Chapter Text
Rim is no stranger to street wars between rival gangs. When she’d taken over her father’s smithy, she’d had a rough year or so before liberally distributed concussions, contusions, broken limbs, and a couple bodies in the river convinced everyone that it would be better not to challenge the blacksmith’s heir.
The factions in the palace have more money and refined manners and plot on longer time scales, but the greed for power and wealth is just the same here as it is on the streets.
The empress has a political problem.
Rim does not have a powerful family. Her allies from the market cannot help her within the palace walls, except to supply food that Rim knows is safe from tampering. Nor does any sage hall step forward and offer to sponsor Rim; Master Nakegora’s hall alone works itself to the bone to guard her from the other sage halls’ outrage at being cheated of the chance to put forward an empress candidate of their own.
It’s cute, the way Hwa thinks she doesn’t know. But Rim has been a street boss, and she isn’t fooled.
Rim finishes another set of exercises well after dark falls. Her sword feels heavy, and her body doesn’t want to move normally. Every morning she feels sick to her stomach, and the scent of her favorite market foods has made her gag more than once lately.
She considers seeing the palace physician before Hwa notices there’s something wrong with her and starts worrying, but she’s not sure which of them she should trust. It’s not like the emperor ever needs a doctor, after all.
She goes to Master Nakegora first, instead. In his offices, with members of his sage hall on guard, Rim feels confident that wagging tongues won’t spread rumors of her potential illness across the palace.
Over tea, Rim describes her symptoms to the sage.
He sets his cup down.
“Thank you for telling me, your majesty,” Master Nakegora says. “Allow me to congratulate you on your pregnancy.”
Rim startles. How had she missed that possibility?
“You will have to be more careful than ever, your majesty,” Nakegora warns her.
“I will,” Rim says. “I don’t want anything to happen to our child.”
The sage shakes his head. “I have no doubts that his majesty’s child will be blessed by the gods, your majesty,” he says. “It is your own safety that most concerns me.”
“I’m a strong woman, Master Nakegora, I don’t think you’ll need to be concerned for me,” Rim says. “Surely the palace physicians will ensure my health for the sake of his majesty’s child.”
Master Nakegora looks very old and sad for a moment. “Your majesty. Things in the palace are not so simple. You know that there is a young man who bears the title of ‘first prince’ already.”
“Yes?” Rim asks. “What of it?”
“It is customary for the emperor’s biological son to receive the title of first prince,” Nakegora explains. “When your child is of the age to enter the court as a prince, he will displace young Jeongwon to second.”
“It seems a bit harsh to grant him the title only to take it away,” Rim observes. “But if that is the tradition, surely he will understand.”
“I am less concerned about the young prince than about his sage hall,” Nakegora says, pouring them both more tea. “Jeongwon’s mentors are renowned for their acumen with medicines. And with poisons.” Setting down the teapot with a thump, the sage gazes intently at the empress. “And their willingness to eliminate competition.”
“How- how can anyone think to raise their hand against the emperor’s own child?” Rim’s teacup rattles against the saucer as she sets it down. “Don’t they understand that it would be treason? Rebellion against the gods?”
“Ah, but his majesty’s child is not recognized by the gods until he wins the trials for himself,” Master Nakegora says. “It is the habit of many sage halls to eliminate promising candidates, if they cannot claim them as princes for themselves.”
Rim stares at the sage with wide eyes. “Then… we are in grave danger.” She presses her hand to her abdomen, which as yet shows no sign of pregnancy.
“Yes, your majesty.”
“What can I do?”
“For now, continue your normal routine. It may be best for you to leave the palace for a while, to protect yourself and the child. I will make arrangements.”
Leave? How can she leave Hwa? “I cannot leave his majesty.”
Nakegora nods. “I do not suggest you leave permanently. Only long enough that the child may be delivered safely. Once he is born, the danger to you will be much less. Please consider it, your majesty.”
Bowing, Master Nakegora sees her out of his office, and one of the junior sages escorts her back to her palace.
