Chapter Text
II. THE FAIRY KING
Hyunjin stepped into the fairy ring.
Nothing changed. The night sky, the stars, the wildflowers -- all remained still like the motionless moonshadows on the grass. Hyunjin looked at the tall span of trees stretched far beyond the horizon, sheathed in cases of glinting ice and belonging to a forest that had a pathway leading to an iridescent creek where nymphs were rumoured to bathe in.
And then, he saw it again.
Emerging from the dark with its enormous rack of antlers glowing in the night like a giant candelabra, the white stag stared at Hyunjin from in between the trees with eyes that seemed to beckon him forward. There was a tug of connection -- of familiarity. With the moon hanging above his head, Hyunjin stepped out of the fairy ring and ran towards the forest when the stag receded into the trees.
“Hey!” he shouted. His feet pounded across the meadow of wildflowers and tall grass before he was running through the ancient trees, his feet snagging onto roots that sprung up from the earth.
Hyunjin lost the stag, but he found himself lost in the forest too. Beady eyes blinked in the shadows. Murky moonlight danced beneath his feet. Faint laughter fluttered between the hollow branches. Hyunjin swallowed loudly and looked around, tentatively calling out, “Hello?”
There were voices itching in his ears spoken in an unfamiliar language. Frowning, his leaden legs took him farther into the heart of the forest. Hyunjin had lost track of time before he finally reached a clearing when he pushed past the thick bushes, and found himself at the creek. The moonlight pierced through the surface of the waters and shone opaluscently.
There were no rumoured nymphs, but there was the ghost-like stag again -- staring at Hyunjin with a bare twitch to its head. Hyunjin quickly wobbled his way through the bumpy ground and skipped over the rocks, and slowly approached the stag that made no indication of running away.
“Hi,” he gasped, holding out a hand. “I won’t hurt you.”
Crouching down, Hyunjin inched towards the white stag until they were face-to-face. It didn’t move, but Hyunjin could still feel its gaze pinned on him despite lacking the detailed anatomy. “Are you magic too?”
The stag leaned forward until their foreheads touched, but then a voice commanded by the skies penetrated the moon and cracked it open, spilling silver-blue grains from its crevices and onto the earth: “PL̷͎̬̳̉̄͝ƐΛse̷ still L̷͎̬̳̉̄͝o̴̜̝̗͛͆͐vє the̷ [1̲̅]Λ[?̲̅][!̲̅][!̲̅][?̲̅].”
The ground beneath him began to rumble. Hyunjin fell onto his back and watched the sky plummet towards him until --
He opened his eyes.
The skylight pooled through his yellow curtains and on to the floorboards. Hyunjin sat up in his bed, grimacing as he peeled the back of his sweaty shirt away from his skin.
He hadn’t dreamed this vividly since he was young, but ever since he turned twenty-three, he’d been getting the same dream over and over again. He was always young in that dream -- maybe thirteen, fourteen. There was the fairy ring. The white, glittering stag. The creek. The clefted moon. The ancient voice that spoke in a foreign tongue. Then he woke up. Rinse and repeat.
Hyunjin scrubbed at his sleepy eyes and watched particles of dust float in the light, evidence of the room being untouched for years. Granny hadn’t cleaned even when he called prior to let her know he was returning to Moondew for the summer. She didn’t find it necessary to upkeep it -- as if she knew, one day, he’d return to inhabit his childhood home again even if it wasn’t for long.
Granny didn’t cling to unnecessary fear nor did she dwell in it like Hyunjin did. He’d always admired her for that.
He hopped out of bed and went to clean up in the bathroom before deciding to take a quick shower as well. He let the cold water wash away the bizarre dream down the drain, taking the agitation churning in his guts along with it. After he dried himself clean, he changed into a white t-shirt and a pair of hideous, floral-printed shorts his friend back in the city had gifted him, then skipped down the stairs with a growling stomach.
The cottage remained the same as when Hyunjin had left it seven years ago, but the plant family Granny had accumulated over the years were gone. There were a lot more charms added to the hearth. They resembled runes that he never bothered to ask about as he grew older. Granny always had a bit of an arcane air to her.
“About time you woke up,” she greeted him gruffly at the table. An empty bowl was pushed aside for the newspaper.
“Hi, Granny,” Hyunjin said, clasping his hands behind his back as he rocked back and forth on his heels. “Still got food for one more?”
“Brat. Who do you think I am? Go sit down. And what kind of pants are those, boy? You’d think a life outside the valley would teach you how to dress better.”
“I just got back yesterday and you’re already ripping me apart,” Hyunjin muttered and took a seat as she shuffled into the kitchen to bring out food for him. He thanked her by giving a quick peck to her cheek. “I’ll change into nicer ones for you after I finish eating.”
Much to his surprise, she chuckled. “You haven’t changed a bit. Thought the city life would’ve made you pretentious.”
Hyunjin shrugged. He scooped up a spoonful of blackberry jam and chucked it into his porridge. As she settled back down into her seat across from him, he realized how much smaller she’d grown -- older, too, from the way her shoulders hunched and her plaited hair had turned white like the milky moon in his dream. “It’s not home.”
He missed Moondew. He could never see the stars clearly back in the city since they were always covered by the smog. The sun looked too dreary and bleak like a spoiled yolk that never burned as bright as Moondew.
Hyunjin missed the fresh apricot jam of the Kim’s, the earthy scent of the fruits and vegetables his grandmother would bring back from her trip to the farmer’s market, the taste of the lemon lollipops Changbin would give him to cheer him up, and the four-leaf clovers that stuck to the lines on his palms as he carried them to the rowan tree that stood tall and wise through all seasons.
He felt homesick, despite running from home in the first place.
“And, uh.” He stirred his porridge before taking in a spoonful. “I’ve missed the people. No one makes food better than you do, Granny.”
His granny hummed, tapping her pen against the rim of the table. She kept her eyes on the newspaper. “You’re just buttering me all up because you want to ask about that Han boy, don’t you.”
Hyunjin choked.
“You may have grown bigger, and awfully tall, but you are still so easy to read.” She clicked her tongue. “The city folk must have a lot of fun with you.”
Hyunjin coughed into the crook of his arm. He took a swig of his orange juice and patted his chest. Though he was older, he never seemed to age around his grandma. “Granny.”
“I’m messing with you, boy. He hasn’t shown up since that summer,” she finally answered after finding some amusement in his misery. “Do you still think he’ll show up one day? Randomly, as he did, those summers ago?”
Hyunjin idly scooped up the porridge before flicking it back into the bowl. He thought he’d gotten better at hiding his feelings, stuffing them all down into a box, but he supposed he could never hide anything from Granny. She had the eyes of a clairvoyant. “It’s been eleven years, Granny. I’m over it. I’ve stopped waiting for a long, long time. Besides, we weren’t even friends for that long. It doesn’t matter anymore.”
“The amount of time you’ve known someone does not correlate to how much they have made an influence in your life.”
“He probably wasn’t even real,” he mumbled.
“To you, maybe, since that’s what you truly believe.” She was looking at him now. Her eyes were sharp and hawkish. “But what if you did believe he was real? Would he show up, then?”
There was an underlying significance to her words. Hyunjin could hear it -- see it. She stared at him like she knew more than she let on. “Granny?“
“If you’re not going to finish that, then let me clean up already,” she stood up briskly. She grabbed his bowl and stacked it with his empty cup, and brought it to the sink to wash. “Now, I want none of your pessimism in this house. God knows how much I’ve had to deal with it since you were a teenager. Go and pick up the milk the Yang’s have prepared for me, but change those revolting pants of yours first.”
Hyunjin huffed. “Just so you know, they were a gift.”
“Get friends who can give you better presents, then.”
Hyunjin rolled his eyes as he stood up from his seat. He chewed on his lips in thought, wondering if he should press her for more information, but he shook the idea away. It was only his second day back. He could wait.
Upstairs, he changed into brown checkered pants with suspenders, and tied his long, black hair into a half ponytail. On his way out, he hugged his grandma from behind and kissed the top of her head. He missed her, quite so; she was a pillar, a titaness of limitless love, and he’d forgotten how being cared for felt like in such a slow-spun town unlike the fast-paced city.
Stepping out of the cottage that was now draped in overgrown vines with dead roses, where their brown and limp petals fell like confetti for their own funeral, Hyunjin stopped and looked around the yard. He found it odd since the roses were always blooming bright and vibrant in the summer. Even Granny’s garden was a cesspool of death, and when he asked her what happened, she merely grunted and changed the topic. Hyunjin knew not to pry, but there was something weird going on.
The sky was grey and the sun was covered by the clouds. Hyunjin began walking down the familiar road of pampas grass and shrubs of wilted azaleas. He walked past the white picket fence and yellow bungalow house, hoping to find Seungmin sitting out on the porch as he usually did, but the house seemed strangely asleep. In fact -- as he trekked down the road more -- most of the neighborhood seemed too quiet. It struck him as odd, because for all that he’s known most of his life, Moondew never slept.
