Chapter : 05
“An Unexpected Talent”
“Ha….”
She stopped staring at the duke’s back.
He was going to leave anyway. What was the point of expecting anything from him?
She completely withdrew her attention from the duke and sat back comfortably. Thinking that there wasn’t much time left to watch him anyway, her mood quickly improved. Alexa kept bringing her food—whether to cheer her up or simply because she herself wanted to eat, it was hard to tell.
They were simple desserts and finger foods, but perhaps because this was a gathering of nobles, they looked quite refined. As she chose a fruit-topped dessert and watched people dancing, time passed quickly.
“Madam.”
“Ah.”
Before she realized it, the duke had returned to her side. She pretended not to notice Clint standing next to her and continued putting fruit into her mouth. Having eaten mostly soup while pretending before, everything went down easily.
“Yes?”
Then Psyche tilted her head when she noticed people suddenly gathering. Clint followed her gaze and explained,
“The Crown Prince has arrived as well. We should go and pay our respects—”
Psyche nodded and rose to approach the Crown Prince, but suddenly froze in shock. Clint also stopped mid-sentence.
“Huh?”
Something far too sudden swept over the place in an instant. Startled, her mouth fell open. The Crown Prince had suddenly collapsed to the floor. People screamed.
“Eek!”
“Your Highness!”
The duke rushed to the Crown Prince first. Psyche, weighed down by her body, followed more slowly. The Crown Prince lay on the floor, conscious but pale, his face deathly white.
“This smell…”
Only then did Psyche realize why her head had been hurting earlier and quickly covered her nose. How had she failed to notice such a nauseating stench before?
The scent of a plant with such a strong presence. The moment she identified it, Psyche stepped forward without realizing it.
“It’s poison.”
She said it absentmindedly and hurried toward the Crown Prince. It was definitely poison. She was certain. No one knew better than Psyche what it looked like to die from poison.
After all, her grandfather—and her biological parents—had all been killed by poison. The one saving grace was that the Crown Prince had been discovered quickly. As Psyche tried to step in, the duke grabbed her hand and shook his head, signaling her not to interfere.
“Madam.”
She knew. She knew that stepping in unnecessarily could make things worse. But she couldn’t leave someone to die from poison. The sight of his pale, fading face overlapped with the image of her dead parents.
And this poison… she might be able to deal with it.
Clint grabbed Psyche’s wrist to stop her as she tried to move toward the Crown Prince—a silent warning not to get involved in trouble. She shot him a brief glance and forcefully shook his hand off. The duke, startled by this unfamiliar side of Psyche, froze in place. Then he urgently ordered a maid standing nearby with a tearful expression,
“Bring gauze and cold water. Ah—there should be ice. Bring ice too.”
Looking at the Crown Prince lying as if dead, Psyche faced the tragedy of her past.
“……”
Her heart felt heavy. Her parents had died a very long time ago.
Normally, the past fades like a stone weathered by the winds of time, leaving only a vague outline. But there are things in life that time cannot erase. Like deep darkness, some memories are never buried.
Psyche’s parents died on the same day, at the same time. That day, she would never forget, even unto death.
When evening came and the count and countess still hadn’t appeared, five-year-old Psyche went looking for them herself.
“Mom? Dad?”
The count had always been extremely diligent and never slept in late. That day felt strange—she ate breakfast alone at an empty table. It was truly an uncanny day.
No one answered her calls. Parents not responding to their child’s voice. When Psyche turned the corner into their bedroom, an unbelievable scene unfolded before her eyes.
The count’s bedroom was dark, the blackout curtains drawn even though it was daytime.
A strangely dizzying smell, as if it could intoxicate her. Damp air. Everything about that day was wrong. In the darkness, Psyche clearly saw her parents’ lifeless, bloodless bodies. Even without light, their pallor was so stark she couldn’t look away.
“Mom…?”
She was young, but she knew the situation was grave—something that should never happen. The cause of death was poison.
It had been so meticulously planned that even the count, knowledgeable about herbs and poisons, had been deceived.
