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The first time you meet the witch, he steals your heart.
In some ways, it’s your fault; Jungkook and Jin both warned you away, and when those two agree on something, you usually take note. But you’re desperate and curious and so you find yourself on the porch of the little apartment. Yoongi had impatiently given you the address for it this morning. It isn’t what you expected. Magic is something you’ve only recently discovered, and there’s still some notion of cobwebs and owls and creepy lighting floating through your head.
This apartment is not that. A little old, perhaps, with peeling brown paint on the door, but it is otherwise clean and bright and owl-free. Your first and only clue that something is different about the small house is that the door opens under the fist you’d raised but never knocked with – and no one is on the other side.
Before that can do more than bring a goose bump or two on your skin, a mild voice issues from down an incredibly ordinary hallway. “Please come in. I’m just attending to something right now.”
Your pause is momentary, and for a few seconds you seriously consider leaving. But none of your trio of magic-knowledgeable friends had said the witch was dangerous, exactly. Powerful beyond any of them, and a little strange, they’d said. Unusual wasn’t necessarily dangerous, and besides, the ache in your chest couldn’t wait, the memories couldn’t wait, and, frankly, you couldn’t wait.
Swallowing, you force your feet into motion. You walk by a collection of pictures hung on the wall, capturing a variety of people with one man present in almost all of them – tall, blonde, mostly solemn. You actually recognize Yoongi in one, hanging off the shoulders of another man whose smile is so brilliant you’re surprised that the camera didn’t pick up a glare. Yoongi is smiling, too, that same goofy grin that he gets when he’s fooling around with Jungkook. You don’t see it very often, but anyone that can make Yoongi smile like that is already good in your books. Your hand rises instinctively, as though to touch it, before you yank it back down, berating yourself. You always want to touch things when you’re nervous – a bad habit.
Pulling yourself away, you continue down the carpeted hallway, pausing at the intersection of two rooms, both of them with doors closed. The voice comes again from the left. “Just through here, if you’d like.”
Obeying, you hesitantly twist the knob and push the door, breath catching in a mixture of trepidation and anticipation as it swings open. And to some extent, you finally get an indication that the man inhabiting this house isn’t someone you’d just casually pass on the street.
His back is to you, and the black sweater stretching across his shoulders does nothing to imply an air of magic. But it doesn’t need to. He’s bent over a cauldron that’s just… floating… in the middle of the kitchen. It’s innocuous in the absolutely comfortable way it fits in among the strands of herbs hanging from little hooks in the ceiling, the thick books scattered in neat array on the kitchen table and counters. Whatever’s inside the cauldron is a dark purple, bubbling softly, and you think that’s where the sweet, oddly nostalgic scent pervading the room is coming from.
You stand, awkward and silent, hands playing nervously with a loose string on your cardigan. Thankfully he doesn’t keep you waiting for long. Letting the wooden spoon he was using fall to the side, the tall man leaves off his potion and turns, a soft, professional smile on his face. He’s… not what you expected, though by now you should have expected that. No warts or boils, no cruel eyes or snaggleteeth. In fact –
Biting at your lip, you tear your eyes away, fix them on the handsome man’s shoulder. “Hello,” he says, seeming not to notice your staring. “My name’s Namjoon. It’s Y/N, right?” When your gaze cuts up sharply in surprise, his smile becomes a little more amused. “Yoongi hyung mentioned you might be coming by this afternoon.”
“But how -” Your teeth clamp down over the question in embarrassment, but he laughs. “How did I know it was you?” He taps the side of his nose teasingly. “Witches know these things. Isn’t that why you came to me?”
Before you can stutter a reply, the cauldron’s simmering becomes louder, an insistent bubble, and he grimaces apologetically. “Just a moment.” A sharp whistle jumps from his lips, and a second later you almost scream as an upright brown shape, about two feet tall, comes bumbling into the kitchen, nearly running into your feet in the process. You leap back with a gasp, almost stumbling over Namjoon, and his attempt to catch you is nothing short of ungainly; an errant elbow knocks into the spoon still resting in the cauldron, and it falls with a clatter, spilling gobs of the liquid all across the tile floor.
“Aish, Ryan!” Namjoon scolds as the both of you manage to catch yourselves and hurriedly straighten. The thing – Ryan? – hangs its head, and despite your flustered mortification you can’t help but stare. It looks like a brown teddy bear, a bear with round ears, and a white muzzle and stomach, and it moves as easily as if it were alive. In fact, when its shiny black eyes meet yours, it winks, and your hand flies up to cover your gasp.
