Employment Contract
“Diana, Diana.”
The only daughter of the Viscount Defierre family, Nephrine, was an exceedingly difficult and sensitive young lady.
Having celebrated her twenty-fourth birthday just days ago, Nephrine seemed intent on expressing her foul temper. One of her habits included harassing the maid tasked with attending to her.
“Diana, you lazy girl, bring the washbasin at once!”
The bell attached to the cord clanged loudly. Nephrine behaved as if she could not take a single step out of bed without a maid by her side.
In the Defierre household, only one maid was allowed to serve Nephrine. If Nephrine noticed anyone other than her usual maid lingering near the door, she would erupt in rage and throw objects.
The butler, his steps weary, descended to the servants’ quarters and knocked on a door.
“Diana, the young lady is calling for you earlier than usual today.”
“Yes, I’ll go right away,” answered a maid who had just begun pinning her hair up at the door.
She had mysterious honey-colored hair and delicate features, a rare beauty. Her skin was pale and translucent as if bathed in moonlight, and her slender neck and graceful limbs exuded the elegance of a dancer.
“She seems particularly irritable today. Please handle her carefully,” the butler advised.
“Yes, sir,” Diana replied with a bow. The butler stepped aside, making way for her as she moved carefully, eyes lowered and feet stepping with caution.
This year marked Diana’s seventh year working in the Defierre household, placing her among the senior maids. Everyone but Diana herself considered it a fortunate arrangement that she alone served Nephrine. This meant they were spared the responsibility of managing the sensitive mistress’s temper.
In fact, since Diana began attending to Nephrine, her frequent outbursts had noticeably subsided.
Additionally, Diana was the only maid in the house assured of not being dismissed.
As Diana walked steadily toward the staircase, someone rushed toward her from the hallway.
“Here, I’ve prepared the water for you!”
It was Helen, her roommate, handing over a washbasin filled to the brim.
“Hurry, Diana. If you don’t get there soon, she might storm down here again and cause a scene like last time. Good luck!”
Helen, who had once suffered Nephrine’s wrath and was whipped for upsetting her, practically worshipped Diana.
Diana lifted the washbasin, which was larger than her own body, and began ascending the stairs. Her steps were careful yet not unsteady. Her gaze remained fixed on a single point in the air as if detached from her surroundings.
Servants passing by quickly moved aside to avoid her path. Sympathetic glances followed her—at her back, her face, even her softly stepping feet.
“Poor girl. So beautiful, yet she had to end up serving a woman like Lady Nephrine…”
Diana’s name was often accompanied by various epithets:
– Diana, with nowhere to go.
– Diana, the blind.
– Diana, the unfortunate girl bound to this mansion for life.
But also: Diana, the most beautiful woman in the capital.
In the imperial capital of Karman, Liporsa, there was even a saying: “The most difficult thing to achieve in Liporsa is to make eye contact with Defierre’s cleaning maid.”
It was half a joke and half the truth. Among the commoners of Liporsa, Diana was a well-known figure. Many praised her beauty, comparing her to Adele, the former empress who was regarded as the empire’s most beautiful woman.
Countless men showed interest in her, yet none succeeded in making eye contact with Diana. In fact, no one had managed it so far.
Because Diana was blind.
When Diana arrived at the secluded space where the violent young mistress practically lived alone, Nephrine was lying on the bed without even pulling back the covers. Nephrine glared at Diana without moving a finger, even as she placed the washbasin on the side table.
“You’re late, aren’t you?”
“I apologize, my lady.”
“Were you shaking your hips at Bill, the stable keeper, and that’s why you’re late?”
Bill was a compassionate, middle-aged stable keeper in his fifties. He often brought Diana necessary items, treating her like a daughter. Somehow, Nephrine had seen this and used all the vile words she knew to insult Diana.
“Did you enjoy panting with Bill in the stables like some wench?”
“Please don’t misunderstand, my lady.”
Diana replied as she opened the window. Nephrine would denigrate Diana in this way over every man she happened to interact with.
“It was the same with Louis and Tom, wasn’t it? How many times did you spread your legs for them? Did you show them your breasts, too? Do they know you’re from a filthy brothel?”
The term “Filthy” referred to prostitutes catering to the lower class in red-light districts. It was a derogatory title used indiscriminately for both male and female sex workers, who were treated with less respect than commoners.
The Butler did say she was in a particularly foul mood this morning, and it’s true.
Diana endured the torrent of verbal abuse silently as she helped Nephrine wash up. When Diana remained indifferent to the stream of insults, Nephrine changed her tone, mocking her.
“You should be grateful to serve such a generous and compassionate mistress like me. Who else would hire a blind, ignorant maid with nothing but big breasts?”
“Yes, my lady. I’m always grateful.”
“Grateful, my foot.”
Nephrine snorted, as if bored. Following suit, Diana smirked inwardly.
Who wouldn’t know the real reason why I can’t be dismissed?
Diana was blind. However, she wasn’t born without sight.
When she first started working for the Viscount Defierre’s household seven years ago at the age of fifteen, Diana’s vision was perfectly fine.
It was one sudden day that she lost her sight.
And it was because of Nephrine. From the very first day Diana began working at the estate, Nephrine had envied her. She bullied her over nonsensical reasons, assigned her the hardest errands, spilled tea on her freshly cleaned uniform, and sent her out on errands covered in soot from cleaning the fireplace to be ridiculed. Her harassment came in all forms, most of which were absurdly childish.
But there was one act of cruelty Nephrine committed that was anything but childish.
The eldest son of the Duke of Gaspar, who was being considered as Nephrine’s fiancé, visited the mansion and became infatuated with Diana. The next day, Nephrine summoned Diana to her room and, surprisingly, served her tea and expensive chocolate as dessert.
Diana consumed them and fell ill. That very night, her vision began narrowing, and by the next morning, the world had gone dark.
The doctor Diana visited with Helen’s help diagnosed her as having ingested a terrible poison.
“It’s brewed from rare ingredients, ones not easily obtained even in the capital. It’s called ‘morte noire’ (black death), named because it feels like staring into a black wall. It’s incredibly toxic—how did you come to consume something so deadly?”
The only things Diana had consumed the previous day were the tea and chocolate from Nephrine and the dinner she shared with Helen.
Diana returned to the mansion with Helen’s support, staggering. Crawling on all fours, she finally reached Nephrine’s room, only to be greeted with laughter as if she had been waiting for this moment.
“Oh my, was there poison in that? I didn’t know. How terrible. Well, you finally look the part now.”
Nephrine looked down at Diana, who was fumbling with her hands, and burst into laughter. It was, without a doubt, the most malicious sound Diana had ever heard in her life.
Since that fateful night when she became blind, Diana’s life had grown significantly more arduous. Yet, even at the bottom of a well, a beam of sunlight can sometimes shine through. Diana’s innate resilience, which she had never fully realized, began to emerge.
Thanks to that, she had been living without major accidents despite her blindness. Seven years had passed since then.
Assisting Nephrine with her washing, Diana quietly withdrew when she was finished.
The rustling sound at the foot of the bed. She’s kicking the covers.
The faint sound of bare feet scraping against the floor, the friction of skin against the surface, and the increasing intensity of a pungent powdery scent and faint breathing.
Diana could easily predict what was about to happen. Pretending to step aside, she subtly twisted her shoulder. The hand that had aimed to strike her shoulder missed by a hair’s breadth. Losing her balance, Nephrine staggered and ended up toppling onto the washbasin.
With a loud crash, water splashed everywhere.
