Struggle Chapter 100

It was only that he hoped Taerok, upon belatedly learning the members of the party, would not be troubled for no reason.

“No, perhaps he is not one to do such a thing….”

Chewing repeatedly on the bitter herb, Nanyoung suddenly laughed.

“I beg your pardon, Young master, I did not hear you.”

“It’s nothing, Sim Eung. It was not meant for you.”

It was meant for Taerok.

Taerok had, after all, conveyed his heart to him without a confession. But tender affection would not change the fundamental nature of the man called Lee Taerok, and Nanyoung could not even imagine such a thing. So even if he was displeased and would interrogate him upon his return, he would not agonize anxiously over what had already occurred. And his uncle, too… no, precisely because he was his uncle, he would know well. That Nanyoung could no longer even feel arousal unless it was through his uncle’s touch and gaze.

“Haa… I’ve truly become a cripple.”

Fortunately, Sim Eung had just stepped out, so Nanyoung murmured freely.

The sound of water, now so familiar it was utterly tiresome, once again filled Nanyoung’s ears.

His body was on a ship upon the sea, but his heart was in his uncle’s palace. Nanyoung closed his eyes and placed his heart upon the sound of the waves.

At last, he was ready to die. Ready to cast away Grand Prince Heonui Lee Nanyoung entirely.

∞ ∞ ∞

They say time flows so fast there is no chance to grasp it, but for a while, that saying did not apply to Taerok.

The season had changed, and now it was reaching deep winter. In preparation for wintering, the tree branches had dried and stiffened until the twigs were sharp as blades, and the leaves were so brittle they seemed they would crumble if grasped, yet even before one could grasp them, they soon fell to the ground. At the sound of the rustling dead leaves, Taerok suddenly stood rooted to the spot.

“Haa….”

Weariness, boredom, and an anxiety that had seeped into his very bones drew forth a sigh, unbecomingly flippant. It was behavior that befitted neither decorum nor dignity. Yet Taerok, in his mind, repeated this with irritation: Dignity, what dignity, for a bastard who is bedding his own nephew, thirteen years his junior?

Besides, this thirst was all caused by that very nephew, so did not the head and tail of the reason match up in its own way?

Waiting for Nanyoung, Taerok felt as if calluses were forming all over his body. “He will return soon, he will return soon,” they said, but the fact that this “soon” seemed within reach yet ungraspable only irritated him further.

“The season has already changed.”

Frowning delicately, Taerok reached out his hand and toyed with a single leaf that was barely hanging on. Even before it fell at his touch, the leaf crumbled completely. Bending his head to pick up the stem that fluttered down alone, Taerok rummaged through the soft bed of fallen leaves, and at the sudden pain that scratched his fingertip, he parted his lips with a soft “Ah.”

“What is….”

A roughly cut mark appeared on his fingertip. It was neither deep nor large, but it was a strangely unpleasant pain that sent a momentary chill down his spine.

“I’m making all sorts of trivial mistakes.”

From the start, his very act of deciding to pick up a dead leaf was unlike him. Clicking his tongue, Taerok turned to end this disagreeable walk.

And after taking a few steps, he suddenly looked back. With a rigidly hardened expression, he stared at the spot that had wounded his hand, then shook his head and turned away again. As if refusing to entertain a foolish and ill-omened thought, his sleeves flapped roughly. Yet the end of that stride was far from refreshed.

After that, an ominous wind pursued him.

∞ ∞ ∞

What had merely seemed a winter breeze began to turn unsettling around the time the sun was setting. All the lanterns hung from the eaves were taken down, and the floor lamps on the veranda were all extinguished. The fire watch, at times like this, hugged water buckets and nodded off, preparing for the outbreaks of fire that grew more frequent.

Amidst this, Taerok was painting orchids to soothe his elusive sleep, but the sound of this wind, unlike usual, scraped particularly at his ears, chillingly so.

“Why is the sound so peculiarly harsh?”

Clicking his tongue, he feigned calm and tried to grasp his brush again, but once scattered, his concentration had no path back. Above all, even to Taerok, who did not believe in paltry premonitions, that sound felt ominous.

