“I’m sorry, Lise. You heard harsh words because of me… I’m really, really fine.”
“Edith!”
Lise came up to her and took her hand. Killian narrowed his eyes and had an expression that seemed to gauge Edith’s intentions. Yes, even at first glance, it must be suspicious that she insisted that she was fine.
“I can’t believe it.”
Sure enough, Cliff didn’t get over it easily. He seemed displeased that Lise was accused of attempted poisoning. Cliff looked at Sophia and Edith coldly before calling some of the maids. Then he ordered the maids to search in Edith’s room.
“What, what are you doing!”
Sophia jumped up in surprise, but she couldn’t stop Cliff’s ferocious spirit. But honestly, Edith wasn’t too worried. The poison must have been put in by Sophia, and there’s no way such poison could be found in her room…
“What is this?”
…She didn’t have it, but somehow the situation seemed to be ruined. In their hands was a small vial of clear potion. At first glance, suspiciously, the bottle had a paper with a picture of a skull attached to it.
‘No matter what anyone says, that’s poison. It’s clear.’
Just because he’s Cliff, there’s no way he wouldn’t know that. And Cliff’s eyes were on her.
“That… my stuff… It is not.”
“Interesting. So who would have hidden something like this inside the porcelain decorations in your room?”
Cliff questioned her while waving the small vial in front of her with a sneer. His mouth was smiling, but his eyes seemed like he was going to choke her at any moment. But fortunately, Lise clung to him.
“Cliff! Edith is a patient. What are you doing to the patient!”
“But Lise!”
“It’s not Edith’s. Why are you blaming the victim, Edith? And it could just be a lotion or an emergency medicine.”
Lise was defending her diligently, but Cliff was convinced that the bottle he was holding was the poison she ate. Sophia’s face was nervous like never before.
‘Did you put it in this room again? Ugh… Who is so stupid?’
She’d rather just throw it outside. Well, that’s why the episode wouldn’t progress. When it became difficult to find the bottle and it was difficult to determine the owner of the bottle, the episode became too long, so the writer must have tried to solve it simply like this.
She let out a long sigh and closed her eyes. Even Killian’s gaze at her was too much for her now.
And by the afternoon of the next day, it turned out that what was in the vial was poison that caused stomach pain and vomiting. Well, it was expected, but the future was bleak. Cliff was angry that she had staged a play to put the blame on Lise, and even if it wasn’t for Cliff, everyone else was suspicious of her.
“Isn’t it crazy to search the room right away? Annoying…”
Sophia, the culprit behind all this, was annoyed by her side.
“You pretend to be smart, but you can’t do anything right.”
She grinned at Sophia while lying on the bed, and Sophia glared at her with fierce eyes and then punched her in the stomach.
“Ouch!”
Her stomach, which had even squeezed blood, felt like it would break through.
“If you climb one more time, I will kill you.”
Perhaps this failure itself was painful, Sophia lost her usual composure and became angry with her. Then, curled up like a shrimp, she left the room, leaving Edith alone in agony.
“Ugh… Ugh, black…”
She felt like her stomach was twisted because she had poisoned her body after starving for several days. Having suffered from leukemia in a previous life, she thought she could endure the pain, but it wasn’t easy. Pain was always painful.
“It hurts… ah…”
She couldn’t pinpoint exactly where the pain was. It felt like her stomach hurt, her back hurt, her heart hurt, and everything hurt. Just then, the door opened and someone strode forward.
“Are you in severe pain?”
It was Killian. She took a deep breath and nodded slightly. But what came back was not sympathy, but bruising.
“Then why did he take the poison…! Don’t you know it’s dangerous?”
He also seemed to believe that she had staged a play. It’s the same thing every time, but this time she couldn’t help but say it.
“I am not. I never did.”
“Then who the hell…!”
“I am not! Oh no!”
Tears flowed as she felt the sharp pain. She wanted to hold back her tears because she was afraid that he would make fun of her for acting, but she couldn’t control it because it hurt so much.
She was so used to enduring the pain alone, but just because she was used to it, it wasn’t okay.
‘If only I could die like this…’
The thought of wanting to end everything like this tormented her again. It was an impulse that she had been fighting against all her life. She pulled the blanket and buried her face in it, feeling that she couldn’t stand it if Killian criticized her any more.
