Chapter 2

Snarky comments aside, when dinner rolled around, the noble Annabelle had no choice but to share a table with me, a plain village woman.

The cramped chairs and wobbly table in my house had Annabelle grumbling the whole time.

"Vincent, these chairs are killing me. Can't we just go back to the inn in town?" she whined.

Vincent actually cracked a smile. For someone usually so icy, seeing him smile was almost unheard of.

But even with that smile, he looked a little lost, like something was weighing on him.

The next moment, I heard Vincent say quietly, "I've been sitting at these rickety old chairs and wobbly table for two whole years now."

Annabelle's face shifted from distaste to genuine concern, her sympathy flooding in all at once.

She was so pretty that even when she looked displeased, you couldn't help but feel sorry for her.

Trying to break the ice, I chimed in right after Vincent.

"I've been stuck with these rickety chairs and wobbly table for eighteen years—and still going strong," I joked.

Vincent could never be bothered to talk to me.

This time was no different.

But Annabelle, as soon as I said that, she shot me a mocking grin.

"So what if you've been sitting here for twenty years? People like you are meant for chairs like these."

I lowered my head in embarrassment—only to see my mother, Serena Rivers, under the table, clenching and unclenching her fists.

Serena had never liked Vincent, not since he refused to marry me.

Yet tonight at the dinner table, she stayed silent.

After a moment, Vincent spoke up to take his leave.

"You bought me when I was in exile.

"All these years, I've worked from sunrise to sunset in your home.

"I believe my labor has repaid the debt I owed you.

So now... we are even. We owe each other nothing."

With that, he stood and gave Serena a slight bow.

Then he turned, ready to walk out with Annabelle.

Panic rising in me, I tried to run after him, but Serena caught my arm and stopped me.

We listened as the carriage bells jingled into the distance. Only then did Serena sigh.

"Let him go, child. I told you long ago—he was never one of us."

In truth, Serena had said exactly that two years earlier, on the very day I'd bought Vincent.

But I hadn't listened. Maybe I inherited her weakness for a handsome face—the moment I saw him, I was lost.

That day, the royal guards had brought a group of convicts to the town market.

Some were exiled; others were sold into slavery to pay for their crimes.

And there, in that ragged crowd, I spotted Vincent—frail and thin, yet still carrying an air of quiet dignity.

When his gaze brushed over me, my heart jumped, and my cheeks flushed hot. Right then, I decided I would buy him.

He fell ill the same day he came home, so weak a breeze seemed enough to blow him away.

We called old Marcus Lewis, the village healer from the next settlement. After examining Vincent, Marcus shook his head. The man's body was worn down to almost nothing—only a thread of life kept him here.

While paying Marcus and counting out the purchase money, Serena kept sighing, "You've gone soft in the head.

"Spent good coin on a sickly man who'll only cost us more. Look at him—he doesn't belong in a place like this."

Back then, I never imagined he was the Royal Chief Scholar, trusted and admired by the king himself.

I didn't expect such disgust at the idea of becoming my husband.

And I certainly never dreamed he'd one day leave this remote, barren village and return to the capital.

But that was exactly what Vincent did. He left with Annabelle, without looking back—away from our farm, and out of my life.

That night, I lay in bed staring at the bright moon outside my window. Sleep wouldn't come.

My chest felt hollow, restless with resentment and disappointment. Frustrated, I reached under my pillow out of habit—and my fingers brushed a neatly folded piece of paper.

I sat up, lit the oil lamp on the nightstand, and unfolded it. There, in messy, scrawling script, was the indenture from the day I'd purchased Vincent—his faint, smudged fingerprint pressed into the bottom edge.

This paper belonged to him. He should have it.

Before the first light of dawn touched the sky, I pushed open my door, indenture in hand.