VOLUME LXXXVI: Raining What? ~ Only a Moment     

Shall I start from the beginning? I was an orphan living in a house in the forest with a barely sane woman. I could vaguely remember the twin brothers coming to live with me when I was four. We could not be separated from thereafter. Then one day, the previous baron of this castle came to take us away. All three of us were to live in the castle. He claimed to be the two brother’s father but we all knew better than that. It had all become a game of “house.” The baron had two sons with the same name. They were also identical twins. In the pool near the crumbling part of the castle, they drowned. My childhood friends and family became replacements as I became the substitute daughter for the Baron’s blood sister, the one I call mother. They some how knew their offsprings were to die and breed us in the forest to mold later on.

From my years of living here, I uncovered many family secrets such as how the original Hye died. Everyone though she died because of her frail health but that, like everything else in this family, was a lie. She could not survive her mother’s cruel way of disciplining…

She was still just a child.

How could she withstand the horrors of the Flower Bed? At first, mother treated me tenderly as if I was a strange princess from a far away land. Then, it all began. She started to see me as her real daughter. When I misbehaved in the slightest way, it was to the Flower Bed for me.

Ahh, pardon me. You must not know what the Flower Bed is.

Hidden underneath the castle are many tunnels running in every direction. Some run to dead ends. Some lead outside the castle and then there are some that lead to secret chambers. The one that I am referred to is the Flower Bed, an extravagant torture chamber directly underneath the flower garden, hence the name. It was where we were taken to be punished, the servants and I. Of course, we were not brought there together… they don’t know I go through the same pains they do… It is better if they don’t.

Ignorance is bliss.

This was how I had acquired these scars you’ve seen.

I sometimes wonder whether it was mother’s way of expressing her love. I know it may sound odd but could it be that her love is painful? Are we all supposed to suffer in the name of love… some point in our lives?

I’ve long learned how to play along. It was a game that had become a reality. I was able to keep my silence and act as if nothing was amiss for the past decade.

And here… I’ve told you everything. I’ve told you everything worth telling.

This is the truth, Jae. Do you understand now why I didn’t want to tell you?