IX: NOVEM

As promised, he appears at my door when the sun hangs high. 

“Lady Son,” my butler enters the room. “The Marquis.” He bows and I feel a flicker of annoyance past my chest. 

It’s my cue to act. 

“He’s here for you again?” Saeun asks with a sceptical look. 

Immediately, I rise up with a curl on my lips, and Saeun stares at me, knowing that her sister would never act like this. She pulls me by the sofa with her eyes on mine. 

“He— you’re not mind-controlled… right?” She asks cautiously, and I burst out a laugh. 

Maybe my acting is kinda over-the-top. “No, Saeun. I’m not.” 

I think of all the cheesy lines he uses. Maybe I’ll have to start using them as well, to get myself even more into character. “You’ll know what it feels like when you’re in love.” I beam at her, and her face turns into a sickly green. 

Glancing at her disgusted look, I let out a real smile of my own. Even I myself cringe at my own words.

I leave the room before she pukes on the sofa.

The front door opens, and I see my acting partner standing under the clear blue sky and warm beams, just like how a Prince would wait for his Princess outside his carriage. 

I’ll have to get used to his handsome face this upcoming year. 

Actually, I might get sick of him very soon, since I’ve already felt uncomfortable after seeing him for consecutive days. 

“Naeun-ah.” He waves with the same cringey voice, and I almost trip over the steps. 

Disgusting. I say in my mind, knowing that he hears me loud enough in his head.

He keeps his eyes on mine, daring me to say my lines. 

“Oppa.” I force the words out of my mouth. 

He opens the carriage door for me to step in, and I find myself bathed in a space that’s filled with his cedar and musk scent. I wonder how many ladies have sat in his carriage. 

The door closes behind him, as he settles into the narrow space between us. 

As soon as he draws the curtains close, we fly towards the opposite sides of each other, staying as far away from each other as possible. It’s hard, since the carriage is a narrow space, but we try to keep our personal space. 

After all, this is the only time when we can drift out of character and become our real selves. 

The carriage ride starts and finishes in silence. 

I’m too tired to say another word, and he’s too preoccupied with the piles of work he has to look over. 

The carriage halts, and he places his piles in the small cabinet in front of us. He turns to give me a look, and I stretch my lips for the countless smiles I’ll have to do later. 

He stretches his hands and I take it. I don’t care whether his hands are calloused or soft, because the acting cues are the only things on my mind. 

We enter a restaurant in the midst of bustling crowds and morning shops. I feel a sensation on my shoulder and I almost knock it off with my thorns, until I realise it’s his arm. 

Calm down. He says. I’m just going to put you on the insides of the road. He speaks as he places me away from the carriages and colourful crowds. 

What a gentleman you are. I sneer back at him, as he drops his arm from my shoulders. 

He answers me with a smile that once again sends goosebumps down my back. 

He brings me to a room in the insides of the restaurant. As soon as the servants leave us alone, I let out a sigh of relief, but he stays on edge, as he scans every corner of his room with his eagle eyes. 

I’m already sitting on the chair when he finishes his scan with a relieved nod. 

“You’re so paranoid.” I shake my head, while he scoffs. 

“You’ve never been in the courts. The invisible spies are everywhere.” He settles in the chair opposite mine. Warm tea had already been poured for us, and I take a sip as he asks. 

“A story, huh?” He says. “Any scandalous ideas?” He sneers, knowing how I started the rumours. 

I sigh. “Can we at least acknowledge how ridiculous this whole thing is?”

He raises his brows. “You were the one who suggested this whole betrothal thing.” 

I roll my eyes. “I never knew you would tell the King that we’d be in love.”  

“Anyways,” I voice out the ideas I’ve been brainstorming for the whole night, “what we have to do is establish that we were—well,— interested in each other pretty early on, but I was betrothed, so we both backed off.” 

He frowns. “So you’re making me a guy who’s hopelessly in love with an engaged woman?” 

I let out an exasperated sigh. “Fine, fine then. How about love at first sight after the banquet held by the Crown Prince? That’s a week after my betrothal was cancelled.” 

He nods. “Sounds better.”

“I’ll reference the time when you gave me an umbrella and make up some stuff around that.” I take out a notepad from my bag. “Then…” I scribble with a pen between my fingers. “I guess we were — ugh— flirting for a week and that our relationship solidified by the second or third week, though obviously we kept it secret from everyone. You think you can handle that?” I direct a look at him. 

“Guess I have to,” he says as he takes another sip of tea. “What did this flirting look like?”

“I—I don’t know,” I say, caught a bit off guard by the question. I furrow my brows then glance up at him. “How do you usually flirt with someone?” I need to know how he acts in order to incorporate it in our storyline. 

He balances his index and middle fingers on his chin. “Maybe I’d find excuses to walk by your court at the banquet. I’d joke around, try to make them laugh. Maybe I’d touch them, just a little, but only if I was positive they’d be into it, and if they weren’t, I’d stop immediately.”

I let myself picture this. Taemin not just leering down at someone, but brushing past someone’s arm with the back of his hand, passing it off as an accident with a shy smile. Taemin placing a palm on someone’s shoulder, telling her how much he loved her show or her story. Taemin trying to make someone laugh. I’m half tempted to ask him to tell me a joke.

The Marquis who flirts with a hypothetical lady is not the Marquis I’ve known since December.

I shake off the lingering thoughts. Why am I even getting distracted?  “You seem experienced.” I say.

He takes a sip of his tea. “I’ve looked through many brains.”

I raise my brows. “You’ve never dated?” Surprise would be an understatement. With such a face on him, I thought he must’ve had some experience, or had women approach him at least.

“I don’t have an ex-lover like you, my dear fiancé.”

