Chapter 27: A Promise and the Moonlit Pond

Though she had sent her only son into the palace and spent countless nights awake with worry, this was the first time Hwaun had appeared in Suk-jin’s dreams. Yeon Ju-won looked on with a startled face as Suk-jin nonchalantly unfastened the jade pendant at her waist and continued speaking.

“He appeared with a bright, smiling face—one I haven’t seen since he was a small child.”

“……”

“He said just one thing: that he is alright now, so I should not worry.”

The son in her dream had turned away so quickly she hadn’t even had the chance to ask more. His receding steps looked so light, as if he might fly away, that she didn’t even feel the urge to follow him. Ruminating on the strange mixture of sorrow and relief she felt upon waking in the dawn, Suk-jin spoke like a sigh.

“Perhaps it is merely a petty trick of mine to comfort myself, but…”

“Wife…”

“Even so, seeing him smile and tell me not to worry… it stings my heart, yet I find myself comforted.”

She couldn’t understand why the child, who never showed so much as a shadow of himself when her tears wouldn’t dry from daily worry, had finally appeared in her dreams now. On one hand, a sudden wave of anxiety struck her. To meet a son who was alive and well in a dream—a lingering sense of uncanny dissonance remained in Suk-jin’s heart.

“…I wonder if he is only now worrying about a mother who cannot discard her anxiety despite the continuous good news…”

Yet, despite these few lingering concerns, Suk-jin spent a peaceful day today for the first time in a very long while. Absurd premonitions that she dared not utter aloud brushed through her mind several times, but they did not make her heart fearful or painful as they had in the past. Suk-jin spent the day sitting there, letting the scattered thoughts flow by without trying to organize them clearly.

“My Lord…”

Suk-jin, who had been lost in thought alone for a moment, lifted her gaze and looked straight at Yeon Ju-won. In her eyes was the same firmness Ju-won had always seen before Hwaun entered the Imperial Palace. Ju-won replied.

“Speak, wife.”

“During this time, I have resented you truly deeply. Even knowing it was not the duty of a wife, I simply could not stop.”

“…Since it was I who chose that path knowing the truth, it is only natural that I listen to your resentment.”

“If we are to live, rather than die, we cannot live like this. So… give me just one promise in this place.”

Suk-jin had resented Ju-won all this time for stubbornly sending Hwaun to the palace, but deep down, Suk-jin also knew. Even if Ju-won had blocked it and kept Hwaun here, that child would not have been happy.

Hwaun’s obsession with the Emperor was not of an ordinary level. If they had blocked his entry into the palace under the pretext of his own good and sent Song-un as planned, Hwaun was a child who would have vomited blood on the spot, resenting everyone until he died.

However, even knowing that, whenever she heard stories of how much her son was hated in the Imperial Palace, Suk-jin could not endure it without resenting someone. When she thought of her son, in a place she couldn’t even reach to stop him, bullying innocent people and accumulating bad karma. When she thought of that child, who loved the Emperor so much yet received not a single grain of affection, spending his nights alone after being turned away.

Then, would it not have been better for him to simply die here in his mother’s arms? Rather than living with the ridicule and resentment of everyone, would it not have been a better life to wither away here, embracing his own heart that faded without even a chance to try? She couldn’t help but think such things. And so, Suk-jin had no choice but to endure by blaming everything on Yeon Ju-won.

Ju-won did not offer a verbal answer but quietly waited for Suk-jin’s next words. Suk-jin spoke.

“If you ever come to learn anything regarding Hwaun… no matter what it is, please tell me everything without omission.”

Standing there listening to her, Ju-won thought of the Emperor, who recently looked at him with difficult eyes as if there were words he couldn’t quite bring himself to say. Ju-won had known the Emperor since he was a young prince, before he had even become the Crown Prince. Reading that much from the Emperor’s eyes and demeanor was nothing to him.

“Do not use the excuse that it is for my sake, nor for the sake of the country. I am your wife and Hwaun’s only mother. Do not try to hide anything concerning that child from me.”

Ju-won knew the Emperor would one day tell him the words he was currently hiding. It was just that he wasn’t ready yet. Every time Ju-won faced the Emperor, he was preparing his heart to hear a story so immense that the Sovereign hesitated to speak it even to him, of all people. And Suk-jin was demanding that he not hide that story from her.

“If you only promise me this… I too shall withdraw my resentment toward you and fulfill the duties of a wife that I have neglected.”

