Chapter 2
The lutenist parted her lips as if to speak, then stopped. A moment later, she spoke in a low voice.
“Treat her with respect.”
“Your name?”
“I erased it long ago. Just call me Old Woman.”
“Very well, Old Woman. Tonight, you say…”
When light disappears and darkness settles in, that is night. The night had begun, and today was nearing its end.
“Are you rushing things? The night will be over soon.”
The emperor downed the remaining green Panian in his pewter cup in one gulp.
“If you’re right, I’ll reward you with gold. If nothing happens, leave the castle before dawn. If I see you again, I’ll cut out the tongue that spoke falsehoods.”
“I decline the gold. I’ll finish my song and leave the castle immediately.”
“Good choice. Play one more piece before you go.”
The blind old woman raised her closed eyes toward the void and plucked the lute strings with her thin, bony fingers.
The emperor sank deeper into the warm water at just the right temperature and closed his eyes.
Was it really to hear lute music that he returned to the castle? Was bringing Patrick to the castle instead of keeping him in the prison camp truly out of respect for an enemy crown prince? Was it merely out of friendship for a fellow academy junior?
As Patrick came to mind, a stifling feeling rose in his chest.
“In the end, excessive greed brings disaster and ruin.”
You said it so firmly, with such a composed demeanor, Patrick.
“History only records mighty strength and power. But weaker royal houses, minority tribes, like the Hun people of our continent, are worth protecting and preserving in history.”
It was a noble idea, and he respected him for it.
Above all, he had been pleased with the way Patrick said ‘our continent.’
He was convinced that the Arkan continent could be turned into a peaceful land, where the sun would shine on all equally not through hostility, but through friendly relations.
And yet, Patrick had led the invasion and commanded this war? He couldn’t believe it. Of course, it must have been the order of the war-crazed Emperor of Tane, who had swallowed up most of the kingdoms on the continent over the past thirty years.
It had to be an imperial order, Patrick.
If this war was started by your own will, I will never forgive your hypocrisy.
The emperor recalled the graduation celebration held last year at the Tane Academy.
A dim terrace. Remembering Patrick, who had said he had no interest in the event and wouldn’t attend, the emperor had gone out to the terrace to smoke. There, he met a woman. A mysterious lady who resembled Patrick. Like an illusion, like a vision.
It had been dizzying, almost surreal.
With a distant expression, he roughly grabbed the pewter cup on the bath tray. As he drank the strong liquor, a fierce heat spread through his body.
At that moment, Kalip entered the bath chamber in haste.
“Your Majesty.”
It was before the lute piece had even finished.
“What is it?”
Kalip knelt on one knee and looked up at the emperor.
“It seems the prisoner is not the crown prince of Tane.”
*
“Haa…”
Kalip looked at the emperor after removing all of the silver armor. The prisoner now wore a white shirt over black trousers.
The emperor pressed his sword against the prisoner’s pale, slender neck.
“I’ll ask one last time. Who are you?”
Through the open front of the shirt, he could see bandages tightly wrapped around the prisoner’s chest. It was clear to anyone that the prisoner was a woman. She kept her mouth tightly shut, refusing to answer.
As if she had poison in her mouth.
Poison…!
The emperor stepped in close and grabbed her chin. He forced her mouth open.
He inserted his index finger and swept around the damp inside. Her soft tongue curled inward, blocking her throat.
He bent closer, peering into her mouth, and pulled her tongue out with his finger. Between his fingers, the slick pink tongue glistened with clear saliva. The emperor paused, catching the scent of her breath and body.
It wasn’t an illusion. It was her.
A strange sensation made him tremble, and he shoved the prisoner toward Kalip. No, he had stepped back because he feared she might hear the pounding of his own heartbeat.
“There’s no poison in her mouth.”
With slightly trembling hands, the emperor raised his sword and pointed it at the prisoner’s neck.
The lady in the violet dress on the terrace, was it you? Then why are you wearing armor in Patrick’s place?
“Reveal your identity. Who are you?”
“Kill me.”
“She might be hiding poison. Search her body.”
At the emperor’s command, Kalip and the knights let out low breaths.
The prisoner, who had kept her head lowered, suddenly raised it with dignity. Her blue-gray eyes surged like crashing waves.
‘Patrick.’
“I am Patricia Kalyan Evas, Princess of the Tane Empire.”
“Ah!”
Kalip, who had been holding the front of her shirt, froze and stepped back.
“The princess of Tane? I thought the Tane Empire had two princes. A princess, all of a sudden?”
‘Patrick, are you alright?’
Patricia tried to clutch her chest, but the knights at her sides held her arms, keeping her from moving.
‘Patrick, all of a sudden… my chest hurts like my heart’s been carved out with a blade. It burns like salt poured on an open wound.’
“So, you really do resemble Patrick. No—you’re identical. Are you his sister?”
“Patrick and I are twins.”
“Twins?”
“Patrick and I shared our mother’s womb and were born on the same day.”
“Is that even possible?”
In the Karsik Empire—no, across the entire Arkan continent, the existence of living twins was unheard of.
It wasn’t that no mother had ever conceived twins, but very few survived to full term. And even if they did, the birth was usually dangerous, and most were stillborn.
On the rare occasion two babies were born from the same womb, one was typically eliminated, as twins were considered an ill omen.
