"Good morning, young master."
Early the next morning, Mira entered his room. Henry really didn't want to wake up. The bed was unbelievably comfortable, so much so that he felt like he could sleep all day.
'How did ancient people even manage to make things this comfortable?'
He lazily opened his eyes and saw Mira waiting beside the bed.
"Good morning, Mira. Did you bring my breakfast?"
After getting off the bed, Henry noticed that Mira was empty-handed.
"No. You can get it from the kitchen."
Her displeased tone ruined his mood instantly.
'Are you fucking kidding me?
Wasn't he the duke's heir? Wasn't he supposed to have his breakfast brought to his room?'
He was. He definitely was.
Henry wasn't stupid. He knew exactly what was happening.
'This woman is messing with me, isn't she?'
Seriously? He was the duke's son. The servants were supposed to serve him properly. So how could she tell him to get breakfast by himself?
'Is that how you want to play? Fine, then.'
Henry said nothing. Instead, he put on the act of that pitiful, naive child.
The twenty-year-old Henry was never truly kind by nature. He had always been born with a darker side. Just because he acted friendly didn't mean others could bully him without consequences.
When Henry realized that Mira was deliberately treating him poorly, certain memories surfaced.
In Henry's past, even his maids had bullied him. Stress and abandonment were the main reasons he had lost his innocence. At first, he acted cruel simply to protect himself from their gossip and abuse. But later, he discovered it was the easiest way to control people.
And so, he became evil for real.
Among those maids, Mira might have been one of them.
'So you want to bully me? Fine.'
Henry smirked secretly and turned to Mira, who was staring out the window.
"I'm not hungry, so I don't need breakfast. Help me get ready. I want to go outside."
He sat back down on the bed. Mira clicked her tongue and rummaged through the wardrobe to find a suitable outfit.
"Here we go. You need to dress more luxuriously. Otherwise, that beggar will shine more than you. You need to be more competent if you want the duke on your side."
She kept babbling nonsense while roughly changing his clothes. It hurt. She was careless, almost deliberately so.
"You have such fair skin."
She touched his stomach, sounding as though she had discovered some kind of treasure. Then she turned him around and touched his back as well.
'What the hell?!'
Disgusted by her unnecessary touching, Henry tried to struggle. To distract her, he began asking questions and acted as if he didn't care.
"What beggar?"
It worked. She stopped touching him and continued dressing him.
The clothes had too many layers. Three layers on his upper body, and three more on the lower half, including long boots. He hated being exposed in front of her, but he couldn't refuse. If he resisted, she would only pay more attention.
So he closed his eyes and endured it, silently praying she wouldn't touch him again.
Luckily, she didn't.
"Who else? That girl the duke brought in," Mira scoffed. "I heard she lived with beggars. I don't believe she's really his child. Why would a duke's daughter end up with beggars?"
She spoke freely, as if she never considered that Henry might expose her.
Henry didn't reply eithet. Once she finished, he looked at himself in the mirror.
'Handsome… really? Damn. I'm not handsome...I'm cute.'
His hair was still messy though. He stared at his reflection without fixing it.
"Let me comb your hair."
She showed him the comb and made him sit down. As she combed, Henry noticed she kept brushing the same spot over and over.
'Don't tell me she likes my hair too.'
"Your hair is very soft."
Henry, who had already expected that, fell silent.
"You mustn't let her steal your position," Mira continued. "It would be better to throw her out of the mansion, don't you think? She doesn't belong here. She must leave."
She kept talking while combing his hair.
'How dare you speak like that about the duke's child? He'd kill you if he heard this.'
Henry knew those words must have influenced the real Henry in the past. If he hadn't known the truth and had truly wanted to be good, he might have listened to her and targeted Ricarda.
What a sharp mouth...
Mira finally tied his hair into a ponytail.
Henry had never had long hair before. He remembered feeling how long it had been when he was fourteen...
'Why do I even have to grow my hair this long?'
Maybe he will cut it off later...
"Where do you want to go?"
Mira asked, watching his reflection in the mirror.
Henry looked straight ahead.
"To meet that beggar."