The Garden of Bi-eun

Everyone whispered that the Emperor was mistreating Yi-seol. But in truth, the Emperor didn’t have enough interest in Yi-seol to even mistreat him. He had never been conscious of Yi-seol’s existence; to him, he was like water or air—something simply there, never acknowledged.

The reason he had not sought out Bi-eun Palace from the start was that he had completely forgotten about Yi-seol until Eunuch Yoon informed him. And even after learning of it, his failure to visit was deliberate.

Yi-seol was a man, not a woman, so he wouldn’t be hurt in his pride. In fact, he might have preferred it. He didn’t seem like someone who would want to be embraced by another man. Though from a small nation, royalty was still royalty. The shame of being slighted by not being visited would be more tolerable than the disgrace of being held by a man. If he couldn’t bear either, that was his burden to carry. Once inside the imperial palace, one must endure such humiliations. The Emperor had no intention of saving him just because he was the one who gave him his name—the so-called ‘true love.’

In truth, the Emperor didn’t even think of him as his true love.

Bestowing the consort rank and Bi-eun Palace had been largely impulsive, but he had no intention of revoking it. It wouldn’t be too late to act when the time was right.

“Your Majesty, shall I prepare for your bath?”

Eunuch Yoon asked cautiously from outside the door. When had the sun set? Looking outside, it was already pitch-black. The nights in the Geum Empire arrived in an instant. If one looked away for a moment, the moon would be high in the sky. Having trouble sleeping in the early morning, these days he went to bed earlier than usual.

“Wait a moment.”

It was the time when he would usually have entered the bedchamber. The Emperor quietly rose from his seat. He didn’t know why the royal physician’s words about taking a light walk before bed helping with sleep came to mind at that moment.

As the Emperor opened the door and stepped out, all the courtiers bowed their heads.

“Eunuch Yoon.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

“We are going to Nokyeom Pavilion.”

When Yi-seol first put on the common attire of the Geum Empire, he repeatedly asked the court lady Danhyang if this was really what men wore. Danhyang said it was, and Yi-seol asked the same question to several different court ladies, but the answer was always the same.

“Milady, this is what men in the Geum Empire wear.”

Only when he heard the same answer from Lady Ju, who seemed unlikely to lie or joke, did Yi-seol change clothes.

It was as embarrassing for Yi-seol, who felt like he was wearing women’s clothing, as it was for the court ladies who had to prepare it. Since he had no choice but to wear what was provided, Yi-seol stubbornly refused all other accessories. He didn’t want to wear gold rings, apply rouge to his lips, or put on hairpins. To the court ladies who were anxiously stamping their feet, Yi-seol finally allowed only a small hairpin made of jade. And even then, he didn’t let them style his hair; he simply shoved it into his half-tied hair himself, which drove the court ladies to frustration.

After ten days of morning battles over clothing, Yi-seol and the court ladies finally reached a compromise. Danhyang, whose sewing skills were still poor, had made a rough gray-white robe as practice, and Yi-seol took a liking to it.

Yi-seol no longer sighed every morning, and the court ladies were relieved to have less of his disapproval. Sometimes Yi-seol wore robes of jade or indigo, but mostly he wore the gray-white one. Though the court ladies were initially dissatisfied, they couldn’t deny that the robe, similar to his hair color, suited him very well.

“Milady, look what Yeonhwa picked! She pulled out a whole flowering tree!”

“No, Milady! What I picked was all weeds. Danhyang cut off all the healthy flower branches!”

Yi-seol, who had been sitting on the stump of what must have once been a huge old tree, startled by the loud voices, looked up. In the distance, Yeonhwa and Danhyang were running towards him, their skirts hitched up awkwardly.

“Don’t run! The ground is wet and slippery!”

Whether they didn’t hear his urgent shout or not, neither slowed down until they stood before Yi-seol. They thrust out their dirt-covered hands, holding a flowering tree and flower branches. Yi-seol hid his troubled expression behind the book he was reading. Like children who survived in this place by reading others’ moods, they immediately turned pale at their master’s reaction.

“I’ll go replant them right away!”

Yeonhwa, holding a small tree with buds about to bloom, turned and ran back. Danhyang, who had cut off the branches, turned pale and glanced nervously at Yi-seol.

“Well… that is… since the branch had no leaves, I thought it was dead…”

“It’s not dead, just not ready yet.”

“I have committed a crime punishable by death, Milady!”

Did she really think she would be executed for cutting off a few branches, even if they were the trees he tended so carefully? Yi-seol shook his head with an awkward smile.

“It’s not that serious. Go ask Ki-yeon how to choose which branches to prune. He will teach you well.”

“Ki-yeon-nim… is scary, I don’t want to. You don’t know how angry he gets when we ask the same thing over and over.”

“I know. I see Yoo Kang getting scolded every day.”

“Ki-yeon-nim is only kind to you, Milady. He doesn’t even talk to us.”

Pouting, Danhyang had already been scolded by Ki-yeon several times, so Yi-seol just smiled. The court lady children wanted to get close to Ki-yeon and would try to talk to him, but Ki-yeon ignored them, so they were all quite upset.

