When it was over, it was like all the shame and diffidence came crashing onto both of them all at once. They laid there together without saying a single word, not daring to even turn their heads in the direction of the other. But the atmosphere between them was not awkward; there was no tension there at all. It was just a kind of shyness from acknowledging what had happened, because it was nothing like what they had experienced together before.

For the first time since she married him, there was suddenly a synthesis between their bodies, and the whole experience felt different. There was no pressure or strain in her flesh, no pain or discomfort for her at all. The exchange played out with lax and tender fluidity, and for the first time for her, it was pleasurable.

When their breaths calmed down, and there was nothing left to fill the silence, Yewon decided to break it by saying: “I really liked that story. You should tell me stories like this more often.”

Seungcheol glanced at her with a thoughtful look in his eyes and nodded. “As you wish, princess.”

“Did it hurt?” she asked him, suddenly remembering the issues that he had. She had almost forgotten that was always painful for him, for he had done a good job of masking that pain if he had felt it.

“A little bit,” he answered honestly. “But the pain was worth it for how it turned out.”

She inched closer to him on the bed, putting her head on his shoulder and nestling against his chest as couples often did in novels after a session like that. He was welcoming of that, as he put his arms around her waist and kissed her head. She felt her heartbeat steadily rise again as he did so; he was so much more inclined to show her intimacy all of the sudden, and a part of her knew why.

“Be honest,” she mused as she ran her fingers over the scar on his chest, “you’re seeing me as Jeonghan now, right?”

He was silent, and Yewon took that as affirmation.

But despite that sad reality, it still felt so perfect being in his arms at that moment; she liked the warmth of his bare skin against her own and the feeling of his cheek nuzzled into her hair. Even if Seungcheol’s heart was somewhere far away, she still felt it physically beat as she rested her head over his chest.

If Seungcheol liked to pretend that it was Jeonghan in his arms right now, Yewon also liked to pretend that it was her in his heart.

-

Yewon had planned to go to the hospital that day to check up on the patients, but mid-day, Haein had come and told her that Seungcheol had forbidden her from going. But Yewon was not the kind of person that would allow anyone to “forbid” her from doing anything.

She guessed why Seungcheol had done that; now that there was a scandal on the loose with whispers about Yewon and Soonyoung’s clandestine ual relations, she guessed that he only wanted to protect her from it.

As much as she dreaded going outside the palace where so many judging eyes would haunt her, she didn’t want to stop going to the hospital for it. She felt that the patients would need her now more than ever, especially since they found out that their other beautiful nurse, Jinye, was a traitor who was now dead, , and dismembered, her putrid, rotting corpse out on the platform in the sun for the world to see.

And so she wanted to set the record straight with Seungcheol, and tell him that she was going to the hospital, and she was not going to take no for an answer.

When she arrived at his door, however, she heard yelling from the inside. Seungcheol was arguing with someone, and when the other person spoke, Yewon recognized that it was Wonwoo.

“What are they talking about?” she whispered to Seungkwan, who was guarding Seungcheol’s room.

“Prince Wonwoo wants that traitor girl to be buried,” Seungkwan whispered, “but Prince Seungcheol isn’t allowing it.”

Curious, Yewon stood outside and listened in on their conversation. Just from the way that his voice quaked, it was clear that Wonwoo was very riled.

“She’s already dead! She had her punishment” Wonwoo said. “Just bury her, for crying out loud!”

“Why do you still care about her, Wonwoo? If she’s dead, then why do you care so much what happens to her dead body?”

“Please, Seungcheol,” Wonwoo muttered with gritted teeth. “Please, for the love of all that is holy in this world, let her find some peace.”

“If you still care about her after everything you know she’s done, then you have a problem.”

“Stop twisting my words!” he snarled.

“She killed Solbin! She killed her, Wonwoo. I will not show anyone who was involved with that murder even an inkling of mercy!”

“I understand that,” Wonwoo replied more calmly. “You loved Solbin, didn’t you? And I loved Jinye too, you know. And now, all I ask is for her to be buried, so please understand the heart that I’m coming to you with…”

“You know Wonwoo, you should really find better people to associate with. You somehow always have relations with murderers.”

“If you call Jinye a murderer, then Jeonghan is one too,” Wonwoo snapped back. “Both killed others for political reasons.”

“Don’t you dare compare them! And why are you defending her after everything she’s done? She desecrated the honor of our family!”

“Since when was our family ever honorable!?” Wonwoo flared back. “You consistently slept with a man that happened to be your deceased fiancée’s brother, and you’re talking to me about honor?”

“Stop talking,” Seungcheol warned gravely. “If you know what’s best for you, stop talking.”

