Chapter 2: Seon-Ho

I almost lost my mind out of fear when she woke up and didn't recognise me, she was even afraid of me. She stepped backward as soon as she saw me approaching her which only made my heartbreak. Despite her crush on me, the version of her that I grew up with used to look up to me to protect her. But this girl in front of me...wore her same clothes, carried her old scent but she looked...different. I had never seen her with her hair out but that strangely seemed to make all the difference. But before I could say anything she had drawn out my sword which I had stupidly left by her side and pointed it at me with a calm yet determined look I had never seen before. It was unnerving how different she was already; she held me in her gaze as she made her way towards me and I couldn't help paying attention to her in a way I never have before. Despite holding my own sword to me she was standing so close to me that my eyes were fixed on her soft skin, her little hands, and the new obstinate look on her face that was pulling me in slowly...until she practically ran out of the room to make her way out of the gates.

I caught my breath and almost collapsed to the floor. I couldn't believe this was happening right now on top of sending away her brother; my only friend in this world to the military just after our exam so my father wouldn't kill him. But I had to admit I didn't think ahead far enough to think about what would happen to his poor epileptic sister who had no one else in this life apart from him and myself to look after her. She was barely 17, how was she going to look after herself?

I stopped my father's guards from going after her; she had her back turned towards me and still seemed determined to leave with my sword in her hands. I took a deep breath and shouted some facts about herself that she could check right there and then to make her trust me. She stopped in her tracks as if there was something holding her back. I shouted more facts, all she could do was check, which made her turn around to face me with a confused but placated look on her face. She looked around her with probably the same look I had on my face when my father first dragged me here and closed her eyes in fear before facing me with a look that she had when we first met; she was trusting me. At that moment I felt my chest rise in both pride and fear for us both. I made my way towards her, took her by the wrist, and took her to my mother's old quarters so I could re-introduce myself to her.

I didn't dare leave her alone all night with my tyrannical father lurking around the mansion, who knows what he would do to her until I settled her into his mansion myself. I woke up a couple of hours later not too far away from her bed...with a thick blanket wrapped around me tightly with my cold hands wrapped around a hot cup of tea.

I was so taken aback that I almost fell backward. In all my years of being trapped in my father's hellhole no one had taken care of me like this...not since my mother died fifteen years ago...I hadn't even noticed that I was cold...

I was so wrapped up in all of this it took me a while to realise that she was gone! My mind..and my emotions went into overdrive as I sprinted all around this god-forsaken estate and out all around the market at the crack of dawn until I found her looking confused and agitated. As I got closer to her I realised that she had been followed by two men with desire in their eyes.

When I saw those men behaving like that with the girl I grew up with like a sister, my rage came out, just like when she used to have her fits in public. And after the day I had, I needed to release it. They started grabbing her but before I could make it in time she had bit the hand of the person holding her from behind and kicked the other guy in the chest and ran away, but I had caught her in time and pushed her behind the wall before taking them on myself, breaking both of their arms in minutes.

Our eyes met; although she was confused she carried a different look...more self-assured. I had noticed she had begun to look at me differently as well since I had to re-introduce myself to her. She wasn't scared of me anymore. In fact, I think she was...guaranteed of my intentions to house her and raise her myself in her forgotten brother's absence. It was the very least I could do. She only hesitated for a moment before approaching me slowly, holding me in her gaze as she did. Her eyes landed on my injured hands and she just sighed...before grabbing me by the arm and dragged me to the pharmacy.

It reminded me of the time when we met after her father's death again...she was scared of me at first in my noble clothes and cried to Hwi that I would hurt them just like the nobles who killed her father. She was barely five at the time. I just approached her slowly with Hwi's help and I promised her that I wouldn't dare hurt her or him. She just looked at us both with widened eyes until she approached me and made me pinky swear to live up to my promise before putting her small hands into mine as we walked her home after her first epileptic fit...

I think this was the first time she had ever really touched me, despite her crush on me since we had met. I instinctively pulled back from her touch, not because it was inappropriate for men and women to touch each other in public, it even wasn't because she was of my respect to her as a sister. Maybe I had just imagined it but I could've sworn I felt something...tingle and shock me when her skin touched mine. But she just grabbed me again harder without even turning around and sat me down before applying the medical substances without even looking at me. I was speechless; I tried hard to blink my tears away before she could see, my guilt was tearing me apart. This was the second time in a few hours she had taken care of me as a stranger, not knowing my father and I were the cause of her current state.

"Why did you run away?" I asked her as softly as I could; a tone I was not used to using at all. But I guess I was going to have to if I had to keep her safe. "A man who I don't remember, who comes from the polar opposite of my world tells me he knows me for almost all of my life and tries to take me in when his father clearly resents me. What would you do if you were in my shoes?" She replied calmly, still tending to my wounds and not looking at me which was beginning to irritate me despite her tender care. I didn't care what lengths I had to go through; for her safety, I had to bring her home, under my protection. "I'm sorry for all that you have gone through. But please come back with me and promise to protect you from the world and I will raise you under my protection as a person of the palace...and a brother to you as you have been a sister to me." I had to swallow hard on that last part and again blink back angry tears. I vowed to myself that I would make my father pay severely for all of this. As if it wasn't bad enough that he had me out of wedlock with a slave he took as his concubine, stole me from her when his legitimate son drowned after I did everything to save me and then blame me for the whole ordeal; but to mess with the only people who took me in as one of their own, to show me kindness, and love...I looked at her tending to me without even a single memory of me...and I already swore under my breath that I would take revenge for her as well as her brother before exacting my own on him when the time came.