Chapter Text
“ Mama !” Jungkook feels the touch to his shoulder even through the thick fog of his sleep, his body bunching so as to escape the intrusion. “ Mama !”
He blinks his eyes open, still sticky from tears and fatigue, his body aching in all the right places. “What?”
“You have guests Mama .”
Jungkook sits up, his feverish mind trying to make sense of the words just spoken to him. He flushes when he notices the palace maid averting her eyes, her cheeks a burning red no doubt upon seeing the bruises across his neck and his chest and his thighs. He tightens his robe, grabbing the larger jacket tossed beside his pillow and wrapping himself in it.
“Who is it?”
“Your brother, Mama .” She bows low. “He is requesting an audience along with-”
Jungkook is out of the bed before she can finish the sentence, uncaring for his ruined appearance. He bursts out of the door into the outer chamber, his heart heavy in his mouth, his eyes disbelieving. He’s right there, hands clasped behind his back as he paces the room, jaw tight. He looks older than the last time Jungkook saw him though it could not be more than a few moons, his face sharper, body drawn.
Jungkook chokes back a sob, Jimin turning at the sound as he flings himself at him, his arms wrapping around him as tightly as he can. He feels Jimin’s strong arms clutching him back, his small face tucking into his neck, muttered words with no real meaning.
“Hyung,” Jungkook pulls away, pushing Jimin’s hair out of his face, unbelieving that he is really there. “Hyung, what are you doing here? When did you come?”
“Just this morning,” Jimin squeezes Jungkook’s hand. “I had to once I heard.”
Jungkook starts, his blood suddenly running cold, his mind an endless stream of possibilities. Heard what? When? There was no way word had spread so fast, had it?
“Why didn’t you come to me earlier?” He tries to keep his voice bare, free of hurt and accusation but they sit fat and bloated in his words, the truth too undeniable to ignore.
Jimin cannot meet his gaze, his fists clenching and unclenching by his side. “ Appa forbade it, said he had a plan to end all of this well, get you out of here safe.” He looks at Jungkook, his eyes flashing almost wild. “But after what we’ve discovered this morning-”
“ Mama , forgive me but I called for Jimin hyung to come to the palace.” Jungkook stills, turning to see Jihyuk standing on the other end of the room, a paper clutched in his hands. “I did not mean to intercept your messages but this was sent for you from the King in the early hours of the morning.”
Jungkook hesitates, there is something too ominous about the moment, something too final about the frayed piece of paper. His hands are unsteady when he takes it, his chest tight with discomfort. The writing is scrawled, illegible to him. But he does recognize two words he has seen far more than any others.
The first is his own name at the very top, Jungkook, in a hand he does not recognize.
The second is a signature at the bottom, Councillor Park’s signature.
He turns to Jimin, uncertain what to make of it, the anger on Jimin’s face more evident than ever before.
“I don’t understand.”
Jimin takes it from him, his hands shaking the slightest, his voice strained when he speaks. “Jungkook, this is a letter from my father to the Namsadang written at the time of your birth.” Jungkook shifts, a strange panic beginning to build within his chest, a sickness he cannot quite choke down. “It is an agreement that they are to raise you till you enter manhood after which he will come to collect you. And take you to his home.”
He can barely understand the words, the world around him slow and sibilant, Jimin’s voice ringing distantly through his ears. The tips of his fingers feel numb, his throat parched, the fog in his mind too heavy to see through.
“So he selected me at birth?” Jungkook says the words slowly, each more weighted than the one before. “He-he chose me for this at birth?”
Jimin’s face crumples, tears like raindrops running down his cheeks but he shakes his head, his hands finding Jungkook’s and pulling him close. “No Jungkook, he didn't select you. He gave you to them, for training. You’re his son, born out of marriage. You’re my brother, the youngest member of the Park family.”
Jungkook does not move. There is nothing, no pain no sadness no hurt, just the far too heavy thump of his heart against his ribcage. He feels it like a guillotine, each beat separating him from himself, it beats and it beats and when he looks up there is nothing around him, only desert. He cannot think, his thoughts scattered about him in fractured chunks, no pattern to help rejoin them.
“Why-why-” he fumbles to speak, grasping blindly for Jimin as he tries to steady himself. “Why would-how- where-where did this come from?”
