by June Hur
Besides, if Brother were alive and had lived this long, he would have kept his promise to me. That he would write to me, wherever I might end up in the kingdom. He was not one to break promises.
“Not my brother,” I said aloud, and hearing those words comforted me. “Never my brother.”
* * *
No one was outside the servants’ quarter. Unlocking my personal chest, I opened the lid and saw two things. The inspector’s blue robe was still there, the silk swimming in the darkness. I also saw the norigae pendant. The amber terrapin stared at me from the corner of its eye, and the long blue tassel of silk strings swayed as I picked it up. The colors around me—the white wallpaper, the yellow floor, the slice of pale blue sky outside the door—seemed to bleed together until everything was a blur, nothing vivid, except for the norigae dangling from my finger.
Whether you are the sun, the earth, or the moon, you are a capable girl.
To me.
I wanted to shut out the echo of Inspector Han’s voice. I threw the pendant back in, slammed the lid shut, but I knew it was still there. Whispering to me, condemning me. I walked out of the servants’ quarter and returned with a dirty cloth from the backyard. It was large enough to fill the chest, so that if anyone opened the lid, they would be too repulsed to dig any deeper.
For now, this would do. I couldn’t risk moving the robe in broad daylight.
I paused before shutting the lid. Reaching into the depths, past the fabric, my fingers smoothed themselves over the terrapin again. The moment I drew it out again, memories reached into my mind like beams of light that wrapped their arms around me, echoing with memories.
There aren’t too many like you, Damo Seol. Man or woman.
I squeezed my fingers over the object and imagined throwing it into the rushing water. Or over a cliff. I must have imagined this scene over and over again, for by the time I blinked back to reality, the courtyard hummed with busy steps of servants returning for their midday meals.
“Seol.”
I snatched the pendant close and slammed the lid shut. Slipping the norigae quickly into my uniform, I whirled around to see Aejung frowning at me.
“You look so sick!”
“What do you want?” I snapped.
She pursed her lips. “Why is everyone so unkind these days?” She turned to stalk off but stopped herself, remembering why she’d come for me. “You are summoned by Inspector Han to the main courtyard. Go, and don’t dally around like you always do!”
Memories scorched my skin as I made my way back to the front of the bureau. I expected to see only Inspector Han, the man I dreaded most. Instead, I saw a team of legal clerks and officers gathered, as well as the coroner’s assistant and the police artist. I was to accompany them.
Curiosity ought to have sparked in my mind with a question: Where are we going? But not today. The inside of my skull felt so bruised from the tsunami of one crashing thought after the other. All I wanted to do was hide under my blanket and sleep for an entire week. To be surrounded, for once, by nothing but silence.
My stare blank, I followed the team, leaving behind the filthy maze of streets and marching into desolation. The wilderness grew thick around us as we climbed up Mount Nam, trapping in the shadows and a creeping sense of uneasiness that woke me from my dazed spell. The past two times I’d ventured into the mountains, something dangerous had occurred. My wounded fingers tingled as though sensing the nearness of hostile spirits.
“Commander Yi spoke to me today.” Officer Shim’s voice drifted through the forest, somewhere ahead of the line. “He said you haven’t been sleeping at all. You don’t do well without sleep, sir…”
“Long few days,” Inspector Han replied. “It would be easier to find rest if only I could see the sun, to feel its soothing warmth. All this darkness leaves me restless.”
Physical exhaustion distracted me from the inspector’s presence, and I was grateful for that. Twigs cracked and soil crumbled down the slope as the men climbed upward. We were not even halfway up the mountain, yet already officers were losing their breath.
Consequences, Inspector Han had said, threatening me for my meddling ways. I wished I could tell him that there were consequences, too, for those who threatened my family.
I looked around. No one was close in front of or behind me. I drew out the norigae, the inspector’s gift to his dead sister. I was about to release my fingers and watch it drop, drop, drop down the mountainside until I could no longer see the terrapin, until I could no longer feel the ties connecting me to the old promises or to the new what-if fears.
