I most definitely took advantage of the situation as I held her hand as much as possible before I mounted her onto my horse. I needed a break from the mansion and I damn well knew she did as she was barely able to leave this place, and when she did she was always heavily guarded. So I didn't even hesitate when I took her by the hand and I got her out of there. I just wanted to catch my breathe in the open air and I didn't want to be alone anymore. So I put her on the horse even though I knew she didn't have nay experience, and I had to admit that having her wrap herself around me for dear life was a nice feeling, and it was a feeling I wanted more of.
We had a fantastic time all over the village, although I was a little sad that she couldn't remember anything at all from our childhoods. But a part of me was honestly glad that she couldn't remember me…and what I had to do to keep the Seo's alive, even if it meant tearing them apart. There were very few people in the village who knew of her crush on me but she had a new look in her eyes that just drew me into her from the moment she had lost her memories. She was full of confidence, which I lacked when I was anywhere near my father. She was highly intelligent, even more so than I could have ever imagined and she could easily use it to wipe out her enemies in the most calmest way I had ever seen, in fact I don't recall Yeon ever being angry in her life, or angry enough to cause some series damage to those around her, unlike me who was a constant hothead as her brother loved to call me. In some ways we had a lot in common but our methods were completely different. I had to admit that I had a higher intelligence level compared to most people in this village, but looking back at how well Yeon could handle herself, I guess that I got a little too arrogant with myself. I couldn't just rely on the fact that I got to have private audiences with the King, I had to start working on myself as soon as possible if I wanted to finally achieve results since I was still tiptoeing around my father and the King after 4 years.
The more I was around Yeon the more I felt like my old self when I was around herself and her brother and I truly missed it. But at the same time I was never given enough time on my own to figure out exactly who I was, what I wanted, my likes and dislikes. And it was like Yeon could see what was going on in my head as she started picking out things to explore that you couldn't do by yourself. In the end she made me try almost everything there was to try in the market; from food and drink I had never tried before, games, accessories, clothing, new swords and so on. We even attended some animal fight much to my surprise, I didn't think she was that kind of girl, but all of my guesses had been wrong about her from the start. She couldn't stop laughing at the shocked expression on my face and explained that she just liked to blend into crowds such as these ones. She was an introverted person like I was although I had always tried to hide it but she liked to be around a lot of noise to keep her sanity.
We talked, we laughed a lot, we enjoyed each other's company and she helped me to find myself a little, and as expected I fit in more in the lowborn world herself and her brother were forced to live in, and the world that I had originally come from being born to my lowborn mother. Living with Yeon made me realise a lot of things, anti was thanks to her that I could stop living in denial. I had missed this world of mine that I was forced to keep away from in my father's place, and it was one of the reasons the Seo's were so precious to me. And now being out here with Yeon I had began to relive all of my childhood memories with them and my mother. I had snacks that I was not allowed to have for years, I saw another easy-going side of life that I was desperate for and I saw how easy it was for people of one cast to rely on each other…it was everything my father's world wasn't. In the word of noble people image mattered more than human lives, friend's and allies were as good as enemies, and if you didn't use and dispose of them in time then they would do it to you. I didn't have a single friend in this world, the Seo's were indeed all that I had and I had almost lost them due to my foolish fixation on trying to prove myself to the man who despised my very existence.
But now here I was, with the one person who waited for me everyday, who checked up on me and didn't have an iota of disgust or sympathy towards me. Although this new version of her was much more reserved than the old one who got excited every time I came around, her eyes still lit up every time I was in her sight, she still smiled just for me and I was also a little blown away by the fact that nobody else had courted her yet…as if I was going to let that happen. It was truly as if she was created just for me alone. So when she not only acknowledged everything I had done for her, but also thanked me for it she completely undid me. But when she leaned in to kiss me on the forehead, that was the moment I knew that no matter what my plans were, I could not afford to loose her. I hadn't had that sort of physical contact or affection since mother died all those years ago; I had caught a whiff of Yeon's scent which was affecting me more today than it ever had done before, and when she pressed her soft lips against my forehead, I was no longer held accountable for my actions. She let me go and didn't want her to, she broke away from my embrace and instead of letting her walk away like everybody else had done, I couldn't let her do that. She was kind to me, cared for me and she loved me again despite her memory loss….so now she had to be responsible for me. I grabbed her again with the intention of taking some kind of action that would mark her as mine, even if it was a simple kiss…my first kiss and her's as well. Despite the look she had on her face her eyes told a very different story, no matter how reserved she was this time she wanted me to so something, I knew it as sure as I knew my name. She yearned to be wanted, to be touched and to be marked by me…she wanted my love and she had deserved it. *********************
We did have a nice time around the market place, the river, the fields and everywhere else where we had grown up around in our youths that I was not supposed to have remembered yet. But it made me miss my brother so much that I had a harder times forcing my smiles. I was too lost in thoughts to notice how he was looking at me, and he was constantly asking me if I wanted to eat or drink anything. I could't help noticing how sweet he was being, so much so that I actually said it out aloud. And the look on his face completely broke me all over again, he looked stunned at first like he had never head of a compliment before and then he couldn't look at me for a while. It was moments like this that completely broke me as well…and before I knew it I found myself hugging his back, and I thanked him for everything he had done for me, the care and effort he had put into my stay and I thanked him for shielding me against his father as much as he could. I made sure to give him a tight hug, goodness knows when the last time he had one was.
I could feel him shaking in my embrace as he still hid his face away from me. I tried to let go so I could have him face me but as soon as I unwrapped myself around him, he pulled my hands back around his waist for a while. I felt myself sink into his back for a while to try to remember what it felt like to breathe normally for a while before he stopped shaking. I turned around to try and face him but he kept hiding his face into his hair and kept looking away from me. In the end I had to place his face into my hands as I wiped away his tears that he was still hiding underneath his hair. I did this for a while before I pulled his face towards me so I could give him a simply kiss on the forehead as a recognition of his hard work…but at that moment there was a powerful force that kept pulling us towards each other, no matter how hard I tried to ignore it. I had kissed him on the forehead and I tried to walk away, but he didn't like that at all for some reason. He grabbed my arm without even turning around and almost slammed me against a tree if he didn't place his hand on my head so I wouldn't hurt myself. Wrestling him off of me wasn't an option either as he wrapped himself around so me I couldn't move, and he was just staring me. I couldn't even speak at all, I just didn't know what to say. His stare was so intense that I couldn't look at him without trembling from head to toe, so I just pointed my eyes to the floor. But this time he took my face into his blistered rough hands and he…traced my face before he leaned in…and so did I…
I tried shaking my head a few times to try and erase what almost took place right now…again…but it wasn't working. He was making me so confused that I didn't know how to act around him anymore, although he made one thing perfectly clear; he got angry about anything that concerned me, really angry. That didn't bode well for me at all; the amount of secrets I was keeping from both him and my brother was already ensuring me into an early grave. It was also one of the other reasons why I had been avoiding him recently, just the thought of him finding out what I was up to already made me sweat when I was around him. So I tried to avoid thinking about it by focusing on what made him happy now, and trying to calm down an angry Seon-Ho who looked like he was on the verge of tearing himself apart. This was it; we had finally been caught together, and now I could only await for my judgement from my superiors in the palace and even my own brother to see which hand date would deal me next" would i be placed in the palace permanently? Or end up leaving with my lover? Or without him?