This was the man he had collided with in the marketplace. Hui-seo could only move his lips, staring at him blankly.
“Then, won’t your brother be worried?”
The moment his brother was mentioned by the lips of one he’d thought never to see again, all his senses returned as if waking from a dream.
“…Do you know my brother?”
Knowing the man knew who his brother was, Hui-seo’s eyes clouded faintly with wariness.
“It’s written on your face — wouldn’t it be odd not to recognize it?”
“Ah…”
No wonder he had seemed startled when they collided. There had been a reason.
At the remark that picked out his resemblance to Hui-won, Hui-seo steadied himself as best he could and lowered his guard. And in this situation, it was only natural.
“…Thanks to you, I am unharmed.”
The man was a stranger — awkward, frightening. But without him Hui-seo would not have escaped a dreadful fate, so his gratitude was only natural.
“How could I ever repay this kindness…”
To offer money in return would be against propriety — but in any case, having scrimped his allowance to buy the pendant for Hui-won, he hadn’t a single coin left in hand.
“Ah.”
The thought of the pendant struck him suddenly. He had come to this pass trying to find it, yet he had forgotten it completely.
This time he had wanted to give something fine, so he had scrimped the allowance his grandfather gave him to buy it. And before he could even present it, he had lost it whole.
To find the child who had fled was a distant hope now.
His strength left him, but he forced himself not to show it. This was no place to fall apart. And besides, the benefactor who had saved him stood before his eyes. To show a grieving face over one lost belonging would be poor conduct indeed.
“Is this, by any chance, what you’re looking for?”
Just as he was swallowing his sense of loss, Hui-seo caught without thinking what the man lightly tossed him, and sucked in his breath.
This was unmistakably what the child had snatched from him.
“…How did you… this…”
The man only shrugged his shoulders at him.
Wearing a disbelieving face, Hui-seo examined the inside of the purse. Fortunately the pendant was unharmed, without a single flaw.
“Truly, I don’t know how I could ever repay this kindness.”
Overflowing with the relief and joy of having found it, Hui-seo thanked him again and again. The man gazed at Hui-seo’s face with a faint smile — as though looking at something quite strange and unfamiliar.
“I will, I will repay you.”
Hui-seo promised him over and over.
They were words full of sincerity. And not only because he had found the pendant.
That he was someone who knew his brother was, moreover, no unrelated matter to Hui-seo. Even so, the man had not passed by one in distress but had shown him goodwill, and thanks to him he had escaped this crisis.
The man tilted his head crookedly, looking down at Hui-seo — as if quite fascinated, or as if thoroughly fed up.
“Repayment, is it…”
When he blinked once, that expression was gone.
“And what makes you think you know what I want?”
“That is…”
As Hui-seo faltered in confusion, the man turned away indifferently. Hui-seo, who had been standing there staring blankly, started and hurried after his retreating back.
The man walked ahead. Hui-seo followed the unhesitating figure as best he could.
He offered no word of comfort, but he did seem to be leading the way, so Hui-seo hastened after him — though it grew harder with every step. After the unexpected sprint earlier — and with his legs trembling from fright — his feet kept tripping over themselves.
Whatever Hui-seo’s condition, the man did not slow his stride. Follow or fall behind — he walked on looking only ahead, as if he cared not which.
If only not to lose him, Hui-seo had to walk with all his might.
“……..”
Even as he busily worked his legs, Hui-seo drank in the man’s retreating figure.
That broad back, straight and graceful without a hair’s waver, kept stealing his senses away.
His face, like carved jade, his lofty speech — he was surely a young lord of some high house.
But how did he know Hui-won? Hui-won belonged to the Crown Prince’s household tutorial office — was the man the same? Or, though he looked younger than his brother, he might be a colleague who had passed the state examination in the same year and taken office.
Amid such conjectures he suddenly realized he hadn’t even asked the man’s name. He would need to know it, to repay him…
He could simply ask — that would settle it. For now, merely walking after him left him breathless, so he thought to ask carefully once they reached their destination.
The man walked on, calm and unhurried, while Hui-seo’s unasked questions piled up one by one. Hui-seo, for his part, now understood the little bird trailing the heron, and strained not to fall behind.
The early-spring night was chilly. Cold wind scraped his cheeks again and again.
His feet were stumbling as if about to give way when the man halted without warning. He nearly walked straight into that straight, solid back, but managed just barely to stop.
“Ah…”
He barely kept his footing as his tangling feet nearly sent him sprawling.
“There — I see your brother.”
Only then did Hui-seo understand why he had stopped so suddenly.
Before he knew it, they were near Hui-won’s lodgings.
The bright lamplight, the open gate, even that somehow-busy air — all of it, surely, was on his account.
“……..”
Abashed, he bit his lip in thought, then lifted his voice.
“Brother!”
Hui-won, who had been about to step out with an anxious face, looked around at the sound of his brother’s voice from somewhere.
Their eyes meeting was the work of an instant.
