Chapter Text
Hours later, back in your chambers, you couldn't sit still.
The oath was still fresh on your skin, the weight of it pressing down like a physical thing. Your hands trembled as you moved through your rooms, unable to think of anything but the four of you standing together in the forgotten archives, swearing treason with your palms pressed against parchment that would either liberate you or see you all executed.
The adrenaline was still pumping through your veins, electric and relentless.
Your ladies had lingered longer than usual, fussing over your appearance after the evening's events, but you managed to dismiss them.
They'd protested weakly, Elara especially, insisting she should at least help you bathe, but you'd been firm.
You needed solitude.
You needed silence.
You needed him.
The bathing chamber was your sanctuary, a space carved from pale rose-veined marble that gleamed like silk in the candlelight. The sunken pool stretched nearly fifteen feet across, deep enough to submerge yourself completely, with a wide ledge running along one side just beneath the water's surface. Steam rose from the water in thick, billowing clouds, carrying the scent of rose oil and lavender.
You sank into the heat with a sigh, letting the scalding water seep into muscles that had been wound tight for days. The conspiracy was moving forward, Yeosang had the decree, San had positioned his legions, Wooyoung would steal the seal on New Year's Eve. Everything was falling into place.
But the waiting was agony.
You were so lost in the steam and your own thoughts that you didn't hear the scrape of stone against stone, the hidden panel behind the velvet curtain sliding open with practiced silence. By the time you realized you weren't alone, Wooyoung was already stepping into the chamber, his dark eyes finding you through the haze like a predator tracking prey.
"What are you..." you started, but he was already moving, stripping off his shirt with efficient, economical movements that made your breath catch.
"Couldn't stay away," he murmured, his trousers hitting the floor. "Needed to see you. Needed to touch you."
He descended the marble steps into the pool, the water sloshing as he moved toward you with deliberate intent. His cock was already half-hard, and the sight of him, naked, wet, moving through the steam like something out of a fever dream, made heat pool low in your belly.
"The guards..." you whispered, but he was already pulling you toward him, his hands gripping your waist.
He shook his head, settling onto the submerged ledge and pulling you into his lap. "We have time."
You straddled him slowly, your thighs bracketing his hips as you positioned yourself over him. He was leaned back against the deep slope of the pool, his legs splayed, his arms resting casually along the marble edges.
He looked like a king in his own right, lethargic, beautiful, and utterly lethal. His dark hair was soaked, clinging to his jaw, and his eyes were tracking every inch of your movement with a predatory focus that made your skin prickle.
"You look entirely too comfortable," you murmured, rolling your hips in a slow, deliberate circle that made the water slosh against the marble rim.
His lips curved into that infuriating smirk.
"And you look like you're trying to kill me."
"Maybe I am."
"Then I'll die happy."
You lifted yourself up and sank down onto him in one smooth motion, taking him completely. The stretch was immediate and overwhelming, and you both groaned at the sensation.
"Fuck," he breathed, his hands flying to your hips. "You feel incredible."
You began to move, slow, agonizingly deliberate rotations of your hips that made his fingers dig into your flesh. The water created resistance, made every movement feel heavier, more intentional. You could feel every ridge and vein of his cock as it dragged against your inner walls.
"Is this what you came here for?" you asked, your voice breathy as you rode him. "To interrupt my bath?"
“I came here,” he said, voice rough, eyes locked on yours, “because I couldn’t stop thinking about you like this… on me. Like you were made to undo me.”
Then, the heavy thud of a brass-tipped staff hit the door.
You froze, your breath hitching, a sharp gasp escaping your lips before you could bite it back.
Wooyoung didn't panic. He didn't even stiffen. He just reached up, his large, wet hands clamping firmly onto your waist, pinning you in place against him so you couldn't move, not that you wanted to. His thumbs dug into your hips, anchoring you to his heat, while his eyes flickered to the door and then back to your flushed face, his lips curling into a slow, wicked smirk.
"Your Highness?" Elara's voice drifted through the wood, calm and professional.
"The evening oils are here, and your sleeping silks are laid out. Shall I enter to assist with your hair?"
You leaned down, your hair falling around your faces like a curtain, and spoke against his lips, "Not now, Elara." Your voice was strained, dripping with fake, pained fatigue. "The fever has taken me. I cannot... be moved."
