Chapter 64: Gwageo (The Past)

I didn't quite know what to do with myself since Hwi had left as soon as I couldn't hear Dal screaming and pleading with his life. I looked almost everywhere in this god-forsaken manor of the Nam's but I still couldn't see him. But i did catch a glimpse of the Young Master almost running out of the front gates, presumably after him. But before i could even take another step, the concubine came out towards me with a look of thunder. But despite everything that she had been through, she still hadn't learnt from her mistakes at all. I swore to myself that i wasn't going to let her hurt me again, and I still wasn't going to let that happen. But if she had different intentions, then who was i to stop her? She was my so-called 'mistress' after all and there wasn't a more perfect timing than right now.

"You vicious cow! How dare you harm me! How dare you almost cause me to miscarry the Nam heir! You..." "Are you still blaming me for what the father of your child put you through?" "What nonsense is this? You will pay for killing my maid Seo Yeon and i will make sure of that." "And what exactly are you going to do? Make up more lies about my fake past that you keep going on about?" "You ungrateful, lowly and delusional bitch! Do you really think that you are worth the clothes you wear? The scents you rub on your lowly skin? Or those expensive shoes that you wear on your dirty feet? I am-was a maid who has seen nobility up front and you are a poor orphan with a disability that most people have never even heard of before. You think you deserve to live this life? Then fine, I will show you exactly where you come from!" And with that, she had her remaining servants haul me into a carriage without giving me time to defend myself at all. As a concubine, she needed her husband's permission to leave her home, even if she was only gone for a few hours. And as for myself, i was now sure that Nam-Jeon would send out a search party for me and would even go as far as to kill the concubine if I discovered my memories on her account. But she still wasn't smart enough to think about herself at all despite all of the so-called education she had given herself. And right now, I wasn't in a position to think about her at all, apart from the fact that she would deliver me to my past by her own hands.

I didn't even put up a struggle as she began to tear my clothes from my arms and legs as we made our way to the other side of the village that i hadn't seen yet. Not that the guard that always accompanied me would let me leave the marketplace in the first place, and now I knew why. But it was only when we got deeper into the road that I started to get the headaches and hear the screams and shouts in my head all over again. my heart was beginning to pound out of my chest and I began to sweat in fear. I really would had given up every expensive item that I owned in return for my brother to just show up out of nowhere and be here for me when I came back home. I wanted him to take me into his arms and never let me go as he re-introduced our home to me. I have no recollection of feeling so vulnerable before and I really didn't want to be here on my own in a place where probably most people would recognise me and either bully me for becoming a noblewoman overnight or crow at me for abandoning my brother even when i couldn't remember doing it at all...

"Here! Take a look at your home! Your real home! This is where the Young Master found you after you had your fit, I am sure of it! The original servants that have stayed on all remember how panicked he was when he brought you to his father's manor in his arms. He was almost in tears they said, that he couldn't bare to leave your side all night long. It was also the first time that he had ever stood up to his father, although I do not know what he threatened him with, it seemed to work..."

Her voice began to fade away long before her servants who were very angry at me threw me out in front of the most wretched and blackened home that was beginning to fall apart by its hinges. I could not remember the home at first, but as soon as the concubine's carriage fell back and abandoned me here, the very first thing that I saw was the old blood stain from my head that my brother still hadn't washed out. He must have wanted to live with the memory of what had happened that day whilst I was helping the Young Master with his own plans...my god, what have i done? Why did i have to loose my memories instead of staying by my brother's side and helping him instead? Now I knew that helping the Young Master was inadvertently helping my brother, but I should really have done a lot more. My brother...

"...Just put the stakes on me! Break into Bang-Won's artillery and hand over the weapons! That will become proof of his treachery against his father's new law to banish private armies and my father will be too busy devising a new scheme to realise that I will hand over Yeon to you! You can take her and run away wherever you want to, i will even arrange for your escape!" "No matter where we hide, your father will kill us all eventually and you know it. It kills me to be away from my sister but I would rather have her live in blissful peace under your roof that to become a fugitive when she barely has regained her memories!" "My roof is no longer safe for her! She...Yeon is not the same naive girl i grew up with! She is fierce, she is defiant and she is far too bold for me to protect at all hours of the day. But you knew that, didn't you! What have you done Hwi? What have you hidden from me about your own sister that I am supposed to help raise in your absence!" "So what? You want me to take responsibility for my sister after you caused her fit that made her forget me? Her only brother who has been raising her since we were orphaned? If she is too much for you to handle, then you should never have stolen her from me in the first place!" "You bastard! You know i had no choice! If i didn't separate you both, I would have found you dead in your beds! And i...i didn't mean to cause her to have a fit like that! In all honesty I...was too busy thinking about you so i...temporarily forgot about Yeon's condition in my panic..." "...And that makes everything better, does it?" "If you will not take her home now, then you shall reveal her true nature to me so i can save her...what? What are you laughing at?"

"Save her? Save her or save yourself? Why are you really here today and chasing me all around the town? Is she...really that different from before?" "If she truly is who she is now, then the girl I grew up with doesn't exist at all...unless it is a mere change from her memory loss..." "It isn't. Yeon has always had trouble...hiding her intelligence. The only problem was that she lost parts of her memory after her first fit and I didn't bother to bring those memories back because we had bigger things to worry about! Like our surviavl! Her medicine! And my trying to find a job to help us both live! So i am so sorry that she is inconveniencing you right now, but I need to devise a way to kill the feared third prince without endangering my own life to bring home a sister who cannot remember me! Now be gone!" "Hwi!" "But there is one last thing I wish to ask of you before you go running back to daddy." "What is it?" "What the hell is going on with you and my sister?"

