Winter had come and gone, and now we in the village were blessed with spring time. The flowers that we had just planted were in bloom, and newly green spaces were being bathed in the delightful hues of the pink cherry blossoms trees. Life was slowly coming arising in this village in the absence of my brother since he was far too preoccupied with building development and his wife had been pregnant during most of her stay here and hadn't had the time to focus on anything else. I had put Chul in charge of his toddler brother and HwaWol's youngest children as I had put BoGeom straight into a studious environment with memorising some medical textbooks to follow in her father's footsteps since she had her heart set on that. HwaWol was busy in remodelling the embroidery house and my sister=in=law busied herself with the domestic issues within the village since most of the residents were still living in basic gaya homes with little to wood for fires in the winter and little relief for the summer time. It was clear to me that we needed to bring in some more educated people to help us, but there was so little people that we could trust not to indulge any information about this village to anyone else, since we needed it keep it a secret from The Third Prince's ever wondering and destructible eyes. He would do anything to recruit my brother by his side again, and he wasn't going to take kindly to being rejected once. And after by husband's attack on him, he will not be content with allowing him to live anymore, even if it strongly went against my husband's wishes and even mine. If we ran into him again after all that we have been through together, then he would not hesitate to annihilate The Seo Clan without hesitation.
Myself and my sister=in=law were doing respectively well without our husband's, but I was having a hard time without him at night; I simply wasn't used to sleeping without him, no matter how much time he spent away from work. "… the scent of roses is very fragrant today, wife; you make it impossible to remember the winter season in this household." "It is just a few roses husband, it is nothing special. Did you wear your knee guards outside in this frosty weather? So help me husband, if you forgot again…" "Relax wife, I wore it well, fret not." "Very well, you are lucky this time; go and wash up before supper and I shall serve you in your chambers, I had already drawn a hot bath for you and I have given you some new sleeping robes with a little fur on the outside to keep you warm all throughout the night. I have also brewed you some ginger soup just in case the bath isn' t enough for you. And give your shoes to the servants for them to wash ad dry overnight, you need them dry for the morning. I even left you some camellia scented pouches on your bed for you to take into work in the palace and…why are you looking at me like that husband?" "Dreams that come and go like spring water as I am leisurely missing my hometown, I have missed you indeed these past few days wife. When I come to you, I can finally get some peace." "Whereas you give me no peace of mind at all husband, but you do give me a nice and warm bed to sleep in every night, and that is more than enough for me for now." "You deserve the world, wife." "I shall take it, only with you, when you retire from work so that I can have you all to myself again."
Looking back at al of this now, it made me resent The Third Prince even more for taking up so much of my time with my family and my husband. How I wished that I had parted from my husband on more sweeter terms instead of it happening right after we sorted his family out for good. I really wished we spent more time together and focused more on my first pregnancy instead of always focusing our energies, time and wealth on putting other people in their place, people that wanted to constantly hurt and destroy us for no good reason other than jealousy, greed and envy, because they could not look past their own ambitions. I wasn't a person who was full of hatred, but I wasn't left with too much hope in this world anymore and even though being in this village was healing me, I knew it would still take a while for me to trust this world that my children were eventually going to be a part of, whether I liked it or not. but raising them here was going to be my first priority, and I was prepared to fight my husband about this matter with all of my might, maybe it would even put a small dent into that possessive ego of his…
I was still lost in thought about my husband and the precious time we had spent together before tragedy struck out of nowhere. A dog had run rabid and straight into a child of a pregnant mother; HwaWol instantly turned into the nurse that she was trained to become by her husband and everyone had gathered around the girl, but my eyes lay solely on the dog. It was completely rare to see one anywhere near this village where there still wasn't much greenery or water around to feed themselves with. We didn't even get any poultry to farm yet, so why would a bunch of stray dogs come all the way out here? Miles away from any other villages, and go straight for a little girl of all things? What could she have done to provoke these dogs out of nowhere at all? Unless this was a planned attack, but either way, I had to figure out what exactly was going on here and why. Because the little girl who was attacked was the only girl who saw the kingdom outside of this village due to her father's work, this little girl was beloved by the entire village and everyone was reduced to tears upon finding out the news, even the men got a little teary eyed themselves as we all waited outside MoonBok's pharmacy for any updates after the menfolk had sorted out the dog, so that it would never bother anyone ever again.