“Hui-seo!”
Spotting him, Hui-won came running at once. The nearer he drew, the clearer the worry and relief written on his face.
“…Brother.”
“What in the world happened! Do you know how frightened I was?”
Pale as paper, Hui-won pulled Hui-seo into his arms without a moment’s hesitation.
“…Brother…”
In that cozy embrace, the familiar warmth and scent, all his fear and tension melted like snow. Only then could Hui-seo finally let his heart rest.
“You don’t know a single street of the capital, yet you chase after him without a thought?”
“I’m sorry…”
Still held in his arms, Hui-seo repeated his apologies.
When Hui-seo nuzzled his forehead against him in appeal, Hui-won scolded, “Aren’t you too old for this?” even as he gently patted his back.
“How fortunate that you found your way back at all.”
Hui-won, who knew well how exceptionally poor his brother’s sense of direction was, breathed relief. Only then did Hui-seo think of the man who had brought him here.
“Ah!”
Hui-seo quickly lifted his head from the embrace.
“Your acquaintance, brother, brought me… huh?”
Turning toward where the man had been, Hui-seo made a witless sound.
“‘Cheon-u’? What are you on about?”
Hui-won looked utterly bewildered, as if Hui-seo were speaking nonsense.
“It was your friend, brother, who brought me all the way here…”
Behind him, there was no one.
The man who had stood there only moments before had vanished without a trace. As if he had never existed at all.
“But he was really there…”
Hui-seo looked around. But all that remained was the quiet dark and the clear moonlight that had followed them.
Truly, it was enough to make ghosts weep.
“…Where could he have gone.”
“Let it be, now. Let’s go inside first.”
Judging it better to take his brother inside than to waste time searching for a man who had left no trace, Hui-won took Hui-seo’s wrist and urged him in.
“Well, all right…”
With eyes full of lingering regret, Hui-seo glanced once more at the spot where the man had stood, then followed his brother inside.
Passing the cluttered servants’ quarters and crossing the threshold into the inner house, all was quiet.
Hui-seo glanced toward the room where his grandfather stayed. No light seeped out — he must have retired.
“I didn’t tell him, lest he worry.”
Noticing where Hui-seo’s gaze lingered, Hui-won added quietly.
“He’s already retired, it seems.” Relieved, Hui-seo let himself be led into the room set aside for him.
In the lamplight — the lamp had been lit beforehand — he could finally look his brother properly in the face.
“…What is this.”
Hui-won, whose face had been all worry for his brother and relief at finding him, now sighed deeply.
His hand touched Hui-seo’s cheek. When Hui-seo winced without thinking at the sting, Hui-won drew his hand back.
“Your face… this…”
“It’s nothing.”
He hadn’t seen it with his own eyes, but he could guess well enough.
“It’s not ‘nothing.’ Your cheek is this red.”
“It’ll settle by tomorrow.”
They had grabbed and twisted it roughly, and on top of that it had been long exposed to the cold — no wonder it was red and swollen. If it was nothing serious, it would go down after tonight.
At his brother’s nonchalant response, Hui-won — who had been clutching his own chest in frustration — seized Hui-seo with a startled face.
“Hui-seo — what in the world is this!”
Following his gaze downward, Hui-seo too wore a dazed look.
What had soaked red into his robe hem was unmistakably blood.
The sound of something slicing the wind, the pain-filled groans — they floated back up to the surface of memory.
“You don’t think you’re hurt?”
He had no leisure to dwell on the memory, lucky or not. Restraining Hui-won, who was acting unlike himself, was more urgent.
At this rate he might raise a ruckus calling for people and wake the household. Perhaps even his grandfather. That was the last thing Hui-seo wanted, so he hastened to smooth things over.
“It’s not my blood. I’m not hurt, brother. Look — if I were hurt, could I be walking about like this?”
Hui-seo shifted his body this way and that. He even smiled, to reassure him. Only then did Hui-won look him up and down.
His cheek was red as a palm-print and his color pale, but otherwise he looked sound. His gait, too, showed nothing amiss.
Hui-won stroked his chest in relief, even as anger slowly welled up.
“Woo Hui-seo.”
Hui-won called him by his full name, his voice sinking lower and lower.
Ah. He was angry. Remembering the voice his brother used when scolding him as a child, Hui-seo reflexively watched his mood.
“Tell me in detail what happened. You mustn’t leave out even the smallest thing. Tell me everything, and mind you tell it straight.”
First Hui-won sat Hui-seo down, then stood before him.
He was angry, yes — but his intent showed through plainly: he would hear the whole story first, and take into account whatever could be taken into account.
A groan escaped Hui-seo.
Hui-won would never back down until he’d spoken. He’d have liked to think of a way to ease the worry, but before Hui-won that was hopeless.
Resigned, Hui-seo began his tale from the chasing of the pickpocket child.
How he’d been lured into the dead-end alley, how he’d met the ruffians there and nearly been abducted, and how the one who had rescued him in his moment of peril —
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