Accettazione

He wakes up to the sun yet to break across the skies. Yet the fatigue that once beleaguered his entire being has long left him. A brand new day. One where he’s not tempted to lose himself to sleep. And perhaps, this time he doesn’t turn away from her.

It dawns to him. Like the first wolf’s fangs to sink on his shoulder. That this is the first. Where he wakes up before she does.

Even when they first spend their first night as husband and wife, he’d woken up last. She left him alone in their shared chambers. To spare him from the burden of seeing his new wife, his sister. Not the woman he loved deeply. 

His eyes sets immediately at her wounded hand. His fingers deftly unwraps the crude bandage he fixed on last night. Her skin split open. About the length of his index finger. Red flesh cleanly sliced. His finger accidentally grazes the wound, scarlet red drips down her palm.

So jumps to his feet. Scours their chamber for fresh towel and ointment. He knows Yeon-hwa hides stashes of bandages here and there. Ointments, poisons and antidotes around the room for safekeeping.

He longs stop questioning her obsession with poisons. Finds the items he looks for and returns to her side. He’s about to hop back into the bed, when Yeon-hwa startles him. She cradles her hand, almost unsure of his actions.

“Let me take a look,” he says, bends to inspect her palm. 

“I can get the Royal Physician to tend my wounds,” she replies, holds her palm so that the blood does not stain her undergarment.

“And what would you say? That the emperor attempted to take his life?” He arches his brow questioningly. His lips curling into a genuine smirk. “I can’t have rumours of the empress throwing her life away easily at the emperor. How did you think it will reflect on you? On the royal family?”

A bemused smile tugging the end of her lips. “As Your Majesty wishes,” she concedes.

He makes it up to Gweonghwagung for the unfulfilled promises they brokered over his solitude of silence. Brings her along to the garden he’s tending. 

“Why was this garden restricted?” Gweonghwagung questions, as she removes the overgrown weeds.

“It used to be a place of solitude for me. Like your secret garden in the temple.”

He drags fallen branches across the garden patches. Wipes the sweat forming above his brows, with his back of his hand.

“Did you bring anyone here? It’s such a waste to not share this place with someone,” she chimes. 

Gweonghwagung rolls her sleeves up to her elbows, squats on the ground. She tends to the colourful flowers in need of a trim.

“I did. Then she left. I sealed the access to this garden from anyone.”

The silence between them resembles none of the one with Yeon-hwa. It’s brief. Always broken by her enthusiastic reply. And he thinks he likes it that way. 

“It’s such a waste to not share this place with someone,” she chides, in the way young children questions the workings of adult’s mind.

He sighs, then release an amused cackle. “You are wiser than your age credits you, niece.”

“Of course, I did my reading as required of an emperor’s consort,” she teases. Her lips beaming the largest grin. An exact copy of Mu’s smile. His own mouth twisting to replicate her smile.

They work in tandem, to the harmony of cicadas and beetles, to the balmy sunray warming their bodies. Gweonghwagung chatting away, about the flowers, birds and trees she read. Her chuckling of carefree and youth, is something So wishes to preserve just a little longer.

And it’s enough to drown the sorrow memories of a certain past. Leaving him with newer memories one that So cherishes, without question. 

His hand reaches out for the cup. Instantly seeking it. Like it’s second nature. Amidst of the performances playing for the Dano Festival banquet, he takes a sip of the chrysanthemum wine. Another sip for the occasion.

He doesn’t drink like he used to. Spiralling out of control, like a mad man with half a mind intact after a night of consuming copious alcohol. He drowns a cup of chrysanthemum wine, one after the other. Stops shortly before the last end performance. 

But tonight, it’s a celebration Gwangjong could afford some levity. He’s among family members. Daemok sits on his left. Gweonghwagung on his right, bears the largest of smiles (her first official dinner as his concubine). Vivacious laughter rings across the table. The music picks up speed, the performance draws their attention until the very end.

Eventually the celebration come to an exciting finish, Jung and Min-hwa are the first to retire to their own palace. The rest follows suit. Gwangjong escorts Gweonghwagung to her chamber, press a soft kiss on her forehead. 

Her lips curling into a smile, “Thank you for having me over, Your Majesty.” Her inflection retains a certain awkwardness that amuses Gwangjong to great end.

“I am pleased to hear that. Have a nice night, niece,” he tells her, with a smile of his own. Then he returns to his own chambers. With his entourage of court ladies and eunuchs, trailing him up to his own palace.