Beneath you, Wooyoung let out a low, vibrating hum of amusement, and the sensation of it, the vibration traveling through his chest, through his cock still buried deep inside you, made your thighs tremble. His smirk widened, and then, without warning, he rolled his hips up in a slow, deliberate thrust.
Your hand flew to your mouth, biting down on your knuckle to keep from crying out.
"Your Highness, shall I send for the physician?" Elara persisted, concern creeping into her voice.
Wooyoung did it again, slower this time, watching your expression like he was reading a secret he already knew.
"No," you managed, the word breaking in a way that sounded like pain, not the devastating pleasure currently tearing through you. "Leave me. I require only... rest."
There was a pause, agonizing, endless.
Wooyoung chose that exact moment to shift his angle slightly, hitting that spot inside you that made your vision blur. Your nails dug into his shoulders, your entire body trembling with the effort of staying quiet.
Then: "Rest well, Your Highness. I'll check on you in the morning."
The footsteps faded.
The moment they did, Wooyoung tightened his grip and drove up into you again, making you moan.
"You're a horrible liar, Princess," he rasped, his voice thick with satisfaction. "I could feel you shaking. For a second I wasn't sure if you'd hold it together."
"You didn't seem worried," you breathed, your heart still racing.
"Because I wasn't," he said, his thumb tracing your lower lip. "If she'd walked in and caught us like this? I would have been exactly where I wanted to be. And you would've had to explain why you were warming the court jester's cock."
"You're insane."
"For you? Absolutely."
You laughed breathlessly, and the sound made his eyes darken with something raw and possessive.
For a heartbeat, neither of you moved.
Then something in him snapped.
His hands clamped on your hips and he lifted you off him. Water sloshed violently as he turned you, pressed you face-first against the cool marble ledge. Your breasts flattened against stone. His hand shoved between your shoulder blades, pinning you.
"Stay," he rasped. Then he slid into you from behind.
The angle punched the air from your lungs. He was deeper, rougher, his hips crashing against your ass with enough force to send waves across the pool.
"Gods, look at you," he groaned, one hand sliding up your spine. "Taking me so well."
His fingers dug into your hips hard enough to bruise. He pulled you back onto his cock with every thrust, using you, claiming you, like he'd been starving for this and finally had permission to devour.
"Gods..." you gasped, but it dissolved into a broken moan.
"Touch yourself," he growled.
Your hand slipped beneath you and between your legs. The moment your fingers found your clit, your body clenched around him, and he cursed, his pace turning savage.
The orgasm ripped through you fast and brutal. You bit down on your arm to muffle the scream, your entire body shaking, and he didn't stop, didn't slow, just kept fucking you through it until you were gasping.
Then he pulled out.
You whimpered at the loss, but he didn’t give you time to recover.
Wooyoung was already shifting you, hands firm on your thighs as he guided you up onto the marble ledge. Water streamed off both of you as he settled back against the slope, reclined just enough to keep his head above the surface, eyes dark and wrecked as they tracked you.
“Need to taste you,” he muttered.
Then his grip tightened. “Come here.”
Before you could fully process it, he was pulling you forward, positioning you over him with deliberate certainty. Your hands braced against the cool stone as he angled you down.
The moment you lowered yourself, his mouth was on you.
It was immediate. Devastating.
His tongue worked you with a starving urgency, no patience, no restraint; licking, sucking, dipping into you like he was trying to memorize you from the inside out. His hands locked around your thighs, holding you open, keeping you exactly where he wanted you.
You gasped, your fingers flying into his hair.
“Oh gods…”
The sound broke out of you as he groaned against you, the vibration shooting straight through your body. He didn’t slow. Didn’t soften. Just kept going, dragging you closer and closer until your body started to tremble around him.
“Wooyoung…”
He hummed in response, and the sound alone was almost too much.
Then, just as your breath began to fracture, he shifted.
Not away. Never away.
Just repositioning.
His hands slid higher, guiding you with him as he adjusted his angle against the marble, pulling you into a fuller straddle over his face like it was the most natural thing in the world. The change was subtle but devastating, deeper, more intense, like he’d found exactly the way to ruin you properly.
“Like this,” he murmured, voice rough with satisfaction.
And then he was back on you with even less restraint.
His tongue worked faster now, relentless and precise, circling your clit with punishing attention before sucking it into his mouth. The sound you made was immediate, broken; your thighs tightening around his head as your balance slipped entirely.
