I Accidentally Resurrected My Dead Husband - Chapter 61

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 61
“Miss Herington, you know something, don’t you? I know you do.”
Desperation dripped from Caroline’s eyes.
“Help me. I can’t stay here any longer. If this goes on, I think I really will lose my mind.”
Udith wanted to help Caroline, naturally. The grain rations Caroline had given her had saved no small amount on living expenses—and the wine too. Udith was a woman who sometimes sent her conscience on extended leave, but she wasn’t so devoid of conscience as to forget the price of a meal she’d received for free.
“Three million gold.”
“Pardon?”
“If you help me reunite safely with my younger brother, I’ll give you three million gold. And if I manage to leave this Empire, I’ll add another three million on top of that.”
A merchant princess—they said—and her commission scale proved it. Udith had been prepared to help without any payment at all, but at the mention of six million gold, her pupils ignited with an unmistakable gleam.
“There’s no one else I can ask but you, Miss Herington. I haven’t had the chance for a private conversation with any other merchant. My husband’s watchers must have grown careless because they thought I was alone.”
Careless—yes, that was possible. Udith had no escort, no attendants. She was utterly alone. Which meant that when her private conversation with the Marchioness ended, they could search her person.
Or perhaps they believed that if they spotted anything suspicious while watching her, they could dispose of her without consequence.
“Listen carefully, madam. You must not get excited or cry out, no matter what.”
But the watchers’ calculation was wrong. A letter’s contents could be memorized and carried away—the paper itself was unnecessary. And if anyone came to dispose of her, they’d find themselves disposed of by Ern instead. That wasn’t a concern.
Udith’s only worry was a single thing: failure on Caroline’s commission, and losing six million gold.
“Lord Loam was reported dead, but he’s still alive.”
Caroline’s hand flew to her mouth in shock. While Udith explained the full story, Caroline had to clench her teeth more than once—half the time to hold back curses.
“Ha, so I wasn’t going mad after all.”
Caroline seemed to find her mind put at ease by that fact alone. She suddenly got to her feet, and before Udith could react, she bent down and sprawled beside the bed.
“You said there would be a wooden effigy under the bed—one that produces moist vapor to cloud the mind and stir lust?”
“Yes, madam, but—there—”
“Ha, I thought it was suspicious when he sent away May and brought in that handsome male servant. Albert Ferni, you were just going to have me betray you with a mere servant?”
Caroline muttered with seething anger, reaching under the bed.
“It’s really here.”
“Madam, please calm yourself.”
Caroline paid no attention to Udith’s protests and pulled out the wooden effigy submerged in lye. Her eyes burned with a savage light as she stared at it.
She looked ready to hurl it into the fireplace that very instant.
“Wait, wait just a moment. If that disappears, they might try something else.”
“So you want me to keep dreaming of moist vapor rising?”
“No, I mean we should deceive them as well.”
Udith retrieved a half-burned log from inside the fireplace, broke it roughly to the size of the wooden effigy, and placed it in the basin of lye.
“They’ll probably only check whether the effigy is there or not.”
The Marquis wouldn’t come check in person—it would raise suspicion. He’d send a housemaid instead. The maid would pretend to clean under the bed while merely glancing with her eyes to confirm the basin and effigy were in place. How could she extract and inspect it every time? Among all the household servants, even if they were united in purpose, it was best if only a few knew of such a secret. The more people who knew, the harder it became to keep mouths shut.
As Udith slid the basin of lye-soaked wood under the bed, Caroline tossed the wooden effigy into the flames.
* * *
“Come with me for now.”
After submitting to a body search and answering a few questions from the butler, Udith was finally able to leave the Marquis’s residence.
Udith seized Ern, who had been waiting for her at the blacksmith where they’d arranged to meet. She was eager to tell him about Loam and Ferni Marquis, but treason was a sensitive subject—they’d need to talk somewhere without prying ears. The least populated place in this quarter was beneath the bridge that connected the plaza to the area where high nobility had their mansions.
When Udith dragged Ern beneath the shadowy underpass of the bridge, he drew a rather mistaken conclusion.
“Has the moist vapor taken hold again? That was fast.”
Ern fixed her face between both his palms and stared directly into her eyes, as if he could tell whether the vapor had affected her by looking into them.
“Can’t you wait at all? No matter what, we can’t do this here. There’s no one around now, but someone could come any moment.”
