I think about what she says. She has a point. It’s the same point of view I had twenty-five years earlier. I feel the righteous indignation that I did then. “State sovereignty,” I say. “Like an independent and free Korea.”
“Yes.” Anna nods. “An independent, free, and united Korea. One Korea.”
I shrug. “So what do I put in my report to the president?”
Anna shakes her head. “I don’t know. I really don’t. But I think the answer is in how you answer my question. Did she fail, Nate? Did Queen Min fail as queen?”
I take a second to think. Then I say, “It’s in her spirit, isn’t it? The spirit of Korea.”
“Yes, the spirit of One Korea,” Anna says. “Her spirit, the spirit of these people, the spirit of this nation.”
We’re quiet for a while. Then she opens her hand. There is the comb with the two-headed dragon. It looks different to me now, almost like a sacred thing. “I have to keep this,” she says. “It’s my duty to preserve it and support what it stands for.”
I look at the tiny ivory dragon. It seems to stare at me, pleading with me to understand what it’s saying. I lift my eyes and take a hard look at Anna. “Who are you?” I ask.
She stares at the comb in her hand. “Years ago, my Korean grandmother gave me this comb and told me that I am a direct descendant of Queen Min,” she says. “It explained the spirits I’d struggled with since I was young. It was the queen’s spirit inside me. So I’m at State to work for America. But I am a child of Korea, too. I love both of my countries, the one that gave me life and the one that gave me a family. I want to help them both.”
I nod and then motion toward the door. “What do I tell them about you?”
She grins. “If you tell them about my involvement here, I’ll go underground. If you don’t, I stay in my job at State. Either way, I’ll be fine.”
She slips the comb in her pocket and stands. She extends a hand and I shake it. “Good luck, Anna Carlson,” I say.
“Good bye, Nate Simon,” she replies. Then she turns and disappears into the room’s blackness.
It’s another fifteen-hour flight back to DC. Second one in four days. The plane hasn’t even taken off and I’m exhausted. It was a grind when the marines, CIA, police, and God knows who else grilled me all night about my little affair. “They were Koreans. They wanted to give me their take on what we should do with their country.” I told them the truth. Well, mostly. I didn’t tell them about Anna.
Then there was the meeting with the CIA about the comb. I said the Koreans took the comb from me. Turns out, those guys had it all wrong anyway. Thought the dragon and the words “One Korea” were a message from the North that they’re willing to go to war for control of the entire peninsula. I didn’t tell them I knew what it really meant.
The airplane points down the runway, and they hit the throttle. The engines roar to life, and we rumble into the air. Soon we’re flying high over Seoul. I look down at the Miracle on the Han River. Hundreds of apartment buildings, thousands of cars and trucks and buses, and millions of people. I feel their spirit. They are Korea, a divided people yearning to be at peace, yearning to be one nation. One Korea, just like Anna said.
Anna. Damn, that woman has guts. I’d shown up at the embassy the next morning and there she was wearing a smart black suit and her hair up like nothing ever happened. She nodded a greeting at me and didn’t say another word for the rest of my time there. When I snuck a look at her in our meetings, I couldn’t believe what she’d done. She has what I used to have, what Jin-ee still has. Conviction, courage, passion. I did the right thing by not giving her up.
The jet hums softly and the cabin is quiet. We turn east and head out over the Sea of Japan. The sky in front of the airplane is dark. Fifteen hours. By chance, Derek the flight attendant is on this flight, too. I grab him and ask for some coffee. As he goes off to get it, I take my briefcase from under the seat. I open it and take out the report I’ve started. The damn report. Only a handful of people get to give reports to the secretary of state and president. Still not exactly sure how I’ll color it. I certainly don’t know what my final recommendations will be. But the more I work on it, the more Queen Min’s spirit pushes its way into it. I think about Anna’s question: Did she fail? I think maybe the queen didn’t fail and something about that needs to go into my report. I vow to read more about Korea’s last queen when I get back. I’ll also read the WikiLeaks documents that Anna talked about. Have to do it on the q.t.; the big brass doesn’t like it when guys like me know too much.