Meanwhile the witch has grabbed a cloth from one of the cupboards and is cleaning up the purple splashes, muttering to himself in a language you don’t recognize. After a moment he pauses, as though something just occurred. Letting the cloth fall back to the floor, he straightens, holding onto the spoon. “Ryan, could you get this? And after, I need you to stir the mixture, please.”
The bear salutes smartly, and begins to pull the cloth across the floor with energetic motions. Namjoon is blushing faintly, you realize, but he’s also smiling again, and it occurs to you that your mouth is open. You snap it shut.
“My familiar,” he explains ruefully to your nonplused expression. “Y/N, meet Ryan the lion.” At the sound of his name, the – lion? – bows extravagantly, ears twitching but blank expression unchanged.
A surprised sound, somewhere between a laugh and another gasp, comes from your throat. “Oh…” you say weakly, and the lion’s ears droop, almost as though disappointed in your response. Swallowing, you force a smile to your face. “Hi Ryan. It’s, umm, nice to meet you.”
Nodding eagerly, the familiar run over and taps your leg before returning to the cloth. You can barely pull your wide eyes away from the busy lion, who leaps agilely up onto the table set next to the cauldron and starts stirring, but Namjoon clears his throat and with difficulty you turn back to the witch. “I’m sorry about that,” is his sincere apology. “Ryan is rather young, and sometimes he gets… overexcited.”
“It’s okay. He just, uh, surprised me,” you admit. Thinking of the lion’s soft round ears, you add, “He’s really cute though.”
Namjoon practically beams, the expression utterly unexpected on the dignified lines of his face. “Isn’t he?” the witch asks enthusiastically. “I’m very pleased with how he turned out.” He reigns in his pleasure with obvious difficulty, and straightens. “But, I’m sorry – you aren’t here to meet Ryan. Yoongi hyung didn’t tell me what you wanted, exactly…?”
The spectacle of the bear-that-wasn’t-a-bear and the pleasant thrill of seeing more magic had shoved your issue from your mind, but at his question it returns with a vengeance and you grimace. The pain flows back in, almost soft but far too deep for you to handle, and you find yourself biting at your lip again. Taking a deep breath, you force your eyes to meet his intent, patient look, struggling not to fidget. There’s something oddly calming about the way he smiles, encouraging but willing to wait, and the mixture of embarrassment and hurt and anxiety eases just a little.
“I recently became friends with Jin and Jungkook,” you begin tentatively, but grow more confident under his understanding gaze. “They’ve been telling me about magic, and – that’s how I met Yoongi – and they’ve been talking about the things that you can do. I heard – well, what can you do?”
If he’s taken aback by your sudden question, Namjoon doesn’t show it. Running a contemplative finger over his lip, eventually he gestures, encompassing all of the little things gathered in the kitchen. “It’d be a bit hard to run over all of the things I can do. There’s quite a lot.” No sign of arrogance marks the statement, but you know it’s almost an understatement. Jungkook speaks of Namjoon in a tone of awe, odd to hear in the competitive witch apprentice, and even Yoongi has a wary kind of respect for the man, something you don’t often see in the elementalist.
Unaware of your train of thought, Namjoon gives a self-deprecating shrug as he continues. “And I am a varying level of accomplished in those things. How about you explain what you were hoping for, and we can see how it might be done?”
You can’t exactly refuse such a reasonable suggestion, though unhappy unease twists in your stomach at the thought. There’s something childish about what you're requesting, you’re aware of that, but is it really so wrong to want to be rid of your heartache? To let go of the weight, if there’s a safe place you can drop it? Jin seemed to find it unwise, but he hadn’t stopped you, and Yoongi had snorted but made no objections. Didn’t a lot of people make this kind of request?
The back-and-forth argument rages in your head, but you’ve already made up your mind in coming here. You take another deep breath. “I’ve heard,” you say carefully, “that witches can… do things… with emotions. Like… make people feel something… or take something away.”
As the last of your quiet words fall between you two, Namjoon’s eyes soften into something almost unbearably sympathetic. “Ah,” the witch says. “May I ask which of those you want?” There’s something in you that needs to hesitate, but Namjoon’s gaze is unwavering, almost hypnotic, and you find yourself answering.
