The following three days passed fairly quitetly. Amelia spent most of her time in the library reading thrilling tales about heroic knights who slayed dragons, saved princesses or became kings. The stories were for children because Amelia wasn't yet a very good reader, but that was fine because she enjoyed them nonetheless.
The days had been surprisingly warm and sunny, being the end of september. Every afternoon Gordon served her tea in the gazebo in the middle of the garden. She noticed that the leaves on the trees had started turning yellow and felt a bit melancholy by the thought that it would soon be winter.
But even though the days passed by peacefully all was not well; every night Amelia was plauged with nightmares. Although she had experienced them many times before they had never been so frequent. It seemed like they became worse by every passing night, perhaps because the duke's return to the manor drew near.
A lot of her dreams were of things that had already happened the most occurring one being about the time that her father locked her in a dark storage room as a punishment for her 'bad behavior'. But one dream, the most terrifying of them, was about what could happen to her once Dario Beaumont returned.
The news that Amelia had been dreading was delivered to her on her eighth day in the manor.
She was reading in the library, seated in an armchair that she found to be especially comfortable. Due to the lack of sleep she had difficulties focusing on the text properly, so she layed the book in her lap to gaze out the window for a moment. It was sunny outside, but the darker than usual clouds indicated that the nice weather would not last much longer.
That's when Olivia flung open the door. It looked like she had been rushing since her cheeks were flushed and she was out of breath. Her apparent attempts at hiding her distress did not do much.
"M-miss! I just got news that His Grace has returned from his journey…"
Amelia froze for a second but managed to compose herself. She forced herself to smile.
"I see… Does he wish to see me?"
"Right now he is resting after the long travel…" Olivia hesitaded before she continued to speak."Miss… His Grace has ordered me to send you to his chamber later this evening." Her expression was sullen when she said this.
Amelia did not understand the reason for Olivias reaction. Hadn't everyone already been expecting that this would happen? It had been obvious since the beginning.
Rather than distressed, Amelia herself was a bit relived that everything was unfoldning the way she had predicted. Although she had expecting that Duke Beaumont had the intention of making her his mistress there had not been a way for her to be completely sure. This situation was better for her. Albeit not ideal, it was at least forseeable.
"Then I shall greet him later instead." Amelia stated and continued to read, although it was nearly impossible to concentrate now.