“The King had it sent Mama ,” Jihyuk’s voice is gentle, a little too careful. “He must have been keeping you here with this knowledge. A final act of humiliation against his greatest enemy.”
“W-why not just kill me then, why wait till now?” Jungkook’s breathing is stunted though still he feels nothing, just the vastness of his own loneliness.
“I suppose he was waiting to sleep with you, Mama ,” Jihyuk says quietly. “So that he could take everything from Councillor Park.”
“What?” Jimin looks at him sharply, his grasp on his arm suddenly painful. “You slept with him?”
“I-I-How do you-you,” Jungkook blinks rapidly, his mind clouding with shame, his body seeking to turn in on itself but held still by Jimin’s grasp. “How-”
“You weren’t exactly quiet last night, Jungkook,” Jihyuk offers him a consoling smile. “I fear the entire palace knows.”
“I don’t understand, I don’t,” Jungkook runs a trembling hand through his hair, “what am I supposed to do?”
“Why would you sleep with him, Jungkook? Do you not know what that man has done to our famil-”
“Your family,” Jungkook says sharply, his voice much harder than it should be but somehow steadier too. “Yours, hyung.”
Jimin stares at him a moment too long before he nods, his grip on Jungkook softening as he moves closer. “We’re going to get you out of here, okay?” he says quietly, his voice barely audible. “ Appa , the King, they’re both just using you. We’re going to get you out of here.”
Leave. Jungkook’s wanted nothing more since he got to the palace, or so he’s told himself every single day. He’s said it again and again and again till it started to feel like the truth, till it blotted out the only thing he wanted even more. Something that makes him sick to the bone to even think of now. There’s a hundred things he could say but none of them seem real enough to warrant speech anymore, so instead he simply nods, his eyes suddenly strained with a threat of tears.
“I can’t be seen here but I’ll wait for you by the West gate tonight. Jihyuk will bring you to me, alright?” Jimin cups his face, turning it to look at him. “Jungkook, promise me you’ll meet me tonight.”
Jungkook nods again, numb and cold, the winter outside more under his skin than upon it.
“Yes,” he says softly. “Get me away from here.”
There is nothing to be done but wait, Jungkook unaware of time or hunger or thirst. He simply sits and stares, his body numb and limp, the palace maids exchanging words with him every now and again though he cannot confess to hearing a single one. Within his skin is a sickness, one that grows larger and larger, a poison he was naive enough to drink that now blackens veins and blood alike. He sits immobile trapped between two betrayals, both bitter enough that he fears he will never recognize sweetness again. On one side lies a family that after abandoning him reclaimed him only to lay him to ruin on a pyre of treachery. On the other a demon lover with kisses of sin and promises of fidelity too sweet to be true. And they weren’t true, so perhaps Jungkook is the fool in this story after all.
He is drawn a scented bath at some point, hair knotted and fitted into his wash clothes. He barely registers till he is submerged in water too hot for human skin, just his neck and shoulders above surface. There are still a few hours till nightfall, still a few hours till he will be gone for good, this entire chapter in his life a nightmare he will do his best to forget.
Still there is a pain that sits within that understanding, something raw and bleeding that burns with rage or loss he cannot tell. Something so fractured it has lost all shape, Jungkook unable to join it together to understand what it is meant to be. He shuts his eyes, letting his head fall back against the rim, letting the anguish within him blossom with fuller petals. He curses himself just as the gods must have the day he was born, up until just the night before he had so little to lose.
Jungkook stirs when the water is disturbed, his body sluggish from the heady scent of oils mixed in the water, the feel of flowers against his skin. His eyes fly open with a soft gasp when there are hands on his waist, lips against the side of his face, a thigh pushed between his legs.
“Hush, little one,” Yoongi murmurs, running his fingers in soothing circles along Jungkook’s inner thigh. “It is just me.”
Jungkook stares ahead of himself dead to the world, a small fragile voice within him calling even now to Yoongi, calling for safety. But Jungkook steps on it, crushes it beneath his heel, his mind as cold as his barely beating heart.
“Why are you here?”
Yoongi stills, raising his head from Jungkook’s neck to look at him. He seems to know from the change in his face, the hardening of planes and lines till he is no longer the man Jungkook knows now too intimately, he is now just a King without a crown.
