Reborn To Change My Fate-Chapter 211 - Two Hundred And Eleven

The morning sun streamed through the sheer, embroidered curtains of Marissa’s private sitting room, casting a warm, deceptive glow over the polished furniture. The air was still, filled with the gentle clinking of fine china.

Lily stood by the small round table, holding a silver teapot. Steam curled from the spout, carrying the delicate, floral aroma of jasmine tea. She poured the hot liquid into a cup, her movements practiced and careful.

"Your tea, Your Grace," Lily said softly.

Marissa sat by the window, bathed in the sunlight. She held a thick, leather-bound book in her hands, but her eyes weren’t really moving across the lines of text. She was staring at the page, her mind miles away, calculating, waiting.

A sharp, distinctive knock broke the morning calm. It wasn’t the tentative knock of a maid, but the firm, urgent rap of someone with business.

"Enter," Marissa called out. She didn’t look up immediately. She marked her page with a silk ribbon and closed the book on her lap.

The door opened. Mrs. Alma, the head housekeeper, walked in.

She looked troubled. Her usually pristine uniform was slightly wrinkled, and a sheen of perspiration dotted her forehead. She held a thick, heavy ledger in her hands, clutching it tightly against her chest as if it were a shield.

Mrs. Alma stopped in front of Marissa and curtsied, but she didn’t smile.

"Your Grace," Mrs. Alma said. Her voice was strained, tight with worry. "I apologize for disturbing your reading."

Marissa looked at her. She saw the tension in the older woman’s shoulders. She saw the way Mrs. Alma’s fingers dug into the leather cover of the book. A knot of unease, which had been gnawing at Marissa’s gut for days, tightened.

"What happened?" Marissa asked. She placed her book on the side table and sat up straighter, her demeanor shifting from relaxed reader to the mistress of the house.

Mrs. Alma walked to the table. She set the heavy ledger down with a solid thump. She opened it to a page that had been marked with a slip of red paper. Her finger, slightly trembling, traced a line of entries written in black ink.

"The procurement accounts," Mrs. Alma said, her voice grave. "This month... they seem suspicious. Highly suspicious."

Marissa frowned. She stood up and walked to the table. She looked down at the columns of numbers.

"Suspicious how?" Marissa asked.

"It is the silk," Mrs. Alma explained. "And the linens."

She pointed to the entry.

"Recently purchased silks," Mrs. Alma said, her voice rising with indignation, "are of poorer quality than before. Much poorer. I inspected the delivery myself this morning at the warehouse. The fabric is thin. The weave is loose. It is rough to the touch. It is not fit for the Thompson household. It is barely fit for curtains in a tavern."

She looked at Marissa, her brow furrowed deep.

"But the prices," Mrs. Alma continued, tapping the page hard, "are much higher. Look here, Your Grace. We are paying double what we paid last month for goods that are half the quality."

Marissa leaned over the book. Her eyes scanned the numbers. She saw the date. She saw the merchant’s name. She saw the sum.

The numbers didn’t lie. A significant amount of gold was bleeding out of the household accounts, disguised as legitimate expenses. It wasn’t just a few coins here and there. It was a hemorrhage.

"This is not an error," Marissa murmured. Her voice was cold. "This is theft."

She looked at Mrs. Alma.

"There must be something wrong," Mrs. Alma said, shaking her head in disbelief. "Our usual suppliers are honest men. We have dealt with the Weaver’s Guild for twenty years. They would never send us trash and charge us gold."

Marissa flipped the page. She flipped another. She scanned the entries for grain, for wine, for candles.

She saw the pattern. It was subtle, but it was there. A small increase in the price of flour. A drop in the quality of the oil. Someone was skimming. Someone was replacing high-quality goods with cheap substitutes and pocketing the difference.

She assessed the situation quickly. This wasn’t just greed. This was a weakness. If the household finances were compromised, their position was vulnerable. Wars were won with swords, but they were sustained with gold and grain.

She looked at the name of the new supplier listed next to the silk entry. ’The Golden Thread Emporium.’

"This is a new shop," Marissa noted. 𝒇𝓻𝓮𝓮𝙬𝙚𝒃𝒏𝓸𝙫𝒆𝙡.𝓬𝓸𝒎

"Yes," Mrs. Alma said. "The steward said our old supplier had a shortage."

