“Please, elaborate.”
“Vengeance is a common practice in our kingdom, Inspector. So what crime would I have committed in wanting to discover the truth about Lady O and her lover?”
“What do you mean, ‘vengeance’?”
“A rat informed me that you were traveling to Suwon, following some information. That it was related to Lady O’s death.”
“What were you hoping to discover?”
“Perhaps I wanted to know the depth of Lady O’s depravity, to expose it and to set right my reputation of having once been humiliated by a slut. I might have wanted to discover who her lover was too, to punish the man who tempted and killed her. Perhaps I wanted to wield justice my own way.” He rested his elbow on the low-legged table, then leaned in toward the inspector. “I think you understand, more than anyone, what it means to hate. I hear you offered to spearhead the Catholic purge.”
My heart recoiled, and perhaps the young master saw the disappointment crinkling my brows, for he made efforts to paint the inspector even blacker. “When the mourning period for King Chŏngjo ends,” he said, “I hear you will execute or banish the Catholics. Men, women, and children alike will be put to death.”
“Ch’oi Jinyeop,” Inspector Han said, his voice low, his gaze unwavering, “I take no pleasure in harming others.”
“But? There is always a ‘but’ with honorable men like you, sir.”
“There are only two types of people. Those you protect and those you crush so that they can never rise up again.”
“Not all—” The words slipped out of me, pushed out by the memory of Lady Kang. The only aristocrat who had ever been nice to me from the start. I bit my lips hard, punishing them.
“Please.” The young master gestured. “Finish your sentence.”
I swallowed. “I just … Surely they cannot all be so bad. Could they, Inspector?”
The corner of Inspector Han’s lips twitched. “They are all bad. Their teaching encourages division. Father against the son, and the son against the father; the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother.”
In the most casual tone, the young master said, “Just as it divided your own family, Inspector?” His gaze slid to the black-lacquered document box resting on the shelf, the box Officer Kyŏn had stolen a letter from. I’d nearly forgotten about it.
“That is none of your concern,” Inspector Han said.
“Well, then. It is almost time for my afternoon tea.” The young master uncrossed his legs and rolled up onto his feet, shaking the wrinkles out from his robe.
“I am not done interviewing you.” Irritation pricked Inspector Han’s voice.
“You may interrogate me all you want once you obtain a warrant.” The young master turned toward the door, and I weakly moved forward to open it. But then he stopped and looked over his shoulder at the inspector. “Allow me to make one thing clear, however. If I did hire those men, it was to avenge my reputation, not my heart. I never loved Lady O. I have never cared much for anyone.”
* * *
All day, the young master’s remark lurked in the back of my mind. He knew, everyone seemed to know, of Inspector Han’s deep-rooted contempt for Catholics. But I couldn’t see how his history connected to Lady O’s death.
I sharpened a knife on the whetstone, for the chief maid had directed me to do so despite my condition. As I did, I lined the other suspects up in my mind; I longed for orderliness, the world outside me far too chaotic.
There was the cocky young master, who’d declared that a woman like Lady O deserved death. Surely a man who could declare such incriminating things assumed he was immune to police interference.
There was also his father, Councillor Ch’oi. The councillor belonged to the Southerner faction, which was endangered by its ties to Catholicism, and was soon to be wiped out by the queen regent. He needed to capture the priest to shield himself from the purge. And, coincidentally, a Catholic woman had turned up dead.
And Scholar Ahn. He had run away while I was sick—from what I’d overheard—perhaps to avoid interrogation and the punishment of having seduced the daughter of an aristocrat. Punishment for sexual deviance was severe in our kingdom, including floggings and imprisonment. It was understandable that Scholar Ahn would run away for this reason, but he could have also escaped to avoid being punished as the killer.
Another questionable person was the victim’s mother, Matron Kim. She had given her daughter a suicide knife, the symbol of ultimate honor, which had been used as the murder weapon. Her daughter was not only a heretic, but an adulteress who’d borne a son out of wedlock. Violence could have resulted from an accumulation of shame and anger in the heart of a mother …
A scream ripped through the silence. Startled, I nearly dropped the knife. “What is that?” I asked a passing servant.
“Maid Soyi,” she whispered. “She’s been screaming at the guards to let her out.”
“Why?”
“It is her turn again. Not yet, but in the afternoon. I think she knows … Inspector Han seems to be at his wits’ end. He’s using torture this time to interrogate her.”
She whispered the terrifying technique that would be used. The juri-teulgi method, where one’s knees, bound together, would be forced by sticks in opposite directions, again and again, until the leg bones curved. Blood drained from my head, leaving me dizzy as I steadied myself against the counter. I had to go speak with Soyi before it was too late.
* * *
Whatever had happened in the prison block, or within Soyi’s mind, it had worn her out until she seemed as translucent as a ghost. The moment I stepped into the wooden cell, swamped in shadows, Soyi’s lips would not stop moving.
“I dreamt of skeletons, and when I woke up, I heard the guards talking about graves, and then just yesterday, I felt something under the straw mat. Look, look what I found.” Soyi opened her palm and showed me a tiny bone, perhaps belonging to a rat. “Isn’t that strange? It is a cluster of coincidences, little links I see each day that somehow all seem to connect with one another, leading somewhere.”
“Leading where?” I whispered.
“Gods, I don’t know. Wherever it’s going, I don’t want to go there. I just want to be left alone.” Her hands darted out and, grabbing my injured hand, she squeezed it.
My mouth dropped open, my face contorting with pain as I snatched my arm back. “Ow!” I yelled so loudly it seemed to wake her up from a spell. Something of her old self returned at the sight of my bloody, bound-up hand.
“So it is true,” she whispered, her breathing slowing down. “I overheard everything.”
I held my hand, cradling it. “Overheard what?”
“Your inspector is like every other aristocrat. His kindness is conditional. So long as you please your inspector, do what he tells you, he will treat you like his sister. But upset him, and you become again a mere slave to him.”
Silence filled my mouth. No words rose in his defense, because Soyi was right.
Then the translucent, ghostly look returned to her eyes. “Don’t let Inspector Han take advantage of your loyalty, as Lady O took advantage of mine,” she hissed. “She made me do things I didn’t wish to do. She promised to return my nobi deed and free me from servitude if I obeyed her.”