"Anastasia."
The voice was low and resonant, vibrating through the heavy, stagnant air of the room. Anastasia, who had been staring blankly at the dust motes dancing in a sliver of sunlight, flinched. She did not turn around. She knew exactly who was standing at the threshold.
"Did you hear me?"
Mikhail stepped into the room. The floorboards groaned under his weight, a sharp, rhythmic sound that seemed to echo the tightening in her chest. He moved with the predatory grace of a man who owned not just the space he occupied, but everything within it.
"I asked if you had finished your meal."
Anastasia looked down at the tray sitting on the small wooden table. The bread was dry, the edges curled and hardened, and the tea had long since gone cold. She hadn't touched it. She hadn't felt the need to nourish a body that felt increasingly like a cage.
"I wasn't hungry," she whispered, her voice raspy from disuse.
Mikhail stopped a few paces behind her. She could feel his gaze—cold, analytical, and possessive—tracing the line of her neck. It was a look that made her skin crawl, yet she remained frozen, unable to summon the strength to pull away.
"Hunger is not a choice you are permitted to make, Anastasia," he said, his tone devoid of heat but heavy with authority. "You are property of this house. And property that wastes away is of no use to me."
He reached out, his fingers brushing against her shoulder. The touch was light, almost clinical, yet it sent a jolt of terror through her. She stiffened, her breath hitching in her throat.
"Do you understand?"
"Yes," she replied, her voice barely audible.
"Then eat."
He didn't move away. He stood there, a silent, looming shadow, waiting for her to obey. The air in the room grew suffocating, thick with the weight of his expectations. Anastasia slowly reached for the bread, her fingers trembling as she broke off a piece. Every movement felt like a betrayal of her own spirit, a surrender to the suffocating reality of her existence.
"Good," Mikhail murmured, his voice dropping to a near-whisper that was far more terrifying than a shout. "We have much to discuss regarding your future, and I would prefer you to be conscious for it."
Anastasia was looking out the window through the curtains. Several magnificent carriages arrived, and an endless stream of boxes was unloaded from them. What on earth could all of that be? One thing was certain: given the large ribbons attached to them, they were undoubtedly gifts. In this manor, there were only three people who would receive that many gifts: the noble Lauderdales.
Anastasia stood there watching the carriages until the sun dipped low and they finally departed.
"Wow..."
Even though it was an ordinary scene with nothing left to see, Anastasia was filled with wonder. In the ten years she had been here, she had never once gazed at the sunset from such a height. That was why this land, which she had never left in a decade, felt so incredibly foreign.
"It's beautiful..."
Facing the sunset of her own Paradise for the first time, Anastasia was simply awestruck. Edenhurst looked entirely different when viewed from the manor compared to when she looked up at the red sky from the forest or the garden.
Only after the crimson carpet covering the ground began to lose its color did Anastasia return to her bed.
Sitting on the edge of the bed, she looked down at her feet. In the week she had been here, they were almost completely healed.
The doctor, who they said was called from the village, visited every day to examine her wounds and apply medicine. The medicine, kept in a circular container, had a strange scent she had never smelled in her life. The doctor would soak a cotton swab in the dark, blood-red ointment that was beginning to harden, then apply it to Anastasia’s wounds. She felt a pain as sharp as when the glass shards had first embedded themselves in her hands, but Anastasia gritted her teeth and endured it.
"You endure it well."
The doctor had clearly applied pressure to the tweezers holding the cotton on purpose, but Anastasia did not let out a single groan until the end. The doctor, who had come every day, said yesterday that there was nothing left for him to check and told her to just apply the medicine once a day. When the maid asked about the medicine she was to take, he told her to ask the doctor at the manor, as it was not his concern.
The maid looked at the tray left behind—with the medicine bottle, cotton, and tweezers—as if they were an annoyance. After all, it was more work for her to do.
Anastasia waited for the maid, who had not come even though it had grown dark.
'They said to take the medicine after a meal.'
