In Another World with JUST MONIKA 41 Interlude 6 – The Daughter of the Ducal House

"Ow!"

"What was that? Sue?" Duchess Ellen turned her head around, trying to hear. "Are you hurt?"

"I'm fine, Mother," the girl replied in a pinched voice. "It's nothing, I just… bumped into something a little bit."

Ellen thought about it for a little bit and considered what her daughter could possibly be doing while her mother couldn't see it. Quickly the answer became obvious.

"You were walking around with your eyes closed, weren't you? Trying to see what it feel like now that I can at least see the difference between light and dark?"

Sue went over to sit by her mother's side and rubbed at her stinging shin, which she had knocked against a drawer. "I'm sorry. But… did we just make it worse? I think that having light shining through your eyelids… it feels uncomfortably warm for some reason."

A low whimper entered the girl's tone of voice. "I'm really sorry… every time I try to help, I just make things worse!"

Ellen pulled her daughter close and hugged her. "Now, don't say that. Those who hesitate to take the first step in the fear they are wasting their time will never reach the end." There was nothing like fearing to fail that could turn what been such a promising youth into a life of nothing but failure.

"The thought that someday I would be able to see you again… that's enough. We have real hope where we had none before, I can deal with a little inconvenience for a time," she murmured and kissed her daughter's head. "Really, your mother is a little stronger than that, you know?"

"None of the healers ever managed to do even that! I'm not just going to… um…"

"Blindly trust?" Ellen offered. "I'm not offended by that turn of phrase. Why would it hurt to be reminded of my disability when I can't ever forget it?"

"… blindly trust them anymore. Mother, I'm going to learn all I can and try to cure you myself!"

Sushie Ernea Ortlinde had an older brother, Edward Ernest Ortlinde, and he would be the one to inherit the title of Duke and his wife would become the Duchess. Sue had never begrudged him that, but she wondered at times what to do with her life. The best that she could hope for was a loving arranged marriage like her mother and father.

There were other strong female examples in Belfast, like adventurers or Charlotte the court magician, but it felt somewhat like a waste of the royal family's ability to build alliances.

She hesitantly reached out to her mother's face. The more she thought about it, the more reasonable it sounded. She had the [Light] magical affinity. It was her only magical affinity. And being a healer was a noble enough occupation, her own maternal grandfather was famous for it. Mother's own father.

Sue had never really thought about why a man who had the ability to reverse any and all harm to the body, lasting physical infirmities and poison and all, would die at physically around the fifties (46 by their calendar). Such a person would have been of immense strategic importance to the nation.

Then she pouted slightly, "But if Sir Zah and Lady Monika could do it, that would be fine too."

Duchess Ellen chuckled lightly and rubbed at her daughter's hair again. She felt a pang of regret, for in her five years of darkness she could barely even imagine how her daughter was growing up from the child she remembered. But it was a parent's joy to have a child that knew what they wanted from life and determined to get it.

The world was not a kind place for dreamers, but without dreams what was the point of being alive? To in end being forced to settle for spoiled noble children who only wanted to consume, that was the one fear she had for her daughter.

"So… your new friends. I didn't expect such great healers to sound so… young. You told me they were adventurers, that's certainly not a skill I expected for them to possess."

"… Sir Zah is blind too, you know? I think I mentioned that. And even then, the guards said that he is a powerful, powerful adventurer. I think it's… kind of inspiring. Maybe that's why… I have a lot more trust in him, even if he can't fix his own eyes, because who else would know the best?"

Sue's strongest memory of them was from sitting inside the darkened carriage, lit only by Monika's projection onto the carriage wall. Zah Playa sat in a very relaxed lounging manner on one empty carriage bench, absently swirling the glass of water in his hand as if it were fine amber wine.

His hair was a dark russet, and the thick slate on his face a matte black that faded into the shadows. His face was all sharp artificial angles, and the most she could see was only his nose and lips and his strong chin. His satisfied smile, his eager shining grins, and because much of his facial expressions were hidden behind a mask he overcompensated with sweeping gestures and body language.

He was funny. He was interesting. Sue was for a moment glad that her mother was blind, because then she would not be able to see her blush.

But Ellen could feel her daughter tense up in her arms. "Sue?"

"It's… it's nothing mother. I'm… I'm going to be a Healer. I just thought for a moment how being an adventurer, living free and on the road… it… it can't be that exciting, can it?"

Ellen laughed. "We've all been there, my dearest daughter. They have freedom like no one else, even as much as they might envy us our ease and wealth."

An adventurer could just drop everything and flee, if circumstances no longer favored them. A Duke was a pillar of the kingdom, no matter what happens they were obliged to face it all with dignity even to very worst of ends.

Sue leaned onto her mother and dropped to lie down on her lap. She stared at her mother's concerned face, and that was enough. Sir Zah already had Lady Monika and three other strong girls with him anyway. She was a daughter of the eminent Ortlinde Family, he wouldn't be waiting for her to grow up. If he were the type of man to be tempted by her station, then he wouldn't have been worthy of it.

She just hoped they would come back. After curing her mother, all she really prayed for was for someone to stay with her and tell her more stories about distant lands and their own adventures.

Tell her stories of all the things her birth meant she could never be.

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Chapter end