But Wonwoo did not stop talking; he added fuel to the fire: “I used to think that Jeonghan was the root of this family’s problems, but I was wrong, you know. The problem here is you. I came here imploring you to just bury a dead body, but you have to come and make this about honor after all the havoc you caused because you were so obsessed with that rogue of a man?”

“Get out!!!” Seungcheol roared. “I don’t want to hear another word from you! Guards!”

At that point, Seungkwan opened the door and went in, Yewon just stepped to the side and continued listening to the conversation.

“Your cruelty is going to come back to haunt you one day,” was the last thing Wonwoo uttered before he was forced out by guards.

When Wonwoo was outside the room, his eyes caught hers. She was standing idly to the side, clutching her arms to her chest.

Wonwoo was very tense when he walked out, but as soon as he saw her, his face softened and he acknowledged her with a curt bow. Then he turned around and walked away from her, which she took to mean that he didn’t desire to speak with her.

Wonwoo had always stopped to speak with her whenever he happened to pass by her in the palace. Even if he was busy with his work and his politics, he always stopped and made time for her when he saw her. Sometimes that meant keeping high-ranking officials waiting, but he didn’t seem to care. Whenever he saw her, it was like nothing in the world mattered but her. But this was the first time that he saw her and walked away, and from that alone, Yewon could tell that something was awfully wrong.

She was so concerned for him, so she followed him silently through the halls as he paced forward. Eventually he stopped and turned around to acknowledge her.

“Yewon, I’m not in the right state to talk to anyone right now,” he told her, stuttering and jittery. It was really unlike him, Yewon thought. Wonwoo, who was calm and composed most of the time, was now showing signs of severe distress. The anger that he had when he was with Seungcheol was still overflowing in his body language; it looked like he was about to punch a wall.

“Don’t talk to me then,” she told him. “I’m just walking; don’t mind me.”

He raised an eyebrow but played along, and he began to walk in long strides making Yewon have to run a little to catch up. Somehow, Yewon took that as a challenge. She held her dress so it didn’t drag across the floor and continued following him, keeping up with his pace with a slight run. Eventually, he was out of the palace and into the scholar’s quarters, where Yewon knew his room was.

He made it to his room, and she followed him inside despite the fact he tried to close the door before she could. She didn’t really know what she was doing, but the fact he clearly didn’t want her there made her defiant and want to be there even more.

When she was inside, he sighed and asked her what she was doing and what she wanted from him. It was obvious that he was trying to suppress his irritation with her, but he still sounded sour and obviously in no mood to talk.

She noticed that his hands were trembling. It looked like all he wanted to do was fight someone in a fit of rage.

When she didn’t answer his question, he let out a loud groan, and threw himself into his bed and buried his face into his pillow. He let out a few deep breaths, and stayed in that position for many minutes.

It was long enough for Yewon to get tired of standing, but all the chairs in the room were covered with books, paper, alcohol bottles and empty glasses. All that was free was his bed, which he now lay sprawled across it.

Yewon hesitantly sat beside him, waiting for him to let out the steam.

It took a couple of minutes, but eventually his breathing steadied. He sat up from the bed and turned toward her.

“Why are you still here?” he asked her calmly. “I don’t want you to see me like this. I’m on the verge of bursting into tears and ready to massacre someone.”

“I’m here because I’m concerned,” she replied. “Talk to me, please.”

“I can’t talk to you about these things.”

“Why not?”

“Because right now, I hate him, because hating him is helping me cope. I know that upsets you, so it’s better not to talk about it.”

She narrowed her eyes at him. It surprised her to hear him say something like that. “That’s more reason for you to talk about it. Hate is a strong emotion, and if you keep it inside, you’ll hate him even more.”

“You’re right,” he told her with a nod. “I don’t want to hate him, but lately, it’s been so hard not to.”

“Is this only because he isn’t burying her?”

“No,” Wonwoo answered. “It’s a lot of things all together.”

“Like what?”

“For one, he came to me after the execution and berated me for not showing up, saying that I was not being a good representative of the royal family, and that as an advisor, I had to show up to these events or it would look bad. I snapped back at him and reminded him that the former advisor, his lover, did not show up to his own wedding. He got angry. He always gets angry when I talk about Jeonghan; I never liked that man very much.”

