The pawn's second life

Chapter 7 - Her Past Life

( T.W : Trauma and self harm. )

Midnight :

Valentina - *Gasp* *Gasp* ( *Whispers* ) This can't be-

Valentina was having a nightmare of her past life all of a sudden. The events that had occurred in her past life were surfacing again making her body shiver and shortening her breaths. It was her memory of the past combined with all the extra information the goddess had presented her with about the events that had occurred.

Flashback :

After Valentina got married to the emperor her happiness knew no bounds, having gotten married to her first love life seemed like a fairytale, until their first night together came up. They were supposed to share the same room but on the night Feliz walked out of their room after threatening her leaving her in tears.

Feliz - ( *Grabbing her arms tightly* ) Listen here! Even though I married you I have not even a least bit of interest in you. So if you even try to inform the duchy about anything happening here then I won't let it slide. Live as if you are dead until I don't need you anymore! Dare to tarnish my image and I'll make you suffer to no extent. ( *Whispers in her ear* ) Even if you are the princess, do not forget I am the emperor and I can do whatever I want.

Feliz left the room leaving her behind. Valentina was standing in the middle of the room in utter shock completely horrified with whatever he just said. Her most beautiful dream had suddenly taken a turn for the worse and she didn't even know what to do.

Valentina - ( *Slumps down* )( *Grabbing her face* ) What- is happ-ening? He-He doesn't love me?...everytime he whispered lovely things into my ear when I came to visit him were nothing but lies? ( *Gasp* ) This-this can't be-

The night was spent with Valentina crying her eyes out till the morning. At some point she had fallen asleep but was yanked out of her sleep by Feliz who had stormed into the room at dawn.

Feliz - ( *Looking at her red and puffy eyes* ) How pathetic! Fix your eyes right now. I will send the maids to attend to you, do not show them such a shameful image. Just do as I say, it's going to make your life easier.

Valentina - ( *Nodded silently* )

Valentina's innocence leading to her inability to use her name which naturally held a lot of authority from being born into a powerful family proved to be an advantage for Feliz. He never liked how she came to always visit him before their marriage because of which he had to put on a mask of a loving fiancé to avoid any possibility of annulment of their engagement. He already knew that Vercil wasn't happy with the engagement and any prior mistreatment would immediately give him a chance to call off the engagement and place the blame on the imperial family. But after their marriage, he was free from any such bounds thus giving him the freedom to treat Valentina in any way as he pleased.

Every day he would demean her and leave no chance to remind her of how much he hated her. The servants had to some extent picked up on the fact that there was some rift between the emperor and empress and being the ones who only feared the emperor, the empress falling out of his grace gave them a chance to slack off.

Maid - ( *intentionally tripping and splashing the water over empress's head making her dripping wet* ) Oh my- I apologise to her majesty I must have slipped because my head suddenly felt so heavy. I'll prepare the water again.

Valentina - ( *Sitting still and staring into the void* ) ( *Nodded* )

The maid went away and as soon as she was out of the room, Valentina heard a few of them giggling and gossiping about her.

Maid - Isn't the empress such a pushover? It's a pity that someone belonging to such a reputed noble family could be such a loosehead.

Maid 2 - I feel bad for the emperor that his majesty had to marry someone like her. Tsk! Tsk! He must be suffering so much.