TM | Chapter 6

When the door opened, a simple room came into view—on one side of the wall stood a moon cabinet, and at its end was a half-closed chest.

Lee Seol stepped inside, familiar with the space, but his footsteps slowed as he noticed something different. Instead of books, bundles of plain cotton and silk were piled on the table, and in one corner of the room sat an embroidery frame he had never seen before. Inside it, an uneven pattern was stitched—wild grass clumsily imitating flowers.

“What’s this?”

“…Big sister-in-law told me to practice embroidery.”

Yoon Sung, sitting on the bedding, kicked his feet in frustration, his face filled with discontent.

“I don’t wanna do it.”

Grumbling for no reason, he flopped down onto the bedding. Lee Seol walked over and sat beside him.

“Then don’t.”

“…”

“I won’t make you do things like this.”

At the subtle push toward marriage, Yoon Sung turned his head away.

Lee Seol silently watched him, lying there, as if ignoring him altogether. He gazed at Yoon Sung for a long while, and gradually, his sharp eyes drooped. His face, which had been rigid, took on a gloomy expression. After hesitating for a moment, he carefully opened his mouth.

“I’m sorry, Sung-ah… I think I’ve confused you too much…”

Hearing his trembling voice, Yoon Sung buried his face into the bedding.

“This marriage proposal that just came in… It’ll proceed as soon as the marriage ban is lifted. It’s the second son of Grand Prince Heo Geon… Once the wedding is over, I’ll be going to Cheongguk.”

Hearing those distant words, Yoon Sung turned his head toward him. Lee Seol looked back at him with an unbearably affectionate gaze. His pale face and reddened eyes made him look pitiful, as if he perfectly embodied the word.

“I know what kind of pain it is to be forced into a marriage you don’t want. That’s why… I don’t want to burden you. Just being able to express my feelings is enough…”

Lee Seol couldn’t finish his sentence.

Seeing his sorrowful expression, Yoon Sung furrowed his brows. When he looked at him with questioning eyes, Lee Seol flinched slightly, his eyebrow twitching. That brief flicker of expression made Yoon Sung’s lips curve faintly.

He had definitely seen that face before.

When they played together, just the two of them.

Was it when they were… twelve?

They had been drawing on the ground with sticks, having a good time, when Lee Seol suddenly furrowed his brows and let a single tear fall. It had startled him so much.

Being the fool he was, he immediately assumed he had done something wrong and started apologizing over and over.

‘Sorry. I did something wrong.’

Seeing the tears fall down his porcelain-white face had made his chest ache, so he had ended up wailing right along with him.

When Lee Seol reached out his arms, wanting to be hugged, Yoon Sung had pulled him close, promising to do anything he wanted if he would just stop crying, swearing that he would be good.

‘Do I look pitiful?’

‘Mm… sniff…’

‘Then what about this face?’

Lee Seol, mid-tearfall, suddenly covered his mouth, his eyelids trembling violently. That expression of injustice had made Yoon Sung panic even more, and he ended up plopping onto the ground in despair.

‘Sniff… What did I do so wrong?’

He had just been drawing with a stick. Why was he acting like that? His heart pounded anxiously. Had he done something stupid again?

‘Sung-ah, stop crying. Were you startled? I must’ve really confused you.’

‘Sniff… Uuhh… Waaaahhh…!’

Yoon Sung couldn’t even make out what Lee Seol was saying anymore. Suddenly, Lee Seol’s expression turned oddly satisfied, and he reached out to pinch Yoon Sung’s cheek.

‘Sung-ah. I learned this. If you cry like this, you look sorrowful.’

It was a few months later that he finally understood what that had meant.

What on earth was that guy learning in his household? One day, he would say he was feeling awful but smile brightly, and on another, he would claim he was angry while acting all cutesy.

At first, Yoon Sung just stared blankly, wondering what the hell he was doing. But as the expressions he made grew more and more peculiar each day, he eventually furrowed his brows.

‘This one is seductive.’

Hearing Lee Seol’s serious explanation, he finally realized that this guy was practicing how to control his expressions freely in any situation.

After that, he even became able to notice the most subtle changes in Lee Seol’s expressions. And right now. Right this moment. That… that expression!

The flicker of an emotion that appeared for an instant before vanishing. A fleeting moment that no one else would ever catch.

Yoon Sung narrowed his eyes, staring at Lee Seol with suspicion. The thought that this expression was something deliberately crafted made his words seem far from genuine.

“…I’ve told you my feelings, so I’ll wait for your decision.”

Finishing his words, Lee Seol slowly got up. His steps were weak as he left Yoon Sung’s room, and even as he crossed the household’s gate, he still carried a lingering sorrow.

Once the gate closed and he confirmed that no one was around, the light in his eyes sharpened. As if his mournful face had never existed in the first place, his expression turned cold, and he gave a slight shake of his head, as if he was displeased with something.

Thinking of how Yoon Sung hadn’t fallen for his sorrowful expression, Lee Seol smiled faintly.

“…Shouldn’t have taught him how to read my expressions.”

Muttering to himself in a low voice, his tone carrying slight dissatisfaction, he then turned his gaze toward the sky, where the sun was beginning to set. His eyes gleamed.

“But Sung-ah. I know you better than anyone.”

With light steps, he changed direction toward the mountains. His swift movements made it look as if he was soaring.

