Chapter 2. What She Saw Beneath the Water

“Do you have a tattoo on your chest?”

The tea Leon was pouring stopped at the rim of the cup.

Seoyun lowered the hand she'd reached out to take it.

“No, I mean. It's just…”

“Did the young master put you up to a wager?”

“What?”

“Last time, he asked you to find out whether my ears were pierced. How much is at stake this time?”

Seoyun picked at the crust of her bread.

“It's not a bet.”

Without asking anything more, Leon slid the milk jug toward her.

“The steward has the identification papers I submitted when I was employed. You may request to see them if necessary.”

The instruction to find a man and fall in love had taken all of three lines, and already she'd made a mess of the first question.

“…That was rude of me.”

“If you intend to ask anyone else, I would advise against doing so during a meal.”

Leon looked down at the teacup.

“They may be holding something hot.”

She laughed. It seemed a little unfair that she could still laugh in a situation like this.

This was her sixth day in this world.

Leon's papers stated that he had no distinguishing marks. The record was three years old. Asking whether anything had appeared since then was more than she could manage.

The messages wouldn't open again. Seoyun put the smartphone into a small pouch and hung it inside her clothes.

She had told the family that her memory was hazy after the fever. Her mother spooned soup for her. Her younger brother sulked because she didn't recognize him, then secretly left her sweets.

It felt as though she had stolen someone else's place. She was afraid of getting used to it, too.

In a drawer, beneath a sheet listing the family's names, she had hidden a note.

〈How to Get Home〉

First, find the man with the mark.

Second, fall in love with each other.

Third, get the key.

She underlined the second line. If she really fell in love, what would happen to her wish to go home?

Find him first. Think about that later.

As she folded the paper and put it away, a maid came in carrying clothes for an outing.

Elin had already accepted an invitation to the imperial concert on the water. Seoyun had initially refused to go.

Then she'd seen the guest list and changed her mind.

Cassian Valter.

The duke who had put down the northern rebellion. The novel had described his battle wounds being sealed by magic, leaving a black mark below his collarbone.

She couldn't remember its exact shape. She hadn't memorized the shape of a scar while reading about someone else's love life.

“I'll wear the dark green.”

She chose the color that would make the pouch less noticeable.

Leon wiped the moisture from the carriage handle. Seoyun braced her hand on the spot he had cleared and climbed in.

“I'm going to try meeting a few people today.”

“If you feel uncomfortable, you may come home whenever you wish.”

“And when I do?”

“I'll have a late supper prepared.”

She looked at him for a moment.

He hadn't told her to do well. It sounded as though there would be a place for her at the table even if she came back having failed.

“Meat.”

“Of course.”

“Not soup. Something I can chew.”

The corners of Leon's mouth lifted a little.

Only then did Seoyun lean back against the seat.

When the carriage arrived at the detached palace, the streetlamps across the river were beginning to come on, one by one.

A wooden bridge led from the palace gardens to a performance platform extending over the river. While the musicians tuned their instruments, dark currents curled around the supports. Leon waited with the other attendants at the entrance to the bridge. On the far side, Theo Landen, commander of the knights, stood guard. He was Elin's old friend, the one who had visited her sickbed a few days ago.

People were looking at one another more than at the scenery.

Seoyun was no exception.

Cassian Valter was easy to find. Everyone's eyes were drawn to the man in black formalwear, but few people approached him.

The second time she stole a glance, he turned toward her first.

“Are you looking for something?”

“No.”

Too fast.

Cassian looked down at the glass in her hand.

“Then I wonder why you've tried to drink from an empty glass three times while looking at me.”

Seoyun lowered it. There was nothing inside except a piece of grape skin stuck to the bottom.

“I mistook you for someone else.”

“Whom?”

“Someone I know.”

“And now you see I’m not him?”

He moved half a step closer. Seoyun pressed her toes into the ground to keep herself from retreating. When she looked up, she caught a glimpse of something like an old burn between the edges of his black collar.

Her gaze dropped, trying to make out its shape.

“Lady Elin.”

Someone beside her exchanged her glass for a new one.

“May I take that? Surely the duke's face isn't enough to make you quite so thirsty.”

There was laughter in the voice. A blond man was offering her a fresh glass. Seoyun reached to accept it, then stopped when she saw the people around them bowing.

It was Crown Prince Adrian.

“No need for formalities. Forgive me for detaining someone so recently recovered, but there is something I wish to discuss.”