“Yes,” you reply, and it feels like the words are being gently but inexorably pulled from you. “I – my boyfriend, he… We aren’t together any more.” Thick, heavy, your emotion curls in your chest and sits there, almost like a cat but too close to being pointed for that. You don’t have the kind of words necessary to explain your shame, your hurt, your bewildered anger at the thought of your boyfriend, probably sitting somewhere with the girl he’d been seeing for months behind your back. You’re aware of a pitiful desperation across your face but you can’t help it; it’s as natural and urgent as breathing at this point.
Namjoon says nothing, letting you continue. “Can you do something for that? Make me forget or – or hurt less?” Tears prick at your eyes but you refuse to let them fall, not in front of some stranger, witch or not.
He turns away from you, his elegant hands skimming over a few of the books on the counters with a restless air, and you’re grateful for that bit of privacy to regain control. “Taking things away is much, much harder than adding,” Namjoon explains gravely. “When I add, I am only building on what is already there. But to take away…” His fingers flip slowly through a few pages of one of the tomes, and your stomach tightens in dread of rejection.
“Ryan, can you please go fetch the Morose Mirror from the library? I believe it’s on the back bookshelf… maybe the third shelf?” You’d almost forgotten about the familiar, but he immediately drops the spoon, leaps to the floor and runs, hitting the doorframe and knocking himself flat. As Namjoon sighs, the lion picks himself back up, seemingly unfazed, and hurries from the room.
Lips thin, the witch turns back to you, and his expression is still solemn enough that you can’t help but feel you’re about to be told no. “Taking away something – anger, grief, heartache – is actually taking away a part of who you are. It’s taking away a bit of your soul, and that is never an easy or entirely predictable thing. I understand how much you must be hurting right now… but maybe it might be better to wait? To see how you feel in a few weeks or months? In the meantime, I could give you a bit of happiness, or perhaps some excitement, to draw your mind away?”
You blink and already your head is shaking, fervently despite the mildness of his suggestion. “I can’t wait,” you say, quiet and miserable. “I – if it had happened before I knew about magic, I might have been – maybe I could have. But Jin told me there’s ways to get rid of this and I just can’t wait anymore.”
Namjoon says nothing and that makes you more desperate. “I can pay you,” you promise, hands trembling as you grab at your purse. “I know you take – Yoongi said you take money, or – he said sometimes you ask for something else? Whatever it is, I can pay it. Please, I -”
“It’s unfortunate.” Namjoon’s voice is so firm, it sails right over your own words. “Magic can give so much, but sometimes all it does is make people aware of what they can’t have.” He turns away again as your hands fall limply, and begins stirring the concoction that’s been simmering contentedly this whole time. “Magic isn’t an easy fix – it doesn’t give without asking for a great deal in return. I wish I could convince people of that without them having to suffer the experience.”
Mutinous silence is your only defense, because you don’t entirely understand what the witch is saying, and you don’t feel like you should care. It hurts so much, and you don’t see this pain making you into a better person or something. It’s not doing anything for you, except making it hard to go out in public for fear of running into people your boyfriend knew. Hard to listen to songs, in case one you shared comes up. Hard to get out of bed in the morning, for fear of remembering what you don’t have. You won’t regret that being gone.
Maybe Namjoon senses your disagreement; he sighs and runs his fingers through his hair in one slow, frustrated motion. “I never can convince them, though,” he observes, as though to the empty air, and turns back to you. All sign of playfulness is gone, his face set and businesslike. “May I assume you’ll just go find another witch, if I refuse you?”
Unable to quite believe your luck, hoping against hope, you just nod. Yoongi knows all sorts of magic-users, and you’ve already gotten a collection of names from him.
“As you like. I’ll do it.” Namjoon’s voice is resigned, so much so it takes a bit of the exuberance from your relief… but only a bit. Finally, finally you’re going to be rid of this shadow that’s been haunting your steps ever since you’d discovered the truth. Finally, you’re going to set the weight down.
“Thank you Namjoon!” you exclaim. “I’m sure you’ll do this just fine; I promise you won’t regret it.”
“It’s not my regret I’m concerned about,” he replies sharply, but that doesn’t erase the smile that spreads like sunlight over your face. Even the ominous tone isn’t enough to dampen your enthusiasm, regardless of the risk, and under your relieved grin, he falters a little.
Coughing, he bends down, and you bite back a yelp as Ryan abruptly appears by your foot, dragging a dark silver book that’s thinner than the ones Namjoon has spread throughout the kitchen. With a Herculean effort he thrusts the tome into Namjoon’s hands, and the witch grins fondly at the expressionless lion that still manages to swell proudly under that look. “Good job, Ryan. We’ve got a long day ahead of us, but tonight I’ll let you join Mang and Chimmy when Hoseok and Jimin come over. You deserve it.”