But an ache in my chest stopped me.
I couldn’t do it. It wasn’t in me to punish. Not this way. I could not throw away Inspector Han’s token of affection for his sister.
Cursing under my breath, I shoved the norigae back into my robe, and it was then that a light drizzle fell, like sea mist spraying through the leaves. The soil released a moist, earthy scent. Strands of my hair became plastered onto my face, and when I pushed them back, I saw that I was too far behind. Hiking up my skirt, I hurried up until I was close enough.
“Three months have not yet passed since the king’s death…”
The legal clerk ahead of me spoke to another, his robe hanging from his slight figure and narrow shoulders, his black cap looking almost loose on his small head.
“… and yet someone dared to kill a cow? Whoever did it, does he think to live?”
So we were heading over to investigate a slaughtered cow. I could already imagine what we would find inside.
As a child, I had once stumbled upon the scene of a butchering. An illegal one, for it was as forbidden to slaughter a healthy cow as it was to kill a human being. Cows were too precious to our farming kingdom. Careful to keep quiet, I’d watched the rogue strike the cow’s head with a heavy iron hammer, and almost immediately, the creature had fallen over. In the next moment, the rogue had stripped the animal of its hide and had cut off its legs. What had terrified me most hadn’t been the slaughtering, but the fact that throughout the brutal process, life had continued to hang on so desperately to the stumps quivering on the legless cow.
After climbing higher, there appeared a shed made of planks and logs, a thatch roof, and a brushwood door. The peasant’s voice echoed ahead, and he was panting, “It was—it was this—this shed!”
Inspector Han crouched and observed the ground. “No hoofprints of the cow, but here are footprints, and the deep tracks in the mud suggest the men were carrying something heavy.”
I joined the circle of officers gathered around Inspector Han, peering down to see the prints. Where the steps had halted was a large rectangular object printed into the mud.
“What do you think this print is, sir?” Officer Shim asked.
“It seems to be a palanquin.”
“But a palanquin is not large enough to hold a cow,” another officer said.
“But look here.” Inspector Han pointed. “These vertical line prints look to be the handles.”
The team studied the prints for moments longer, making room for the police artist, who began sketching the scene with charcoal. After a while, Inspector Han reached into his robe and pulled out a white handkerchief. Pressing it against his nose, he told me and the other officers to follow, then disappeared into the shed.
Not wanting to smell the stench either, I pressed my sleeve against my nose and stepped into the dark and drafty place. Blue light streamed in through the cracks between the plank walls, casting stripes of light onto the hay rotting beneath our steps. A few paces away reed blinds hung down from a wooden beam.
“There’s something there,” I whispered, seeing a shadow looming behind it.
Inspector Han moved the reed blinds aside with the hilt of his sword. Then he froze. “What?” he whispered.
I moved to see past him, and the moment I did, my legs buckled and I was sitting with my eyes locked onto a man hanging upside down, suspended midair by a rope tied arou
nd his ankle. I couldn’t understand what I was staring at. A man, a dead man, hanging upside down.
“You said you saw a cow.” Inspector Han’s voice was flat and probing.
“I—I saw the shadow behind the blinds, and the s-s-smell,” the peasant replied. “I thought surely a cow carcass. I’ve seen p-plenty of cow carcasses hanging, but never a human—” He never finished, running outside, and all we heard was him heaving out vomit.
An officer kicked down a plank with splintering force. An abundance of light poured into the shed. Someone gasped loudly; perhaps it was me. The corpse’s wrists were tied. His nose was missing. And he looked familiar. He was hanging upside down, his face gray, so I couldn’t say for sure—
My heart froze. “It’s Scholar Ahn.”
Total silence followed, then whispers of confusion. Inspector Han just stood there, staring.
Officer Shim frowned. Then he turned to the inspector and whispered, “So he is not the killer?”