Brushing away the niggling concern, Hyunjin continued his way towards the Yang farm. Their well-kempt farmhouse came into view soon enough, and he gave the front door a few knocks. He put his hands into the pockets of his pants, looking around their fields as he waited -- only to notice that all their land was empty of the crops they usually grew in the summer.
“Mr. Yang?” he called after there was still no answer. The windows were all covered by their chiffon curtains. Hyunjin began walking around the house. There were no signs of the Yang’s, but Hyunjin spotted a figure from afar who was lugging a stack of hay to the paddock. Hyunjin squinted at them, wondering if it was a newcomer, but then he recognized the lazy gait of the figure and gasped.
“Hey!” he shouted, running towards the figure. “Binnie!”
Changbin’s eyes comically widened and his expression immediately went slack at the sight of Hyunjin. He shouted back incoherently and threw down the stack of hay, opening his arms for a hug only to almost topple over when Hyunjin barrelled into him.
Hyunjin grinned and squeezed his best friend tight. Once he withdrew, he placed his hands on Changbin’s shoulders that’d grown broad. Changbin was no longer the gangly high schooler six years ago. He’d grown taller but still stood a bit shorter than Hyunjin; he filled out his proportions and was now healthily toned. He looked a lot happier, too -- happier than the last time Hyunjin had seen him, when he was brooding in the attic of the church with an apple-sized bruise on his cheekbone.
“Dude, what the fuck,” was the first thing Changbin said while laughing in disbelief. “Why the fuck did you grow even taller? What have they been feeding you in the city?” He reached forward to pinch Hyunjin’s cheek, stretching it like a rice cake. “You still look like such a baby, though.”
“Hey, hey, hands off,” he complained, swatting his hand away. “Don’t brutalize the face.”
Changbin snickered. “Did you just get back? Woulda brought over some drinks to celebrate if I knew.”
“I got back yesterday, but I knocked out straight away. It was a long commute. Are you working for the Yang’s, now?”
“Yeah. They needed an extra pair of hands to help around and I just so happened to have the brawns for it.” Changbin put his hands on his hips and sighed as he looked over at the dead fields. “The animals are what they got, right now. Can’t really do much without the crops.”
“About that -- what’s going on?” Hyunjin followed his gaze to the rows and chewed at his bottom lip. “Everything is so empty. So barren. Even all the flowers in my Granny’s garden had died, and she’s not the type of person to let it all just -- wilt. It’s kind of scary.”
Changbin smiled in a way that made his eyes soften, but it was a sad kind of look that Hyunjin rarely saw even as children. “Moondew lost its sun, Hyunjin.”
“What?”
“The sun disappeared after you left, never to shine again. Always hiding behind those nimbostratus clouds. It’s been a struggle to upkeep agriculture without the sun. Everything, everyone -- we all need it. There’s either heavy rain or storms but never the sun, so nothing grows in Moondew anymore.”
There was a pang in his chest. Hyunjin looked up at the sunless sky and swallowed loudly. “But why? How can that even happen?”
“The sun is grieving.”
“The sun isn’t animate. So how can it grieve?”
Consternation clouded Changbin’s expression. Hyunjin’s mouth opened with a question, but stopped when Changbin shook his head and waved away the topic at hand. “Nevermind. You’re here for the milk, aren’t you? Wait here. Everyone else went to prepare for the upcoming Syzygy festival, so I’ve been managing their farm alone for a while, now.”
Hyunjin blinked. “The what, now?”
But Changbin was already trudging away in his heavy boots. Hyunjin blankly watched him waddle towards the farmhouse to grab something perched on the back porch, before running back to Hyunjin with a large glass jug of milk in his arms.
“Tell your gran I said hi,” he said as he handed the bottle over.
“Since when did we have a sig -- zig -- “
“Oh. Syzygy?” Changbin shrugged. “Well, it’s a rare phenomenon, actually. It was foretold that it would happen this summer ever since Moondew was created. Everyone’s been anticipating it since March.” He glanced up at the sky. “Maybe the sun will shine once again, after the festival.”
Hyunjin stared at him. His heart toppled down to his stomach that churned in trepidation, uncertainty, and slight fear. Hyunjin had never heard of a Syzygy festival nor did he ever know such an event existed. So much had happened within the duration of him being gone.
Hyunjin had an inkling that Moondew was no longer the Moondew he knew as a kid. But the question arose in the back of his mind: did he truly know anything, at all?
“Thanks,” he said belatedly as he looked down at the milk. “I, um. Okay. I guess I’ll be heading back, then? I -- yeah. It was nice to see you again, Binnie. Let’s catch up, soon.”
Changbin grinned impishly and flicked him on the forehead. “Of course.”
His mind was still surging with confusion. Hyunjin watched Changbin work a little longer before he turned around and trekked off the farmlands.
All the flora and fauna was gone, no longer seen in the fields stretched lazily across the billowing hills with its wilted stubble and yellowed pasture. Though his head was set on returning to the cottage with the milk, his heart took him down the road instead. The bare cypress trees that stood from afar looked like towers that guarded the entrance to the forest in his dream. But as he reached the familiar forked path by the meadows, he stopped at the sight of the rowan tree. It was the only tree that still bore life among the dead plains.
The fairy ring was still there. Empty, but still there, with the arc of red-capped and pink oyster mushrooms, and the darker patch of grass inside. It glowed with a ribbon of silver light.
Hyunjin gnawed at his bottom lip. Unresolved grief rattled between his ribs the longer he stared at it. He remembered how he returned from the house at the end of the lane with tear tracks down his cheeks and mud stains on his knees eleven years ago. He couldn't forget the shock that flitted across his grandma's face when he cried in her lap.
He didn't remember much, after that. But Hyunjin knew that the more he grew up, the more the fairy ring got pushed to the back of his mind. There were the school bullies and Granny’s garden and lending a hand with moving all of Changbin’s belongings to the church attic when that became his official home. Hyunjin had been too busy, too hurt, to dwell on childhood lingerings.
But on the last day of school before summer break, Hyunjin had stood outside of the fairy ring and stared at the circle of mushrooms after classes had ended. He no longer brought four-leaf clovers with him. Sunshadows stood motionless on the grass, but the sun itself was orange and bleary, smearing the sky like brassy oils.
The sun had never looked the same ever since Jisung disappeared. It dragged the days behind like cold molasses.
He closed his eyes. And for the last time, he had waited underneath the rowan tree outside of the fairy ring until the sun met the earth, until the sun set behind the mountains, until the clouds covered up the watery light of the moon. Then, he'd trudged back to the garden with a crestfallen heart.
“You must eat well,” Granny had said the same night as she peeled an orange, split it into perfect halves, and gave both to him.
He looked down at the fruit in his hands. All he could think about at that moment was wanting to give the other half to Jisung, if he were still by his side.
And then, just like that, he finally stopped waiting.
He had deemed Jisung as merely a figment of his active imagination when he'd been lonely and bored that summer day. After all, growing up was about losing things. Growing up was about losing people. And growing up meant losing a part of his imagination.
Shaking his head, Hyunjin turned around and walked back up the road. There was no point in ruminating over the past. Jisung had never been real in the first place. He was grieving over a ghost that never existed.
Jisung belonged to the ruins, just like that dump at the end of the lane.
And so, he returned to the cottage, ignoring how the clouds rumbled and wailed and covered up the sun’s lamenting light.
☽
There it was again -- the white stag.
Hyunjin pried his way through the forest. Leaves got caught in his hair and branches scratched against his bare knees. The trees were alive, whispering unintelligible enticements in his ears as they blinked their white eyes open. The moon smiled with teeth whiter than milk as it followed him to the creek.
“Wait!” he called after the stag, which stopped in its tracks. It waited by the logs of the creek, its figure glowing with silver dust. “Who are you?”
Hyunjin watched as a trail of rabbits hopped out from the bushes and surrounded the stag, their beady eyes shining red in the night. The white stag lifted its neck so that it faced the moonlit sky, but then its face began to warp and stretch and drip like melted wax. The stag’s face changed shape until it molded into a distorted, human face, with a wide hollow smile and a hollower pair of eyes. Hair grew from its scalp until it reached the ground like a black waterfall.
Hyunjin scampered backwards in shock, tripping over his feet that made him fall back onto his bum. He looked up at the stag, his stomach bottoming out as his heart lurched to his throat.
“PL̷͎̬̳̉̄͝ƐΛse̷ still L̷͎̬̳̉̄͝o̴̜̝̗͛͆͐vє the̷ [1̲̅]Λ[?̲̅][!̲̅][!̲̅][?̲̅].”
