But Who Was Chopin?, Patrick Sean Lee [uplifting book club books txt] 📗

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                       But Who Was Chopin?

 

One

 

If I were to tell you that I have been to the ends of the universe and returned, would you believe me?

 

My name is Ae Cha-Min, daughter of Mei Cha-Min, King of all the Koreas, and I have made such a journey. Oh, such a comment! you say. And the daughter of a king. Hah! That in itself is outrageous, you must be thinking, for there are two Koreas, and neither has a king. And the universe is unfathomably large.

 

But both are true, I swear by my ancestors. You see, I was taught well (though not in the modern notion), and further, I was counseled never, ever to lie. And so, I do not.

 

Please let me tell you of my centuries-long journey. I will start at the beginning.

 

Over three hundred years have passed since my soul first entered this existence we call humanity. Why was mine chosen to be instilled into royalty? I don’t know. Can anyone know the mind of God? But I was born royal, and that led in time to my death. But let me not mention the details of that just yet…

 

I was six when I was betrothed to the heir to the Qin dynasty by my father, a good and honorable man. This was done in order to further cement the uneasy, often-wavering relationship between my kingdom and the lords of the powerful land of the ancient Chinese rulers. Of course I never met the man I was to marry—the boy at the time, three years older than me.

 

Gossip in the halls of the Gyeongbokang Palace whispered that he was a vicious boy, but I don’t know if this was true, or simply one of the tales constructed by maids and concubines who loathed the Qin, that ruling dynasty which demanded our subservience and yearly tribute of rice. True or otherwise, the years slipped uneventfully by, and little was said further on the subject of the marriage to take place in my 15th year.

 

I spent cool spring months in the study of Confucius, in the study of the stars that forecast our fortunes…and in the study of music. Sweltering summers I walked beneath the gracious Tan trees bordering the Hangang River, dismissing study, but never the sacred songs of our heavenly land.

 

In my 13th year I found myself walking along the banks of the Hangang one afternoon, humming the notes of a lovely Hu-asan melody. The weary sun was behind me, seeking rest in the great sea that buffered us somewhat from the Qin. The air was fragrant with the smell of hyacinth and lotus, and it was now merely warm. I felt a small pebble strike my back. Not with force, as though hurled from a Qin sling, but mischievously. A second after it struck me I heard laughter, and I turned.

 

There it was. The ragged cloth covering a leg following its owner into the bushes ten feet behind me. The impertinence!

 

“Come out!” I demanded. “Who are you that you would defile the body of the princess of Qin? I will have your head.”

 

Another burst of giggling from the bush’s interior, and then the evil little beggar stepped back out onto the path. His hair was long, but kept surprisingly well, falling in black rivers onto his strong young shoulders. I thought as I stood gazing on him that his face was well proportioned—for a beggar born in a cave, or a hovel deep in the bowels of the city at least. He smiled, which pointed upward, as smiles must always do, upward to eyes the color of the sky at midnight. He seemed not to fear my threat, possibly because he was ignorant and had no idea who I was. That is what I thought.

 

“Come forward,” I said to him.

 

He obeyed. When he reached me he stopped, and his smile grew larger yet. At least he understood me, even if he did not value his life.

 

“Kneel,” I commanded him. But he did not. Instead he reached forward, grabbed my shoulders, and began twirling me like a top.

 

“Close your eyes,” he said with a laugh. His voice was sonorous, like the notes from the song I’d been humming. Not at all deep, but neither screechy like a child’s stretching in agony in its journey from pubescence to manhood.

 

“Do you see the stars? Can you hear the music I’ve written for you? Do you know that I am to become the next king of our land, and you shall be my Queen?”

 

I planted my feet and stopped.

 

“How dare you!” I was dizzy, although not entirely from the spinning. His eyes were clear and penetrating as he waited for me to continue, and my anger ebbed as I became trapped in them.

“Have you no idea who I am?” I asked.

 

“None. Only that I have never heard such beautiful singing, nor gazed upon such beauty. Tell me, then, who are you? And answer swiftly and honestly lest I decide to have your head!”

 

“I told you, beggar.”

 

“I don’t believe you, beggar’s bride.”

 

His impertinence had no end! I raised my left hand and put my thumb behind the finger encircled by my ring.

 

“Look at this, foolish boy. Do you recognize the stone, the face, the script?”

 

He took hold of my fingers with a calloused hand and drew the ring finger closer to his face.

 

“It would fetch a king’s price in the market. Feed myself and my family for at least a year.”

 

He dropped my hand, but not before he kissed it quickly, softly.

 

“May I have it?”