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Later that night, Hwa visits the empress’s palace. Rim has been waiting anxiously. She would have gone to the emperor’s palace with the news herself, to tell him as soon as he finishes his work, but that would be out of her normal routine.
After the emperor embraces Rim and they exchange their usual greetings, she sits him down and whispers, “Can you make a barrier that stops sound?”
Looking confused, the emperor complies, flicking his fingers to show Rim that it’s done. “What is it? Has something happened?”
“You could say that, your majesty,” Rim replies.
Grasping her fingers, Hwa looks fierce. “Tell me, I will set everything right-”
“I’m pregnant.”
The emperor grabs Rim in a tight hug, then suddenly relaxes so that his arms are barely touching her. Great tears begin to fall down Hwa’s face. “You’re pregnant! What if something happens to you? Have you spoken to the physicians? I will make sure you have everything you need and anything you want.”
“Your majesty, why are you crying? Aren’t you happy?”
“I’m afraid you will resent me. Our child will be born into this dreary place where you won’t be free to raise him the way you want.”
Rim pats the emperor’s back. “Of course I won’t resent you. That’ll never happen.”
Sniffling, the emperor sits up, clinging to her hands. “Are you sure?”
“If you don’t believe me, I don’t know what to tell you.”
Rim tightens her grip on Hwa’s hands. “But there’s something else I need to tell you. I spoke to Master Nakegora, because I didn’t know which physician would be best to see. And he says… he says I should consider taking a trip outside the palace for a while, to have the baby.” Rim is not going to utter the word ‘leave’ in front of the emperor. The world might flood.
The emperor looks stunned. Rim slides her fingers through his hair. “It would only be for a little while, your majesty. I want to come back to you with our child, safe and sound.”
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Nakegora and Heuk-yeong persuade the emperor that the threats to the empress are pressing enough that sending her “to the countryside for her health” before news of the pregnancy spreads is their best option. That she suggested it first was probably the deciding factor. Clouds cover the sky and rain often falls in the days leading up to the empress’s departure, though the emperor has taken to keeping a smile on his face at all times. Accompanied by a retinue of sages and palace guards, the empress heads for the countryside retreat owned by Nakegora’s hall. In the heart of the emperor’s mentor’s power, away from the palace where every sage hall but one has agents, she will be safe.
Rim never arrives.
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They’re nearly three-quarters of the way to the sage hall when a highly organized military force hits the empress’s procession. A double-strength platoon of guards accompanies the empress, but the scouts bring back word of a large group of “bandits” too late. Outnumbered by a mercenary force dressed as outlaws, the procession shatters in the attack.
Rim knew the plan had failed the instant she heard the shouts of the guards. But she and Nakegora had prepared a backup plan, just in case. In her skirts she had concealed a small travel pack and under her gaudy clothes were underthings in dark tones suited for stealth. Her dagger rips her dress and cuts long locks into a short, ragged bob. A bladder filled with blood from the market butcher serves to paint a brutal scene within the empress’s palanquin. Tucking a cap over her bright hair, Rim chooses her moment… and flees.
Reports reach the emperor that the empress’ bloody clothes are found in the wreckage, along with long strands of fiery red hair.
Hwa Ryu grieves.
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Rim had studied many maps under Master Nakegora’s tutelage. If the emperor’s sage hall’s protection were to prove insufficient, his advice had been simple: fly to the last place anyone would look for an empress.
A mountain named Pilju.
It’s a long journey. Two months later, she reaches a village where frost forms at night, though it’s barely the beginning of autumn.
Blacksmithing is a skilled trade. Those who are good at such jobs are in high demand. The villagers don’t ask questions when a young woman who can wield a hammer shows up one day, travel-stained and alone.
Pilju is a place where people come to start over.
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Winter winds howl outside the midwife’s cottage.
A newborn babe screams at the top of his lungs.
When the midwife lays a wrinkly baby on her bare chest, Rim holds him close and strokes fuzzy, dark hair.
Golden eyes, hazy and unfocused, blink open.
For the first time since before she’d met the emperor, Rim weeps.
