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When Son Hyejoo is assigned to spy on the crown princess of Nicodranas, Park Chaewon, she’s almost disappointed. The mission is simple, after all: observe her surroundings, take notes on daily routines and weaknesses in security, and integrate herself as a trusted bodyguard so that no one suspects her covert communications with the Dwendalian Empire when the princess is eventually kidnapped for political leverage. Hyejoo is nothing if not skilled at observation and reservation, able to exude both an aloofness that gives her privacy as well as a confidence that inclines others to trust her.
Imagine her surprise, then, when the first thing Princess Park Chaewon does is give her a nickname.
“Princess? Meet your new bodyguard, Olivia Hye. She has the kind of special skills your father wanted your improved security team to possess,” Jo Haseul had announced, revealing Hyejoo’s brooding form and, obliviously, her undercover alias.
Park Chaewon glances up from her pastel rose canopy bed with impossibly shining eyes, big and bright and curious in a wondrous sort of way when they catch on Hyejoo. Her hair falls in waves down her right shoulder, where it’s been meticulously swept, and she’s wearing pink Kirby pajamas.
“Hi, Oli!” she calls, grinning. Hyejoo doesn’t think it’s fair that her crooked mouth only increases her luminosity. “Do you mind if I read out loud?” Her voice is so…
Hyejoo clears her throat. “Not at all.”
“I’ll leave you two to acquaint yourselves,” Haseul says, already halfway out the door with her cell phone poised at her ear, ready to coordinate something else for the royal family.
Princess Chaewon pats the spot next to her on her bed, but Hyejoo opts to pull up a desk chair and sit with her arms crossed. Chaewon only giggles before resuming reading aloud, as she had presumably done before Hyejoo arrived.
Try as she might, Hyejoo cannot ignore how often Chaewon glances up at her, gauging her reaction. Finally, when there is a lull between chapters:
“So… Oli?”
“Oh,” Chaewon blinks her Bambi eyes and peers intently at Hyejoo. “Is it okay for me to call you that?”
Hyejoo can’t look away, but she can feel her heart kickstart in her chest.
Dammit, she thinks.
“It’s fine, I guess,” she mumbles.
-
“I’ve never had a bodyguard even close to my own age,” Princess Chaewon tells her the next day, skipping around her room as she readies herself for the trip to the mall they’re about to take. Royalty in public is quite the undertaking, apparently, and the staff has been preparing for this excursion since Chaewon requested it at breakfast. It’s now long past noon and the safety measures are finally all in place so that Chaewon can find herself a new fluffy jacket.
“I’ve never even had a girl bodyguard, actually,” she continues, pausing at her vanity to add some glitter to her cheekbones.
“I’ve never had a princess as a charge,” Hyejoo returns. She’s never had anyone as a charge – she’s never been a bodyguard before – but Chaewon doesn’t need to know that.
The older girl’s lips quirk in acknowledgment. “It’s so weird that you’re younger than me, Oli.”
“By a year.”
“You’re practically a baby.”
“I am a very serious professional whose-“
“Can you even hold a gun with your baby hands?”
Hyejoo pauses.
“You don’t want to know all the things I can do with a gun,” she warns darkly.
Princess Chaewon only giggles a bit awkwardly and flips her hair, meeting Hyejoo’s eyes in the mirror. “Okay, scary.”
“And my hands are much bigger than yours,” Hyejoo grumbles, arms crossed. “If anyone has baby hands it’s you.”
Chaewon spins on her heel and pokes Hyejoo’s cheek. “Cute.”
“I am not-“ Hyejoo starts, but Chaewon is already skipping out of the room, and so it is Hyejoo’s duty to follow.
-
Hyejoo is a trained assassin, a skilled spy, and an expert hand-to-hand combatant. Several people have called her brave in her life. There is something about the cool exterior she adopts in public that makes people think she’s untouchably confident. Unshakeable.
But she’s never been in front of a horde of flashing cameras and shoving bodies and cacophonous shouts for attention. Her hands shake as she helps keep the paparazzi at bay, but then Sooyoung, one of the other newly hired bodyguards, is taking her place and directing her back towards Princess Chaewon.
“Don’t leave her side,” Sooyoung instructs, and Hyejoo gladly slinks into the safety of the small space they’ve managed to ensconce Chaewon in.