“The bandits from Suwon,” Inspector Han said in a subdued voice. “Do you have any information about them yet, Officer Shim?”
“No sighting of them, but a merchant said he’d seen an earless bandit before. He and the rest of the rogues caused trouble before in the Fox Mountain Pass, stealing from travelers. I had men comb through that area, but nothing.”
Silence crept back in as we stared at the hanging corpse.
“Inspector … the nose,” the legal clerk said. “Can this be connected to the first murder?”
“Perhaps.”
“But why the nose?” Officer Shim leaned in closer to observe the cavity in the victim’s face. “It reminds me of what occurred during the Imjin War.”
“Go on,” Inspector Han said.
“Hideyoshi wanted to take along with him the severed heads of our people, but there were simply too many. So he had their noses sliced off and pickled in salt instead. Maybe the killer took the noses of Ahn and O as a sort of memento. Much more portable and less suspicious than a head. And if that’s the case, does it not mean he’ll strike again? To collect more noses?”
“Hmm.” Inspector Han did not sound convinced. “Or perhaps the severed nose is a kind of symbol.”
“A symbol of what?”
“A symbol of the victim’s guilt. Ui-hyung, a punishment in which the culprit’s nose is cut off. Perhaps a mutilated nose is to the killer a justification for their death. To ease the killer’s sense of shame.”
The men nodded their heads, and I wondered what kind of killer this was. What kind of murderer understood shame?
Officer Shim tilted his head to the side as he frowned at the corpse. “But there is no sign of blood on him. No stab wounds. How did he die?”
“He drowned.”
“How do you know, sir?” I could not stop myself from asking, and I hoped no one had heard the suspicion edging my voice.
“Look, there is froth at the mouth.” Inspector Han took his white handkerchief and swabbed inside the mouth. “See this pinkish foam?” He raised the cloth to the stream of light. “It is tinged with blood.”
The coroner’s assistant approached. “Evidence of violent attempts to breathe,” he added.
“But how could he have drowned when hung upside down?” Officer Shim asked.
“It’s because he was upside down that his drowning was possible,” Inspector Han explained. “Water would have been poured on his face, and with a constant stream, it would have effectually stopped his breathing.”
Kyŏn, who stood in the shadows behind me, asked testily, “Might I ask how you know this, Inspector?”
Kyŏn and I were starting to sound eerily alike.
“It is a method of torture the aristocrats are known to use on servants, usually to obtain something—a confession, information, and so on,” Inspector Han replied. “Less noisy than beating them.” He paced around the corpse again, as though searching for other evidence. “Ahn and Lady O … they were lovers and shared secrets, which a third party wanted to know. Perhaps.”
“It seems the young master was behind this all,” Shim said. “He planned the Mount Hwa incident, and now this.”
“Perhaps he was behind the Mount Hwa incident, but I am not so sure that he is the killer,” the inspector replied. “He is not yet under house arrest, but I’ve had officers keep a close eye on him, and they claim he spent days in the House of Bright Flowers. It seems he is more distraught by Queen Regent Jeongsun’s wrath than anything else.”
I saw something twinkle in the blue light, winking at me from beneath the hay. I scrambled forward, right past Inspector Han, and picked up a necklace of lacquered brown beads. I might have mistaken it for one of those Buddhist rosaries, but the beads were smaller, and at the end hung a silver ornament like the one I’d seen hanging from Lady Kang’s necklace. A cross shape.
The legal clerk snatched it from my hand and offered it to Inspector Han, who looked at it and swore under his breath. “The symbol worn by heretics.”
“Catholics…” The legal clerk shook his head.
“I thought this was a case of a jealous lover.” Officer Shim heaved out a sigh and ran a hand over his face. “Where do you begin to unravel this tangle?”
“At the beginning…” Inspector Han did well at hiding his feelings, by the stoic expression pinned to his face, by the silence that followed. Then he clicked his tongue and I realized he was afire with rage. His voice sank, and the words he uttered sounded as though they were being dragged through the mud of bitter defeat. “We will return to where it all began, and from there, we will find our way to the damn truth.”