The red-eyed rabbits carried the bladed moon across the waters. Hyunjin blinked, then the stag was there inches away from his face, staring into him with its hollow slits of eyes, and then he was screaming, and then --
Hyunjin sat up in his bed with a strained gasp.
Hazy skylight poured through his curtains. Hyunjin took in a shaky breath and ran his hands through his hair that was damp with sweat. It felt -- looked so real. He clutched his chest and willed for his heartbeat to calm down. Just a dream.
The clamor of pots crashing downstairs grounded him in the moment. He swallowed and threw aside the thin covers. As he stood up, the dim skylight had reflected off of a surface that gleamed in his peripheral vision and he turned towards it. Hyunjin stopped in his tracks. The moonstone, after all these years, continued to collect dust from atop his shelf.
Hyunjin had forgotten about that too.
Tearing his gaze away, Hyunjin kept his eyes down as he left his room. He relieved the ache in his bladder and washed himself, before he changed out of his sweaty pajamas and into clean clothes. Shambling down the stairs while tying up his hair, he called out morning greetings to his grandma, only to receive a grunt in response.
“Granny, can I ask you something?” He shovelled porridge into his mouth before swallowing it down with a swig of tea. He tore off a piece of Yorkshire pudding and stuffed his face in it. “It’s about the Sig -- shi -- siz -- “
“What?” she asked gruffly.
“The -- festival that everyone went to town to prepare for,” he finally said after failed attempts at pronouncing the name. “What does it mean? Like, what are we celebrating?”
Granny watched him closely. “Did that Bin boy tell you about it?”
“Was he not supposed to?”
“No, nothing like that,” she said as she straightened out the newspaper in her hands. “God, about time this conversation happened.”
Hyunjin sent her a puzzled look, voice muffled by the food in his mouth. “What?”
“The Syzygy festival is for the Sun King,” she said, “and for the Moon King. They are the deities of Moondew. I don’t do a very good job at explaining the story, but the most I can tell you is that the festival is to celebrate the time where they will finally meet again and align. It’s quite a special occasion. We’ve all been waiting for it since we existed here, and it just might be the thing we need ever since Moondew went into a sundrought.”
“How come I’ve never heard of it?” Hyunjin frowned. “Any of it, actually. I never knew we had -- deities we worshipped.” He blinked, his eyes slowly widening at a thought coming to fruition in his mind. He leaned forward and lowered his voice to frantic whisper, “Granny. Are we a cult?”
Granny rolled up the newspaper in her hands to smack the top of his head. “You and your nonsense!”
“It’s a genuine concern!”
“You are a child,” she scowled. “Eat your food and get outta here. The city air must have contaminated the cells of your brain. Go breathe back the air of Moondew!”
“Okay, okay,” Hyunjin mumbled sadly as he scooped up the dredges of his porridge. He slurped up all his tea and stuffed his mouth with another Yorkshire pudding before he narrowly dodged Granny’s rolled newspaper when he brought all his empty plates to the sink. After he washed all the dishes, he slipped into his sneakers and stepped outside.
Hyunjin kicked their rickety gate and made a mental note to himself to try and fix it later in the week. He noticed that the Kim’s were still missing, and so were their other neighbours. He wondered if he should pay a visit to town to check out how the preparations for the festival were going. But he never liked going to the town, so he shook the thought away and walked around the vicinity.
He mindlessly wandered around, only to find that his legs had taken him down the road to the meadows where the rowan tree stood tall and stoic. The fairy ring glimmered with the same sort of enticement the trees had whispered to him in his dream.
He chewed at the inside of his lip before looking around. He was alone. Moondew was quiet -- almost asleep. Dead.
After a moment’s worth of uncertainty, Hyunjin finally crossed the field of wilted wildflowers and approached the fairy ring. He stepped into the circle and slowly sat down, ensconced in the middle as a trail of goosebumps rose on his skin. There was a pang of longing in his chest for the graveyard of dissipated friendships Hyunjin had made in his head the day Jisung disappeared like a star at daybreak.
“The king of the fairy ring,” he whispered. He scoffed at the nostalgia -- the foolishness of it all -- and laid down on the grass.
Through the foliage of the rowan tree, the sky seemed to drape him in a cocoon of warmth that had him closing his eyes. He started to drift off, lulled to sleep by the memory of Jisung chatting non-stop about the eight wonders of the world. He could almost hear him right beside him, his voice high-toned and cheerful, all doe-eyed and rosy-cheeked.
Hyunjin hadn’t realized he’d fallen asleep until something soft brushed against his cheek, jolting him awake.
At first, he thought it was a butterfly. He swatted it away, only to get smacked on the cheek by the mystery insect, and he sputtered in surprise. His eyes fluttered open and blinked away the bleariness in his vision. But as soon as it cleared, he found himself staring at a winged creature in the shape of a tiny, human being, depositing gold dust all over his bishop-sleeved blouse.
Shock was an understatement.
“What,” Hyunjin croaked.
It was a fairy.
Hyunjin sat up cautiously; his heart was pounding in his ears and sweat was trickling down his back. This wasn’t possible. Fairies only appeared when Jisung was there with him. Hyunjin frantically looked around, but as expected, Jisung was nowhere to be seen.
He swallowed and looked back at the fairy fluttering before him. Fairies often appeared in flocks, but strangely enough, it was just one this time.
“Hi,” Hyunjin said, scooting back a bit. “Um. Hey.”
The fairy spoke in its same, garbled language. It circled around him almost out of frustration, leaving a trail of golden dust to scatter after it, and Hyunjin caught the dust in his cupped palms.
“Wait, wait. I -- I’m not like him. I don’t understand. I’m sorry, I can’t -- I don’t understand,” he whispered, letting the sand sift through the gaps of his fingers. It reminded him of the silver grains that spilled from the crack of the moon in his dream. “I wish I could. I’ve always wanted to know what you’ve been saying to me all this time.”
The fairy stopped in front of him, tilting its head and putting its tiny arms akimbo. It looked as though it was scrutinizing Hyunjin from head to toe, when finally, a tendril of words echoed in the space between them.
“T̩̫̞̟h̹͕̞̩̝e̝ͅ ̥̙̝̼̫̲̙w͚i̦̜t̺̻c͉̲̱̠̳̭̦h͓̮.”
Hyunjin gaped.
“T̩̫̞̟h̹͕̞̩̝e̝ͅ ̥̙̝̼̫̲̙w͚i̦̜t̺̻c͉̲̱̠̳̭̦h͓̮.”
“The witch?” he repeated tentatively. “Me? Are you saying that I’m a witch? I’m not a witch.”
The fairy swept around in convoluted arcs. Hyunjin watched, nonplussed, until he realized that the fairy was drawing out an object with the gold dust that scattered after it in its wake. The sparkling image was that of a flower with overlapping petals and a tall, long stalk.
The golden dust fell and scattered. The fairy hovered before him once again.
“T̩̫̞̟h̹͕̞̩̝e̝ͅ ̥̙̝̼̫̲̙w͚i̦̜t̺̻c͉̲̱̠̳̭̦h͓̮.” A pause. “G̝̲o̫̯ ̞̖͔to̜̪ ̹̥̺̠t̼͕̙͎h̗̯̮͈e ̘̖̜̙̺w̱̪̟͎i̝t͈̭̭̯c̲̪̞̬̖h͓͚͉.”
“What witch? Who’s the witch? Just tell me!” Hyunjin demanded petulantly before throwing his hands up in exasperation. “Can’t you guys just give it to me straight? Why does no one here speak normally? Like, okay. First it’s the fates, then it’s the whole sig -- seh -- zigzag shit, and then a sundrought, and -- argh! Just tell me what the fuck is -- “
The lone fairy hurled itself at him and smacked him on the nose. It felt like he got pinched by a baby ladybug. “Wh -- hey! Did you just hit me?”
The fairy chittered and twirled around.
“He̺͚̝̟ ̱m̞̺͇̥i̦̱̹͓̗̼̤s͖̻̤͝ͅs̛e̵͓̼̟ͅs̩̯̰ ̠̯͇̕y̼͔͓o̗̝̣͖̫ͅu͍̜̺̬,” it said. “C̱̟om̳̞̭̳̗̠e̵ ̗͖̪̞f̲̥̦i̙̯̠͚n̨̝̥͚͇͚͍̼d̦̲͢ ̖̥͈̗̟̼͎͜h̦i͓̺͈̺̪͞m͓̻̘͡ ͈͎̯̰̭s͕̣̞̯̹̼͍ơ̠o̯̘̹̩̦͓͔͟n̗̕, H͞yun͏jinie҉.”
“What?” Hyunjin stared at the fairy with his heart in his throat. His hands were trembling as he reached for the fairy, his voice lowered to a scratchy whisper, “He misses me?”
But the fairy flew back. With its dainty gold-crusted wings that fluttered one last time, it disappeared like the wispy florets of a dandelion.