I chuckle to myself. What a rebel I am, secretly reading leaked government documents. I feel like when I was in college with Jin-ee, all upset about this or that. Oh, yeah, Jin-ee. She’ll want to read the WikiLeaks reports, too. We’ll do it together, at the kitchen table. We’ll read the especially shocking passages aloud to each other. “Our country is better than this,” we’ll declare. Then we’ll find a protest group or something to express our rage. We’ll take the kids with us, show them what’s important in life. Hell, State will probably fire me for it. Then we can show the kids how to really change the world. I’m excited just thinking about it.
I can’t wait to tell Jin-ee.
OCTOBER 8, 1895
They had planned it for when the moon was new and the night was deep. Twenty men crouched in the shadows outside a rear gate of Gyeongbok Palace. They were dressed in black with scarves covering their heads and faces. Only their eyes were uncovered. They moved silently as one. They approached two guards at the gate. One guard slouched against the wall, asleep. Days earlier, the other had sold his loyalty to them for fifty yang.
As they approached, the men in black drew swords and pistols from underneath their garments. One went to the sleeping guard and slit his throat before he could make a sound. The other guard looked uneasily at his partner gushing blood at his feet. One of the twenty—short with intense eyes—gave him a pouch containing fifty yang. The guard looked first at the pouch, then at the man in black. “Open the gate,” the man demanded. The guard unlocked the gate and cracked it open just wide enough for one man.
One by one, the twenty slipped through the gate. They were at the edge of a courtyard surrounded by many buildings and lined with persimmon trees.
“Who’s there?” shouted someone from the other side of the courtyard. “Guards, report!”
The short man in black gathered his men. “The fox is three buildings in,” he whispered. “Half of you to the right, half to the left. Go now, for the glory of Japan!”
A bell rang out, and palace guards spilled into the courtyard with swords and pistols drawn. They looked around. They spotted the intruders and attacked.
The bell’s toll woke her from her sleep as she lay in her bed. When she heard the shouts and swords clash, she sat up and wrapped the covers around her as if they would somehow protect her. Outside, there was a pistol shot, then another. Men shouted out.
They have finally come. All of her efforts to prevent this day had been in vain. Could she have prevented it if she’d had more time, if she’d had more skills? Had she failed?
The shouting drew near. A woman’s scream was cut short. “That’s not her,” a voice said in Japanese.
“Over here!” another one shouted.
Her lady’s maid rushed into her bedchamber. “Majesty, you must run!” the lady’s maid cried.
“It is too late for me,” she said. “Save yourself.”
“I will not! I will tell them that I am the one they want.”
The lady’s maid ran to the chest next to the queen’s bed, and took the queen’s medallion. She stood at the door.
The head of the palace guard came running from his quarters. He clutched his sword. Two of his men were with him. “General,” one said, “they are going for the queen!” When they got to the queen’s quarters, there were men dressed in black at the door. The three guards threw themselves on the men. A shot rang out, and one guard collapsed to the ground. Wit
h a sweep of his sword, the other guard killed a man in black. Two intruders jumped on the guard and quickly sent him to the ground. His blood ran onto the cobblestones.
The general lunged with his sword and killed two intruders before they could face him. Another shot the general in the chest. Blood oozed into his white shirt and ran down his torso. At first the shot stunned the general, but then he set his square jaw and charged. He plunged his sword into the shooter, killing him. Others jumped on the general and delivered stabs and blows that would have killed any other man. Covered in blood, the general swung his sword wildly, and the men in black fell back.
“Step away,” a voice said from behind. The men in black stepped aside and there in front of the general, was the short man holding a pistol. Breathing hard and spilling blood on the ground, the general looked into the man’s eyes. He had seen them before.
