The Maid With a Child - Chapter 26

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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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26. Methods to Boost Morale
Adlen offered an alternative, her red lips working uncertainly.
“Well, since the Child sleeps through the night now quite soundly… couldn’t I go to my own room once he’s asleep and return before dawn?”
She was clearly desperate—willing to die just to sleep in her own quarters.
From a passing glance at the servants’ quarters, they weren’t particularly comfortable. Everything was arranged neatly enough, but it was fundamentally communal living with minimal furniture.
The Foldable Bed-Sofa that Adlen currently used was worth several times more.
Racalte saw no reasonable justification for her objection.
“Why are you so desperate to go back to your quarters?”
“Because, because people might say I’m a maidservant who shared a room with my master……”
“Hmm?”
Racalte tilted his head at Adlen’s reason for refusal.
He’d assumed it was simply because she disliked the room, or found his presence uncomfortable—some reason like that. But there was a concern he’d never anticipated.
“Rumors?”
“Yes… truthfully, when I worked at another house, I saw how terribly the maids who cleaned the master’s room suffered from gossip.”
“What kind of gossip.”
“Since they spend long hours around the master, people assume something happened during those times.”
The aristocratic social circles and the servants’ gossip mills were no different from each other.
In society too, the endless chatter was always the same: “Did you hear what happened between so-and-so and such-and-such?”
Yet Racalte had never cared about such rumors, never paid them the slightest attention.
“If it isn’t true, you simply ignore it. Problem solved.”
“It doesn’t work that way! You have no idea how loose servants’ tongues are. A maidservant who shared a room with the master while raising a child? Whether anything happened or not, once that spreads, my prospects are finished—love, marriage, everything ruined.”
Adlen spoke with fierce conviction, her voice tight with emotion.
If she simply couldn’t find a match and had to live alone until she died, she could accept that as her fate.
But to be driven from the marriage market by rumors of things she never did? She’d die of resentment without even being able to close her eyes in peace.
“……Mm.”
Racalte made a low sound in his throat.
Listening to her, he could see the logic.
True enough—a woman’s reputation mattered greatly in matters of the heart.
That his decision, made purely for security, had connected to something like this was a angle he’d completely overlooked.
Yet he couldn’t simply yield to her wishes.
“Don’t you understand? Your body is no longer yours alone.”
“What? Whose body is it then?”
“His Majesty has issued a Special Order. Until you complete that task, your body belongs to Teplan. There are people who might approach you to use you as leverage against the Crown Prince, people who might try to blackmail you. Can you really handle all of that alone?”
Adlen felt her throat tighten as she thought of His Majesty’s gaze.
His Majesty’s stern look frightened her, and the possibility of some unknown threat appearing frightened her too.
She realized she’d been viewing the situation far too lightly.
“Ah, I understand. I’ll stay in your room. Sniff……”
But it wasn’t agreement born of acceptance.
Resentment and sorrow welled up, and tears began to seep from her eyes.
At Adlen’s response—as if the world were collapsing—Racalte clicked his tongue.
Morale matters in a military unit. At this rate, she’d become a Deserter. But for now, there was no help for it. He’d have to keep her tethered, whether she liked it or not.
* * *
Adlen was not the type to mount active resistance.
By nature, she fit the role of a maidservant perfectly.
She possessed a servant’s instinct so thoroughly that it was uncanny.
When her master gave an order, she’d say yes, yes without question. If he scolded her unfairly, she’d blame herself and reflect. The slightest praise would brighten her mood instantly, and she’d laugh with delight.
And now this Adlen, even while carrying out a Special Order from the King himself, seemed to wither.
“Child… let’s be happy together… yes……”
On the surface, little had changed.
She still devoted herself earnestly to putting him to sleep, feeding him, and playing with him.
“You’ve returned, sir……”
“…”
Yet something about her subtly grated on Racalte’s nerves.
If she were doing it deliberately, he’d scold her into compliance. But that wasn’t it.
