I was slow, but I wasn't stupid. I knew what a kiss and "I like you" meant.
What I couldn't understand was why. We were both men, and oceans apart in rank. Why would the prince fall for something as common as mud?
That night I tossed and turned until I finally shook Little Nine awake. He was the shadow guard with the best luck with women. If anyone had answers, he would.
"Are you insane? Waking me in the middle of the night?" Nine rubbed his eyes.
"Nine. What happens when two men fall in love?"
"Why are you asking that? Did you sneak off and read one of those cheap novels—" He grinned.
"I'm serious!"
"Ugh, that stuff's only in trashy penny dreadfuls. 'The passion of the cut sleeve'? People call it a perversion. The very thought makes your skin crawl."
Nine wrinkled his nose.
My head dropped. My chest felt like stone.
"Besides, look at every royal who keeps a male concubine—every one of them is disowned, disgraced. In a ruling house, it's the ultimate shame."
Nine chattered on. My thoughts had already tangled into a knot no blade could cut.
* * *
No! The prince was brilliant, exceptional, destined for great things. He could not become a laughingstock.
He had already suffered enough as a child. Now, on the cusp of manhood and power, I would not let the world trample him again.
From that day on, I kept my distance. I performed my duties and nothing more. I did not cross the line by a single hair's breadth.
Neither of us mentioned the kiss in the rain. As if it had never happened.
It was an accident. It could only be an accident.
After countless attempts to win me over came to nothing, the prince grew quieter. He threw himself into study with a kind of fury.
Classics, essays, archery—he took first place in everything.
At last he stood at the top. He held the military. No one could touch him.
I exhaled and knelt to request my discharge.
I wanted to go home. A few acres of farmland, maybe a small martial-arts school, a handful of students.
But I didn't want to marry.
Not because of the prince.
I said it wasn't, so it wasn't.
* * *
But the prince only smiled, cold as frost, and asked if I truly didn't know his heart.
I knew. Of course I knew.
That was precisely why I had to leave.
But I couldn't escape. The prince was no longer the little boy who cried at everything. I had become his obsession—the love he could never have.
I told him again and again: "I only like women. Turn back before it's too late."
He only grew more reckless. He began dressing as a woman to make me smile. He adopted a nameless infant simply because its eyes looked like mine.
Rumors spread through the kingdom—the prince had a bastard child, proof of debauchery, unfit for rule.
I couldn't let him keep falling.
I stole the baby and left him on a path where a young couple would surely find him.
The prince tore the palace apart looking for the child, screaming at me, demanding to know where I'd put him. I pressed my lips together and said nothing while the lash fell across my back, again and again.
"He is our child. You can't throw him away—"
He crumbled. A helpless boy, crouching on the ground, sobbing.
"Wake up! We can never have a child! We have no future! Not ever!"
I seized his collar—an act of treason—and roared the truth into his face.
He smiled faintly. "I say he's ours. So he is."
* * *
The child was found. The prince kept dreaming.
One day he came running to me, eyes bright. "A Jin—once I reach the very top, we can be together forever. No one's whispers will matter. Nothing will stand in our way."
Could it be true?
A thread of hope. A mountain of dread.
If that day ever comes, I'll tell him the truth. I'll tell him it was never one-sided.
That day arrived. The prince became emperor. He looked magnificent in the dragon robe.
Is our future finally here?
But the old emperor's words shattered everything. Our secret was already common knowledge. The court whispered behind cupped hands: Disgusting. Deviant. Against nature.
In that moment, I understood. I was the one who was wrong.
A shadow guard exists to be his master's armor—never the blade that cuts him.
I should have died long ago. On that confused, rain-soaked day, I should have ended it. Instead I was selfish. I allowed myself to dream of a future.
It wasn't too late. I would correct my mistake now.
After dinner with the prince, I returned to my quarters. I picked up a brush, meaning to write something, but couldn't find the words.
The beginning was wrong. Every step was wrong. Everything was wrong.
Better to leave nothing at all. If there's nothing left behind, maybe the prince will stop thinking of me.
When the blade pierced my stomach, tears blurred my sight.
It hurt.
I was crying because of the pain. Not for any other reason.
* * *
After death, two underworld guards led my soul down to hell. On the Bridge of Forgetting, the old woman held out a bowl of blood-red soup.
"Drink, and you'll forget everything."
I raised the bowl with trembling hands. The instant my eyes closed, every memory surged loose and flooded through me at once.
The prince's jade-smooth smile the day we met. His worried, guilty eyes when I was hurt. His cautious, dimpled grin when he kissed me.
"Shall I give you a name? How about A Jin? Do you like it?"
"A Jin, does it hurt? It's my fault you got hurt."
"A Jin, I like you."
"A Jin, don't ignore me."
"A Jin, if we could have a child, do you think it would look like this?"
"A Jin, I'm emperor now. We can be together forever."
"A Jin, A Jin, A Jin."
My eyes flew open. I smashed the bowl on the ground.
* * *
I refused. My life had been nothing but gray. These memories were the only light I had. If they were taken from me, what was left?
The guards swarmed me and dragged me before the King of Hell.
"A Jin, do you know your crime?"
The king lounged on his divan, one eye cracked open.
"In life, I served faithfully. Every person I killed was a traitor who endangered the prince. Tell me, Your Honor—what crime have I committed?"
"Your crime? Loving someone you were never meant to love. That is your sin."
The king sat up and glared.
"Which law in all the mortal world says a man may only love a woman? The prince and I loved each other. It was our affair and ours alone. We harmed no one. Why can't you give us one road to walk?"
I strained my neck and screamed until my voice cracked.
The King of Hell pinched the bridge of his nose, flipped through every statute in the human world, and couldn't find a single law against loving.
"Er—my apologies. It seems there's been a misunderstanding. Don't get worked up. How about I arrange a next life of wealth and glory?"
"No! I don't want a next life. I want to go back. I want to see the prince!"
* * *
"Fine, fine, stop shouting. I'll send you back. Just—I can't guarantee when you'll land. Good luck."
The king waved a hand. A flash of white light, and I vanished from the underworld.
"Wait—didn't this fellow kill himself? How is that my problem?"
The king blinked, feeling cheated.
Oh, forget it. Consider it a good deed.
When I opened my eyes again, I was staring into the prince's tear-reddened face.
Rain. Mud. The grotto.
I touched my lips. They were still warm. I was back—back to that day, the very moment after the kiss.
Before the prince could lower his head in shame, I lifted his chin, leaned in, and pressed my mouth to his, swallowing every trembling sob.
Fierce. Consuming. As though we would never let go.
When the kiss ended, I looked into his wide, glistening eyes—deer-like, crystal clear—and felt myself flush. My breath came ragged.
Before I lost what was left of my self-control, I scrambled out of the grotto, intending to stand in the rain until my head cooled down.
Wait.
I stopped.
Last time, the prince hadn't started crying until after I left the cave.
I turned and looked at the figure still sitting inside, wearing the same bewildered expression I was feeling.
And in that instant, we both understood.