In the county of Manno, far northwest of Seorabeol, away from the buzzing merchants and irate shoppers, where the breeze was sweeter, and the grasses were taller and faster, two yellow group nangdos journeyed to a noble man's house for a special mission (coming from the King). Guarded by the foot of the mountain fairies and surrounding thick brick walls, a tiled-roof hanok bungalow of classic Silla design stood low in the middle of a garden filled with magnolias, daisies, and red or lilac dwarf shrubs—with fragrances bringing up the delight of an afternoon nap and a mother's lullaby.
Three purple nangdos on the tall, wooden arc gate. The yellow nangdos bowed. "We have a letter for the royal matron. This is from the King. Is she inside?"
"Yes, she is. We'll check on her."
One of the purple guards went in. He walked down the bermuda grass carpet, passing down five other colleagues standing like tall trees amongst the undergrowth. As he reached the base of the porch, he called. "My Lady, some palace hwarangs are outside. They said they have a letter for you from the King."
The mahogany door growled open and revealed an elderly royal matron. Her gray-dominant hair tucked in a jade hairpin. Indigo robe and aquamarine skirt gleaming brightly under the past-noon sun. She smiled, lines of age spreading elegantly on her round face. "Yes? A letter from the King you say."
"Yes, my lady."
"Why, yes. I will see them."
She tucked her slippers in and reached the gate. "Oh. It's been a while since I've seen a vibrant yellow color. Would you like to go inside for some drinks? Your journey must have been exhausting."
"We respectfully refuse, ma'am. We need to go back shortly. Thank you for your offer."
"As you say."
They gave the letter, wrapped in a red scroll with pink ribbons. The matron dropped her head in a low bow. "Thank you. Well, have a safe trip," the matron wished.
After the nangdos left, the curious lady scampered back to the house and sat on the floor, her arms leaning on a low-to-the-floor table. She opened the letter and read its short yet exhilarating message. Her face brightened as she almost jumped in joy. Right away, she hurried to a closed room and called, "Young Lord, are you awake?" her bright, orotund voice shrilling.
She heard stifle sounds of boots coming in. The door slid open, and there he was—the true owner of the house, a young boy in green, silky robe, standing as tall as the matron's chest (at maximum), his black shiny hair leveled highly in a topknot. A book on his right hand. Pale, round face and turbid, hazel eyes gazing flat at her.
"Yes, Lady Seo?" his undertone voice trying to soften more.
She crouched and waved the letter, lips curving upward in a big smile, "Young Lord, good news! It is a letter from the King. He asks you to go back to the palace and report to his chambers. This is it!"
"I don't see what's good about it." He turned around and tried to shut the door, but his servant held his cold, little hand.
"Lord Jung Min, you can come back to the palace."
"What for?"
"So that you could live your life the way it was before. Play, read books, make new memories like any other kid. Most especially, spend time with your family—your father and your new sister."
Jung Min dunked and shook his head. "That would never happen. My father doesn't want me. He blames me for all his misfortunes in life, including my mother's death. I don't even know what she looked like. Do you?"
"I'm sorry, young lord… but please, don't say those words again. It's not true. Perhaps your father didn't mean it. He loves you. Remember that."
"I have learned to accept that bitter truth when he had me banished when I was seven. This is my home."
"But, Young Master. Give it a chance, please," she purred. "Consider this as the King's humble request to you. Knowing that he wrote this letter to you means that you are important to him. Please don't break the King's heart."
The kid bit his lips, pearls of tears shaking from the corners of his puppy eyes. He wrapped his arms around the matron's neck as he bellowed raspy sobs. "I don't wish to break anyone's heart. I don't wish to break the King's heart! Please don't be mad at me." He ran out of breaths, wheezing, and wailing like a lost fawn in the jungle.
Seo patted his back and cooed, "Oh, young lord. I would never be mad at you. I am sorry. Please don't cry."
The magical power and warmth of a mother figure's embrace pacified the disheartened boy. After a few more strokes, Jung Min snorted and rubbed his eyes, redder than the blood moon. Seo clasped her fingers and smiled, her eyes fuzzy with suppressed tears. "Smile for me, will you?" She cupped his red cheeks. "I miss your cheerful face and your squeals every time you wanted to show me something interesting. Do you remember that earthworm you brought to me while I was cooking for your lunch? I screamed, but you said you wanted to count the stripes on its body."