The lion does an excited dance before clambering back onto the table and taking up his stirring task again. Namjoon’s smile fades into something stern as he turns back to you, and you clasp your hands primly in front of you, feeling like a grade schooler about to be scolded.
“I’ll do this, but it isn’t free. As I said, magic never is.” If you hadn’t been so excited, you might have swallowed nervously at the sardonic promise in his voice. “In payment, you’ll assist me for three weeks, three times a week, however so I desire. It will involve a lot of fetch and carry tasks, but I’ll also teach you a few things.”
Once again, but in a totally different way… this is not what you expected. Your mouth has fallen open. You hurriedly close it, and hope your eyes aren’t as close to popping out of your head as they feel. When you manage to speak, your voice is a strangled whisper. “But… why? You have…” Helplessly you gesture at Ryan, fiercely absorbed in his mixing.
Finger skimming across his lip, Namjoon tilts his head. “Do you think Ryan can procure me things from the store? Or pick flowers from the nearest park?” Flushing as you imagine the reaction to a teddy bear running manically around the spices aisle, you look down and he continues. “No, my familiars are strictly for working in the house, or at Gatherings. They can’t go outside, or at least not without my presence. You can help with that. Besides… Yoongi isn’t much inclined to teaching, Jungkook is far too young in the arts, and Jin…”
You expect him to make a disparaging remark and can’t help but bristle, ready to come to his defense. Jin might be erratic, but he’s one of the kindest individuals you know, and not even an experienced witch can get away with insulting him on your watch. Namjoon surprises you. “Jin is an excellent mentor when he isn’t busy, but he’s working on a project right now and I imagine instructing you is hindering his progress. I could help him by taking you on.”
It hasn’t occurred to you that Jin is busy, but if you thought on it… he has been spending an awful lot of time in his kitchen of late. You’ve never been in there – he’s expressly forbidden it, saying you’d mess up his “marvelous work” - and you sort of just thought he was experimenting with recipes, but maybe it was more than that? Beyond that… is there anything wrong with having Namjoon as your teacher?
Yoongi throws out helpful advice with infuriating casualness, Jungkook is only a few months further into his studies than you are. Jin is fun to learn from, but if your inexperienced presence is holding him back… And Namjoon doesn't seem so bad. Does he? A bit intimidating, sure, and very competent, but he also sees calm, maybe even kind. Surely three weeks won’t even be a chore, but rather a great chance to learn?
Maybe if you throw yourself into your work, you’ll even forget about your boyfriend that much quicker.
You’re not proud of the fact, but it’s that thought that cements it. “Sounds good,” you say, blurting out the words so you don’t regret them. “I can help you with any kind of tasks – Jin’s already had me measuring a lot of ingredients and things.”
He seems a bit taken aback by your abrupt, hesitation-free enthusiasm, but witches don’t turn away from such contracts, even if they’ve only been spoken. “It’s a deal, then,” Namjoon says smoothly. “I will take away your heartache, and you’ll apprentice to me for three weeks, free of charge.” When you nod, he whistles again, but the notes are just a little bit different and Ryan doesn’t react.
This time you’re less surprised when another small creature scurries into the room. It's a koala, but a pale blue instead of the normal grey, and it immediately clambers into Namjoon’s arms, clinging to him as it stares at you curiously. Feeling a bit more confident, you give the familiar a small wave. “Hi,” you say softly, and it waves back.
“Koya, meet Y/N. She’s going to be helping us for a little bit, but first we need to help her. That’s only fair, right?” There’s something a little ironic about the way Namjoon says it, but the tone flies over the familiar’s head and it bobs in agreement, and you try to suppress the flutter of nerves in your stomach. Holding Koya in one hand, the witch flips through the blue book Ryan had fetched with the other, his full lips moving soundlessly as he reads. Every once in awhile he says something to the familiar, who listens intently, but you don’t know any of the terms he uses. Eventually they finish their consultation, though he keeps the book open, set on top of another of one of those already opened on the counters.
When he turns, he starts slightly, as though he’s already forgotten you’re there. “Oh. Y/N. This is going to take quite awhile to prepare – would you like to come back later?”
