Chapter 8 Kicked out!

Taeyang and Soyono walked side by side into the dark cold night.

Behind them, the outlaws moved in a loose column — Seokjin and Dohan at the front, Baekho, Soohyun, and Yohan and the others trailed near the rear. The moon above them was thin and offered barely enough light to see the road ahead.

Soyono walked with her hand resting on her sword hilt, her eyes fixed on the small partway they were walking on that unhinded into the darkness ahead.

Taeyang kept glancing at her. The blood on her face had dried into dark streaks. She hadn't bothered to wipe it off.

"Stop staring at me," she said without looking at him.

"I'm not staring." He denied.

"There's no use lying. You've been staring at me since we left the warehouse."

"I'm just making sure you're alright."

She didn't answer to that and kept walking.

"So," he tried again. "Do you do this often? The whole…" He mimed a sword stroke. "Or is that reserved for special occasions?"

"It seems you're forgetting the first rule I gave before allowing you on this mission. You don't speak except when asked or spoken to."

"Come on, we are not yet on the mission. We are walking now, walking there."

She ignored him.

"Walking is not a mission. People walk all the time. It's practically the most common activity in the—"

"Taeyang."

"Yes?"

"If you don't stop talking, I'm going to have to kick you out and leave you out here”

"You wouldn't."

“Try me.” She snapped and doubled her pace. Taeyang jogged to keep up.

The others behind them muttered something about them and laughed into the night.

Minutes later they arrived at Elder Jungsang's estate. The group positioned themselves in a ridge a little distance from high stone walls of the mansion and watched as the patrol guards patrolled the perimeter with lighted torches.

Seokjin studied the estate through a narrow spyglass. While the others crouched beside him.

"That's his residence," Taeyang pointed out quietly. "I've been there only once. Several years ago, for a banquet. The main hall is the large building in the center."

"How many guards guard this place?" Soyono asked.

"I don't know.” Taeyang answered honestly.

Seokjin lowered the spyglass. "I don't think we have enough manpower to breach those walls, Soyono. The guards are too many, the place looks like an anthill.”

"Then what do we do?" Dohan asked.

"We'll have to watch them." Soyono said decisively, taking up position immediately.

They laid there for several hours, crouching down and watching the estate gate.

Taeyang's legs cramped from the crouching, the cold seeped through his borrowed robes. But what really triggered him was Soyono. Beside him, Soyono was perfectly still, her eyes were determinedly fixed on the estate.

"You know," Taeyang said quietly breaking the silence. "most women I've met prefer candlelit dinners to lying in the dirt watching a traitor's house."

“Shut up!” She hissed, without even looking at him.

He groaned.

"Quiet." She hissed again, her voice sharp and impatient.

"I'm just saying, after this is over, maybe we could—"

"Taeyang." Her voice was ice cold now. "If you finish that sentence, I will have to gag you up and leave you tied to a tree."

He swallowed audibly and the memory of her severing a man's head clean off the neck resurfaced in his mind.

Behind him, Yohan whispered, "She's not joking, Taeyang."

"I know she's not joking."

"Then stop talking."

"I've stopped."

"You haven't stopped. You're still talking right now."

"Boys." Seokjin's voice cut through. "We have movement at the gate."

All eyes snapped to the giant iron gates immediately.

A wagon was being pulled out through the gate, drawn by two horses. A group of arm guards rode alongside it, their torches bobbing in the darkness.

The wagon turned into a track and began moving away from the estate unhurriedly.

"That's the shipment," Soyono said decisively. "He's moving more weapons tonight."

Seokjin was already rising. "Let's follow them and see what we'll find. We'll stay off the road completely."

Soyono agreed and with that they all filed out.

They tracked the wagon for nearly an hour, keeping parallel to the road and using the darkness and the trees for cover.

Taeyang found himself walking beside Soyono again. The cold and the tension had loosened something in him. Or maybe it was just the nearness of her — the way she moved through the darkness like she belonged to it.

"You know," he said, "I've been thinking."

"That sounds dangerous."

"I'm serious. After all this is over — after we expose Jungsang, things could be different. I could be restored. My title, my position. And someone like you…" He hesitated. "Someone like you could be more than an outlaw."

