How to Avoid Becoming a Vicious Stepmother - Chapter 91

Extra 1. How to live as the daughter of Count Petrika.

A formal relationship with her mother-in-law, the Duchess Dowager of DeMancier, and fear-stricken by her own husband, the Duke of DeMancier, had made Merilyn quickly become acquainted with the only aristocratic woman of her age, Charlotte. Merilyn remarked that Charlotte was unmarried and she envied the latter’s life by the side of the Duchess Dowager. She noticed that Charlotte had also envied herself and her life. Yet even though she begrudged her truly, Merilyn still missed her so much that she just could not cut off Charlotte as such.

It was said that emotions would overlap each other as much as their bodies touched and all she ever felt whenever her body had overlaid with her husband had been an ever-increasing fear. Her husband still didn’t say a word at dinner or even at night and Merilyn chose her silence as well.

A second rebuke from her father soon came forward. Merilyn cried in shame and horror at the letter which asked if she couldn’t do it all because of herself being such an absolutely stiff woman.

“Merilyn, stop crying.”

Charlotte took her into her own arms and patted her back as she burst into tears. Amanda would be the one to have done this if she had been here, but Merilyn could only drench Charlotte’s shoulder shamelessly as she remembered her very dear friend.

“It seems like someone is actually telling the Count about your life here.”

Geez, how pitiful. Charlotte whispered in her ear as she patted Merilyn in her own pitiful voice. Merilyn’s body instantly stiffened in response. It then occurred to her that her father had sent her such rather detailed letters as if he knew everything about Merilyn and Gellerhard’s life.

“Then, ask the Duke. Please tell him that you no longer want to be waited upon at meals in the future.”

“Charlotte…”

How could she dare to ask him? And such a strange request even? She had never spoken to the Duke of DeMancier except the time when Merilyn had asked him to make her bear an heir.

“Trust me. Please tell him that.”

Charlotte said quite confidently and patted Merilyn on the back. Merilyn was terrified, but suppressing her fear, she asked Gellerhard.

“From now on, please tell them that I do not want to be served during meals. I hate it because I feel like I’m being constantly watched.”

As she added to her crude excuse, Merilyn squinted her eyes and groaned. It was impossible for her to be gentle and playful with her words when she had been suffering just from having to share a meal with him.

“Hah.”

Gellerhard couldn’t understand Merilyn’s words at all. In fact, he couldn’t figure out why the hell she had wanted it so, but it wasn’t that hard to attend to it either.

“I will.”

Merilyn had been bewildered by his sheer willingness to agree, but she was delighted too. True to Charlotte’s words, Gellerhard had indeed granted her request. In the end, she gave her thanks to Charlotte instead and not to Gellerhard.

“I knew it would work. He’s actually pretty, hmm, simple.”

“Simple?”

That scary Duke? Charlotte then continued to say while leaning over to Merilyn, who had her eyes opened wide.

“Really. I saw the Duke quite often while attending to the Duchess Dowager. Unlike his sharp appearance, he is actually quite simple himself.”

She repeated her simple words that were accompanied by a sneer. Charlotte’s expression was saying something like, ‘I’m only saying it in a roundabout way because I’m an aristocrat myself’. They—Merilyn and Amanda—had often exchanged expressions like this with each other over the guests and knights of the castle who had often visited the castle before.

“Simple… okay.”

Charlotte’s meaning was crystal clear. Gellerhard was just dense. It was then that a smile began to slowly return to Merilyn’s dry lips. Right at the moment when the subject she had been afraid of became rather funny instead. Just in time, Merilyn was separated from Charlotte because the Duchess Dowager would be leaving for the South as she said that she had already taught Merilyn enough and Merilyn lived quite well on her own.

Merilyn refused to share the bed together until it was time for her to conceive a successor. Gellerhard had accepted this fact. Even the meals which she had been forced to eat together were eventually decided to eat separately by herself. Gellerhard accepted this as well. Merilyn did not see him off to war or even meet him upon his return. Yet Gellerhard said nothing at all.

Regardless of the husband and wife relationship, Merilyn was still a Duchess who had been meticulous in her work. Besides, she had reproached Count Petrika a few times by saying that she would turn herself infertile by eating poisonous plants, which made him stop reprimanding her much. Merilyn enjoyed her alone time very much as she would only meet Gellerhard when they were trying to conceive an heir.

It was flowers that Charlotte had found during her travels that had gotten sent along with her letters often. Charlotte said that if Merilyn were to have a baby, she could then disguise an accidental death for the latter and she could run away after that, but Merilyn was not interested in the offer at all. In fact, her work as the ‘Duchess’ suited her quite well and Merilyn did not want to give up this life nor did she wish to live without a husband.

Gradually, as the letters from Charlotte became obsessive, Merilyn ordered for them to be put aside and she did not even try to read those letters at all. She said that Charlotte was under the protection of the Duchess Dowager, so she couldn’t completely cut it off and if Charlotte were to do anything ungodly, Merilyn intended to present these letters as evidence.

Then came the long-awaited pregnancy. This baby was her savior, who would even be able to get rid of her once-a-month, obnoxious bedfellow. Nevertheless, Merilyn’s life didn’t turn out the way she had expected at all.

*

The baby whom she had given birth to at the end of her labor was her own baby boy. After his first cry right before she got to hold the baby in her arms, his eyelids opened and she could see a pair of eyes that were identical to hers. Tears of joy soon followed the tears which she shed in pain. At the same time, Merilyn could suddenly sense the fact that her time with her own baby was running out. The effect that her pregnancy retained on her body had been profound and she was already dying while carrying her own baby. Merilyn soon asked with her parched lips and hoarse voice.

“Amanda—I want to see Amanda.”

Her father’s dream of turning his own daughter into a Duchess as well as his grandson as the next Duke in order to wield the prestige of the Duke of DeMancier still remained. That dream was already coming true and Count Petrika didn’t really care what his grandson would eventually do, just as he no longer cared what happened to his own daughter in the process.

But her childhood friend, Amanda, was completely different. Amanda had always looked at Merilyn with amiable eyes and cared for her with her attentive touch. Merilyn had believed in her more than she ever did in her own parents.

At the very end, right up till the very last moment, her wish had finally come true. Her baby would soon grow up to be loved more than anything else in the arms of her safest and most loving friend whom she really knew. After fulfilling her last wish, Merilyn, who was the daughter of Count Petrika, had become the Duchess of DeMancier before she eventually passed away.

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