“Plant this branch well over by Dowolso. With luck, it might sprout.”

Danhyang’s face brightened immediately. She answered with a “Yes!” and ran back the way she came. She’s going to get hurt at that rate, Yi-seol thought. Even though he told her the ground was still slippery from watering, she didn’t listen. But Yi-seol didn’t mind; he didn’t dislike the children.

It had already been over half a month since he entered the imperial palace. The only day that stood out in his memory was the first day he arrived. Since then, every day had been similar.

Bi-eun Palace was not only impressive in its timber and architecture. Everything within the palace walls, in Yi-seol’s eyes, was a sketch of a perfect landscape.

The gloom created by the old trees was simply because the unkempt branches spread in all directions, blocking sunlight from reaching the palace. On the shaded ground, grass and weeds grew thickly. There were flowering trees, but only a few species that could survive without human care had remained, and none had bloomed yet.

It was clear that not a single tree, grass, or flower had been planted meaninglessly. As far as Yi-seol knew, most were trees and flowers that didn’t require much water. Considering the weather of the Geum Empire, they must have carefully selected plants that could survive long with little water.

Seeing the court ladies making faces at the weeds and trees everywhere, Yi-seol rolled up his sleeves and took the lead. Having grown up in Yeon, a country where more than half the territory was forest and even the palace was built in the mountains, such tasks were nothing to him.

Lady Ju seemed shocked to see Yi-seol squatting on the dirt, pulling weeds. Sweating profusely, with dust on his sleeves, Yi-seol smiled at her, and it took her a while to find the right words.

“I will send word to the Jeonyeonsa to send people. You don’t need to do such work yourself, Milady.”

She told the court lady beside her to bring a wet handkerchief and spoke stiffly, but Yi-seol shook his head. He didn’t want to call people over a trivial matter; he wanted to stay as inconspicuous as possible. Lady Ju eventually agreed.

With Yi-seol covering himself in dust and tending the garden day and night, the court ladies couldn’t just stand by. They took charge of pulling weeds, pruning branches, and cleaning moss from Dowolso. While court ladies from other consorts’ palaces spent their days making new clothes and chasing after famous jewelers to commission ornaments, the court ladies of Bi-eun Palace were fully occupied from morning to night maintaining the rear garden.

“Yi-seol-nim! Hwahong-nuna cut off all the climbing ivy on the wall again!”

Yoo Kang came running just as Yi-seol was about to quietly read a book before the evening meal. Despite Lady Ju’s stern scolding that he should not call Yi-seol by name, Yoo Kang stubbornly continued to do so. Yi-seol preferred it to being called “Milady,” but since it wasn’t a matter of personal preference, he reprimanded Yoo Kang.

Seeing Yi-seol shake his head with a deliberately stern expression, Yoo Kang quickly corrected himself with an “Ah!” expression, “Consort Ru, Milady! Hwahong-nuna caused trouble again!”

“I clearly told her to carefully cut only the ones that hung low, but she messed up again.”

“Wasn’t the ivy on the wall your responsibility, Kang-ah?”

“Hwahong-nuna complained that I only took the easy tasks, so I told her to try it once.”

“Pruning is not easy. What if Hwahong gets hurt?”

“I was watching closely, so she didn’t get hurt!”

“Then the fact that Hwahong cut all the ivy is also your fault for not teaching her properly while watching.”

“No, that’s not…”

Yoo Kang, who had been acting smug, was caught off guard and fell silent. As Yi-seol laughed out loud and walked past him, Yoo Kang grumbled and followed behind.

Unlike the quiet rear garden, the front courtyard was bustling with court ladies doing their respective tasks. Except for those preparing the evening meal, all were engaged in the work. The number of court ladies was already small, and since some had packed up and left after Yi-seol’s first day at Bi-eun Palace, it couldn’t be said there were many hands.

But Yi-seol had plenty of time and enjoyed this work as a pastime, so he had no complaints about the slow progress. Even with this small workforce, the once weed-filled front yard was already clean, and many branches that blocked sunlight had been pruned, making the palace brighter. The court ladies, who initially followed without much expectation but couldn’t bear to see their master work, now saw the front and rear gardens becoming cleaner day by day and moved more diligently with excitement.

After teaching Hwahong more about pruning, Yi-seol sat on a flat stone beside Dowolso. It was said to be a pond reflecting the moon, but he hadn’t confirmed it yet because the fallen leaves on the surface hadn’t been removed. According to Lady Ju, it was quite deep, so one shouldn’t go in carelessly.

Though it was an artificial pond, since it was built over an underground spring, he was told it always maintained a constant depth even during long dry spells. Hearing that, he understood why the trees and plants here had survived so well.

“You bitches! What are you sneaking a peek at like rats!”

“Hey, get lost, you girls!”

“Shh, be quiet! Milady is over there!”

He thought he misheard something carried on the wind sweeping through the leaves. The children always spoke so gently that he had never heard them speak like that. Surprised, as Yi-seol looked around, Juran, who was nearby, blocked his view.