On the table in the room, where one could barely make out shapes in the dim light, sat the medicine and water. It was the medicine prepared by the man named Igor who had come with Mikhail. Anastasia was someone who followed orders exactly as given. Therefore, the idea of taking the medicine before eating, as the doctor had instructed, was out of the question.
After waiting for the maid a while longer, Anastasia climbed into bed and pulled up the covers.
'I guess she isn't coming today.'
Since coming to this room, Anastasia had been fed three meals a day without fail. The meals were even the same as those the head chef prepared for the masters. Freshly baked bread that was savory and soft, packed with butter; a glass full of juice; well-roasted vegetables, eggs, bacon, and beans. And even roasted potatoes topped with an unknown sauce.
These were foods she had only ever been able to eat as leftover scraps from the kitchen on special days, like the birthdays of the Lauderdale family. To be given that three times a day—Anastasia thought she could never eat it all. But the human body was treacherous; even after sweeping away portions twice the size of what she usually ate, it didn't feel burdened and instead craved more. That was why Anastasia was afraid. She wondered if this was the sin of gluttony her father spoke of, the insatiable greed of a hungry ghost. Yet, she could not overcome the temptation of the soft bread and butter. So, after the meal was finished and the maid left, Anastasia would take her medicine and then offer a prayer of atonement to God.
"..."
She had been lying there for a long time, but sleep would not come. It was strange. Since coming to this room, she had been so overcome with drowsiness after eating and taking her medicine that she could barely finish her prayers, but now her mind was perfectly clear. Just as she was about to get up to pray again, she heard the maid's voice in the hallway.
After a moment of hesitation, Anastasia simply pretended to be asleep. She knew that if she were asleep, the maid would leave the meal and exit the room immediately. If she were awake, the maid would stand by her side for the entire duration of the meal.
A moment later, there was a knock, and the maid entered the room.
"She's really asleep?"
"See? I told you she'd be asleep. She's been collapsing and sleeping all day long. She's got it easy."
The maid had brought someone else with her. Behind her back as she lay turned away, she heard the sound of a tray being set on the table and a chair being pulled out.
"I came late on purpose."
The maid smiled with satisfaction as she looked at Anastasia, who was turned away as if dead.
Recently, whenever she went to the kitchen to pick up Anastasia's meals, she would claim that Anastasia was eating a lot and get extra food. Naturally, all of that extra food went into the maid's own mouth. The kitchen didn't question it, and since Anastasia was like an idiot who didn't notice if her plate was messy, there was no problem at all.
Thanks to this, the maid had been enjoying bread and meat lately. Besides, once Anastasia fell asleep, she didn't wake up.
"I knew she'd be asleep. Let's eat and hang out here comfortably."
Extra food and a quiet room where no one else would come. Moreover, a place they would never dare to enjoy themselves. The maid in charge, who had brought along her closest friend, smiled and pulled out a small bottle of liquor she had hidden.
Soon, the two maids sat comfortably as if this room were their own, eating Anastasia's food and chatting.
"You saw the gifts piled up in the foyer today, right?"
"Of course. How could I miss that? Even the gardeners were hanging around the main house to get a look."
The gift boxes Anastasia had seen during the day. As the topic she had been curious about came up, Anastasia held her breath and listened even more closely to the maids' conversation.
"I'm so envious of the young ladies. Just the thought of marrying such a handsome man is enough to be envious of, but to think he's incredibly wealthy, too."
"The maids for Miss Catherine say that according to something Miss Catherine saw in a magazine, Mikhail's wealth might even exceed that of the Imperial family. They say he's even called the Emperor of Sokolov."
"Miss Elizabeth will be the one to marry him, surely. I'm so envious..."
Thinking she shouldn't move, Anastasia still found herself nodding at the maid's muttering. She was envious. It wasn't that she was envious of Elizabeth marrying him, but rather she was envious of the confidence that allowed her to do so.
"But when are they getting married?"
"Who knows... They say noble marriages are different from ours, so it takes some time."
"Then is he going to stay here the whole time?"
