"I don't trust you," Xecania said to the face of my new maid, the blue fur on her arms was slanted upwards as she glared at Alexi, who, in response, kept a professional smile despite the insult, simply staying silent even as the Heiress verbally abused her without remorse. Insults have been flying around, mostly around the bloodline of the maid who, to Jacob's pleasant surprise, did not start off at this Kingdom but from one of its neighbors. Which one? Jacob did not know, nor did he try to, listening in to Xecania's explanation about what the bloodline represents- which to say isn't really anything, - had already been tedious despite his general interest in the history of this world.

Getting Xecania to talk about the Kingdom they came from and how that correlates to Alexi's family exile and "betrayal" would only lead to more words that Jacob would find useless in the long run.

"Xecania, I get what you're saying but you've been saying that repeatedly for half an hour now," Jacob told her as he checked the spines of the books in front of him, titles such as 'Nobility and Responsbility' weren't common in the library, but they sure as hell aren't rare either. Really, he's starting to think that because of a general lack of moderation mixed with poor communication, the content of various books in this world might just be repeating one another, whether it is an accident or not.

"She's untrustworthy," Xecania said, glaring at the maid, "that's why my father threw her out during the first week of her coming here,"

"First week?" Wait, she hadn't been here back when Jacob was still making his way to the Dukedom?

Xecania nodded, "Yes." She admitted, voice now much calmer and less fervorous, "She's only been here for one week, in fact, she only arrived much sooner than you because her family paid for a Bluebeak service,"

"Huh, nice." Jacob complimented, "They must be genuine if they're willing to pay that much right?" He added as he finally (re)found a book that interested him, honestly, he should just keep reading the bestiary at this point, there's so much written inside, and they're all interesting to read about too, "you said that her family isn't that well off right now?"

"Yep." Xecania said, her glare still fixated on Alexi, who was just eyeing Jacob like he had grown a second head, "but that's exactly what they want you to think," the Heiress added, why was she so aggressive towards Alexi anyway? Jacob's supposed to be the one to deal with her because she's now his maid and yet somehow, Xecania was acting worse than him when it comes to the girl, "they want us to think that we're genuine because they want our trust, then when we give it, they'll toss us out."

"Did... your family get betrayed by hers or something?" Jacob asked as he found his seat, causing Alexi to walk away from the corner she was standing on and place the tray she was holding in front of him, she poured him tea with great care even as Xecania glared at her, which made Jacob feel uneasy and he can't imagine how someone can move under all that, "this hate is making me worried that you'll kill her when she's sleeping."

Xecania scoffed, "I don't need to do that, also, I should be the one who's worried because between the two of us, she's the assassin so I don't doubt that she knows how to plan against hidden attacks in the dark."

Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

Oh. Oh.

Jacob realized something just as he opened the page about Beastmen- specifically the Bear kind - in the bestiary, the lazy but ultimately capable Bearmen are unsurprisingly mad at anyone willing to kill people when they're asleep because not only do they like to hibernate, but also that animals like Wolverines like to hunt them down during winter, a time when they're at their weakest and can't fight back against most things.

'Guess it does run in their blood,' Jacob thought as he flipped through more pages, eventually, he reached the page that he was reading last night, he placed a paperweight on top of it as he nodded at his new maid, while taking a sip from the cup, "thank you,"

"You're welcome sir," Alexi bowed, taking her brown hair with her.

Reading about the Warbeast can come later, for now, Jacob's pretty curious about something, "why did your dad accept her if he was just gonna give her to me?" Jacob asked.

"My father never accepted her!" Xecania loudly defended, "In fact, he only agreed to her family during the week of the Dungeon raid!" The Heiress' eyes widened, indicating that she came to the same conclusion as Jacob.

He met Alexi's eyes and thought that his guess was actually right, she was only here because the Duke wanted her to work for him. Whether or not she knew about the arrangement is completely out in the open, in fact, Jacob guessed that she most likely agreed with the condition of working under him before she came here, which gave her casual acceptance of working for him some sense.

But then again, her family has apparently been trying to make her work under the Duke, who had been denying it for some time now. But why?

Jacob's gaze turned to Xecania, most likely because his daughter wouldn't get along with the... Assassin maid... holy shit he just got himself an assassin maid- He quelled his excitement down and went back to finding holes in his paranoid thoughts about the Duke sending him a spy (which is still a real possibility, but less so now that he knew the situation,) and going back to the Duke, if his daughter won't accept Alexi living here, and from the impression that he got from Xecania, Alexi's family was insistent of putting her here, then the Duke most likely just decided to kill two birds with one stone by throwing the maid over to Jacob, and when both the family and Alexi herself agreed, then this was the end result.

"You shouldn't trust her Jacob," Xecanina repeated, adding nothing more despite her realization.

"I'll trust her," he replied, nodding at Alexi, who bowed in response. He should probably still act more paranoid about the situation- and he is, but too much of it is just uncalled for - But for the time being, he's going to trust Alexi.

Xecania rolled her eyes, "whatever, do what you want." She said before angrily snapping the book in her hand. She was about to stand up when she huffed, stared at Jacob, then at Alexi, and proceeded to sit back down- most likely out of pride, "you two should leave," she said, proving Jacob's thoughts correct, she didn't want to get kicked out of her family's own library so she did this instead.

"Sorry," Jacob apologized, "but I don't think anything's going to happen to me," he tried to counter and ended up failing so he backed down, "can... we stay here?"

"You." The Heiress pointed a single finger at him, "You can stay here," her eyes moved to glare at Alexi, "but she needs to leave,"

Jacob nodded and turned to Alexi, "Sorry about this but can you leave?" Was he being harsh? Definitely, but in the end, staying here is more valuable both because he wants to keep a friendly relationship with Xecania and also because this is a library, and besides, he can always make it up to the maid, he'd have plenty of opportunities to do so now that she's going to be working for him back in Yarya village.

"Of course," Alexi bowed and promptly made her way out of the library, tray in hand.

"Sorry," Jacob said as she started walking.

"It's fine, I understand," Alexi turned back and gave him a nod.