“You are brave, Kyung-jik,” the short man said. “But you cannot save her.” The man raised his pistol and shot the general between the eyes. The general dropped his sword to the ground with a clang and fell dead onto the cobblestones.
They were just outside. She pushed the bedcovers off and folded her legs underneath her. She rested her hands on her knees and opened her palms toward the ceiling. She leveled her chin and closed her eyes. Her black hair fell down her back. She forced herself to breathe slowly.
She was overwhelmed with sadness as a thousand years of history swept over her. She could not bend its long arc. She had not made a difference. A tear ran down her cheek as she said a prayer for her people.
The door swung open and men clutching swords rushed in. Her lady’s maid stood in front of them. “I am the one you have come for!” she screamed. “See? I wear the queen’s medallion.” She thrust out her hand to show them the medallion.
The short one came forward. He reached up and slowly took off his scarf exposing his face. His hair and long mustache were completely gray now, but his eyes were focused and sharp. On top of his head, he wore a topknot. The lady’s maid’s eyes went wide. “Mister Euno!” she gasped. The short one motioned to another. “Kill her,” he said. The other intruder thrust his sword into the lady’s maid’s throat. She uttered no sound as she collapsed to the floor.
The assassins stood in the room with their swords drawn, staring at the woman dressed in white and kneeling on the bed before them. She sat the way he had taught her a lifetime earlier. Her eyes were closed. Her lips moved in a silent prayer. Tears ran down her cheeks.
Mister Euno went to her. He took a moment to admire her beauty. He saw that she held her shoulders down and back, and her head level and straight. Her arms gracefully curled down to rest on top of her legs. “Perfect,” he whispered. And then he plunged his sword into her heart.
The room is suddenly bright, the air is suddenly warm. She hears no more shouting or gunfire. She is weightless and rises above her bed, floating like the red-crowned cranes above the Han River. She wears the robe with one hundred fifty-six pairs of pheasants in the chima and thirty gold dragons in the hem. She wears the ebony wig from her wedding day. In her hand is the comb with the two-headed dragon. Her face is dusted and her lips are painted red. Tucked in her arm is Songs of Dragons Flying to Heaven.
There are many people in the room. She sees her mother and father as they were when she was young. She sees her uncle and aunt. All four smile at her and nod their approval. She sees her lady’s maid, Han-sook, and her guard, Kyung-jik. They bow to her respectfully. She sees Woo-jin, the blind potter, at his wheel turning a pot out of clay. She sees her sons, the one that died and the one that lived. They are happy, mischievous boys splashing in the pond, trying to catch koi fish. She sees her husband. He is dressed in his finest king’s regalia and sits high and proud on his throne. He looks at her lovingly.
She floats outside her bedchamber high above the palace. She sees the gray granite mountains and the white foam seashores. She sees the terraced rice paddies, the villages in valleys, and the cities in the flats. She sees the Han River from its source high in the Taebaek Mountains to where it spills into the Yellow Sea. She sees children flying kites, the elderly and the newly married. She sees the yangban, sangmin, chungin, and former slaves. She sees soldiers and merchants, scholars, Buddhist monks, potters, farmers, women in the paddies harvesting rice, miners in the north, fishermen in the south. She sees young women in schools. They all reach for her as she flies and they chant, “One Korea! One Korea!”
She looks back to the Three Kingdoms of Baekje, Silla, and Goguryeo, and to Tan’gun, the father of Korea. She nods to the great Emperor Taejo of Chosŏn. All the kings and queens who came before her are there. They, too, are chanting, “One Korea! One Korea!”
She looks forward to her children’s children and all of Korea’s future children. She sees great cities with millions of electric lights and swift carriages made from iron, and buildings as tall as mountains, and giant steel birds carrying people inside. She sees armies of nations with terrible weapons facing each other at a line that divides her country. She sees that her people are afraid. Some are bent under the tyranny of foreign nations. Some are bent under the tyranny of one man. They cry to her, “Why are we not free? Why are we not one?”
