The Dragon Queen

by William Andrews

  In less than a decade I had Korea on its way to becoming a modern, Westernized country that, in a few years, could stand on its own against Japan, Russia, the United States, and even China. Koreans, north and south, rich and poor, were beginning to come together to form a country. I hoped and prayed that for the first time in our history, we would finally be one nation, independent and free. We had made great progress, but we needed a few more years.

  Just a few more years.

  One summer day nearly three decades after I’d become queen, Kyung-jik delivered a report to the afternoon meeting and it was not good news. “The Japanese have sent troops to confront the Chinese troops in our north,” he said, standing at the head of the table dressed in his new blue and red officer’s uniform. “They are marching toward Seoul. I think Peking will declare war.”

  Though my reforms had begun to build a nation, the changes had caused strife, too. Two months earlier, a group of traditionalists had taken up arms to protest the foreigners who had come to Korea to help enact our reforms. I asked Empress Cixi to help us put down the uprising. She had sent more troops than necessary, and they easily chased the rebels back into their homes. But Chinese troops in Korea were the perfect excuse for Japan to challenge their long-time adversary to the west. Tensions and distrust between the two countries had only grown over the years, and Emperor Meiji apparently believed that his new modern military could finally defeat the Chinese. So even though the Chinese agreed to pull out after they had put down the uprising, Japan sent thousands of troops to the peninsula. Now Japanese soldiers were in the south and marching toward Seoul.

  It was a precarious situation, and I needed advice from my ministers who sat at the table across from Gojong and me. Another seat was empty, and now there were three ministers absent. After Kyung-jik bowed and left the room, I asked, “Where is Minister Pak?”

  The palace secretary stepped forward and said, “Majesty, he did not report today.”

  “Why?” I demanded.

  “I have received no word, Majesty,” the secretary replied.

  “I see,” I said.

  I looked at King Gojong sitting just ahead of me. My husband sat straight in his chair with his eyes forward. Though he tried not to show it, he looked worried.

  I addressed the ministers. “Advisers,” I said, “what are your thoughts on this matter?”

  Not a one spoke up. They sat mute like stone statues in white robes with their legs folded underneath them, not daring to make eye contact with me. I was convinced that, like Minister Pak, most of them were planning to leave now that the Japanese had sent their troops. They looked like rabbits poised to run from a fox.

  “Don’t you understand?” I pleaded. “The future of our country is at stake. We have come so far but we are in danger of losing everything.”

  Minister Chung cleared his throat. “Majesty, if there is war between Japan and China, the Chinese will win. Then we can go back to the way it was before.”

  “The way it was before . . . a protectorate of China,” I said. I shook my head. “And if Japan wins, we will become its colony and we will lose everything we have worked for. Well, I will have something more. I will have a unified nation independent from all others. One people, one nation. One Korea. Isn’t this what you want? Isn’t that what our people want? Is there not one among you who will support our cause?”

  Still they said nothing and the room was silent for some time. Gojong continued to look worried. I wanted to be angry with the ministers, but I couldn’t blame them. They were not the ones who were ultimately responsible. I was the one who had pushed for all of the changes. They had put the crown on my head, not theirs.

  “Go now,” I said finally. “Tell your people that their queen will fight for their country.”

  The ministers stood as one and quickly left the room. The king sat a while longer. Then, without saying a word, he left, too.

  THIRTY

  Late fall 1894

  The society of the two-headed dragon made my comb from tortoiseshell and gave it a solid gold rim. The inlay of the two-headed dragon with five toes on each foot was made from the finest ivory and looked almost real. Every morning I combed my hair with it when I arose, and every night before I went to bed. When I was done combing my hair, I always asked the dragon if I had been a good queen. He never once answered me.