It is only then that Hyejoo realizes Chaewon is shuddering imperceptibly, that her body is wracked with the very same anxiety that infects Hyejoo’s steady shooting hand.
Chaewon meets her eyes for but a split second before she’s wrapping her small hand around Hyejoo’s index finger and clinging. In turn, Hyejoo shifts their hands until their fingers are entwined and then squeezes, not entirely sure which one of them she’s comforting. The deep breath Chaewon releases is enough for her to know it was the right move regardless.
For the rest of the day, Chaewon holds her hand – even when they traverse the mall which has been vacated entirely for the afternoon.
-
“What do you do for fun, Oli?” Princess Chaewon asks, not lifting her gaze from the mint green polish she’s been carefully applying to her toenails.
Hyejoo shifts in her seat next to the bed. “I don’t have fun,” she grumps, but she’s mostly joking, and they’ve spent enough time together now that Chaewon’s lopsided grin appears in response.
“Fine,” she rolls her eyes. “What do you do in your spare time, when you’re not with me?”
The bodyguards work in shifts, although as Chaewon’s personal guard Hyejoo is almost always with her, escorting her to everything from private tutoring to archery lessons. Hyejoo’s allowed Tuesday afternoons off and she dedicates that time to writing down every detail she can remember that might be pertinent for a kidnap plot. She can’t very well tell Chaewon this, though.
Racking her brain for a reasonable response, all Hyejoo can think about is her 14-hour-day-training, how she’s enjoyed moments of triumph over her hand-to-hand combat enemies the most, how she’s been praised for her fortitude and her drive and her focus, how she can’t remember the last time she’s done anything for herself and not a governmental agency. Her tongue is heavy in her throat and yet Chaewon waits patiently for a response.
“Uhh…” Her eyes briefly catch on a gaming console near the oversized television in the corner. “I like to play video games,” she blurts. It’s not a whole lie; she used to consider herself a gamer, although she hasn’t touched a controller in years now.
“Really?!” Chaewon’s eyes light up. “Why didn’t you say something earlier?! Do you like Mario Kart? I bet I can beat you at Mario Kart.”
Chaewon is rambling and already halfway through setting up her console, so Hyejoo simply drags her chair over and resigns to her fate. If she can headshot someone from 1000 yards away in real life, she’s pretty sure she can demolish a princess in a cartoon racing game.
“Why are you sitting so far away?” Chaewon rolls her eyes and tugs on Hyejoo’s sleeve. “There’s a couch here for a reason.”
“I will join you on your couch but just know that you’ll be trying to shove me off of it in about ten minutes when I’ve embarrassed you,” Hyejoo responds, already embracing her competitive spirit as she settles and spreads out next to the princess.
Chaewon proves her point by smacking at her arm.
“Hey! I’ll have you know that I’m a master at this game. OG,” she defends, ridiculous gang signs and all. Hyejoo meets her eyes head-on and lifts an eyebrow.
“I could beat you with Donkey Kong,” she deadpans. Chaewon’s scoff is as miffed as it is delighted, and something has sparked in her eyes.
“Oh, really? Prove it,” Chaewon dares. Hyejoo doesn’t have to see the screen to know she’s selected Princess Peach.
(Hyejoo does, in fact, prove it, but she allows Chaewon to win one round so that her face will light up again.)
-
Chaewon enjoys evening walks. Every day, she requests a stroll in the garden the moment the sun has descended enough to caress the horizon. Hyejoo knows that Chaewon could probably just demand what she wanted, but she never does, and so Hyejoo never says no.
Sometimes they walk in companionable silence; sometimes Chaewon has a million and one random thoughts or questions for Hyejoo. Though she knows she shouldn’t, Hyejoo always takes one look at Chaewon’s moonish face and is as honest as she can be.
Today’s walk appears to be one of contemplation, so Hyejoo spends her time covertly evaluating the garden for weak points.
“Hey, Oli?” Chaewon suddenly says, voice delicate like the flutter of butterfly wings. Her loose grip on Hyejoo’s forearm tightens.
“Hm?” Hyejoo returns distractedly. She’s still mentally calculating the open distance between the thinnest shrubbery and the service door to the palace.
“You’re probably my best friend, you know?”
Hyejoo’s head snaps towards her wide, bright, naïve face. 216 yards, she thinks nonsensically.
“I’ve never really had one, I guess,” Chaewon continues, “but I spend the most time with you and I have the most fun with you, so I think that’s what that is.”