You can’t tell if he’s trying to get rid of you, or if this is a test of some sort, him looking at how ready you are to work. Shifting, eventually you shrug. “I could stay and help, if you wanted.”
He shakes his head regretfully. “I’m sorry, and I mean no offense, but this is a little too much for you at this point.” You nod quickly, mortification running with rampant heat across your cheeks, but then Namjoon’s expression brightens. “You could stay and watch, though. If you take over for Ryan, I could use him to help Koya and I, and we’ll be finished that much faster.”
Uncertainly your eyes go to the bubbling pot, and, perhaps sensing your apprehension, Namjoon adds, “It’s essentially complete; all you’ll need to do is stir it consistently, as Ryan is doing right now. If anything unusual happens I’ll be nearby to deal with it.”
That seems… manageable. And besides, you can hardly tap out now, after saying you’d be willing to help with this sort of thing. “Okay,” you agree. Ryan hands off (paws off?) the spoon happily enough, and you find the task a little more difficult than expected; whatever Namjoon’s making, it’s far thicker than it looks, and sticks greedily to the wood like it’s trying to suck it into the cauldron. You persevere though, and soon you’re comfortable enough to take your eyes from the purple liquid and see how Namjoon and his familiars are getting on.
And they are getting on. It’s a mixture of amazing and intimidating to watch the trio at work; they move around each other confidently, smoothly, and even Ryan’s exuberance is tempered into something more productive. Namjoon raps out instructions, most of which go above your head, and the familiars rush about, grabbing things from the shelves of the kitchen or disappearing from the room only to reappear minutes later with something else. The counter is efficiently stripped of books (except for the Morose Mirror), the cleared space used to pile herbs and metals and little trinkets you don’t recognize.
Namjoon isn’t just sitting back giving orders. As the little animals bring in materials, he arranges them, judges them with a critical eye, rejecting this or asking for more of that. Koya lugs in a heavy jar of some kind of dark green dust, and Namjoon begins sprinkling that in agonizingly precise lines across the kitchen floor, murmuring some kind of chant under his breath. The level of intensity, of focus, in every single deliberate move he makes is staggering; once again you feel as though you’ve disappeared. The process stretches on for at least two hours, the light filtering through the windows growing dim, and the only time he speaks to you is to ask you and the familiars to move the cauldron to give him more space.
(Your fears about being burned are unfounded; the metal is cool to the touch, and you’re not sure how the liquid is being heated, but it’s certainly not by any fire.)
It’s almost sobering, the level of detail he’s putting into the lines on the floor. It makes it obvious how intricate the spell is; how easy a mistake would be to make. Yet watching Namjoon, observing the fierce crinkle between his brow as he nudges a bit of the powder into a straighter line, places one of the pieces of metal just so, you don’t find yourself nervous. His natural mastery is so obvious, it’s a numbing comfort, soothing away most of your fear. A question occurs in that muted, stretched out time, and as the preparations dwindle to a close, you voice it.
“How do you take away my – the emotion?” Namjoon looks up from the silver book he’s been reading and re-reading for the last ten minutes, and for the second time that night he looks taken aback by your presence.
As his eyebrows furrow you’re quick to add, “Not – I don’t need a complex explanation. I mean – what happens to the emotion?” Maybe that would be something simple enough for him to explain.
Namjoon stretches, long and luxurious, the muscles in his forearm standing in stark contrast under his skin. (He rolled up the sleeves of the black sweater before he began). You pull your eyes away, blushing faintly and more than a little appalled at the direction your mind is going. You’re here to get rid of feelings for your ex, not think about how good another guy looks! But even as you chide yourself, you can’t put much heart into it. The witch is, it must be admitted, extremely good-looking, veering away from Jin and Jungkook’s classical beauty into something a little more unusual. It’d be hard not to think about how attractive he is, at least briefly.
You pull your mind away from it when Namjoon replies thoughtfully. “What happens to it? Well… I suppose the simplest explanation is that I receive it.”
Eyes widening in disbelief and no small amount of horror, you stare at him. “What? It – you have to carry it?”
He laughs lightly at your expression. “Oh, it could never be as heavy for me as it is for you. And because it is not mine, it will fade more easily, with time.”
“But how can that be worth it? How can you stand it?”
You can’t help your incredulous questions, but he doesn’t seem offended or surprised. “There is very little that can’t be borne, Y/N,” he says, and there’s definitely a gentle rebuke in that. “For a price, I’m willing to do it, because what I get out of it is worth the difficulty.”
