A Walk?
When he echoed the question, Yeo-won nodded vigorously.
“Yes. It feels so stifling, being trapped inside all the time.”
“I shall open the window for you, then.”
He snapped his fingers, and the wooden doors swung wide. When he looked at her as if to ask whether that was enough, Yeo-won shook her head quickly.
“No, I don’t want to look at the scenery. I want to walk.”
“Hmm.”
Shin-wol stroked his chin, appearing to ponder for a moment before his lips curved into a smile.
“Well, I suppose it will be fine.”
“Really?”
Fearing he might change his mind, Yeo-won dashed out onto the wooden veranda. She didn’t care that she wore no shoes; she stepped straight onto the grass and moved forward without hesitation. A cool breeze swept past, and she paused, turning her face into the wind.
“Ah… that feels good.”
It had been a sudden whim, but walking after so long wasn’t unpleasant at all. Behind her, Shin-wol stood quietly, following at a measured pace like a guardian watching over a child from a single step away.
Yeo-won, who had been strolling through the garden, glanced back, then turned and trotted over to him.
“Um, there’s something I want to say.”
Her eyes crinkled as she offered a bright smile. Since he had permitted the walk, she thought he might readily agree if she asked to be sent home now. With hope sparkling in her gaze, Yeo-won opened her mouth.
“Home—”
“No.”
“……”
“Your little tricks were adorable, so I indulged you once, but I cannot allow it a second time.”
He refused her with casual ease, a faint smile on his lips. The words she had barely managed to voice melted away on her tongue. The corners of Yeo-won’s mouth, which had been curved in a smile, began to tremble.
“Why not?”
“Have you still not regained your senses after everything you endured? There is no place safer than my side.”
“I’ll be more careful now that I’ve experienced it. I can’t stay here forever. I’m worried about Grandmother, too.”
“Ah. Your blood kin.”
He repeated the words without a trace of emotion and turned his head. His gaze fell on the pond at one edge of the garden. Yeo-won followed his line of sight, and her body stiffened at once.
The events of a few days ago surged back. The day she had seen Mun-a by the pond, picking up a red sachet and weeping tears of blood.
She had collapsed before she could even grasp the situation, so the memory had slipped from her mind.
“Come here.”
When Shin-wol walked toward the pond, Yeo-won reluctantly followed. Standing before the water, she scanned the bottom with quick, darting eyes, but there were only fish of rare shapes and swaying water plants. The red sachet was nowhere to be seen.
It definitely fell into the pond. Is it hidden among the plants?
With Shin-wol beside her, she could not very well search the water. Besides, something told her she must not let him see that sachet.
As Yeo-won fidgeted restlessly, Shin-wol extended his hand over the surface. The water rippled like waves, then grew still again. A rustic landscape rose upon the mirror-like surface.
A mountain thick with fog. Familiar houses. People working here and there in the rice paddies. Every detail was intimately known to her.
Inwol. It was Inwol.
Once she recognized the village, the surface rippled once more. This time it showed a single house with greater clarity. A worn but spacious home. Beyond the orange gate, a tall tree stood in the courtyard, and beside it sat an old woman on the wooden veranda.
Her white hair was neatly tied back. She gazed at the tree with an indescribably lonely expression.
“……Grandmother.”
Caught in a trance, Yeo-won reached toward the pond but flinched and drew her hand back. She remembered she had been told not to touch it, and the nightmare the eodukseoni had shown her also flashed through her mind.
It might have been better if the image had overlapped with that terrifying vision.
This old woman looked nothing like the one who had clutched her throat and spat such bitter words.
The Grandmother sitting on the veranda drinking tea seemed somehow gaunt. Every visible part of her body was so skeletal that Yeo-won wondered whether she was eating properly at all.
Gazing at the image of her Grandmother floating on the water mirror, Yeo-won bit her lip hard.
“She isn’t sick, is she?”
“Who knows. I infuse her with spiritual energy from time to time, so she will not die immediately.”
His shockingly indifferent tone made Yeo-won’s shoulders twitch. There were moments like this. Shin-wol was gentle only in front of her; toward everyone else he maintained an unchanging attitude of cold mockery.
No, it was not only humans. He treated every living thing except Yeo-won the same way.
Though he watched over Cheong-sil and Dan, it was closer to neglect than care.
While Yeo-won was lost in thought, the water mirror vanished, returning to an ordinary pond.
“The wind has grown cold. Let us go inside.”
He smiled sweetly and held out his hand.
This tender side was only one small facet. Most of the time he was either indifferent to everything or simply found it tiresome.
Yeo-won looked at his offered hand and hesitated. Even if she went back now, the same acts would only repeat.
Whether she liked those acts or not, she wanted to hear her Grandmother’s voice. She wanted to send word to Grandmother Yoon as well, and she wanted to finish the work she had been given properly.
But no matter how she explained the situation, Shin-wol would not try to understand.
He was not human, and ordinary reason or duty meant nothing to him. She could not persuade him through any common point of view.
She was not particularly eloquent, so how could she possibly make him understand?
In that instant, one possibility flashed through her mind.
Taking his hand, Yeo-won said, “Would you like to make a bet with me?”
His eyebrows arched like a drawn bow. Shin-wol frowned as though he had heard something utterly absurd.
The scene shifted. She had already lost seven times.
The circumstances were these: to persuade Shin-wol, Yeo-won had wagered a game of janggi.
If she won even a single match, he would send her home.
She knew it was ridiculous, yet no better idea had come to mind.
Her heart had pounded as she waited for his answer, but he gave no reaction at all.
Just as she thought she should hurriedly correct herself, believing she had misspoken, Shin-wol silently moved to the janggi board inside the room and sat down.
His action was clearer than any words. Yeo-won cheered inwardly.
It had been the right answer.
She sat across from him and began setting up the pieces when he asked,
“And if I win?”
……She had not thought that far.
Shin-wol had no greed for objects or actions, so she had assumed he would not set any conditions. It was a selfish thought, but the match was already overwhelmingly unfavorable to her even without conditions, so she had expected him to simply play.
After a moment’s hesitation, Yeo-won asked cautiously,
“Is there anything you want?”
Even as she asked, she knew it was laughable. There was nothing she could give him. He did not seem to desire material things, and no matter how she thought about it, aside from the marble, there was nothing he could demand from her.
“If I win, I shall claim one full joining of our bodies.”
He touched one of the pieces in his camp and smiled with perfect composure.
At those words, Yeo-won could not even force a smile. Her face turned deathly pale at the unexpected condition, and she desperately refused. In the end, the compromise they reached was a kiss lasting one gak. If either of them pulled away or removed their tongue during that time, the kiss would begin again from the start.
After seven matches in a row, Shin-wol had won every single time, and Yeo-won had not even been able to approach the edge of his camp.
At the end of the seventh kiss that lasted exactly one gak, Yeo-won pulled her lips away and let out a heated breath.
“……You went easy on me last time, didn’t you?”
“Who knows.”
His soft chuckle sounded unbearably smug to her ears.