The maid's voice was excited as she asked.
"No. They say he's returning to Sokolov soon."
At the maid's answer, Anastasia's body flinched. But the maids, who were slowly getting tipsy, didn't notice. They had already forgotten that they weren't supposed to eat all of it and were reaching for Anastasia's share as well. Their conversation, fueled by bread and meat, continued.
"Why? Is he going to go to Sokolov and bring back more gifts?"
"No. They say Mikhail isn't coming back to Edenhurst. It sounds like the young lady will be going to Sokolov. He's a busy man, so I suppose it's hard for him to stay here. Since the marriage talk is practically confirmed... Miss Elizabeth is going there to prepare for the wedding."
"But he's going to be the Count of Lauderdale. I heard the old Count only went to the capital during the social season or when summoned by the Imperial family."
"Oh, even if Mikhail becomes the Count, he has his own businesses. Edenhurst is nice, but it's hard to travel back and forth from here to Sokolov, so I imagine he'll only come during summer vacation. But he has so many summer villas everywhere, maybe he'll only come to Edenhurst once in a blue moon?"
"Then that means only the Countess and Miss Catherine will be left here."
"Who knows. Maybe they'll all go up together. That's why there are so many maids trying to get into the young ladies' good graces lately. They're hoping to be chosen to go along when the ladies leave for Sokolov."
"Will we not be able to go?"
"Forget it. They say they're only choosing from the maids who already serve them, so do you think they'd even look at the likes of us if we tried to suck up to them now? I don't care if I don't become a lady's maid, I just want to go to Sokolov once. They say it's even more magnificent than the capital now. Miss Catherine says they're in the middle of building the 7th pier."
"The 7th pier? What's that? Is it a big deal?"
"The capital's port only has five piers. But as Sokolov has grown, they already have seven. And what's more, all of those piers belong to Mikhail."
"So?"
"Are you stupid? Ships entering the port must dock at a pier. And they have to pay the usage fee every single day. They say sometimes, even if they offer to pay, he won't accept certain ships. Then they can't unload their cargo properly, they can't get supplies, and they won't even sell them food. That's why traders have to bow their heads before Mikhail no matter what. Didn't you see that man who's the boss of Ilenka today? He was practically crawling in front of Mikhail."
Anastasia couldn't fully understand what the maids were saying. But she could tell that Mikhail was a powerful man.
After chatting for a long time, the maids stood up once the liquor was gone and left. Anastasia turned her body carefully. The light from the small lamp they had left behind was burning quietly. As she approached the table, she saw what were clearly leftovers, messily piled on the plates.
Her body, now accustomed to eating three meals a day, clamored for her to eat, but Anastasia just sat in the chair and stared blankly at the plates. One of the things the maids had said a moment ago kept echoing in her mind.
Mikhail isn't coming back to Edenhurst.
"He's not coming back..."
Anastasia’s shoulders slumped. For the past few days, whenever she was awake, she had spent her time staring out the window. It wasn't because she wanted to admire the beautiful scenery of Edenhurst; in truth, her eyes were always scanning the people passing by. Anastasia knew exactly who she was looking for. Mikhail. She wanted to see him just one more time.
She had seen him a few times. Each time, he was always with Elizabeth. Sometimes Catherine or the Countess would be with them as well.
Anastasia had hoped that he would marry Elizabeth. If he did… then as long as she remained at Edenhurst, she might be lucky enough to see him. But to hear that he wasn't coming back?
Just then, she heard footsteps in the hallway. Realizing the sound was approaching her room, Anastasia scrambled into bed in a panic. Didn't the maid leave? Did she forget something?
Knock, knock. A short knock sounded at the door.
In an instant, Anastasia realized. The person outside was not the maid. Then who could it be?
As Anastasia remained still, she heard the door creak open, and the person outside stepped in. The moment her body froze in terror, the owner of the footsteps spoke.
"You haven't taken your medicine, Miss Anastasia."
The owner of the voice was Mikhail, the man she had been stealing glances at.
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