Duchess of the Glass House - Chapter 1

Prologue

“Where did it go wrong?”

Reina Vinoscht faced her husband, who looked at her heartlessly with hatred in his eyes.

In the eyes of my insensitive husband, I felt the last handful of my expectations disappear.

She glanced at the people standing behind her husband.

The pale blonde child, who looked just like her husband, was gripping the hem of the woman’s dress with a pale blue complexion.

The woman reached out her hand sadly and hugged the child’s shoulders.

Reina, watching the situation unfold with her unfocused gaze found the woman’s gaze filled with contempt.

“Why…?”

Reina really wanted to ask.

Why are you standing there as if it’s for granted?

Where the hell did things go so wrong, that you are the one holding my child.

‘I’m the one who gave birth to my baby in my belly, so why are you more…’

Reina was unable to voice out her numerous thoughts as she died without being able to say a word.

“Oh, I love you, I couldn’t even tell him…”

Only the dry white tear marks on her cheeks were left behind in her last moment.

Chapter 1, Reina Vinoscht

Reina Vinoscht was born as the granddaughter of Duke Vinoscht, a nobleman of the Sorsi Empire.

Everyone said to her.

“How could a person be so blessed?”

People were right.

Her father was Duke von Vinoscht’s only son, and he would soon take over the Vinoscht family.

Her mother was the third daughter of the Grand Duke of Rotwal, who was part of a royal family.

Born to the second most noble family after the imperial family in the Empire, Reina lived a comfortable and affluent childhood until she was six years old.

A caring and loving father, a kind and warm mother.

Six-year-old Reina loved her parents.

But her happiness was short-lived.

“Come here, Lintes, let’s play with your sister.”

Reina loved her younger brother Lintes, who was born when she was five.

He followed her around even though he couldn’t yet properly walk, calling “Sister” in a soft voice.

“Sister, sister. What are you doing?”

“I have a glass bead. I’m going to give it to grandfather for his birthday.”

That day, Reina, her mother, and Lintes were on their way to the Duchy of Rotwal to meet their maternal grandfather.

While carefully threading the glass beads onto the gold cord, the wagon shook and the beads fell to the floor.

“Uh? Sister, the beads fell.”

Roll. 

Lintes leaned down to pick up the glass beads that rolled under his feet.

It was then.

The wagon wheel was caught on a large stone and tilted strongly to the side.

Of all things, the shackles of the carriage were not properly latched.

“No, Lintes!”

As soon as the carriage tilted, Lintes, who leaned down, rolled over.

Their mother, who was with them, screamed and fled to protect her son.

“Mother! Lintes!”

Everything happened in an instant, but for Reina, it felt like an eternity.

Even the sound of a carriage stopping in a hurry.

People’s screams.

The dirt floor turned dark red with blood.

Lintes and her mother lying down like corpses…

Everything was faint, dark, and distant.

So Reina lost her mother.

“Her neck broke when she fell off the wagon. They say it was an instant death.”

“Oh, that’s terrible. But she must have felt no pain.”

Fortunately, Lintes was lucky enough to survive, but was told that his left arm would have a permanent disability.

As soon as Reina returned, she was called by her father.

“Oh, father, mother…”

The father, who had been ignoring his daughter for a long time, suddenly shouted at Reina.

“Because of you.”

“What?”

“…Everything, it’s all because of you! Lintes almost lost his left arm, and my wife…..”

Reina felt that her father was somebody else, as he held onto her shoulders and shook her.

I couldn’t find the usual friendly and loving figure.

As I looked away from my father’s red eyes, I could see the back of his hand turning blue from his forced strength.

‘Because of me? My mother died because of me?’

Reina stopped thinking, shaking like a piece of paper in her father’s hands.

Only her father’s sharp voice, which sounded like a curse, remained and drove her into an endless abyss.

After her mother’s death, Reina was treated as if she didn’t exist in the Duke’s residence.

Because her father didn’t want see his daughter.

“Tsk tsk. I’m sorry to hear that. You’re young, your father’s too much for you.”

“He lost his wife and his successor got a disability. I understand how he feels.”

Despite the rumors surrounding her, Reina kept her silence to survive.

She no longer ran through the Duke’s house as before, she did not sing, and she did not open her mouth.

There was still warm soup and appetizing steak on the table.

But she could not enter the dining room until after her father and Lintes had eaten.

After a while, her room was moved to a separate house.

A maid served her meals on a tray and brought them to Reina.

“Why do you bring my meals to my room?”

“Master said that there is no need to come down to the dining room anymore.”

“But…”

“There was an order to do everything possible, not just meals, in the lady’s room.”

“…”

At first, I spent days soaking my pillowcase with tears, but gradually, everything became duller and duller.

What Reina used to enjoy was dismissed as a dream.

She was still the granddaughter of the Duke of Vinoscht and the daughter of the heir of Vinoscht, but she was technically not the daughter of her father anymore.

As time went by, her father still treated her as if he did not have a daughter”

After that day, Lintes lived in and out of temples and the estate for treatment, so she couldn’t even see his face.

Reina was well aware of the gazes of compassion and sympathy poured upon her.

The Duke of Vinoscht, who occasionally comes down to the estate, felt sorry for his granddaughter.

“I heard about your situation, Reina. You must not be comfortable. Why don’t you come live with your grandfather?”

“…..It’s okay. Here… I want to be with my father.”

Reina knew that the Duke’s interest was just a shallow courtesy that he simply threw at his granddaughter who was living a miserable life.

Shortly after that, her grandfather died and her father became the Duke of Vinoscht.

Reina became more and more broken as the years passed.

As she grew older, her outer appearance blossomed beautifully, but only darkness remained within her.

When she tried to fall asleep, the tragedy of that day repeated like a nightmare.

‘No, Lintes!’

‘Mother! Lintes!’

Thus, Reina would rely on medicine and force herself to lie down.

However, the sleeping pills were not too effective.

‘It’s all because of you! Because of you!’

Her father’s shouts, shaking her body and cursing, echoed in her distressed mind and often caused her to wake up.

As the sleepless days continued, her blooming face became emaciated with haggardness.

She felt like she was going to die like this.

On my 15th birthday. Tired of the endless darkness, she took the courage to find her father and returned to the estate after a long time.

There was something she wanted to ask her father.

“Father, this is Reina. I want to say something…”

But before she could say what she wanted to say, she had to turn around.

It was because as soon as I opened the door, I was hit by an ink bottle that flew and cut my forehead.

“How dare you come here!”

Reina turned around, feeling the blood flowing from her forehead soaking her mouth.

‘How could I be forgiven.’

I felt pathetic when I mistakenly thought that I could be saved.

‘I don’t deserve to be forgiven…’

The pale moonlight shone on her as she spent her days accustomed to such endless darkness and solitude.

It was really a coincidence that Reina met Edhar Hiseuvilian.

It was a banquet held to commemorate Lintes’ official status as a minor lord at the age of fifteen.