#2: The One To Marry Is The Older Sister (2) — I Told My Political Marriage Husband "You Don't Have to Love Me," and That's When the Spoiling Began (WN)

Returning to her room, Marguerite looked around the interior once more.

The room assigned to her was the northernmost one, with the worst ventilation. It was hot in summer and cold in winter; when it rained, stains bloomed on the walls, drafts whistled like a discordant quartet, and the maids had long since abandoned cleaning it.

She opened the wooden box that passed for a wardrobe and considered what she would take with her to the ducal house. Aside from what she was wearing now, Marguerite was permitted only a few dowdy dresses, a pair of shoes with worn-down heels, several books, and her embroidery tools.

Everything else she had thought might hold any value had been taken by Isabella.

Just then, unladylike pounding footsteps approached, and the door flew open with a loud bang.

The sister she had just been thinking of entered cheerfully, the tear-streaked expression from earlier completely gone.

Marguerite no longer had the energy to scold her about knocking or asking permission before entering.

“Oh, how pitiful, dear sister! To think you’ll be marrying into House de Broy. I’m sure it will be far worse than it is now. Those people won’t even see you as human. After all, you’re their enemy.”

‘It’s you who don’t treat me like a human.’

She wanted to say that she was already used to such treatment, but she knew Isabella would fly into a rage if she did, so Marguerite merely lowered her gaze, her face expressionless.

“I’ve seen people from that house at a banquet, you know. Lord Lucien had a beautiful face, but he looked angry the whole time and never smiled once. Being from a ducal house, he probably looks down on everyone around him. You’ll be treated like a worthless rag.”

When Marguerite still said nothing, Isabella frowned.

“Hey! Are you listening to me?!”

A sharp sound rang out, and a stinging pain shot across Marguerite’s cheek.

“!”

When she touched her cheek, her fingers came away faintly smeared with blood. Isabella’s long nails had scratched her skin.

“How could you do that? We might have a meeting with the people from House de Broy…”

“It doesn’t matter. It’s better if you meet them with that face—then they’ll understand how we feel.”

Seemingly satisfied at Marguerite’s distress, Isabella flashed a smug smile and left the room.

Having succeeded in hurting Marguerite, she had no desire to stay even a second longer in such a miserable place.

Just as when she arrived, the clattering footsteps faded away.

Closing the door that had been left wide open, Marguerite shook her head, trying to steady herself.

“…Yes, after all, this really does seem like a good thing.”

An Isabella who constantly sought to demean her, and a father who always took Isabella’s side.

Compared to being treated that way by her own family, marrying into an enemy house at least made it easier to resign herself to her circumstances.

She bid farewell to a mouse scurrying past with a strange-shaped mushroom clenched in its mouth, then went to the table and opened a book with a blue cover.

“Above all, there is the sea in the lands of House de Broy.”

Unlike the Clavel lands, the de Broy territory lay at the southern edge of both the kingdom and the continent. All its borders, except those with a neighboring country and the Clavel lands, were sea.

The sea—
It had been Marguerite’s longing since childhood.

It had also been the longing of her mother, the only one in the family who had ever shown her genuine affection.

They said the boundless ocean was filled with salty water. People set out ships, opened unknown sea routes, and obtained rare gemstones and spices.

The creatures living there had forms entirely unlike those on land.

“Storms come from the sea. They say mermaids live at the center of the storm. They sing with beautiful voices and lure sailors into the tempest…”

“That’s scary, Mother!”

“So scary!”

“But it’s all right. If you’re good girls, the mermaids will welcome you and take you to their palace beneath the sea. And at the end of the feast, they’ll give you a wonderful gift.”

Isabella, too, had once listened to their mother’s bedtime stories with shining eyes. But now, it seemed the sea stirred no feelings in her at all.

‘If I marry into House de Broy, I might be able to see the sea.’

Holding onto that hope—one her father and sister would surely have laughed at as foolish—Marguerite went on to marry into House de Broy.