Chapter Text
Clip! Clop! Clop! Clop!
Hooves beat against untrodden snow. Flakes swirl in breeze and silver of dawn is breaking. Before moon vanishes a lone wolf howls its farewell.
Railings move. Wheels turn. Heavy gates of the compound of Kangs crack open.
Flags, dump in snow yet proudly flapping in the wind are the first sight for the guardsmen. Like stains of blood against the pristine white of the snow - reds, blacks and golds ripple in the air.
A distinct shout of an order - a last pair of hurried footsteps later, the men in black sink to their knees, hands grasping swords, heads bowed in deference. Snow continues to fall - on their bowed heads, resting like ashes atop their shoulders.
The brilliance of the snow pricks against their eyes, still their gazes never rise to meet the man who dismounts his stallion - majestically black, similar in color to the blowing midnight robes of its master.
There is a choir of greeting - a chant of loyalty and then Shinju sinks into silence.
The emperor has arrived.
Kang Shin the clan leader curls and uncurls his fists. The balance of power has been toppled rather swiftly and rather unexpectedly. There bowed in snow for a man who had once been a boy under his thumb - Shin tries to fight the growing feeling of intimidation. Fear is best hidden - a corner of his mouth twitches - an emotion for a more private setting - similar to disgust -
His eyes flickers up to the object of his thoughts, an unconscious but foolish action on his part for his gaze remains rooted there - on the pitless darkness of his monarch’s gaze. The man belongs in winter of Shinju as much as he is home at the gold dragon throne, his face is carved in ice - lips pressed into a thin line - slightly crooked. There is a patronizing tenor to his gaze as it sweeps over Kang Shin and the man deliberately postpones uttering the next word.
“Rise,” he says in the end, once the cold had found its resting place between the gaps in Kang Shin’s spine. “Dear uncle..” the endearment spoken without true feelings of affection feels like a veiled insult.
There is no common blood between them. Theirs is a bond that was forcefully forged by an edict of a king long gone. Kang Shin grits his teeth, for all that he had lost to that man and then his sons. One by one. He tries not to think of his sister - of her precious child. Of his own sons killed in pointless wars. He tries but fails to forget that all the sacrificed prestige of his clan was to finally sink into his knees in front of a discarded Yoo, a disgraced Wang.
He takes his time rising, swallowing the bitter words rolling on his tongue like bile, until finally meeting the eyes of the emperor is inevitable. Just like Shin - he has not forgotten much, his eyes tell him. They plunge into the man like pricks of ice - wrenching deep into his soul with a searing hatred.
“You bring blessings to Shinju, your majesty!” Shin plays his part and hopes that the emperor will do the same.
A corner of the emperor’s mouth twitches, a shadow crosses his eyes.
“I shall take your word for it,” he says breezily, walking past the clan leader down the path swept free of snow and leading to the stone built insides. Kang Shin stands outside in the snow storm for a moment longer and as if collecting an afterthought, shakes his head and follows after his monarch.
His own safe keep suddenly feels like a lion’s den, where the growling hungry monster awaits. Shin knows his wit is all that lies between certain death for three generations and himself. It is with that thought he shuffles in, wheels of his mind already set in motion. The emperor has already settled at the seat Shin usually occupies and watches him with the calm of a predator waiting to spring upon a prey.
He doesn’t dare utter the commonplace apologetic term ‘I deserve death -’ for he fears the baster- emperor - might agree. Instead he bows low, folds himself into the humblest possible and opens his mouth -
“Where is she?” The emperor beats him to it, his tone remains icy, and had Shin dared to raise his head he would have noticed his eyes remain frozen too.
“Your - your majesty?” The silver - tongued man stumbles over his words and in another time the emperor would have been amused. Instead he raises an eyebrow.
“Your daughter - dear uncle, I wish to see her.”
“I cannot believe - after all the disgrace she had brought upon - why would your majesty want to ruin your day by setting your sight on something so foul…”
“Am I to be held answerable to you?” The emperor draws out his words slowly, deliberately - watching their effect in the pallor of Shin’s complexion.
“No - no! Of cause not - your majesty!”
“Very well then -” the emperor rises his voice once more. “Call her.”
“She is - she is still recovering, your majesty.”
There is a pause in which Shin fools himself into believing that he has finally deterred the emperor. He however, rises to his feet instead.
“Take me to her - then.”
“Your majesty! But - but -”
“What is the matter dear uncle?” The emperor rounds upon him, hands clasped behind his back. “Was she not proposed to be my bride? Would it be immoral of me to see her? Or is this the part where you confess to a greater scheme?”
**
It is the silence that wakes her up - for that kind of void belongs in nowhere but her dreams. The world where she desperately wished to return, but could never grasp in the realm of reality. Ha Jin waits, eyes closed and pulse pounding in her ears. She waits for a sound of heels on marble - a tick tock of a clock - a buzz of a mobile or the screech of a car.
Nothing comes.
Instead in the stillness that surrounds her - somewhere in the distance a wolf howls and she freezes. It has little to do with the chill slowly curling up her toes, or the sound of wind outside - but the realization that sinks in slowly.
No - it couldn’t be.
No. No.
Her purpose here was done. That was the answer she was given.
Done. Dusted.
A king no longer needs a kingmaker. No matter how much she ached for the man she loved. In his life she no longer had a part to play.
Her tears had dried up a long back - her aching heart still throbbing from time to time. Her pleas still fresh in her mind.
“I need to go back to him!”
“You can’t,” she was answered. “Your role has ended. Your body burned. You cannot return.”
Shifting between mist and rain - sleep and dreams - the darkness behind her closed eyelids feels warm. She wonders, filling the silence with her thoughts, she wonders what this was - an imagination? A delusion? Another universe that has pulled her in? Another time frame?
Whatever it is - she resolves to herself - she will not challenge the fates. One thousand years worth of heartbreak was enough. She did not have it in her to go through the same yet again.
In the darkness a hand brushes over her forehead and a voice speaks.
“Perfect my Rose, you’ve done so well.” The voice is willfully distorted, as if to keep away an identity. There is no real affection in the touch that wipes her forehead. “My little obedient Rose… I wouldn’t have believed someone could accomplish so much with a single cut across the skin. But you brought the dragon all the way into your den… Perfect - perfect!” The voice coos and cackles. “Keep your thorns sharp my darling - and play your part. The hunt begins now - the beast is coming!”