11. Iseul
The following day passed byuneventfully, and without Wonsik to converse with, I had kept mostly to myself, reviewing all that I knew about Nameless Flower. By dinnertime, I could smell from my room the bitter scent of the meals prepared. Chogeun mokpi, Yul had called it—the coarse and miserable food relied on by the poor and desperate. Once, I would have refused to even eat a spoonful, but I knew now that to miss a single meal would result in debilitating weakness.
As I left my room, I nearly stepped on a book lying outside my door. The pages were bound by five stitches, the cover faded yellow. Picking it up and flipping it open, I found a note:
The first thing you must learn is how to think like an investigator. We will discuss.
—Wonsik
Annoyance twisted through me. Instead of offering me a short route to the truth, he was taking me the long way around, compelling me to discern the truth for myself. I had even tried to do what he had asked—I had spent the entire night holding on to the bead, asking myself why a dying man would cling to it, and the effort had resulted in nothing but frustration.
Sitting down before one of the tables out in the yard, I let out a huff and flipped through the book, titled Muwonrok: The Treatise on Forensic Medicine. The first chapter explored ways in which to prevent the unjustified death of a human being, relying on traditional knowledge and forensic investigation. The second listed all the causes of death, from common ones such as death by strangulation to death by stabbing, or more outlandish ways, such as death by lightning strike, by boiling water, by live burial, by tiger, and so on. My appetite had vanished by the time my meal arrived, and the thought of corpses filled my thoughts as I chewed on the bitter, overly tough mugwort mixed in soybean paste soup.
A shadow settled before me.
I looked up to see Yeongho. His entire troupe had gathered in the yard, clustered around a table where they sat rubbing their hands in anticipation of food.
“What are you doing here?” I asked.
“Madam Yul always feeds our troupe whenever we perform in this village.” He plucked the book from my hand, flipping it aside to glance at the title. He arched a brow and let out a low whistle. “An intellect are you, reading such books out of amusement?”
“How could anyone find such a book amusing?” I said dryly. My sister would have loved it.
He snapped my book shut and set it down next to my empty bowl. Perching his elbow on my table, he leaned forward. “Well? I have come to collect your story.”
“I do not want to talk about it.”
He opened a golden pouch—the same color as his sash band—took a pinch of a white substance and ate it. “You owe me a story.”
My stare returned to the pouch. “What is that?” I asked.
“It is limestone powder.”
“That sounds terribly salty.”
“Mother used it to make delicious confectionery for me.” He smacked his lips together, then looked away as he murmured. “My mother is dead, too.”
I stiffened.
“I assume both of your parents are dead, since you are roaming about alone,” he continued. “Shall I tell you my story, then?”
“No.”
“I was destined for a bright future, like many of us, until the one-eyed dragon—” he leaned in and dropped his voice “—that will be our moniker for the king—” he raised his voice again “—ruined our lives. I was devastated, nearly at the brink of death, when I was taken in by the troupe out of pity. The troupe, and this inn even, is a place for those like us.”
I quirked an eyebrow. “Us?”
“Those who are without a home, without a family.” He smiled, yet a painful note strained his voice. “And without a future.”
“Without a future…,” I whispered. No young person had any future in this kingdom. All that consumed our minds was whether we would even live to see tomorrow.
The Muwonrok pulled at my attention, and I continued to look at it as Yeongho and his troupe devoured their meals, then bid us good day. I watched the way the setting sun pooled over the cover, half in light, half in shadows. The book felt like Wonsik holding out his hand, his offer that I learn from him. That I trust him.
I flipped through it idly again, the sour scent of aged paper perfuming the air.
It was a tedious book, and half the time, utterly incomprehensible. I nevertheless continued with my reading and was a quarter of the way through it when I heard a great yawn from the street beyond the inn’s gate. A farmer was returning home, pulling along his wagon. It was nearly nightfall, the last rays of light fading, rendering the pages difficult to read.
I returned to my room and lit a candle. Setting the book before me, I unplaited my hair and brushed through the locks, running the comb from my scalp all the way down to my waist. My hair, among my other vanities, was an indulgence I could not bring myself to abandon, even after the passing of both my parents. But tonight, I stopped at the fiftieth stroke.
Let there be no resentment, the book seemed to whisper, lying there in the shadow.
I tossed aside the brush, grabbed the book, and rushed out of my room. I walked down the veranda that wrapped around the inn, then settled myself close to the bright lantern hanging from the eaves. The sky was not yet completely dark, but a deep, washed-out gray.
I drew my long hair behind my shoulders, then flipped the book open again. I would do whatever it took to bring Suyeon home, even if it meant reading and memorizing the most dreary book I had ever perused.
A warm gust of wind billowed by, rustling the pages.
The sound of footsteps crunched across the innyard.
My dancing hair obscured my vision; I tucked the strands behind my ears and looked up.
My heart stuttered.
A young man strode across the innyard, moving with a grace that few men possessed. His hat was tilted to shield his face from the lantern light, and his tall figure was garbed in silk, inwoven with golden threads.
