The Abandoned Empress

When I felt a burning sensation in my swollen eyes, and my neck was stiff and my voice was hoarse, I released the soaked pillow. I felt like a limp noodle.

As I tried to stand up to put out the candle on my wobbly legs, a soft fluffy thing hung on me and meowed. When I looked down with blurry eyes, I saw the small silver cat.

‘I forgot you, Luna.’

I held Luna in my trembling arms. I felt sad as the kitten without worry or concern looked up at me casually.

‘It was Allendis who brought you to me.’

Maybe it was because I was thinking about him that I dropped her.

‘No, Luna!’

A silent scream burst out in my croaky voice. Fortunately, the silver cat landed safely on the floor. While I breathed a sigh of relief, she, meowing sharply at me, ran into the corner under a table. As she would not move out of it, I was worried a bit.

‘What if she got hurt?’

I put some power in my legs and got up. The kitten, who saw me approaching her, turned around and bumped into the leg of the table.

‘Oh my!’

The chess board and chess pawns placed on the table fell all at once. Surprised by the loud noise, Luna ran to me and hung on to me. I held her, trembling on the floor covered with the chess pieces.

“You’re okay. It’s nothing. Calm down.”

As I stroked her gently with a croaky voice, she stopped trembling and soon closed her golden eyes.

When I was about to get up, holding the sleeping Luna in my arms, I saw the shadows of the chess pawns created on the wall by the swaying candlelight. It reminded me of the shadow play I saw in the village. I also recalled the puppets that only moved as shadows behind the white cloth.

I gently put her down and picked up the bishop near my feet. The shadow of the bishop was on the wall in my hand. I moved my hand around, and the shadow moved along.

When I was looking at the bishop wearing a round hat, Allendis came to my mind, who always used the bishop skillfully when he played chess.

When I thought of Allendis, my heart began to ache again. What if I had given him a different answer? Did I really close my heart to him? Could I begin to love him if I had more time?

While looking blankly at the shadows of the bishops and pawns on the walls, I opened the chessboard on the floor.

I placed a bishop on a black square. Gathering scattered pieces, I picked up one of them. White queen.

‘No, not this one.’

I put down the queen and put the rook back on the chessboard instead, which I tended to be obsessed with, according to Allendis.

“… Good.”

When the shadow of the bishop on the wall asked, the shadow of the rook hesitantly answered. The shadow of Bishop approached the rook with joy. At that moment, the shadow of the rook moved back. The closer the bishop approached, the more the rook retreated. I stopped the bishop in its place with a sigh.

His sad emerald eyes came to my mind. Alendis, who was friendly, kind and warm to me. Allendis who used to care for and love me.

‘Why don’t you love him, Aristia? Think carefully. Where can you find another man like him?

Do you think any man in the world can love you more than him? Change your mind. Don’t you see him looking at you only? If you can’t love him right now, you can try. Try getting close to him instead of staying away from him.’

I moved the rook instead of the bishop. One space, two spaces. The shadow of the rook on the wall gradually approached the bishop looking at it. The distance between them was gradually narrowed. But when there were only three spaces left, the rook didn’t move as if it had been stuck there. Even if I tried to move it with my wobbly hand, the shadow of the rook was still there as if to show that’s as far as it could move.

The distance remained as the shadow of the rook that would not move.

I smiled a bitter smile. Even though I knew that there was no man better than him, I couldn’t come closer to him stupidly. I was a woman who broke his heart. He who was so precious to me.

How cold, cruel and heartless I was!

I pounded my chest with a fist out of frustration. However, no matter how hard I knocked on my chest with a deep sigh, I didn’t feel better. Does Allendis feel the same way now?

When I recalled his green eyes as he waited for my reply nervously, I also recalled the deep blue eyes of Carsein who was looking at me wistfully like Allendis did. How were my feelings toward him? Just like I broke Allendis’s heart, did I do the same to him?

I quickly looked down on the floor and put the black knight on the chessboard, which I found among the scattered pieces on the floor.

‘Carsein.’

He was aggressive in approaching and contacting me excessively. He smiled at me, cracking jokes childishly after casting an intense gaze on me sometimes. My first meeting with him wasn’t very pleasant, but the young man with red hair, who got close to me little by little, became one of my best friends.

The knight’s shadow was indignant. I smiled to myself.

‘What are my feelings for Carsein?’

Actually I don’t feel the same warmth that I do in Alendis, but he gives me comfort in another sense, and he keeps preaching at me to be more mature and makes me smile with joy when I am with him. What the heck are my feelings for him?

The shadow of the knight approaching the rook suddenly stopped. The rook then moved one space towards the knight, which seemed to be hesitant. The shadow of the rook that stopped with three spaces to go hesitated. After hesitating for a long time, the shadow of the room paused once again instead of trying to step forward. I saw the shadow of the knight standing still in its place without moving forward.

As the intention of the knight is unfathomable, it’s hard to narrow the distance between it blindly. After hesitating, the rook stopped finally, with three spaces to go. The shadow of the knight laughed playfully as it saw the rook hesitating. After looking at their moves for a moment, I cleared the bishop and knight on the chessboard with a sigh.

‘What the heck am I doing now? Let me clear the chess pieces.’

I picked up the chess pieces scattered all over the floor, and suddenly noticed a king scattered in a shade. I hesitantly picked up the king.

I put it on the chessboard.

Only

The shadow of the king on the wall and the shadow of the rook standing on the other side. Stunned at seeing the king, the rook hid at the edge of the chessboard. As if it didn’t see the rook or didn’t care about its move at all, the shadow of the king stood firmly in its place.

The king, standing still for a while, gradually began to approach the rook hidden in the dark. The rook, awkwardly hiding in the shade, now walked out of it cautiously.

The king’s shadow asked the rook half covered with darkness. As if it didn’t care about anything around it, the king’s shadow quickly moved to the rook. The shadow of the room trembled and retreated. Whenever the king’s shadow approached, the rook stepped back a little, step by step.

At that moment, the candle flickered. The shadow of the king on the wall was split into two.

The surprised rook lurked into the darkness. The shadow of the king saw its other shadow and said in a bitter tone.

When I saw the two shadows, I remembered a headache that I had forgotten for a while: the old him and the present him. Which of the two shadows was the rook looking at? Who was it the old him or the present him that made me have hopes that my frozen heart would be able to survive once more?

Two shadows and two princes.

The shadows of two dark and light kings, the same but different.