3: Scar-face

These people were Carra's father and step mother, lord Livingstone and Angela Cawthorne, who happened to be the new wife of lord Livingstone.

It seemed that Audrey went home to complain to them about what transpired earlier.

Carra was still in the bed, lazily, when they arrived. Seeing the two entering her chamber, she didn't even bother to get up from bed. Since she was seriously injured, no one would blame her if she didn't get up to give them courtesy.

 "Father, mother." She called bluntly. She was unaccustomed to addressing them with such titles, so her manner was unnatural. 

But the two did not care. They were used to it by now.

In Angela's eyes, this eldest daughter was a completely twisted soul. Every time she saw them, she always stood aside and wouldn't speak. She didn't even dare to look at them, straight in the eyes. She was not at all like the sweet-talking second daughter who was caring and sensible.

When her father saw Carra, he naturally thought of her biological mother and his former wife, Sophia, who was formerly known as Sophia Ashmore.

Sophia was the wife chosen by his parents for him, and she was the daughter of the Ashmore's family in Salefrid. Ashmore family was a well-known aristocratic family of the Arthurian empire.

The Ashmore monastic schools that was founded by them, couldn't name the number of talents they had nurtured for the Arthurian empire. More than half of the officials in the emperor's court came from Ashmore monastic schools.

It was just that the education which Sophia received from a young age made her very orthodox. So, the Great Lady of the house, Madame Mildred Copperstone, respected Sophia more than any noble lady.

But lord Livingstone didn't. 

What he liked was a gentle and charming woman like Angela Cawthorne. A lady who would be submissive to him. Who knew how to act like a young girl, and serve him comfortably. He was only after satisfying his machismo and ego. Nonetheless, he got married to Sophia Ashmore. But sadly, she became sick, and three years after giving birth to a daughter, she died.

During that time, the person that lord Livingstone feared most in the family, his father, Great Lord Alcott Copperstone, also passed away. So he disregarded his mother's opposition of Angela, and married her. He helped her family, the Cawthornes, to become a powerful house. More significantly, he handed the care and welfare of the daughter that Sophia left behind to the Cawthorne family. Since then, he had never taken care of this eldest daughter of his.

A year ago, prince Algernon Fairhurst of the ruling wolf clan, wanted to get married to a lady from the house of Copperstone. Originally, the prince wanted to marry the second daughter, Audrey, as proposed by lord Livingstone, but was strongly opposed by his mother.

Madame Mildred had been living in seclusion in the monastery since the old man, Great Lord Alcott, passed away. She ignored all family affairs.

However, after learning about her son decision, she came out of the monastery hall and scolded him severely, saying. "Age is designed by God. So, order must be followed. You can't leave your first daughter and jump to the second. How do you want her to feel? I say no."

Upon hearing these words, lord Livingstonei's face had turned white like a frozen bone. Mildred's words were, undoubtedly, hitting him hard in the face, because neither was he the eldest son of Great Lord Alcott, nor was he born by Mildred herself. He was born to a new wife who died of complications after giving birth to him, and he was raised by Mildred.

Had it not been for the death of his elder brother Cutler, after the death of the old man himself, the seat of the house would not be his to sit on.

Grandmother had made it known to him that there was no way he could replace his blood relationship with Carra, no matter how hard he tried.

After learning of this, Angela and Audrey could only cry in front of him, but he was unable to do anything because of the power of Madame Mildred, the Great Lady of the house of Copperstone. For this reason, the Cawthorne family hated Madame Mildred to death. The old lady had been against them since the first day they entered into the Copperstone castle. 

Afterwards, Madame Mildred had gone back to the monastery and would only come out to ruin their plans whenever she felt like doing so.

Now, seeing Carra laying crookedly on the bed, her face burned by the fire, Angela felt the resentment in her heart easing a little bit. She took a few steps forward, pretending to be concerned, and said in a sad tone. "Poor Carra, why are you hurt this way? Let me see what's going on with you?"

*How come the mother and daughter were the same? They both pretended to care, but wanted to see her burned face so badly.* Carra sighed inwardly.

She subconsciously avoided her stepmother's hand, turned her face away, and said faintly. "Thank you for your concern, mother, but the injury on my face is a bit unsightly. I'm afraid it will scare you at this time. I'll show you my face when I get better in the future."

Angela smiled awkwardly. "What? I'm your stepmother. No matter what may have happened to your face , how can I dislike my own stepdaughter's look?"

*Yea right.* Carra thought. *Since you want to see it that way, then let it be so.*

Carra slowly removed the veil on her face, turned towards her stepmother and said. "Well, what do you think?"

"Ahhh." Angela didn't expect that Carra would actually remove her veil and showed her the scars on her face. When Carra didn't react for a while, she thought they would only argue about it like before. But after seeing her stepdaughter's scarred face, she couldn't help herself from screaming. Slowly, she took a few steps back with a look of horror on her face.