☽
Days pass.
Hyunjin hadn’t been dreaming lately, mostly because he barely got to sleep. Restlessness crept up on him and snagged it away in the gibbous of night. All he could think of was the fairy that pushed him to the witch, dwelling somewhere in the hidden canals of Moondew, but Hyunjin couldn’t bring himself to ask Granny about it. Not yet, at least.
He distracted himself by fixing the cottage’s gate. He stayed in bed and ruminated over fading memories. He drank with Changbin some nights, talking about wispy dreams and mundane nothings. Hyunjin had admitted that he thought Changbin would leave for the city too; he was never as homebound as Hyunjin was, and Changbin has always been too free-spirited and brave to stay trapped in one place forever.
Changbin replied with a smile that softened his eyes. He sighed and stretched his arms over his head as he tilted his head up to look at the tarpaulin of stars. “As much as I want to leave, I can’t. At least, not yet. My heart’s tied to Moondew until everything is fixed.”
He hadn’t elaborated on what “everything” was. Hyunjin wanted to ask, but Changbin shoved another beer into his hand and clunked their bottles together.
Days pass.
One night, Hyunjin kept his eyes wide open at the ceiling. The walls were painted with tides of the moonlight, and ironically enough, it shone directly against the moonstone that sat atop the surface of his bookshelf across the window. He could hear him, then -- Jisung’s young, cheerful voice that echoed from its pearl luster.
A token of a summer memory, he had said. You’re forever stuck with me. I won’t easily be gotten rid of!
How funny it was, for love to be so short but forgetting to be so long.
Hyunjin sighed and rubbed a hand over his face. He sat up and threw aside the covers. He put on his windbreaker, stared at the moonstone with a conflicted frown before he shoved it into his pocket. Then, he tiptoed downstairs and headed out for a midnight walk.
It was cool and windy. Fireflies flickered among the bare wireframe of the trees. Hyunjin plodded down the road as his eyes swept across the barren lands, the moon hanging above his head like a blade sculpted out of marble. The lights were still on in the houses and cottages he passed by.
Without thinking, he made his way to the fairy ring, his eyes lowered to the gravel he scraped with the soles of his shoes. He supposed he could never escape something that’d been such an integral part of his childhood. The fairies, the forest, the house at the end of the lane -- they were all part of his heart, even if it’d hurt him to the point of running away from Moondew in the first place.
As he approached the forked path, he lifted his head up, only to freeze in his tracks.
A white stag.
It was there -- waiting by the fairy ring, with its ghostly eyes and glittering antlers. Hyunjin gaped at it before he rubbed his eyes and smacked his cheeks, wondering if he was merely dreaming, but the stag was unyielding. Hyunjin opted to pinch his arm until it was too painful to endure, but the stag was still there, pulling the moon towards it.
“Well,” Hyunjin mumbled in awe, “shit.”
He was not dreaming. The white stag was real, it was real, and it was right in front of him -- until it wasn’t.
“Hey!” he shouted after the white stag that took off to the forest of towering trees. Hyunjin looked around, jumping indecisively in place, before running after it like he’d done in his dream.
He trekked upon the naked earth and stumbled over ancient tree roots that punctured through the soil. The narrow path, made uneven by the knotted roots that crossed it, branched at intervals, and the bare branches spiked into the charcoal sky. There were red eyes blinking in the shadows, the shrill hoots of an owl perched somewhere high above him, and the cirrus of tangled voices grew like static in his ears.
Hyunjin carried on aimlessly, pushing his way through the forest. He could feel the cuts on his cheeks and the scrapes on his knees from tripping. He was just about to give up, and maybe cry, when he saw a pool of moonlight peek through the thick clusters of trees from up ahead.
Excitement and fear thrummed in his veins. He shoved his way through until he reached the clearing. It was the creek from his dreams. Before the glimmering water stood the white stag that waited by the logs, staring at Hyunjin as though it had expected him to arrive.
“You,” he breathed, taking a hesitant step forward. “You were in my dreams.”
Hyunjin wasn’t sure what to expect. Half of his dreams consisted of the stag’s face turning into the face of a woman that came straight out of a supernatural horror movie, while the other half was mostly of the moon collapsing that brought down the whole sky. Hyunjin hid his trembling fists behind his back and willed his craven heart to prepare for the worst, but the stag remained motionless. It just stood there, twitching its nose, staring at Hyunjin with blank eyes.
“Who are you?” Hyunjin asked, taking another step forward. “Why are you always in my dreams?”
He kneeled down before the stag and lifted his hand, letting it hover over the stag’s head. “Are you real?” he whispered. “Is this real, right now?”
“I’m real if you believe I’m real.”
Hyunjin flinched at the voice of a child that tinkled over his head. He whipped his head around, calling out, “Jisung?”
He turned back to the stag when it nudged its head against his hand. As soon as they touched, Hyunjin found himself falling backwards into a tunnel of blackness. It felt like he was plummeting into the abyss for an eternity, his limbs immobilized, before a glaring whiteness washed over his eyes that had him squeezing them shut tight at the light.
Then he was no longer in the forest. He was in the middle of an empty field now, with a single, golden chain tree glowing like the sun before him.
“Do you think I’ll ever get to see him again?”
And curled around the hearth of the tree -- was Jisung.
There was a hurricane of thoughts inside of Hyunjin. His heart rate was accelerating so fast his heart might as well have leapt out of his ribcage and into the empty sky. His muscles were so tight that he couldn’t bring himself to take a step forward. He just stood there in shock, in disbelief, shaking like he was possessed by an otherworldly entity when it was merely the entity of grief.
But then something nudged him from behind. It was the white, glowing stag pushing him forward.
“No. No. What is this?” he asked frantically. He fell onto his knees to keep himself from getting too close. Jisung was giggling with the fairies and seemingly unaware of Hyunjin’s presence. He was still the same baby-cheeked boy from eleven years ago. “Why is he so young?”
“M̫̣͇e͖̙͎m̦̫̘̩͉̲o̭͇͖̟͙ͅͅr͚y͉̦,̩ͅ” it said.
Hyunjin barely had time to react to the stag talking to him for the first time since they encountered each other when a chorus of chitters tugged his attention away and back to Jisung.
“You really think so, fairies?” Jisung whispered. “But he seemed to really hate me. He even stopped believing in me too. What should I do if he never stops hating me? I’ll be stuck here forever and he won’t be able to see me again. He’ll forget me too.”
The fairies flew around him; a few landed on his cheek and a few rested on his shoulders. Jisung sighed and curled into himself a bit tighter. “I miss him a lot. But he’ll be waiting for me, won’t he? He always waits because his heart is all soft and gooey, so it’s my turn to wait now! Yeah, I’ll wait for him no matter how long it takes!”
Jisung laughed as the fairies agreed in their garbled voices and played with his hair. Hyunjin watched him, because that was all he could do, because that was all he learned to do since he was a cowardly child. His heart hurt so much he feared it might explode.
The white stag stepped forward and nudged its nose against Hyunjin’s cheek. When they touched again, the young Jisung with his fairies faded. The laburnum tree slowly lost its glow like a lightbulb that blew a fuse, and now it was all black when it used to be golden. The grass beneath Hyunjin turned yellow and dry, and the flowers surrounding them had wilted and died.
And then, there was Jisung, but he was different. He was old like Hyunjin, now. His large shirt finally fit him and his hair had grown wavy and messy. But there was something missing -- something lackluster. His back leaned against the trunk of the burned out tree and a lone fairy perched itself on to his nose.
“Ah, I’m so sleepy,” he murmured, and it surprised Hyunjin to hear how low and mature his voice sounded, now. “Will you let me sleep for a few more days? I’m just so tired.”
The fairy zipped around Jisung’s face. Jisung managed a weak smile and closed his eyes. “I’ll just sleep. Sleeping counts as waiting, right? I can do that forever.”
Hyunjin looked at the white stag. “What’s happening?”
“F̪̟̰̤o̗r̪̞g͕̣͍o̮̩̗t̙̖̳̱t̪ḛ̘̖n̮,” it replied hollowly. “U̜͈͖ͅn̺͖̙͔l̟͍͕͎̗͉̩o͎̹͉̪͎͎v͔͔̜͕̣̱̻e͇d̫̩͈.͉”
“I -- I don’t understand. What does that have to do with -- ”
It stared at him. “Ỵ͙͖̩̘o̙̺̦̦̪u͖͔.”
Hyunjin blinked at the white stag in growing confusion before he looked back at Jisung, only to find that the fairy disappeared and Jisung was fading. He looked so transparent, so ghost-like. A ghost that doesn’t even know that it's dead. Hyunjin wanted to swallow all those words he’d spoken back down his throat and stuff it into his box instead.
