"……Your Majesty?"
The voice calling his name pulled Cheonghyeon back to the present. The sweet scent drifting from the tea stirred something old in him—a longing he couldn't quite name.
"……Sorry. My mind wandered."
Cheongya tilted her head. But she didn't press. Instead she lifted her cup, took a sip, and waited.
Cheonghyeon drank from his own cup. The tea had gone cold. Then he spoke.
"About Ihwa…I wanted to thank you. For what you did."
The words took time to find. This wasn't a king bowing to his queen. It was someone who had failed to protect Ihwa, speaking to someone who hadn't.
Cheongya set her cup down.
"I only did what any person should. There's nothing to thank me for."
"No. There is."
His voice was low and firm—not the cold firmness she was used to, but something different. The firmness of a man holding something down. Trying not to let his voice shake.
"Ihwa…never says when he's hurting. He just smiles and says he's fine. We can't always be there with him…"
Cheonghyeon's gaze drifted past the window. Toward Suyeong Palace.
"If it hadn't been for you, he would have suffered through it alone again."
Cheongya watched his profile. She had never heard him speak this many words at once. The wall between them hadn't come down. But there was a hairline crack running through it.
She was about to speak when the door opened and Hyowon stepped in, a stack of documents in one hand. He stopped briefly when he saw Cheongya, then moved to stand beside Cheonghyeon.
"Your Highness."
A blunt greeting. But not as sharp as before.
"He wants to say thank you."
Hyowon's eyebrows went up. The look he gave Cheonghyeon wasn't the look of a guard toward his king. It was the look of an old friend—rough and unguarded.
"……Well. Can't say he's wrong."
Hyowon crossed his arms and stood at a slight angle, expression flat.
"We owe you."
He said it short and plain. Then turned to look out the window. Blunt as it was, there was something real inside those few words.
The hour when sunlight turned the water red. When Cheongya arrived at Suyeong Palace, Ihwa was sitting in the pavilion, folding paper.
"Ihwa!"
She called out as she pushed through the gate. Ihwa looked up. His mismatched eyes found her and smiled.
"You came."
"Should you be out here already?"
Cheongya climbed up into the pavilion and reached toward his forehead. Ihwa leaned back slightly, still smiling.
"I'm fine. Really."
"When you say you're fine, I can't believe you."
Ihwa's eyes went wide. Then he laughed softly.
"……Were you that worried?"
"Of course I was."
Cheongya sat down beside him. She studied his face. He looked paler after the fever—but his eyes were clear. His breathing was steady. Only then did she let her shoulders drop.
"What are you folding?"
"Boats. I thought I'd float them on the pond."
His fingers moved over the paper slowly and precisely. Cheongya watched his hands for a moment, then said:
"Can I fold one too?"
"Of course. I'll show you how."
They sat side by side and folded. The wind moved over their hands and the paper edges fluttered. Ihwa's boats came out clean and exact. Cheongya's came out crooked.
"……It's crooked again."
"That's okay. It's still pretty."
Ihwa smiled. Cheongya looked at that smile and smiled back.
After a while, Cheongya said:
"What else do you do, besides folding paper?"
"I draw sometimes. Read."
"Read? What kind of books? I love books too! When I was little I used to beg the servants to bring me books from the market stalls."
Cheongya lit up, counting on her fingers as she listed her favorites.
"I wish I could read books here too!"
Ihwa smiled faintly and picked up another sheet of paper.
"There's a place on the east side of the palace…called the archive. You could read there."
Cheongya's eyes brightened.
"Really? Could I borrow books? I could pick some out for you too!"
Ihwa fell quiet for a moment. His fingers stilled on the paper.
"……Anything is fine. Whatever you choose—I'll enjoy it. Though…something I can read slowly, and take my time with. That would be nice."
Cheongya nodded. She made herself a silent promise. She would go to the archive today, without fail.
The archive stood at the far eastern end of the palace.
She asked a court lady for directions and found her way there. When she opened the door, air thick with dust and paper rushed out to meet her. The shelves rose high, packed dense with books.
Something Ihwa would like. Cheongya walked between the stacks, running her eyes along the spines. Collections of poetry, albums of paintings, storybooks. She pulled things out one by one and leafed through them.
In one corner stood an older set of shelves. Dust lay thicker there than anywhere else in the room. The books on those shelves had faded with age.
Her hand found it by chance. Something about it caught her eye—as if it were quietly announcing itself, whispering: *I'm here.*
*The Chronicle of Cheonghwa's Founding.*
The cover was worn, but unlike everything around it, not a single speck of dust clung to it.
The first page told the story of Geumdong. The goddess of the moon palace descending into the human world, founding a kingdom alongside Cheonno. It was close to what Cheongya had heard from her nursemaid as a child.
She turned the page.
A record of how, when Geumdong grew old and her power began to fade, she divided her strength between two newborns on the night a blue moon rose.
She knew this part too.
She turned to the next page.
*The blue moon rises once every twenty-five years, in the year when the moon's power reaches its peak. On that single day, a Cheon-a and a sacred woman are born. — The Selection is held. — Those who are not chosen receive divine punishment and are annihilated.*
Annihilated. Her hand stopped at that word.
*—The body fades slowly in agony. They wept and crawled across the ground and wept tears of blood.*
Cheongya's hands began to tremble.
She turned the page. The characters blurred. She read on, her eyes unsteady.
*Since the time when many kings chose the wedding ceremony over the Selection, a Cheon-a born male has been stripped of eligibility.*
Stripped of eligibility. Annihilated. Gone without a trace.
Ihwa's face rose in her mind. His smiling face. The face that said *I'm fine.* His slender fingers folding paper. The voice that said *I'll enjoy whatever you bring.*
And the feet that had stopped at the wall.
Ihwa was male. He was a Cheon-a. When the blue moon rose—
Ihwa would die.
Only now did she understand why Cheonghyeon had been so sharp with her at the beginning, telling her to leave.
The book slipped from her hands.
It hit the floor and sent up a small cloud of dust. Cheongya couldn't pick it up. Her legs gave out beneath her and she sank down.
Ihwa had been smiling. Every day, every moment. *I'm fine.*
He couldn't possibly be fine.
Knowing he would die. Knowing she was the one fated to live in his place—
Moisture gathered in Cheongya's eyes. She bit down on her lip. A sound tried to rise. She swallowed it. It came again.
The archive was silent. Dust drifted slowly through the light.
In that silence, Cheongya's breath broke apart.
"……That can't be true."
Her trembling voice scattered into the dust of the archive.
No one heard it. No one answered to say it wasn't.