He didn’t stop you from collapsing into it.
In fact, he held you there.
One hand firm on your hip, the other anchoring your thigh as he kept you right where he wanted you, devouring you like you were something he’d been starving for too long to behave with now.
Your vision blurred.
Your body betrayed you.
And he just kept going, until you were shaking apart above him, gasping his name into the steam-heavy air.
When you finally lifted off him, boneless and wrecked, he pulled you down into the water, positioning you against the side. He lifted your leg over his hip and thrust inside in one brutal stroke.
"Fuck," you both groaned.
This time there was no control.
He moved like he’d finally stopped holding anything back; hard, fast, wrecked by need. His hands didn’t stay anywhere for long. Gripping your hips, cupping your breasts, sliding up to your throat like he was trying to feel every part of you at once.
His pace turned uneven, desperate. Like restraint had never been an option. Like nothing could possibly be enough.
“Wooyoung…” you gasped, breath breaking as you clung to him.
“I know,” he cut in, voice rough, his hand slipping between you to find your clit.
“Come with me.”
The orgasm crashed over you both at once. Your pussy clenched around his cock as he groaned, his hips stuttering, his release pulsing hot inside you.
For a long moment, neither of you moved. You just stayed there, tangled together in the cooling water, both of you breathing hard.
"We almost got caught," you whispered finally, your voice hoarse.
"I know," he said, and you could hear the smile in his voice.
"Made it better, didn't it?"
You laughed, breathless and exhausted.
"You really are insane."
He smiled against your skin, a soft, reverent sound escaping him. His hands moved in slow, soothing circles across your back, his touch gentle now, worshipful rather than demanding.
You tilted your head to look at him, finding his dark eyes already fixed on yours. His expression was soft, almost vulnerable in the candlelight, nothing like the cocky jester or the desperate lover from moments before. This was something quieter. Something that made your heart ache.
"I've got you," he whispered, pulling you closer, his arms wrapping around you like he never wanted to let go. "Just breathe. I've got you."
The water remained blissfully warm, the heated pool maintaining its luxurious temperature even as your bodies gradually cooled from their frantic exertion. Steam still swirled around you in thick, lazy clouds, clinging to your skin and hair like silk. Wooyoung's arms stayed wrapped around you, his forehead resting against yours, both of you still catching your breath.
"Come on," he murmured after a moment, his voice softer now, gentler. "Let's get you cleaned up properly."
He helped you stand on shaking legs, his hands steady on your waist as you rose from the water. Your thighs trembled, oversensitive and exhausted, and he noticed immediately, of course he did. His thumb traced a soothing circle against your hip.
"You okay?" he asked quietly, his eyes searching yours with genuine concern.
"More than okay," you breathed, though your voice was hoarse and your body felt thoroughly undone. "Just... thoroughly ruined."
He smiled, that real smile, the one that made him look younger, less burdened, and guided you up the marble steps. The air was thick with steam, warm and humid, wrapping around you both like a cocoon.
Wooyoung reached for one of the thick linen cloths stacked near the edge of the pool, shaking it out before wrapping it around your shoulders. His movements were careful, deliberate, as though you were something precious that might break.
"I can dry myself," you protested weakly, but he was already rubbing the cloth gently over your arms, your shoulders, down your back.
"I know you can," he said, his voice carrying that familiar teasing lilt. "But I want to."
His touch was different now, not desperate or consuming, but tender. Reverent. He dried your skin with slow, careful strokes, his fingers occasionally brushing against you in ways that made you shiver for entirely different reasons. When he knelt to dry your legs, his eyes lifted to meet yours, and the softness in his gaze nearly undid you all over again.
"You're staring," you murmured.
"Can't help it," he replied simply. "You're beautiful like this. All soft and undone."
Heat flooded your cheeks despite everything you'd just done together. When he finished, you took the cloth from him and returned the favor, drying the water from his chest, his arms, the sharp lines of his collarbones. He stood still under your ministrations, his eyes never leaving your face, his breathing steady and calm now.
"You should probably stay," you said after a moment, trying to sound casual. "The guards will be changing soon."
Wooyoung's eyebrow arched so high it nearly disappeared into his damp hair. His expression was pure, exaggerated disbelief, and he let out the most bombastic eyeroll you'd ever witnessed.
"The guards?" he repeated, his voice dripping with theatrical incredulity. "You're using the guards as your excuse?"