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Sleepless nights blend together. Villagers whose cottages are held together by nails forged by a dauntless young woman come and go, bringing hot food, fresh nappies, helping hands, or wood that was split with axes Rim herself had repaired and sharpened.
The winter freeze begins to thaw.
Rim carries her swaddled son out to see the first snowdrops blooming in the village square, poking their slender buds through a blanket of soft snow.
A pudgy hand reaches out and bats at the flower buds, and the emperor’s son giggles when petals tickle his fingers.
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Doha learns to crawl by the time spring thaws the passes open again.
Rim thinks about leaving Pilju.
The journey to the palace was hard for a woman in her first months of pregnancy. For a mother, nursing a crawling child, to make the same trip?
If death stalked them, she would be gone into the night as swiftly as one of the flitting bats that swoop in the twilight. But Pilju is safe, just as Nakegora had promised.
Surely he will send someone to get them very soon. Better to wait.
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The village grandmothers take turns babysitting young Doha, who coos and babbles with them while his mother spends her days repairing spades, plow blades, and sharpening a multitude of tools used for the short alpine growing season.
Rim’s hope that an escort home will come from the palace melts with the last of the winter’s snow. Trees are blooming in Pilju when itinerant traders bring word that the empress’s funeral was held the previous autumn.
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Rims stays busy all summer. There’s a part of her heart that’s aching and hollow, longing for a place of stone walls and still air even though the mountain breezes are sweet. The villagers all tell her how Doha is her perfect reflection in miniature. She smiles and says, “He has his father’s colors.” Rim is glad they never ask what happened.
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Autumn comes with falling leaves and Doha’s first toddling steps. His laughter echoes off the mountainside and in the empty place in his mother’s heart.
Snow flurries have begun to swirl in chilly winds. The passes will close soon, filled with snow and ice.
No one comes for them.
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In the long nights of her second winter on the mountain, Rim has plenty of time to think about what might have happened. On good nights she thinks that the reason they’re still here is that Master Nakegora believes the palace is still too dangerous for them. That no message has come because he is being extraordinarily cautious to avoid bringing attention to the hiding place they’d prearranged.
On bad nights, she wonders if the emperor’s mentor has decided that a commoner for an empress is too much trouble, and it’s best to abandon her in this remote place.
When the sun rises after those awful nights, she remembers that Doha, at least, is valuable to the sages. They’ll come to retrieve the emperor’s son as soon as they feel it’s safe.
In the meantime, she raises her toddler as best she can and spends her days earning a living. The village builds a simple smithy for her to use, and there’s always another pair of hands ready to scoop a small curious boy out of harm’s way.
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The moons wax and wane, and seasons go by as one year turns into two, then three, then four… Rim knows that if Nakegora was listening for word out of Pilju, he would certainly have heard of the woman blacksmith and her little boy.
Doha is lean and tanned from the sun. He’s a shrieking hellion who runs in the high pastures with the other village boys, but as soft and gentle and quiet as can be when peering into a basket full of newborn kittens. Sometimes he helps her at the forge, long curling locks pulled up out of the way, handing his mother tools as she works.
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One day the village smithy has a distinguished guest. The reclusive and enigmatic Master Nahora shows no sign of recognizing that the woman discussing building repairs with him is the empress. He hadn’t come to the wedding; perhaps he really doesn’t know who she is. Rim wonders if Nahora has ever seen the emperor. Surely anyone who has would instantly recognize Doha as his majesty’s son.
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The year after Doha turns six, he and Rim are working at the forge when they see Master Nahora walk through the village, holding a little boy’s hand.
His short hair is inky black and his eyes are as red as the forge flames.
Doha is entranced. The boy glares.
Rim watches the sage and his new disciple walk by, and wonders.
Should she take Doha to the sage hall and ask Nahora to teach him, too? How do sages find boys who can wield divine power? She’s never seen Doha do anything out of the ordinary.
Maybe Nakegora was wrong, and Doha is an ordinary human, like his mother.
Maybe that’s why no one has come for them.
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A few months later, the new boy walks into the forge.
“Need to buy some nails,” the boy says, when Rim stops hammering and turns to him.
