Chapter Text
With a pounding heart, Jimin paces quickly to his chambers. He hears the faint whispering of his ladies in waiting but he refuses to actually listen to them.
It’s the same thing. It’s always been the same awful thing. Sometimes he wishes for himself to not be an omega, to be courageous and fight, even if it’s a maiden’s fight with words.
When he reaches his doors, a guard opens it and Jimin immediately asks for a bath to be drawn.
“The hottest water, please.”
He wants his skin to burn, for his shame to melt away.
The girls bustle around him, bringing in a wooden tub, essential oils and a wet cloth. Another omega begins to undress him, pulling his sash open hurriedly, as if she can sense his turmoil. But that only ignites his panic. He feels his face begin to grow hot, a deep flush descending to the ends of his toes. He grabs the open lapels of his outer garment, holding them close.
“Stop.”
Everyone falls silent. The omega removing his garbs is looking at him with wide eyes, scared and confused. It’s exactly how he’s feeling.
“Please leave,” he whispers.
They run out as if he’s shouted at them.
He can’t help it. The moment he’s alone he doubles over in humiliation. Ugly sobs burst out of his chest, ones that he feels deep in his bones. His eyes hurt from clamping them too hard and his palms hurt from clenching his fist too tight.
Garments and all, he crawls into his tub, half filled with boiling water. All he can think of is Yoongi, of how he wishes he hates him but can’t and how he wishes he loves him but can’t.
He hugs his knees to his chest and thinks himself pitiful. His body aches in the steam and he yearns for more.
There’s a sudden knock on his door and Jimin jumps to his feet instantly, his sodden robes weighing him down. Before he can even refuse entry a furious looking Yoongi strides in.
Jimin hears himself gasp in shock. It’s entirely unbecoming. His wet clothes cling to him, gauzy and see through. His face is red and unappealing, mucous slathered from his nose to mouth. Hiccups barrage up his throat as he desperately holds back his tears.
But Yoongi is angry. And Jimin is scared.
"Why are you crying?”
Jimin shakes his head. There’s nothing going through his head, no explanation, no reason, just an echo of his drumming heart.
Yoongi approaches his bath tub, slow and purposeful.
“Jimin.”
Jimin closes his eyes.
“Jimin, look at me.”
He shakes his head frantically. No to Yoongi and no to himself.
He feels a sting in his mating bite, like Yoongi is trying to reach him in more ways than one, through the palm he’s laid against Jimin’s cheek, their bond.
Yoongi confuses him. Yoongi who claims to want him but has bed him only once many months ago. Yoongi who swore that Jimin’s stillborn child was not his own fault. Yoongi who stood up to those who slandered him.
Sometimes he forgets that Yoongi is the king. And that he is the consort. He should know that it’s always duty, never feelings or love or the heart.
“Tell me.”
With his eyes closed everything feels clearer. The goosebumps on his skin against his chilled wet clothes, the finger pads of his left hand, subconsciously clutching Yoongi’s sleeves. And Yoongi’s mouth, his breath, fanning onto Jimin’s lips and into his lungs.
Yoongi confuses him.
“Yoongi,” Jimin says, Jimin whines.
He feels like he’s being squeezed so tight. His other hand comes to rest on his flat tummy as he opens his eyes. He can’t even relay how he feels let alone what happened.
Coming to the palace, he had only known to bear the king’s heirs. It’s what his father had told him, his mother, the ministers, what his village expects from him. He hadn’t known he would crave for Yoongi’s attention and affection, or bear the ill words of the court members, or suffer as he had suffered.
Yoongi’s eyes flare red and Jimin feels his insides twist, his nether regions tingling, always so attuned to his mate no matter his own circumstances.
Yoongi breathes deeply from Jimin’s neck, on the opposite side of his mating claim. The tendons in his neck are taut with tension and Jimin is entranced by them.
“Tell me,” Yoongi grits out. And this time, as Jimin locks eyes with him, he sees it. The power, the absolute authority. His husband, his alpha, his king.
“He knew about… about the baby—”
Just saying it causes a series of images to flash through his mind. Yoongi spilling his royal seed in him that first night. The journey back to the palace being terribly long and arduous. How they weren’t yet mated and Jimin was already with child. How not even seven weeks had passed and he had bled out a grotesque form. His baby, their baby.
And now he must live with this. And maybe this is Yoongi’s punishment for him, to never have a child ever again.
“He touched me here. Like this,” Jimin rubs his wrist against his neck, over and over, like he’s caught in a trance. His body and mind are so far apart.
Yoongi stops him, his entire hand encompassing Jimin’s fist.
“I’ll take care of it,” he says gently.
Gone is Yoongi’s ire, replaced with this lax disposition.
Yoongi confuses him so terribly. All Jimin wants is to be a good omega. A good mate. He wonders what Yoongi wants of him.
The parts where Yoongi touches him are burning. The rest of his body is freezing. He wants to feel him everywhere, to feel this burning sensation everywhere. He feels his knees bend slowly, dipping back into his now lukewarm bath. Yoongi doesn’t let go of his cheek and crouches down with him outside his tub.
Jimin rests his chin the edge, his breath stuttering as he stares at Yoongi.
“Alpha,” he hears himself say.
“Yes, omega,” Yoongi replies.