  I didn’t need his answer. I knew I had failed. I hadn’t been able to build my nation quickly enough for it to stand on its own. As Empress Cixi had said years earlier, Korea was in the middle of a fight between two tigers. If China won the war, they would reassert their dominance over East Asia and we would continue to be their protectorate, unable to rise from their shadow. It would be as Minister Chung had said, “the way it was before.” If Japan won, Korea would be their first conquest on the way to building an empire in East Asia. If they controlled our country, there would be no telling what they would do to us.

  While war raged on the peninsula, I was a prisoner inside the palace. The king and I were unable to leave or even send messages to anyone. The Japanese occupied Seoul and had soldiers just outside the palace. They were pushing the Chinese back across the Yalu River and were winning important battles on land and at sea. There were no afternoon meetings anymore, the ministers long ago having run off to hide from the Japanese. I spent my days alone at my desk. On the tapestry behind me, the two-headed dragon mocked me.

  Kyung-jik was a prisoner, too, and he raged like an angry bull. He forced his men to practice hand-to-hand combat with him for hours every day until he—or more often, they—could no longer stand. King Gojong spent his days in his library, trying to learn what he should have learned decades earlier. My son was now a man and had married a lovely girl from the Min clan, arranged, of course, by me. The prince had grown to be much like his father—soft in stature and character. I loved him just the same. He was a good husband and had a good heart. I prayed that someday he would have a country to rule.

  I went out to my courtyard. Weeks earlier, the hot and humid days of summer had given way to the crisp days and cool nights of fall. I pulled my robe tight around me and sat on the Chinese bench. On a table next to me, Han-sook had set out the year’s last orchids. She knew I liked the cream-colored ones with a blue and pink center and a long yellow pistil—the kind my mother had grown. Their perfume was light this time of year, but I could smell them just the same. Their colors were fading and I knew that in only a few days, the blossoms would die and fall.

  I heard a screech above me and looked up. There high in the sky was a flock of red-crowned cranes heading to their wintering grounds in southern China. I remembered when I had seen them while sitting in my uncle’s bamboo grove the day they told me I would be queen. It was spring then, and the cranes were flying north to their breeding grounds in the lowlands of Manchuria. I remembered how I had felt that day, that something important was about to happen to me. The same feeling was heavy on me now. I tried to send my spirits to the cranes so that I could fly away with them.

  Han-sook came into the courtyard. “Majesty,” she said, “is there anything you need?”

  I didn’t answer right away. She was in her later years now, only a few years from being an old woman. All the same, she carried herself with grace and humility.

  “Come,” I said. “Sit with me.” I had never offered to have my lady’s maid sit with me as if we were equals. She did not hesitate and sat on the Chinese bench next to me.

  She didn’t keep her eyes low as we both looked out over the courtyard. “I have heard the war will be over soon,” Han-sook said without addressing me formally. “They say that the Japanese will win.”

  “I have heard the same,” I replied. We were quiet for some time. Then I said, “I want you to remove the tapestry with the two-headed dragon from my study. Give it back to our people.”

  “That is a good idea,” Han-sook said. “I will have it done right away.”

  “One more thing,” I said. “There is n
o telling what will happen once the Japanese take the palace. They will most likely bring the Taewŏn-gun back from China, though he is an old man and will be nothing more than a figurehead. I want you to leave. They will not stop you. Go to where you will be safe. Go soon.”

  My lady’s maid looked out over the courtyard and shook her head. “Oh, my queen, I will never leave your side,” she said. “As much as it hurts me to disobey your command, I must this one time. I would rather die than leave you.”

  She turned and smiled at me.

  We sat for some time, looking out at the courtyard, smelling the orchids’ sweet blossoms. Finally she said, “I have had one of your servants fetch a book from the king’s library. It is Songs of Dragons Flying to Heaven. I know you like those poems. I thought you would enjoy reading them today.”

  “Yes,” I said. “I would like that.”

  She stood and said, “It has been my life’s greatest honor to serve you, Your Majesty.”

  I said, “Thank you, Han-sook.” She bowed low and left the courtyard.

