THE SALE.

A couple nights later, after Yvette had been let out of the cellar and was back in her bedroom for the time being, someone snuck into her room again.

This time it was two men, and rather than leaving something in her room, they were taking. More specifically, they were taking her. While she was pretending to sleep, they wrapped something around her mouth and then tied her hands and feet up.

One of them then lifted her up and carried her out of the room. He had thrown her over his shoulder, and the other man was walking in front, so Yvette opened her eyes and watched as the Decaux manor got smaller and smaller, memorising the path they were taking so that she could find her way back later.

Eventually she was brought to a fire they had set up next to two horses. They were clearly planning on taking her even further away, but were probably waiting until sunrise so that they could see the roads better.

While she was still pretending to be asleep, the men started to talk.

"How much do you think she'll be worth?" One of them asked.

"Have you seen her face? We'll be making enough to be set for life." The other one replied.

So they were planning on selling her off to someone. When someone had taken her from her room at first she though it might be another one of Sabine's schemes, but she knew Sabine wouldn't know how to be in contact with men like this. This was likely Adele's scheme instead. She probably thought Yvette was becoming more and more of an eyesore, especially with how everyone else seemed to just have endless praise for her.

Unfortunately, Yvette was not just going to go along with her plans.

Without making it obvious, she dislocated a few of her bones so that her hands could slip free from the ropes, then, once the men had fallen asleep, she popped them back into place before untying the rope around her feet.

The sun had still yet to rise, and she suspected there was still a couple hours yet before it would happen. Leaving the men there for the moment, she took the ropes that she had just undone, and quickly ran back to the Decaux manor.

Without making a sound, she snuck into the master bedroom, and quietly stole Adele away. She tied her up similarly to how she had been tied up earlier. Fabric around her mouth, rope around her hands and rope around her feet.

Adele had woken up halfway through but even as she tried to scream it was too late, Yvette had already brought her out of the house and was moving quickly back to where the men had set up their fire.

Yvette didn't bother to be quiet when she dumped Adele onto the ground, jolting the two men awake.

They looked up at Yvette, confused, and then to Adele, tied up on the ground beside them. Neither of them seemed to know how to react at first, before the bigger of the two men decided to just attack. With his bare hands.

Yvette made quick work of him, knocking him unconscious with a swift hit using her elbow before he collapsed to the ground. She then removed the knife she saw he was hiding in his belt, and pointed it towards the other man.

He backed up, sensing that he was outmatched here.

"You were saying you would sell me earlier." Yvette said.

The man cowered in fear. "I'm sorry! I'm sorry! Someone paid us to do it! Please spare my life!"

"Who were you going to sell me to?"

"A-An earl, I think his name is Robert."

An earl named Robert. Yvette thought about it for a moment before realising he must've been talking about Robert Marchand. He was a man in his sixties who had no wife and no children. He was married, at one point, but his wife died in a carriage accident and took their unborn child with her. It was said that Earl Marchand was so lost in his grief that he turned to alcohol and then became a deviant. He would often be seen visiting brothels and whenever he attended any social events he would get drunk and make a scene.

Eventually people stopped inviting him to things and he became isolated from society, though people still often saw him stumbling around town drunk, or with a pretty young woman in his arms.

Really it wasn't surprising at all that he'd be taking part in something like this.

Yvette looked down at Adele, who was shaking with fear and had a look in her eyes that seemed to say 'who are you?'. She wondered what Robert would think if he saw that he was paying for a woman that was closer to his age rather than a young woman like he had thought. Would he just not buy her? And let her return? Or would he just take her anyway?

Well. Whatever. She wouldn't worry about it.

"You wouldn't mind a little change in merchandise, right?" Yvette asked with a sickly sweet smile.

The man shook his head. "A-As long as we have a woman she can be sold!"

Exactly what she wanted to hear.

Yvette then bent down and looked into Adele's eyes.

"You hear that, Mother?" She said, as she brought the knife she was holding to Adele's neck. "I wonder how much Earl Marchand will pay for you."

Tears were streaming down Adele's face, but her expression was still closed off, as if she didn't want to show her weak side to Yvette.

Yvette laughed, and then withdrew her knife for a second, only to then make a quick upward slicing motion, leaving a long cut along Adele's left cheek.

She then turned back to the man, who was now hugging his knees to his chest. "Make sure I don't see either of you here again, or else you won't be so lucky next time, got it?"

He nodded fervently, to show that he understood, and then Yvette walked away, enjoying the sight of the sunrise on her way back to the Decaux manor.