In the Tane Empire, Empress Aldisha barely made it to term with the help of the palace physicians and the herbal remedies of the Hun tribe. After three days of labor, she gave birth to twins.
Emperor Kazan had the midwife, the Hun healer Amir, and eighteen handmaidens who assisted with the birth executed immediately afterward.
Amir, who had delivered the prophecy: ‘Until adulthood, the sun shall guide the moon,’ was cast out, her eyes and tongue taken.
Even without the prophecy, the boy was pitifully small. The emperor, displeased, declared that had the genders been reversed, he would have eliminated the girl. He ordered that the child be locked away in the western tower until adulthood.
Thus, Empress Aldisha’s delivery of twins was concealed.
‘Patrick… Are you alright? You’re not dead, are you? That wretched, vicious woman, Consort Pamela, she orchestrated this entire scheme.’
Patricia raised her head and looked the Karsik Emperor squarely in the eye.
“Kill me.”
Her blue eyes filled with tears. Her wet eyelashes trembled. Like a crashing wave, the tears overflowed. The emperor was flustered at the sight of the tears running down her pale cheeks.
“When did I say I would kill you?”
Watching her cry in silence, the emperor felt as though something had been carved out of his chest with a blade. It was her. He was sure of it. Even then, on the terrace, she had silently shed tears just like this.
“Don’t touch me. Just kill me.”
“Princess… Why do you keep asking to die?”
The emperor, startled by the tearful yet dignified gaze of the princess, instinctively switched to a more respectful tone.
Looking at her wavy golden hair, like sunlight itself, he recalled the words of the blind lutenist.
He had dismissed them as nonsense.
Unintentionally, the emperor spoke without thinking.
“Let her sleep in my bedchamber.”
Then his face flushed red. The aroma of the strong Panian liquor rose to his throat. Irritated, he brushed back the wet black hair clinging to his forehead.
***
Patricia, the shadow princess of the Tane Empire, was the twin sister of Crown Prince Patrick.
As foretold by the Hun prophet Amir, a pair of twins symbolizing the sun and moon had been born.
Typically, the sun symbolized a boy, and the moon a girl. But in their case, it was reversed. In particular, the boy who symbolized the moon was half the size of the girl.
The existence of the girl was concealed from the moment of birth. She was locked away in the west tower of a separate palace with her nursemaid, Eva. When the crown prince turned nine, the war-mad Emperor Kazan ordered him to begin observing battles.
Aldisha pleaded for more time until the frail prince could grow in size and strength. But the emperor was dissatisfied with such a weak heir.
Patrick fell behind in anything physical. When Aldisha saw Pamela’s son, Chris, swinging a sword with ease, she made a firm decision.
Empress Aldisha, formerly a princess of the Torun Kingdom, stood Patricia in front of a mirror and said.
“Patrisha, my child. Listen to me carefully and remember this. In this palace, there’s a boy who looks exactly like you.”
‘Mother, why am I not allowed to leave the west tower?’
Patricia did not ask.
She could not.
“That boy is Crown Prince Patrick.”
The empress cut Patricia’s golden hair, which had flowed in waves down to her waist.
“You consumed even his nourishment in the womb. When he was born, he was only about half of you in every way, his body, his internal organs.”
“……”
“His lungs are weak. He can’t ride a horse without struggling to breathe. So, Patrisha, I want you to wear this instead of Patrick.”
The empress dressed Patricia in armor. Her diet was even more strictly controlled than before to manage her weight, and her figure was tightly bound with cloth to conceal her shape.
Patricia held a sword far too large and heavy for her. Her hands, cheeks, arms, legs, and shoulders blistered and burst.
When scabs from dried blood and tangled sword cuts formed layers over one another, she finally became swift enough to cut through the wind with her blade.
Patricia had been born with a strong will. She was bright and full of laughter, but during sword training, when sorrow surged up with the blood from her wounds, she would throw down her sword and stand firm before Eva.
“Eva, tell me. Why do I have to do this in place of someone I’ve never even seen?”
“Princess, Princess Patrisha.”
Eva, swaying like a willow branch in the wind, wrapped Patricia in a warm embrace. She always smelled of butter, which made Patricia feel hungry.
“Your Highness, it takes courage to reveal the truth. If that moment passes, it takes even greater courage to go back.”
“You’re a brave princess, Patricia.”
“Of course, I know. But if your existence becomes known to the outside world now, it will be difficult for Her Majesty the Empress. The moment has already passed. Just a little longer, until His Highness the Crown Prince comes of age.”
Eva was a window to the world. As Patricia grew from a child into a girl, and then into a young lady, Eva explained her doubts in simple ways, and at times, taught her how to answer silence with silence.
In place of her mother, who was emotionally fragile and often on edge, Eva taught her what a young lady needed to know. She was the only one who held and comforted Patricia.
Eva, daughter of the esteemed Count Tenesi of Tane, had served Aldisha since her days as crown princess.
She was an exceptional woman, educated, refined, and gifted in the arts. If she had one flaw, it was that she spoke frankly in ways other maids never would.
Under Aldisha’s orders, after hearing Amir’s prophecy, Eva prepared a nursery in the west tower. She advised Aldisha that although twins were rare, their existence deserved to be acknowledged naturally and with respect.
“You speak so carelessly, as if this isn’t your place to speak at all.”
