My Disfigured Duke Husband Helps Me Plot My Revenge
Chapter 233: Touring

Chapter 233: Touring

Interested eyes looked at Leonor and Quinn.

The silver haired mage was one they were used to but to have a noblewoman there was different. Usually the visiting nobles stuck to the main palace to try and garner attention from the young King or someone close to him.

If someone close to the King had a favorable opinion of you, the hope was that word would get to the King and you would have the honor of being able to get close to him.

Men wanted this so that they could gain power while women wanted this because they wanted to be the next Queen.

The late King establishing his son as a womanizer was purposeful. Stephano III’s lack of interest in the ladies presented to him was alarming and he was required to pass off his royal genes in his father’s eyes.

Despite the rumors, no one had ever actually seen him take a woman to the palace. His allure rose because he was attractive and unattainable, somehow experienced based on rumors and the mystery continued to rise.

However, the one that seemed most possible, Leonor von Burien, was married off to the disfigured duke and it left the kingdom trying to rack their brains for who might be suitable instead.

And there she was in front of a classroom in the capital, entirely unattainable to the King despite rumors that they were lovers while she was in the Academy. She was known as a quiet noble lady but her father made sure to make sure her virtue was never questioned despite his accusations behind closed doors.

There was a variety of different greetings. Some offered simple "how do you do"’s while some more accustomed to nobles bowed at the duchess, knowing that she was someone of importance.

Considering the wide diversity of mages, there were certainly a few there who weren’t from kingdoms with such a strict social structure as Castille and the game of nobles was entirely beyond them. They were only there to participate in the learning of magic.

Rather than being caught off guard and timid, Leonor used the moment to pull herself together quickly and address the room in a more calm manner than her true feelings.

She stood up straighter and offered a light smile.

"Please don’t let me interrupt your lab time," Leonor said. "I simply missed being in this sort of environment."

The students easily returned to the tasks at hand considering mana was often a trial of time and they couldn’t waste too many seconds or their experiments would certainly fail.

That was the beautiful yet frightening thing about using mana. It was entirely within your control yet there was a time limit that could be detrimental to you.

After Leonor spoke, she glanced at Quinn who had a certain glint in his eye. She didn’t appreciate him jumping to conclusions and reading in between the lines of her words so she turned away and continued her walk around the room.

For a while, Leonor admired the different colors of mana people revealed as they worked. There was a wide range of colors signifying different mana categories as well as different lineages. It was interesting how all these factors tied into the color of someone’s mana.

However, it made her contemplate her blue eyes compared to her mother’s purple ones and the reason her father always claimed she wasn’t his daughter. He always refused to understand mana.

In the past, Leonor reminded herself.

As they reached the end of the room, a few students glanced at Quinn and gave nods of respect before returning to their work.

They were back in the hallway and Leonor turned towards the mage expectantly.

"I believe the other rooms have active testing going on," Quinn realized. "We ought to go upstairs then."

"Lead the way," Leonor said.

Considering there was no longer a need to present themselves a certain way in front of nobles, the mage and duchess walked beside one another without needing him to guide her forward by the arm.

On one hand, he didn’t like to be touched. On the other hand, Leonor had expressed to him before that it made her feel like a small child because the noblemen a woman walked with were meant to seem like they had the upper hand by being the leaders even if the woman knew perfectly well where they were going.

Out of all the men in the world, Quinn was least likely to look down on women considering his mother was a powerful mage and he was raised to believe that they could achieve just as much as any male mage. Perhaps it was he who made her attitude and timidness leave. She was surrounded by men who believed in her when she was away from her father’s home.

They found themselves on another staircase, but Leonor noticed it wasn’t the one they used before because that one ended on the second floor. This one was more private and was a thin hallway at the side of the building. So thin that Leonor’s dress was squeezed as she walked up the stairs behind Quinn.

"Does this mean we’re going to your area?" she asked. "How secretive."

Even when they made it to the top, they had to get around a wall and in a thin hallway above the stairs there was still a door to walk through.

Leonor began to believe that the place Quinn was using as his study and personal quarters was going to be quite shabby considering he had it built in what seemed to be an attic.

However, the mage opened the door with a magical circle only he knew and they were able to walk into the room together.

What Leonor wasn’t expecting upon walking through the door was a wide open space with an entire wall of windows on one side. Yet it remained warm because of the magical device that kept the entire building at a decent temperature.

On the wall with windows there were rows and rows of potted plants except Leonor knew right away that the plants were medicinal herbs mages often used for potions and experiments.

"This place looks like what I imagine your mind looks like," she uttered almost listlessly.

She hadn’t even scratched the surface of things to look at in the space.