Chaewon is chewing on her lip now, discouraged by Hyejoo’s sudden paralysis. Hyejoo would respond, she would, but her mouth is dry and she’s forgotten how to string sentences together.
216 yards.
“It’s okay if you don’t feel the same,” Chaewon rushes to say, cheeks pink. She looks down. “You probably already have a best friend… and I’m, like, your job, anyway.”
It’s the way her voice cracks and wavers, rice paper thin, that spurs Hyejoo into coherence.
“I don’t,” she interrupts, “um, have a best friend.”
Chaewon watches her from under her lashes, afraid to hope.
“You’re…” Hyejoo doesn’t know how this sentence ends. She doesn’t know how to classify this instinct Chaewon activates in her, or how it could run so counter to all her other instincts.
Then, she thinks of Chaewon’s excitement at a new book, how she communicates her loneliness by engaging everyone around her, even workers and maids, – two-hundred and – Chaewon’s dark-bright eyes, sparkling when Hyejoo pleases her, watching her now with cautious anticipation.
“Um, I guess you’re my favorite person.”
Hyejoo thinks she might’ve blacked out for a second, because there’s no way she just said that, but then Chaewon’s mouth widens crookedly and her own is twitching involuntarily and – if she’s completely and totally honest with herself – she’s never even mentioned their evening strolls in any of her detailed notes.
Why start now? she thinks, and then doesn’t bother to write in her journal that Tuesday.
-
Hyejoo always knew that the Dwendalian Empire would contact her for the first information transfer at some point. She just didn’t expect for it to come via text while she’s waiting for Chaewon to finish her turn at croquet.
2019.05.05 19:00
Her stomach plummets. There is no more nebulous eventuality to seek comfort in, to enable her revel in denial.
She has three days.
“Oli-yahhhhhh?” Chaewon calls, drawing it out playfully, cutely. She’s just finished a triumphant little dance in her billowy pink dress, so her turn must have gone well.
Copy
Hyejoo pockets her phone and tries not to shake as she steps up with her mallet. Chaewon is watching her with keen eyes and she wants to crawl out of her skin to escape the burning shame. She can blame the weather for the sheen on her forehead but she can’t explain away her unwillingness to meet Chaewon’s eyes so easily.
-
The problem, of course, is that Hyejoo cannot do her job properly if she avoids Chaewon like one avoids the sun, gaze always dancing near but never directly at for fear of blindness. But she cannot look at Chaewon either, not anymore, because if she does she will forget herself and her mission and all that her life’s work has built towards, and that is a blindness of its own.
It’s why she enforces a slight distance between them the next time she’s escorting Chaewon to an upscale restaurant, why she focuses on the flashing lights and suffocating crowd and brushes off Chaewon’s reach for her hand as covertly as she can. It’s not subtle enough, she knows – just as she knows Chaewon’s eyes must widen with hurt and confusion and yet she can’t bare to witness it, not now, and so Hyejoo affixes her gaze elsewhere, anywhere that is not Chaewon.
It’s why Chaewon is left vulnerable and hurtling, all at once, in the opposite direction of Hyejoo. Someone has found purchase on her sleeve and yanked.
Hyejoo sees, and she forgets herself.
All her training rises to the surface, blood rushing in her ears in that familiar way which allows her to focus on the physical. A chop to the inner elbow of Chaewon’s assailant so he’ll release his grip, a fist in his gut so he cannot breathe and is set off balance, a brief kick behind his leg so that she may hook his unsteady ankle and trip him backwards. A swift punt to his tailbone once he has been upended because she cannot stop, because he touched Chaewon and it’s all Hyejoo’s fault.
“Oli,” she hears distantly, Chaewon’s voice rising in volume as she repeats her false name twice more. Chaewon’s small fingers are digging into Hyejoo’s bicep and so Hyejoo allows the smaller girl to pull her away, allows her to tuck herself under Hyejoo’s arm for shelter.
An inexplicable urge to press a reassuring kiss to Chaewon’s forehead overcomes Hyejoo, but luckily Chaewon calms her adrenaline by meeting her eyes with a look she’s never seen on the princess before. Quirked eyebrow, tilted mouth, eyes that twinkle and burn.
Hyejoo feels that heat in her cheeks.