She was giving her all, yet he could see plainly that she had no strength left—something beyond her control.
Before, she’d been like furniture or wallpaper—something he never even noticed existed.
That was what servants were supposed to be.
Yet once a pattern on the wallpaper catches your eye, you can’t stop counting it. Now that he was conscious of Adlen as a person, every gesture and tone of voice bothered him.
“Sigh……”
Once, when he entered the room, she’d press herself into a corner and watch him intently the entire time without looking away. Now, she’d greet him and nothing more.
During the day, she sat leaning against the window, sighing heavily again and again.
As if the world itself had come to an end.
‘……Has everything fallen apart?’
The more he turned it over in his mind, the more his thoughts kept circling back to that single conclusion.
Racalte had never devoted himself so intently to any thought besides strategy—and certainly not to understanding the heart of a mere servant, someone he kept close as his own limbs. He found it absurd, this concentration he turned upon himself.
Yet she was no mere servant. She was a precious appendage, appointed by His Majesty himself.
From her position, it must feel as hollow as having every fingernail torn away.
She had spoken of wanting to meet a man, to marry, to build a home—and every condition for that dream had curdled.
She would spend her life bound to the Child, and she had fallen into the worst possible circumstances for meeting anyone.
‘There’s nothing I can actually resolve here.’
And that made the whole thing feel even more hopeless.
Her marriage was a distant dream; the confinement would be lifted once safety was assured, but when that would be, he couldn’t say.
Yet if he simply left things as they were, she wouldn’t become a deserter—she would wither away.
‘A general hunts game with his own hands and feeds the meat to his soldiers to lift their morale.’
It was a method Racalte employed often enough.
Not just any meat, either—meat caught freely by a superior’s own hands was invariably more precious.
Humans were animals, after all, and once food and sleep were satisfied, morale recharged itself naturally.
‘Does Adlen care for meat?’
Now that he thought about it, he’d never actually seen her eat anything properly.
All the food always went into the Child’s mouth.
The Head Butler would certainly see that she was fed, but never having witnessed her eat with his own eyes struck him as oddly startling.
They’d lived together for months, and he’d somehow never noticed.
‘First things first.’
What would please Adlen most would be producing a man for her, but she’d likely refuse, citing her lack of inclination. The odds weren’t favorable.
So approaching something more instinctive would have better chances of success.
“We should talk.”
At Racalte’s call, Adlen turned her head slowly.
“……Yes? ……Me?”
“That’s right. Come here and sit.”
“Yes…….”
Adlen shuffled toward the sofa and sat across from him.
Once, she would have met his gaze with eyes glistening as she bit back words she wanted to say; now she didn’t even look at him, only at her own hands folded in her lap.
Racalte watched her fingers fidget nervously before he began.
“I’m thinking of redecorating the room.”
“Yes…….”
“You’ll be living here for a long time from now on. I thought I might arrange things more to your liking.”
Only then did Adlen raise her head.
Something in Racalte’s chest thrilled with the sharp thrill of a successful ambush—he’d drawn her attention. The fact that he’d managed it moved his heart more than he expected.
“Redecorate……? How?”
Adlen looked uncertain, tilting her head as she glanced around the room.
Racalte promptly summoned the Head Butler.
“You called, sir.”
“I intend to completely renovate this room.”
“Renovate…… you say?”
“The Child will be staying longer than expected. As things stand, there are clear limits to raising a young one properly. I want to make comprehensive improvements.”
“Ah! Yes, sir!”
At the mention of renovating the room, the Head Butler’s face brightened considerably.
“I’ve been concerned about it all along, truth be told. With the master away at war constantly, I hardly felt I could suggest it……. Everyone knows that when a household master changes, the master’s chambers must be redesigned!”
The room had remained exactly as the previous master left it. This was precisely the right moment.
The party preparations had failed, but now a real chance to distinguish himself had finally arrived.

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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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