The ride back from the border had been grueling, but Ace had pushed his men and his horses with a relentless pace. Officially, he was returning to the capital to deliver a personal report to the Emperor regarding the skirmishes in the North.

Unofficially, a nagging curiosity had lodged itself in his mind three weeks ago, and no amount of cold mountain air had been able to soothe it.

As his warhorse thundered toward the heavy iron gates of the Alvarez estate, Ace felt a grim sense of anticipation. He knew exactly what he was about to walk into.

He had left the manor in a state of carefully engineered collapse. He had frozen the household credit. The Duchess had no dowry and left with no means to buy so much as a sack of flour.

He had expected that three weeks of reality would have broken Evelina’s new icy and aloof facade.

He expected to see weeds choking the gravel paths. He expected to see servants, ready to throw themselves at his feet with a list of grievances.

Most of all, he expected to find Evelina, disheveled, and humbled, waiting at the doors to beg for his forgiveness and gold.

"Be ready for a mess," Ace muttered to his lieutenant, Marcus, as they cleared the gatehouse. "The women of the Snow family have never known how to handle a house without a silver spoon in their mouths. We’ll likely be spending the night cleaning up her disasters."

Ace pulled hard on the reins, his horse’s hooves skidding on the stone of the main courtyard. He braced himself for the chaos.

But the chaos he expected never came.

The courtyard wasn’t overgrown; the gravel had been freshly raked into classic aesthetic patterns.

The guards at the entrance didn’t look sluggish or neglected; they snapped to attention with a synchronized perfection that Ace usually only saw in the Imperial Guard.

Their armor was polished to a mirror sheen, and their eyes were bright with a newfound discipline.

Even the air was different. Instead of the stale and dusty smell of an old fortress, the wind carried the warm, intoxicating scent of yeast and rosemary.

Ace dismounted the horse, his boots hitting the ground with a heavy clack.

He waited for the usual swarm of frantic servants. In the past, his arrival was a signal for everyone to scramble. They usually came right away, to serve him and fight for his favor.

This time... it did not happen.

Instead, a young footman approached him with a calm bow, "Welcome home, Your Grace. Your horses will be tended to immediately. Would you like your travel gear taken to the East Wing guest quarters, or shall we wait for the Duchess’s instructions?"

Ace blinked, "The guest quarters? I am the Duke. My things go to the master suite."

The footman hesitated, just for a fraction of a second, but his expression remained polite, "Of course, Your Grace. It’s just... the Duchess has been using the master study for her administration. We didn’t wish to disturb her work without notice." 𝕗𝐫𝚎𝗲𝘄𝐞𝕓𝐧𝕠𝘃𝕖𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝚖

"_"

Ace pushed past the boy, his jaw tightening. Administration? Her work?

As he marched through the halls, his confusion only deepened.

The carpets were vacuumed, the silver sconces were gleaming, and the servants he passed didn’t look like they were living under ’budgetary restrictions.’ Instead, they seemed to have gained pounds since he last saw them.

They bowed to him as he passed, but they didn’t linger. They returned to their tasks with a quiet efficiency that seemed to imply that they were being held to a much higher standard than he had ever set.

He passed the dining hall and saw a group of scullery maids laughing as they polished the long table. In fact, they looked in a better state than his own soldiers.

"What is going on here?" Marcus whispered behind him, his eyes wide, "Did she hire a team of invisible stewards?"

Ace didn’t answer. He couldn’t. He felt like he had walked into a mirror version of his own home; one where his presence wasn’t the sun the world revolved around, but merely a detail to be managed.

He reached the heavy doors of the master study. This was his territory, the place where he planned wars and managed the duchy’s vast wealth.

He threw the doors open with a crash that should have made anyone inside leap out of their skin.

"Evelina!" his voice rose, reflecting his annoyance and confusion within it, "Explain the state of this house. I left orders for—"

His voice died in his throat.

Evelina wasn’t huddled in a corner neither was she weeping over bills(as he had thought she would be).

She was sitting behind ’his’ massive obsidian-oak desk, framed by the afternoon light streaming through the stained glass.

A mountain of ledgers, maps, and architectural sketches was spread out before her. In her hand was a fine fountain pen, and perched on the bridge of her nose was a pair of thin, silver-rimmed reading glasses he had never seen before.

She didn’t jump when she heard his voice.

She slowly finished the sentence she was writing, blew on the ink to dry it, and and only then did she look up.

Ace stood there, covered in the dust of the road, his hand still gripped on the doorframe.

Evelina’s gaze was utterly unimpressed.

She reached into her pocket and pulled out a small but intricate gold watch; a piece she must have bought with the money from her jewelry. She clicked it open, checked the time, and snapped it shut.

"You’re back early, Ace," she said. Her voice wasn’t the desperate pitch he remembered; it sounded melodic yet it seemed to have the strength to command the air in the room somehow, "The border reports suggested you wouldn’t return for another ten days. My schedule is currently quite full."

Ace was momentarily speechless, "Your schedule? This is my house! I return when I please!"

Evelina set her pen down and leaned back in his chair, ’his’ chair, crossing her arms with a regal poise that made his armor feel heavy for a moment.