He took a deep breath, and continued his rant: “I also had requested to see Jinye just one more time before she was executed, but Seungcheol wouldn’t give me the permission. She died before I had a chance to get closure about her. Years of loving and caring about her went down the drain in an instant, and without any prior warning. I felt like I was slapped with a very, very painful reality. And now I’m thinking back on our time together, and I realized so many things. Like… when I was a hostage in Galacia, she knew that I was a hostage. She could have easily told your brother, and they would have used me as leverage against my father. But she didn’t, because she wanted to protect me. There are so many other little things she did for me that I’m beginning to realize, and it’s all crashing down on me now, after she died. So now, she’s always on my mind and I’m intrigued by everything about her, but she’s dead. If only Seungcheol gave me just a few minutes with her; it would have spared me so much of this heartache and confusion…” he trailed off to take a breath.

“I think she knew about us,” Wonwoo continued reflectively. “She knew that you were the one I loved. Why else would she have made up a rumor like that about you before she died? And as I’m thinking about this, I wonder how she felt knowing that she gave up so much for me, but I was out here in love with another girl that I only knew for a few months. I just feel so lousy thinking about this.”

“I don’t understand why you’re still thinking about her,” Yewon mumbled. She was very surprised by how he was speaking about Jinya: with admiration and awe. She was a murderer, thought Yewon. Jinye had caused people to die. Even if she legitimately loved Wonwoo, she still lied to him and manipulated him for years. Why was he suddenly so fascinated by her?

“I don’t understand either,” Wonwoo replied. “But I can’t help myself. She’s always on my mind now. It’s like she’s haunting me, Yewon.”

“Then don’t let her haunt you. Forget her and move on. She’s distressing you and making you anxious over nothing. She is not worth mourning and not worth thinking about, and she’s especially not worth hating Seungcheol over. She was involved in wicked schemes that killed so many people. Please, Wonwoo, move on from this.”

Wonwoo gazed at her for a long while before saying, “you’re truly making me feel better. Thank you.”

“Good,” she said.

“But still,” Wonwoo continued, “I really want her to be buried. Maybe she’ll stop haunting when she’s buried.”

“Why do you care if she’s buried or not? She’s dead. It doesn’t matter what happens to her body.”

Wonwoo narrowed his eyes at her. “You’re from Galacia,” he reminded her. “Don’t you believe that the soul continues even after death? And don’t Galacians believe that you can talk to the dead at their gravestone, and that the burial ground becomes the dead’s eternal home after that?”

Yewon was always shocked at the extent of Wonwoo’s awareness about her own culture. This was a part of her beliefs that she never shared with him, but he still knew about it, probably from his reading. Lately, she had lost touch with those traditional beliefs, she realized. She was subconsciously starting to adopt the Solenese understanding of death being the end of it all­, and it was only now, after Wonwoo had reminded her, that she realized just how much the Solenese worldview had impacted her.

“You’re right,” she told him. “That is what Galacians believe. But you’re not Galacian.”

“I’m not, but she is,” Wonwoo responded faintly with a soft shrug.

Yewon stared at him blankly.

“I want her to be buried,” he explained, “because that’s what she would have wanted. I want to do one last thing for her before the end, Yewon. I think that I’ll feel so much more at peace with myself if she’s buried. At least I did something for her.”

Yewon nodded. “I’ll talk to Seungcheol about it,” she promised.

“Would you? Please do,” he requested earnestly. “He might actually listen to you. If you’re able to convince him, I’d love you. Not that I don’t love you already,” he added lightheartedly, “but I’d love you even more, if that’s possible.”

She was happy that he was acting lighthearted; it meant that he was calming down and that all the negative energy was being released. Although him telling her that he loved her made her feel uncomfortable because it felt like she was transgressing her boundaries with him, she decided to not comment on it. She didn’t want to shut him down now when he was only just starting to feel better.

“How are you, by the way?” he asked. “I know there are ridiculous rumors about you and Soonyoung being spread, but I hope you’re okay.”

“I can get through it,” she said, avoiding his eyes. “Worry about yourself; I’ll be fine.”

“I can’t not worry about you, Yewon,” he said as he eyed her with a longing look in his eye.

The conversation seemed to be going somewhere Yewon did not want, and so she didn’t react, hoping her lack of acknowledgement would tell him she was uncomfortable with where this was heading.

“Can I read you something?” Wonwoo suddenly asked. “Would you listen?”

“What?”

“Something I wrote yesterday after the execution. I want to read it to you. Please?”

Wonwoo loved to read out loud; Yewon remembered that from Jinye and Wonwoo’s story. Wanting to keep him happy, Yewon nodded her head, assuring him that she would listen to whatever he wanted to read to her. He smiled, and got up from his bed. Dodging all the books and papers on the floor, he got to his desk and picked up a book. He came back on the bed and sat in front of her, facing her.

He cleared his throat and began to read:

Headless beauty on the platform, she lay,
a face that had been the envy of every girl,
now she’s hideous and ugly, they say,
the least desired face in the world.

