The walk to her chambers was so draining. Neither looked at nor spoke to one another, but Yewon felt like she was drowning deeper and deeper in this sea of helpless anxiety, stress and fear. It eventually overtook her body, and she began to tremble.

Seungcheol, with his arms linked to hers, had clearly felt her tremble. Yewon could feel him turn his head to look at her, but she was too afraid to make eye contact with him.

When they were in the room, and the doors were closed and locked behind them. Seungcheol immediately unlinked their arms.

She tried to stop trembling, but it was getting worse and worse.

Seungcheol took of his crown and put it to the side. He turned to her and crossed his arms, as if he were waiting.

She could not find it in herself to move or say anything.

He let out a sigh and approached her.

“Calm down,” he told her.

She hated this. She hated that she was so weak right now in front of him. Now he could take advantage of her and hurt her. Now he feels he has some power over her, just because she was scared and he clearly wasn’t.

He took her arm and pulled her closer to the bed. Her heart began to beat out of control, so much so that her chest felt too constrained by her tight dress again. But this time, she did not want anyone to loosen it.

He putting both hands on her shoulders, as if trying to stop her from trembling.

“What are you afraid of?” he asked her. Her eyes were on the floor, but he raised her chin and forced her to look at him. He looked irritated.

“You,” she answered honestly.

“You don’t need to be afraid of me,” Seungcheol said. “I don’t want to do this either, but I need an heir.”

He let go of her chin, but maintained eye contact as his hands made their way to the buttons on his suit. One by one, he undid them, eyes never leaving hers. When that was off and thrown to the side he took more steps towards her, and she kept stepping back until she was against the wall.

He closed the space between their bodies and held her arms, which were still trembling. His face was way too close to hers, so close that she heard him breathe. Their eyes remained locked, and Seungcheol’s hands began to rub against her arms.

“Please calm down,” he requested. It was not as cold as usual, but there was no genuine concern for her in his voice either.

They only remained in this position for about 20 seconds, in which Yewon could not calm down at all.

Seungcheol sighed and closed his eyes, breaking the eye contact for the first time. He then let go of her arms and stepped away from her, heading towards the bed and sitting on it.

Yewon relaxed just a little bit.

“You’re not ready,” he told her as he took off his shoes.

“What?”

“You can stop shaking now. I won’t do anything to you.”

For a moment, Yewon felt extremely relieved. That relief, however, did not last long as she remembered everything her parents had told her: she needed a son. The future of Galacia depends on her having a son and consolidating this marriage once and for all, forever.

“W…. wait,” she stuttered. “You have to carry on,” she managed to say to him.

He narrowed his eyes at her, puzzled by her request for him to carry on: “You clearly are not ready for this, princess, and I’m not going to force myself on you.”

“I am ready.”

“Your unsteady hands beg to differ.”

“Well this isn’t about me,” Yewon managed to find her confident voice again. “This is about my country and my duty to serve it by making an heir with the Prince of Solen.”

“As much as it thrills me to serve your filthy country’s interests….”

“Take that back,” she yelled.

“Are you always this snappy?”

“Are you always this rude?”

“Quit your patriotism, princess. Galacia is not as great as you think it is…”

“And do you think Solen is? I know what you and your advisor do, and how many military attacks you’ve led against us. I know you hate us so much that you’d do anything to exterminate us. I don’t even know why you agreed to marry me when you hate Galacia so much.”

“Tell me princess: did anyone close to you die because of Solen? Anyone that you truly loved?”

"Of course."

"Who?"

She listed the people she knew who died because of the war: the boy who used to serve her breakfasts, two of her guards, her cousin, her aunt's jolly husband, and one of their royals physicians. Many people died because of the war with Solen, and it was evident that more Galacians died than Solenese. Solen is stronger, wealthier, greater in quantity, and Galacia was weak and defenseless against Solen. It was Solen that waged the war first, Solen began with the occupation.

"But is there anyone you were truly loved?"

The person that came to her mind was Jisoo: but she wasn’t even sure that he was dead, nor did she particularly know him. So she remained silent. Indeed, there was no one she knew very well and loved that died in the war. Jihoon never got to fight in it…

“Jeonghan had a sister, and I loved her. In front of Jeonghan, she was by a Galacian soldier, and then chopped into pieces. They sent me her eyes in a box with a note saying they had taken Jeonghan hostage. In order to save Jeonghan, I had to give your men weapons that they had used to kill my men. And now I have to marry the princess of the men that had traumatized Jeonghan and taken away someone I loved dearly. So do not dare tell me I’m not justified in my hatred against you and your country.”