“Why is he fading,” he whispered, scrambling towards Jisung who was asleep against the tree. He crouched before his sleeping figure and gingerly held out a hand, letting it linger above his cheek, untouching. “Hannie.”
The white stag stepped beside him. Even if it was a phantom, Hyunjin could still see the melancholy in the blank slate of its eyes.
“W̼i̪̹̘͓t͎̭͎̜c̞̜̲̟͈h̰̳̫̞̫,” was the last thing it said before it took him back down the tunnel into the abyss.
Then Hyunjin woke up.
Not in his bedroom, but in the fairy ring. He saw the night sky and the stretch of stars among the blue-grey clouds, and the moon that dangled in its deep silver mist.
Hyunjin sat up with a hitched breath, eyes frantically searching across the meadow when he spotted the white stag staring at him from between the trees of the forest, before it turned around and disappeared into the shadows. Hyunjin blinked at it, wondering if it was a dream, but then he looked down at his scraped knees and the cuts on his arms and realized it wasn’t a dream. It was very much real.
Han Jisung was very much real, too -- waiting, waiting, waiting at the hearth of that sundrought tree. Waiting, sleeping, forgetting.
There was pain in his chest. His pomegranate heart was cracking open and spilling seeds all over the floor -- an ache that never stopped growing. Hyunjin hadn’t felt this much hurt since eleven years ago but he hadn’t been the only one hurting. He was so young, so selfish and cowardly, and Hyunjin could feel his face crumpling when he scrambled to his feet and ran back to the cottage.
He needed to find the witch.
At the cottage, he realized he’d locked himself out, so he unabashedly pounded his fist against the door until it creaked with the warning of breaking. After the nth time of almost knocking the entire door down, it finally opened, and Granny stood there with a very unhappy, very grumpy expression with her long hair tucked into a purple nightcap.
“What in the God’s name is -- “
“The witch,” Hyunjin gasped sharply, his chest was heaving, and it took him a second to realize he’d been crying the entire journey back. “I need the witch.”
Granny’s expression immediately changed into that of concern as she cupped his face into her wrinkly, gentle hands. “Oh, poor boy,” she murmured as he wiped away his tears with the pads of her thumbs. “My poor, sweet boy.”
“I need -- I need to -- I need to find the witch. Please. I saw him, Granny. I saw him and it’s all my fault but I -- but I don’t know who or where and -- fuck. Granny, I don’t know anything,” Hyunjin sobbed out and squeezed his eyes shut when his voice had cracked. “I did my best to forget everything that happened here! I grew up quickly and moved away and found a job -- everything that an adult was supposed to do, because adults always knew everything, didn’t they? But I’m not an adult. I still don’t know anything. But why? Why don’t I know? Why am I so unworthy to know the truth? Why?”
Granny’s eyes flickered upwards to the moon. He folded in half when she brought him to her chest and rubbed soothing circles on his back; it might have looked comical, but he’d missed being small enough to be held by someone who was safe like his Granny. “Sweet pea, you’re not unworthy. You are so much more than what you think you are.” Her hand traveled to the back of his head, petting him gently like she used to do when he was a kid. “How could you ever think that? I’d smack some sense into you if you weren’t such a mess at the moment.”
Hyunjin didn’t answer. He didn’t know how long they stood there, with Granny comforting him in silence as he cried into her nightgown. After a while, his cries finally subsided into tiny sniffles when he calmed down, and she withdrew from their hug. Granny cradled his face in her frail, strong hands, forcing Hyunjin to look at her in the eyes. “You’re ready, my sweet boy. If you must find the witch right at this very moment, then let me help you.”
Hyunjin wiped at his tear stained cheeks that stung from the cuts. His entire body was wrung out by the emotional disposal, and everywhere ached so bad he felt as though he’d collapse any second. “Granny?”
Her eyes glowed silver, for a moment. And when she opened her mouth, it wasn’t her raspy voice, but the sound of the fairies:
“I am the black of eye,
my feet firmly in the ground.
I turn my face to the sun
and follow it around.
When I am dead and gone,
I will droop real low,
I will keep the birds well fed,
standing stiff there in my row.”
Granny leaned in. “What am I?”
“What -- what does that -- “
“You must figure it out yourself. I am not allowed to tell you,” she said. “So think. Think with that city brain of yours.”
Puzzled, Hyunjin sniffled and used the hem of his shirt to wipe the snot away from his nose. He was too tired to react badly at the riddle. All the anger drained out of him through his tears, so this time, he tried to understand instead rather than react out of frustration. He shut his eyes and listened to Granny repeat the riddle again as he stewed over the answer.
“Turn towards the sun,” he muttered.
Hyunjin thought of the lone fairy, then -- how it used its golden dust to trace out an image of a flower with broad, overlapping petals on a tall, long stalk. He thought of the memory the white stag had shown him of Jisung laughing at the hearth of the laburnum tree, which had once burned like a thousand stars during that late summer day when Hyunjin had been shown a sun illusion. But the sun illusion had only been possible because of the --
“Sunflowers,” he whispered.
Hyunjin blinked slowly. He stared at Granny, who looked a bit less human and a bit more magical in the moonlight. She wore a steady smile of approval at his answer and opened her mouth, but Hyunjin didn’t hear, because he was already running.
He was out of the cottage and the neighborhood within seconds and his feet were pounding against the tarmac as he fled down the road. He should have realized it sooner. He could have, if he hadn’t been blinded by his own emotions. But he remembered the unsettling smile and the dark eyes that had met Hyunjin’s when he’d caught him talking with Jisung that day, and of course -- of course, the Lee’s only son would know something.
The sunflower maze full of wistful memories finally came into view, along with the Lee’s relic of a house. Hyunjin skidded to a halt at their old, patinated gate covered in vines of dead flowers. The sunflowers were all dead and drooping, matching the house’s eerie demeanor of moss-covered walls and overgrown leaves shaped into a canopy.
Hyunjin wiped his sweaty face with his arm, wincing at the cuts, and caught his breath. He ducked underneath a drape of vines that curled around the top of the gate, and walked past a dried up pond ensconced by rocks. At the door, he rang the bell and waited restlessly for an answer, hoping that the witch hadn’t gone to town to prepare for the festival too.
But then the door swung open, and standing there was none other than Lee Minho.
“Mr. Hwang,” he greeted. His expression was unaffected, almost calculative, and his eyes were black like two pristine stones of onyx that reflected a blue hue when touched by the moonlight. “How can I help you during this time of the night?”
Now that Hyunjin was there, he was at a loss of words. He wasn’t sure how to approach the topic. What if Minho wasn’t the witch? It’d be rude to assume he was. He’d cause his grandma grief if he insulted one of the families she so often traded herbs and oils with. Hyunjin chewed at his bottom lip and wrung his wrists. “Well. Um. Hey. Sorry to bother you, uh. I’m not sure how to say this? The thing is -- well -- “
Minho raked him from head to toe with his eyes before he turned on his heel and went back inside the house. “Come in,” he called.
Hyunjin blinked. He took a hesitant step forward.
The interior of the house was completely different from its exterior. It was clean and decorated in drapes and tassels of deep reds and browns that hung from the cinnabar-coloured walls with charms plastered on them, and Ziegler rugs that extended across the halls. There were a myriad of succulents that took up space at any available surface, and there was an incense burning near the entrance of the door.
He toed off his shoes and meekly followed after Minho into the warm living room. He was beckoned to take a seat at the couch by a dainty, wooden table with an empty vase while he disappeared into the kitchen.
Now that Hyunjin thought about it, this was the very first time they’ve ever properly talked to each other.
Minho reemerged from the kitchen with a tea tray after a while, setting it down on the table. He picked up the Gorgian teapot and poured rose tea into a cup and placed it in front of Hyunjin on a saucer. There was a globe-shaped bowl containing cream and sugar.
“Thanks,” Hyunjin murmured, watching the smoke of the hot tea curl into the air. He looked up to find Minho staring at him, so he stared back. They stared at each other until Hyunjin started to sweat underneath his gaze. “I -- is something on my face?”
“Yes. Many things, in fact,” Minho said.
“Oh. Right.”
“I suppose we should drop the small talk. I’ve been told that’s how you establish civility but I’m sure neither of us are a fan of it.” He leaned back and crossed his legs. “I know why you’re here.”
Hyunjin frowned. “You do?”
“In fact, I’ve been waiting for you, Mr. Hwang.”
“You have?”
“Yes.” Minho’s lips twitched. “You’ve come for the sun.”
Hyunjin shut his eyes to regain his composure. Then, he took a deep breath and spoke in the most quiet, polite tone he could muster in that moment, “I really, really cannot deal with more riddles. So, explain to me. Please. I’ve been kept under the dark for so long. I wouldn’t have known to come here if it weren’t for the -- “
“The fairy,” Minho guessed. He leaned forward and rested his elbow on his knee. “The fairy came to tell you. And then it was the Moon Spirit who took you to that memory realm, and showed you what was becoming of your beloved sun. Yes, I know. I’m a witch, Mr. Hwang. I know of the creatures you’ve seen. I’ve spoken to them myself.”