My sweet, Venus with the bright smile and clumsy steps,
have you lost your fire to the blade?
My sweet love with beautiful hair and saccharine lips,
has your light obscured into fade?

Your fire had once burned my heart with rage,
Now my heart feels cold and black.
Losing your fire has set me in craze,
I desire to have my lost soul back.

But how to do so? I don’t know…
How to get out of this wicked shore?
Who do I speak to? Where do I go?
I feel more lost than ever before.

One thought consoles me, one face gives me rest.
Pretty eyes doused Venus fire from my chest.
And her own fire still burns with blinding light,
Giving me the strength to continue to fight.

My Goddess with a big heart and short hair,
You’ve defeated Venus with a most powerful flare.
The spot she left empty, you can fill with such ease.
My heart you’d set free and fulfill and appease.

Venus may be gone, but you still remain,
And that and that only stifles the pain.

He lifted his head to see her reaction, a reaction that she tried to restrain because she didn’t want to encourage him. But he was so persistent, and the worst thing about it was that his persistence was ever-so-sweet.

Wonwoo with his saccharine poetry and his skillful aptitude with words and phrases, she wished he would stop making it so hard for her. She wished he would just back down, but it seemed like his love for her was helping him, which made it doubly more difficult.

“Please Wonwoo,” she managed, “I know you can’t control your heart, but please control your actions. As beautiful as your poetry is, if it’s about me, I don’t want to hear it.”

There was suddenly a knock on the door, and it opened before Wonwoo had the chance to react. At the door were a few guards and Seungcheol.

When Seungcheol saw her there sitting beside Wonwoo on his bed, he looked surprised for a second, but quickly masked that with a glower aimed in Wonwoo’s direction.

“What do you want?” Wonwoo muttered, his soft expression suddenly going hard again. “Please don’t enter my room without prior permission, in case I’m doing something I don’t want you to interrupt.” Wonwoo was obviously trying to antagonize Seungcheol, and it was working.

When Wonwoo said it, Seungcheol’s expression went even grimmer. “I’m here to let you know that you’ve been dismissed from your position as my advisor,” Seungcheol hissed through gritted teeth.

“What?!” Wonwoo thundered; suddenly he looked like he was about to explode.

“I don’t want to see your face in my court. Actually, I don’t want to see your face ever.”

“You can’t do that. You’re stubborn, but not stupid. You can’t dismiss me,” Wonwoo said in seeming denial.

“I just did,” Seungcheol spat.

“No you didn’t!” Wonwoo exclaimed. “You can’t do that! You’ll be hated in the courts, Seungcheol. It’s under my instruction that we got forward in the war! I’m the reason we’re starting to win again! I’m the reason we don’t have thousands of casualties stacked up in the battlefields! You can’t dismiss me! I’m the only hope this damn country has.”

“You’re so full of yourself,” Seungcheol snarled at him.

“Funny how you’re dismissing me, but you left Jeonghan in that post despite all the destruction he caused. What kind of King are you going to be, Seungcheol? You always let personal feelings get in the way of your politics. I know you don’t like me right now, but that should not impact your decisions for our country.” Wonwoo had gritted teeth and clenched hands at the moment, it looked like he was about to throw his fists into Seungcheol’s face.

“My decision is final,” Seungcheol declared before turning around and walking away without another look back.

Wonwoo legs began to shake, and he collapsed onto the floor in defeat.

“How can you expect me not to hate him, Yewon?” Wonwoo managed to say when Seungcheol and his guards were out of sight. “He’s taking everything away from me,” he mumbled, seeming like he was one the verge of tears. “He’s going to banish me soon. You’ll see. I’m actually surprised that he hasn’t done that yet.”

Yewon was still dumbstruck about the entire scenario that unfolded before her; she had no words to express how she felt watching two people she cared about go down another’s throats like that. She couldn’t even take a side or pinpoint who was right and who was wrong, because she understood Wonwoo’s resentment just as much she understood Seungcheol’s wrath.

She felt like she had no place at all in this feud between them.

He asked her for some time alone, and this time, she granted him that request and left him, realizing that this conflict was a lot more complicated than she thought, and that talking it through with him isn’t going to help at all.

She could only wish that the olden adage that time heals all things would apply in this case, and that, with time, Wonwoo and Seungcheol would go back to how they were before.

A/N: took me long enough to update asdajfgjnksfg

I’m not gonna give any more excuses in my A/Ns all the excuses will go on twitter from now on lol

BUT I WILL TELL YOU TO VOTE FOR SVT AND PRISTIN ON MAMA (& also my favorite beautiful NU'EST? maybe? ^^”)