How to Survive as the Wife of the Monster Duke - Chapter 80

“I’ll tell you all about it in a moment,” he said as if reading her mind.

Aden couldn’t help but feel partly responsible. When he saw Ilyin’s face while coming here, he wished that her ability was a lie just this once. Ilyin looked scared and troubled.

But it was the truth.

I had already guessed what was going to happen to the Viscountess and didn’t tell Ilyin. Ilyin foresaw the attack on me, and I in return allowed her to get attacked by this surprise.

As Aden looked at Ilyin’s concerned profile, his lips became sealed. This was too big of a sin to be simply covered with the word mistake.

“Alright then.” Ilyin turned away from the speechless Viscount Arlen and as she passed him his eyes never left her. She was having cold sweats as if someone was after her.

There’s no need to worry, Ilyin thought as she grabbed Aden’s arm despite herself. He softly brushed her hand with his fingers and escorted her.

The attendants of the mansion when they saw Ilyin gasped in their own voice. Their reaction was all similar.

How and why was she here?

“Everyone, get out of the room.”

Her words held power. It was a majestic presence they never felt from her before. The maids stopped themselves and left without realizing.

Ilyin, just like that, entered the Viscountess’s room quickly like in the foresight.

***

It was the same ceiling she saw in the dream. The sky that could be seen out the window had the same full moon; everything was exactly the same as it was in the dream.

Her mother’s weak body lay in the bed in front of Ilyin. The Viscountess’s eyes had almost had no life. The silver hair that was wet with cold sweat was covering a face that had become as pale as ghost. The lips that were so dry and had no blood called her.

“Ilyin.”

The only thing different from the dream was Viscount Arlen’s gaze that followed Ilyin as she walked into the room.

Ilyin slowly approached the bed. She felt everything more clearly than in the dream, she could sense that her mother didn’t have more time. The dream that she dreamt wasn’t a nightmare, but a real foresight. She foresaw the death of a family member again.

Ilyin couldn’t help thinking of how much she didn’t like the future she couldn’t stop as she looked at her mother in bed. Now she could understand a little the reaction her mother showed when Ilyin had foreseen Sid’s death at seven.

She remembered how one time the disaster of an avalanche that was going to hit the Delrose Knights in Biflten was averted. While the avalanche itself couldn’t be stopped, they were able to avoid getting hurt. She wished she could only see the foresights for those kind of events.

Ilyin stared at her mother, whose breathing was getting weaker. Aden, who was beside her, was also watching the Viscountess. In Aden’s eyes, it was more certain now than when he saw her earlier in the day. That the Viscountess’s muscles were already giving in. It was sign of a death.

The Viscountess’s lung muscles were slowly giving in, she was having trouble speaking and her eyesight was becoming dimmer. Right now, with unbelievable determination, she was focusing her gaze on Ilyin.

The breathing was weak. Slowly the sound of life was going away. Really, there was almost no time left. Soon, that hard breathing would end.

“Ilyin,” the Viscountess’s voice was more air than sound.

Ilyin stood by the bedside and listened.

“Yes, I’m here,” she swallowed the lump forming in her throat, “like you called me.”

Aden, who was looking at the Viscountess, turned to look at Ilyin. He was convinced now more than ever that she could definitely see the future.

Ilyin never liked Viscount Arlen. The short stories that she told Aden at night she always made sure to portray the Viscount as a good person, but the Viscount was never a father figure to her.

What happened to her brother when she was seven had surprised Ilyin but since she wasn’t able to control her ability, she had to be kept under the watch of her so-called father who brainwashed her into thinking that she wasn’t supposed to say anything about her ability to foresee the future. Ilyin was also separated from Viscountess who had taken care of her, her entire childhood.

Viscount Arlen was the reason why Ilyin’s childhood ended at seven years old.

And Viscountess Arlen? In Ilyin’s stories, she was a comforting mother.

Until Sid died.

After that, Viscountess Arlen started losing her mind due to the shock and had no filter. She said hurtful things to Ilyin, but even then, her account of the Viscountess wasn’t as bad as when she talked about stories of Viscount Arlen.

What kind of a person was Viscountess Arlen to Ilyin? Aden thought. Ilyin was separated from her mother after coming to Biflten and even though that was the tradition, if that gave Ilyin a feeling of loss, that was Aden’s sin.

He always thought that, so when Ilyin arrived, his first order to the people of Red Delrose was that since Ilyin came to a faraway region of winter, scared and unfamiliar, she should never feel loneliness.

But no matter how hard Delrose tried, there was always a hole where the Viscountess used to be in the heart of the child Ilyin and as if it was telling him that right now, Ilyin’s face carried a weight like he had never seen before.