Your Pride, My Prejudice | Rawoong/Seohee +18

Lingering Shadow

Three weeks. Three weeks had passed in which the only man in Hwanwoong's house had been himself since Seoho had been out to focus on finding Sujin along with their uncle. The blond had imagined the day he would have found himself managing the house on his own would have eventually come but, only in the perspective of Seoho marrying before him, as naturally as it should have been, happily. Those had been rough weeks instead, considering their mother's constant whining in bed and tearing up at least five times a day while imagining all the worst case scenarios possible involving the young Sujin and Mr Yonghoon, getting lost somewhere. Seyoung would get upset and screamed at their maid or at any family member near her. Eunseong had turned even quieter than usual, spending almost all day long playing depressing songs at the pianoforte in the living room or reading silently in her room.

Hwanwoong seemed to be the only one able to calm their nerves, to make them reason, to allow them open up and express themselves in words well, but he missed Seoho. Hwanwoong wasn't born to be the perfect brother who was able to be so accomplished while taking care of everyone in a house full of noisy people, all different from one another. He felt immature and unready for the first time in his life and he could really feel his brother's absence in many ways, but there was nothing Hwanwoong could do except trying his best to think and act as his brother would have in his place. Seoho had been clear, he would have written a letter to them only if they had either found her or if they had lost even their last crumbles of hope they had left.

When the mailman rang the bell of their house in a beautiful sunny day, Seyoung was the fastest to open their door to him: "Hwanwoong!! Mama!! It's from Seoho! A letter from Seoho!!" She said out loud so that everyone in the house would have gathered around her. Mrs Yeo almost fell down the stairs to reach her children downstairs, but none of them dared to say a word nor opened the letter because it was in Hwanwoong's place, and in his place only, to do it.

The new head of the house grabbed the letter from her sister's hands and he quickly opened it. He tried his best to appear ready to face whatever was its content because, in reality, he was not the least ready to get the worst news of all. He gulped as he read the few, short lines his brother Seoho had written him: "They have found her."

"Oh, sweet merciful Lord, you heard my prayers!" Mrs Yeo immediately said, taking a sit to avoid losing her senses at the entrance of the house. "What else did he say!? Is she alright!?"

"Are they married? Please, Brother, tell us!" Seyoung insisted with Eunseong who simply held onto the fabric of Hwanwoong's shirt. Their maid and housekeeper were listening too.

"They will be... If we settle a hundred pounds a year on her. That's Yonghoon's condition." Hwanwoong kept reading out loud while trying to hold back his desire to just simply go and make the man who had taken his sister away taste the iron of his sword.

The ladies of the house gasped in disbelief: "A hundred pounds a year!?" Mrs Yeo exclaimed.

"Will Seoho agree to this?" Eunseong quickly asked.

"Of course he has already agreed." Hwanwoong confirmed. "God knows how much our uncle must have laid on that wretched man. He has surely chosen Sujin as his target because she's young and he knows we would have supported her in any way we could have. Honestly, I thought he would have dared to ask a lot more, I'm afraid to know how generous our uncle must had been in order to get such a reasonable negotiation from Mr Yonghoon." He explained to the ladies as he couldn't stop thinking their uncle must had paid the despicable man at least ten thousand pounds, considering how much he had meant to steal from Miss Yongsun.