Sae-byeok / Ho-Yeon Imagins

Forbidden... perhaps - Pt. 2

The lights streamed like golden ribbons across the ballroom, casting everything in a warm, honeyed glow. Laughter echoed like music against marble walls, glasses clinked in perfect rhythm, and beneath the glamour—beneath the chandeliers and the sweeping gowns—deals were made, alliances whispered, and futures promised. There was no escaping it.

I'm not promised to anyone. Not yet, at least. But everyone knows what's coming. Being the princess means your freedom dies long before your heart has a chance to dream.

And yet—my eyes always find hers.

Across the room, she stands like a flame amid the crowd. Calm, composed, untouchable. Most would see her as a threat, a trap wrapped in grace. But I know better. I've seen the way her guard slips when we're alone. I've heard the frustration in her voice when she speaks of her duties, her dreams, her rage.

Tonight, I don't wait for an excuse. I let my body lead. I move through the crowd with quiet urgency, my dress sweeping like mist around my legs. And there she is—already waiting.

Tall, elegant in a way she detests, her black dress clings to her like a second skin. Her short hair curls slightly at the ends, and a dusting of freckles softens the sharp angles of her face. She looks like a portrait painted in defiance of royalty.

"What an honour to meet with you once again, Princess," she says, voice low, deliberate. But I know it's not her. Not really. I know she's itching beneath the fabric, her shoes biting into her heels like punishment. She'd rather be sword training in the courtyard, beating the crown prince at every duel. She always has.

"I'd hoped we were past these formalities," I reply with a hint of a smile.

Secrets live best in silence. Some out of shame. Some out of fear. Some because they're too precious to name aloud. And this—this thing between us—is all three.

"If we are ridding ourselves of formalities," she says, her tone gentler now, the facade cracking just slightly, "then am I allowed to ask for a quiet walk around the grounds... with just you?"

It's the smile that undoes me. The rare, unguarded one she saves only for me. I offer her my hand. She takes it without hesitation, and together we slip from the noise of the ball, vanishing like ghosts into the quieter halls of my castle.

"And what lucky prince has been chosen as your suitor, Princess Y/n?" she teases once we're far enough from prying ears.

"Don't even speak of it," I groan. "You know better than anyone—a prince is the last thing I want haunting my thoughts tonight."

As we walk, I feel her fingers brush against mine. The contact is fleeting, but it sets fire to my skin. Temptation is a strange thing. It doesn't shout. It whispers. Gently, like this. A touch. A glance. A lingering silence.

"If circumstances were different," she begins, "you know I would—"

"Stop." My voice is sharper than I intended. "The circumstances will never be different, Sae-byeok. And there is no good in hoping for the impossible."

We step into the garden, the heavy doors closing behind us with a dull thud. The night air is thick with moisture, clinging to our skin, making it harder to breathe. I welcome the discomfort. It's easier to feel that than the ache rising in my chest.

"I didn't mean to upset you..." she says quietly.

I turn to her. No guards. No courtiers. Just us and the stars.

"Sae-byeok," I whisper. "I would give up everything—my title, my kingdom, my name—if it meant we could live as we choose. Just you and me. No laws. No crowns. Just... us."

Her eyes soften, but she doesn't speak. She doesn't have to. The silence is louder than any vow.

"But hope," I continue, "hope is a cruel thing. It feeds you just enough to keep you starving. And only a fool plays with impossible odds."

Her hand finds mine again, this time firmer. We don't kiss. We don't dare. But in that grasp, in the desperate way our fingers intertwine, I feel everything we've never said.

Her grip doesn't loosen, and neither does mine. We stand like that—our hands hidden between us, pressed tight, as if the simple act of holding on might rewrite the rules of the world.

"I hate it," she says after a moment, voice raw. "This game we have to play. The lies. The pretending. I'm tired of dancing with men I'll never love, of smiling for people who'd burn us alive if they knew the truth."

"I know," I whisper. "I'm tired too."

She looks at me like I'm a story she's memorized, one she rereads every night just to feel closer to the ending she knows she'll never get. There's a question in her eyes, one she doesn't ask—because the answer will only break her.

"I think about it," she admits, quieter now. "What it would feel like... to stop hiding."

"And then what?" I ask. "We're hunted? Dismantled? Torn from each other completely? I couldn't live through that, Sae-byeok. I'd rather have these stolen moments than lose you entirely."

She looks away, jaw tight. I know the way her anger curls in her chest, not always loud, sometimes just a quiet trembling under her skin. "You say that, but you don't know what it's like to feel this much and never say it out loud. To love someone and have to pretend it's nothing."

My breath catches. It's not the word—love—it's the way she says it. Like it's something she's carried for too long. Something that's been eating her alive.

"I know more than you think," I murmur. "Every time I see you with someone else, laughing, pretending, I feel it like a knife to the ribs. And yet... I stay silent."

We sit on the stone edge of the fountain, its waters still and silvery under the moonlight. I can't bring myself to let go of her hand.

"I dream about running," she says. "About leaving all of this behind. Going somewhere no one knows us. Living freely. Together."

"And where would we go?" I ask, the ache in my chest blooming wider. "There's no kingdom in this world that would welcome two women in love—especially not two royal ones."

"Then we build one," she says fiercely. "We forge our own life. Maybe it's small, maybe it's hard—but it's ours."

A pause.

"Sae-byeok..."

She turns to me. Her eyes glisten—not with tears, but with conviction. "Say it."

"I can't."

"You can."

My heart feels like it might cave in. But I've carried this too long. We both have.

"I love you." The words fall from me like the first breath after drowning. "I have loved you from the moment you stopped bowing and started challenging me."

Her face crumbles with something between relief and devastation. "Then why can't we just—"

"Because they would kill us," I say, and the words feel like a death sentence. "Maybe not with blades, but slowly. With laws. With separation. With marriage contracts and alliances that stretch us across the continent."

"I would still love you across the continent," she says.

"I would still love you from the gallows," I reply.

The wind shifts, cooler now, rustling the leaves. Somewhere in the castle, the music is still playing, like the world is determined to pretend none of this exists. That we don't exist.

She leans in, forehead against mine. We breathe the same air. We don't kiss. We can't.

But this closeness is sacred.

"I'll wait," she whispers. "For as long as I have to. For whatever scraps of time we're allowed. I'll wait."

I nod, tears pressing at the backs of my eyes. "I'll find a way. I don't know how—but I will. I swear it."

And in the dark, in the hidden part of the garden where the moon sees more truth than the throne ever will, we promise each other everything we can't have.

Yet.