Rewriting the Trash Ending - Chapter 43

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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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43.

“Is the Grand Duke at the castle?”
Tera straightened in her seat at Magda’s question.
“His Highness is not here at present.”
He’d returned only yesterday—had he ridden out again already?
“Then the Grand Duchess must be here alone.”
“Yes, that is correct.”
The head maidservant answered with proper deference, her eyes cast demurely downward.
The perfect show of submission drew a soft laugh from Magda’s nose.

“Though I overstep perhaps, this is not a matter for you to concern yourself with, madam.”
“I appreciate your kindness, but the hiring and dismissal of servants falls within my purview, not yours.”
“I beg your pardon…….”

Overstepping. Begging pardon.
The woman had been so bold before, staring straight ahead with such impudence, yet now it seemed she’d grown to regret her own existence. How convenient.
If anyone in this household had the standing to instruct and correct the mistress, it would be herself—the family elder.
“Tell the Grand Duchess I’ve come calling.”
“Very well. I shall show you to the Reception Room first.”
Once in the Reception Room, Magda settled back comfortably with her tea to await the Grand Duchess.
But even as the tea cooled to near tepidity, there came no sound of her arrival.
“How much longer before the Grand Duchess appears?”
“My apologies. The Grand Duchess is preparing herself, so if you would be patient a moment longer……”
The head maidservant’s tone was exquisitely courteous, yet combined with the unusual quiet that hung over the Grand Duke’s Castle today, it stirred something unsettling in Magda’s chest.
‘Am I being too sensitive?’
The woman had never been warm to her anyway—that was nothing new.
Magda shook her head, dismissing the thought as nothing.
How long she waited, she could not say.
The door to the Reception Room opened, and the Grand Duchess appeared.
“Forgive the wait. Your sudden visit without notice made me tardy—I trust you’ll understand.”
“But you were delayed only because you took pains to receive me properly, so of course I must show that understanding.”
“How kind of you to say.”
Lumiere gave a soft chuckle and took her seat across from Magda.
Her silver hair was arranged in a neat, upswept style, and she wore a deep cobalt-blue dress of austere elegance, with a pristine white shawl draped across her shoulders.
The jewels that adorned her ears and throat gleamed softly—a picture of flawless refinement.
Things that would have been mere fantasy on the stipend that Moberta received each month.
As her inner bitterness twisted tighter, Magda twisted her lips into a sneer.
“You do look rather radiant these days. After showing me such contempt at the Grand Celebration Banquet, it seems you’ve been living quite comfortably since.”
“Why should I live uncomfortably? But it seems you yourself have not been at ease.”
Magda’s lips curved upward in a bitter smile.
To think she’d dare carry on so boldly just because the Grand Duke had shown her some favor.
A woman treated as nothing in the Empire.
“I am troubled by my nephew having taken the wrong woman into his household, so how could I rest easy?”
Magda arranged her features into an expression of genuine concern.
“The wrong woman brought into the household—so that’s why you’ve come?”
“I’ve heard the castle is in disarray. As someone of standing in the family, I cannot ignore such matters.”
“As someone of standing……”
“Surely it is customary that any new member brought into a household must be vetted by the family elders, is it not?”
“Don’t tell me you’ve come here to conduct some sort of vetting?”
“The Grand Duke is a man of great affairs and keeps a busy schedule. If I can fulfill my role in his stead, should I not do so?”
“Very well. Let’s hear what you have to say.”
With Lumiere’s permission, Magda lifted her chin with affected solemnity and spoke.
“I’m told that the Grand Duchess misplaced an entire storehouse the moment she laid hands on the household accounts?”
…….
“When you reassign the servants’ duties on a whim, these errors are bound to occur, are they not? How grave must your nephew’s countenance have become?”
When Lumiere did not respond at once, Magda let out a short, derisive laugh.
Yes, that was the proper way to hold one’s tongue.
