Tying the Flower Needle (7)

Wiyeon had reached the peak alongside her, but he came down first.

"Haah…."

With a sigh of satisfaction, he withdrew from her. The monstrous, swollen pillar shrank, though not yet to its true size. Still rigid and lifted high, it seemed ready to take her again the moment he wished.

He could see his seed spilling from her flushed, gaping hole. Wiyeon pressed his thumb against it and drew it shut, wiping her clean with a slow, deliberate stroke.

"Mm…."

Seoin, still trembling with the aftershocks, moaned softly and folded her legs beneath her, turning onto her side. Beneath her rumpled skirt, a cloudy liquid trickled down between the pale rounds of her behind.

Books lay scattered and splayed in every direction, and amid them, disheveled yellow petals. And here, this lush bare body from the waist down was the most magnificent bloom of all.

Wiyeon liked it better this way — a flower bed that bloomed and wilted into ruin.

Beyond the window, the sky had begun to redden with sunset — like a man's desire burning back to life. His hand reached out once more to pluck that flower, brushing gently down her cheek.

Seoin, lost in her daze, lifted her eyes and parted her lips.

"I… must conceive a child."

Her voice was low, but unmistakably clear.

Wiyeon leaned toward her, his hand coming to rest on her glistening, plump backside. Then, sliding a finger into the cleft between the cheeks, he murmured,

"Then you'd best not let a drop spill. Keep it clenched tight, and hold it in."

Seoin realized the night would be long — because the whisper of his voice tickled her earlobe, far too hot and clinging.

For the first time in ages, Seoin fell into a deep, dreamless sleep. Body and mind emptied completely, she sank into rest with utter contentment. Not a single scrap of that dregs-like feeling remained — no anxiety, no regret, no unease.

Thanks to that, even the morning sun teasing her eyelids could not wake her. It was only when the midday sun had warmed her bed that she finally stirred.

"Mmm…."

But the moment she rolled onto her side, a sharp pain lanced through her as if her back had been twisted out of joint. She curled up briefly, waiting for the ache to subside — and heard knocking at the door.

"Have you still not broken your fast?"

The voice was courteous, yet devoid of any warmth — clipped and businesslike. For days now, the maids coming and going from her chambers had all spoken with that same soulless tone.

"Enter."

Seoin's voice was weaker today than at any other time — cracked hoarse, dull and ragged.

Clunk.

At the sound, the door swung open. The four maids standing in the doorway flinched visibly at the state of the room.

Seoin blinked her half-lidded eyes and gave a faint smile. Well — they had every right. Even to her own eyes, the scene was a spectacle.

The chair lay toppled where it had been knocked over. The teapot that had fallen from the table lay shattered, shards scattered everywhere. Broken branches and petals strewn about the floor had wilted overnight into something pitiful.

Seoin suddenly remembered the pale yellow petals that had fluttered across his face the night before. For a fleeting moment, it had been beautiful. The flowers — and his face too.

The maids, having slipped inside unnoticed, began clearing away the mess. One of them moved to throw out the flower branches still lying on the table.

"Wait."

Seoin's rough voice came out sharper than she intended. The maids froze all at once and turned to look at her.

"Put those flowers in a vase."

"…Yes, Your Highness."

Her face and voice alike radiated displeasure — the look of someone annoyed at being made to bother with trivial errands. Seoin paid it no mind; she had received her answer, and that was enough.

Her eyes closed again, and even as the maids undressed her and washed her body, she did not wake. No — she was not asleep. Lost in a fevered haze, she drifted like someone dreaming, surrendering her body entirely to their hands. Between the burning fever and her exhaustion, neither her body nor her mind would obey her anymore.

By flickering lamplight, flowers were blooming from the brush of the Noble Consort Yu Munhui. Yellow dogwood blossoms unfolded across branches of ink-black. As if to console herself for the tree she had torn out days before, she let the flowers bloom in lavish abundance wherever her brush passed.

Bae Ilhwa, the consort's maid, chattered on before her.

"They say it was beyond vulgar — simply beyond words. They call her a princess, but born of a base mother, she has no refinement whatsoever. Perhaps it's what she learned from her mother — how can anyone be so brazen and shameless? Hah. I can hardly bear to speak of it."

"For His Highness to be bewitched by something like that — it's no different from men frequenting the pleasure houses, wouldn't you say? He'll tire of her soon enough. It's only been a short while since he returned from the front; he's simply enjoying the thrill of conquering a princess of an enemy nation. How long can that amusement last?"

This was the gossip relayed to the consort — the tongue-clicking complaints of the maids who had entered the princess's quarters. Ilhwa was resentful herself, of course, but she spoke chiefly to soothe her mistress, who had more reason than anyone to be troubled by it all. A princess, yes — but a base-born woman through and through, no better in a single way than the consort herself, one of the countless such creatures crawling the palace.