“May I not be?”
His hold does not release, his weight against Jungkook not moving, heavy and watchful, hair unbound floating behind him almost serpentine.
“Have you not already taken what you wanted?”
Yoongi’s hands tighten, his nails drawing blood, Jungkook bites back the small grunt of pain that rises to his lips unbidden. “Have I taken from you then?”
“You tell me, Jeonha .” Jungkook shifts, Yoongi’s grip not relaxing, his jaw set too tight. “You have won. I have lost. What more do you seek?”
“An understanding of your words, to begin with.” Yoongi says evenly though the threat in his voice is evident. It does not scare Jungkook, he has bite too.
“You used me,” Jungkook says, and there is too much emotion in his voice but he no longer cares, the anger within him suddenly baring its teeth, snapping them white in the darkened room. “You knew all along but you didn’t tell me till I gave you everything. Everything!” He pushes at Yoongi viciously but Yoongi catches his hands, Jungkook’s back to the tub making it easy for him to pin him down.
“I have told you nothing, Jungkook, I know not of what you speak” Yoongi leans down over him, his gaze searching his face for answers.
“You knew he was my father. Deny it, deny it I dare you,” Jungkook spits, trying desperately to stop the angry tears that form in his lashes. “You knew and you had that wretched contract sent to me.”
Yoongi does not move, his knowledge only betrayed by the paling of his skin, his grasp at last easing. He makes to speak but instead inhales unsteadily, his words “What contract do you speak of?”
“Tell me you didn’t know,” Jungkook’s hands fist weakly in the front of Yoongi’s wash clothes. “Lie to me.”
There is something new in Yoongi’s voice, something vulnerable. “I knew,” he says softly, “but if you believe I would ever pass that knowledge to you to hurt you then you may kill me now. If I remain in your mind the monster you’ve been bred to think I am then finish what you came here for.”
“You lied to me,” Jungkook whispers. “You lied to me, you kept me here, you seduced me, for what? Some power play you have against Councillor Park? Some ultimate act of humiliation for his family.”
Yoongi draws away from him, his eyes flashing with a kind of madness Jungkook hasn’t seen before, his face morphed almost terrifying. “You think I do not know what it is to crave family? To crave belonging?”
“What would you know you were born choking on silver spoons!” Jungkook is heaving by now, his body feverish with anger. “You think I haven’t heard the stories, I know exactly what kind of a man you are, Min Yoongi. Knowing you is a curse, being with you is a curse, loving you is a curs-”
Yoongi grabs him so roughly by the jaw Jungkook chokes, his other hand wrapping firmly around his throat slamming him back against the rim of the bath. His grip is tight but not pressing, Jungkook’s breathing laboured beneath him but he doesn’t fight back. He cannot muster in him a care to live.
“It is power you want, I will give you power.” Yoongi’s voice is barren of all emotion, his breath burning against Jungkook’s face. “You think I don’t understand family? Loss? Want ?” His nails scratch into Jungkook’s cheek and he inhales sharply. “You claim I have taken from you and left you with nothing? You want the power to unmake me the way your father has whored you out to do? Very well, take it.” His thumb strokes across Jungkook’s cheek, brushing over his lips, tugging at the lower one. “My mother was Min Sang, the head concubine of my father’s court. The day I was born was the night the Queen died, leaving an heirless Kingdom in her wake. I was snatched from my mother moments after labour and it was declared the Queen died in childbirth, my entire reign is a lie. I am as much a bastard as you are.” Jungkook stares at him, eyes wide, heart thumping frantically in his chest. He feels the weight of the words he has just heard, a guillotine too heavy against his neck, too sharp.
“T-that can’t be,” Jungkook whispers, his own voice seeming small and distant to him. “It can’t-”
Yoongi leans forward and Jungkook chokes softly when he feels his tongue inside his mouth, his lips slow but devouring. It is not a kiss, it is something more, something bitter. It is a goodbye.
“Go tell them, take your place as saviour of this fallen Kingdom. Make of it what you will, as you will,” Yoongi whispers, his eyes roving every inch of Jungkook’s face as though memorising it. “But it is the last thing you will ever get from me. I suppose I was wishful to believe something so beautiful and cruel could ever feel anything but repulsion for a maimed beast.” He releases him, the action gentle despite the hardness of his face, a hymn of mourning in his words. “Goodbye, Jungkook.”