She embraces them all, back to the Three Kingdoms and forward through the generations to come. She is the link. She is the one mind. She is the breath. She is where north meets south, east comes to west, and heaven joins the earth. She is the axis mundi. She is the mountains and the sea and the great cities. She is the Han River. She is both the tiger and the crane. She is the then, she is the now, and she is what will be. She is one, and she is all.
And as she soars high above her country in her queen’s regalia, she cries out, “Hear me! I am the Dragon Queen! I am the spirit of One Korea!”
AUTHOR’S NOTE
THE “ONE KOREA” DREAM
In a windowless hotel meeting room in northern South Korea, twenty South Korean families sit quietly waiting to meet their loved ones from the North. The men wear dark suits and have fresh haircuts. The women wear unpretentious dresses that the authorities told them to wear. The children at their sides are on their very best behavior. The families have with them small, inexpensive gifts that the armed soldiers who watch their every move have carefully inspected.
These people are here because the allied victory over Japan in World War II separated thousands of families just like theirs. When Japan surrendered after a brutal thirty-five-year occupation of Korea, what to do about the peninsula was little more than an afterthought. It was left to two young American officers, who proposed that the Russians occupy the peninsula above the 38th parallel and the Americans occupy the land to the south. The Russians agreed and, as the Americans were mopping up in Japan, the Russian Army marched into Korea and stopped at the 38th parallel. Weeks later, the Americans hastily sent troops to the south and Korea has been divided ever since.
Immediately after World War II, negotiations between the US and Russia failed to unify the peninsula under one government, neither side willing to compromise their political ideology. The result was the Korean War fought between Russia/China/North Korea and America/UN forces/South Korea that killed 1 million combatants and 2.5 million Korean civilians. It ended in a stalemate with the exact same division at the 38th parallel. Then Korea became a front line in the Cold War between the US, the Soviet Union, and China. And while the Cold War supposedly ended with the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, the world is still fighting over Korea. In fact, a sign at US Camp Bonifas one mile from the 38th parallel proclaims that the Korean Demilitarized Zone is “The Most Dangerous Place on Earth.”
In a 2014 survey by Seoul National University, 70 percent of South Koreans said they were in favor of reunification. (Because North Korea is a closed nation, their opinions are impossible to determine.) However, they are concerned about the enormous financial burden it would place on their country. The 2014 World Factbook estimates that GDP per capita in South Korea is twenty times hig
her than in North Korea. By comparison, West Germany’s per capita GDP was only three times higher than East Germany’s and reunification there has cost Germany an estimated two trillion euros and counting. Experts agree that the only way Korean reunification can succeed is through the cooperation and financial assistance of the US, Russia, China, and Japan—countries that haven’t agreed on much of anything since World War II. Korean reunification remains the world’s greatest political conundrum.
Even so, Queen Min’s dream of an independent and free “One Korea” is a goal of both North and South Korea. In June 2000, the two governments adopted a five-point joint reunification declaration.
The South and the North have agreed to resolve the question of reunification independently and through the joint efforts of the Korean people, who are the masters of the country.
For the achievement of reunification, we have agreed that there is a common element in the South’s concept of a confederation and the North’s formula for a loose form of federation. The South and the North agree to promote reunification in that direction.
The South and the North have agreed to promptly resolve humanitarian issues such as exchange visits by separated family members and relatives on the occasion of the August 15 National Liberation Day and the question of unswerving Communists serving prison sentences in the South.
The South and the North have agreed to consolidate mutual trust by promoting balanced development of the national economy through economic cooperation and by stimulating cooperation and exchanges in civic, cultural, sports, health, environmental, and all other fields.
The South and the North have agreed to hold a dialogue between relevant authorities in the near future to implement the above agreements expeditiously.
The Dragon Queen Page 29