He Walks Alone in the Moonlight

A FAULTY MIRROR

Jihyun blinked his eyes open, wincing as they encountered the bright gray sky. He was lying on his back, the damp ground cold and uncomfortable beneath him. Jihyun rose to a sitting position, watching his breath cloud before his face. All around him, towering trees pierced the sky, their waxy needles carpeting the forest floor. It looked like the forest outside of the training camp. Jihyun's heart beat faster as he scrambled to his feet, which carried him forward as if being pulled by an invisible string. Soon he was sprinting, his lungs burning as they filled and emptied with the chilled mountain air. Time didn't seem to pass, but simply stretched on and on as Jihyun ran. The scenery became more familiar, and Jihyun's soles drummed a steady rhythm on the dirt path leading up to the training camp. The large wooden gate of the camp greeted him, the towering wall meant to fend off attacks made him feel the way others would upon seeing a light in the window of their home. Jihyun knocked on the graying wood, bouncing on the balls of his feet as he waited anxiously for an answer.

    Silence greeted him, the shrill whistling of the wind the only noise. An eerie feeling crawled up Jihyun's back. The camp was never this quiet. There was no sound of the soldiers training, no crackling of the fires lit to stave off the cold, no scent of the porridge cooked from dusk until dawn, there was... nothing. Panicked, Jihyun whirled away from the gate and scrambled up the mountainside, slipping as loose rocks and dirt gave way under his feet.

    "Where is it," Jihyun whined, feeling along the stone wall that protected the camp on the mountain side. He distinctly remembered Sulhee telling him about the hole in the wall the servants would go through to sneak into town.

"It looks like any other part of the wall, except one of the stones is loose. If you pull that one out you can make a hole big enough to squeeze through."

Jihyun ran his hands up and down the stone, moss and grime turning the lines in his palms black. Wait. Jihyun stared at the green smudges on his hands, then at the wall.

"Calm down, Jihyun. Focus." He knew from lessons with Raejoon that this kind of moss grew only on stationary objects. It wouldn't take root on a stone that was constantly being moved. Jihyun closed his eyes and took some deep breaths, trying to slow down his racing heart. When he looked again, the spot on the wall seemed to jump out at him. The dark stone was littered with white scratches, the smaller ones around it similarly free from the dark green vegetation. The stone was about twice the size of Jihyun's head and lodged into the wall at knee height. Grunting with exertion, Jihyun pushed and pulled at the stone until it gave way, slipping out of the wall and nearly crushing his feet. Jihyun's shoulders sagged in relief, then he quickly moved several smaller rocks out of the way until the hole was just wide enough for his shoulders to fit through. Holding his breath, Jihyun wriggled through the hole head first, bracing his hands against the earth to help pull his hips through. Once through, Jihyun looked back at the hole, debating if he should cover it. Deciding against it for the sake of time, Jihyun stood, dusting himself off, turning away from the wall.

He stopped short, one foot still raised in the air. "This is...." Jihyun shook his head in disbelief, at a loss for words. Before him was not the training camp, but Mugunghwa pavilion. And there, beneath the two willow trees, stood the crown prince. His back was to Jihyun, facing the pond that the branches of the willows played in, rippling the water with each breeze. Jihyun looked back at the wall, only to find it was no longer there, replaced by the overgrown garden that took up much of the prince's residence.

In a daze, Jihyun made his way to the pavilion, gently walking up the steps so as to not make a sound. The prince either didn't notice him or ignored him, his stoic gaze trained on the water. Jihyun came up beside him and looked over the edge, curious. At first nothing seemed amiss, the prince was staring at his own reflection, a conflicted expression painting his face. Then Jihyun's eyes wandered from that reflection, searching for his own. Except there was no reflection. Jihyun's face did not appear in the dark water. He gasped, backing away from the edge. At the same time the prince turned, gaze affixed to something behind Jihyun.