The sun hung low behind the clouds, its light pouring dim and golden into the palace halls.
Seo Yul stepped out of the eastern wing, his feet silent against the smooth stone floor. The air was cool not too harsh against his still-weakened body. He wrapped his shawl tighter, careful not to be seen, as he made his way past the corridor guards. They didn't stop him. Maybe they were told not to. Maybe they pitied him.
He didn't know. He just needed to move. To see someone who felt safe.
Hwan Jae.
They hadn't spoken since the day he visited, and Seo Yul's heart ached for that easy voice, that warmth. He remembered the soft pouch of apricots. The quiet laughter. The way Hwan Jae made everything feel... less painful.
He headed to the calligraphy hall where he had seen him last.
The doors were already open.
Seo Yul stepped in slowly, hoping to see the prince hunched over paper with his usual messy brushstrokes and dramatic flair.
But instead...
He froze.
The figure at the low desk wasn't Hwan Jae.
It was King Hwan Seong.
Clad in black and silver robes, sleeves rolled neatly at the wrists, brush in hand. His expression was sharp, focused, completely different from the cold silence Seo Yul remembered. But it didn't make him less intimidating. If anything, the king looked even more unapproachable in this stillness.
Seo Yul instinctively bowed his head.
"I asked you a question."
Seo Yul flinched.
The king's voice was calm but firm.
"Why are you here instead of resting?"
Seo Yul hesitated. He hadn't expected to speak, but something about the king's gaze firm but not cruel allowed a truth to slip out.
"I... was bored," Seo Yul said softly, voice barely above a whisper. "Tired of lying down all day."
Hwan Seong raised an eyebrow, then set down his brush slowly, wiping his fingers clean.
"Hwan Jae isn't in the palace," he said simply. "He left this morning with the General for training rounds."
Seo Yul's heart sank a little, though he tried not to show it.
The king noticed.
"Do you want to stay here?"
Seo Yul looked up, confused.
"You came to find someone. You're already here," the king continued. "You can stay... if you want."
Seo Yul stared at him uncertain, unsure what to say.
The king turned back to the table, as if it didn't matter to him either way.
But then, without looking up, he added:
"You don't need to talk. Just sit."
That single line broke something inside Seo Yul not in a painful way, but like a lock quietly turning open.
He nodded slowly and walked to the side of the hall, settling quietly onto a floor mat near the window.
The king resumed writing. The only sounds were the soft scratch of brush on paper and the occasional rustling of leaves from outside.
They didn't speak.
They didn't need to.
Two shadows in the quiet. A prince with nothing left, and a king who'd never known how to give.
And somehow, for a brief moment, the stillness didn't feel so lonely anymore.