Secret Wardrobe of the Duchess

Chapter 4

-Everyone… get out!

She didn’t think. She just ran to the nearest underground grocery storage. And then, that strange Stella started to rain fire on the ground. It was the first day that she learned bombs could fall from the sky.

Stella only left debris. The Berner Mansion, the place that Rubica’s grandfather had erected and where she had grown up and which had been taken by her uncle and his wife after her parent’s death, met that fate as well. Her uncle always traveled abroad as he was a merchant, but he was at home that day. Rubica wailed in front of his black body.

And oh, how was Angela’s dead body, who had grown up enough by then and would tell her mother not to be too harsh on Rubica? Her heart ached just thinking about that horrible moment.

‘What should I do, what should I do to save everyone? Should I ask Angela to go on a stroll with me and take her to the storage? Oh, but her mother won’t approve it… what should I tell my uncle?’

No matter how hard she thought, she couldn’t think of a way to save the others. She didn’t know how the war had broken out and how that day’s air raid had proceeded. How did Seritos’ invention end up destroying Seritos? She bit her lips anxiously.

‘No, I should think about it later.’

The taste of blood made her realize she was going too much ahead. She took a deep breath and decided to focus on the present instead of the distant future and past to calm herself down.

‘Has anyone visited so early in the morning some time this year?’

Rubica frowned. Such a thing hadn’t happened, no matter how hard she thought. However, she couldn’t be sure. To her, the things that had happened when she was 22 were memories more than 40 years old. It is hard to remember even things that took place a decade ago, so she wasn’t confident about 40 years ago.

“Rubica! Rubica!”

Then, she heard a voice calling her urgently. She got up in a hurry and went outside. She looked down from the stairs. Her uncle, Mr. Martin Berner, was calling her from the stairs on the first floor.

“Uncle?” Rubica called him, quite confused.

He looked up at her. Then he smiled broadly while saying, “My child, don’t be surprised. No, I will understand if you pass out in shock. Duke Claymore has proposed to you!”

Rubica felt dizzy on the stairs, and she staggered for a moment. In her previous life, she had lived as a single woman until she died. Fate was changing. What hadn’t happened in her former life was now happening.

***

Duke Claymore? That Duke Claymore?
Compared to Rubica, he was too great.

She had never gone past him, much less talked to him. However, Mr. Martin Berner, Rubica’s uncle, wasn’t smart enough to see her anxiety. He thought Rubica was hesitating just because she was very happy. He smiled widely and opened his arms.

Normally, Rubica would have played along, but she didn’t feel like it now.

“Why would he propose to me?”

The voice was small and weak like a lark’s cry. Rubica was blinking with her small eyes and was not coming down the stairs. Mr. Berner looked at her. Why wasn’t she delighted about such a great offer?

“How do I know that? If anyone knows that, it should be you.”

He spoke as if the duke had seen her before and had fallen in love with her. It was the only explanation he could think of. However, Rubica had never run into Duke Claymore. Her youth had all been about the huge debt her father had left her and her mother’s illness.
She had no memory of going to the neighboring baron’s ball, much less going to a ball held at the capital in a decent dress. She really didn’t know why.