"Investigate the owner behind this shop," Marissa ordered. She handed the ledger back to Mrs. Alma, closing it with a definitive, dusty sound.

Her eyes were hard.

"Find out who they are," Marissa instructed. "Find out who recommended them to us. I want to know who owns the building, who signs the receipts."

She paused, looking Mrs. Alma in the eye.

"And see if there is any connection to estate personnel," Marissa added. "Check the steward who authorized this. Check the kitchen staff. Check everyone who handles the deliveries. If someone inside this house is taking a cut, I want to know. I want a name."

Mrs. Alma nodded, her face grim. She understood the gravity of the order. This was a purge.

"I will do it personally, Your Grace," Mrs. Alma promised. "I will go to the city myself."

Mrs. Alma hesitated. She held the ledger to her chest again. She looked like she had more to say, something that worried her even more than the stolen money.

She cleared her throat.

"Also," Mrs. Alma added, shifting her weight. "The shipment you ordered... it arrived this morning."

Marissa raised an eyebrow. "Which shipment?"

"The medicinal herbs," Mrs. Alma said. "The ones you requested last week."

Marissa nodded her head. "Good."

Mrs. Alma looked at her mistress. The order had been massive. It was far more than needed for a simple household remedy or a seasonal flu. It included rare roots for stopping bleeding, potent powders for infection, and quantities of clean linen bandages usually reserved for a field hospital.

"They have all arrived," Mrs. Alma said. "The crates are filling up the main storage room."

She looked at Marissa with open concern.

"But..." Mrs. Alma asked cautiously. "Your Grace, is someone in the estate sick? Is there an illness I should know about? A plague in the city?"

She was frightened. The quantity of medicine suggested a disaster.

Marissa looked at her. She saw the fear in the older woman’s eyes. She wanted to reassure her, but she couldn’t tell her the truth. She couldn’t tell her that she was preparing for a war that hadn’t started yet. She couldn’t tell her that she was preparing for wounded soldiers, for arrows, for blood.

Marissa kept her face calm, revealing nothing of the storm she knew was coming.

"No one is ill," Marissa spoke smoothly. "Not yet."

She walked to the window. She looked out at the peaceful garden, at the flowers blooming in the sun. It looked so tranquil. But Marissa knew how quickly peace could shatter.

"However," she said, her voice dropping to a serious, commanding tone, "they will be needed soon."

She turned back to Mrs. Alma.

"Have them moved to the South Wing," Marissa commanded.

Mrs. Alma blinked. "The South Wing? But that is the guest wing. It is empty."

"Exactly," Marissa said. "It is quiet. It is clean. And it is defensible."

She stepped closer to Mrs. Alma.

"Store them properly," Marissa instructed. "Keep them dry. Keep them safe from rats and dampness. Organize them by use."

She looked at Mrs. Alma with intensity.

"No mistakes allowed," Marissa said. "Those herbs are more valuable than the silk. More valuable than the gold. Do you understand?"

Mrs. Alma didn’t understand why, but she understood the tone. She curtsied deeply.

"Yes, Your Grace," Mrs. Alma said. "I will see to it immediately. No mistakes."

Mrs. Alma turned and left the room. She walked quickly, the heavy ledger tucked under her arm, her mind already racing with the investigation she had to conduct and the strange, ominous task of stocking a hospital in the South Wing.

The door closed.

Marissa was alone with Lily.

Lily stood by the tea table. She looked pale. She had heard the orders. She knew Marissa better than anyone.

"Your Grace?" Lily whispered.

Marissa didn’t answer. She walked back to her chair. She picked up her book again. She sat down, feeling the heavy velvet of the cushion.

She didn’t open the book. She just stared at the cover, her thumb tracing the embossed title over and over again.

She thought to herself.

She thought about the date. She thought about the reports Derek had shared with her from the border. She thought about the silence from the West. She thought about Liam’s increasing desperation.

The pieces were moving on the board. The theft in the accounts was just a symptom. The instability was starting.

"Counting the days," Marissa whispered to the room.

"The time is near," she said.