When Jungkook runs he does not look back.
Jihyuk has kept his promise, being at Jungkook’s door as soon as moonlight reflected off his window. Getting out is easier then he would have expected, the doors never heavily watched, the guards being used to Jungkook’s nightly ramblings. It is the border of the palace that is to be broken, yet this time Jungkook knows Jimin is waiting for him. Jimin is waiting for him but he can still taste Yoongi on his tongue.
They are well towards the outskirts of the palace boundaries by now, the night so dark Jungkook can barely see much ahead of him, behind the palace lights still blink sleepy though distant. He realizes Jihyuk is coming to a halt, slowing down before him.
And then he sees them. Two hooded figures waiting, one slightly taller the other lither. Jimin must have brought Taehyung as well, the knowing is too sweet, something painfully like love at the back of Jungkook’s throat.
Except the figure is a little too tall to be Taehyung, the other too hunched to be Jimin. Jungkook comes to a stop, his eyes wandering the periphery to find his brother, a certain kick of uncertainty making its way to the front of his mind.
“Come Mama ,” Jihyuk’s hand is at the small of his back guiding him forward. “We must not dally.”
Jungkook is not as surprised as he should be when he feels the touch replaced with one of steel, the two men in front of him drawing long swords as well.
“Come,” Jihyuk is smiling he can tell, his voice so close to his ear. “We’ve all been waiting quite long haven’t we?”
“You brought the contract,” Jungkook says softly. “From the Councillor.”
“No, had we had an ace to play like that we’d have done it a long time ago.” He digs the blade sharply into Jungkook’s back, kicking at his calf. “On your knees. But as providence would have it a handsome young man has been trying to find audience with you for the last few weeks but as the Queen’s counsel I was sure to intercept him each time.”
“You are no such thing,” Jungkook says, thoughts racing to match a face to the stranger.
“He got so frustrated with all your denials to see him he finally asked I relay that document to you and let you know an old friend wanted to speak with you.” Jungkook whips around but his arms are caught roughly from the back, a hand on his head shoving him down to his knees even as he struggles.
“If you wanted to kill me there were simpler means.” Jungkook says, a small voice within him asking if Jimin could have possibly known about this. A small part of him already resigned.
“You really are as stupid as you seem,” Jihyuk sighs, a small chuckle of amusement. “ Your death in here is just a little casualty in our plan to kill the King, isn’t it evident?”
Jungkook’s head snaps up, a flame white and hot and possessive licking up his insides, his mind suddenly clouded with an alien fear. “What?”
“You didn’t think the plan had changed did you, just because you were too weak to see it through? Councillor Park is a careful man, Jungkook, you are so lucky to be born off him.” Jihyuk presses the tip of his sword against his chest, Jungkook inhaling sharply at the biting pain. “And who better to pin the whole affair on than a hysterical traitor already detested by the entire Kingdom.” Jihyuk smiles, a look so pathetic Jungkook looks away. “Your father said to wait for the right time but when I saw we could add betrayed lover to the narrative I knew it was too perfect to pass on.”
“You can’t kill him,” Jungkook says softly. “He’s stronger than all of you.”
“Yes, Jungkook, yes. But more than half the court is on our side, the force that is entering that palace to silence him is immense. And anyway, he suffers from a broken heart,” Jihyuk smiles tightly. “You don’t see it, do you? I’ve been at court many years and never seen our young King so taken. And love makes you weak.”
Jungkook tries not to let the words impact him, tries to fan down the flames of panic alighting high in his stomach. Yoongi doesn’t love him, he will not be weak. He scrambles, for something, anything, any thoughts to ease the worry, to ease the feel of metal biting further and further into his skin.
“If Park didn’t have the documents and the King didn’t either,” he raises his head to look at Jihyuk, gasping harshly as the blade finally breaks skin. “Who gave it to you?”
“I did.”
