The Day She Had Waited For

Nothing out of the ordinary happened on the road back to the capital of Pyeong. But... by the time they arrived, the mood inside the imperial palace had turned strangely unsettled.

Even after scrambling to bring Seol Deunghwa back, the Emperor never once came looking for her.

"And for months after that, the human Emperor never so much as set foot in the rear palace."

Seol Deunghwa, who had been sharpening herself for revenge against the Emperor, sank into hollow despair. In name she was a concubine, but in truth she was all but a prisoner, forbidden to step outside — so trapped within the palace walls, her growing gloom and emptiness were plain for anyone to see.

"So I took it upon myself to sneak the Madam out for a little fresh air now and then."

The great fox puffed out his chest, brimming with pride, wearing an expression that plainly read, Did I not do well? Am I not a good fox, deserving of extra credit for good deeds?

I held back a laugh and answered. "So you two must have gotten quite close."

"Right! The Madam turned out to be far more curious and bolder than I'd expected, so I enjoyed myself going about with her too. And she grew more at ease little by little — her face brightened right up! I'd hardly ever seen her smile before, but she smiled so beautifully it made me want to give her even more reasons to!"

Seokjuk spilled all of this out in one delighted rush, grinning from ear to ear. Seokran, who had been watching, wrinkled her nose and gave a few odd sniffs.

"I smell somethin', I smell somethin' all right."

"What smell?"

"The smell of a fool hopelessly in love — the kinda smell a baby princess never gets to smell. It used to be my favorite smell, but seein' my own baby brother act like this is just plain gross. Blegh!"

Seokran mimed a dramatic bout of retching. What on earth has gotten into her? Seokjuk, evidently just as unable to follow his sister's antics, scowled.

"Big Sis, why in the world are you gaggin' at a perfectly healthy yokai?"

"Don't you have any idea what you just did, little brother?"

"What did I do?! Her Highness asked about the Madam, so I merely told her about the Madam!"

"...If it were somebody else's business it'd be hilarious, but that fool happens to be my own brother. What a headache..."

Seokran pressed a forepaw to her forehead and shook her head back and forth.

I watched the two of them, bewildered, then turned to Seokjuk. "That reminds me — why do you call Seol Deunghwa 'Madam'? I don't recall ever ordering you to serve her like a retainer."

"We made a bet while we were out on one of our strolls. If I won, the Madam would call me 'Master,' and if I lost, she'd call herself 'Madam'... and she was so very clever that, well, I went and lost, of course."

Why does he look so delighted about losing a bet? He's practically over the moon.

At the sight of Seokjuk's beaming face, Seokran covered both eyes with her forepaws as though she couldn't bear to watch a moment longer.

"Can't watch this, nya."

"What exactly has been eating you since a moment ago, Big Sis?"

"Do you have even the faintest clue what you're doing with that human woman?"

"How could I not? We're escapin' from the imperial palace as we speak!"

"Not a clue in the world. Off burrowed in some mountain valley cultivatin' your Dao, sayin' you'll become a Cheonho — knew you'd turn out like this, keheh. There's hardship written all over your future, so good luck with that, nya."

Declaring she wanted no further part of this, Seokran flopped down onto the floor of the room and stayed there, one forepaw resting halfheartedly on the fox bead.

What is that girl even talking about? I blinked at the fox on the screen just as she had, then simply changed the subject.

"In any case — ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠did you manage to find ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠out why the palace atmosphere was so strange?"

"The palace was thick with shamanic wards, and there were suspiciously many yokai prowling about, so I couldn't investigate in any real depth. I had to concentrate on not blowing my cover while playing at being an ordinary pet fox."

Seokjuk heaved a long sigh, then added,

"From what I managed to overhear in passing... the Crown Prince appears to be the problem."

"The Crown Prince of Pyeong?"

While gazing into the span of Seruhwa's life through the scrying mirror, I had seen the Crown Prince of Pyeong more than once. Seruhwa had been such an unloved wretch she ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠could barely scrape together a proper meal, but a princess was still a princess, so she was hauled out to every important ceremony and had seen the faces of the imperial family plenty of times.

'The Crown Prince... a full-grown man, stumbling and fumbling through the sacrificial text at the ancestral rites, then collapsing on the spot all of a sudden.'

I remembered wondering at the time whether he was suffering from some illness or had been born with a flaw of some kind.

Seokjuk flicked his ears back and forth, as if uncertain. "There were whispers that the Crown Prince had somehow changed, and other rumors that the Emperor has grown afraid of him. I don't know the details, but either way, one thing is certain — it's the Crown Prince who has poisoned the mood of the palace."

The Emperor, afraid of his own son?

It was strange, no doubt about it — but when I thought it over, it was another country's affair anyway. I had chosen to live my life as the Crown Princess of Un, so the private complications of the Pyeong imperial household were none of my concern.

