9 Chapter 9

"Miss, wake up. We need to have our breakfast now." Ginny opens the window wide and the sun shines to Celestina's face.

There aren't any nightmare worst than this, Celestina decides when Ginny pulls her blanket and wakes her from her wonderful dream where she meets a very handsome tanned black haired with very striking amber eyes and that muscles- ughh.

The man from her dream looks like Ambrose, maybe he's Ambrose. The author from this novel loves pretty and handsome looking people, all her characters' descriptions are always long and detailed even to the aura they shot out. Ambrose was never mentioned in the novel or maybe he was mentioned but she doesn't remember him.

"Stop whining miss. We really need to get ready now or you'll miss your breakfast. The duke will kill me if I let you starve especially with your already skinny body. Now get up miss." Ginny seems to be more hasty and on edge this morning. Maybe she doesn't get her beauty sleep...

Celestina is entirely wrong about that. Almost everyone is on edge and somehow looks pissed. When her innocent face looks at the duke's darkening face, he glares at the servants around them and all of them quickly straighten up and put a stiff smile on their faces. 'Their acting are really bad... I wonder what happened?'

What she doesn't know is that most of them were forced to stay awake due to the duke's stubborn and suspecting attitude, they were on alert all night and caught another man lurking around the inn around the stables tampering with the horses.

When the duke found out, he was so mad that he asked them to dispose the man especially when the first horse he tampered with was the horse that will carry the carriage of the young miss's.

Ginny was pissed off by that and couldn't get any sleep even after the man has been disposed and stay awoke all night when she finally got some sleep, the sun rises and they have to quickly get ready.

"Let's eat." The servants in the inn serve a warm breakfast that is just enough to fill all their stomach and they even give puddings after they're done. The duke's pudding obviously goes down to Celestina's mouth- as well as Ginny's, and Louise's as well as the rest of the puddings in the room.

With her belly full of pudding, Celestina enters her carriage with Ginny and continues their journey to Ashdown.

"The land of Ashdown is usually cold and very windy so make sure to always wear your coat and gloves. The land belongs to our duke, it was given to him by the emperor when he won the war 7 years ago." Celestina is having a brief history lesson about the duke from Ginny. They don't have anything to do in the carriage so Celestina asked Ginny to tell her about the duke and the land of Ashdown. Although Duke Ashdown is the villain in the story, his backstory wasn't described in detail in the book, Celestina doesn't want to feel like a fool to the land she is foreign to.

"The duke has 2 children, young master Matthew and young miss Mellisa, they're twin. Our duchess passed away 4 years ago when they were just 7 years old. It was such a heart breaking sight..." Ginny get emotional every time she thinks about her mistress who was always kind to all the servants.

"What about the duke?" The duchess was never mentioned in the novel and Celestina finally realizes how the empty the book is. It never explain anything about the villains, the land and even the back story of the villain is not explained.

"The duke locked himself in his room for almost a week. Our duchess passed due a rare heart disease and the duke did everything he could to heal her but no amount of effort is enough and the duchess left the world holding his hand. It pains me to accept she isn't here anymore but it makes me happy that she died holding the hand of the person she loves with a smile in her face." Celestina isn't sure how to react to that. The strong and reliable duke have such a sad story, it never comes to her mind that he hides such pain every time they meet.

"Let me tell you about the land now!" Ginny realizes the air is gloomy and quickly changes the topic, the young miss should be happy and hear only good things.

"Okay"

"Well, this kingdom is divided to 4 areas. The center is where the royal family lives, it's where we just come out from. And the other 3 areas are led by the 3 duke of this kingdom. Duke Ashdown, Duke Kenward and Duke Atkinson. Duke Ashdown, our duke, is in the north where it's directly connected to the border of this kingdom and our neighboring kingdom. Duke Kenward's territory is in the west and Duke Atkinson's in the south." Ginny explains.

"Land of Ashdown is known for our strong knights as well as the rare plants that is grown across our land. As I mentioned just now, our land is always cold and sometimes windy so miss you must remember to wear your coat, okay?" Even in her explanation she can't stop nagging.

"Where was I? Right.... Land of Kenward is known for their mining, they mined diamonds, gold and some even said there are magic stones there but nobody know whether it's true or nor."

"Then there's Land of the Atkinsons. The people in Atkinsons are very closed to themselves and they rarely come out, their land is covered in mist and it always looks the darkest and gloomiest but they are well known for the knowledge they have inside."

"Knowledge?"  Little were mentioned about Atkinson, they were so closed off that none of the members have ever attended any parties that the main leads attended.

Ginny nods her head "Scholars all over the world gather in Atkinson, they have the largest library in the world as well as the largest and most advance research land but people rarely come out after they enter so not many have come out and said about it and not many details are known."

Her explanation makes Celestina have her own deep thoughts as well. It's really wonderful and magical now that she is inside this world. Everything Ginny described to her makes her extremely curious and wants to see those lands for herself especially to visit the library in Atkinson but her priority now is Ashdown so Celestina grits her teeth and makes up her mind.

"How long till Ashdown?" She asks with fire in her eyes, she knows what to do now. She'll make sure to meet the villain and study hard and go to the Land of Atkinson.

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