The sound of bamboo chimes echoed softly as the morning wind stirred the petals of early plum blossoms. In the courtyard of a grand hanok nestled between mountains and mist, Lady Hae-won moved like silence itself, her white jeogori brushing the wooden floorboards as she walked.
She was the eldest daughter of the noble Yun family—quiet, composed, her beauty whispered about in the capital but rarely seen beyond the village gates. To the outside world, she was everything a noble daughter should be.
But behind her calm gaze was a heart that yearned.
Her days passed in routines: tea ceremonies, embroidery, poetry. Yet each morning, before the sun fully rose, she slipped away into the courtyard to read beneath the plum tree her late mother once tended.
That's where she first saw him.
Jin-seo.
A scholar's son from the low village, hired to assist the younger Yun children in their studies. He entered the courtyard with ink-stained fingers and eyes that held no fear of the nobility. He bowed, but not too low. He spoke, but not too softly. He noticed her—but not for her name.
It unsettled her.
And intrigued her.
As spring deepened, their paths began to cross. First in quiet greetings. Then brief exchanges over books. One morning, as the sun painted gold across the paper walls, he left a folded poem beneath the plum tree.
*The plum waits for no one,*
*Yet it blooms for the quiet heart.*
*I see you.*
She didn't speak of it, but the words curled themselves into her chest like warmth in winter.
Still, they were worlds apart.
Her father had already chosen a husband—Lord Kang, a powerful ally in the court, twenty years her elder. The wedding was set for the next full moon.
One evening, Hae-won stood on the garden bridge, eyes on the river's soft shimmer. Jin-seo approached quietly, pausing at a respectful distance.
"I'm sorry if the poem was too bold," he said.
She turned, her voice a whisper. "It was not bold. It was brave."
Their eyes met—not noble and commoner, not student and daughter—but as two souls caught between duty and desire.
The wind shifted, carrying the scent of plum blossoms.
And for the first time, Hae-won smiled.
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