Chapter Text
Nichkhun smiled as he unwrapped the swan’s down shawl. Sunmi’s work was always beautiful and the fabric was thick and luxuriously warm. Humans were fragile things. They were susceptible to being too hot and too cold, rain, wind, cuts and scrapes, there were so precious few things humans didn’t die from. Sometimes they even keeled over helpless from nothing at all. How much more delicate would a small one be? He had to be careful.
No, only soft things for their Jinyoungie.
He put folded the shawl neatly and rifled through all the other tiny robes and wraps Sunmi had had woven, all made of good soft things like spider silk and otter fur, nothing too over-saturated with magical energies or resentment, all hand-gathered by his disciple brothers and sisters and approved by Nichkhun himself.
A pulse of magic brushed against his senses and bundled all the clothes up, leaving only the large downy shawl. This he threw over his shoulders before fetching a basin of water, heating it with a quickly whispered incantation, and giving it legs so it could trail along behind him.
To the human eye the fragrant peach tree blended well into the forest, unobtrusive but for a fading talisman on its trunk, but for Nichkhun’s wood sprite heritage, it was evident that its roots ran so much deeper, burrowing into the heart of the earth. The magic he’d woven around it shimmered softly like a dewy spider’s web. They swayed lazily, disturbed by the ever so slight heartbeat thumping from within the tree.
Nichkhun drew a breath. He’d been waiting for this day for over a decade.
Chanting beneath his breath, he nicked his thumb with one careful nail and unpicked the blanket of security spells motif by motif. Then placing his hands on the trunk, he softly coaxed the life from the branches and leaves draining it down towards the little bundle of life nestled in the roots.
Beneath his hands, the tree slowly died. It’s leaves wilted into gold and then red and brown, falling off their branches in curtains. The bark dried gray and desiccated as moisture pulled away from the greenwood beneath it. Bit by bit even the nourishing sap trickled to a stop, and the tree stood lifeless.
“Sorry little one,” Nichkhun sighed, petting the crackling bark, “I would have let you stay if I could have.”
Breaking into the base of the trunk with a small hatchet, Nichkhun began to carefully rip out the dry rotted wood and loamy earth. He didn’t dare use tools lest he damaged the treasure inside. Once he’d dug close to the main root, the earth gave much more easily, until suddenly, a crust of it caved into something soft. His digging turned to brushing, wiping soil off soft pink skin until little by little a tiny baby with a wild tuft of ebony hair emerged from the earth. He was a little big for your average newborn, but that wasn’t his fault. His heartbeat had sounded so weak for a while that Nichkun had let him carry on for a few extra years in his earthly womb until his heartbeat thrummed healthy and strong through the tree bark.
Without disturbing the umbilical cord, a mangled looking thing attached to a twisted gnarled root, Nichkhun slowly cleared the baby’s nose and mouth of as much dirt as he could. Then with one last whispered rune, he drained all the magic from the roots into the tiny baby, tying off and severing the cord as soon as the last drop of life dripped into the tiny form. The baby coughed around its first breath, spitting out the residual mud in his mouth, and began to cry.
Nichkhun scooped the little thing into his arms, an old memory of his disciple sister reminding him to support the soft little head as best he could, bouncing the baby slightly in his arms until the little thing calmed and blinked his big dark eyes open. He looked so much like his mother.
“Hello there, Jinyoungie, I’m your Nichkhun-hyung.” Nichkhun murmured softly. Smile, babies like smiles . If he managed it, it wobbled off his lips when little Jinyoungie chirped softly back at him.
Before he dissolved into useless mush, Nichkhun wrapped the baby up in his sleeves and carefully crawled out of the tree cavity.
The basin of water had cooled to a temperate lukewarm and little Jinyoungie babbled as he was lowered into it, splashing about with his tiny fist. When Nichkhun finished bathing him, he dried the boy with the swan’s down. The soft water retardant feathers, wicking away the excess bathwater before it could sap the heat from the little baby body.
Sparing a second to strip off his outermost robes and throwing them across the peach branches - there were limits on cleaning spell, and Nichkhun wasn’t going to spend the power to do something so complicated for everyday wear - he tucked the little bundle against his chest and commanded the basin to dump itself out and follow him back to the cottage.
Settled against his new hyung, Jinyoungie turned his little face into Nichkhun’s lapels and was asleep by the time they got home.