The hands holding Jungkook’s arms behind his back are wrenched away, the clean sound of a sword, two strokes, two bodies engaged. Jungkook grabs the blade that cuts into him with his bare hands, falling backwards to take it with him. Jihyuk stumbles, crashing down onto him, wrestling to win back possession of the sword. Jungkook hooks a leg around him, flipping them over even as the blade draws blood from both his hands, Jihyuk blindly pushes to run it through him. Out of the corner of his eye he sees the first body fall, the second lunging with a drawn weapon towards his mysterious helper. It is a momentary distraction but it is too long.
For a moment it is as though the world is upside down, the pain so hot so wanton Jungkook isn’t sure it is real at all. He looks down to see that Jihyuk has missed, a flesh wound though it is deep enough that it burns with a vengeance all its own. He grabs the blade again, wrenching it loose from his side and slamming his elbow across Jihyuk’s face at the same time. Jihyuk’s grip slips as he grunts in pain, Jungkook turning the sword around and burying it into the collar of his hanbok and down into the earth, pinning him in place. He smashes his elbow across his head once again to make sure he has lost consciousness for good before sliding off him, his body trembling all over with pain.
“Are you alright?” The voice in his ear is familiar, the hands known. “Jungkook-ah, look at hyung, can you hear me?”
Jungkook turns his gaze, certain he is heady from his wound, the face before him entirely unreal. “Hyung,” he chokes out, reaching out bloody fingers to try and touch. “Hyung how did you-”
“I’ve been trying to reach you for weeks,” Hoseok pushes back his hair carefully, takes his hand to press a gentle kiss to the back of his palm. “I’ve been waiting here hoping you’ll come see me.”
“Hyung, I didn’t know, he never told me-”
“It’s alright my darling, it’s okay everything is okay now.” He hesitates, the creases in his face too prominent. He looks fatigued, more worn. “I needed you to know what kind of a man your father was, I should have told you a long time ago, forgive me.”
“There is nothing to forgive that man is not my father,” Jungkook gets to his feet, the pain in his body bold and demanding but he doesn’t care, he can’t slow down. Not now.
“Come with me,” Hoseok says, his hand outstretched. “Your brother went the other way looking for you, we’ll get you out of here and then I’ll take you home. With me, where you belong. Where you’re loved.”
Jungkook has imagined many endings for himself over the years since he left the Namsadang. Most involved loneliness, some mundanity, some violence of the kind that would wake him deep into the night, his body covered in sweat, heart pounding. But every now and again he would let himself imagine a different ending, one that ended in the arms he grew up in, in the hands that first taught him care, every now and again he would imagine he was back with the first person that loved him. And he never craved anything more.
Until right now.
“I can’t hyung,” Jungkook whispers, a step already turning back. “I can’t come with you.”
Hoseok squints, uncertain, his hand flexing as though wondering whether to reach out and hold. “I spoke with Jimin-ah, we will arrange it together. Jungkook there is nothing but death for you here-”
“No,” Jungkook shakes his head, bending down to pick up one of the discarded swords. “No I have to stay, hyung. Find Jimin hyung and bring him to the palace. We have to stop them, there is a coup to overthrow our King and we need to put an end to it.” He turns, his steps picking up. “I have to save my King.”
…..
The throne room smells like blood, metallic and sour.
The corpses that strewn the floor are already beginning to rot though their bodies remain warm from battle. Yoongi walks the length, both his swords dragging after him, making it cleave the wooden ground into pieces.
It had been both sudden and expected, the onslaught, the attackers lying in wait for him to sleep. But Yoongi had known no sleep, not this night, and something about the bitterness of the moment made his need for blood so much stronger.
He sits now, heavy and waiting, the entire palace awake and milling around, scurrying to put decaying corpses to the pyre. Some tend to wounded soldiers, others to righting the palace’s upset state, but Yoongi sits, quiet, waiting.
“No word yet, Jeonha ,” Namjoon’s brow is kissed with sweat, the worry creasing his forehead far too evident. “No one has seen him or heard from him. Perhaps he made to leave before it all.”
“Perhaps,” Yoongi echoes back. “But he wouldn’t have been able to get off the palace grounds without being seen. He is somewhere, find him.”
Namjoon hesitates a moment as though there is more he wants to say, more he needs to say. But he bites back his tongue, bowing deeply and slipping from the room.