“You’ve come down with Master Nahora from Pilju?” she asks, as Doha puts aside the bellows and fetches a box of nails from the storage shelf.
“Came down by myself,” the child mutters.
“I’m Doha. What’s your name?” her son asks.
“Ye- Jeokyeon. I’m Jeokyeon, Master Nahora’s student.”
Doha peppers Jeokyeon with questions about the sage hall until the other boy exchanges a few coins for the nails and hurriedly takes his leave.
“Mother,” Doha says, watching him go. “Do you think I could climb up to Pilju Hall someday?”
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Doha and the rest of the village boys are incredibly curious about the standoffish newcomer. He visits the village every few weeks, buying supplies and returning to the mountain. Then he doesn’t appear for months, and the word in the village is that Master Nahora has taken him to the palace to become a prince.
One night, Rim holds her son in her arms and cries. He hugs her back and asks what’s wrong.
“I miss your father,” she tells him.
“What was he like?”
“He’s the most beautiful, generous, kind man I’ve ever known.”
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Jeokyeon returns from the palace just before the winter snows close the mountain passes.
He stops by the smithy on his way back to the sage hall. Snowflakes swirl around his feet onto the floor.
“Hi!” Doha bounces up to the other boy. “Welcome back! Do I call you ‘your highness’ now? What was the palace like? Are there lots of other princes? Are they nice? Did you make lots of friends there? Are classes there really hard? Did you meet the emperor? …”
A flood of questions washes over Jeokyeon, who stares at Doha very thoughtfully.
Rim sets a pair of hot tongs down very carefully on the anvil and turns to Nahora’s student.
Jeokyeon looks up at her, expression blank.
“Welcome back to Pilju, your highness,” Rim says. Doha cuts off his stream of questions when she speaks.
“If I may ask a question… did you meet a man named Master Nakegora at the palace?”
“Who?” Jeokyeon must not recognize the name.
“The emperor’s mentor,” Rim explains.
Jeokyeon appears to ponder the question. After a moment, he blinks as if remembering something, and says, “The emperor’s mentor died when the empress did. That’s what I heard the court ladies say.”
Rim’s world tilts on its axis.
“Mother!” she hears, and small hands are catching her as she faints.
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When she wakes up, on the floor of the smithy, the first thing she notices is that she’s been buried under a small mountain of blankets. The floor of the workshop is still very cold.
Two worried boys peer closely at her.
“Mother! Are you awake? What happened?”
“I – I’m sorry for frightening you, Doha, I’m all right.” Rim shifts the blankets over and sits up, tucking a fuzzy woolen one around her shoulders.
Jeokyeon sits back on his heels and eyes her doubtfully. “You fainted.”
Rim falls back on her breathing exercises to stay calm. “I’m sorry I frightened you. Jeokyeon, I need to speak to your master.”
Jeokyeon nods. “I’ll tell him as soon as I get home. You’d better not try to climb the mountain if you’re not feeling well.”
Rim nods.
She needs to start packing, after all.
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Jeokyeon shivers and tucks small hands around the steaming cup of tea Master Nahora offers.
“Did you enjoy the palace?” he asks.
“It’s awful and I hate it,” Jeokyeon says. “That’s why I came back before winter. I’ll just get snowed in here so I have an excuse not to come back until spring.”
“How enterprising of you, my student.” Master Nahora sips his tea.
Jeokyeon sips neatly at her tea, too. Palace manners; no slurping.
“That blacksmith’s kid looks just like the emperor,” Jeokyeon says, putting down the teacup. “And then she asked me if I’d met the emperor’s mentor. When I told her that he’d died, she fainted.” The small child frowns. “What does that mean?”
“Ah,” Master Nahora sighs. “Is that what happened? I suppose I should have involved myself sooner.”
“Involved yourself? What’s going on? You said you never get involved.”
Master Nahora finishes his tea and rises, walking to the broad stairs that lead down the mountain to the village.
“What? Where are you going so late? I just got here!” Jeokyeon protests.
