Dokja's eyes shot open, the first thing he noticed was how cold the ground beneath him was. Sitting up, he looked around and was greeted by darkness. Allowing his eyes to adjust, he saw that he was in a cave. Jagged rock structures made up the walls and roof, though some tufts of grass and weeds grew up through the cracks. The dripping of water in the distance echoed off the cave walls. Belatedly, he realized that the front of his body was engulfed in a dark blue cloak, one that most likely belonged to the crown prince. His sword lay beside him, and another more studier one was propped against the cave wall
He stood up, adjusted the cloak to wrap around his shoulders, and went out of the mouth of the cave. A gust of cold air greeted him when he stepped out, making him shudder and retreat deeper into the warmth of the cloak. Above him the night sky blanketed the empire with its vast field of stars, the moon shining brightly above.
Dokja glanced around for any sign of the prince but didn't even find any footprints indicating that he'd been there at all. For a second, he entertained the thought that perhaps the prince had abandoned him, maybe he realized that Dokja wouldn't be able to contribute anything. After a painful throb of his chest, he shook the thought away. Yoo Joonghyuk wouldn't have left his sword and cloak behind, and he'd made the effort to carry Dokja from the river to the safety of the cave.
Dokja would just have to search around for some more. But before he could get very far with that idea, he heard a soft cry from the foliage beside him.
"Ba-at!" Dokja turned to see Biyoo, Popo, and Griffin emerging from the bushes and looking over his body worriedly.
"Woah, it's good to see you guys here!" He greeted them as he walked up to them.
"Ba-at!" Biyoo cried out, grinning at him. As she did, he faintly heard a voice in the back of his head. [It's wonderful to have you here too!]
'Eh, what was that?' Dokja wondered. Maybe he hit his head on a rock when he plunged into the lake. He'd need to remind himself to get checked out by Lee Seolhwa when he got back to his family's safety. Then, remembering when the assassins were chasing them, and how they were there when the forest vines started attacking them, he asked; "Do you guys know about the–"
"KIM DOKJA!" Dokja and the three all flinched with wide eyes as the yell cut through the forest air.
He hissed to the three, "Quick, hide!" and ushered them into the nook of a nearby tree. After securing them, Dokja turned back to the direction where he thought the prince yelled from and cupped his hands to his mouth. "JOONGHYUK, OVER HERE!" He shouted out. Footsteps rapidly approached him, and when the plants shifted to reveal the prince's form, Dokja grinned and said, "Hello, Your H---," but he was taken aback when Joonghyuk grabbed his shoulders roughly and scanned over his body.
"Are you okay, are you hurting anywhere, do you have any major injuries?" Joonghyuk questioned in quick succession.
Dokja tried calming him down, softly putting a hand over the prince's own, "Don't worry, I'm fine, but where did you go? I was looking everywhere for you." But as Dokja stared at the prince, he remembered something. Panicked, his hands flew to his neck, only to find that the necklace was no longer there. Dokja looked at the prince, his eyes wide. "The necklace, I don't have it anymore! I-it must've dropped somewhere when we were chased, we need to go look for it right now before something happens!" Dokja cried out. Before he could sprint off, though, the prince stopped him and reached for his pocket. From it he pulled out a long silver chain, a familiar pendant still hanging from it.
"I was able to grab it from you before we ran," Joonghyuk told him calmly
Dokja examined it closely, relieved to see it hadn't been damaged anywhere, "Phew, that was a close one, I almost had a heart attack…" he said, a hand on his chest.
Joonghyuk answered his question from earlier. "I went out to find some food for us to eat, we need all the sustenance we can get right now. Let's go to the cave already." Agreeing, Dokja and the prince started making their way back. He gave a side-eye to where the three creatures were hiding, hoping that the creatures would stay put.
When they arrived at the cave, he noticed a large pile of wood and a few fish set aside. Joonghyuk gave him the fruits he collected and went over to build the fire. Sitting down, Dokja simply ate while admiring the man before him. When Joonghyuk was able to get the fire going, he skewered the fish on a few twigs to start cooking them. As he waited for the fish to heat up, he noticed Dokja staring at him with a strange look on his face.
"What are you looking at?"
"...nothing." he mumbled, bringing the cape closer to his body. "It's just…why are you being like this?" Dokja lowered his eyes.
Joonghyuk asked, "What do you mean?" his face morphing into a scowl.
"Well, one minute you want to kill me any way you can, the next you sleep with me, and now… well it seems like you're actually willing to give me a chance to make up to you,". They exchanged looks for a moment until Joonghyuk broke their eye contact and turned to face the blaze.
They were silent as the cicadas outside the cave chirped away; "The Road to Dawn, do you recognize the name?" the prince questioned him.
