Chapter 6 : Countess No More

"What is the meaning of this?" Maggie rattled against the iron bars separating her from her home.

"Richard! Anyone! Open the gate at once!" she commanded, but no one answered to her.

She almost screamed her throat hoarse when Richard, the butler, finally emerged from within the towering building.

"… Young Lady," he greeted Maggie with an oddly restrained voice.

"Richard, what is happening here?" Maggie lowered her voice as she spoke to the butler. "Why are the gates locked? Why am I not allowed into my own estate?"

The knot at Richard's throat bobbed up and down in anxiety.

"This… Young Lady, have you by chance not received a letter from the Crown Office?" he asked.

"The Letters Patent? Yes, of course! It is in my bed chamber!"

"No, the second one. The second letter from the Crown Office revoked the Letters Patent. As of today, Young Lady, you are no longer Countess of Huntington."

Maggie's eyes grew wide in disbelief.

"But why? Richard, why?"

"I am sorry," Richard apologized, his voice low and formal but he bowed his head in deference. "Young Lady, I am so sorry but I don't know. It is best if you contact the Crown Office directly. As of now, Huntington Hall is not allowed to receive any visitor until the new steward has been appointed."

There was no use pressuring Richard, Maggie knew as much. As a butler, he could do nothing but adhere to royal decrees. The question now was rather, why did the Crown Office revoke the Letters Patent?

Wasting no time, Maggie took the carriage and headed to the Crown Office in a haste.

Dusk had already begun its descent, casting long shadows as she arrived. A steady stream of officials exited the grand building, their faces etched with the day's weariness. Bursting through the doors, Maggie's voice echoed through the hushed hall. "I must see the Lord Chancellor immediately!" she demanded, her tone laced with barely controlled panic.

A young clerk, startled by her abrupt entrance, stammered, "Forgive me, My Lady, but His Grace is unavailable. He's embarked on an important mission, assigned by the King."

The clerk might just tell Maggie that she had lost her inheritance for good, it would not have made any difference.

"May I inquire about the reason for your unexpected visit, My Lady?" the young clerk asked, trying his best to be of assistance.

"I was appointed the Countess of Huntington following my late father's demise a month ago," Maggie explained. "I even received an official Letters Patent. But today, when I returned home, I was barred entry. My butler told me that I was no longer the bearer of the Countess title, evident through a second document released by the Crown Office to revoke my appointment. I need to know what exactly is going on."

"Oh."

A cloud of understanding settled on the clerk.

"My Lady," the clerk stammered, a touch of unease flickering across his face. "This is a rather delicate situation. I'm afraid any updates on the matter will have to wait until Lord Chancellor returns to his post."

Maggie shot him a look of disbelief.

"It sounds like you have all the answers to my question!" she exclaimed.

"N-No, I mean, yes, of course, but…"

"Do we have any problem here?" A voice, laced with unexpected authority, sliced through the tense air. Both the clerk and Maggie flinched, their gazes snapping towards the source. A tall figure emerged from the shadows, casting a long silhouette across the room.

Maggie's face darkened as soon as she recognized the person. It was the uncouth person from the Great Library!

The clerk, on the other hand, appeared so relieved as if he had just sighted his savior no less.

"Marquess of Canterbury!"

Marquess of Canterbury?

Maggie's lips fell slightly open. If she was not mistaken, the one who held that title was none other than the eldest son of the Duke of Winchester. The Duke of Winchester, in turn, was the current incumbent for the Lord Chancellor position.

In simple terms, the heir to the Duke of Winchester's title was none other than this insufferable man. It turned out that years of strict upbringing in the ducal house failed to instill the qualities of a true gentleman in him!

The Marquess swept his cold, haughty gaze over Maggie, taking in the former Countess from head to toe. After a long moment, a curt, "My Lady," escaped his lips, followed by a begrudging dip of his rigid spine in a shallow bow.

"Your Grace," Maggie murmured, her fingertips pinching select spots of her dress as she dipped into a curtsy.

"Nigel, fetch me the records," the Marquess then said. "I shall assume full responsibility during my father's absence."

"Very well, Your Grace," the clerk scurried away in haste.

Left alone, standing like two generals in a raging cold war, the Marquess extended a hand at Maggie.

"Percival Clement Duane Locksworth, Marquess of Canterbury," he introduced himself. "We have yet to be introduced to each other."

Maggie put her hand on top of his.

