Under the Oak Tree

Memories of the day that she left that place resurfaced in her mind. The day when Riftan led her by hand and brought her into a carriage felt like a distant past, she left on a whim, without knowing the world, innocent. Even in her dreams, she would have thought that she would have returned there of her own free will. She leaned her head against the wall of the carriage, drenched in a strange sense of despondency. Her father, who was sitting quietly across from her, looked at her and made an unpleasant expression, then struck the floor with a cane. Max shuddered and sat upright.

Riding in a carriage with her father was like torture, she couldn’t relax for a moment. She closed her mouth tightly like a clam, trying as much as she could to not get on his nerves. Fortunately, Elliot was with them. The knights argued that they could not disobey Riftan’s orders, so they insisted that at least one of them had to accompany her. It was then concluded that Elliot was going to be the one to escort her to Croix Castle.

The duke couldn’t unleash his wrath upon her because he followed them closely on horseback, right next to the carriage. The duke could do nothing but ferociously glare at her with his eyes and clutch his cane tightly.

“When you get to the castle, live as if you were a dead mouse.” He would say repeatedly, nailing it to her ears the whole journey. “Rosetta will be married as spring comes next year. You should hide quietly in the castle until then. I intend to reject all the visitors who will come, making your recovery an excuse. Although I told them to tell Calypse to come if he wishes to take you, I have no plans of letting him meet you. When he comes, he will formally demand for a divorce. That will have to be delayed until next spring.”

The Duke of Croix looked at her with faded gray eyes. “Even the church sees it justifiable to divorce a woman who miscarried a child. Needless to say, King Ruben will grant that divorce with open arms. You shouldn’t be the cause of ruining what I have planned for decades.”

Max was overwhelmed with shame and lowered her head. It was his father’s ambition ever since to obtain an outstanding successor through Rosetta, he planned it to the point of obsession: it was so embedded in him, comparable to a stew left to boil for a long time that it had stuck to the bottom of the pot. He continued to speak of his plans, anxious to manifest it.

“Rosetta needs to have at least two children. A healthy child, a boy, who will inherit the royal lineage and another boy, a perfect child to be the successor of Croix. I will surely convince them that Rosetta is the healthiest and most perfect woman, better than anyone else, unlike you.”

Knowing that he wasn’t expecting a reply from her, Max simply held her hands tightly and earnestly prayed that an Ogre would come out of nowhere and overturn the carriage right away. But, as always, her expectations were shattered. The carriage entered the luxurious and magnificent gardens of Castle Croix without any trouble. Hundreds of servants descended the stairs to greet the Duke, who returned earlier than expected, as she stood in front of the carriage and anxiously clutched the skirt of her dress.

Elliott jumped off his horse and approached her. “Are you alright? Your complexion does not look good.”

“She must be tired from the long journey.” Before she could reply, the Duke of Croix quickly intervened. “Now that she is home, she will recover soon.”

He wrapped her around his shoulders and turned around. Then, he looked at Elliot over his shoulder and talked.

“Are you satisfied now that you have seen with your own two eyes that she has arrived here safely? You have fulfilled your duty. I will allow you to stay in my castle tonight, but you must leave at once tomorrow.”

Elliot’s face hardened at the duke’s rude words. Max didn’t know what to do, she looked at him and went up the stairs because she couldn’t overcome the duke’s pulling force. As soon as the duke entered the Great Hall, he pushed her away as if she were something despicable. Then he walked proudly into the magnificent hall, it was so big, and its ceiling was so high that even ogres would be able to fit inside and hold a banquet. Then, he yelled for the butler to take her to the room immediately.

Max lowered her head to avoid the gaze of the servants who looked at her with surprise. The butler, who had served the Duke of Croix all his life, obeyed his orders without asking what was going on.

“…please follow me, miss.”

As he bowed his head, Max followed him like a ghost. Suddenly, she stopped when she noticed something silvery shining above her head. Rosetta was standing in front of the second floor, looking down at her from the railings. Max took a deep breath. How could it be? In just over a year, Rosetta had become so much more beautiful. Her luscious, flax-colored hair shone like silver against the sunlight, and her slender, perfectly shaped body boasted her alluring charm. Max bit her lip. The perfect figure of her younger sister shattered her chest more cruelly than ever. She was engulfed in misery as she hastened to follow the butler. He immediately led her to a quiet room at the end of the annex.