Master Nahora turns slightly as he descends. “It’s past time I paid a visit to the blacksmith empress, my student. Stay here and rest if you like.”
“WHAT?” shrieks his student, knocking over the tea in her haste to jump up and follow.
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Doha flutters around his mother. Rim has pulled out several packs and directs Doha to fetch her one thing after another. Clothes. Food from the pantry. Cooking tools. The little bit of money she’s saved up.
“Are we going somewhere?” asks Doha, fretfully. “Mother, what’s wrong?”
Someone knocks on the door. Doha springs over to open it and gasps.
The master sage of Pilju Hall bows. Behind him, Jeokyeon looks confused but follows suit.
“May we enter?” the sage asks.
“Welcome, sir,” Doha says. “Hi, your highness.”
Jeokyeon stays half-hidden behind his mentor and stares at Doha.
Rim tucks a roll of eating utensils into the pack and turns to greet their guests. “Master Nahora, come in.”
“Thank you, your majesty,” he replies.
“WHAT?!” shrieks Doha.
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Candles burn late into the night in the village smithy. Rim sees no reason why she should not tell the tale, since Nahora already knows her identity.
Doha’s eyes are as big as saucers.
His father is the emperor?
The sage halls sound terrifying.
Doha wants to say that he’d rather stay here on the mountain, but his mother is clearly planning to leave as soon as possible.
When Rim and Doha depart the next morning, Jeokyeon goes with them.
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Snow flurries chase the travelers down the mountain slopes. Rim had intended to camp at night to save her sparse coin for food, but Jeokyeon solemnly shakes his head.
“I’m a prince. I can pay for lodging, your majesty.” Looking up at Rim through a fringe of dark hair, the small child says, “It wouldn’t be right for the empress to sleep outside.”
Touched by this kindness from the child, Rim accepts. “We mustn’t use our titles outside the palace,” she says. “Call me Rim, Jeokyeon.”
Jeokyeon leaves the bed to Rim and Doha, taking only a thin blanket to wrap around himself on the inn floor.
Doha is fast asleep at her side when Rim hears the faint sounds of a child crying. She looks over at the small form curled up in one corner.
“Mother, mother,” a tiny voice calls, choked with despair and grief.
Rim slides out of bed, padding quietly across the room, and gently touches Jeokyeon’s shoulder. The boy is asleep, but tears run down the small face.
Strong arms slip under Jeokyeon, and Rim carries him back to the inn’s bed with her and tucks him in beside Doha. There’s plenty of room for two small boys and a slim woman in this bed, and Rim sees no reason for the little princeling to suffer alone. He’s very warm, despite having been sleeping on the cold floor, and Doha curls around him as Rim tucks the blanket over them all.
The rest of the night passes in peaceful slumber.
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Jeokyeon looks embarrassed, wiggling out from between Rim and Doha as soon as he wakes in the morning, muttering apologies for being a nuisance.
“Nonsense,” Rim says. “You’ve been kind enough to come with us, Jeokyeon. There’s no need for you to sleep on the floor, and I should never have allowed it in the first place.”
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Doha had spent their first day on the road interrogating Jeokyeon about the palace, Hanryeo Hall, the Hall of Great Joy, and his own personal palace within the greater palace complex.
When they set off on the second day, Jeokyeon asks Rim, “Doha is going to have to take the tests when we arrive, isn’t he?”
“Tests?!” Doha exclaims.
“I think so,” Rim says. “Jeokyeon, can you tell us what it was like?”
“They measure your spiritual power with this little table thing you put your hand on and it makes light shoot up,” Jeokyeon says. “Then there’s a written exam, on the palace rules,” Jeokyeon pauses. “Doha, you can write, can’t you?”
Doha looks extremely nervous. “A little? I haven’t practiced much.” He’d learned from Rim by using a stick to trace lines in the ashes from the forge.
“You’ll need a sage mentor anyway, I’m sure he’ll help you practice while you learn all the rules,” Jeokyeon says.
“Are there a lot?”
“Yeah, kinda. And some of them are stupid,” Jeokyeon says. “It took me two weeks to read through all the books Master Nahora had. I did okay on the test.”
