Good day to all you people! I took the title of this story from the title of the Broadway play, "How to Succeed in Business without Really Trying," but it doesn't have anything to do with the story of the musical. I just thought up this story because it's fun to make people argue. In other stories, I make'em argue, but I can't make them fight for as long as I want because THEN, the story would never get anywhere. (I kinda like it when it's like that. Pointlessness, you gotta love it.) So, it's pointless arguing set in medieval-ish times, maybe renaissance era. Whatever.

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"That'll be ten pounds apiece, noble lady."

I stared at the toothily grinning vendor, vexed. Ten pounds apiece? That was ridiculous! The price was fine for a loaf of bread, I suppose, maybe a little more costly than what I suppose a single loaf costs, but for EGGS?

That would not do.

A fire lit in my already crimson eyes. 'Well, well, well. Your prices shall be unfair no more'. It was time for me to use my surprising bartering abilities I had recently discovered taking care of the marketing last week. I smiled grimly at the man. He smiled back as dourly as I did.

'Not for long, big guy.'

And the haggling began.

After some intense wrangling on my part, I had managed to bully the 'innocent' vendor into selling to me a dozen eggs for eight pounds.

"Pleasure doing business with you, Goodman Egg Seller." I smiled winningly at him and walked off with my now-heavier basket, hoping that my triumph at this recent victory didn't show on my face. After all, I knew what it was like to loose a duel an argument.

My face suddenly soured. No need to think of that in the face of such a good success.

I know I attracted some looks as I strolled by. And I know why they were doing so. Most of the onlookers were amazed at my admittedly dazzling features. I was a radiant eighteen year-old, a perfect picture of a fire goddess, with a temper to match. Of course, they would look. Some recognized me as the Countess Sora Takenouchi while others simply noticed my manner of holding herself with pride as a noble did and bolted.

Admittedly, the behaviors of some other title-holders in dignified society were intolerable, acting as though they were their betters. Many commoners had suffered under their high-and-mighty attitudes. Of course, I myself wasn't exactly Saint Sora with the commoners under my wing, but I never drove whips to them or forced anything out of their salary. Well…except for that time I docked their pay for ruining my celebration for my seventeenth birthday. You should've seen the mess they made! We resolved things out, anyway. But I never drove whips to them and that was what mattered.

Returning to the main point of my blathering is vital. Blathering isn't good for even a lowly Countess. I must confess it is the fault of my mother's, though I lay no blame on her. I enjoy learning all about women's civil liberties ever since I was a toddler. That eventually led to my intense fascination to read every single book within my Father, my Grandfather and my Uncle's libraries. (A/N: Short of the phone book, eh?) Therefore, my childhood deemed me an outcast and actually caused me to grow a backbone; unlike those simpering daisies we call 'noble women'.

Is that a good thing?

Well, this upbringing caused me to decorate the lovely walls of each grand ball we attended. Perhaps I would contaminate their lives and cause them to actually grow a brain! Horrors!

But I forgive them. They don't know any better, after all. When you think about it, they don't know anything! Yes, pity is what I feel towards them. It's not their fault that they were born into this class of lifestyle. If it weren't for my mother, I might've been exactly like them!

But why would the Countess Sora be in the marketplace doing the marketing? It was a job reserved for the maids. Well, let me trace it to the beginning:

I. Am. Getting. Married.

Getting married when I have no interest in doing so is bad enough, but my father is forcing me to enter into wedlock to someone who I absolutely cannot spend the rest of my life with. Someone who cannot possibly understand my ideas and opinions and will treat me like an equal.

Unacceptable.

But that is a hard quality to find in a man, these days. Nobility sometimes rots people's brains. All of this etiquette and propriety is difficult to remember, thus causing everything else to leak out of a brain. I, on the other hand, learned little decorum and as a result, I'm proud to say I learned (nearly) everything and still kept my brainpower.

Could that be why I'm said to be extremely blunt on occasion?

Who is this cretin who, through a signed contract, is going to marry me? The answer?

The Duke Yamato Ishida.

I remember the first time I met him. We were young seven-year olds and by then, I was hooked on rights. He had bossed me around, saying that he could do so because he was male and I was just a simple female. (A/N: Doesn't it make you all heated inside? Let's just say that Little Matt was influenced by the higher powers who allowed me to write this story. If they had hit off as youngsters, this story would be non-existent!) I repaid him the reminder by sending him to the medicine man five times before the Ishida family returned to their home.

Our next encounter was five years later. He continued to make fun of my clumsiness. Grace just wasn't my thing back then. I took it all with scarred pride, though, and instead of launching him into the next county with an interesting mix of skin-melting acids, I vowed revenge. The next time we would meet again, I would rub his face in my beauty.

Over the years, I lost most of my inelegance, but I was still as plain as a post. My hair wasn't the vibrant red it is now; it was a hideous orange. My eyes simply scared the breeches of some people. Three years after our last meeting, they came back to the Takenouchi lands to celebrate some event. I believe that this was when our parents so ingeniously signed the marriage contract between the two of us. He was asked to dance with me during the grandest ball thrown in our manor. He agreed after a great deal of persuasion on his mother and his little brother, Takeru's part. Takeru will be a fine young man.