  I went into my study, and there on my desk was Songs of Dragons Flying to Heaven. I took the book from my desk and sat on the floor in the middle of my study. I saw someone had marked a page with a silk ribbon—likely it was Han-sook. I opened the book to the page and read the poem there.

  The flying dragons of Chosŏn

  Everything they did was blessed by heaven

  Their spirits harmonize with the ancient ones.

  I closed the book and set it aside. I searched for the meaning in the poem. I wondered if heaven had blessed me and if I had harmonized with the ancient ones. I wondered if I had been one of the flying dragons of Chosŏn. Though now the ancient ones’ spirits were everywhere around me, I doubted if I had become a dragon. Since the war between the Japanese and Chinese had started, the spirits scared me again and haunted me at night. I was glad Han-sook was taking away the tapestry with the two-headed dragon. I thought about throwing my comb with the two-headed dragon into the palace pond. I wondered if I was going crazy like my mother.

  That night, though he had not called me, I went to King Gojong’s quarters. I found him alone in his library reading a book. He sat on the floor with a candle for light. His mustache and goatee were long now and starting to gray. His face was pale, and he looked older than his years. When he saw me, he motioned for me to sit with him. As I lowered myself on a cushion, he closed his book.

  “I see, husband, you are reading John Stuart Mill’s Principles of Political Economy,” I said.

  “I do not understand it,” the king said, shaking his head. “Production and distribution and capital and how governments make decisions. It all seems so silly.”

  I nodded. “I thought so, too, when I first read it. But there is merit to it. It explains things.”

  “Yes, you were always smart with books,” he said, pushing the book aside. “It didn’t help us, though. Did it?”

  “No,” I said, “it did not.”

  “What do you suggest we do now? How do we save our country? How do we save ourselves?”

  “I fear it is too late to save our country,” I answered. “Japan will win the war. They will take Korea for themselves. I pray for our people.”

  Gojong nodded. “Yes, it seems that way.”

  “As for us,” I said, “you should go to the Japanese without me. Though he is in the eighth decade of life, they will bring back your father from China. He won’t harm you. The Japanese will put you on the throne only as a figurehead. But you will still be alive.”

  “What about our son?”

  “They will not harm him or his wife, either. His fate will be the same as yours.”

  “And what about you?”

  I didn’t answer him. I took his hand and looked at him. His eyes were moist. My heart broke. He was my king who, thirty years earlier, I had promised to serve. And my service to him had led to this. “I am sorry, my king,” I said.

  “Why do you say you are sorry, wife?” Gojong asked. “Do you think you are a failure?”

  I looked into our hands and nodded.

  The king shook his head, “No one is a failure who has done their best.”

  At that moment, I truly loved the man sitting next to me who was my husband and king. In spite of his weak character, in spite of having a dominating father who had used him all of his life, he had become a man and a king. I squeezed his hand, and he pulled me in close. We kissed a most tender kiss. And for the first time in my life, I knew a man’s love. We embraced for some time, and then pulled away. There were tears running down my husband’s face.

  He smiled sadly. “My queen,” he said.

  A tear ran down my face, too. “My king,” I replied.

  THIRTY-ONE

  Present day. Seoul, Korea

  “Did she fail?” Anna asks me as she sits straight-backed on the throne and glares down at me. “Tell me, Mr. Simon, what do you think? Did she fail as queen?”

  It’s a good question and I don’t have an answer, so I say nothing. Outside the room, it’s been quiet since I told the marines to back off. Thank God for that, but I doubt they’ll stay cool much longer. Those guys get twitchy when they’re not in control.

  Anna gives a signal and two women come to her. They start working on her hair. One pulls out the binyeo as another takes off her wig. Anna’s hair falls down to her shoulders. Two men go to the tapestry with the two-headed dragon and take it off the wall. They roll it up and carry it away.

  “Do you remember what happened to Korea after the Sino-Japanese War?” Anna asks.