-
That night feels delicate. It is still as Chaewon readies herself for bed, as Hyejoo hovers near the doorway and wonders when she will be dismissed. Sooyoung guards the door as she does every evening, rendering Hyejoo’s presence unnecessary, but Chaewon has not bid her goodbye at the threshold as she usually does.
Hyejoo tries not to fidget for fear of disrupting the quiet of the night. Chaewon holds no such reservations.
“Will you read me to sleep?” she calls from behind her changing screen, voice small and shy. Hyejoo wonders if she, too, struggles with the weight of their eye contact and is avoiding it as a result.
Chaewon has never asked Hyejoo to read to her; she is always the one who reads, the one whose delicate voice befits the stories she likes.
“Is this because of today?” Hyejoo asks. The movement behind Chaewon’s changing screen halts.
“If you don’t want to-“
“I will,” Hyejoo interrupts. Chaewon’s downturned head peeks out from behind the screen. “I just thought you might want to talk about it.”
Chaewon sighs. “My father warned me that things were getting more dangerous.” She makes her way towards Hyejoo in an embroidered silk nightgown and robe that Hyejoo hasn’t seen before, fingertips grazing the volumes on her bookcase as she walks, and Hyejoo must force herself to focus on her words. “That’s why I suddenly got a new security detail. Rumors of an impending attack, or something.”
Hyejoo swallows. Her eyes are wide when Chaewon finally lifts her gaze to hers.
“I feel safe with you, and I… I just wanted to have you around until I fell asleep,” she admits quietly.
There is a searing, twisting ache in Hyejoo’s side. She ignores it, asking, “What do you want me to read?” as she pulls her desk chair up to Chaewon’s bed.
For her part, Chaewon grabs a collection of fairy tales and then makes herself comfortable in her sheets. When she hands Hyejoo the book, her fingers linger like she wants to take Hyejoo’s hand but fears rejection. That doubt wasn’t there before this afternoon; Hyejoo swiftly accepts her hand and squeezes.
“I’ve been having nightmares,” Chaewon admits quietly. “But if you’re around, it might…”
“You want me to chase the demons away, Chaewon-unnie?” Hyejoo asks, equal parts teasing and gentle. Chaewon nods.
“You’ll stay until I fall asleep?” She asks earnestly, looking for reassurance and looking entirely too small under the sliver of moonlight that caresses her form.
“As long as you like,” Hyejoo promises. It burns and it sears like a brand.
-
Hyejoo returns to her room hours later, and it is as if the searing pain is a poison that has entered her blood stream. Her legs prick with numbness and her hands tremble, and before she knows it she is unearthing her journal from its hiding place under the floorboards and flinging it into the fireplace.
The trembling stills, and then a whole new kind of dread overtakes her.
-
“Why didn’t you mention this earlier?” Hyejoo asks, arms full of rumpled chiffon and lace as Chaewon flings dress after discarded dress in her general vicinity. There is a gala at the palace tonight and Chaewon is the host of honor, apparently.
“Because the thought made me nervous, and I didn’t want to let the nerves build.” Chaewon says this as if it’s the most obvious explanation in the world, and then she emerges from behind her screen in a deep red satin number that plunges in the back. Hyejoo cannot breathe.
“What do you think?” Chaewon asks, posing in front of her vanity. It takes all of Hyejoo’s mental fortitude to remember that she needs to move her mouth in order to talk.
“I, uh- that one. Yeah.”
It’s enough to make Chaewon’s gaze snap to hers in the mirror, that strange new expression crossing her face so that Hyejoo is left tugging at the collar of her all-black work suit.
Chaewon’s eyes suddenly shift as she appraises Hyejoo.
“You’ll wear a tux, won’t you, Oli-yah?”
-
Chaewon does get Hyejoo into a tailored black-and-white tux, just as she gets all the white orchids arranged throughout the foyer and on the tabletops in the ballroom exactly how she wanted, just as she greets her guests with perfect poise and hosts the evening with a practiced ease that belies her subtly shuddered breaths.
When she can, Hyejoo offers a crooked arm so that she might escort Chaewon around the room. When she can, Chaewon accepts. She introduces Hyejoo to people as her best friend rather than her personal bodyguard, and though their eyes sometimes linger suspiciously on Hyejoo, no one dares to contradict the crown princess.
Until her father, of course. Hyejoo has seen the unkind set of the man’s face in passing, but his involvement in his daughter’s life is limited at best. With his drooping nose and pursed mouth and the stern way he peers down at Chaewon, Hyejoo finds it easy to imagine why the Dwendalian Empire might be interested in overthrowing him.