Heat flooded your cheeks.
"It's a legitimate concern..."
"Oh, it absolutely is," he interrupted, his grin widening into something wicked and knowing.
"Very legitimate. Very real." He stepped closer, his hands finding your waist. "But it's also very convenient that you're suddenly so concerned about my safety."
His eyes danced with amusement. "Almost like you're looking for a reason to make me stay."
"I didn't say..."
"You absolutely did." His thumb traced your lower lip. "You're a terrible liar, Princess. We've established this already tonight."
You glared at him, but there was no heat in it. "Fine. Stay because the excuse is real and because I want you here. Happy?"
"Ecstatic," he said, his grin softening into something warmer, more genuine. He pressed a quick kiss to your forehead. "But for the record, I was already planning to stay. The guard excuse was just adorable."
"You're insufferable."
"And yet, here we are."
He grabbed his discarded trousers from the floor, pulling them on but leaving his chest bare. You wrapped yourself in a silk robe hanging near the door, and together you crossed the threshold directly into your bedchamber.
Your chambers were bathed in silver moonlight streaming through the tall windows. The bed looked impossibly inviting, piled high with velvet blankets and silk pillows, the covers already turned down by your maids hours ago.
Wooyoung closed the door behind you with a soft click, then turned to face you. For a moment, you just looked at each other, the weight of everything settling between you like a living thing.
"Come here," you said quietly, holding out your hand.
He crossed the room in three strides, taking your hand and letting you pull him toward the bed. You climbed in first, shedding the robe and slipping beneath the cool silk sheets. He followed, settling beside you and pulling you into his arms. You curled into his side instinctively, your head resting on his bare chest, his arm wrapping around your shoulders.
For a long moment, neither of you spoke. His fingers traced idle patterns on your shoulder, circles, lines, shapes you couldn't quite identify. The silence was comfortable, grounding, so different from the frantic desperation of earlier.
"What do you think it'll be like?" you murmured finally. "If this works. When we're free."
He was quiet for a moment, his fingers pausing their gentle exploration. "I think," he said slowly, "I'd like to wake up next to you every morning. Not like this, not stolen and hidden. Just... normal. Boring, even."
You lifted your head to look at him. "You? Boring?"
"With you?" His smile was soft, almost shy. "Yeah. I want boring. I want to argue about what to have for breakfast. I want to watch you read by the window. I want to fall asleep knowing you'll still be there when I wake up, and not because we're hiding from guards or maids or your father."
Your throat tightened. "That sounds perfect."
"What about you?" he asked, his hand coming up to cup your face. "What do you want?"
"I want to laugh without worrying who's listening," you said quietly. "I want to touch you in daylight. I want to introduce you as mine, not as the jester, not as entertainment, but as the man I chose. The man I love."
His breath caught, his eyes searching yours. "Say that again."
"The man I love," you repeated, your voice steady despite the way your heart was racing.
He kissed you then, slow and deep and achingly tender. When he pulled back, his forehead rested against yours, his breath warm against your lips.
"You're mine," he whispered, the words raw and reverent. "Say you're mine."
"I'm yours," you breathed. "Completely. Entirely. No matter what comes next."
"Good," he murmured, pulling you more fully against him. "Because I'm not going anywhere."
You buried your face in his chest, breathing in the scent of him, cedar and cloves and something uniquely Wooyoung. Outside, the palace slept, unaware of the revolution brewing in its heart. But here, in this stolen moment, wrapped in his arms with the moonlight painting everything silver, you felt something you hadn't felt in years.
You felt safe.
"Thirteen days," you whispered against his skin.
"Thirteen days," he echoed, his arms tightening around you. "And then we're free. Or we're dead. Either way, we're together."
"That's still a terrible comfort."
"It's the only one I've got."
You laughed despite yourself, the sound muffled against his chest. He shifted, pulling the blankets up around you both, cocooning you in warmth and silk and safety.
"Go to sleep, Princess," he murmured, pressing a kiss to the top of your head. "I'll be here when you wake up."
"Promise?"
"Promise."
You closed your eyes, letting the steady rhythm of his heartbeat lull you toward sleep. Tomorrow, you'd return to the masks and the games and the deadly dance of court politics. Tomorrow, you'd continue plotting treason with three other desperate souls.
But tonight, you had this. You had him.
And for now, that was enough.