Royal Duty [Minjoon]

II

Jimin hurried into the throne room to heed his father's call.

"You called father?" He asked the man who was seated on the throne in front of him. His father. The king.

"I did." The man confirmed, strictly. Eyes icy to notify his son of the importance of their current correspondence.

"I wanted to remind you of the ball that will be held tomorrow. You have not forgotten?"

"I have not." The son spoke back, fully aware that no other answer would be accepted.

"Good. As you are aware, you are going to have to choose your future wife during this ball. This will be your final chance." Jimin's smile faded at his father's words despite the man being right, he was indeed aware of the matter. The prince felt a chill go through him. He did not like the thought of having to marry someone. He had had a lot of balls like this before, with beautiful girls dressed in their most precious dresses, smiling and dancing. He could choose whomever he wished out of all the women, yet he had never felt like he wanted any of them as a wife. It had never been a matter of attractiveness. The girls were all beautiful. Instead the issue was that he simply could not imagine himself kissing them, let alone marrying them. He sighed, but nodded to his father, knowing that he could never fight the king on his word.

As he walked through the halls the following day, the maids were running around in the castle, making sure that everything would be ready for the coming celebration. Jimin too had been made ready, and had been dressed in his new dark burgundy colored robes. They were flawless, and had the same colors as the rest of the decorations of the party.

The throne room was slowly filling up with girls. Jimin eyed them, smiling halfheartedly. Trying his very best to cover the bad feeling of dread crawling up his stomach. Nerves acting up through this entire body. He did not want to marry. It was neither the girls nor their beauty which led him astray. Simply a general feeling in his body that screamed to him that this was all wrong. Its screams rang so desperately in the prince's mind, that he did not feel like ignorance was an option. Still, as a prince, he knew his duties. He knew that he was not granted all the same possibilities in the matter of marrige as everyone else.

Knowing his father, he knew that neither he would stay quiet about the matter. Rather, the man had clearly stated the importance of this evening. His last chance to find a bride. It was a situation of which he had to choose which outcome he loathed the least. Marrying a girl from the party that he chose himself, or marrying a girl chosen by his father. No son wanted to disappoint their father. For this reason the events of tonight's ball weighed heavier than ever before. His final chance.

Jimin tried to think of something that would calm him down, ease his tensing nerves before the event. Strangely enough, as he desperately searched for relief, the first image that came to mind was that of the man in the dungeon whom he had spoken to previously. The thought of the lanky boy somehow made Jimin smile. The imprisoned man had been pushed to the back of his mind, behind all his other duties, and had almost been completely forgotten. Now suddenly, he made a reappearance in the prince's mind at a very important moment. This he took as a sign of good fortune. Thus, he grabbed a firm hold around his draping robes to hold them off the floor while he once again made his way towards the dungeons.

Just as the day prior, the prisoner was there. In the very same cell he had been left in. Occasionally prisoners were moved to different cells when they were emptied. Today though he supposed there was too much business in the castle, there was left no time to think about prisoners. The dungeon had always been a place of relief for him. One where he could be alone, shielded and surrounded by interesting people with stories much less fortunate than his own. Somehow though, Namjoon made him feel an even stronger relief than just the room. It was strange, how one man, whom he barely even knew, could make him feel at ease such as this. It made him think that their meeting was a destined one. He had always loved the tales of destiny.