Jung Min chortled. A small portal into his happy world. "You are a special kid, young lord. I have seen your talents, your wit, and your strengths as a child. You are a brave one. But above all, I am the living witness of your good heart. I will always be here for you, and I will never stop believing in you."
She placed her right palm in Jung Min's chest; the defibrillator to his dying heart. The one that has always charged him with positive outlooks in life. A mother's touch—his only one. With a bright smile on her face, Lady Seo asked Jung Min, "Shall we get ready, Young Lord?"
The young boy chewed his teeth and raised his head. A nod and a flashy white beam.
~~•~~
Back in the palace, as the Prime Minister sauntered down the palace grounds, he paused and raised his right arm. An alert sign for everyone (if you were sleepy, might as well do it forever). He looked behind his matron with steel eyes, and Lady Min scurried. She bowed, "Yes, Your Excellency?"
The Prime Minister wiggled his index finger, signaling Lady Min to come closer. The elderly matron leaned her cheek closer to the Prime Minister's face.
"I will go to the prison.," he whispered.
Min's heart hopped once and almost never returned. "My Lord?" She pulled away, eyes goggling before the Prime Minister whose brows were raised and lips pressed. She gasped, realizing she had used a dulllllllll wire inside her skull. "Right away, Your Excellency!" Her head bobbed like an automated cat scooping for money in the air, as she returned beside other court ladies.
Jung Ho went outside the palace and rode his small, crimson palanquin. With just a few servants and two hwarangdos, his destination: the great evergreen forest, a few miles away from the capital. At first, traveling down the woods was revitalizing. The vibrant colors of the towering living skyscrapers spellbound everyone passing through. Resonant orchestra of the chirping birds perked the tired souls of the servants carrying the palanquin. However, as they moved to the deeper portions of the jungle, unknown to most people, its hidden colors were brutally revealed. Century-old trees with bulging roots over-arched the ground, as lichens and dead foliage had enveloped their gray moribund trunks. The tangled, gnarling thorny vines from one oak-brown tree to another blocked the supernal gleam of light coming from the high sun. A miasmatic hood of putrescent organic matters overthrew the once sweet scents of the spring asters and the chilling mints of eucalyptuses. As visitors of the unwelcoming dimension, all they could do was to save their noses and mouths from awful punishments of the tricky nature.
"Halt!" a hwarangdo ordered, and the servants dropped the palanquin on the floor gently.
The Prime Minister stepped out and walked shortly through tall, withering shrubs, passed through a couple of thigh-level undergrowth, and cleared the witch-brown tangled vines from an enormous fallen timber, giving way to the opening of a secret natural tunnel. Lady Min, carrying a box wrapped in pink silk cloth, on his tail. By the fall of the macabre came another bigger one. An abandoned house, deliberately hidden from the paths of the common folk (as if it was a common track to go through the grotesque portion of the forest). Fallen branches, twigs, and decaying leaves hatted its straw roof. A cover extremely repulsive that could repel any lost traveler. On the inside, however, was a simple, harmless kimchi storage. Loin cloths on top of large earthen pots. Spider webs forming their formal assemblies on the ceilings. Pillars that had once been bedeviled by colonies of nomadic termites.
Another ploy to trick any beasts who wished to pester the place. The real color was revealed when Lady Min removed a pile of dead leaves and branches from the floor, exposing a wooden door. She unlocked it with a silver key and pulled the door open. A piercing squeak like an army of fruit bats incoming. The Prime Minister went down the stairs, leading to a dark, poorly ventilated subterranean room. Lady Min lit the wall torches, providing the sheath of light needed to cast away the cloak of total darkness.
Ten, one-man, narrow prison cells. Five on the left, five on the right. Tiny holes on the wall barely provided them air to survive. Faint whimpers and groans trying to evolve into wails. Eyes burning and crying for help.
The first man from the left—scrawny and ghastly, hair gray and balding, was curling down the hay floor. Tongue sticking out from his arid, cracked lips. Panting and chasing his breath. Eyes shut. Jung Ho approached the bars to inspect, but he suddenly bounced back and covered his nose. The stench of the man's clumped stool clung on his nostrils. Swarm of flies flying around their moist, cushiony, yellow cake. Fresh, open wounds on the face, neck, and arms—covered with fluid pus—eaten by wriggling maggots. A centipede just slithered out of his pants as the Prime Minister scrutinized.