“Ugh—no, that’s not it.”
Udith tapped his arm sharply. It wasn’t the moist vapor, but even if it were, why was he being so oversensitive? It was just holding hands.
“Why can’t we hold hands here if there’s someone? Other people hold hands all the time.”
“Your intentions aren’t pure. That’s why we can’t.”
“My intentions are purely for health reasons.”
But this wasn’t the time for such a conversation, regardless of intentions. With no one around, Udith still leaned close and whispered so only Ern could hear.
“It seems Ferni Marquis is hiding Lord Loam. They were apparently friends.”
“What?”
“According to Ferni Marquis’s wife, it looks like he’s been moving food he bought for a banquet to his villa. A villa south of the Capital.”
Ern fell silent for a moment. Like Udith, he seemed to suspect that Ferni Marquis was one of the Followers. And at this point, Ern and Udith shared the same question.
“But why did Mosley Marquis just leave that bastard alone?”
Ern growled savagely. Whether Mosley Marquis had made a mistake or not, it hardly mattered—either way, Ern would tear him apart for it. Udith offered her premature condolences to the Marquis.
* * *
To Cain Mosley, Ern was like a thunderbolt—once the lightning that had struck down countless enemies, and now mere lightning that had fallen upon his peaceful life itself.
The moment he returned from the palace, he found himself facing Ern in the reception room, glowering at him with eyes that looked ready to devour him whole. A savage aura rippled through the air, and as soon as Cain laid eyes on him, both his heart and shoulders seemed to shrivel. The Marquis was sitting in a chair, yet he radiated the feeling of someone on their knees.
“Listen here, Marquis.”
Yes, I’m a Marquis, and you’re a Count. So shouldn’t our forms of address differ between us? But Cain swallowed the words that had risen to the tip of his tongue—wisely.
“You left someone very suspicious untouched. Ferni Marquis. Did you show him favor because you’re both Marquises?”
“That’s quite a leap, Ern. Do you really think I’d do such a thing?”
“But how could Marquis Ferni have remained friends with Loam all this time?”
It was muttered under his breath, yet it sounded like a death threat—or was that just my ears playing tricks? Cain swallowed hard after hearing the full story from Ern. The look in Ern’s eyes seemed certain that all of this was Cain’s fault.
Loam had committed the treason, so why was he the one being persecuted? Cain felt a flicker of injustice, but he was a man of considerable tact. Rather than try to persuade Ern, he turned his gaze toward Udith.
“I’ll place an order for ten boxes of candles. You needn’t deliver the goods.”
It was a rather creative distress signal—pay the bill, and please do something about Ern. And his signal reached Udith perfectly.
“Ern, listen to what the customer—no, what the Marquis has to say.”
Like a trainer gentling a fierce hound, Udith, who had remained silent until now, grasped Ern’s forearm and whispered in a soothing voice. Ern looked as though he had plenty to say but knew it would only tire his lips, yet the fierce edge that threatened to draw steel at any moment had dulled somewhat.
He’s rather weak to his wife, isn’t he.
“Ahem, thank you, Udith. First, it has been established that Marquis Ferni had no involvement whatsoever in the recent treason.”
Cain decided to offer his explanation to Udith instead of Ern and turned his seat to face her directly.
“But you said he was friends with Loam.”
“Yes, I’m aware. However, Marquis Ferni had been in the Penco Kingdom for two years before the treason occurred, and only returned after it was suppressed.”
During those two years, Marquis Ferni had little contact with Loam. They exchanged only three or four letters at the beginning.
“According to what we learned through someone planted among the Followers, Albert Ferni has a notably loose tongue and acts rashly—so they decided not to recruit him.”
The Ferni family had sold all their lands and accumulated nothing but debt; they possessed no reputation, no connections, no power. The Followers might have wanted such a family even now, but back then they were remarkably influential—they controlled an entire Imperial Knight Order and were plotting treason, which speaks for itself.
There would have been no need to involve a man who had nothing and acted recklessly in such a grand undertaking. Thus, despite his friendship with Marquis Ferni, Loam did not bring him into the plot.
“Didn’t the Marquis become wealthy upon marrying his wife?”
“The Marquis has not been married for even three years.”
Judging by the timeline, it was as though he had departed the empire almost immediately after beginning to bask in his wife’s family’s influence.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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