The Saintess and the Villainess

Chapter 44

Nia's mother, Tara, clung to her daughter tightly, stroking her hair, and kissing her head. "You're the only thing, the only thing I have left. You're the only one who will never leave me. You're all I have in the world. My beautiful daughter."

Tara Singh was the youngest daughter of an important military family in Quellinia, the largest and most powerful country that shared a border with the Wyernwolf Empire, to the South-East. Both nations were warlike, but they were too close in terms of military strength for either to want to risk going to war with the other. So they maintained close, careful, and fraught diplomatic relations.

This went beyond simple ambassadorships. The two nations had long-standing exchange programs for students or workers to visit and experience each others' culture. In theory, these exchange programs were meant to encourage the sharing of knowledge and the building of international unity and friendship.

In reality, they were more like extended vacations for the aristocracy.

It was on one of these exchange trips, when she was just eighteen, that Tara Singh had met Cedric Lowind, the handsome son of a local Baron. He was a few years older, had an open-hearted smile, and went out of his way to include her even when others avoided her for being a strange foreigner.

The homesick Tara had quickly fallen in love.

When she returned home and her family found out about the pregnancy, they'd used their influence to have her named as the new official ambassador to the Wyernwolf Empire, young as she was. Ostensibly, this was so that Tara would have a way to support herself and her child, with or without a husband.

In reality, it was a sort of banishment.

Tara had become an embarrassment to her family, so they were sending her away to a foreign land, alone, where they wouldn't have to see her or think about her anymore.

But Tara didn't mind. Returning to the Wyernwolf Empire meant she could return to Cedric's side. And being appointed Ambassador gave her the equivalent rank of a Viscountess according to the Empire's laws, so she would have the social status required to become Cedric's wife.

However, when she finally tracked him down at his home in the Wyernwolf capital, she'd discovered that he had already married someone else while she was gone. His open smile had turned into a cold-hearted frown, and he wouldn't even let her into his home to talk to him. He wanted nothing to do with her or the child she was carrying, and made it very clear that he would deny any connection with them.

It was then, when the door had been closed in her face, that Tara truly felt she had lost everything.

In the present, Nia quietly allowed her mother to embrace her and fawn over her, but made no move to return the gesture.

"What is it that you want, Mother?" she asked in a quiet monotone.

"You were out on the town today, right?" said Tara. "Did you stop by the post office? Were there any letters for me? You did send him my letter like I asked, didn't you?"

"There have been no letters for you, Mother," said Nia.

"Or perhaps you saw him, even?" continued Tara, ignoring Nia's words. "Did you go by his house? Maybe you came across him in the marketplace? His family owns businesses, you know, he'd have a lot of good reasons to be in the marketplace."

"Mother, Baron Lowind moved to a city up north a long time ago, you know that," said Nia. "He lives far away now. With his family."

Suddenly, Tara pushed Nia away with some force. "It's all your fault!" she screamed. "You're the reason he left me! You took everything from me! If only you'd never been born! He would have loved me if you hadn't been born!"