“Well then, please rest well. I’ll summon Joanna.”

When the butler did his duty and left, she stood still in the middle of the room and looked around the space that she once lived in. It was a dark room, where the shadow of nature was cast even during the day and dust sat everywhere. As she walked to the window and looked out the scenery, she felt weak and helplessly slumped on her bed. Moments later, a heavyset woman about fifty years of age opened the door and entered.

“Miss…”

Max looked strangely at her nanny whose gray hair had grown considerably compared to the last time she had seen her. The nanny, unable to continue her words for a long time, slowly approached her and took her hand in her wrinkly palms.

“How did this come to be, my poor miss? Madam Arian* also suffered the same misfortune and died…and now, how could it happen to the miss as well…how could God have no mercy?” //TN: Arian is the name of Maxi’s mother

The woman’s laments pulled on her nerves that were already tight to the point of numbness. Max’s face contorted as she pushed the woman’s hands away. For some reason, seeing her eyes full of pity felt more unbearable than the indifferent faces of the other servants.

“I, I …” Max turned her back towards her and tightly shut her eyes that were sore from crying. “I… I feel tired. I want to rest.”

“Alright. Please wait for a while, I’ll bring bath water and a meal at once.”

Joanna wiped her wet eyelids with her handkerchief and headed out. Max took the flagon sitting on the bedside table and vomited up the bowl of porridge she forcibly downed that morning. As she threw up the sour liquid, the emotions she was suppressing broke like a dam. Remorse and shame boiled in her stomach and the sense of loss weighed heavily on her chest. Every time she was reminded of how reckless she had acted and strained her body, guilt pounded on her head like an axe.

Max trembled as she put the flagon down on the floor. Like other lords, Riftan would want to have a successor to pass on his castle, lands, and riches. But would she be able to have another child in the future? Her miscarriage could not have been the result of overworking her body, it was probably inherent in her blood. Reminiscent of the women who have died in the Croix family, she hugged her cold shoulders. Would she be able to bear it when the cruelty grew?

Max touched her burning throat with shaking hands. She had no face to see Riftan, and she was scared and frustrated when she imagined how he would treat her. She looked up and saw the mirror leaning against the wall. When her pale, clear face caught her eyes, her spine seemed to freeze. Her mother’s face, which she vaguely remembered, was clearly revived in the mirror. She was looking at her daughter, who would face the same fate as her. Max squeezed her eyes shut and laid her dizzy head on the pillow.

She didn’t want to think about anything anymore. It would be better to live trapped in that small world, pretending to be as insensitive as possible to pain and sadness as always. If so, she wouldn’t have to worry about losing someone’s affection and she wouldn’t have to try so hard to be someone other than herself. Max buried her face in the pillow. It would be easier to pretend something like happiness did not exist in the first place than to have it ruined, even when her hands were barely holding it. If she had nothing at all, then there was nothing for her to painfully lose.

***

Max quickly adapted back to the life she had before she met Riftan. The helplessness that was buried deep in her bones swallowed her up as if it had been there all along, just waiting for her. While staying in her dark room, her confidence dropped as much as how it used to be, and her voice became a bit slurred because the only person she could talk to was the nanny. Little by little, she felt the things that she had built in herself over the past year fall apart, and she didn’t have the strength to hold herself back. Fear, frustration, and resignation ate her all up.

Max sat by the window and looked at the bare branches swaying in the wind. It felt like she had gone back to that day when she was shaking with fear of being divorced. No, the pain she felt now made her suffer more than before. Before she left for Drakium, he didn’t even embrace her or make eye contact to comfort her. He didn’t even give her a chance to explain why she did it. ‘Please, leave.’ was what he said. Maybe he wanted her to disappear before his eyes.

Max looked up at the cold sky and then turned back to the bedroom. She looked at the bed where her mother once laid and where her stepmother was, and then curled up on top of it. In the corner of her heart, she kind of knew that this moment would come for her someday. She fought so hard not to be separated from him. Every time she was away from him, she struggled from the terrifying thought that her happiness, that came like a miracle, would disappear like a mirage. However, her own actions backfired at her like a boomerang, stabbing her, disappointing Riftan, and even causing her to lose their child. And now, it brought her back to this place.