Jung Ho's eyes aroused as a grin reached his ears. "He's ready. Take him out tomorrow before the sun rises."
He inspected other cells, his eyes perusing each detail of an inmate's morbidly destroyed body. No—moved to the next—another no—maybe if she broke her gaunt, wrinkly arm tomorrow—no—no—and no! Only one passed his standards. As he turned to the last cell on the right, his shadow obediently following him from behind, sheathing the poor detainees' light of salvation, Jung Ho studied his main objective. Lady Jang, all in white, hair unpinned and tangling down to her waist, and lying on the big, wilting palm leaf. A cup and bowl flipped, scattered on the floor.
"Get up," ordered Jung Ho, his voice as frosty as a glacier.
The dethroned (suspended) Head Priestess moaned. She opened her eyes, a hazy figure of a man in front of her. When her sight adjusted, a quick breath heaved at the top of his desert-dry throat. She stuck her arm between the spaces of the bars, fingers reaching for the Prime Minister's boots as she writhed and dragged her feeble body closer.
Jung Ho looked down like he was about to step on a worm. "You will be released today to help the King in the ceremony. I assume that you have learned your lesson, or else I would start thinking what lies inside that vacant-brained head of yours."
Lady Jang raised her head and muttered, "Thank you… Y-yo-your Excellency."
His brow lifted, nose wrinkled in a grimace. "I have read your letter. You said the Queen was carrying twins. It seems like Chil Yook was right with his reports."
"That's true, Your Excellency. A nurse has told me."
"You're lucky. I'm aware that you wish to retire in a quiet temple, far from the turmoils of the palace. Now if you want to earn your freedom, you need to pull this one last string for me. Suppose you succeed, I will personally arrange your trip wherever you wish. Fail, then you'll have the same fate as these people over here."
"Anything you ask, Your Lordship!" She pummeled her master's boots with her lips.
Jung Ho signaled, and the elderly matron opened the cell.
"Get dressed. I'll wait outside my carriage."
~~•~~
The Queen's chamber was like a spillway, filled with rushing beavers (nurses) rushing to and fro bringing clothes, herbs, and other equipment. Court ladies rearranging the room, removing unnecessary things to make it more spacious and conducive for childbirth. Everyone was in a state of panic, like a neighborhood expecting a thief at any time of the day.
It seemed like they had forgotten about the solar eclipse. All that mattered was the Queen's delivery. According to Dong Hee, she was set to give birth later at night. How she wished she was wrong!
The Queen had become more lethargic after her argument with the King. She spent most of her day lying in bed, the sheets sucking her energy. Suddenly, she felt a strong, excruciating pain inside her tummy. Eventually to her hips, until it annihilated her. She could not describe how painful the feeling was. Maybe the word painful itself was a stomach-clenching understatement. The contractions never stopped—piercing, pinching, and boring every muscle, every portion, not just in her baby bump but all over her body.
"Dong Hee!" she screamed. The Head Nurse, who was wiping her feet, ejected and gave her a calming tonic that she had prepared. "Here, Your Grace." She raised the Queen's head and guided her in drinking the medicine slowly.
"It's… it's stronger today," the Queen mumbled.
"Hush now, Your Grace. You will be better."
"They're coming today, aren't they?"
"I hope not, Your Grace."
The ebbing queen held her friend's hands. "Dong Hee, please do not forget my request." Her upper eyelids flickering, head circling. "Save my—" She did not finish her statement and fell asleep. Once again, Dong Hee was reminded of the door she must enter.
~~•~~
Waiting outside the palanquin, the Prime Minister crossed his arms, stomping a foot. When Lady Min and Lady Jang came out from the bushes, he scanned the Head Priestess from her braided hair in a silver pin down to her long white robe, with a touch of black motives at the ends of the sleeves. She appeared to have gone on a long, refreshing vacation. No trace of one-day trauma after all. An angel that has descended from the sky.
He ambled towards her, eyes as black as basalt, which made her flinch in fear, "The whole kingdom needs your presence, and for that, I give you temporary freedom. Do your best to fulfill your duty, and we shall do ours. But after this, pray to the Heavens as much as you can because we still have a lot of things to settle."
He swiped her chin with his finger before continuing, "Do you understand?"
"Ye... Yes, My Lord," Lady Jang murmured.
