Sisters in the Royal Court
Copyright© 2026 by Megumi Kashuahara
Chapter 20: Rotting Away
Historical Sex Story: Chapter 20: Rotting Away - A story of two sisters who both became consorts to the same Joseon prince, both elevated beyond their station, both genuinely loved by a man who chose them for who they were. One brilliant and brief. One quiet and enduring. Both essential to the tapestry of a family built from loss.
Caution: This Historical Sex Story contains strong sexual content, including Ma/Fa Romantic Oriental Male Oriental Female
Two months after Jiwon’s death - 1490
Hyeon stopped counting days.
What was the point? One day bled into the next in an endless gray blur of existence that couldn’t properly be called living. He woke because his body forced him to. He breathed because breathing was involuntary. But everything else—eating, bathing, speaking, moving—required effort he couldn’t summon.
The quarters that had been filled with Jiwon’s presence now felt like a tomb.
Her calligraphy still hung on the walls—elegant characters that mocked him with their beauty. Her belongings remained where she’d left them, because he couldn’t bear to have them moved. Her scent lingered faintly on the bedding, and he refused to let servants change it, clinging to this last trace of her.
He was, as the court whispered, rotting away in grief.
The Numbness
At first, there had been pain. Overwhelming, crushing, unbearable pain that made him scream and sob and rage against the universe that had taken her from him.
But after weeks of that intensity, something in him had simply ... shut down.
Now there was just numbness. A vast, gray emptiness where his heart used to be. He couldn’t feel joy or hope or even real sadness anymore. Just nothing. A void where Jiwon had been, and without her, there was no reason to feel anything at all.
The princesses tried to reach him.
“Hyeon, you have to eat something,” Myeonghye pleaded, bringing food that he ignored.
“She wouldn’t want this for you,” Sukhye said, her voice breaking. “She’d want you to live.”
“Come outside. Just for a few minutes. The fresh air might help,” Jeongmyeong begged.
But he couldn’t. Moving felt impossible. Caring felt impossible. Living felt impossible.
“I can’t,” he would say flatly. “Just leave me alone.”
Eventually, they did. Not because they stopped caring, but because there was nothing more they could do. Grief had him in its grip, and he had no desire to break free.
The Darkness
In the quiet hours—and all hours were quiet now—Hyeon talked to Jiwon as if she could still hear him.
“I don’t know how to do this without you,” he would whisper to the empty room. “You were everything. My partner, my love, my reason for waking up each day. And now you’re gone, and I don’t know what I’m supposed to do.”
No answer came. Of course not. She was dead. Gone. Never coming back.
“I should have saved you,” he said, tears streaming down his face—the only emotion he could still access. “I should have done something, found better physicians, tried harder—”
But there had been nothing to do. The fever had taken her despite everyone’s best efforts. Despite medicine and prayers and desperate love. She had died, and he had been powerless to stop it.
That powerlessness haunted him. He was a prince. He had resources, authority, privilege. But none of it had mattered. None of it had saved her.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered to her memory. “I’m so sorry I couldn’t protect you.”
The guilt was crushing. Irrational, perhaps—what could he have done differently?—but crushing nonetheless.
The Palace’s Concern
The King summoned him once, early in his grief.
Hyeon managed to pull himself together enough to attend—unwashed, hollow-eyed, barely functional, but present.
“Your mourning is noted and appropriate,” King Seongjong said, his voice not unkind. “But it cannot continue indefinitely. You have duties, responsibilities. The palace requires your presence.”
“With respect, Your Majesty, I cannot—”
“You can and you will. In time.” The King’s expression softened slightly. “I understand your grief. Losing a beloved consort is devastating. But you are young. You will recover. You will remarry, have children, build a new life.”
The words were meant to comfort. They felt like knives.
You will remarry. As if Jiwon could be replaced. As if any other woman could possibly fill the void she’d left.
“I have no interest in remarrying, Your Majesty.”
“That may change with time.”
“It won’t.”
The King frowned at the defiance, but seemed to recognize that pushing now would be futile. “Very well. Take the time you need. But remember—you are still my son, still a prince. Eventually, you will need to return to your duties.”
Hyeon bowed and left, knowing he had no intention of returning to anything. Duties felt meaningless. The palace felt meaningless. Everything felt meaningless without Jiwon.
The Memories
The worst times were when memories would surface unbidden.
Her laugh, bright and genuine, echoing through their quarters.
The way she would bite her lower lip when concentrating on difficult calligraphy.
Her hand in his, fingers intertwined, the most natural thing in the world.
The feeling of her body against his, warm and alive and here.
Her voice saying his name—not his title, just his name, with love and exasperation and joy.
The memories were torture because they reminded him of everything he’d lost. But they were also all he had left of her, so he clung to them despite the pain.
“Tell me about her,” he would sometimes ask the servants who had known her. “Tell me what you remember.”
They would share small stories—how kind she had been, how intelligent, how she had never looked down on anyone despite her elevated status.
“She helped me once when I was struggling with a task,” one servant said. “Showed me an easier way, never made me feel stupid for not knowing.”
“She always remembered our names,” another added. “All of us. Even the lowest kitchen maid. She saw us as people.”
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