Unless, of course, it turned into a catastrophe large enough to spill over into Un.

"So then — how did the assassination go?"

"Three nights ago, the Emperor came looking for her in the dead of night."

A faint crease of displeasure pinching the space between his brows, Seokjuk went on.

"I told her that if she wasn't ready, I'd hold that man off for her — but she said the day she had been waiting for had finally arrived, so I kept watch from outside."

The day she had been waiting for.

I remembered the answer Seol Deunghwa had once given me — her eyes blazing with a searing blue fire — when I promised I would do anything for her.

What must she have felt, preparing for and waiting upon the day the Emperor would come to her? I could only imagine that it was something far deeper and fiercer than anything I could measure.

"The man inside was bellowing one moment, pleading the next, then shrieking and throwing an utter fit — so I laid a silencing spell over the room and waited, so that not a sound would leak out."

"You didn't hear what the Emperor said, then?"

"It didn't feel like my place to hear — not where the Madam was concerned. If she tells me herself someday, once her heart has grown lighter, I will listen then."

For a would-be Cheonho, he really did carry the unmistakable air of a fox who had cultivated his Dao properly. I was nodding my approval when Seokran, still sprawled out hugging the fox bead, heaved a sigh so colossal it came out as a groan.

"It's over, it's all over. And look at you — ring already through your nose, kid."

Seokjuk apparently decided that his sister's grumbling no longer deserved a response, and simply carried on.

"I waited until the Madam told me it was finished, then went in and tidied everything so nothing would look suspicious, watched over her even as she feigned death, and then waited outside the palace walls."

"There was no risk of the body being desecrated — dismemberment, cremation, anything like that?"

That had been the single greatest worry in our plan to assassinate the Emperor. The fear that something might mutilate the body of Seol Deunghwa, who had deliberately cast herself into a severed-soul state. If that happened, she would never wake again — she would truly die.

'That's the biggest reason I sent Seokjuk along as her guard in the first place. To forestall any disaster I couldn't foresee.'

"I kept watch the entire time, but thankfully no such crisis ever came."

Just as I had anticipated, it ended with Seol Deunghwa's corpse being flung out into an open field — the punishment of exposure, nothing more.

Seokjuk, lying in wait, carrying her body away in secret — even that, he said, had gone smoothly.

The trouble came after Seol Deunghwa had woken safe and sound.

"That part was my fault, kek."

Seokjuk flattened his ears and continued, looking thoroughly crestfallen.

"There were precious things the Madam asked me, above all else, to bring out of the palace with her... and I went and left one behind."

"What did you leave behind?"

"The first swaddling ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠jacket of 'Seruhwa' — the one the Madam made with her own two hands and dressed her in."

......

For a moment, the words died in my throat.

A baenaet-jeogori — the first garment a newborn ever wears in this world. Made by the hands of parents or grandparents, with a long skein of thread tied in place of the coat strings as a prayer that the baby live free of illness and long of days; and once it had been dressed on the child, it was believed to hold the infant's fortune within it, never to be handled carelessly or thrown away. I had heard that families treasured it for years, and that later, when the child grew and prepared for great undertakings like the state examinations, they would even sew it into the child's clothing like a protective talisman.

'Seol Deunghwa... didn't even want to look at Ruhwa right after she was born.'

A child conceived by violation, at the hands of her enemy. Seol Deunghwa had given that child nothing but a sorrowful name — Tearflower — and resolved never to lay eyes on her again.

Let the palace maids raise her, she had thought; some wretched spawn of the accursed Pyeong royal line would be looked after well enough on its own, wouldn't it?

And yet, princess though the baby was, in truth not a single soul came to tend her.

It was said that when Seol Deunghwa saw the infant — abandoned even by her own mother, wailing until her throat went hoarse from hunger — she belatedly put her to her breast. And after that, for the baby who had nothing on her skin, she made and dressed a swaddling jacket with her own hands.

A woman who had lived her whole life as the cherished daughter of a chieftain — it was the first garment she had ever made in her life, she had said.

"I put the swaddling jacket on her too late... and even that was clumsy and poorly made, so maybe... maybe that's why Sohwa left us so soon."

It was something Seol Deunghwa had told me in the days when I came and went, teaching her how to read the Lifespan Cord.

...And she left such a garment behind in that place. Yes — this really was Seokjuk's fault.

"So I hid the Madam away somewhere safe and snuck back into the palace to retrieve the swaddling jacket... and just as I was on my way out with it, I ran smack into a yokai of all things."

Seokjuk shuddered from head to tail, as though the memory were one he would gladly never revisit.

"From the outside, it looked like nothing more than a human with hair gone white, but the face was impossibly, vividly young... and the eyes. Those eyes were truly terrifying."

"What kind of yokai was it?"