Caught off guard by the sudden topic change, Dokja still decided to entertain whatever he was getting at. "… yeah, that's the name of the novel I was reading the other day, how the hell did you know of it?" He questioned cautiously.
The prince sighed out, seemingly reluctant to continue on, "… you should know that I've been keeping tabs on you. I've had a person watching you for a time, to report if you planned to make any moves against me or Lee Seolhwa."
Dokja was taken aback. He didn't know what he was more alarmed at, the revelation or the fact that Yoo Joonghyuk even told him in the first place. "… well, did they find anything about me?" Dokja quietly asked. Yoo Joonghyuk didn't answer right away, instead adding more firewood to the embers. The fish had finished cooking, so he grabbed one for himself and handed another skewer to Dokja to eat. After the both of them took a few bits from the fish (which was somehow cooked to perfection, Kim Dokja begrudgingly admitted) Joonghyuk finally responded.
"Most of the time they had nothing new to report to me, only saying that you spend the majority of your time hiding yourself away in your chambers," at that Yoo Joonghyuk looked at him a bit judgmentally, to which Kim Dokja glared back, "They feared that I'd punish them if they kept on coming back with nothing to report, so each time they returned they'd tell me useless menial information about you," The prince's tone took on a slightly more thoughtful countenance, "Your strange preference in novels, the squabbles you get into over story plots, the lessons you make for the children you adapted, and… your engagement" the prince ended, his tone taking on a strange shift at the last remark, though Kim Dokja didn't notice.
Finishing his fish, Dokja set the bones to the side and looked at Yoo Joonghyuk seriously. "So, after those reports and all my recent actions until now, will you finally entertain the apology I gave you all those months ago?" Kim Dokja asked, looking the other man in the eyes, tensely awaiting his answer.Taking in Dokja's glistening eyes boring into him, Yoo Joonghyuk had to look away for a second before answering.
"…Lee Seolhwa was also adamant in vouching for you, both your genuine change in character and your innocence in poisoning her. But yes, with all those factors combined, I'm willing to… have more amical relations with you," the prince ended off awkwardly.
Dokja sat back, his arms supporting him, and heaved a huge sigh of relief. At long last, one of the biggest problems that he faced since coming into this world was resolved, at least for the most part. He'd still need to be careful around the prince so as to not lose his trust, but this was a big step forward.
"Thank goodness" Kim Dokja breathed out; his head tilted back.
Joonghyuk looked at him for a moment before asking a question of his own, "What exactly prompted this change, why are you so desperate to gain my approval when you had no need for it before?"
Dokja's body went rigid, not knowing how to answer that. He'd been trying his best to avoid that exact question ever since he'd come into the world, and now it had come back to bite him, from the one person whose trust he needed the most. A few beats of silence passed as he tried his best to figure out how to word his answer, the prince waiting for him patiently.
"… I suppose… you could say that I didn't like the way my story was heading. My place in the world was moot and I was only dragging everyone around me down along with myself. For me to find the ending I want, I knew I'd have to change myself, and that meant ending our rivalry and letting go of Lee Seolhwa."
Dokja ended his answer quietly, he was too nervous to see how the prince would react to his response, so he stared at his lap instead, awaiting his judgment. For the next few seconds all he heard was the fire crackling away, as if even the cicadas held in their cries to hear his answer.
"… I see," was all the prince decided to respond with. Listening in for any more words the prince might've wanted to share, Dokja let out a quiet, exasperated sigh when he realized that was all he was getting out of him. Not wanting the both of them to fall into an awkward silence, Kim Dokja decided to change the subject away from this heavy topic.
"Well, I'm glad that we're working together now, despite the circumstances. I've been able to see a side of you that I've never seen before" Dokja said while smiling. Joonghyuk was staring blankly at him, so he quickly added, "A good side of course, I can see how cool you look wielding your sword when it's not pointed at me," Dokja joked. Joonghyuk looked away for some reason and he continued talking, "But I'm kinda curious, why do you glare at people so much, it's a waste of your handsome face." Joonghyuk then glared at him. "Hey, I'm just curious!"
Joonghyuk stared at him before sighing and tending to the fire again. "If you're curious, ask that asshole" he muttered out. Dokja tilted his head to the side, not understanding, so he added "The emperor."
Dokja blink at him before laughing. "Pfft, my my, I didn't know His Highness could be so crass," he chuckled out. He didn't see how the corners of Joonghyuk's lips tilted up a little.
"Well, it's not like I'm exaggerating," He continued after Dokja stopped laughing, "I'm sure you've heard the rumors about my sister and I not having royal blood." Dokja nodded, shifting his demeanor into something more serious as the atmosphere around them grew heavier.
