Legend [YEONBIN] ✓

sixty-eight ; yeonjun

I didn’t know when I fell asleep. But in sleep I dreamed, a fitful toss of images.

“Yeonjun-ah.” She was just as he remembered, fair skin, dark eyes, hair as white as the moon.

“Halmeoni. Are you real?”

Halmeoni smiled, the kind that creased the skin at her eyes and made them sparkle. “Whether I’m a spirit come to visit or a figment of your dreams, say what you need to say to me, Grandson.”

“I’m sorry.” Tears ran hot and thick down my cheeks. “In my next life, I hope I’m reborn as your grandson. Then I can treasure you, and honor you the way you deserve.”

“Oh, Yeonjun-ah, you can still do that in this life. I hope you can live this life filled with joy. I think that will be a great way to honor me.”

“How can I, after what I’ve done to you?”

“I made my own choices. You don’t want to die, Grandson. There’s still so much I hope for you to have in this life.”

I squeezed my eyes shut, the last of my tears streaming down my cheeks.

When I opened them again, she was gone and I was outside. I blinked up at the sky. I lay in the forest under so many stars that they outnumbered the dark.

“It seems you didn’t need me to get into trouble.”

I glanced at Ara beside me, sitting cross-legged in the tall grass. She watched the heavens instead of me. Why would my mind do this to me? Take my halmeoni away and replace her with this woman? “You might love your son, but I can never forgive you for what you’ve done.”

“I never asked for your forgiveness. But if you love my son, then let her live.” There was a pleading on Ara’s face, lending a softness to her angles I’d never noticed before.

“I don’t want her to die.”

“But you want to live, too.” Ara’s voice became hard.

As she said it, I knew it was true. New tears sprung to my eyes. It swirled the light of the stars until they mixed into a potion of stardust that blinded me. I couldn’t look my impending death in the eye and accept it. I wanted to live so desperately it hurt.

“At least when humans die there is an afterlife,” Ara said. “Gumiho cannot be promised such things.”

I was silent, unable to answer.

“Soobin tethers me to my humanity,” Ara said softly, her eyes shining. I blinked. Sitting like this, Ara almost seemed human. “I had a human family once. They betrayed me, tried to kill me. Called me a monster and then made me into one. I thought that I didn’t deserve a family until I had Soobin.”

“Is that why you’re fighting so hard for him?” I asked. “Because you’re afraid of becoming a monster?”

“I don’t fear my own fate. I was betrayed because I thought with my heart instead of my instincts. I won’t let the same thing happen to my son.”

Ara stood, her eyes black as onyx.

“That’s why you must die.”

And I realized this wasn’t a dream.