He smiled.

“The letter you sent me last month. May I give you my answer now?”

It was a letter she had never read.

As she searched for a reply, the duke intervened.

“Conducting business with someone barely recovered, are you?”

“Who said the lady's request was a matter of business?”

The two men looked at each other. Seoyun took the opportunity to set her new glass on the table.

What sort of relationship had Elin had with these men?

A bell rang to announce the next piece. Adrian withdrew, saying they would speak again later. Cassian's gaze lingered longer.

Seoyun slipped away through the crowd.

“Please step away from the railing.”

The voice came from somewhere near her feet.

A white-haired man was crouching beside a bridge support. He traced something in the air with a finger, and blue lines appeared beneath the water, then vanished.

“Were you speaking to a person?”

“Assuming you are one.”

He raised his head. His eyes went not to her face, but to the pouch hanging below her chest.

“Where did you get the object inside that?”

Her hand rose to cover the pouch.

The man stood. A silver tower-shaped pin adorned his collar.

Isel, master of the Mage Tower.

“I didn't say I intended to touch it,” he added.

“Keep it away from the water. I can't tell yet whether it's coming from that object or this bridge.”

“You can’t tell what?”

“The ringing.”

Seoyun couldn't hear a thing.

Just then, a crowd approached from the other end of the bridge, trying to secure places close to the platform. Isel turned, and Seoyun stepped aside.

Her heel caught the lining of her dress.

She tilted backward. She grabbed the railing, but the wood beneath her palm bent outward. The railing tore free as far as the next section.

Someone called her name.

Cold.

The water rushed in at the back of her neck. Before she could shut her mouth, it filled her nose and washed over her tongue. She reached upward, but her skirt tangled around her legs. The lights receded.

The pouch cord tugged at her neck.

She clutched that first.

She couldn't let go.

If she lost this—

The surface broke with a great splash. A dark shape descended through the bubbles. A hand caught her wrist. The grip was so fierce, so determined not to lose her, that her knuckles ached.

Seoyun pressed herself toward him. Her hand, reaching for his clothes, slipped inside his open collar.

A faint red light seeped through the gap. The water distorted the shape of the mark. Beneath a round loop, a slender line ran downward, then bent.

A key…?

She lifted her head to see his face. Hair blocked her eyes. She wanted to breathe. She needed to ask his name, at least, but couldn't open her mouth.

His arm pulled her closer.

Even when the current wrenched her body sideways, he didn't let go. Seoyun clutched his clothes. The pouch cord slipped between her fingers. Still, she didn't try to catch it again.

She felt certain he wouldn't let her go.

Even after she could no longer see anything, she could feel the strength of that arm.

Something hard pressed against her back. Someone turned her onto her side. At a voice telling her to spit it out, Seoyun brought up water instead of a breath. When she opened her eyes, the first thing she saw was a wet glove.

Its seam had split.

“Cough. Slowly.”

Someone supported her back. Her throat felt scraped raw. Tears blurred the faces in front of her into one another.

“Sir Theo, give her some room. She's breathing again.”

Isel pushed himself up with his hands on his knees. Water dripped from his sleeves. Theo Landen took his hand from her back, but the knight commander stayed where he was.

People were being hauled ashore. Several must have been swept away trying to catch one another at the broken railing.

Cassian was pushing his wet hair back. Around Adrian's waist was a blanket someone had hastily wrapped about him.

Leon knelt in front of her. His waistcoat was gone, and his shirt clung to his body. He loosened the pouch cord around Seoyun's neck.

She looked at the five men, one after another.

Every one of them was wet.

A cough tore out of her. Someone called for a doctor, someone else for a carriage.

Beneath the blanket, Seoyun felt for the pouch. Her phone was safe.

She remembered the shape she'd seen underwater.

The red mark beneath an open collar. It had been faint. Perhaps a dying person had simply seen what she most desperately wanted to find.

But the arm wrapped around her had been real.

Wet clothes couldn't tell her who had dived in and who had reached out from the bank.

One of them would know. Know that she had let go even of her phone to hold on to him.

Perhaps he held her way home.

Seoyun caught the hand reaching to help her up. Before she could even check whose it was, the words escaped her.

“Who was it… who held me in his arms down there?”

Waiting for an answer, she tightened her grip. The face she'd failed to see beneath the water kept hovering just beyond her sight.