Later, when Psyche came of age, she learned who had killed her parents: the count’s younger brother, whom he trusted most. They said there was no one in the world you could truly trust—and indeed, how could someone betray trust like that? From then on, Psyche decided not to trust people. Trust only invited a knife in the back.
Come to think of it, perhaps she had trusted the duke all this time simply because he had been so kind.
“Yes. I can’t make the same mistake again…”
Deep inside her, a twisted belief had taken root—that trusting people always led to betrayal. And the series of events only reinforced that belief.
She shook her head, trying to erase the image of her parents superimposed over the fallen Crown Prince. Turning to the maid who was standing there dazed despite having received orders, Psyche spoke again,
“What are you doing? Hurry and bring it.”
The maid hurriedly obeyed. Psyche quickly checked the pulse between the ear and neck and assessed whether he could breathe on his own.
His breathing was faint, but the poison didn’t seem to have spread throughout his body yet. As Psyche examined him, the Crown Prince’s attendant rushed in and shouted in alarm upon seeing her.
“Do not touch him carelessly!”
As the attendant tried to intervene, it was unexpectedly Clint who stopped him. He watched Psyche with a strange expression.
“Do not be rude to the duchess.”
His face was so cold that the attendant couldn’t push forward any further. Torn between his duty to protect the Crown Prince and the duke’s intimidation, he could only fidget helplessly.
“But—!”
The attendant was clearly flustered. Psyche paid him no mind and leaned her face close to the Crown Prince’s mouth. A strong scent of wine stung her nose. Seeing this, the attendant’s face crumpled as if he were about to cry.
“Poison? Is there poison that doesn’t react even to silver?”
At that, Psyche stood up.
“That’s because it isn’t poisonous when eaten alone. Did you bring the ice?”
The maid who had been ordered handed over a glass filled with ice. As Psyche tried to place ice in the Crown Prince’s mouth, the duke stepped in and took the ice from her.
“I’ll do it, madam.”
As time passed and color slowly returned to the Crown Prince’s face, Psyche stood up with a sigh of relief. She staggered slightly from focusing too hard, but Alexa supported her, preventing a fall.
Thanks to Psyche’s quick response, the Crown Prince, who had been struggling to breathe, gradually stabilized. It helped greatly that Psyche was familiar with such situations from her time in the count’s territory.
“He’ll wake up soon.”
No sooner had she finished speaking than the Crown Prince coughed and regained consciousness.
“Cough.”
“Your Highness!”
The frantic attendant finally looked as though he’d come back to life and grabbed the Crown Prince.
“Ugh…”
“Your Highness!”
He carefully helped the Crown Prince sit up.
“Mm…”
Seeing him awake, Psyche added briefly,
“The young leaves of the Jabi tree are very expensive tea leaves, but when consumed with alcohol like wine, they become poisonous—so it’s best to be careful.”
At her words, the crowd stirred.
She had always quietly attended gatherings and disappeared without notice; this was the first time she had stepped forward like this, and everyone watched her with interest. Unaware of all the attention, Psyche focused on explaining to the attendant.
“No matter how expensive or good something is, if you don’t know how to consume it properly, it can become poison instead.”
She smiled bitterly. No matter how good something looks on the outside—it felt as though she were talking about herself and the duke. Her chest tightened.
Wasn’t their relationship becoming poisonous, too? Right now. At her explanation, the attendant exclaimed,
“Ah!”
The nobles sharpened their senses at the revelation that the duchess possessed such an unexpected talent. Those who had thought of her as nothing more than an ignorant, fallen noble from the borderlands under the duke’s protection were shocked.
They whispered among themselves, stealing glances at Psyche. Talk followed that the duke’s already solid power base would only grow stronger—after all, she had saved the life of the future emperor. Hearing her words, the attendant asked with genuine curiosity,
“How did you know it was Jabi leaves?”
At that question, all eyes turned to Psyche, waiting for her answer.
End Of Chapter : 05