Clicking his tongue again, Taerok set down his brush as if throwing it onto the inkstone. Even when droplets of ink splattered and marred the orchid he had painted in long, sweeping strokes, Taerok did not spare it a glance.

Shoving the door open, he stepped out and sought the aged servant.

“Is Bongsu there?”

Because the weather was foul, Taerok had told him to stay rather than risk injury returning from the palace, and so Bongsu had been in the guest quarters preparing to attend him. Bongsu came out at Taerok’s summons.

“Yes, Young master.”

“The wind is no small matter. If there is damage within my domain, use the servants to render aid without regard for the hour.”

And then Taerok, pausing hesitantly over what he truly meant to command, added.

“And the envoy party should be embarking on their return journey in these days. I worry they might be caught in the midst of these rough seas. Even if it is only rumor, if there is any news, report it to me at once.”

“Yes. I shall bear it firmly in mind.”

Bongsu bowed deeply at the waist.

Yu Bongsu was efficient at directing men. He ordered that squads be formed to inspect every corner, from the neighborhoods where the middle-class folk, whose roofs were especially prone to flying off, lived in clusters, to the back alleys where the lower folk resided. And he especially summoned a swift-footed, small-framed man and secretly ordered him to report at once if any signal fire or the like were lit near the Bongsu garrison.

Taerok, unable to sleep, waited for daybreak. Day broke, and until the sun reached its zenith, no news of the kind Taerok feared was heard. In the meantime, the wind, too, grew still, growing as calm as if its violent sweeping across the earth had been a lie.

‘Was it, after all, nothing but groundless worry?’

Yet an odd unease remained, too persistent to be dismissed as mere groundless worry. Until he could confirm Nanyoung with his own two eyes and hold that body in his arms, the tempest blowing in Taerok’s heart seemed utterly unlikely to subside.

And in the evening, as the sun was slowly, slowly setting, a mounted courier arrived urgently at the capital. The horse was lathered in foam, such was the desperate urgency of the matter. The rider dismounted as if collapsing, retched repeatedly, and only after gulping down several drafts of water could he deliver his message to the capital’s gate captain.

The gate captain’s eyes flew wide at the content conveyed.

“I shall enter the palace. There is no time to waste on changing the watch, so you must keep your wits firmly about you and close the gates at curfew. Do you understand!”

The gate captain hastily received a sealed letter. It had been sent by the governor of Pyeonggok, a fertile land reached only by crossing the river far upstream.

Mounting his own horse, the gate captain entered the palace in an instant, conveying that it was an urgent matter. Passed through the hands of several people, by the time the story finally reached the king, the setting sun had extinguished itself beyond the mountains and night had fully fallen.

And around that time, Taerok, having used his own men to hear the news first, was likewise raising a commotion—though not quite a commotion—demanding to see His Majesty without revealing the content beforehand.

“Did I not say I must see him at once? Do you now disregard and insult a royal kinsman? If you continue to detain me like this, I, too, shall not stand idle.”

Struggling not to shout, his veins bulging on his forehead rather than his neck, Taerok ground out the words through clenched teeth. As he could not enter the palace bearing a sword from the start, he wore no blade or edged weapon at all, yet Taerok habitually gripped his waistband.

The one remaining thread of his reason was likewise on the verge of snapping. The grievous news he had been given was consuming Taerok alone. It spread faster than moss on water during the rainy season.

A ship accident.

The news Taerok had received was that.

‘On the return voyage, the winds and waves grew fierce, and it is reported that instead of the original sea route, they diverted their course further upward. But then the clouds rose, a sudden gust struck, and it is believed that the ship was wrecked at Gwangdolmok, where the currents are treacherous by nature.’

The moment he heard those words, Taerok had bolted from his seat. There was no need to wait. Nor could he.

Having barely entered the palace, Taerok, fortunately thanks to the chief eunuch who had come out upon hearing the rumor, was able to meet the king immediately. The king, too, having just heard the news as he was about to retire, looked utterly distraught. Pale-faced and dressed in comfortable attire, the king descended from the dais where the throne sat and cried out.

“Uncle, Nanyoung has…!”

“Allow me to go.”

Taerok blurted out his purpose without prelude.

“Permit me to go and confirm it.”