Unexpected Invitation

Countess Lancaster.

My father’s fated mate, Isabella’s mother, and my stepmother.

A mated she-wolf whose heart was darker than Isabella’s. If Isabella had always disguised her feelings for me in the façade of a kind and caring little sister, Countess Lancaster had always been upfront about hers.

Right from the beginning, I had always known that she detested my existence.

Asides from taking after the Countess in loathing me, Isabella was basically a miniature of the Countess with her dirty blonde hair, and high cheekbones. She only took after our father’s blue eyes and not the Countess’s light green eyes.

I, however, took after my mother entirely, and not a single feature from the Earl. I was glad I didn’t have a connection aside his lecherous noble blood.

‘’Sit down Athena, and let’s begin our dinner.’’ My father, Earl Lancaster, coughed lightly to get everyone’s attention.

If your family hadn’t spoken up, I would have been seated.

I nearly rolled my eyes at the blatant favoritism and headed straight for the chair opposite Isabella. My father was seated at the head of the table, my stepmother and Isabella by his left side.

A chair was between my father and I as I sat opposite Isabella. The maids and butlers served the meals the moment my father gestured for them to serve. I blankly stared at the appetizing dishes on the table without moving to pick up my cutlery.

Unlike my family.

*Pfft!*

My eyes immediately locked with Isabella, who merely smiled when our gaze met in the air. It was obvious that she made that sound. My father and the Countess acted as if they heard nothing, when in reality, it was audible for them and even the surrounding servants to hear loud and clear.

There was a reason Isabella had given out that snicker.

I had never been invited to a family dinner. I had always stepped inside the dining chamber with an identity of a low-class servant to serve, but not to be served.

Isabella had mentioned that the status of a maid was too much for myself with a lowly blood. So, I have always been a low-class servant, much lower than the maids and other servants.

The lowliest in the Lancaster manor, exactly to Isabella’s preference.

As if to constantly remind me of my roots, the Countess had never arranged for me to learn noble etiquettes, unlike Isabella.

I only had the knowledge of using a spoon to drink soup. It was part of the little knowledge I had learned from my mother or rather imitated to learn. As a runaway slave, she was of a lowly background with no knowledge of noble etiquettes nor whatsoever.

And that’s exactly what I picked up to start my meal. I didn’t care if my family found my situation amusing in their wretched hearts. They were the reason I couldn’t learn some basic etiquettes. Even servants knew how to make use of knives and forks.

‘’......!’’ A sharp briny taste touched my tongue the moment I took a bite, that nearly urged me to spit out. I glanced carefully at my family’s normal faces while they ate, and then at the servants upright in their stature.

It’s only mine.

I immediately let go of my spoon with no intention of eating anymore. My food had been messed up with too much salt, and I didn’t need a second to guess the perpetrator was a servant.

Perhaps one of the maids.

They must have hated serving me as their second young lady, someone who they had assaulted in the past, for the past days.

Neither of my family cared of the reason I had dropped my spoon. Isabella’s faint gloating eyes were quite easy to spot as I have known her well since we were pups. 

She could be the main perpetrator as well.

It wasn’t until my father was done with his own that he decided to break the silence.

‘’His majesty’s fifteenth jubilee ball is approaching at haste. Our family was fortunate to receive an invitation from the royal palace and you will be attending the royal ball with us, Athena.’’

What?

My eyes grew wide at my father’s words.

I was going with my family to attend a royal ball?

Why?

That had never happened in the past.

If anything, Countess Lancaster and Isabella would never have allowed me to attend in the first place. At the thought of the mother and pup, I carefully glanced at them, expecting at least either of them to speak up, but no one disagreed with my father’s words.

He must have informed them much earlier.

There was no other explanation other than this.

Why do you want me to attend a royal ball, father?

I found my father’s sudden words utterly suspicious. He had always been neglectful, and turned blind eyes to my existence in the Lancaster family, yet suddenly decided to invite me to a royal ball after ordering my marriage with an old marquess.

Was it for me to gain experience as a supposed future marchioness or something else?

I highly doubted my father was that good to have thought that far. He has a greedy nature, thorough and thorough to marry me off for wealth, and probably Isabella to a higher standing he-wolf for status.

Two she-wolves to provide him his desires on a silver platter.

What a good noble father.

‘’Countess, I trust you will prepare our pups for the royal ball.’’ My father stared at my stepmother, saying in a serious tone. ‘’We absolutely must not embarrass our family’s reputation in the royal palace.’’

That’s a warning.

I suddenly realized that my father was warning the Countess not to go far with her schemes against me at the royal palace. This was the first time to witness him calling out the Countess, and in the presence of others at that.

You were really aware of her actions. I inwardly sneered at my two-faced father. After many years, he was suddenly calling out Countess all because my attendance at the royal ball.

As expected, I sensed a scorching gaze, and faced my head forward to the sight of Isabella with her glaring eyes.

Not pretending again, are we?

I almost wanted to laugh aloud at the crack of her kind and caring façade. She must be blaming me for our father’s warning to her mother.

‘’Rest assured, Earl.’’ My stepmother smiled calmly at my father. ‘’Our family’s reputation can’t be tarnished at the royal palace. Do I speak correctly, Athena?’’

She suddenly called me out, and I became the center of attention once more.

What else could I do but agree when I had no choice in the first place?

‘’Yes, mother.’’ I answer right back with a smile of my own.

That’s right.

The Countess was my mother or rather, my legal mother outside the Lancaster manor. She held the legal status of my father’s fated mate, unlike my mother whose position was comparable to a mere concubine.

Except she wasn’t as my father never made her one.

Her position was rather conspicuous in the Lancaster family. Even if my father had taken her as a concubine, my illegitimacy wouldn’t have changed one bit, as well as the abuse from the Countess and Isabella.

As the second young lady of the Lancaster family, I would have no choice but to refer the Countess as my mother to others.

Even if my real mother was dead.