You tried to teach me, yet you couldn’t even govern your own household properly—you should have nothing to say, even with ten mouths.
“Indeed, how could someone who’s never even managed a modest household possibly know anything? Though, of course…”
Magda let her words trail off with a pitying air, straightening her spine.
Now came the heart of the matter.
“So from today onward, I shall be delighted to assume management of the Grand Duke’s Household.”
“You?”
“How could I allow my nephew, who undertakes such great affairs, to trouble himself with mere household matters?”
Lumiere crossed her arms as if to say, go on, let’s hear more.
“I shall speak to my nephew most carefully. Since Your Highness still lacks experience, I shall stand beside you and offer my assistance.”
“Remarkable—there’s truly nothing you won’t say.”
“Say nothing inappropriate? Every word I speak is for Your Highness’s sake.”
“How can meddling in my household affairs possibly be for my benefit?”
“Your Highness must focus on more important duties. If you wish to see an heir, you ought to exert yourself in the bedchamber with our nephew—shouldn’t you?”
……
Lumiere’s expression, which had remained composed all this while, wavered. She pressed her tongue against her cheek and closed her eyes tight, as if holding back rage.
As that calm face began to crack, Magda smiled like a serpent.
She’d struck precisely where it hurt.
Now she would tear the wound open properly.
So that she might feel the same humiliation I felt that day.
“Yet I hear the Grand Duke, who should be enjoying his new marriage, frequents the castle less and less.”
……
“Born of a dancing girl, he surely inherited her talents—and still you cannot keep him to your bedchamber, despite every trick at your disposal. How pitiable…”
Magda let her words fade as her gaze traveled slowly, deliberately, up and down Lumiere’s form.
“Perhaps Your Highness fears the Curse is real after all?”
……
“If you truly cannot manage, there is another option—bringing another woman to stand beside my nephew. Of course, you would have to step down from your position.”
At this naked threat and mockery, Lumiere’s face hardened like stone.
At the Grand Celebration Banquet she had smiled with such confidence, yet now she seemed entirely unable to control her expression.
So her dismissal of the Curse as mere superstition at the banquet had been nothing but hypocrisy.
“By what authority do you presume?”
“I am the Grand Duke’s aunt. And I have long represented him in Society. Is it so difficult for me to dispose of one who cannot even bear an heir?”
……
“If your belief that the Curse is false proves true, then entrust the household to me, and let Your Highness simply…”
But then.
As if all that rigidity had been mere theatre, a smile bloomed across the Grand Duchess’s face.
“Your Highness, I’ve brought her as you commanded.”
Kaiden entered the Reception Room and hurled a shabby-looking woman onto the floor.
……!
Magda’s pupils dilated sharply.
‘What is that wretch doing here?’
Though her hair hung in tangled disarray, she could not fail to recognize Britta’s stout frame.
“She talks so much—it was exhausting merely to listen.”
“You’ve worked hard.”
At the exchange between Lumiere and Kaiden, Magda’s face flushed crimson.
Could it be they had been toying with her all along?
“Wh—what is the meaning of this?”
Magda leapt from her seat and cried out.
A warning bell clanged through her mind.
“Britta, who asked you to gather information about the Grand Duke’s Household and ordered you to sabotage it?”
Britta, crumpled on the floor, glanced nervously at Magda before opening her mouth.
“The… the Countess…”
“Silence! This wretched creature—what nonsense is she spouting? When did I ever—!”
As Magda’s face went white and she sputtered indignantly, Lumiere spoke.
“I received a letter yesterday.”
“What? I don’t…”
“It said that when the Grand Duke saw the state of affairs, he grew grim—and that you should step forward soon.”
Magda’s eyes flickered violently.
The words were identical to the letter she herself had received.
Which meant…
“Isn’t that so?”
When Lumiere asked in a low voice, Magda’s face twisted with fury.
The servants’ grievances reaching a peak, her nephew’s temper souring, the murmur that she herself ought to step in soon—
she realized it had all originated from the fingertips of that woman.

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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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