Please Let Go Of Me Now

Chapter 7

***

The fields of winter were desolate. It was so dry that not even a handful of vitality could be found.

The fields of golden wheat that had been wildly growing were all cut down after the harvest season, and only the roots remained to occasionally fill the empty space.

Lily kept walking aimlessly. She walked for all of three days, filling her empty stomach with only water from the river.

When she was too exhausted from hunger to move any further, she leaned her back against an old tree as she collapsed. She lowered her tired eyelids.

Her dry mouth smelled of burning. The shriveled lungs twitched, letting her know that she was still alive.

“Perhaps you are looking for me.”

Not long after she left, she missed the old woman and the hunter.

“You must be angry.”

It was very disconcerting that she walked away without saying a word.

Lily shielded the rest of her body with her arms. She rubbed her frozen cheek, remembering the warmth of the firewood.

Her dreamy sentimentality was short-lived when she was jolted awake by the sound of horses’ hooves on the ground.

“Wake up!”

The hairs on her neck stood on end.

“I have to run away!”

It was an intuition close to instinct.

Lily sluggishly got up and followed the edge of the queue that was just passing by.

A wooden wagon rattled along the uneven dirt road. The people were shabbily dressed and looked as tired as Lilly.

None of their mouths was open. Winter was a cruel season for all of them, and they just had to hold their breath and wait for it to pass.

The sound of the horses’ hooves was getting closer as the gravel vibrated against the dirt and jumped up.

Lily tied her hood tightly around her head and dodged as far as she could.

Soon the sound of horse hooves and other noises rang in her ears.

“We’re looking for a woman with silver hair.”

“She is in her early twenties, has green eyes, and speaks imperial.”

“We have information that she was hiding around here some time ago.”

The knights on the reins shouted orders in turn.

White heat rose from the horse’s body, and the sound of horseshoes rolling on the ground and the friction produced by the knights’ armor ravaged the blades as they struck.

Lily tore at the wisps that had formed around her nails. She slumped down and slumped her shoulders so that she would not be seen by any means.

“Check them one by one.”

A lonely, sinking tone.

The familiar sound evoked the fear of days gone by. Fear struck like a tsunami, taking up space and time.

Lily couldn’t breathe as if her throat was clogged.

She couldn’t move as the knights got off the horses and checked the people one by one.

One long-haired man took off Lily’s hood, and then her startled lungs let in cold air.

Her stained black* hair flowed down the ragged piece. When he saw her messy hair, the knight turned around, saying there was nothing more to see. (*the old woman dyed Lily’s silver hair to black)

The pursuing party retreated. A moment after the sound of the horses’ hooves had died away, Lily raised her head.

The shrinking chest was stretched out, and she let out a breath.

The flock had already gone, and Lily was left alone.

She was truly alone now. There was no one to help her, not her father, not the old woman, not the hunter.

She needed a place to hide, so she didn’t delay and took refuge in a nearby grain storage.

“It’s okay. They didn’t recognize me…..”

Sitting on the sacks, tapping her swollen foot, Lily said to herself, “Don’t be afraid. I can do it. I can do it on my own.”

Despite her earlier fear, she was filled with a fundamental confidence. It was thanks to the words that the old woman had taught her the other day.

Going south, there would be a huge harbor there, she said. If she could just get on a ship, she could go anywhere she wanted. That was  what the old woman said she had done.

Lily put on the hood she was holding. Dust rose up from where the rag had fallen and scattered in the fine sunlight.

After jumping lightly off the top of the stacked grain sacks, she brushed off her floured buttocks and re-tightened her apron.

It was freedom. It was liberation.

Behind the door would be the world that she had always wanted.

“I can do this!”

With a strong confidence, Lily pushed the door forcefully.

“Long time no see.”

And then he laughed.

“Lily.”

The emperor who waited sluggishly leaning against the wall…

***

The winter wind blowing into the empty field was as cold as the season itself. It was dry, cold, and scentless. All she saw was a red sunset.

The wind carrying twilight blew away the baby hairs. Lily could smell the faint scent of roses in the wind. Was it a dream, or was she dreaming?

The frozen ground brought reality and dreaminess together. Lily was lost in the gap.

Kaakaa, the crow cried.

The black-eyed animal flapped its wings and looked down, sitting on a dead old tree. The black birds’ feathers fall over the red-hot sunset, the shimmering sun, and the hazy horizon.

The man approached Lily in the dying sun. He raised his back from leaning against the wall and slowly, inch by inch, came to her.

“I’ve been waiting for you.”

He said, lowering his posture.

“Why are you so late?”

The question he posed without hesitation is as sensitive as it was to a lover.

‘’I missed you. Didn’t you miss me?”

His eyes roamed, in search of the place where her gaze stayed. Where was she looking?

The reddened ground, the fluttering shadows, the blonde hair flowing over her arms.

After waiting and receiving no response, Leo lowered his head a little more to meet her eyes.

Not trying to see her eyes. It was to see his own image reflected in them. He settled into the vacant eyes.