Hyunjin swallowed loudly. It felt like he was still trying to catch his breath from running so long. His back was pulled tight like a bowstring.
“As you know, the fairies are more than the creatures you hear in folklore. They are the fae of the sun: loyal followers and enchanters of light. And just like the faes, the Moon Spirit -- who lingers in the forest alongside the night creatures -- are followers of the moon. The Moon Spirit had not appeared in decades, so his form is still unstable. That is why he shows up in your dream as a woman, sometimes, when he gets his form wrong.”
Minho paused. He lifted his hands and pressed his forefingers together. “Have you still not connected the dots?”
Hyunjin bit the inside of his cheek until he could taste blood. Minho took that as an answer and continued on.
“The sun is a lonely star, don’t you think? Whenever the sun comes out to see the moon, it disappears. And, well. Mr. Han knew that I was a witch who used plants as a medium. He wanted to use the sunflowers because the maze was a threshold, and once you’ve crossed the threshold, you’re in the world that was wished upon by the requester.”
Minho picked up his cup of tea, bringing it to his mouth to take a small sip. “But that day, when you saw us together, he was telling me to maintain the illusion for as long as possible, because he knew the sundrought would happen one day. After all, he found you when you were still too young -- too volatile, and he knew you would push him away. The fates showed him how this would all play out and he had to abide by it, even if it meant being forgotten by the only person he loves.”
The world was spinning and spinning and the ground beneath him was tilting over. The sunflowers, the sundrought, and the memory of the older Jisung sleeping against the trunk of the dead chain tree flickered before Hyunjin’s eyes. The link between the sun and Jisung was so overwhelming that Hyunjin felt his chest almost burst.
“Do you get it now?” asked Minho.
“He’s the sun,” he rasped. “Jisung is the sun.”
Minho finally smiled.
🌣 ☽
Gods existed, once.
The Sun King, Yongbok, was the divine harbinger of life and light, draped in all gold silk and blood-red gemstones, harnessing fire that burned as powerful as the cosmos. Legends say he was the embodiment of the sun and that he had no concrete form, merely an outline of hot, fiery light; others say he resembled his fae creatures, with iridescent hair and gold dust that fell from his eyelashes and onto speckled cheeks.
The opposing force to his existence, on the other hand, was The Moon King, Chan -- divine harbinger of death and eternity, all in silver robes and icy feathers, commanding the stars and lunar tides. A mysterious phantasm that never revealed its true form, merely watching through the eyes of its strange creatures in the ribbons of light amidst perpetual darkness.
They were Gods. They were destined to be apart -- to never meet, like perpendicular lines and twin primes.
But they were also in love.
Because of their preordained elements that juxtaposed each other, they were never able to meet as they were. For eons, they relied on the Morning Star to catch glimpses of each other, but when one rose the other fell -- an eternal, cosmic rhythm that brought control to the universe’s ways but grief for each other.
The Gods could not endure it anymore. That was when they decided to meet in a different way.
🌣 ☽
Hyunjin stared at the sunflowers.
“Moonchild, moonchild,” Minho sung, “where will you go?”
Turbulence and confusion melded together into a storm within his chest. He had reserved a moment’s worth of time to have another meltdown outside of the witch’s house, but after that, as the moonflowers unfurled in his presence and the stars lent their warmth to his body, he felt peace. Understanding. Maybe crazy.
Hyunjin looked up at the moon that winked down on him. He basked in the cold, shimmering moonlight, before he stepped forward into the sunflower maze.
The sunflowers were all dead and rotting but Hyunjin forced himself through the crowd as he went off-trail. He followed the north star in the cascading, night sky, body shaking as though he was freezing in the winter. Through the stalks of the sunflowers, he heard the rustles of the moon creatures that followed alongside with him -- the running, white stag, and the leaping, red-eyed rabbits that carried the moon.
🌣 ☽
Before falling into eternal slumber, the Sun and Moon King detached a piece of themselves into the form of disembodied souls, and sent them down to earth so that they may have the chance to be together where they may begin their lives as humans with old and new memories. A reincarnation, of sorts. The sun fae and moon creatures followed them as they did from the very beginning and to the very end.
But the Primordial did not like that Sun and Moon were cheating the cosmos and the fates for their own greed. He was enraged at the disloyalty. Thus, the Primordial separated the trajectory of their souls plummeting down to earth, and caused the Moon to lose all of its memories of the past, leaving the Sun as the sole bearer of both their lives.
The moon creatures lamented over their God. They watched as an old kitchen witch discovered their God in the clearings of a forest, and raised the Moon with her gentle hands and knowing eyes. She loved the Moon like he was her own son, all bright-eyed and tender-hearted, curious at the strange tug of connection he felt for the moon and the stars.
But as the Moon was nurtured by the hands of an old maiden, the Sun was left alone.
🌣 ☽
The north star brought him home.
Hyunjin pushed past through the last of the tall sunflowers and stumbled forward into the sun illusion from eleven years ago, except now, he was swimming in a field of wilted wheat, and there were no suns apparent in the sky -- merely a cloudy, murky grey. The barn still stood in the distance with a dried up rivulet. The stark, ancient trees of the forest still towered like giants that reached past the sky.
“Where could he be?” Hyunjin asked, mostly to himself, but then he felt a slight nudge against the back of his hand, and looked down.
The white stag stared up at him, tilting its head almost judgmentally.
“Right. Stupid question,” he grumbled. “Shut up.”
He yelped when the stag rammed into his side with its antlers.
🌣 ☽
The Sun remembered. He knew of the Moon, dwelling somewhere among the moon-splashed crevices of the earth, and travelled far and wide to find him with the help of the faes. When the Moon found him in the fairy ring one summer day, by chance, the Sun believed that they could finally stay together and no longer be apart.
But the Moon did not remember him.
He did not remember the Sun, who he was or who they were, so the more the Moon’s faith in the Sun wavered, the more the Sun faded. Because, after all -- when something was forgotten and unloved and no longer believed in, they began to disappear as though they’ve never existed in the first place.
The Sun had made a mistake in finding the Moon too early when the Moon was still so young and easy to hurt and prone to misunderstand. But the Sun did not leave his side, because he loved the Moon, and came to love the Moon as his own, sentient person, and not as a fragment of the God he was born from.
And even as the Moon left and the Sun grieved and grieved, the Sun vowed to still love and believe in the Moon, no matter if he faded away like a ghost in his slumber.
🌣 ☽
Hyunjin tried to retrace their steps as children when he walked through the forest.
He hopped over roots before his feet could snag onto them. The witch had cleaned up his wounds earlier with an ointment that had closed up the cuts, leaving only faint, white marks that would fade in a couple of days. Minho was eccentric in the sense that he spoke and presented himself in an unaffected, cold manner, yet the surprise in his eyes when Hyunjin pulled him into a hug revealed the softness of his dainty features.
Minho had been watching over the both of them all this time, even when he was handed the sunflower maze to oversee when his father passed away at an early age. He was there for Jisung when he seemed to have no one to turn to, and he was there for Hyunjin, who had dug up his graveyard of memories and demanded answers.
Maybe, when everything ended, Hyunjin could find a way to repay him.
Hyunjin slowed down to a halt when he felt the emptiness by his sides. He looked over his shoulder where the moon creatures had stopped a few feet behind him, watching his back. Always there, even when unseen. His heart thrummed along to the beat of the brave, no longer the coward it’d been years. He turned back around, and continued on his way.
It didn’t take long for him to recognize the path he was trekking on. He skipped over dead moonstone flowers and spotted a wooden bridge that dandled over an empty lake. And as Hyunjin continued further into the heart of the forest, he finally stopped in front of the golden chain tree that withered within its own, rotting light, scented with summery memories barely threaded together in his fingers.
And in the hearth of the tree, was Jisung.
It was just like Hyunjin had seen in the memory the white stag had shown him. Jisung was sleeping against the trunk of the laburnum tree, eyes closed peacefully with an uncharacteristically pale complexion.
Something churned in his gut. Hyunjin gripped the ends of his jacket and slowly -- quietly, approached the sleeping sunchild.
“Hey,” he whispered, kneeling down in front of Jisung with shaking hands. “You’re not supposed to be in here.”
Hyunjin gnawed at his bottom lip when he felt his nose prickle. His aching heart was pounding in his ears. He’d already cried so much; he didn’t think he’d have any tears left. “Hey, Hannie. Hannie. Han Jisung. Hey, you idiot. You can stop waiting now. You don’t have to wait anymore, because I finally found you.” He leaned forward and gently cradled the sides of Jisung’s barely solid face, and whispered, “Wake up, Hannie. The moon’s out. I’ve come to take you back home.”
