Chapter 82 (2/2)

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Embarrassed, he looked at her and said, “I can’t open it.”

The rusty side door, hidden under the endless high wall, wouldn’t open no matter how hard he pushed it.

***

The Dongbi Palace, where Kyosul resided, was shrouded in a tense atmosphere. None of the court ladies opened their mouths. Their gloomy look and actions reflected a very heavy atmosphere in the palace.

Lady Yuon, Kyosul’s nanny, was pacing up and down in front of the door of her room. She kept sticking her head out to check whether Kyosul had come back, while walking past the door. She nibbled her fingernails out of nervousness.

“Your Highness, when are you coming back?”

She looked up at the sky. The sun had already set and reddened the sky. Looking at a red sky, she narrowed her eyes. It was not a good sign. The sun was high up in the sky when Kyosul left the Dongbi Palace.

“She has never been outside so long.”

Kyosul would go out of the palace, not accompanied by anybody, including the nanny. It was her secret outing.

On such occasions, the nanny didn’t ask about her destination. Though Kyosul had never told her about it, the nanny was well aware of why she went out. It was kind of a tacit promise between Kyosul and the nanny.

“Nanny, let me go out for a walk alone.”

“Please come back before 7 PM at the latest.”

“Don’t worry. I won’t be late. I’ve never come back late, right?”

Today she went out of the Dongbi Palace with that promise, but 7 PM had passed and she still wasn’t back.

The nanny grew more and more worried while waiting for Kyosul.

Typically she went out for two reasons.

For example, she went to the back garden of the outer palace in the afternoon when she felt lonely. On this occasion, there was no specific rule on the curfew, but she would come back before it got dark. Sometimes she ran into someone there or she would spend time alone.

On other occasions she went out when the nanny conveyed Ruhae’s message to her as a messenger between the two, visiting the Dongbi Palace and the South Palace secretly. In this case, she usually met him early in the morning or late at night, which lasted between 15 minutes and an hour.

This time she went out after the nanny conveyed his message to her around noon. She always avoided the time when there were many people moving around in the palace, but today she ignored it. The nanny felt it strange but didn’t stop her. Kyosul didn’t come back even after the sunset.

“Your Highness, I’m just worried if anything happened to you.”

Holding her hands tightly, she murmured to herself nervously, looking at the street corner. So, everybody in the Dongbi Palace earnestly waited for her return.

After all, it was after 7 PM.

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And it was slowly getting dark as it was late summer when the days were getting shorter. The nanny couldn’t wait any longer.

“I know she ran amok around the palace when she was in the Hwa kingdom, but she never broke the promise.”

She was consumed by the thinking that something wrong had happened to her. She went out of the Dongbi Palace to search for Kyosul. Though she didn’t know where Kyosul had gone, she had to find her by checking out every nook and corner of the palace.

She went to the back garden of the outer palace fist because it was Kyosul’s favorite place, but she couldn’t find any trace of Kyosul even after she walked around the garden twice.

“What should I do now?”

She was in the thick of wandering here and there in the palace when she was stopped by somebody.

“You must be Lady Yuon, right?”

The moment she heard that familiar voice, she got cold feet. It was the voice that she didn’t want to hear in a situation like this.

With a pale face, she slowly turned and exclaimed, “Long live the Crown Prince! I’m honored to see you!”

The man standing before her was none other than Bipaan.