One court lady steps out from the line, quickens her small strides to pursue him. Together they enter his chambers. He stands perfectly still, waiting for the court lady to unbuckle his belt. His belt remains untouched.

“If Your Majesty don’t mind, I sent the court lady away. Today is a holiday, isn’t it?” Yeon-hwa pipes up. Her voice fills the stillness. She’s already decked in the appropriate clothes, bare off her usual golden finery. Long dark hair hangs loosely over her shoulders. Her lips are soft pink. Not red.

“That would certainly be preferable as opposed to working our servants to death,” he replies, a smirk snaking its way onto his face.

A smile tugs the corners of her lips, just barely. Her hands working to loosen the buckle. The buckle falls unceremoniously on to the floor. Her fingers untying the strings of his ceremonial robe.

One robe slips off from his body. Her breath hot on his exposed chest. His skin prickles with a sensation that reddens his neck. His stomach housing fluttering butterflies, all wanting to escape of their cage. He swallows his saliva down. 

She’s lost in her concertation. Her gaze oblivious to his own attention, set on his clothes. Her fingers brush against his neck. Another electrical buzz along his bones.

Off goes another layer. And now, he’s exposed. All his past scars displayed for her eyes to see and judge. Yet, she barely bats an eyelid. She spares him a quick glimpse and a smile. Her eyes reserve no judgment for his marked torso. 

He holds his breath in. His heart hammering against his ribcage hard. Consents to her fixing his undergarment for him. She picks on a loose linen on his robe. Straightens her spine, gaze up to him.

Her eyes are a shade of brown, like pools of liquid honey. Under these dim candles. It’s dark. Just at the right colour that he knows resembles his own eyes. 

And he leans.

Closer. So close. Too near. 

That he could just peck her lips right there. Right now. And satisfy that innate curiosity of what her lips would taste like. Will it be sweet like the honey in her eyes? Will it be bitter as gourd, a reminiscent of her resentment for his past transgressions?

And he feels hot breath on his jaw.

Bends forward. Smooth hand presses against his lips. So opens his eyes, perplexed.

“Not when your breath tastes of chrysanthemum wine, Your Majesty,” is all she says. Yeon-hwa wheels around. Heads for their bed, her tracks stop just few steps away from him. Gazes over her shoulder, a smile still fixed on her face.

“Good night, husband,” is what she says. By the smirk that graces her lips, “Try again, when you have drink nothing but tea or water.”

So chuckles into the empty room. Amused. Commits her words to his memory. Perhaps, he might try it again. Someday. Tonight, Lady Luck doesn’t shine favourably on him. And he makes peace with it.

He rides his horse. With his brothers trailing behind him. Brings his hand up in the air, So halts his horse. Behind him, they obey his silent cue.

He pulls his bow, draws an arrow. Aims the arrow at the buck hidden between the trees. Releases the arrow. It whizzes through the air, cuts through the shrubs and lands on its target.

The buck falls down. In minutes, it stops kicking. Jung slides off from his horse. Walks up to the buck, and brings his blade-wielding hand down. Baek Ah dismounts from his horse, paces up to Jung’s side.

So ties all horses to a nearby tree. Rechecks the tightness of the reins, then strolls to his brothers and the buck he shot down. Jung kneels, he props the buck against a nearby tree. Baek Ah lends a hand, and slices the skin open.

They remove its guts and organs. Jung prefers to seal his mouth shut. Baek Ah fills the silence with his singing. He sings of old lullabies. Notably Silla’s children folk songs. Neither So or Jung interrupts him. 

So picks up where they left off. Skins the buck. While his younger brothers wash themselves off the blood. Without further delays, they climb their horses again and the hide and meat separated in different compartment of his saddle. They ride back to the palace.

Jung’s animosity has recede a little. With the increasing frequencies of their hunts together. Despite Yeon-hwa’s best intention to hide her new scar adorning her palm, Jung’s no fool. Deduced that So’s the cause of such scars. They almost came blow to blow, if Yeon-hwa and Min-hwa weren’t sitting next to them.

The palace’s gate closes behind them, So shifts his gaze from his horse to his brothers. As he permits a small smile at Baek Ah. Jung’s grimace is less genuine than Jung likes it to be. Baek Ah bears the widest grin of all.

So thinks, it’s a success. Today’s hunt is one step closer to him regaining the bits he lost himself to void Hae Su created. It’s a small progress, but he’s not stopping. Goryeo deserves better. He deserves better. ‘Better’ is not Hae Su.