Max stared blankly at the ceiling, then slowly closed her eyes. At lunchtime, Joanna usually came into the room without fail, carrying a tray of bowls filled with porridge. No matter how much she threw up, the nanny always tried to still feed her. Considering the nanny’s sincerity, she forced the spoon into her mouth. She hadn’t even consumed half of it when her face turned yellow, and she vomited it all out.

Joanna’s eyes, looking at her, sank into melancholy.

“Madam Arian was also too delicate and sensitive, it must be a disease.” She shook her head softly. “At the worst, even a sip of water was too hard to swallow down. How could you be so similar to your mother…”

“I-I’m sorry… I’ll eat it later…”

Joanna sighed deeply as she gently cleaned the bowl of porridge. “I’ll get a new blanket. Please lie down.”

When Joanna left the room with the soiled blanket, Max got up, washed her face in a basin, and changed into clean clothes. And as she was lying weakly on the bed again, she heard knocking on the door. She wondered if that was already Joanna. However, when she raised her head, she saw Rosetta in a purple dress gracefully entering the room. Max looked at her blankly. Rosetta skipped the formal greetings and dragged a chair to the side of the bed and sat down.

“You don’t look well.”

Max sat up and looked at her anxiously. “Wh-why did you come here…”

“I came here because that fickle woman is talking about how my sister is dying.” Rosetta’s hazel eyes, a mix of emerald and sapphire color, swept her figure coldly. “I see her words aren’t mere exaggerations.”

“If you have no-nothing else to say…just leave.”

“Do you intend to die?”

Rosetta spat out her words frankly, not even paying attention to what Max said. She looked at her with apprehension and her half-sister looked back at her, Rosetta’s eyes were clouded with gloom, a true contrast from her vivacious beauty as she spoke to Max.

“You won’t be able to last a year in this castle with your body in that condition. Father wouldn’t even blink an eye if you die.”

“Whatever happens to m-me… is none of your business.”

Rosetta’s face hardened with coldness at Max’s rough answer. “You are so pathetic that I can’t stand it. You’re drowning in self-pity and ruining your own body. I’m tired of seeing my sister’s foolishness.”

“There’s no reason for me to hear those words… from y-you.”

“Then you shouldn’t have returned here in that condition!” Rosetta retaliated in a fierce manner. “Whenever I look at you, anger boils within me. Like a complete idiot, you went to the middle of the battlefield and miscarried your child, came back in a vegetative state, and now you’re killing yourself by refusing meals? Do you think your husband will care if you do that? Ha! He might even rejoice at the fact that he wouldn’t have to go through the cumbersome process of divorcing you when you die. And then, when the last shovel of dirt is laid upon your grave, he will probably marry Princess Agnes, because men are cruel like that!”

Max flinched as if she had been stabbed by Rosetta’s sharp, knife-like words. She glared at her brutal sister, holding back the tears building up in her eyes.

“Don’t talk bad about… hi-him like that. He was… g-good to me. He truly ca-cared for me. That’s why I…”

“And you fell for him just because he spared you some affection.”

Rosetta was cynical and sarcastic. She hastily tried to refute her, but when she saw the bitter smile floating on her lips, she suddenly became speechless. Rosetta then continued to speak in a dry manner.

“Come to your senses. You only fell for him because he was nice to you, but that’s not true affection. Men’s feelings are as changing as the two sides of a coin, when the odds are not in their favor, it flips over in an instant. Haven’t you already realized that from our father? Men will be generous and give whatever you ask for as long as you fulfill their expectations, just like how father treats me. And when a man could no longer get whatever he wishes from you… you are well-aware of how cruel they can be.”

“Ri-riftan… is not like fa-father. He is…”

“If that man is not like father, then why are you here?”

Max’s lips twitched; she couldn’t find the words to argue. Rosetta blatantly mocked her. “Don’t tell me words that even you yourself have no faith in. That man is not different from our father, you know that. That’s the reason why you came back here. Although you don’t see it, you are just as cynical as me, no, you are more cynical than me, sister.”

“S-stop it… leave. I don’t want to… spe-speak with you again.”

Max covered her burning tears with her palms and spoke in a muffled voice. Rosetta sat still and quiet for a long time then slowly stood from her seat.

“When you left, I wished that you would never come back to this castle again.”

Max looked at her, pain was evident in her eyes. Rosetta turned around and as she went towards the door, she muttered.

“You disappoint me sister. You always do…”