Yewon was silenced by that. She didn’t know what to say.

“I hate your country. It’s filthy and morally corrupt. I wish I could exterminate it, but the price of its extermination is the lives of Solenese men, and it’s not worth it. So I agreed to marry you, because marrying you will solve this problem and stop what happened to her from happening to anyone else in Solen…” Seungcheol’s voice trailed off. Yewon could tell that he regretted going off like that, for he gazed at the floor and clenched his fists.

Yewon felt like she understood him a lot better now.

He got under the covers of the bed and turned his back to her. She stood there, still startled by what she learned. A part of her wanted to believe that he was just making this story up, and that no Galacian would be so cruel, but somehow, she could not bring herself to disbelieve him.

“I didn’t know,” she managed to say after a long silence.

He didn’t reply.

“The men that did that to Jeonghan’s family do not represent my country,” she added. She didn’t know if he was listening, but she felt like she had to defend herself and Galacia. “And I have heard stories of Solenese soldiers doing much worse…”

He also didn’t respond to that. She figured he wasn’t listening.

She noted that she had stopped trembling, probably because she was no longer thinking about the coming consummation, which did not seem to be taking place that night. Not after he told her such a personal thing and revealed very explicitly that he hated her.

She wasn’t hurt by it. She had actually expected that he hated her, and after learning what she did about him, she began to feel he was justified in hating her. But he was not justified in all the military raids he led against Galacian civilians and soldiers. He was not justified in causing so much pain to her people, even if it were a form of revenge.

Now what? Yewon thought as she stood there at the side of the bed with no idea what to do. Was she to try and encourage him to continue, was she to try and prompt him into it? Was she to just let it go?

She was certainly not ready herself, and he was not in the mood either probably, especially after bringing up his past lover that died in the hands of her country’s men.

Yewon felt like a failure for not being able to encourage him properly, and for letting the night go to waste.

“If not tonight, then when?” Yewon asked him, hoping that he was listening.

Seungcheol shifted under the covers and spoke: “I’ll come tomorrow night. Please be more prepared.”

Yewon felt slightly more at ease with that.

“Wedding night consummation is a very important custom in Solen,” Seungcheol told her, “and so please pretend that it happened or the elders will be angry with both you and me.”

“I will,” she told him.

“Now remove your garments and go to sleep,” he ordered.

She obeyed, understanding that his intention was to upkeep the illusion of a consummation. She removed the crown and the pins in her hair, and then stripped from her dress. She climbed under the cover on the opposite side of the bed.

She was extremely tired, and so despite the fact she was in only her undergarments in a bed with a man for the very first time in her life, she managed to drift off to sleep immediately.

-

It was the Queen of Solen who woke her up, much to Yewon’s surprise.

Yewon sat up quickly, bowing frantically and apologizing for being in such a state in front of her.

“Don’t worry,” the Queen told her with a smile. “Congratulations on the consummation.” The Queen pointed to the middle of the bed, which had been uncovered from the sheets. There were drops of red blood.

Yewon’s eyes widened.

“Oh don’t be afraid, sweet Yewon,” the Queen told her, “all s shed blood on the first night.”

The Queen had completely misidentified Yewon’s surprise. Yewon knew very well that s shed blood on the first night: but the first night did not happen.

Did it happen while she slept? Did he drug her so that she would not feel anything? How else could there be blood on the sheets?

-

The answer to that came when Yewon next saw Seungcheol during breakfast. She was sat beside him, and he only lifted his sleeve to show her his bandaged arm with a fresh bruise.

She immediately knew that it was his blood on sheets.

“Did you cut yourself?” she whispered so that only he could hear.

He didn’t reply to her, but she immediately knew that he did. He wanted to pretend that the consummation had actually taken place, and so he faked it down to this detail, one that had completely escaped her before.

If he had not used his blood and disguised it as blood, Yewon tried to imagine what would have happened. It would not have been a very good situation for her at all. “The princess had not been a ,” they would think, and God knows what they would have done? Divorce? Blame her father for giving them “damaged goods”? War again? The prospect was way too frightening, and she was so glad that he had saved her from it.

“I didn’t do it for you,” Seungcheol added, as if reading her mind. “I don’t care about you at all. But I do care about the honor of the future Queen of Solen.”

A/N: I couldn’t think of any other title that started with h that fit with this chapter lol