There was a beat of silence. Then, the tree flickered to life.
It was gradual, slow -- as light began to reenter the hanging drapery of the trees that circled them in its shadows. Like a flame that had been rekindled, the golden chain tree burned gold and bright once again, like that summer many years ago when it’d stood in the grand centre of the dreamscape with determined brilliance.
The gilded light dived down from the crown of the tree and washed over the earth beneath them, stirring the flowers from its drooped posture into a slow unravel as they bloomed to the warm kiss of the suns that shone in the cleared up sky. The whispers of running waters and the chorus of birds returned to the verdant heart of the forest.
Everything thrummed with life and light, as if a curse had been lifted.
A strip of sunlight peeked through golden foliage. Hyunjin was watching Jisung with his heart hammering in his ears and a knot forming in his throat. He was watching as Jisung’s gossamer figure began to solidify until he was concrete to touch -- until Hyunjin could feel his soft cheeks that squished beneath his hands. And he was watching, even as Jisung began to stir from his sleep.
“Go away, ugly fairies,” Jisung mumbled. Hyunjin retracted his hands before he could be touched when Jisung swatted blindly at the air. “Lemme sleep for another five minutes.”
“Five minutes is still far too long,” Hyunjin croaked, his voice thick with tears. “Jisung.”
Jisung stilled. Then, he slowly opened his eyes, and he was looking at Hyunjin. Seeing him. Believing him. In the faint halo of the sunlight, Hyunjin could see the flash of liquid gold in his dark eyes, warm and so, so bright. His mouth stretched into a wide grin that reached his ears and he surged forward to cup Hyunjin’s face with strong, warm hands.
“You’re here!” he laughed, bringing their foreheads together. “You’ve found me!”
Hyunjin could barely process how close Jisung was to him, more so the fact he was laughing wholeheartedly like he wasn’t on the verge of disappearing forever mere minutes ago. But most of all, he hadn’t realized how much he truly missed him, because Jisung was so, so warm and soft and his childlike laughter brought a tender ache in his chest that had his face crumpling again.
He clutched the collar of Jisung’s shirt tightly, willing his hands to stop shaking. But he feared if he opened his mouth, a cry would come out instead of words.
“Whoa, you grew up so much!” Jisung exclaimed as he leaned back to take a better look at Hyunjin’s face. “I mean, I grew up too, duh. But it was kinda hard to imagine how you’d grow up too, but not bad, Hyunjinie! You’re a lot prettier than I remember.” He grinned and wiped a tear away from his cheek. “But why’re you crying? Were the boys from school mean to you again?”
It was not a cry, nor were it words, but what came out of his mouth instead was a string of incoherent apologies. “I’m -- I’m so -- I’m so sorry, Jisung, I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry, Jisung, so sorry I’m so -- “
“Hey, hey, why’re you apologizing?”
Out of frustration, Hyunjin smacked him on the shoulder. “You know why!”
“Because I disappeared? But that’s not your fault,” Jisung said, genuinely confused. He rolled down his sleeves and used them to wipe at Hyunjin’s snotty, tear-stained face. “If anything, I’m the one who should be sorry for breaking my promise.”
“Promise?”
“I promised I wouldn’t disappear again, even though I knew it’d happen since I couldn’t tell you everything.”
Hyunjin gritted his teeth. “You could have trusted me. We could have -- if you just trusted -- “
“Your heart’s a little gooey, you know,” Jisung laughed quietly, poking him on the left side of the chest, making him stop in the middle of his words. “I know you care so much about what other people think that you’re willing to bend just enough to make them happy, because you want them to like you. I knew if I told you who we really were, you’d force yourself to try and have the same feelings for me because you didn't want to hurt me. And that wasn’t okay at all.”
Hyunjin ducked his head down, but Jisung brought his head back up and beamed at him. “You’ve grown up to be your own person, Hyunjin. This is your life! You decide which paths to take, not your predecessor. And if, in this life, you don’t love the Sun, then that’s okay. Chan would think it’s okay too. I’ll love you and believe in you for the both of us!”
“Why?” Hyunjin jerked away from him and stood up to take a few steps back. “Why do you love and believe in me so much? What if -- what if I wasn’t the Moon? What if I was just a normal kid, and your Moon was out there somewhere else? Would you still feel the same way, then?”
“Of course,” Jisung answered easily, his eyes wide in wonder, and it startled Hyunjin at how much belief he had.
“How do you know that?”
“I just do.”
“But why?”
“Because you’re so easy to love!” Jisung proclaimed confidently as he stood up to put his arms akimbo, only to grasp for the tree trunk to balance himself when he stumbled. Hyunjin leapt forward and held his arms, seeing that he was still weak from sleeping so long. But Jisung wasn’t unnerved by his own words, his own feelings, and he dissolved into shy laughter. “What’s there not to love about you, Hyunjin?”
Hyunjin whispered, “You’re just saying that.”
“Because I’m the Sun? Nah, ‘cause I learned a lot from you, and one of the things I learned was to be myself -- as Han Jisung, and not some piece of a Sun God. I’ll always be Han Jisung first. And right now, I’m saying that I love you as Han Jisung! Even if Han Jisung wasn’t the Sun, he’d still love you, too.”
Jisung looked at him with so much fondness and affection that Hyunjin’s chest might burst. He might faint. He might go crazy if he hadn’t already. The sun never asked for anything in return, and some part of Hyunjin hated that, because he couldn’t understand how somebody could be so selfless and thoughtful and stupid within the same body.
But it was Jisung, the boy with the soft, rosy cheeks with light flecks of freckles across his nose, doe-like eyes beaming with curiosity and wonder to the world that Hyunjin grew up in. It was Jisung, standing there as he was, smiling at Hyunjin like he hadn’t been in pain and alone for all these years, and that waiting had been worth it -- that Hyunjin had been worth waiting for.
In the distance, the moon began to rise along the sun.
“Idiot,” he laughed wetly. “And I love you, as Hwang Hyunjin.”
With the weight of the moonstone in his pocket, gunk in his nose and tears in his eyes, he grabbed Jisung into a tight hug and buried himself into the neverending warmth of the sun.
🌣 ☽
“And the sun returns,” Minho drawled as he breathed in the roses that’d rebloomed around his gate, only to choke on a fly that probably flew up his nostril. “Oh, that was unpleasant.”
“Moondew’s back to normal,” Hyunjin murmured, looking around the area. The sunflowers were standing tall and strong, their faces turned to the bright sun that was shining in the clear, blue sky with drifting clouds and sweeping contrails. The pastures were green and verdant, the fields all plush with bright flowers and wheat, and there were crops already growing along the rows of the farmlands.
“Dude,” Jisung said, “is that you, Minho?”
“The one and only in the -- ow.”
Jisung had rammed into him with arms open. He clung to Minho and jumped in the spot, bringing Minho up and down with him. “You’ve grown up so much too! Do you have plants that talk now? I remember you mentioned you wanted plants who could hex people, which is like, totally a great idea, by the way. Wait. Or did you do that with the sunflowers? Man, your house still looks like crockshit. God, I missed swearing. Crockshit, crockshit, crock -- “
Minho pinched his nose bridge before vehemently shooing them away. “Since when were you so chatty?”
“Since I became real again.”
“You’ve always been real,” Hyunjin said, nudging his shoulder. “Everybody loves the sun.”
Minho darted his black eyes between them before vehemently shooing them away. “Okay, none of that near me. Go away, now. The festival’s over so everybody should be back. I have plants to take care of and cats to feed.”
Jisung planted a wet smooch on Minho’s cheek that had the witch staggering and falling onto his bed of flowers out of shock. “Love you, dude!” He jogged up to meet Hyunjin’s strides and intertwined their hands. “It feels so good to walk out here, again. I missed the people here. Is Granny still alive?”
“I can’t believe you asked me that.”
Jisung blinked. “Wait. She’s dead?”
“No!” Hyunjin tugged him forward and walked faster down the tarmac road. “She’s alive and well and very magical, apparently. Hey, is everyone here magical? That’d explain a lot of things.”
“Well, kinda. You still don’t know?”
“Know what?”
“They’re the Crux,” Jisung explained, swinging their arms back and forth in large sweeps. “The constellation. Your friends, I mean. Minho too. They followed you down here to look after you and anything that could cause you bodily harm, because everyone thought Chaos would do more than just separate us.”
Hyunjin thought of the ribbon of silver in Changbin’s eyes, the knowing sharpness in the way Seungmin watched him, and Jeongin’s questionable walks at night that had him scouting every acre of the alley. They were tied to Moondew because of Hyunjin.
“My friends are stars,” he intoned.
“Yup.” Jisung grinned. “This is exciting, isn’t it? I can finally meet them since everything’s done. Also, I’m starving, so let’s go go go, slowpoke!”