As he was satisfied with his servant's answer, the letter about the twins struck his curiosity for the second time. His obsession with the details pestered his head like a tick crawling on his scalp so he asked, "Say, who among the twins would be the good fated, the ill-fated? How would I know? A birthmark? A sign? Or shall we do another ritual?
Shaking her head, Lady Jang respectfully replied, "I wish I have the power to predict it early." She knew her visions were bound to happen. Failure in technical aspects (like calculations) would not tarnish the accuracy of her gift. "I do not know any signs, My Lord. You can only know when it's the right time."
"When they're fifteen." Jung Ho rolled his eyes.
"I'm afraid so. I saw something about your nephews that disturbs me."
"Do continue."
She gulped, ready to share her dreadful premonition. "Out of nowhere, I saw an image of two kings, sitting on two thrones. One wears black, the other is dressed in white."
"That's it?"
"The one in white flaunts a human head with his hands, while the one black pets a human heart."
Jung Ho pouted his lips, eyes squinting. He laid his hands on his waist as he paced around the moist forest floor. He chewed his gums, his thumb circling his chin. "That's an interesting thought. Two kings on two thrones, you say? What does that mean? Never in history had it happened. Two kings at the same time? It must mean something else."
Lady Jang sucked her teeth, contemplating about what the Prime Minister said. He had a point. Two reigning kings would be against the law. Diving to her mystical pool of thoughts, she convinced herself that her precious blessing was on-point, even if the Prime Minister seemed not to believe at all.
Jung Ho turned around, ceasing his thoughts for the time being, and ordered, "Go inside. We shall wait for Chil Yook. He might be here at any moment from now."
When the Prime Minister entered his palanquin, the ladies followed. After a few hours, a nangdo called, "Your Excellency, Gukseon Chil Yook is here." Jung Ho went down and noticed that his right hand was alone. In supposedly high noon, Chil Yook's dried cheek wound glimmered under the fading sun from a tiny crevice caused by coiled, old vines, up in the canopy.
"Chil Yook, you came just in time. Where are your men?"
"It was a long story, My Lord. They were killed by one of Dae Wong's nangdos.
"What about Dae Wong? Where is he?"
"By this time, I assume someone has already saved him, cleansed his wound."
"Wound?" Jung Ho barked. "Haven't I told you—no bloodshed."
"You have, Your Excellency. But it was the incompetence of his nangdo that almost took his life. One of his men followed as I chased the minister. He planned on shooting an arrow to me, but it missed. It did scrape my skin, but it impaled the minister. The nangdo took his life immediately, and as a Gukseon, I buried his body. Worry not, My Lord. I attended the minister's wound. He won't die, and he also won't make it on time."
"You better make sure about that." Jung Ho stretched his palm. "Now hand it over."
Chil Yook picked the book from his robe and passed it to him. As Jung Ho touched the real almanac, his cheeks blushed, lips stretching to the biggest smile ever. The dose of euphoric satisfaction charged his prancing heart, his floating feet, and his spinning head. Finally—as certain as he was—the King would not be able to discover the truth about the eclipse.
"Congratulations, My Lord."
"Thank you, but not yet. Stealing the throne is not my utmost priority as of now. I should weaken his post until stepping down would be too luxurious for him."
Out of a sudden, the two ladies got off the palanquin to see Chil Yook. Lady Jang smiled in relief, and Chil Yook waved his hand gently. Thought they could hide that to Jung Ho? The Prime Minister scoffed and sneered, but he chose to ignore their growing teeny romance, considering his henchman did his job very well.
Lady Min butted in, jaws gaping wide open, "Impressive! You've got it! I guess it is a good thing that even though no one among us could read that one, the King would still remain clueless about everything."
Jung Ho agreed, engraving a smirk on his lips. "Definitely. He claimed himself as the so-called father of the nation, so it is he who should answer to the people."
Lady Jang put in, her spirit of inquiry poking her. "I don't intend to ruin the mood, but suppose the eclipse did not happen. What would you do, Your Excellency?"
The Prime Minister vehemently censured her question, "I doubt it! I refuse to believe with that stupid idea that the planets' and stars' alignments have something to do with the solar eclipse, but hypothetically speaking, if the eclipse did not happen, then I guess I have to proceed with my next plan already."
__________
NOTES:
Hanok (한옥) - an ancient Korean house.
Kimchi (김치) - a traditional Korean side-dish made from fermented vegetables, usually cabbage.