Chapter Text
“Today is the day we leave the house that we have called our home for so many years. I am both saddened and excited to leave this place behind. There are so many memories here, both good and bad, and I am reluctant to let it go. But I am excited to see more of the world again, to see how much it has changed over the years. Besides, a house is just a house, it is the presence of my beloved family that makes any place a home."
From the diary of Lee Minhyuk, 1770
For nearly two hundred years, they live happily in their house by the sea. Kihyun probably wouldn’t have minded staying there for all eternity, content to live in their little bubble, but Hoseok’s sense of adventure is itching and Minhyuk is also curious to see more of the world. So the three of them pack up, trading in their comfortable life at the coast of Africa for life on the road.
For years they travel throughout Europe, going from country to country, never staying long enough in any place to settle. Hoseok and Minhyuk love the adventure, content to live with very little possessions. But Kihyun misses his books and his garden, he misses having a place to call his own, so after about ten years of constant travel they strike down in France.
It is the year of 1785 when they buy a house in the suburbs of Paris. Little did they know that they arrived a mere four years before a long period of social and political turmoil. Little did they know that they would flee the country again not even ten years later to escape the violence and the rising dictatorship of the man called Napoleon.
But they knew none of that when they settled into their new home on a particularly hot and sweltering summer night. It wasn't a remarkably large house, nor was it very lavishly decorated, but it had a little garden and a charming little balcony and a spiral staircase leading up to a little study. (Despite all the terrible things that would happen in Paris in the following years, Kihyun insists that that little house will always be his favorite.)
Kihyun fills the study with books and the garden with vegetables. He hangs flowers from the balcony and paints the study a bright blue. (It reminds him of the sea)
Hoseok, too, flourishes in Paris, enjoying the vivid nightlife of the big city. He takes on a job as a bartender in a nightclub. He loves being around people, and the normalcy of having a job helps get rid of his restlessness.
Minhyuk, above all, enjoys the company of his little family. After having roamed the earth alone for hundreds of years, it is the little moments they spend together that he treasure the most. Like eating breakfast together (breakfast, lunch and dinner being blood, but it is the idea that counts) at the kitchen table, or watching Hoseok and Kihyun bicker over little things (they really were like siblings).
Minhyuk picks up painting. As a hobby, at first, but he seems to have natural talent for it, and simply through word of mouth, potential buyers start showing up at their door. He opens a little walk-in studio where he spends many evenings painting exquisite landscapes of faraway lands and portraits of great figures throughout time.
In hindsight, they should have probably seen it coming. They should have felt the dissatisfaction brewing amongst the people. The unrest and anger buzzing through the streets. They should have seen that the random destruction, the shouting, the stares were only the beginning.
On the eve of the revolution, the tension between the working class and the highborn is palpable wherever you go. Riots break out more frequently. Aristocrats are mobbed and beaten in the streets.
Their garden is trampled. Kihyun is inconsolable, cradling his broken vegetables in his arms as if they were his babies. The flowers are torn from their balcony. Kihyun's sadness awakens an anger in Hoseok. Who did these mortals think they were, blaming them for their misery and poverty? Minhyuk calms him, and for a while, everything seems to be good.
The windows of Minhyuk's studio are thrown in. And one night, several months later, they watch the building go up in flames. Minhyuk insists it is alright. The people are just fighting for their rights. It's not their fault.
Minhyuk would never voice how much it hurts him, losing all his work to the fire, but Hoseok and Kihyun can see it in his eyes. (Many, many years later they surprise Minhyuk by buying him an art studio closely resembling the one he has lost. They even track down some of his old work, those few that survived the Revolution.)
Neither of the three of them have any royal lineage, but people make assumptions based on their strange pale complexions and irregular public appearances. For the first time in their vampiric existence, they feel like their lives might actually be in danger.
On a cold winter's night, Hoseok makes his way back home from work. It has been increasingly dangerous to go outside alone, and Hoseok makes sure to keep to the shadows. He almost makes it home, until he hears the sound of fists connecting with flesh, followed by muffled cries from a nearby alley. He jumps onto the roof of the closest building, peering over the edge.
Below, he sees a group of 5, maybe 6 men, mercilessly wailing on someone. The poor guy is gagged with a piece of cloth, his hand bound behind his back. His elegant clothes are ripped and tattered (he must be a nobleman, but judging from what is left of his face, he cannot even have passed the thirty.)
He is bruised and broken, bleeding from various gashes all over his body. Hoseok is overcome with anger. It is probably a combination of the constant threats, the destruction of Kihyun's garden and Minhyuk's art studio that tips him over the edge. Hoseok has had enough. He is angry and tired of it all. He jumps down from the building, grabbing the first two guys' heads and smashing them to the ground before they even have a chance to react. (Hoseok doesn't hold back his power, and their skulls pulverize on the concrete.)
The other four jump up, alarmed by the sudden intruder and the near-instant demise of their fellow men. Two of them pull out knives. Hoseok grins, turning to the third, flashing his fangs and closing the distance between him and his next prey.
Hoseok, generally, is not a violent person. He is softhearted and gentle, concerned with all life human and animal alike. But even the softest vampire can break down if they are provoked long enough. (And even the softest vampire can break a man's neck like a twig.)
He grabs the man by the throat, squeezing hard until he feels the bones snap beneath his fingers. (He dies a quick death, which is more than he deserves, probably). The other two suffer an equally quick (but not necessarily painless) fate as Hoseok rips their hearts from their chests.
Hoseok kneels down next to the gagged man. He whimpers against his bounds, but he doesn't seem to be afraid of Hoseok. He unties the rope on his wrists and the cloth from his head. Looking at him from up close, the damage is worse than he thought. The bleeding seems to be internal as well, and he fears the man does not have that long to live.
So he makes an impulse decision. One that goes against the unspoken agreement made between the three vampires. One that tests the bonds of trust between them. One he makes selfishly, incautiously, for himself.
The next day, Minhyuk finds Hoseok and the other man lying on the bed in his room. Blood is smeared all over the furniture. The man is dead, clearly, no human could survive this amount of blood loss, and his skin is sickly pale.
But as Hoseok stirs, so does the man. The man, who is not dead at all, but rather undead instead.
(No human is to be turned without all three vampires' acknowledgement and agreement)
(No human is to be turned unaccompanied by Minhyuk)
(No human is to be turned. Period. Not in times like this. Not here. Not now.)
Minhyuk clasps his hand in front of his mouth. "Hoseok, what have you done?"