Hyunjin watched in amusement as he hopped around. “You’re just buzzing with energy, aren’t you?”
“Why wouldn’t I? I’ve been hibernating for literally eleven years.”
.
.
.
.
.
.
Granny took one look at Jisung, then at Hyunjin, then glanced up at the sky, before back down at them. “About time that damn eclipse happened. Everybody in town cheered like they nabbed a bunch of fresh corn in time.”
Hyunjin sheepishly dug his heel into the ground while Jisung beamed up at Granny. “I’ve missed your cooking so much, Granny,” he chirped, probably charming his way back into her heart. “Your porridge with blackberry jam was one of the best things I have ever eaten in my entire life -- including the life up there, and before the life down here. Will you make me some again?”
“Flattery will get you nowhere boy, especially when you killed my garden,” she said, narrowing her eyes. “But because you’ve been imprisoned for quite some time, I’ll make this an exception. I will not be cooking with my disastrous son around, however. The Kim’s and Yang’s are back, and so is that Bin boy. Now, shoo!”
The both of them hurriedly rushed out of the cottage gates, Granny’s garden now back to full bloom. Hyunjin saw his friends talking amongst themselves outside of the Kim’s white picket fence, and he called out to them. All three of them turned around and maniacally waved, with Seungmin jumping onto Changbin’s back to make himself higher and more seen.
“There’s no way they’re stars, Hannie,” Hyunjin whispered. “They’re just a bunch of pseudo-country dweebs.”
Jisung sent him a puzzled look. “Pseudo-country? Is that a new genre of country rock?”
Hyunjin didn’t get to reply when Seungmin was pulling him into a hug. He was smiling, flecks of silver dancing in the darks of his eyes, and Jeongin too, who threw his arms around Hyunjin and squished their cheeks together. Changbin hugged Hyunjin the longest, patting him square on the back as he muttered proud words into Hyunjin’s ear that had his chest glowing warm and fuzzy.
“You guys,” Hyunjin began, but stopped, because he was suddenly unsure of what to say. “You -- you guys knew?”
“Yeah,” Seungmin said in the most casual tone possible, “we’re stars. You know, the little celestial bodies you see up in the sky most of the time? I’m Becrux. I have an apparent magnitude of 1.30 and am approximately 350 light years distant from the solar system.” He turned to Jisung, eyeing him from head to toe. “Why’s the Sun so short?”
Cue the next few minutes of Jisung chatting up a storm and chasing after Seungmin with a stick. Jeongin joined in the hunting party when he found a large log and carried it with him with seemingly murderous intentions. Changbin looked like he was slowly aging the more he watched the three of him, his arms crossed against his chest.
Hyunjin tucked his hands into the pockets of his jacket. “So. You’re a star.”
“I’m your best friend, above all things,” he corrected seamlessly, and Hyunjin couldn’t help but smile. “We all are. We, you know, had a celestial obligation, but like you -- like Jisung -- we all grew up to be our own persons and had the chance to form genuine bonds with other people. Clearly, I had a lot of fun growing up.” He muttered wryly, before letting out a sigh. He threw an arm around Hyunjin’s shoulder. “I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you.”
“I’m not angry,” he reassured. “Maybe if I knew, like, five years earlier, I’d get super angry, but I’m -- I think I grew up. Didn’t I?”
Changbin grinned. “You grew up in the best way ever.”
His heart swelled, and he ducked his head laughing. “Hey. Does this mean you guys can finally leave Moondew?”
“Mhm. I’m not sure about the other guys. Hell, maybe I’ll take them with me. But I, for one, would like to see the city.” Changbin stretched his arms wide and looked up at the warm sky with closed eyes. “It’d be nice to see more of the world.”
Hyunjin smiled and looked back at the three running around.
Yeah. It’d be nice.
🌣 ☽
When all three of them returned back to their homes, Hyunjin and Jisung wandered down the path to the meadow.
The sun was beginning to set, smothering the sky in hazy oranges and pinks. Past the pampas grass and green-gold fields, they spotted the rowan tree, and Hyunjin dragged Jisung towards the fairy ring where they sat down in the middle once more. Hyunjin could taste the sweet nostalgia in the air -- just like the good old days, where before sunset, they would wait for the fairies within the circle and talk about all sorts of things to waste time.
“Wow. I’m surprised it’s still here,” Jisung said as he sifted his hand through the dark green grass. His eyes glowed amber in the sun. “Can you believe this is where everything started? You and me, I mean.”
Their shoulders touched. “Yeah. I can believe it.”
Jisung grinned. He plucked a daisy from the grass and lifted it up like a precious stone. “Shall we make flower crowns?”
Hyunjin sighed fondly. “Okay.”
He fell into a comfortable routine of collecting wildflowers for Jisung to do the weaving, and after a few minutes of warm silence, Jisung asked, “Did you ever write a book yet, Hyunjin? I’ve always wondered, because I told you I’d be the first one to buy it. It’d suck if you did and I couldn’t even go near it.”
“No, I -- don’t worry about it. I haven’t published anything. I’ve had something in the works, but I stopped because I kinda gave up on it,” he admitted sheepishly. “But I know what I want to write, now. A children’s book.”
“Oooh. What will it be about?”
“That’s for me to know and for you to find out.”
Jisung scoffed. “Okay, party pooper. Fine. Be that way.”
Hyunjin nudged him in the side with an elbow. Jisung stuck his tongue out and then yelled out in indignation when something flew to his eyelid. Something soft brushed against Hyunjin’s cheek, and he almost went cross-eyed as he tried to look at the fairy floating close to him.
There were many of them, this time. The golden chorus of fairies fluttered around them in playful enthusiasm, and Hyunjin could hear the warbled sounds of tittering as they surrounded Jisung, who was growing red by the second as he petulantly swatted at them with the flowers gripped in his hands.
“Shut up, you stupid flies!” Jisung complained. “All you fae do is get my blood boiling!”
“What are they saying?” Hyunjin frowned.
“Nothing! They’re just teasing me and being a bunch of busybodies and asking me to spill details! Like, don’t they have better things to do, like keeping a look out for a literally angry embodiment of the universe -- ow!”
Hyunjin watched Jisung get attacked by a swarm of angry fairies, but he noticed one wandering idly about in front of him. Though they were the size of the tiny stars that were seen from below, Hyunjin could immediately identify the lone fairy as the one who had appeared the day he first arrived at Moondew. Without the fairy, Hyunjin wouldn’t have gone to Minho, and he wouldn’t have found Jisung. And Jisung would have disappeared, forgotten and unloved.
He looked to where the forest was. In the distance, the white stag watched them from afar alongside other creatures of the forest, icy feathers hanging from its bine stems of antlers, its eyes glowing more warmly than before. Hyunjin smiled at it, before he looked back at the fairy.
He stuck out a hand. The fairy saw that as an invitation to land on top of his palm. Hyunjin brought his hand closer, raising it to his eyes, and murmured, “Thank you.”
He received a high-pitched chitter as a response.
Gold dust lingered on Jisung’s cheeks and hair after the indignant fairies finally spared him. Jisung huffed and tried to tame his wild hair, before laughing when one of the fairies got tangled in the strands from trying to help him out.
The world was bathed in his radiant laugh that wrestled itself into Hyunjin’s mind, and his eyes skimmed over the cardinal line of the earth where the glorious sun burned ever so brightly behind the coral mountains.
Hyunjin wouldn’t have ever thought that this was where he would be right now -- that their small hands pressed onto the concrete and copper wires in the past would exist today with their hands pressed against each other instead.
All this time, he’d pondered the great mystery behind Han Jisung, when it had all been so simple. Jisung was the sun, the child or piece or remnant of a God, the harbinger of light and life, the caster of sun illusions in a maze of sunflowers, but to Hyunjin -- Han Jisung was merely a simple boy whom he fell in love with eleven years ago.
The fairies swirled above their heads. Jisung dusted off the gold grains from his shoulder and held up the flower crown to Hyunjin.
“Hey, hey. Do you remember? As kids?” Jisung gave a gummy smile, a twinkle in his eye as he raised the finished crown to place over the top of Hyunjin’s head. “Hwang Hyunjin! The king of the fairy ring --” he swung his arm in a grand, wide sweep, “-- the lover of the sun.”
It made sense now, he thought. He snorted at the cheesiness, but he plucked the crown off from his head and reached over to place the flower crown over Jisung’s anyway. Then, his hand slides down to frame the side of his face, cradling the warmth of his cheek.
“Han Jisung. The king of my heart,” Hyunjin whispered, leaning forward to press a kiss to the tip of his nose, and laughed. “The lover of the moon.”
Never step into a fairy ring, or it will bring you bad luck.
And for once in her life, Granny was wrong, and Hyunjin proved it by showing her the very sun in his hands.