"Marguerite Delaney Antoine Blanchard," Maggie's voice was stuck in her throat when she was about to mention her Countess title.

"…Countess of Huntington," the Marquess ended on her behalf before giving Maggie's hand a polite squeeze.

Maggie offered him a curt nod.

After a while, Nigel the clerk returned with a neatly rolled-up parchment.

"Here you go, Your Grace," he said, handing the scroll to his superior with both hands.

The Marquess unrolled the scroll and scanned the content from top to bottom.

The Marquess's brow furrowed as he scanned the document. "There it is," he muttered finally. "Lady Marguerite Delaney Antoine Blanchard's claim to the Earldom of Huntington is being challenged on grounds of birthright."

Maggie's eyes turned as round as saucers.

"How come? I am my father's only daughter, his only heir apparent!"

A complicated expression spread across the Marquess's face, a mixture of a wince and a grimace.

"Apparently, you are not. Several witnesses have come forward, claiming the real heiress perished at birth. They allege you were switched with the deceased child and raised as a lady of Huntington Hall."

"But…"

Maggie did not know what to say. She wanted to repeat the same sentence again and again, telling the Marquess and the clerk that it was all a slander, the most vicious lie ever spoken on Earth, but her words failed her.

The air around her seemed to thicken, refusing to enter her airway. Her surroundings started to spin faster and faster before her view darkened. Maggie's eyes rolled backward before her knees buckled under her weight and she fainted from the overwhelming distress.

"My Lady!"

A pair of strong arms caught her before she crumpled to the floor.

"My Lady, please get ahold of yourself!"

Maggie was barely able to stay awake.

It all did not make sense, she told herself over and over again before darkness claimed her for real.

It was a lie.

A nightmare.

It was all just a nightmare.

When she woke up again, she might be lying in her bedroom in Cavendish Academy's dormitory, preparing to go back to Huntington that day.

Or maybe she already arrived back home, and exhaustion caused her to fall asleep in her childhood bedroom in an instant.

A disorienting blend of dread and hope yanked Maggie from sleep barely an hour later. "Father!" she cried out, her voice hoarse from disuse.

The gentleman, engrossed in a scroll across the room, snapped to attention at the sound. He rose swiftly and approached the chaise lounge where Maggie sat, now fully awake.

"Are you alright, my Lady?" he inquired, his voice unusually kind with a hint of care.

"I… Where am I? What am I doing here?" Maggie blurted out a torrent of questions, disoriented.

"You passed out at the entrance hall, so we took you into the inner chambers of the Crown Office to rest for a little bit," the Marquess said in reminder.

"Oh. I…"

Maggie pressed both hands against her cheeks, slightly clawing into her fair skin.

"I am sorry, I…"

"It's fine," the Marquess dismissed her apology. "It must be a shocking revelation."

"It was not a revelation!" Maggie shot upward, her eyes shimmering with defiance. "It was a lie! A most vicious lie! A slander upon my birth claim!"

She finally managed to say what she wanted to say all along, but the words held no ground against the scroll clutched in the Marquess's hand. If anything, she appeared like a crazed woman right now, one who was unable to accept the truth and still insisted on being the Countess she was not.

"Please," Maggie's voice trembled from excessive grief. "I just lost my father. If my father were here, he would tell you all that I am his biological daughter, I am not some unknown babe swapped into the Blanchard family eighteen years ago."

"If only the late Earl of Huntington could attest to it," the Marquess shook his head in regret.

Upon hearing the Marquess's words, Maggie's hands flew to her mouth.

"Wait!" she cried out, almost sounding ecstatic. "There are other people who can attest to my birth! I still have my distant cousin Nicholas Cunningham! And his father, Lloyd Cunningham, was my father's cousin! They knew me from birth!"

"I'm afraid not," the Marquess said, his voice extinguishing Maggie's flicker of hope like a cold wind snuffing out a candle flame.

"B-b-but why?"

The Marquess closed the distance between them and held the scroll up in front of Maggie.

"Because, my Lady, the person who gathered all these eyewitnesses to challenge your claim to Huntington was none other than Lloyd Cunningham."

It was Uncle Lloyd.

His signature, the first of many, adorned the document's bottom. Each witness swore on their very lives that the testimony they provided was nothing but the truth.

"No," Maggie whispered. "I refuse to accept it! I refuse!"

Just like that, the former Countess stormed out of the Crown Office, racing towards Huntington, where her doom awaited.