The Duke's Daughter's Third Life

Chapter 28

The tea party went off without a hitch and it was going smoothly. Claud was watching from the outskirts of the party, not partaking in it whatsoever.

Leon wasn't interested in tea parties whilst the twins were busy practising with Hugen. Claud had a foul look plastered on his face as he watched everyone interact with one another. Soon his eyes fell on Aeliana who was talking to the other children and their parents.

He clicked his tongue and rolled his eyes. He wanted to get revenge on her and decided to ruin her tea party however it never worked due to the servants almost everywhere, constantly checking if everything was in place and correct.

'I'll just pull a simple prank on her then'  Claud decided on that.

A small prank would let him get away with it. He was just going to do a simple prank on her and that was it.

That was all he thought of but when he crept behind Aeliana and pushed her slightly to scare her, he didn't expect this to escalate so far out of his hands.

Without thinking, he fled the scene before anyone saw him. He ran to his room and locked the door shut. He slid down to the floor, burying his face into his knees.

'It was supposed to be a simple prank...'

'I didn't mean to use so much strength..'

'It was an accident...it was an accident...I didn't mean to do that..'

Claud could feel the guilt eating him away. He didn't like her— he hated her and he knew he used to hurt her by bullying and pulling pranks on her. However, this time he wasn't even thinking of hurting her. He didn't want to hurt her at that time.

All he wanted to do was scare her as a prank and that was it.

'Ah...in the first place I shouldn't even have done all those things to her, I'm the one at fault. I cannot put the blame on anyone else except me..it's all my fault..'

He curled into a ball, trying his hardest not to let his tears fall because he knew if he did, they wouldn't stop. The realisation hit him too late.

He didn't know how long had passed until he heard someone knocking on his door. He didn't have the energy to speak so he kept quiet, ignoring the knocks.

"Brother?" his eyes widened at the voice.

He jolted his head up in surprise. Why was she doing here? Claud's eyes shifted around as he licked his lips before slowly speaking,

"Why are you here..?" his voice croaked out.

He lightly flinched at how his voice sounded. It was obvious he wasn't doing well and was close to tears.

"Leave me alone." Claud spoke, sinking back into his previous position.

"...Can I ask one question?"

"..Do whatever you want.."

"Okay then,"

Claud heard her feet shuffling then her voice.

"Why did you push me?"

He nearly let out a laugh when he heard her question. Of course, she would question him that. She's planning on telling their father about what he had done. If their father found out, Claud knew he was going to get a scolding and whips across his palm as punishment.

But he didn't care anymore. It was his fault this all happened.

"I wanted to scare you, a simple prank. The push wasn't on purpose," he answered.

He knew she wouldn't believe him yet he didn't know why he told the truth. How could she believe that it was a simple prank after everything he had pulled on her?

"Is that why you had that face?"

"Face? What do you mean?"

"You looked guilty, brother."

"Oh."

"And you said you didn't push me on purpose right?"

"...Yeah."

"Brother, just one more question."

"...."

"You think I don't believe in you, right?"

Claud lifted his head up and turned to the door. Although it was closed, he still stared at it.

"..."

"You know brother, I do believe in you." Aeliana began, "If you really did it on purpose, you wouldn't have looked guilty."

"You...you believe in me..?" Claud muttered.

"I wouldn't have if I didn't look at brother's face." she chuckled softly.

"Brother, do you hate me?" she asked.

Claud kept his lips shut. Of course, he hated her..up until not long ago. He didn't know when he slowly stopped hating her. Was it when he accidentally lost her in the crowd, realising he still cared for her or was it when she genuinely complimented him?

"I..." he couldn't say anything.

It felt as if his throat was sealed shut by magic.

"You don't need to say anything. I wanted to tell you that I'm not going to tell anyone. That's all."

Claud could hear her footsteps growing further until he couldn't hear anything. Despite knowing this, he stayed by the door.

***

Aeliana closed the door to her room and softly sighed. She wondered if what she said went through Claud.

She really did believe in his words.

'Well, it is up to him if he wants to believe in my words when I said I wouldn't tell anyone. Though it's another thing if Violet told instead but I doubt she saw since she only screamed after noticing me in the pond.'

Aeliana stretched her arms and yawned. The tea party ended abruptly which she was fine with since most of the people there didn't want to talk to her either.

Aeliana slipped under the blankets and grabbed hold of her teddy bear. Rubbing her tired eyes, she slowly fell asleep, not knowing what was installed for tomorrow.

---

Author's Note: exams are done woohoo!! sadly I failed my driving test ;; so I have to take a compulsory class and then retake the exam for it,,, not to rant about it but I wish I could have at least passed the road test cause I'm actually decent for that!! (;'༎ຶД༎ຶ')

Anyways!! Thank you guys for reading this chapter hehe, see you guys in the next~ (i promise i will post next week too!!)