part. But in the novel, Lyssel had died like that.

"Did something happen with His Highness…?"

Rotte ventured carefully, taking in how furious Iberin looked.

"Mhm. Something blood-pressure-spiking."

"You fought?"

"Not exactly. But it's not exactly His Highness's fault either…."

It was complicated.

Either way, Baron Elvin must've been sent by the imperial family to pull the same thing on Ether.

But unexpectedly, the Grand Duchess and Ether were tight.

He'd have picked up that something was off, and now he was running his little operation to slowly pry them apart.

Using the cover of education, he wasn't actually starting with the Lecashe brainwashing right away—he was starting with brainwashing about Iberin first. That much was obvious.

What was a five-year-old going to know.

Especially when his so-called teacher was being kind to him—he'd just take it as fact.

"Rotte, do you happen to know a Roto Civelli?"

"Mm, hard not to, he's famous. He used to be a viscount, but he's a marquis now."

"A viscount became a marquis?"

"Mm. Generally, becoming an education tutor for the Lecashe family means a major title bump."

"So the baron's going to get the same?"

"How high he climbs depends on his ability, but he'll make count at the very least."

Which meant that piece of shit Civelli was still alive.

Day she ran into him, she'd kill him.