A Crane Among Wolves

If by any chance we do not meet again in this lifetime, then I will find you in the next—or as many lifetimes as it takes to see you again.

We mortals exist for but a season, and yet we love as though we are bound by eternity.

So long as you live, we’ll have the rest of our lives to find each other again. And I will find you again. I promise.

You would brave a life with me?" "I would brave this life," I murmured against him, "and a thousand more.

Tell me to leave,” he urged me desperately. I knew I ought to bid him farewell, yet my hands would not release his sleeve. “And if I do not?” After a long, tense moment, he leaned in, pressing his forehead gently against the curve of my shoulder. “Then I will be yours,” he confessed, his voice a soft caress, “and I shall be your ruin.

You will not always be the wisest, nor the strongest, nor the bravest. That is why we need friends. They will guide you down the right path, no matter how dark it grows.

There are too many sorrows in life to feel each too deeply.

Tomorrow, the kingdom could sink into the sea. Tomorrow, all the elders we trusted could betray us. Tomorrow, the fog might consume everything we loved. But I had him today. And he had me.

I am tired of being the elder sister, were the words within. When I expressed my objection for the first time today, Father gave me such a look of disappointment that I felt my entire world tremble. Why does he only see my disobedience, and not my desperate love for him? To live near home, to be close enough to care for my parents in their old age—I wish I could cry, I wish I could fall apart as little sister often does, and still be loved and understood. But I cannot. My parents do not love me when I am weak, when I fail them, when I err. Who am I, if I am not the perfect daughter?

We were sisters. Two girls who shared pieces of each other, tied together by an unspoken bond, a warm feeling of attachment, that no amount of bickering could easily sever. We were sisters. Comrades born from the same womb.

You look like a vengeful ghost," he murmured, adjusting the seat. "And you are the sort I would furiously haunt for all eternity," Iseul retorted.

Because rape is about power; it is never about desire or love,” he answered quietly. “His Majesty is a power-hungry beast with a voracious hunger for more, and what better way to display that he reigns supreme than by taking what is precious to his own people? “But the more women he devours,” he continued, “the more starved he becomes. A thousand will not satiate him. And one day, should his dream come true, and he gains ten thousand … I fear he will only be hungrier than ever.

To believe that life is far greater than this one wretched moment.

In dark times, every mother becomes your mother, every child your child, every sister your sister, and every stranger-in-need a friend.

I am just here until I am not. I do not think of one, five, or ten years in the future.

Our kingdom is surrounded by the sea, yet I have never seen it…,” he confessed, grappling with every word. “I should like to stand before the very expanse that literati scholars have captured in their writings. To witness this vast eternity.” There was a beat of silence, and then he murmured under his breath, “To believe that life is far greater than this one wretched moment.

The ones I loved most dragged me through the darkest of hours. Yet in the next life, I would still love them again.

History moves its course, Young Mistress Iseul, (...) but it is the youth who point the current in its direction.

Go and move the heavens for her.

Who am I, if I am not the perfect daughter?

Hopefully in the next lifetime, we will meet again,” he said, glancing down at me. “And in kinder circumstances.” I gazed up and offered him a small smile. “I hope so, too.

He fell quiet. The urge to shield his vulnerabilities was strong, but in the gentle glow of firelight, he found a rare sense of security. Or perhaps it was her presence.

Stay alive, no matter what.

Sometimes, a little sweetness cheers the soul.

the worst is never over.

Hwang Iseul,” his voice rasped, his hands gripping tight onto my skirt, “if by any chance we do not meet again in this lifetime, then I will find you in the next—or as many lifetimes as it takes to see you again.

And when you find such a friend,” Wonsik continued, lowering the brim of his straw hat, “you fight for them, and they will fight for you. But alone, you will not survive in the capital. Either defeat or death will crush you, and you will never bring your sister home.

For a long while, I remained still, taking in the weight of her existence. A weight that grounded my spirit. My sister, my sister, my sister. The words that had once felt as forgettably light as air now squeezed my heart tight. We were sisters. Two girls who shared pieces of each other, tied together by an unspoken bond, a warm feeling of attachment, that no amount of bickering could easily sever. We were sisters. Comrades born from the same womb. I glanced at Suyeon for the hundredth time, to convince myself that she was truly by my side. And when realization finally settled, memories unfurled of the long journey I had taken to reach her, of the kind strangers who had become my dearest friends along the way. Prince Daehyun. Yul. Wonsik…

To those who have dared to be a beacon of light in the bleakest of moments