“You did? What did you score?”
Jeokyeon looks a little bashful. “I’m the third prince,” he says, rubbing the back of his neck. “But I guess after you get officially presented, I’ll be fourth.”
“I don’t think I’m going to do well enough to score higher than you, Jeokyeon.”
“The emperor’s son is always first prince,” Rim says. They are the only travelers on the road at the moment, so it’s safe enough to discuss this.
Doha looks a little green around the gills, so Rim asks Jeokyeon to tell them about some of the other princes he’s met at the palace.
“Do you think we’ll be friends with them?” asks Doha.
Jeokyeon gives Doha a sideways glance. “We might be called brothers, but we’re all enemies,” the child says.
Rim winces. Doha has grown up with village children, in a much smaller village than Rim’s hometown. There aren’t any street gangs or blood feuds in Pilju Village; Doha’s never had to be careful of other children before.
“I’m afraid Jeokyeon is right,” Rim says, when Doha looks disbelieving. “You’re all competing for the throne.”
“Why are you helping us, then?” Doha challenges. He crosses his arms and stares at Jeokyeon, effect ruined when he has to jog to catch back up with his mother’s long strides.
Jeokyeon merely glances up at Rim, then stares back at Doha. “I’m going to be emperor after the trials anyway, even if you are the first prince,” he says confidently. “You might be the emperor’s son, but you’re really just a village kid, same as me. I’m not scared of you.”
Doha looks like he can’t decide whether or not to be insulted by this, and Rim can hardly contain her laughter at the sight of a tiny prince glaring down his nose at her bewildered son.
Maybe Doha will have a friend in the palace, after all.
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The nearer they travel to the capital, the more crowded the roads become. Rim is glad of Jeokyeon’s generosity in paying for lodging every night – winter has overtaken them and the nights are cold.
Jeokyeon tried to protest sleeping in the same bed as the empress and the emperor’s son at every overnight stop for a week, but Rim gently insists their benefactor cannot sleep on the floor. One particularly cold night, Doha shivers even under the blankets and crossly says, “If I’m the emperor’s son and my mom’s the empress, then you should listen to us and get over here before we freeze. You’re really warm. It’s like sleeping next to the forge.”
Startled, Jeokyeon lets Rim guide him to the middle of the scratchy straw mattress and doesn’t protest when Doha promptly grabs onto him with all four limbs.
“Do you miss it, Doha?” Rim asks softly, sliding under the blankets and making sure the children are tucked in tightly. She too has noticed Jeokyeon’s constant fever-like warmth and the ashy scent the boy carries, even after bathing.
Doha just nods and curls around Jeokyeon more tightly. Rim pats the other boy’s hair. “Thank you for indulging us, Jeokyeon,” she says. “I won’t forget your kindness.” Tucked between them, the little prince finally relaxes, and Rim watches over them both as they sleep.
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The palace walls loom over the travelers when they arrive. The guards recognize Jeokyeon at once – the boy’s striking looks must have been quite the talk of the court when Nahora presented him. Rim has been anxious about their arrival, wondering what to say to the guards if they don’t recognize her.
It’s a moot point; Jeokyeon merely tells them that the others are with him, and the guards let them through.
Once they’re in, Jeokyeon pauses in an empty courtyard. “Do you know where to go from here?” he asks Rim. “My palace is that way,” he points, “But the emperor’s palace is over there somewhere.” Jeokyeon waves a hand in the other direction.
“I know the way,” Rim says. It’s all coming back to her with every step she takes on smooth stone pavers. “Thank you so much for your help, Jeokyeon.”
Doha nods, his eyes wide and drinking in every detail of the palace. “I’ll see you again soon, right?” he asks.
“Yeah, in class,” Jeokyeon says. “See you later, your majesty, your highness.” He bows and trots off.
“Class,” Doha says, sounding a little faint.
Rim takes her son’s hand, and begins walking. “Yes. But first, let’s go find your father.” She turns down the path that will lead not to the emperor and empress’s palaces, but to the buildings that house the court offices and the emperor’s throne room. Court will be in session at this time of day, and she doesn’t intend to waste another second before she sees Hwa again.