"…what malicious beast could harm such a young girl? And unprovoked at that!" "…what sort of dog does not bite without orders?" "And why go after a little girl instead of a boy? Isn't that truly a waste of human life?" "Wasn't this girl known to have specific heart issues? Wasn't that why her father always kept her close to him?" "Maybe this is all linked to the clothes she wore today? They were new clothes and a lot brighter than usual…" "they were my daughter's first pair of silk clothes! I just got them fresh from the embroidery house only this morning…no, I am sure I smelled something unusual about it when I dressed her this morning…" "Bright colours? Smells? We do not scent the fabrics we use for the villagers and we certainly do not dress you all in bright colours, as it would simply defeat this village's protection….although these things would certainly trigger a rabid dog…maybe it had allergies to the spring time pollen? Maybe that could excuse its behaviour? I need to ask MoonBok to examine the dog also, because I am getting a really bad feeling about this now…what scent was on the clothes, Madame?" "It was rose water! The same one that my mother used to use on me before we become leftover refugees from war! I thought that you did that for my own daughter for my sake…but now I just realised that I have not told anyone about this at all! So how could you have known about such a thing!" "How could we have found out indeed…."
"My Lady! Your brother was just about to choose a suitable envoy for this village as well before he left, maybe this has something to do with that also?" "Are you suggesting foul play amongst us? An envoy? He never mentioned anything like this to me at all. An envoy from this village would have to be the most inconspicuous man r woman of the lot of you…may somebody found out about this and made a plot? Are we now trapped in this village? The road out of here is high and steep, so plenty of unknown accidents can occur for sure…" "My Lady! There was a number marked on my daughter! The numbers 2 and 5!" "2 and 5…is the girl being compared to the 2nd and 5th Prince? My husband was the one who took them down…but why is is being brought up again after all of this time? And how did they trace it back to my husband? And this village of all places…what a perfect calculation indeed…"
"This envoy business, the embroidery house being tainted with corruption and a rabid dog…my husband was always compared to that throughout his youth for daring to have the ideals that he possesses today that pulled him to the top of the social rank in the palace… the embroidery house works stop from this moment on until a full investigation is carried out! HwaWol, please escort everyone to their homes whilst Jeong Beom carries out an official investigation, including everyone here as well! And as for…Madame? Madame! What is wrong with her! Why did she just faint!" My Lady Seo! She is currently bleeding! She must be suffering from a miscarriage!" "Yeon! Her body's vitality energy is currently attacking her body! Her prenatal vitamins must be too strong!" "We must investigate that also! Jeong Beom! Carry her over to Moonbok! HwaWol, find her medicine! Everyone lock yourselves in your homes for the rest of the day and find the Village Chief's wife and have her handle the embroidery house investigation! Right now!" "The baby in this woman's womb is far too large to be delivered! This labour shall be hard for her and even damage her body! What shall we do!" "We cannot stop a baby from coming! She has been trying for this baby for a long time, so we need to give it a chance, even at the expense of her own life! Her medicine must be overused…" "My Lady? Seo Yeon! No, do not black out, not now! Think about your children, please! Yeon? Wake up! Please! My goodness, how do I explain this to your brother! Or even your husband…"
I was suddenly engulfed my darkness as I felt my own body give up underneath me before my knees gave way under me, causing me to loose all balance and collapse upon the ground with the memory of my beloved husband's face before my eyelids got heavier and heavier. I had to stay alive no matter what though, for the sake of my family, and most importantly my father. I knew my husband would have a special plan for our children and that it would be dedicated to my father, and I just had to trust him and support him no matter what from now on…I couldn't die without him, I simply wasn't allowed to…