I well and truly felt my heart drop into to my feet and my heart started pounding like a beating drum. But it didn't make any sense; I had done nothing to be ashamed of, so why did i feel so nervous? My head shot down to the ground the moment that my brother brought up such an outrageous topic...did he see something? Or was it Dal who was stirring things up behind my back for whatever reason he could to get his own revenge on me for ignoring him? Or did the concubine direct him to do this? No, he couldn't question our motives before i fully regained my memories, not yet. And maybe it was just my partial wishful thinking, but it sounded like i wasn't the only one who got nervous all of a sudden.

"What...are you talking about?" "You know exactly what I am talking about. I am in this mess because no matter how noble your intentions are, you are not the best of planners. You are far too impulsive and reckless to think ahead long-term and you know it. So what was that with Yeon when we all ate in her quarters? How many times did you interrupt us before I could even begin to have a conversation with her? And for what? Another scheme you were playing out? Since when do you tell anyone about your plans? You hardly even let me in on anything and yet here you are, following Yeon around because of what? I am warning you Seon-Ho, i will kill you with my bare hands before I let you use her for your dirty work like you are doing to me. Do you understand me? With her intelligence and wit, my sister deserves to be someone's husband who can help support her dreams if she wasn't disabled! My father had suitors from noble families lining up for her hand just before his death! So i will be damed if you even think of using her to make up for what you lack. Do not provoke me by using my sister, so tell me now! What is going on with you?"

Everything was a lie. My entire life that I could remember I have...done things to displease my brother, my only brother who raised me...good god, what on earth have i done. I knew it was for our survival in the Nam mansion and maybe my brother was unaware of the true hardship that we had living there but...if someone had told me, i would have continued to hide my true identity...maybe.

"There...is nothing going on between us. I look to her as my sister as i have always done and I will never...take advantage of her. I won't involve her in anything ever again and I...will never speak to her again if that is your wish. I know how dare she is to you even when she cannot remember who you are..." "Good, and you had better keep it that way. That brat of a girl is the only family that I have left and she is the only thing that I have in this life that keeps me sane and living. Do not cut of my air and spend time with your concubine so she stops mistreating her, or so help me god i will pay her a visit myself."

I barely had time to hide myself away before I saw Seon-Ho storming out of that home without the look of disgust that everyone else had when they passed it by. Instead, he looked worn out and just as miserable as my brother did under his layers of tension, fury and plain injustice. I could see it in his eyes as soon as Seon-Ho had no choice but to walk away from him with so much dejection in his walk. They were both in equal amounts of pain with their foolish little ego's blinding the both of them, along with their different paths of survival. It was raw, it was deep and it was something I needed to consider when I helped them both escape Nam-Jeon's destructive grasp. I needed to reunite the two men before I...well, just in case something happened to me and i needed to stay behind. Both of these men had no-one like they did each other, and that was another thing that I was hell bent on retrieving from the man who had stolen so much from all of us.

"Well well well, look who we have here. What is a pretty girl like you doing in a slum neighbourhood such as this one? You are a noble woman now, in case you have forgotten, Seo Yeon, daughter of the greatest swordsman of the century; Seo Geom." Seo Geom? The daughter of...my father? The greatest swordsman of the century...whose son was facing a life and death situation based on his survival skills...his fighting skills...just like Seo Geom must have...

"What are you doing here Dal? Did you follow me? Why didn't you come with your concubine?" "Won't you even look at me when you are talking to me? And what exactly are you doing here anyways?" "Why don't you ask your lover instead? She forced me into..." "Force? Who could force Seo Yeon into anything against her will? Not even your father and brother could force you to put your books down when they were raising you. And to be honest, you are probably the only 'ward' who hasn't tried to seduce her Master for a title to elevate your social and economical status. So let me take a guess; you saw an opportunity to make yourself a victim in the eyes of the Nam men against another woman as so many of your sex do. Typical. But for what, i wonder."

Brother, I miss you, I love you and i am so sorry that I cannot fully remember you. I am sorry that I have left your side, for you to fend for yourself when you have only ever raised me with love and affection, which was rare in the corrupt nation of ours. I will return to your side soon, i can promise you that. But until I find a way to rid us of the concubine and her lover, I do not even have the chance to approach you in peace without bringing you the threat against our lives. Please, I beg of you to wait for me and I will help you...."Wait! Where are you going? Yeon?" "Shouldn't you be tending to your wounds instead of chasing me all around town? What do you want from me, man?" "Is that it? No word of concern for me after that slave beat me up, no even for when you outed me in front of the Nam men? I barely escaped with my life and you..." "Dal! Hear me well; just because i am a woman, I doesn't mean that i should be an emotional sponge for all the men in my current life. I am barely able to keep up with the Young Master and I have no time for someone who is clever enough to scheme his way through life..." "Like the Young Master himself? I truly do not understand why you choose to help him and refuse me?" "Because you both have different intentions and I do not like yours." "Oh really? Even when the Young Master likes someone else?" "I have no proof of that." "So where do you think he is right now? He is heading to that girl's brothel right now and I can prove it to you."