“Don’t forget to greet the Duke and Duchess of Zadash, daughter,” the king says in lieu of greeting.
“Yes, father,” Chaewon preens. For all her attempts to equalize herself with those of a lower station, Hyejoo has never heard her sound so subservient.
“Tuck your hair behind your ear as well; it looks better that way,” he continues, and Chaewon becomes an echo of herself. “I saw you forgot your courtesies when you greeted Lady Kim Jiwoo. Friend or not, slipping is improper. Don’t disappoint me during what is only your second party as a hostess.”
He sniffs haughtily; Chaewon sniffs discreetly. Hyejoo emerges from behind her the next second so that she can place a comforting hand to the small of Chaewon’s back.
The king’s eyes narrow. “What’s this?”
“You know Oli, father-“ Chaewon begins only to be cut off by a sharp laugh.
“I did right by hiring her, I see,” he says. “Protecting you like a proper guard dog.”
There’s a rumble in Hyejoo’s chest that she doesn’t recognize as a growl until Chaewon has placed a palm on her shoulder. The king is still contemptuously entertained.
“We shall reconvene after you’ve completed your hostess duties,” he dismisses, walking away.
Hyejoo watches Chaewon chew her lip before speaking. “We can leave. Right now, right this second.” Something bubbles up in her as she says the words; she wants it, she realizes. In a way much grander than simply leaving the party behind.
Chaewon shakes her head.
“I must do my duty,” she insists robotically. When she walks away, Hyejoo follows warily.
-
After that, Chaewon enters a sort of frenzied state. She adjusts her flyaways every time they pass a mirror, barks out orders to pull curtains open and cook more appetizers, greets what Hyejoo is pretty sure is every single person in attendance.
She burns bright and erratic and outlasts every guest, and then at the end of the night, she crashes unto an askew dining chair near the exit of the ballroom. Hyejoo carefully lifts the sleeping princess, light as a paper doll, and carries her back to her room.
-
It is as Hyejoo is carefully tucking the comforter around Chaewon’s sleeping form that the older girl’s eyes blink open, her head lulling so that she can fix her gaze on Hyejoo.
Hyejoo pulls away, suddenly feeling entirely too close, and Chaewon grabs for her.
“Stay,” she whispers. Her eyes are on their clasped hands now and her hair is concealing half of her face.
Though she knows she shouldn’t, though she has yet to solve any of her problems, though she is drowning in panic and yearning and dread, Hyejoo squeezes Chaewon’s hand and nods her assent. Perhaps this is her burden to carry: that she would prioritize Chaewon over anything, even the impending end of her own world.
Chaewon scoots over to make room for her, and it is not a conscious choice but rather the way their bodies naturally shift that results in Chaewon’s head on Hyejoo’s shoulder, Hyejoo’s own body curving around Chaewon protectively, melting into her subconsciously.
A small fist entwines itself with Hyejoo’s lapel as Chaewon nuzzles closer. Her hair smells like tangerines.
“Did you want me to read you anything?” Hyejoo asks to distract herself.
“Well, there is reading material on the nightstand,” Chaewon replies. Her voice is both cagey and light.
Suspicious, Hyejoo glances behind her to find a tabloid with the headline “PRINCESS FINDS A KNIGHT.” She rolls her eyes before turning back to Chaewon, but Chaewon’s already detected her annoyance and is giggling gleefully.
“I promise they wrote about you favorably,” she taunts. Hyejoo butts their heads lightly and smothers any rising anxiety about what this might mean to her superiors in the Dwendalian Empire.
“I don’t care.”
Eventually Chaewon’s giggles fade and they are shrouded in silence. The fist in Hyejoo’s lapel turns into a fingertip lightly tracing the stitching on her clothing, some pants of breath fanning out against her collarbone; Hyejoo closes her eyes and allows herself to enjoy the respite, as she knows it will be brief.
“You’ll stay the night?” Chaewon asks an indefinite time later. Hyejoo feels disoriented in the way unique to dozing off.
“Yes,” she says, tongue heavy.
Chaewon places a kiss on her cheek, brief enough to be innocent but close enough to the corner of Hyejoo’s lips that her heart stutters.
“Thank you for everything, Oli.”
Hyejoo has never before hated the sound of her false name coming from Chaewon’s mouth, but it is a fitting bittersweet sensation for the moment she realizes what she has to do.