"When it was revealed that I didn't have golden eyes, everyone pointed their fingers at the empress, saying she was unfaithful to the emperor, since all the children of royal blood had that trait." Dokja was also interested as to why Joonghyuk didn't have golden eyes, maybe it was genetic? The empress had black eyes, so he could've just gotten it from his mother. But there could've also been some extraordinary influence on the trait Even the novel didn't provide a good answer for it, it was used as a plot point for the character Yoo Joonghyuk to be ostracized by everyone around him, only to make him fall deeper in love with Lee Seolhwa when she gave him her attention.
"Even the Emperor had lost his trust in my mother, despite her promises that she would never betray him. The nobles around us refused to acknowledge me as the heir, all because of my eyes." Joonghyuk said while looking at the bonfire, bitterness filling his face. "The emperor locked up my mother within her chamber for years on end, not letting her step a foot out of the room. With the rumors started about me, he refused to accept my existence and went on to try to have another child with my mother, this time confident that they'd have golden eyes."
"He tried fruitlessly to impregnate her for many years. By the time they were successful, I was a teenager, and no one even believed I was the emperor's son anymore. Everyone focused on the baby and forgot about my existence. But it was all for naught. When the emperor saw the baby's black eyes, he was indignant and told all the maids and nurses to stop tending to the empress. They didn't care when she was crying for help because of blood loss. That night the empress died."
----
[There was a lot of commotion going on around the manor. Joonghyuk was heading out to visit his mother, since he'd heard that she had finished giving birth to the next child. Hearing a few maids approaching, he thought about just walking through them, but listening in on a few of their whispers, he found that they were talking about his mother and the baby. Curious about his mother's condition, and knowing he'd only get vague answers if he asked anyone himself, he quickly hid behind a corner. As they passed by, he caught some more of their whispers.
"—how could they not be golden, we've tried everything we could…"
"I thought that firstborn's eyes were just a coincidence, but maybe there really is something wrong with Her Majesty."
"I suppose you may be correct,"
As they continued to whisper, Joonghyuk was unable to feel anything akin to anger or sadness, not after being neglected by everyone around him for so long. When the maids eventually left, he emerged and started heading to his mother's quarters. The emperor, in all his callousness, hadn't even allowed his mother the luxury of staying in the manor after birthing him. He'd built a small cottage outside the manor to accommodate the empress.
While it may have been a quaint abode to others, anyone within the manor would be a fool if they thought of it as anything other than a glorified prison cell. When he arrived at the gates leading up to the entrance, he was halted by a group of regal guards who crossed their swords in front of him, "Your Highness, you can't enter."
"Why not?" he questioned.
"The emperor has forbidden the Empress from receiving any visitors."
"… fine, I'll come back later," the prince said, and turned to leave. When he'd gotten far enough to where he was sure the guard wouldn't see him, he went of the path and circled back around to the back of the house to the Empress's Garden, where he knew no guards would be stationed. There was a large fence that kept any unintended visitors from entering, but Yoo Joonghyuk knew that at a specific section at the bottom, there was a hole just large enough for him to crawl through. He'd concealed it using rocks and bushes.
Making it past the fence he shook the dirt of himself and entered the house. It was deathly quiet compared to all the noise going on inside the manor. He would've expected this place to be full of hustle and bustle considering the empress had just given birth. There should've been maids and doctors running around the house. But the rooms were filled with nothing but a fragile silence.
Cautiously making his way to his mother's chambers, Yoo Joonghyuk slowly turned the handle of the door and opened it. The stench of blood and sweat hit his face before anything else. Looking at the bed, he saw his mother, surrounded by bed sheets and blankets stained dark red, her skin deathly pale.
"Your Majesty?" Joonghyuk called out nervously. His legs felt like lead, not allowing him to move past the bedroom door as he looked on in horror. It took the empress a worryingly long time to look at him, her eyes misty and unfocused. It looked like she was struggling to stay awake, her eyelids frequently closing before shooting open again, and her breathing was labored.
She reached out a trembling hand towards him. "My son..." she called out, sounding impossibly delicate. Joonghyuk flinched away. Never before had the empress ever addressed him in that way. "Come here...please…"
After hesitating, he went to her side and took her shaking hands within his own, warily eyeing the blood-stained sheets. "Do you want to call me a physician, Your Majesty?" but she shook her head at him and reached up to stroke his cheek with her other hand.
Her fingers felt like ice. "No need, my time has come anyway..."she said, while giving him a melancholic smile. Seeing her look like that made something in his gut twist painfully. She'd never smiled at him before, the only thing she'd given him until now were bitter looks of remorse. "But can you promise something for me, my son?"
"…what is it, Your Majesty?"