Yoongi shuts his eyes, letting his head fall back against his throne. He would leave himself to look but his movement would cause too much of a disturbance, his arrival bringing more harm than safety. It should have been obvious to him, in many ways it was. Yet he spoke from pain anyway and chased the little bird from his home. His chest clenches painfully, whoever gave Jungkook that cursed page could not have meant him well. He is so trusting even with his fangs bared, so gentle. And Yoongi has turned him out into the world, unprotected and unguarded. His fists clench on the arms of the throne. If anything were to happen to him he wouldn’t rest until-
“I’ve been looking for you.”
The fingers against his cheek are warm to the touch, singeing like embers against his skin, his scent achingly familiar. Yoongi breathes him in, muscles unclenching at the proximity, something fragile within his chest beginning to beat again. He reaches out, one hand curling around an offered wrist, the other around his narrow waist as he pulls him close.
“Was my bride worried for me?” He rasps, turning his head to kiss the fingertips, to bask in the feeling of holding him.
“Yes,” it is said softly, the hand slipping from his grasp as both arms link around his neck. “Yes.”
Yoongi coos softly, the break in Jungkook’s voice moving him to action, pulling him uncaring for who may be watching onto his lap. He hugs him close, closer, closer still, his heart thumping a song it has only recently learnt within his chest. Yoongi hums quietly, running his hand down along his waist, along his back. Jungkook flinches, a sharp inhale of pain.
“You’re hurt,” Yoongi says, his voice calm though dangerous, his hand already moving to his sword. “Who hurt you?”
“It doesn’t matter anymore, my brother is looking after it.” Jungkook says, his words quiet, the pain laced in his voice a touch desperate. “Don’t leave me.”
“Never,” Yoongi mutters back. “Never.”
“They said I had weakened you,” Jungkook whispers against his neck, a foreign wetness against his skin, “that I had broken your heart and it would weaken you.” He pulls away, eyes wet, hands grasping at Yoongi’s robes. Yoongi stills when he sees the cuts to his cheeks, the wildness to his hair. “But I see they were wrong.”
“It would have, possibly. But my heart remained as one.” Yoongi admits softly, reaching out a hand pushing back his hair, running his thumb under his eyes to clear the tears. “I have never told you this but there was this boy, I’d seen him years ago.” Jungkook shuts his eyes, his jaw clenching as though the words unbearable, his grip tightening further. “We didn’t speak but I saw him, suspended in the sky, one with the clouds. He stood in front of the sun, more luminous, more beautiful than anything I’d ever seen before, and he was fearless.” Jungkook gasps softly when Yoongi presses his lips to the underside of his jaw, a sob of disbelief escaping his lips, gaze fevered as it meets Yoongi’s. “And this day though he fled, that boy told me he loved me, though it be but a curse.”
Jungkook’s hand clutches in his hair, his lips hot and insistent when they find Yoongi’s. Yoongi holds his fast, holds him steady, holds him safe.
“I will not stop you should you choose to leave, Jungkook,” Yoongi hesitates, the confession painful though necessary. “This night has been cruel but the one’s ahead are even more so. I could deliver you to safety if you do not wish to stay.”
“I shall remain cursed forever, Min Yoongi.” Jungkook murmurs into his mouth, his lashes thick with tears, undeterred by his cautions. “I shall remain your sun forever.”
“Then I shall keep you aflame, see that your fire never ebbs, even if I have to ignite it with mine.” Yoongi tugs gentle at Jungkook’s hair, grazes his teeth along his neck, the emotion within his chest too large, too feral. “I shall keep you burning.”
“ Jeonha ,” Jungkook whispers, between kisses, between heartbeats, his body already heated, already moving. “Yoongi.”
“Come little dove, let’s get you stitched up.” Jungkook moves painfully as Yoongi shifts him off his lap, lifts him to his feet. “I’ll call the healers.”
“Will you sit with me,” Jungkook asks, his voice wavering, his body weak even as he makes to move.
“Where else would I be but at your side?” Yoongi turns, lifts his chin to kiss at the corner of his mouth. “Where would I be but seeking your light.”
Jungkook reaches for his hand, their fingers intertwining, his gait too heavy against him. But Yoongi doesn’t care, doesn’t mind, he would hold him up till his body gave way, till his lungs could no longer draw air. He existed in answer to him now, bleeding blue from within, never to be whole if torn from him again. And finally, he knows warmth.