* * *
There was death under my nails. I had helped pull down the corpse, digging my fingers into Scholar Ahn’s flesh, then used a knife to cut the rope. The corpse had thudded to the ground. Deep furrows marked his wrists and ankles, engraved by the restraints.
Rubbing my hand against my skirt, I walked quickly, jittering with the need to wash myself. Everyone, in fact, seemed eager to leave the shed, which now felt haunted with the mountain mist pouring in.
Inspector Han and a few officers remained at the scene of the crime, while the rest of us made our way back to the bureau, the corpse carried on a stretcher with a straw mat covering him from the prying eyes of passing pedestrians.
Kyŏn and another officer whispered ahead of me.
“Isn’t it odd?” Kyŏn asked.
“What is?”
“You’ve read Ahn’s letters to Lady O,” Kyŏn said. The letters I’d found, the content of which Inspector Han had refused to share with me. I quickened my steps through the mud and puddles to hear better. “It was mostly them fighting, because O wanted to end their affair to join a ‘Heretical Virgin Troupe.’”
“Virgin troupe,” the other spat out. “Times are growing dark and unnatural. Why would a girl refuse her duty to marry and bear children?”
“Here is the odd thing,” Kyŏn pressed. “How could Lady O join this virgin troupe if she wasn’t a virgin?”
“Didn’t you hear? Inspector Han said that in the letters, a man with the initials ‘ZW’ baptized her, then granted her absolution. And only one man in this heretical community is known to forgive sins. Priest Zhou Wenmo. As always, Inspector Han is a few steps ahead of you. You need to think quicker.”
Kyŏn’s prickly voice shot back in response, but I heard no more of this conversation. My mind withdrew, shuddering against the chill of new information. Were the deaths of Lady O and Scholar Ahn somehow connected to the most wanted criminal in our kingdom, the Catholic priest?
Why was this case becoming more tangled and hard to grasp? Why wasn’t it getting any easier?
Right then, the straw mat shifted and I saw the gray face of Scholar Ahn, his eyes staring blankly up at the sky. I knew I’d never forget the sight.
* * *
The afternoon had grown cold, so the chief maid instructed me to light the ondol heating system of the main pavilion. She spoke with a tone of such casu
alness, as though nothing had happened this morning. As though I had not just returned from cutting down a hanging corpse.
Inside the under-floor furnace, a small space beneath the hanok structure, I crouched and fanned the flames. With enough kindling, the curls of woodsmoke would spread throughout the underground ducts and heat the stone plates laid under the floor of the building, warming the air inside as well. The fire crackled as I fanned, emphasizing the silence around me. A silence I did not want, for I kept thinking of the hanging corpse, his clouded eyes staring at me, as though he wanted to talk to me. Who killed me? Why?
A sound in the distance pulled me out of my thoughts, voices in the light rainfall.
I struggled out of the dark, cramped space and hid behind the beam that upheld the tiled pavilion roof, peering ahead. Officers, legal clerks, and servants stopped in their tracks to greet Commander Yi, who strode through the bowing crowd, seemingly oblivious to all, staring fixedly at the ground with his brows slammed low over his eyes. Behind him followed Officer Kyŏn.
A few steps more, then Commander Yi stopped and turned to address Kyŏn. “Clear yourself from my sight, and do not appear before me again until you have solid evidence,” the commander said in a voice so low it was almost a whisper. “Do not make a single mistake.”
The hairs on my skin rose, sensing that trouble was around the corner, and Kyŏn knew exactly what it was.
Once Kyŏn was alone, he rolled his shoulder once as he stalked across the courtyard like a predator about to pounce on his prey. I followed him, quickening my pace to catch up, until I was near enough to call out, “Officer!”
He paused in his step. A snarl slid into his voice. “Good afternoon, Damo Seol.”