  I sort of do. Probably not in the detail that I should. “Tell me.”

  Anna emits a sigh as if I’m a student who hasn’t done his homework. “The Japanese won, of course,” she says. “Empress Cixi spent the money the Chinese had raised for modernizing their military on rebuilding the summer palace to celebrate her sixtieth birthday. I’ve seen her palace. Lakes, gardens, and pavilions built among hills. You should visit it someday, Mr. Simon. It’s spectacular. But it cost China the war and its dominance in East Asia. They could no longer protect Korea, so Japan took over. Their troops never left the peninsula.”

  The women have brushed Anna’s hair and pinned it back in the business style she wore when I first saw her. Now they go to work on her face, removing the powder and red lipstick.

  I want to show Anna that I know something about Korean history, so I speak up. “After that war, the Japanese went to war with Russia. Nicholas II wanted to colonize East Asia, just like the Japanese. The Japanese won that war, too. Decisively. It was the first military victory of an Asian power over a European one.”

  “Yes,” Anna says, “it was significant for Japan. What’s also important is the treaty the two countries signed to end the war.”

  “The Treaty of Portsmouth,” I say, feeling smug that I remembered it.

  “Correct. You recall that President Theodore Roosevelt negotiated it.”

  “Of course,” I say. “He won the Nobel Peace Prize for it.”

  “That’s true. But what most people don’t know is that at the same time, he negotiated a secret agreement with Japan. The agreement stated that if Japan didn’t interfere with America in the Philippines, they could do anything they wanted in Korea.”

  “I didn’t know about that,” I admitted, my smugness fading away.

  Anna continues, “As a result, Japan turned this country into a slave state. They annexed the peninsula in 1910 and for thirty-five years did their best to wipe out everything Korean. It wasn’t until the US defeated Japan in World War II that they were forced to leave. And you know what happened then.”

  The women finish removing Anna’s makeup. Two more come with a sheet and lift it to Anna’s neck. Behind the sheet, I see that they are helping her take off her queen’s attire. One carries off the robe that Anna wore. Another provides a shoulder for her to lean on as she slips on her skirt.

  “Yeah,” I say. “A divided country with the communi
sts in the North and the capitalists in the South. The Korean War. A standoff ever since. And now the mess we have today.”

  “The mess we have today,” Anna repeats. “The mess you need to report on to the secretary of state and the president.” She finishes dressing and the women drop the sheet. Without her regalia and makeup, she’s no longer a terrible, beautiful queen. She’s back to being just a junior embassy aide. In my job, I outrank her by quite a bit, but here, now, I don’t feel like I do.

  I look around and see that we’re alone. The fire in the fireplace has died to glowing embers, and there are only a few candles still burning. The room smells musty again.

  Anna comes down the dais and sits on the step in front of me. I see that she is holding the comb with the two-headed dragon. “Mr. Simon,” she says, “may I call you Nate?”

  “Sure.”

  “Nate, have you seen the State Department documents from WikiLeaks regarding our policy on East Asia?”

  “I don’t pay attention to documents from WikiLeaks,” I reply. “I get the real thing.”

  “You get what they want you to get,” she replies with a look. “What they want you to believe is that we have this altruistic foreign policy to promote a democratic world order. It’s supposed to be ruled by international laws and connected by free markets.”

  “And what’s the problem with that?” I ask. “Free markets have made the South Koreans extremely successful.”

  “Financially they are. But are they happy? South Koreans are far down the list of the happiest people in the world. And we don’t care about international laws. The WikiLeaks documents prove it. We prop up lawless regimes. We support anyone as long as it’s in our financial interest to do so.

  “And we don’t believe in fair markets, either,” Anna continues with fire in her eyes. “We only care about market dominance. Profits from supposedly fair markets flow to Wall Street without the cost of a physical occupation of the countries we dominate. And market dominance trumps any commitment we have to human rights or state sovereignty.”