His lips, redder than pomegranate seeds, spread and his breath escaped to touch Lily’s cheek. As the hot breath melted away the chill, the hardened consciousness melted with it.

Lily jumped up, like a rabbit, before the emperor grabbed her neck.

Soon, however, she slumped down, unable to take any steps. The chase team that had been waiting in the distance formed up in a circle.

They narrowed the distance.

She couldn’t escape. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t run away.

Lily was shaking, unsure if it was a dream or reality.

Fear was always a step behind. It came late, visited her, and tied her hands and feet.

Should she cry, or should she pray?

Her mind faded to white  as she searched for answers.

The fear was so great that it didn’t even allow for a moment’s thought.

“I have prepared a gift for you.”

Leo’s long-stretched words were filled with painstakingly pressed pleasure.

“I hope you like it.”

The keen hearing reacted quickly to the sound of the approaching shoes.

She could feel his presence behind her. Her shoulders shook.

“Look straight ahead.”

Gloved hands held her shoulders, and with a pop, a spherical object was thrown to the ground. The blackened lump made a dull thud, then slowly rolled over to Lily.

“Ah…”

Lily bit her lip and made eye contact with the lump.

“Father!”

Lily fell to the ground.

“Father, father…”

There was a sizzling sound from the torso holding her father’s head in his hands.

“That’s right. This isn’t enough.”

He said it wasn’t enough of a payment for making fun of him with just a mere head. The emperor grabbed Lily’s hair and lifted her head.

Her neck bent so far that it couldn’t warp any more and her lower jaw opened. He grabbed the open jaw and held it upright, whispering low.

“Next.”

The two round balls rolled fast. It stopped when it touched her knees. Faded white hair and jet-black hair. (*I’m thinking it’s the heads of the old woman and the hunter)

“ Aah! Aaah”

Finally, the demise explodes.

The scream that erupted from her torn throat echoed through the winter wilderness like blood vomiting.

Lily fell backwards, convulsing like a fish with its gills pierced.  When the rib cage was exposed and flapped up and down.

Caw, caw.

The crows that had been watching spread their wings and took off toward the setting sun.

***

[Grandma, what’s this?]

[It’s rosemary. It’s fragrant and it boosts your appetite.]

[What about this flower?]

[Well, it’s lavender. I dry the petals so we can keep them long.]

Lily’s closed eyelids opened.

It wasn’t the fragrant rosemary or the well-dried lavender that greeted her waking eyes.

It was white roses in a gorgeous vase.

Lily was on a white bed that resembled the flower.

Her eyes, which had been lingering on the flower, blinked intermittently and she looked around.

The room was a single color, jade. The walls reached high into the ceiling, each section carved with gold colored rose vines, and the ivory furniture was decorated in jade and gold.

Lily turned her head to the left, where the light hit her.

The entire wall was glass. Beyond the transparent wall was a rose garden with scattered flowers.

“You’ve been sleeping for three days.”

Her soul was drained, and she didn’t even know who had come in.

“It was fortunate that the wound was not deep.”

Lily had heard that voice somewhere before.

“I’ll take you in two days, so I hope you make every effort to recover.”

The head maid put her hand on Lily’s forehead and checked her temperature.

Lily blinked, and her eyelids moved.

Either the lighting in the room was too bright, the scent of the roses in the vase too intense, or her tone of voice, so castrated with emotion, was too dry.

Either way, Lily couldn’t understand a word the head maid was saying. This woman, who was like a rod of iron, was the one who had forced Lily into the emperor’s bedroom and forced her into silence.

She was a consistent bystander with a blank expression on her face when Lily ran down the hallway and called for help.

Lily remembered the nightmare she had buried.

The cold air of metal against her bare feet, the fire inherent in savage violence, and even the blood-soaked madness. She had to escape. She had to get out of here, any way she could.

“I’ll take care of you.”

So Lily was warned not to overreach, before she could even utter a thought.

“His Majesty will not tolerate any messiness.”

The maid added an additional remark in a humble tone.

She pointed to Lily’s hair, which was cut to her earlobes, and said.

“…”

Her temperature ran high.

It wasn’t because her hair got cut off that made her angry. It was more of an outrage that they had robbed her of something so important.

For them, greasy and stained black hair may have been ugly, but not for Lily. It was the happiness that the old woman had taught her, the deviance that the freedom of the moment had given her, and the only trace that made her remember all that time.

Biting her lower lip, Lily stared at the maid.

There was no way the maid was going to deal with raw anger. So she left the room without so much as a greeting.

After glaring at the back of the maid, Lily made sure that the door to the room was completely closed before getting out of bed.

The moment she stepped onto the wool on the floor, the ceiling spun with a pinprick.

She had spent three days sleeping on an empty stomach, so there could not have been any energy left in her body. Still, she ran to the glass wall and smashed her body against it.

Pfft, the transparent surface tickled and laughed.

“Two days.”

It was two days. The time when the Emperor will not touch her. The only time given to her.

She had to take whatever measures she could before then.