“If you don’t have anything to say… Go back.”
He stood still there for a long time, and eventually turned around and left. There was the sound of a door closing and the room fell into silence.
It was not too funny Pretending to be strong, she asked him to leave, but when he left, it felt like her heart was ripped in tatters.
* * *
After returning from Edith’s room, Killian was confused. It was undeniable that this incident was Edith’s own play. If Cliff hadn’t searched Edith’s room and found the bottle of poison with that animal instinct, Lise would have been misunderstood as trying to poison Edith, no matter how fine Edith said she was.
It seemed that the peaceful atmosphere of the bazaar was broken in an instant. However, the reason he couldn’t blindly hate Edith was because of what the doctor who examined her said.
“Her body was so weak,” he said. You should take good care of her medicine for the time being.”
At first, he thought it was just the consequence of having eaten the poison. But when he asked again, the doctor gave an unexpected answer.
“It looks like she has been starving for a few days.”
“Starve…?”
“It’s not exact, but it seems to me. There are a lot of young ladies who recklessly starve to lose weight, and their situation is similar.”
He couldn’t believe it. It was because he knew how well Edith ate, even if he didn’t know anything else.
“I don’t think she’s starved for a long time, but since she swallowed the poison while she hadn’t eaten, it’s more lethal than if she swallowed it while she was healthy. She will be in pain for a while.”
“Approximately! Is there any medicine that will relieve the pain?”
“There is also a pain reliever in the medicine we prescribe, but only when it is to a certain extent. Now you just have to be patient. Warming the stomach will help a little.”
He was dumbfounded. The fact that she had poisoned her body after starving for several days made him angry, apart from the fact that she tried to frame Lise.
‘Are you stupid or toxic? What if you die then!’
Killian was very angry and called Edith’s maid, Sophia, to question her. At first, Sofia, who said that Edith ate well every day, finally confessed that she was starving herself to lose weight when he told her the doctor’s diagnosis.
“To lose weight?”
“My lady gained a lot of weight after getting married. In the meantime, it seems that even the lady herself was not conscious of it, but she said that she should lose weight because I told her, and she…”
It was said that she gained a lot of weight after marriage, but no matter how much he remembered, Killian couldn’t recall where Edith had changed. However, the current Edith did not gain enough weight to lose weight. Rather, places like the nape of the neck and collarbone looked too skinny, so it’s dangerous…
‘Where the hell is there to pull it off!’
Besides, it’s nice to see how well she eats…
Then, suddenly, he thought of Edith, who was sitting quietly alone at the bazaar.
‘Did she feel embarrassed when she heard that people were only praising Lise at the bazaar? So, to lose her weight…?’
Prior to their marriage, despite rumors that she was a villainess, she was a woman who received the attention of society. It was only natural for her to miss the attention of others, since the person who used to receive that attention was treated coldly in an instant.
‘Maybe she drank poison because she wanted to get attention rather than trying to frame Lise.’
If that was the case, it would be really pathetic. If she had starved herself for a few days, she would have known that she was not feeling well, but the thought of swallowing poison made her even feel scared.
‘But I can’t let her incur the wrath of my father!’
Duke Ludwig was furious with the suspicion that Edith tried to harm Lise by swallowing poison. And it was natural. The Duke and his wife promised to save Lise, who was living under severe persecution in the Sinclair family, and keep her safe. However, another threat to her arose within the Ludwig family.
Killian let out a long sigh.
‘Somehow I have to buy her sympathy and appease my father’s anger. Otherwise, he won’t let Edith go unnoticed this time.’
Killian, who was worried, headed to Edith’s room. He thought she’d opened up a little to him, so he thought he’d try to convince her to be honest and ask for his father’s forgiveness.
But as soon as he entered Edith’s room, she was seen crouching over her body as if in pain. Her hands, which gripped her sheet so tightly that she blanched, were trembling.
“Are you in severe pain?”
He hurriedly approached and looked around, but Killian couldn’t help either. The doctor said that for the time being, even if she took medicine, she would feel sick to her stomach, so this was the pain Edith had to endure alone. Killian got angry without even realizing it because her sick and thin body was frustrating.
How do you feel?