Tap.

Munhui set down her brush and gazed at the finished dogwood.

"Oh my. You've finished it already? It looks just like real dogwood blossoms. Hang it by the window and the butterflies will come flying."

Ilhwa, who had been cursing the princess to her heart's content, broke off at the sight of the painting, her face brightening into pure admiration.

Then Munhui asked in a calm, level voice,

"Is the bouquet of dogwood still in the princess's room?"

"Oh, don't even speak of it. That room is an absolute disast— Hup!"

Ilhwa clapped a hand over her mouth mid-sentence.

"Ah… you already knew?"

When Ilhwa had heard that the princess had ordered the surviving dogwood branches sorted and placed in a vase, she had stamped her feet in fury. She had even sworn the other maids to silence, lest the news reach the consort's ears.

And yet the consort had known already — how could Ilhwa not be stunned?

"How could I not know? That man has never once looked at a flower in his life. He likely didn't even know I cultivated them."

"I—I didn't hide it from you to deceive you, my lady. It's only… His Highness seemed to be deliberately provoking you. If that were the case, I thought it better for you not to know at all."

"I understand your heart. But the judgment is mine to make."

"I—I beg your forgiveness. I was shortsighted. Please forgive me."

Though the consort showed no anger at all, Ilhwa bowed low, trembling with fear.

"Never once has any woman he brought into the palace received flowers. If he means it merely as provocation, then the manner of it is certainly novel."

"Th—that woman must have asked for the flowers! Surely that's not something His Highness would think of on his own!"

"Then he is a man who would so readily grant a woman's request to pick flowers for her. How curious."

"Th—that's…!"

The more Ilhwa spoke, the more she seemed only to wound the consort's pride, and the words died in her throat.

"It doesn't matter. Flowers, jewels — let him gift her whatever he pleases. So long as she does not conceive."

"Yes, yes! Of course. In two months' time the pulse can be read for pregnancy, and then we can summon a physician to—"

"Must we wait until then?"

Munhui crumpled the finished painting in her fist.

Startled, Ilhwa bowed her head lower still and hastened to answer.

"No, of course not! W-we will take measures at once."

"Ilhwa."

"Yes, my lady."

"Rushing ahead will do no good, either. I cannot shake the feeling that His Highness is showing a diligence toward that princess he has shown no one else."

"Surely that can't be true!"

"The princess must have some peculiar charm. Whether it is merely that her body pleases him, or whether there is something greater at work — I cannot tell. So move slowly. This time may be different from all the others."

Ilhwa sometimes found it suffocating how excessively cautious Munhui could be. But her lady had never once been wrong.

"Yes. As it happens, she's taken to her sickbed — I shall see that she has nightmares."

Strength crept into Ilhwa's reply, so careful only moments before. She could not touch the princess herself just yet, but she could surely make her life bitter. And if the princess had conceived — well, if terror made her lose the child, all the better.

Seoin was suffering the cruelest illness of her life. Not even on the campaign trails had she known a body this wrecked.

Early in her soldiering days, she had once fallen ill from riding on horseback for days without rest. This ailment resembled that one in shape — but it was heavier, denser, far more punishing.

Her blood seemed to boil from the crown of her head to the tips of her toes. Her head ached and swam so badly that simply keeping her eyes open made her long to sink back into sleep.

That part was easy enough. Her body hung so heavy and limp that she would sink into the bed as if buried in it. But the sleep brought no relief.

Her throat was so parched that even the roof of her mouth had dried and cracked. The inside of her throat burned, and if she so much as twitched a single finger in her sleep, her whole body would chill and throb with aching.

Worse, she seemed to be growing weaker by the hour. Because no one was caring for her.

She had been nearly unconscious ever since the maids bathed her that day, yet not one of them had summoned a physician. The king, who had slipped out alone in the small hours, had never returned. Last time he had abandoned her for days on end; no doubt he would do the same again. He likely had not even heard that she lay gravely ill.

The maids brought her meals she could not eat, then left — and returned only to carry out the cold, untouched food. No one ever woke her.

Each time she surfaced to consciousness, Seoin thought desperately:

I have to get up.

She had to rise, eat something, gather her strength. If she spent days like this, she would starve or sicken to death before the king ever came to find her.

But something's wrong.

If she had slept this long, shouldn't her body at least feel lighter by now? Before the thought could go any deeper, the haze swallowed her again.

And so Seoin never knew — that in the dead of night, a mist-like smoke had come seeping thick into her chambers.

Nor that something, writhing within that fog, was creeping toward her.