She continued to stroke his cheek as she replied, "I know this is selfish of me, after everything that I've put you through already, but please promise me that you will protect your sister." Indignation welled up inside of him like a poison. How could she expect him to care for a child when no one had done the same to him. Ignoring him for years on end and this was the last thing she said to him. He wanted to scream at her. He wanted to cry. He wanted … he wanted to be seen.
However, looking at the empress' pleading eyes, and how she'd been abandoned to die laying in her own blood, he held his tongue. No matter how much bitterness overcame him, he knew that his mother had been just as neglected as him, and that all their suffering had come from the emperor's own selfishness. Gritting his teeth, Joonghyuk bowed down his head and faced the empress. "I...I promise, I'll protect her with my life," he spoke out, his voice on the verge of cracking.
Her face broke out into a relieved smile, and she pulled him into a hug as her entire body was giving out. His first hug with his mother wasn't what he expected. Her trembling arms could barely hold on to his shoulders, it was more like they were leaning into each other. He slowly brought his arms up to reciprocate but froze, his hands hovering around her torso, unsure if he should or not, as if just one touch would shatter her. Joonghyuk could feel the empress' tears on his shoulder, but he didn't mind.
Reluctantly, his mother slowly pulled away from him. She unclasped her necklace and handed it to him., "For you my child…" She wasn't able to finish her words, roughly coughing up blood from her lungs.
"Your Majesty!" Joonghyuk cried, his eyes widening as he looked to the door, contemplating if he should run out to get a physician.
The empress assured him that she was fine as she lay in bed, placing a palm on his cheek and looking at him. "Joonghyuk...I hope you find your happiness."
Joonghyuk laid his hands over the empress's hands and whispered with a shaking voice, "I will...Mother." His arms and legs subtly shook as he stared at her. He felt like his lungs were made of lead, his chest heavy.
His mother's eyes glistened brightly at his words. "Haa… that's the first time… you…" Her words got quieter with each syllable she breathed out, taking a palpable amount of efort to say each word, until her eyes closed softly. Her hand slowly fell away from his cheek. Joonghyuk could only stare at the empress's corpse, his body becoming numb. Grabbing her hand, he sat by her side, knowing this was the last time he'd ever see her. For all she hadn't been able to do for him, she was the one person who knew how much he'd suffered. By the time he left, her body had gone cold. ]
----
Joonghyuk was unsure of why he'd told Dokja about this. Rather than making a conscious decision to do so, it was like the words kept flowing out of him. However, he knew he needed this... someone to listen to him. "No one knew that I was there when the empress died." As Joonghyuk told the story, his hands had unconsciously drifted over to the pocket where he stashed the necklace,caressing it delicately, "By the next day the maids had already removed the empress belongings, everyone moved on as if she wasn't there to begin with. Just like me, the emperor and staff abandoned Mia to fend for herself, so I tried my best to take care of her...," Yoo Joonghyuk's jaw clenched as he grinded his teeth together, "Then that wench came to the palace with the emperor and a boy who was two years younger than me… everyone was delighted to see he had golden eyes, so the emperor made her his new wife. Her son became the palace's favorite child, and me and Mia were outsiders."
After Joonghyuk stopped speaking, the cave fell into silence once more as Dokja soaked in his words. Even in the novel, Yoo Joonghyuk's childhood had been obscured with vague wording. He had no idea the amount of trauma he'd experienced. Dokja had wondered if his cold nature was just something he'd been born with, but now it was easy to tell that it had been a natural byproduct of his harsh upbringing. But there was a lingering concern in the back of his head.
"Your Highness, why did you propagate a lie about me being an illegitimate child when you've gone through the same ordeal?"
Joonghyuk furrowed his brow at him, "You really think I'm the one who spread those rumors?"
He blinked in surprise, "Huh? If you are not the one who spread that, then who is it?" Joonghyuk looked at him, like he was
judging him.
"Kim Dokja, I'm not the only person in the empire who has a vendetta against you,"
"What do you mean?" scowled Dokja.
Dokja was startled when Joonghyuk told him, point blank, "Kim Dokja, you're the most hated person in the entire empire," making him widen his eyes in shock. Was the villain Kim Dokja really so bad? "I'm the second-most hated person here, so don't worry."
"That doesn't do anything...dammit," Dokja huffed out,kicking a stone into the fire. "Well, I managed to get you on my side for now, maybe I can convince everyone else I'm not so bad."
"Hmph, you're not completely off the hook yet. Try anything stupid again and I'll go back to choking you."
"Yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever you say." Dokja rolled his eyes at him, but then he grinned, "Joonghyuk make sure you keep your eyes on me, I'll be sure to show you that I've changed." A smile as radiant as the stars overtook his face, captivating Joonghyuk.
"I'll be sure to do just that, Kim Dokja, be sure to not disappoint me."