Meanwhile, Yoon Sung was staring at the closed door before shifting his gaze to nothing in particular. With a deep sigh, he ran both hands through his hair, gripping at his head.

To be betrayed by his lover, Kang Taegwon, and then to receive a marriage proposal from Lee Seol—the person he had feelings for, of all people!

And of course, it just had to be Lee Seol, whose face was the only thing he liked about him. The fact that Kang Taegwon had been in love with him only made it worse.

On top of that, outright rejecting the proposal was terrifying because he had no idea what would happen next. But staying silent felt just as unbearable—after all, ever since childhood, he had detested unwanted marriages to the core.

It was miserable to think that, in the end, Lee Seol wouldn’t be able to escape his family’s pressure and would end up as a grand prince’s daughter-in-law, sent off to Cheongguk.

Feeling infuriated by his own conflicting emotions, Yoon Sung shoved his face into the bedding. He gritted his teeth against the turmoil twisting inside him, but at that moment, the door suddenly burst open.

“You little brat! It’s dinnertime, so you should be out helping your sister-in-law with the kitchen work! If you can’t handle outside work, then at least learn how to manage household chores!”

Just when he was at his lowest, his eldest brother barged in, raising his voice, clearly unimpressed by the sight of him lying on the bedding.

“Even if the servants do the work, you need to know how to manage them properly! Now get out here and help!”

At his oldest brother’s thundering command, Yoon Sung’s barely held-back tears spilled over once again.

“Oh, for heaven’s sake… We spoiled him too much, and now he’s crying again just because he got scolded. When is this kid ever going to grow up…”

Clicking his tongue, his eldest brother looked at him with sheer exasperation, clutching at his own chest as if he were about to explode from frustration.

“What, are you exceptionally beautiful like Seol? Are you noble and dignified? Or are you at least smart? You’re just a tiny thing who only has his cuteness going for him, and even that’ll be gone once you get older! You need to hurry up and get married!”

As his brother’s frustration reached its peak, he practically roared the words, making his sister-in-law rush over to pull at his arm, urging him to quiet down before their father overheard.

“Seriously… I have a feeling I’m going to be stuck looking after this one for the rest of my life…”

Letting out a deep sigh, his eldest brother shook his head and finally slammed the door shut behind him as he left.

Silent tears streamed down his face, overcome with sorrow. He had no talent, no skills—what had he even been thinking when he proposed to Kang Taegwon? He was so foolish, so utterly clueless, that he hadn’t even realized he was nothing more than a plaything in someone else’s eyes.

Clutching at the empty ache in his chest, he absently picked up the piece of plain cotton in front of him. His sister-in-law had said that he should at least learn some basic embroidery and simple floral patterns.

Threading the needle, he pushed it through the fabric. It felt as if he were stabbing it straight into his own heart. A sharp sting spread through his fingertips as the needle pricked his index finger.

Even in this moment, a strange thought surfaced in his mind—he suddenly remembered the girl he had seen in the mountains, wearing clothes that left her wrists exposed. A frail child, holding her younger sibling’s hand as they dug through the dirt, searching for food.

The sight of that little girl made his chest tighten painfully. The way she had looked at him with those clear, sorrowful eyes while he cried—it felt as if the ground beneath him was crumbling.

Children who had it far worse than him still managed to smile. And yet, here he was, wailing over his own misery.

Tears dripping down his chin, Yoon Sung continued stitching, doing his best to keep the length of each stitch even. He tried so hard, yet the stitches remained crooked and uneven.

Staring at his pathetic attempt, he mumbled to himself that he was nothing but a useless fool before collapsing onto the bedding.

It hurt now, but eventually, he would forget him. Wasn’t it said that first loves never worked out?

…Ah.

It wasn’t his first love, was it?

Even in the midst of his heartbreak, his own idiotic train of thought made him scoff at himself. Frustrated, he smacked himself on the head.

Tears continued to flow, soaking the back of his hand before seeping into the bedding. That night, he didn’t eat dinner. He just cried and cried, spilling every memory of Kang Taegwon and every lingering feeling he had left.

And in the end, exhausted from weeping, he fell asleep just like that.

𓇢𓆸 ࿐ ࿔

With his eyes so swollen that he could barely open them, Yoon Sung spent the early morning following his eldest sister-in-law around, helping with various chores.

For the first time in his life, he seasoned vegetables. While pounding garlic, he accidentally slammed his already wounded index finger—still sore from the countless needle pricks of the night before—against the flat of a knife. At one point, he even came dangerously close to slicing off the tip of his fingernail with a terrifyingly sharp kitchen knife.

His eldest sister-in-law sighed softly after tasting his dish, clearly unimpressed. But his second sister-in-law, on the other hand, patted his back encouragingly, saying that for a first attempt, it wasn’t bad at all.

Then, she told him to add more seasoning and mix it again. Without a word, he obediently followed her instructions.

A maid, watching from the side, quietly slipped in a spoonful of sesame oil. The moment he mixed it in, the vegetables transformed—the flavor was now perfect.

He moved through the morning in a daze, mindlessly following their instructions without thinking too much. By the time he snapped out of it, half the day had already passed.

Afterward, he took a medicinal decoction to his father, only for the old man to nearly jump in shock at the sight of his swollen eyes. And just like that, his eldest brother was summoned.