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The guards stationed by the courtyard gates stop them just short of their destination. There are many servants and officials bustling about, and Rim and Doha’s simple traveling clothes stand out like a banner proclaiming they don’t belong here. Doha hides behind his mother’s skirts, overwhelmed.
Rim stares haughtily at the guard blocking her way. He’s a young man, young enough that he might not have worked in the palace six years ago.
“Call for General Heuk-yeong,” she commands. “The emperor’s attendant knows me.” A firm grip on Doha’s shoulder pulls the boy out from behind her. “Look at my child, then take word to the general quickly.”
Doha glances shyly up at the imposing guard, who goes pale as snow and stammers, “M-my lady, please wait here...” Spinning around, he grabs the nearest court lady and hisses something in her ear that makes her gasp and run through the gates.
Another guard says nervously, “Would you like to come with us to the guard house, my lady? We can serve you and your son tea while you wait for the general.”
“I will wait here,” Rim declares. A crowd has begun to gather, whispering about Doha’s purple hair. Rim’s own bright red locks are tucked back, under the raised hood of her cloak.
A querulous voice rises from behind the gathered onlookers. “What is the meaning of this unseemly display? Don’t you all have work to do? Clear the gateway!” An elderly minister followed by his servant carrying documents strides up through the parting crowd.
Rim turns to look at him. “Good day, Minister Ju,” she says. The servant drops his scrolls, which hit the stone with a clatter and roll in all directions.
“Your majesty!” he cries, and faints into his aide’s arms.
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Some in the crowd have shrieked as if they’ve seen a vengeful ghost walking under the sun, and a swell of babbled questions breaks out. The guards have rushed to step between Rim and the crowd, and Doha has tucked himself as firmly as he can into his mother’s side. She gently puts a hand on his back, but otherwise remains unmoved, gazing at the crowd impassively.
Heuk-yeong comes striding up from the other side of the gate, a fierce frown on his face. A court lady runs along behind him, but the guards stop her from approaching.
As soon as he crosses through the gauntlet surrounding Rim, the frown melts into utter astonishment.
“Your – your majesty!” he cries. Rim reaches out, and he takes her hand, staring at it as if he can’t believe it. “How – how can you be alive?” he asks, his face pale. A brutal scar traces its way across his face from his jaw to his forehead, just missing his eye where it crosses the bridge of his nose.
“When my procession was attacked, I fled,” Rim says. Mindful of the crowd of listening ears, she says, “I needed to keep his majesty’s son safe. Now that he’s old enough, I’ve brought him to the palace.”
Heuk-yeong looks down at the boy hiding in Rim’s skirts, the attendant’s eyes shining with unshed tears. “Come with me,” he says. “I’ll bring you to the emperor at once.”
Rim takes her son by the hand, and follows General Heuk-yeong as he leads them across the courtyard and through the corridors that will take them to the throne.
To Hwa.
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Heuk-yeong bids the guards at the imposing throne room entryway to open the huge, ornate doors. Eyes wide, they obey. Court is in full session, the throne room full of ministers and officials murmuring.
Silence falls as Rim and Doha follow Heuk-yeong across the grand audience chamber. Rim’s hand tightens on her son’s and her eyes go immediately to the figure seated at the other end of the hall, straining for every last detail she can drink in.
Her beloved husband looks just the same. A faint smile sits on his face. As they approach the dais, Rim sees that it doesn’t reach his eyes.
“What’s this?” he asks Heuk-yeong, tilting his head. The motion is so familiar it makes Rim want to cry.
Instead, she reaches up and sweeps the cloak off, shaking red locks to fall over her shoulders.
“I’m sorry I’m late coming home, your majesty,” she says, before her throat closes with emotion and tears start trickling down her cheeks.
But it’s all right, she doesn’t need to say anything else, because Hwa has leapt off the throne and pulled her into his arms, and he’s crying, too.
Outside, rain pours from the sky – but every tree in the palace has burst into bloom for the first time in six years.