I roll my eyes. He keeps on calling the Kang’s my ex-lover. It’s getting annoying. “He’s not my ex-lover. I’ve never loved him.”

I push on. “What else? I need to know what to tell the ladies when they ask.” It’s those annoying tea-parties that act as the real challenge. 

He balances his index and middle fingers on his chin. “Hm…Don’t ladies ask about confession or dates?” 

I shoot him a look. “And you knew this through looking into another person’s mind?”

“You know me well.”

I don’t know if my look at him is incredulous or disgust. “Where did you see that?”

He shrugged. “Just looked past a maid for some information yesterday, turns out she just got confessed by a guard and she’s heads over heels about it.”

“You are so weird.” Suddenly, I began to wonder if he has looked into my brain yet. And if he did, what he saw.

I clear my throat, with my pen on the notepad. “Back to the confession— any ideas you’ve seen from other brains?”

He rolls his eyes. “I don’t pay attention to these useless things. Wouldn’t you have more ideas? How did you interact with your ex-lover?”

“How many times do I have to say this? He’s not an ex-lover. And we didn’t even interact much, just had small talks.”

He shrugs nonchalantly. I have a feeling he would keep on calling Kang Minhyuk this nickname. 

We sat and continued plotting— well, more like I continued— he was just sitting there and sipping his tea. 

Gosh, this Marquis wasn't a great help. 

And there we have it — Our first date: late night walk in the courtyard after a cabinet meeting. Our second date: watching fireworks on the top of the roof, counting down New Year. That was the night we made our relationship official, deciding to keep it from our friends and families for obvious reasons. The houses were staying for 3 months in the capital, and we didn’t want to make a fuss. Then, last month during the King’s birthday banquet, we decided to get married. Taemin lived in the Capitol for his Marquis position, but I had to go back to district 4 after Spring. We didn’t want to separate from each other and considered us as "fated and star-crossed lovers and soulmates for life-ugh”. 

I tell him to memorise these details, but he just nods nonchalantly. 

“Did you really memorise it by heart? If people hear us telling different stories, we’ll be blown up.” I stare at him.

He finishes the rest of our teapot. “Worry about yourself, miss fiancé.”

Finishing off the storyline, he calls the waiter with a bell on the table, and we sink into our own characters. The servants and waiters enter with porcelain plates and steaming food, but I have no time to adore the lovely cuisine, because he gives me a knowing glance. 

“Naeun-ah, try this. It’s your favourite food.” He fakes a smile that looks too cheesy in my opinion. The curl on his lips doesn’t reach his eyes. I feel the hairs on my neck stick up from either the name-calling, his tone, or his face. Maybe all of them. 

I force out a smile. “Of course, oppa.”

The servants and waiters are our audience, and clearly, they are petrified. In the midst of our cheesy eye-contacts, they only shuffle their feet quicker. 

Glancing at our terrified audience, he picks up a piece of steak with his chopsticks, then does something that utterly blows my mind. 

“Naeun-ah? Open your mouth, ah —” He brings the meat towards me with a devilish glint in his eyes. 

I bite the insides of my cheek so hard, just to refrain myself from glaring at him. 

I keep all my focus on the sizzling beef and its delicious scent that travels up my ears. 

Think of the steak. I tell myself. I don’t care who feeds me, I’ll still be eating that steak — think of the absolutely beautiful beef that will melt in your mouth, Son Naeun. 

While I try my best to keep my smile, the servants must’ve gotten sick of our lovey-dovey atmosphere, because they all leave in a blink of an eye. He holds the steak with his chopsticks, and the door snaps shut when the meat is an inch away from my lips. 

Before I can taste the steak, it flies away and disappears into his mouth. 

This annoying brat.

I shoot daggers towards him, and he returns me a teasing smile. 

“The steak is good. Try it out for yourself.” 

~~~~~~~~~~

Within an hour or so, the Marquis and his newly announced fiancé stepped out of the restaurant. They had widened smiles on their faces, yet if one looked closer, one would notice that the new couple had pupils that were emotionless as buttons. 

“Naeun-ah.” The Marquis said as he placed his arm on the lady’s shoulder. “Wait for me outside, will you?” 

The lady nodded with a shy curl on the lips. 

“My lord, this is the bill.” Unlike most shops in the capitol, which was extravagant and luxurious, the cashier wore a worn-out suit that was filled with stains and dust. The cashier is not a man of the Capitol, instead, he is a man from the outlying districts - only sent to work here for labour. With tinted white hair, he handed a receipt to the Marquis with a shivering bow on his head. 

Without sparing another glance, the Marquis placed a thin stack of golden notes under the table. 

The old cashier widened his eyes and waved his hands frantically. “M-My lord!” He lowered his voice to a hushed whisper. “This is too much, my lord! Please keep this, sir! My boss— ”

The Marquis let out a smile that only the cashier could see. 

The cashier heard a voice in his head. It was a delicious meal. Thank you, old man. Please take this for yourself and the overworked servants. 

The cashier stayed frozen as he stared at the Marquis, wondering how he knew the servants were long under-paid and overworked. 

While the Marquis stuffed the bills into the cashier’s pocket, a pair of sentinels entered the restaurant. 

In full armour, they hit tables and shouted loudly. “Old geezer! Food! We need the food!” One of them scanned past a young waitress and pulled her by the collar. “If we don’t get it within five minutes, I’ll take this woman with me!” He sneered. 

The customers who were dressed in luxurious dresses and colourful makeup merely continued their meal without sparing a glance, while the servants hung their heads low, all fearful but powerless against the regime. 

Before the sentinels could mess around further, they bumped into a figure. 

“HEY YOU!” The sentinel grabbed the figure by his collar. Meanwhile, anoth