Let me lay things on the table. I don't have any grudges against anyone else in the Ishida family except for maybe Yamato's father for agreeing with my father that we were to be wed. The Duke's wife and Takeru are marvelous people.

So Sir High-And-Mighty gave his consent to dance with me for the opening dance and my parents were so elated that they invited everyone they knew (everyone worth knowing, that is). The night of the ball came and the scum had stepped up to open the ball. He made his way to where I stood with my parents…and mistook this ugly and evil girl for me. He danced with her the entire night, and when he was told that she wasn't me, he actually insulted me again! I was told that he said to a good friend of mine that he supposed that what she was telling them was right. I quote him: "After all, Sora couldn't become THAT pretty. Not if her life depended on it."

Yes, I was humiliated. Yes, people pitied me and felt embarrassed for me. Yes, he got a reprieve for it. And yes, I was going to kill him.

Then I learned the next day that they had left. My chance was gone. For now. I knew, though, that justice wasn't evil enough to keep him away from my vengeance. He would come back and I would have him on his knees. Don't think that this offense is minute or insignificant, or maybe that I'm exaggerating.

I am a noble, after all. Every little affront to my pride is a deadly insult, and I would take everything personally, although I draw the line at allowing the nobleness to infect my brain. I like it the way it is.

Then a full three years later, I find that they are coming again and was euphoric. As I planned which way to disembowel him (a quick death or a long, agonizingly excruciating demise? No question), my parents decided to be honest with me and tell me that they had planned our betrothal. I had killed several ears then and was the cause of my father's temporary deafness.

Serves him right.

But as sweet as vengeance is, it still didn't change the fact that Yamato would come and we'd have to get married and live very unhappy lives. I had no intentions of getting married at all. Living like a spinster doesn't look too bad.

Therefore, I hatched a plan. Nothing outrageous, it was all I could do. Well, all I could do short of running away with some commoner just to insult the foul Duke or murdering him. Doing what the maids' errands may perhaps get to be a habit that nobles hate in other nobles. I was sure that Ishida was exactly the perfect picture of a noble: incredibly well- mannered, polite, mean and downright brainless.

How typical.

The plan could work another way, though. Father is often tired of hiring new maids and increasing wages. Times were hard. I've read about bribery, and it isn't really that pretty, but…whatever works, right? Just picture it like this: I do the work, no need to hire a maid, thus more money for him! Just as long as he threw that contract right out the window and into the jaws of justice.

And that is why I was in the marketplace.

I took a look into my basket and realized that I had finished getting everything on the list the head cook told me. I was free to go home and go into one more of my daily arguments with my father. Oh joy! Why have you come upon me?

Satisfied, I made my way out of the market easily; the past weeks I spent putting my plan into motion have taught me all possible ways around the market. As soon as I stepped out of the busy plaza, I was greeted by the beautiful sight of the Takenouchi lands; a lovely mountain range topped with snow. I smiled at the panoramic vista and continued on the mountain trail which led to a long and equally scenic bridge. Of course, that bridge is famous for the river it flew over. It was dangerous and enormous and the current was whip-fast. And if the current wasn't dangerous enough, the river led the flow through numerous rocks and over a waterfall.

Lovely place to go swimming. (The lake, I mean.)

I've traveled over the bridge many times. After all, it DOES lead to my family's manor eventually. So I stepped onto the bridge without giving the raging river below me a single thought. Well…maybe a little concept occurred to me about falling into the river and getting out of the marriage, but suicide wasn't very attractive to me. It might've been attractive to other noble ladies back then, as it was a very dramatic exit. (A/N: A la Mimbrate!)

I was a good way in the middle of the bridge when I heard a carriage clatter up behind me. I decided to ignore it and continue on. Carriages are so bothersome. All they are good for is making the noisiest racket possible.

The carriage stopped beside me and the coach door opened and startled me out of my wits. My arms flew up in terror. I can't believe that this happened. I am often described as difficult to startle. I fell over backwards in the most ungracious way…

Causing my basket to go spinning over the edge of the bridge and into the ferocious river.

As I was about to hit the cobble-stone street, someone caught me before I kissed ground. I looked up and met his pale blue eyes. I stared at them for a moment. There was something familiar to them but I couldn't quite put my finger on it.

A thought occurred to me. 'My basket!'

I broke free from his hold and lunged to the side of the bridge and stared over the edge. There were the ruins of what used to be my basket and the goods I had spent haggling and buying in the past few hours. Ruined.

Tears sprung to my eyes. I know that this is overacting, but I couldn't help it at that time.

You see, I have to tell you that when I saw this, I couldn't help but feel as though my hopes to get out of the marriage got dashed into the rocks along with the over-priced oranges. Dashed into the rocks, thrown around in a brutal current and thrown off a waterfall. Aren't I lucky?

An annoyingly familiar voice rang out. "Come on. The loss of a little basket of groceries is hardly anything to cry over." It was the person who had 'rescued' me from my fall. The person who was caused my goods to go flying over the bridge.

I turned around, ready to force the full brunt of my wrath upon my 'rescuer'…

Only to find that it was my future husband (not if I had anything to do with it!), the Duke Yamato Ishida.

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I know that she doesn't have a very Renaissance-like attitude/narrative, but if it works for the story, deal with it. I actually think that it's kind of refreshing.