Two Fold

Seol is faced with the two most uncompromising guards outside Seo's door. The only thing that pleases her is that they are Seo's own men - not those mighty buffoons from the imperial guard. If the situation had been ugly, Kang Seo wouldn't be allowed to keep his men - or his old quarters at that matter.

"No visitors allowed for General Kang," they repeat drily, their expressions set in stone.

"As if I care!" Seol tells them, her jaw squared. "Step aside before I lose my temper -"

"No, Gongjunim mama - we have explicit instructions that none is to see him."

"Well I tell you now," Seol trails off as she carefully looks at the guard's face. "Your name is Jung - Ho right? Remember you from Shinju. I tell you now Jung - Ho, 'no one' doesn't include this princess!" With that said, she pushes past them and through the door. The guard Jung - Ho follows after her, reaching to grab her by the arm.

"Gongjunim mama!" He holds her back.

"Impudence," she snaps at him, struggling to free herself. "How dare you touch an imperial princess!"

"Leave her Jung - ah," Seo says from inside. He had his lanterns extinguished and the windows shut so that she could not make out where the voice came from in the dimly lit inner chamber. "My command is not worth losing your head over. Let the imperial princess do as she wishes."

"Yes, my lord Kang."

The guardsman Jung leaves her hand, bowing profusely in apology. He steps out leaving her standing at the dimly lit threshold, closing the door behind him. It is a cloudless noon outside, Seol marvels at the shadows for a moment.

"Why is it so dark in here?" She asks in general, venturing in blindly. "Seo - where are you?" Her foot finds a porcelain jar that topples and shatters, the sound makes her jump.

"You shouldn't have come - mama."

Something about his voice gives her a pause. Seol feels a chill along her spine that has nothing to do with autumn. The drift is unnatural, a gust of ice that reminds her of Shinju mountains.

"What are you doing all cooped up in here?" She says instead, trying to quell the peculiar feeling. "Kang Seo, are you upset over being investigated for no reason?"

Seol hits against an edge of the war table and a sharp pain shoots across her hip bone. A gasp leaves her as she loses her footing. She has to grip the same edge that had hurt her to steady herself.

"You keep walking in blindly," Seo comments in an offhanded fashion, as if he did not care for the hurt she suffered. "Despite being warned. Aren't you afraid?"

"Afraid of what?"

Hands she has never before appreciated the sheer size and strength of, seize her by the hips, lift her up and deposit her unceremoniously on the war table. Maps laid out beneath her rustle as she sits with a startled yelp, legs dangling from the table edge. Yet Seol has no eyes for anything else. Seo grips the edge of the table and looms over her, silver of his narrowed eyes flashing as if they held a light of their own. From that ghostly silver light she could see each pale, hard line of his face and the singular brow that he arches.

"Of shadows and of what hides beneath."

There is an eeriness to his angular face, too pale, too perfect, simmering on its own, when a moment earlier she could not make him out in the shadows. His hair is unbound, cascading his face in soft tendrils of darkness, thick strands falling across his forehead slashing against the striking sliver of his eyes. Seol scoops her legs up, her fists bunching upon the snuggled fabric of her skirts. Silk crushes in her hands and Seo leans closer yet. An involuntary breath spills from her parted lips and he dips his head as if to drink that very air. Pounding of her heart drowns every other sound. His mouth twitches and curls into a condescending grin.

"You are afraid now."

It is a lazy statement. Furious tears at being belittled prick at her eyes, Seol blinks.

"Tell me, imperial princess - if I touch you now - what will you do?"

His fingers curl around her ankle, sliding along the stocking clad foot towards her embroidered shoe. A shudder passes down her spine and gently he removes the shoe, bringing her attention to the stinging cut just below her ankle - where the stocking was torn. Seol realizes belatedly that she might have cut herself on the jar she had smashed before.

She looks up and finds the silver eyes on her.

"Will you call the guards?" He suggests mockingly. "But wait - they answer to me. They've done their part by asking you not to open closed doors. Now that you are on the other side of the closed door - what will you do mama?"

Seol swallows thickly short of breath, her lungs on fire.

"I suggest - you run," his whispered breath is hot against her throat. "As far as you can."

She doesn't move. Seo pulls back, silver eyes raking across her flushed face.

"Leave!" He says scathingly, shadows stir in the depth of his eyes and his exhale shatters against her face. "Leave before I do something that both of us will regret."

Seol raises a trembling hand and touches it to his cheek.

"You'd set the world aflame before ruining me."

The words hang between them for a moment. Seo looks stricken by them. The tension that holds him taut melts away and his shoulders hunch. With a groan he kneels at her feet, forehead pressed against her knees. Seol's fingers cautiously curl into his unbound hair and his frame shudders. She aches for him, tears that he fails to spill brimming her eyes. She folds herself around him and clutches him against her as whatever that had pained him runs its course through. He trembles at her touch every time her fingers run through his hair or her palm slides over his back - yet he borrows into the embrace that she offers.

Seol cannot bring herself to ask him who he mourns with such profound sadness that it drowns away all the boundaries he had set up between them.

"It's not your fault," she says instead. "You did your best. You did your best."

*

For a moment the emperor stares at the scroll in his hands, a muscle at the corner of his mouth twitches. The minister who had gone ahead and offered it looks on with a condescending smirk twisting his mouth. However he stumbles a step back when the emperor raises his head to look at him, his expression murderous.

"You dare to stand at my court and question my daughter's character?" He growls. Yong rises from the podium below, fists clenched and hazel eyes hard.

"Her highness's character? No - no - my liege, you misunderstand me. I am merely inquiring about her highness's whereabouts. It is General Kang whose capability to fulfill the responsibilities of his esteemed duty that's being brought into question."

"Lord father," Yong intervenes. "Should this slunder be entertained? This man stands before us bluntly admitting to the fact that he had dared to position spies to trail my lady sister, dares to question the validity of your imperial wisdom and expects to be commended for his efforts?" He laughs shortly, mirthlessly. "Why are we entertaining this mockery?"

The emperor side eyes him, his mouth twitching with distaste.

"Because there is a lesson even in mockery," he says shortly. "Bring me your source." He commands the minister.

"Your imperial majesty -"

"You heard me -" The emperor snaps. "If you dare slander my daughter's name, bring forth your witness and someone summon the First Princess to court. Let her learn how deep the loyalty of her own people runs."

"A very sound decision Pyeha," the minister bows. "Do summon the first princess. May everybody present in this court know where the first princess is - or rather - with whom."

*