 

“You are worse than stupid! This ring was given to me by King Mei Cha-Min...my father! Have you not heard of him at least? Begone. Leave me. If ever I see you again I’ll take your head myself, you insolent little pig escaped from your sty! Go!”

 

He bowed low in obeisance, his hands folded at his stomach, and then he rose. The gleam in his eyes was like twin stars hurling themselves down from the heavens. Quite unexpectedly, quite without fear for his endangered life, he stepped forward, grasped my cheeks with his hands, and then kissed me!

And then he left, giggling and bowing, fool that he was.

 

“What is your name?” I called out when he’d reached the bend in the road.

 

He turned.

 

“Yung-Jae. And there is no need to have my head, princess. You have already taken my heart. I intend to marry you. What purpose would there be for you to marry a headless swine?”

 

I could not hold back my own laughter. Never, ever, ever had any boy at the palace addressed me in such a manner. Never had lips touched my cheek, other than those of my dear father and mother.

 

Never could I have imagined believing such an audacious thing.

 

                                          *

 

Three weeks passed until I saw the pitiful, lovely little beggar again. Again after receiving the gentle tap of a pebble on my back. It was not uncommon in those days to hear the tales of gods descending from heaven, taking human or animal form, and seeking the hand of a princess. Such did Hwan-ung, son of Hwan-in, God of all. This thought captured my youthful imagination. Who could say whether Yung-Jae was god or mortal? The son of a god, or that I’d been chosen to accept his hand and free our land of the Qin at his side?

 

He seemed to care little that I was of royal blood. We walked along the peaceful path each afternoon, and I laughed at his witty tales, and the oft-repeated vow that we would marry.

 

A year passed, and then another. How often I made excuses to abandon my studies and courtly duties, then slip out of the palace in order to meet Yung-Jae. How often, more frequent with every meeting, did he kiss me, and I did not resist his lips.

 

But palaces are places of intrigue, and furtive as I was, I did not notice another set of eyes watching my beggar prince and me that year. In two month’s time I was destined by decree to marry Sin Mun-hee, and I am certain the eyes watching us belonged to one of his spies. To whom he reported I do not know, but it was not to my honorable father. Had his ears heard the news I would have been dragged before his throne to explain myself, and Yung-Jae’s neck would certainly have met the sword. This did not happen. What did was perhaps more unfortunate.

 

Yung-Jae and I met that day when the locusts sang and the river was rushing, but sparkling. Hundreds of dark green leaves sprinkled themselves on our pathway. He had composed a song, he told me. A song that would be sung by every living creature until the end of time. By then I loved his voice more deeply than the vow he’d made so long ago. His rags were gold and silver in my eyes. His heart beat in perfect balance with mine, and our souls were one. But Sin Mun-hee was on his way to claim me, and so I began to cry.

 

“What is it, Ae Cha-Min? You don’t want to hear what my heart has written for you?” he asked me with great sadness clouding his face.

 

“You must leave my beloved Yung-Jae. Our time together has run its course. Our dream…we must awaken. Our destinies are written in the blood of our people. I will wed Sin Mun-hee, monster that he might be, and Korea will be spared greater bloodshed because of it. Please leave, now, before it’s too late.”

 

He did not speak. His face grew dark like a winter storm bearing down on Autumn’s fields of brown and red and gold. At that moment my heart fell to the earth, out of my very chest, and I began to weep more. Jung-Jae wheeled in front of me and took hold of my arms. He was trembling.

 

“You…” he began, but unlike me he still inhabited the childhood dream. I’d threatened long ago that I would cut off his head, but that day I did worse, I ripped out his heart.

 

“No, my lord. We must turn and leave, never to meet again. I cannot dishonor my father’s pledge.” I pulled myself free from him and took a step backward. As Yung-Jae stood with my dagger in his heart, I pulled the royal ring from my finger and thrust it at him.

 

“Take this. Let it signify the love I have for you. Let it become a balm when the pain becomes unbearable. Until the stars swallow our land and all the lands beyond, let it sing to you and remind you that we will meet again, but not in this life.” At that I gave him the ring, and then turned and ran back along our path, alone and shattered.

 

I ran. It seemed forever. Over a low rise where he first kissed my lips, around a bend where the river narrowed. I couldn’t see for the tears. I tripped in the very spot where the path came closest to the water on my left, and I tumbled into the water.

 

Screaming children from the lowest caste of society swim like fish in the Hangang all summer long. They learn early on the whereabouts of currents, and the pleasures of its cool waters, but at this spot not even the bravest among them would dare to dive in. Swimming is the pastime of the lowly, never for one of royal blood. My gown was layered. That did not help my plight. Even had I known how to thrash my arms forward and backward like the children did, the weight of my clothing would have pulled