Across Time Chapter 5: Sister’s Bond

“Ouch!” In less than an hour into her embroidery, that’s the third time Seungyeon has pricked herself with the needle. For someone who considered embroidery as her main weakness, she has improved a lot.  When she started several days ago, she thought she might shed blood any moment. Admittedly, there were times that she wanted to quit.

“I can’t believe that I will live to see this day that you would engage yourself in embroidery, eonnie.” Soo-jin commented as she watched her sister battle with the needles and thread. “What made you change drastically, huh? Oh. Wait! Wait! Let me rephrase the question. Who made my stubborn eonnie desire learning and befriending thread?” She blinked her eyes slyly towards her sister who just gave her flustered look.

“Nothing special, really. Maybe the three days worth of high fever finally awaken the woman in me.” Seungyeon was stuttering and pouting her lips simultaneously in her effort to control the shyness dominating her.

“Mmmm..” Soo-jin sounded unconvinced. “Does that awakening includes the awakening of the maiden in love?” she continued teasing her sister. Seungyeon surrendered to the teasing and chose to continue with her needle work. Soo-jin became unamused of her sister’s reaction. “You are no fun at all.”

Although they live in the same household, grew up together, learned calligraphy, embroidery and music together, the three sisters are not that close. Primarily, they pointed out the differences in personality as the main reason for it. Seungyeon, the eldest, loved reading the most. She reads all kinds- legends, poems and songs. But she loves Confucian books the best: The Basic Concepts, Great Learning, Analects to name a few. She’s also fond of writing poems. Her sisters and parents would often bet she can compete with the best kisaeng in town.

Soo-jin, who is one year younger than Seungyeon, is usually described by their father as the one who resembles their mother a lot. Woman in nature and in deed, Soo-jin excels herself in embroidery and calligraphy. Her room, where Seungyeon is right now, is a museum of her embroidered works. Despite not being required to learn cooking, she has some skills in it too. At times when their father would host a gathering, she would cook for the guest and would receive a lot of compliments because of it. The ideal wife, people says.

Lastly, Jungyeon is the maknae and the most free-spirited. Going around the town is her primary hobby. No wonder she knows a lot of commoner. Although it can be perceived as improper, it proved itself useful at times for gathering intelligence. People readily open up to her and share recent rumor and stories in town. The most talented sister in music, she plays different instruments very well. Aside from gayageum in which Seungyeon is unanimously seen as the best among them, Jungyeon can play geomongo, hyangbipa, sogeum and gonghu really, really well

As their different interests have seem to divide the three, their relationship is something can be described as harmonious. They respect each other’s strength and weaknesses well and would help one another in times of need. That’s why, being together like this, as Seungyeon and Soojin are working on the same activity together is a rare chance that should not be set aside to do some reconnection and bonding for sisters.

“Eonnie, tea?” the tea she asked the servant to bring has arrived in the room, along with some snacks. Jungyeon probably is the town right now. Their mother on her room as always while their father is in the palace and would not be back until night.

“Wait.” Seungyeon was at the final stage of her project. Locking the thread before cutting it down, she showed it to Soojin for inspection.

“Not bad, eonnie,” the younger commented after sipping some hot tea. “I think it would look better if you put more sakura blossoms carried by the wind.”

What Seungyeon is currently working on is a simple handkerchief. She bought an expensive cloth with Jungyeon last week as a gift. However, she deemed it too simple. Moreover, she thinks that the recipient does not care about the monetary value of things. She decided to put some hand-woven design of sakura branch at one of its corner.

“I see. Thanks. By the way, with this cloth, is it okay to write calligraphy? Will the ink stay even after washing?”

Soojin inspected the type of cloth her sister is working on. “Yeah, I think so. Though I have not tried it in the past. It would be better to test it with a piece of extra cloth you still have. Write something on it, then wash.”

The mixture of emotions surging in Seungyeon right now is indescribable. She’ll try Soojin’s suggestion later on after stitching additional plum and his initials on it. L J H. She blushed on the thought. It’s just his damn initials. Why get so giddy about it?

These past days, she’s been feeling weird things in herself whenever Jonghyun came into her mind, especially now that for the first time in her life, she’s personally making an effort for a man. The excitement of finishing the gift and the nervousness she’s feeling as she tries to imagine his possible reaction keeps her nerves out of control.

Would he accept it? She bets he has received a lot in the past, considering the looks he has.

Would he like it? The embroidery was poorly done. She bets he would be ashamed to use it in public.

But, how can he use it in public if she will write a calligraphy on it? Her initial plan the gift was calligraphy as a show of gratitude to what he has done the previous week. But the moment she saw the cloth, she immediately planned to write the calligraphy on the handkerchief to make it more special. This is so not like her. This is out of her character and yet she’s enjoying it a lot.

As Soojin ang Seungyeon enjoyed sharing a tea during their break, Jungyeon suddenly dashed it and surprised them both.

“He’s back,” Jungyeon said puffing as she tried to catch her breath.

“Who?” puzzled Soojin asked.

“Father.” Deep inside, Seungyeon was kind of disappointed. It’s not that she doesn’t like her father to come home. However, she’s waiting for someone else whom she’s yet to see since she recovered from her sickness.

“And he wants to talk to us. Urgently” Jungyeon blew off the bomb. Looking at one another, they know for themselves that it’s the one of the few chances their father called the three of them that’s why they are nervous. The last time they were called like this was when they were informed of their Aunt’s sudden death.

Walking towards the Great Hall like it’s a penitence and countdown to their judgment, the three of them reached their destination is 10 minutes. In there, they found him together with the documents holding their family’s genealogy. Now seated surrounding their father, the confused look on their face stimulated Min-jun to start right away.

“I know you are confused. I know you are scared.” Her daughters didn’t response which opted him to continue. “When was the last time I called you like this?”

“10 years ago? When you informed us about Aunt Soo Young’s death.”

Choked by his own, Min-jun confirmed the memory. “But we didn’t tell you the cause of her death.”

“Well, we assumed that it’s because of her health since she has frail body,” Jungyeon answered.

“You are wrong about that. Soo Young may be skinny but she’s healthy. She didn’t die of disease. She was murdered.”

No matter how shocked his daughters with his sudden revelations, for he witnessed them became stiff and stopped breathing momentarily, Min-jun continued starting this bloody long narrative.

“She was murdered, much like many of our ancestors in the past. Poisoned, ousted, and stabbed. Our household is known as one of the oldest and noblest family. We were relatives to the Kings that became foundation to our great nation. Literally, our blood became sacrifice to it.”

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Hi Friends,

I was planning to post this last night but the internet connection was so slow. -_-

Enough with that, here's another update for you guys. As usual, I am hopeful that you'll like it :)

Lovelots,

Kiara <3