Soyono stopped dead in her tracks and turned to face him.

He swallowed. The look in her eyes made him take a step back.

"Someone like me," she repeated.

"That's not what I—"

"You think I want your title? Your position?" She walked closer, he drew back frightened. "You think I'm doing this because I want to live in a palace and wear silk dresses and wait for you to come home from court?"

"No, I just meant—"

"I know what you meant." Her voice was low and dangerous. "You meant that if you get your old life back, you could lift me out of mine. Like I'm something you'd be rescuing."

"That's not—"

"You've been clearly disobeying all my orders from the first one. You nearly endanger my entire group by almost getting yourself killed in that warehouse, and now you're walking through the dark trying to charm me. Do I look like one of your palace girls." She yanked the front of his robe and shoved him against a tree. "Listen carefully, Prince. This is the last I'll take from you.”

“I'm sorry.” He muttered.

But he was still saying it when he threw him to the floor and stepped back.

"Our Journey ends here. Right now, take your three friends and get out of here, quickly. All of you." Her eyes swept over Baekho, Soohyun, and Yohan.

"Soyono—" Taeyang started.

"That's an order." She snapped cutting him off.

And without waiting for any further protest from him, she turned and vanished into the darkness chasing after the wagon. The rest outlaws followed her on.

Leaving Taeyang and his friends, alone in the forest.

Taeyang stood up from the ground slowly and backed against a tree.

"She's right, you know," Soohyun said quietly. "About all of this, I think—."

"I know, don't tell me what you think." He growled.

"What are we going to do now?"

Taeyang said nothing.

His mind kept circling back to the same things.

The fight at the warehouse. The guard that had almost killed him, that gleaming dagger so damn close to his throat. Everything just brought him back to one thing.

He was a waste, useless and wanted by none. Even outlaws saw him the same way everyone did.

He couldn't even be a warrior.

"Taeyang?" Baekho called. "We need to figure out something?"

Taeyang tried to answer, but no words came to him when he opened his mouth so he just closed it instead and leaned his head back against the tree.

“You young punk!” a familiar voice suddenly called from somewhere beyond the darkess startling the friends.

Taeyang's head snapped up visibly frightened.

His panic doubled when a figure stepped into the open clearing and walked towards them.

"You punk, I have searched the whole city for you!" The man snapped in feigned annoyance.

Now at close range, Taeyang recognized who it was immediately.

It was his master Wolseong, a renowned swordsman in the entire district and a personal friend to the emperor.

Wolseong stepped closer and took in Taeyang's appearance simply. “You look terrible your highness.”

Taeyang relaxed his guard, and his curiosity kicked in immediately. “Master, how did you find us?”

The old man laughed and drew out a gourd from his waistband. He chugged down the contents of whatever was inside the gourd before answering. “Wolseong has his ways, Young Taeyang.”

“I see.” Taeyang grunted and fell back against the tree. He had never loved training and martial arts combat. Because what was the essence of all those if you had no resonance?

Someone with an ability could easily blow him apart with just a snap of the fingers before he could even draw his sword.

There was no use for him wasting his time learning such inferior techniques. That was infact what had actually made him flee from his Master Wolseong after several months of frustrated training.

“What are you doing here?” He asked suddenly self aware. Then his jaw tightened. "If you're here to lecture me—"

"I'm not." Wolseong extended his hand. "I'm here to train you again"

“Oh no.” He sighed and stared at his outstretched hand. "Why do you still want to train me, sire? I have no abilities."

Wolseong laughed.

"Because your father paid me a fortune to train you, and you spent half that time running away from my lessons."

Taeyang stiffened.

"Did my father send you?"

"No." Wolseong took another swig.

"The Emperor has no idea where I am.”

Taeyang looked at the hand, then at his three companions. “How long would our training last?”

The man stared at him thoughtfully. “That depends on how much you can commit to it, Your highness.”

He nodded, his mind drifted to Soyono and then Elder Jungsang, the man who had kicked him out of his own father's house.

Fresh rage ripped through him.

He reached up and took Wolseong's hand firmly, his face set. His mind decided.