I set my book aside, and at my slight movement, he glanced my way. My breath caught. His falcon-sharp eyes sent a jolt of terror down my back.
I bolted to my feet and crossed the yard, away from my room that could easily be invaded, and into the kitchen, where I hoped to find Yul. She was not there. The kitchen was swamped in shadows and the dim glow of a burning furnace. I was utterly alone, and my limbs froze as I heard footsteps approaching.
Stay alive, Mother’s words urged me, as the memory of his arrow rushed past my left ear, so loud that my knees buckled as I retreated deeper into the kitchen. Stay alive, no matter what.
My hands fumbled through the darkness and stopped at a kitchen knife. The blade glowed red in the furnace light, and Mother’s blood dripped into my mind. Even as a crimson stream had dribbled from her mouth, she had continued to cry, Stay alive. Stay alive.
A hand touched my shoulder.
I whirled around. My knife hovered before his throat as I stared up into what felt like the endless night, for his expression was just as dark and impenetrable.
His fingers wrapped around my knife-holding hand, and my entire body stiffened with fear. “You are shaking. Have you ever killed a man before?”
“I will make you my first”—my damned voice trembled—“if you do not release me.”
“It is nearly impossible to kill with a knife unless you know precisely where to stab. Either you bury the blade beneath my ribs and stab my heart, or…” He leaned forward, his face so close to mine, as he pressed the blade to his throat. “You cut me right where the blood flows.”
“Daegam mocks me.”
In one smooth motion, he gave my wrist a quick twist, disarming me easily. He kicked the knife away, and it went skidding out of the kitchen. I rushed for the entrance, but he blocked it with his body.
“This is the second time that I have had to disarm you,” he murmured. “I hope this will not become the norm each time our paths cross.”
“This will be our last.”
“Will it?”
“What—” my voice rasped as I took a step back. “What do you want from me?”
“What are you doing here, away from home?”
“It is no concern of yours,” I growled.
“You are right, it is no concern of mine…” His eyes were dark and intent. “But I admit—your presence here raises many questions, and I am, by nature, prone to curiosity. You traveled all the way here by a rudimentary map, crossed the king’s hunting territory, to come to the capital.” He placed on the kitchen table my map, opened and revealing the sketch. “I was informed that a young lady here had procured an arrow wound on the same day of our own incident.” He picked up the map and flipped it around, staring down at my drawing. “Did you come for this girl? Your friend? No… your sister?”
My face and neck grew hot. I snatched the document and lowered my gaze to the floor.
“I say this out of kindness: You ought to consider your sister dead. You will never free her from the king.”
His words slammed into my chest. “I will not,” I snapped, as much to him as to myself. Hot tears rushed to my eyes, tingling my nose, but I kept my voice steady. “When someone you love is taken, you go into the den of the tiger. You go to the ends of the kingdom and across. You go to where they are. You find them—no matter the cost.”
“So you will steal her from the king?”
“She is my sister!”
“Do as you wish,” he murmured, turning to leave. “I will not stop you. Neither will I assist you.”
I stood in the darkness, the meager light of the furnace dancing across the wall. Of course you will not help me, I thought, still shaking. Why would you, when rumors claim you murdered your own flesh and blood?
“Daegam,” came a gruff voice outside. “What brings you here?”
I peered out from the shadowy kitchen, and my lips parted at the sight of Wonsik bowing to the prince with such reverence. When he drew himself back up, I saw his face in the lantern light, the way his lashes remained lowered in submission, not daring to look into the face of a royal.
“Have you any intelligence on Min Hyukjin’s whereabouts?” the prince asked.
“Not yet. I received your note. He did not arrive for his duty at the palace. And when I visited his residence, a servant informed me he had indeed rushed out at daybreak and did not return. He left this note behind. It was half burned.”
Prince Daehyun looked at the note. “It is from his younger sister. She writes that she is running away from the palace… But it cannot be her. She was in the palace being interrogated this morning with the rest of the attendants. Who knew of their familial relationship?”
“He spoke of her often when she was with us three… And once, she sneaked out and came to the inn to meet him here. But more important, the note—it is the same handwriting as Nameless Flower’s.”
The prince at once tensed, and the man he had been inside the kitchen was no more. No studied casualness to his tone, the biting coldness to it gone. There was, instead, a warm depth of concern to his voice. He seemed like an entirely different person.
“So I followed his trail,” Wonsik continued, “and the last person to see him was a farmer; the man saw Min Hyukjin riding into Mount Acha.”
“Come,” the prince whispered, “we must leave at once.”
I watched as they took horses from the stable at the back of the inn, and they rode out with bows secured to their backs and cased arrows strapped to their horses. Once they were gone, I walked toward my room, then paused. They were going to go find the killer, and if the killer was the only path to my sister, then I ought to accompany them as well.
As I rushed to the stable to borrow a horse, I knew I was being reckless, following those two men to Mount Acha. But risking my life was easier than sitting alone in the silence of my thoughts. For if I was not running, if I was not charging forward, I feared that self-loathing would corner me. And I refused to feel defeat when I had barely even begun.