“……”

“Can you promise me this…?”

In truth, if one were to consider the rules of the household or the laws of the land, Yeon Ju-won could have blamed and scolded Suk-jin as much as he wished. Even if Ju-won had truly committed a wrong, he was a man with the power to rule his household according to his will.

Nevertheless, the reason Ju-won had endured Suk-jin’s resentment until now was because he understood her heart. Even if his decision was a thousand times right for his lord and his country, he acknowledged that as the head of a family and the father of a child, it was a choice of peerless cruelty. Perhaps Ju-won, too, had been alleviating his own petty guilt by listening to Suk-jin’s resentment.

And here, they stood before an opportunity to leave behind long-standing, deep-seated emotions. Ju-won silently looked at his wife, who had grown old alongside him for a long time. Suk-jin was not a woman who didn’t know that Yeon Ju-won would prioritize the Emperor over a promise to her. Her saying this meant this was likely the last chance she would give him.

Eventually, Ju-won let out a long sigh and slowly opened his mouth toward Suk-jin.

“…I shall promise.”

“……”

“At the very least, if it is a matter concerning that child… I shall tell you everything without hiding a thing.”

Suk-jin’s eyes shook violently upon hearing Ju-won’s answer. It seemed even she hadn’t expected Ju-won to make such a promise. Seeing Suk-jin’s reaction—which looked more confused than if he had refused the proposal—Ju-won let out an uncharacteristically light laugh.

For a very long time, he had lived as the Emperor’s subject rather than this woman’s husband. It was not a life he regretted, but there was no way to be without apologies. He simply endured the apologies as hypocrisy, as he was born to a life that could only be lived that way in the future.

“…I will certainly do so.”

Ju-won spoke again, as if making a vow to himself. Ju-won kept the image of Suk-jin’s face—unable to even answer, nodding with eyes full of tears—deep in his heart for a very long time.

Until that future moment when he would hear the unbelievable story from the Emperor.

Hwaun stood by the pond of Jeong-an Palace, where all the flowers had withered, quietly watching the night settle over the ripples of the water. He knew the servants of Jeong-an Palace still recoiled at the mere mention of the pond, but to Hwaun, this was not a terrifying space where he had nearly lost his life several times.

A memory surfaced of a man who had sat in this spot long ago, weeping sorrowfully as if the world were collapsing. Back then, it was a nightmare. It was fear. That man was always in the dreams that tormented Hwaun. Hwaun believed that as long as he lived under this name, he would never be able to escape that same nightmare for the rest of his life.

It was the same even after he confessed his identity to Ihan. Hwaun had received forgiveness from Ihan, but he had not received forgiveness from the ‘Yeon Hwaun.’ Hwaun had merely gained the strength to overcome that terrible guilt and nightmare through Ihan.

However, the man who wept so sorrowfully that night no longer appeared in Hwaun’s dreams. This was true even though Hwaun’s guilt had not entirely vanished. In the cycle of seasons where the flowers Hwaun planted by this pond bloomed and withered, he had not encountered him in his nightmares even once.

Hwaun blamed his own shamelessness for this. Because the Emperor had forgiven him. Because he had accepted Hwaun as he was. He thought it was because he had allowed his guilt to lighten without even realizing it.

Hwaun still did not believe he deserved to enjoy all of this, yet just as he was adapting with surprising naturalness to treating the children of Jeong-an Palace, the elders, and the Emperor… he thought that, regardless of his will, he was shamelessly forgetting his guilt toward the original owner of this body.

“If there are days when your sorrow overflows, you may come to resent me… it is alright…”

The moonlight reflected in the pond wavered with the wind, and Hwaun spoke in a whisper while watching it. Since even Ajin had taken a position far away at Hwaun’s command, the only one who could hear those words would be the invisible presence there.

“I am still… a sinner before you, Mama…”

But regardless of the punishment he deserved, Hwaun truly wished for that person to be at peace. He wanted him to find rest. He hoped he would no longer sit alone in such a place on a cold night, weeping in secret.

“You may blame me, resent me, and curse me as much as you like, Mama…”

Hwaun inhaled the wind deeply and closed his eyes.

‘However, what I wish for even more fervently… is that you may forget all that sadness and find rest…’

And just as he carved one more wish deep into his heart—a wish he was too ashamed to utter aloud—a voice spoke.

“Look at this. Is it any wonder your master has developed such a troublesome habit?”