-
Counter to her own instincts to the last, Hyejoo leaves behind a note for Chaewon. A goodbye of sorts, lacking in any coherent explanation, so that Chaewon will not wake up feeling entirely abandoned.
This is a mistake, as it turns out, because Hyejoo is only halfway through chucking her loose belongings into her suitcase when there is a knock at the door.
Hyejoo ignores it. Before dawn as it is, there should be no reason for anyone to disturb her.
Chaewon, rather fittingly, barges through her door.
She takes one look at the older girl’s disheveled hair and wet cheeks and forces herself to look away. Chaewon, for her part, is holding up the note and taking in the state of Hyejoo’s room.
“You were just going to leave in the middle of the night?” Chaewon asks. Accuses.
Adopting a practiced coldness, Hyejoo returns, “It’s for the best.”
“What are you talking about?!” she bursts, stomping up to Hyejoo and shoving at her shoulder in an attempt to force eye contact. Hyejoo evades her.
“You don’t want me as a bodyguard; you should have someone better suited for the job,” she insists flatly.
“I don’t want anyone else!” Chaewon yells, and this time when she shoves at Hyejoo’s shoulder the younger girl is forced to confront the only thing that can weaken her: Chaewon’s heartbroken face, sticky from tears with bits of her disheveled hair sticking to it, confusion widening her eyes and hurt rimming them red and puffy. She’s quieter when she continues, “I only want you.”
Softer, but no less resolute, Hyejoo insists, “I have to leave.”
There is only a split second of hesitation – a moment for Chaewon to gnaw on her bottom lip – before she’s replying, “So take me with you.”
“What?!” Hyejoo splutters.
Emboldened by her shock, Chaewon pushes on: “I- I don’t want to be without you. Please. You’re the only person I feel safe with, Oli.”
Inside of Hyejoo, a dam finally breaks.
“My name isn’t Oli,” she begins.
Chaewon rolls her eyes. “Okay, fine, Olivia-“
“My name is Son Hyejoo.” Chaewon’s mouth clamps shut. Hyejoo takes a steadying breath. “I’m a spy of the Dwendalian Empire and they sent me here to aid in a plot to kidnap you as political leverage against your father.”
Chaewon blinks, stunned.
“I-I’m sorry,” Hyejoo continues. Desperation propels her forward. “I couldn’t do it, obviously, and I swear I never sent them any information, but now I have to leave before they come for us both. Maybe-maybe if I’m gone they’ll focus on chasing me down and… and I could send them a message to leave you alone, but… be careful who you trust, okay, Chaewon?”
Chaewon is still dazed and shaking her head in disbelief, so Hyejoo steels herself to say a final goodbye and maybe, maybe kiss Chaewon’s forehead. There’s a palm on her shoulder the second she makes to step forward.
“Take me with you,” Chaewon repeats steadily.
This time, Hyejoo’s spluttered question is, “Why?!”
“I told you why.” Chaewon blinks up at her, face now clear and stern.
“Yeah, but… why would you want to come with me still? After everything I just told you, you can’t possibly trust me anymore.” It is the thought of this girl being so trusting, so naïve and kind and sure of herself, that has Hyejoo’s voice breaking. “Please, Chae, why would you risk yourself like that just to-“
“Because I love you, you idiot!” Chaewon exclaims.
Dammit, Hyejoo thinks.
It is not until Chaewon’s eyes widen that she realizes she has said it out loud.
Timidly, “I-if you don’t feel the same, it’s o-“
And because Hyejoo cannot bare this any longer, because she is suffocated by wanting and Chaewon’s inability to see herself as the everything she is, Hyejoo kisses her. The shock of it melts from Chaewon almost immediately so that they are left with an overwhelming neediness and an overwhelming warmth.
“I love you, too,” Hyejoo admits when they separate. Chaewon’s eyes light up.
“So?” she prompts, watching from under her lashes.
Hyejoo smirks. “Pack your bags, princess.”
“Whatever you say, Hye.”
In twenty minutes they will have to leave, by the end of the day Hyejoo will have to send a message to the Empire discouraging their pursuit and Chaewon will have to inform the kingdom that she is perfectly fine, though they will almost certainly spend some months on the run, and in a year’s time Hyejoo cannot say if they will be safe yet. But for now?
For now she kisses the girl she loves again.