Chapter 116: Sweetness and Pain-I

Elise didn't know what to make out of the scene she had seen. Her hearts felt stopped and all sound almost disappeared from her ears. Then she saw Master Ian and when their eyes met, he smiled at her with a meaningful look. She couldn't tell what he was going to say and watch him walk from the place he had stood to sat at his chair. Placing the sword beside to Maroon, Ian then smiled at the men who was as shocked as Elise, "What are you doing? Continue, Gerald." He instructed and his eyes fell to the Count Gerald, the father of Lady Monica.

Ian tilted his head very slightly with a wicked smirk on his lips, "Do you want your head to roll too?"

On Ian's words, Gerald who was still staring blank at the headless body saw how the body was being cleaned felt shiver down on his spine. His mouth stammered and he quickly reply, "N-No. I mean, Y-Yes, milord. The villages in the southeast have been fully questioned and interrogated, they replied to have seen Vervor in the land and receive notice that the Lord had let the land goes." Seeing Vervor's head rolled, he wouldn't want to meet the same fate where his neck was separated from his body.

"Which means the magistrate must have turn a blind eyes and work with him." Ian clicked his tongue and leaned his back to the red chair, "Capture all those idiots bring them to the scaffold and notify everyone to come at the scaffold. No one, no single person should be excused from watching except children of sixteen and bellow."

Elise held her hands which had turned sweaty. She had lost her ability to speak, losing clue as to what she should do or speak now and stood still at the spot. It wasn't her first time to see death. She had seen how her family had brutally murdered which was why she didn't scream. But fear was not something Elise could run away from. Seeing someone killed in front of her was her first time and not to say it was a gory experience. She didn't watch as the body was cleaned by the maids who were also frightened by the scene.

Elise raised her head, her neck slightly turn as she wondered why Master Ian had told her to watch before he took Mr. Vervor's life. Elise could tell Ian had called her to stand by his side to witness the death but she was still left puzzled as to why. When her face turned, she met Ian's red eyes. He had stared at her expression while keeping a keen hearing to her heartbeat, like the habit he had kept. He saw how her blue eyes stared at him for a while and Elise felt herself tightening the grip on her hand which she settled in front of her black skirt.

In contrary to what people thought, Ian gave her a sweet smile, the smile she like to stare but now it only gave her ambiguous thoughts. Ian turned to look at Cynthia amongst the guest and raised his hand he placed on the armrest to call the woman. For a while, Cynthia gave Ian a look but she knows the boundary for her not to glare at the Lord as she was his subordinate. But she can't help herself from giving a frown after seeing how the Lord had planned the court only to gave Elise watch him passing an execution. "Take her to my room." Ian instructed his words were clear but a surprise to Cynthia.

Cynthia's eyes widened at his instruction, for a good two seconds she stood there with her eyes widened, "Your room?"

Not only Cynthia was surprised but Elise too. She felt her emotions in a bundle. Elise was still surprised by the death which was bloody and gory, an image that had people to turn their face away which happened just a minute ago. Now that Ian had told her to go to his room, she felt unsettledness. But for a different reason than afraid.

"I'm sure you've heard me." Ian smiled at Cynthia, an empty smile the woman thought to herself seeing that when Ian turned to look at Elise, his smile was filled with mirth, "Wait for me."

Not long after Ian's instruction, Elise stepped out of the courtroom. Cynthia walked close to her and held one of her hands and asked, "Are you alright?" By now it wasn't odd for anyone to scream or faint as it was the normal reaction anyone would have given after seeing a living human beheaded in front of them.

Elise was surprised too, her body felt chill when she remembered the gory scen but not to the point of fainting. Before she saw the black annises who tried to kill her in the very castle, they were killed in the very same manner by Ian and somewhere Elise didn't feel scared as she knew it was Master Ian who had killed the man. Although Mr. Vervor was a bad person and somewhere she felt sympathy for the man for loosing his life; She believe more in the reason reason for Master Ian to kill the man and thought that the man did deserve the death.

Elise knew this was her naivety and began to learn on walking away from it. She still believe that not all people deserve death but there are people who deserve death. It would be a good wish for not anyone to get hurt but she know that couldn't happen. Now she realized that when death are frightening, no one could control death. Some people may feel other's death as right and some may don't. It could be different from which view the person had used and the effects affected people differently. There was no place for people to judge other's death than the people related themselves.

"I'm alright thank you, Cy." said Elise with a smile she mustered. Cynthia wish to say something encouraging but she didn't know what to say and could only smile.

Cynthia left her once she arrived in Master Ian's room. The view was dark when she came by last night which reminded her of her rendezvous memories where Ian had touched her legs when she was dressed in a thin chemise.

Her cheeks that were ice cold felt hot at the thought and she opened the door of the bedroom to see that like the passage outside Ian's bedroom, the place was dark. There was almost no different she could compare when the light had graced the land or when the moon appeared on the sky. Ian's room was dark as if she had entered the nighttime.

Her feet padded across the room as she didn't want to clumsily hump her body to the cupboards or tables, she kept her hands on the wall and walked while using her hand to slowly move across the room to feel the frames hanged on the wall until she reached the curtain.

She felt a sense of deja vu after repeating the same method she used in the gallery and using her both hands, Elise pulled and tied the curtain aside to arrive at the largest double window to see the large patio. There her blue eyes stopped at the view to look at the backyard that leads to the forest.

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