There’s something so serenely certain about his words that you find yourself at a loss for what to say. You can’t imagine ever being so casual about taking on the kind of pain that’s living in your chest – hell, you can’t even imagine living with it for a few more days, let alone forever. Settling with saying nothing, you go back to stirring the pot, and Namjoon goes back to reading. It isn’t long, however, before he closes the book with a decisive snap that makes you jump.
“I’m ready,” he says to your mildly startled expression. “Are you?”
The rush of anxiety that slams into the dam of your resolve makes you sway… but the wall holds, and after a moment you stiffen your spine and nod. It’s almost decisive. “I’m ready.”
Namjoon considers you for a long moment. “This is my last warning, Y/N. You will lose your heartache, but it is a part of who you are. Perhaps even a large part – I cannot know until we start. There is no way to get it back, exactly as it was before. Are you sure you want to lose it?”
If anything, your nod is even more decisive. “Yes, I’m sure,” you declare, and swallow the bit of uncertainty scratching at your throat. “I’d like to get it over with, though.”
“As you say.” Namjoon gestures at Koya and Ryan, who’ve been perched dutifully at the doorway of the kitchen, locked out by the wide lines Namjoon had painted. They quickly run to the cauldron, helping each other place a lid over it before scurrying away – and this time they don’t come back. “They’re magic,” he explains idly to you, “and with some major spells their presence becomes disruptive. Better that they’re away from here.”
You murmur your understanding, and Namjoon lights several candles, placing them outside the circle. And then the witch is taking your hand with his warm one, pulling you to a specific spot on the complex design spread throughout the room. There’s a deep red stone near one of your feet, a jagged black one near the other, and the lines in this area of the design remind you of a maze, funnelling away from you until they change into whorls and jagged lightning further out. Namjoon stands in the center, and he brings a strange sensation of uniformity to the otherwise random assortment. You feel a tingle, like static running over your skin, and recognize it from being near Yoongi and Jin when they’re using magic.
“Be very careful not to move, Y/N. It would break the spell, and while I’ve set containments to lessen the chance of any pushback, it would still be dangerous. This will hurt in a way you’ve never experienced before, but it will not be agonizing, or anything near it. Just keep your eyes closed, breathe, and, if you can, focus on sending what you want to give me into the lines on the ground. You’ll be able to feel them once we start – mentally picture your emotion draining into those lines and travelling towards me, and it will be easier.”
You nod nervously, not – quite – shifting on your feet, and Namjoon doesn’t hold you in suspense. With an abruptness that makes your breath catch, there’s a sudden shift, like a curtain being ripped back, and suddenly you’re aware of two sources of power far beyond anything you’ve ever felt before. The first are the lines, pulsing as they curl across the floor, and you find as you look at them that your eyes can no longer trace the shapes. They almost seem to quiver, to breathe, to move, mingling together and then spreading out again in a weave of energy that focuses on the rocks and other items scattered throughout them. It makes you vaguely nauseous to look at them.
The other source is Namjoon himself, and he is a blaze against your mental perception. Neither of your mentors have yet had reason to expose their power to you, and when you’ve practiced with Jungkook, his light was a steady but small fire, eagerly consuming fuel and flaring with the potential to grow bigger, stronger. Namjoon is a lightning bolt, ragged around the edges but pulled into an unyieldingly sharp form, blinding to consider for any length of time. His power sends painful prickles of energy skittering across your skin, but the pain only exacerbates your awe; it’s a reminder of what could be, if Namjoon didn’t hold such masterful control over it. He stands with his feet apart, head a little back, lips parted, eyes open but unseeing, and the unearthly, almost divine focus on his face is hard to look at for long.
Remembering your instructions, you wrench your eyes closed. As promised, you can feel the lines, just as easily as seeing them, and you begin searching in your chest, ripping out the black and red sensation nestled there. It is not easy, and Namjoon’s promise shortly comes true; a pain the likes of which you’ve never felt accompanies the attempt. Hollow, somewhere under your skin and inside your lungs, the pain is far from agony, and you persist, gradually pushing more and more of the emotion into the thick bands of energy at your feet. There’s another sensation across from you, like a magnetic pull, and you realize it must be Namjoon, collecting what you’re discarding.
It goes slowly until you recall what else the witch said, about actively thinking about the heartache going towards him as well. That’s hard to do as well, though not in an effort sense; you just can’t feel good about giving Namjoon such a pain, and it makes it more difficult to visualize. Guilt settles in your chest, an anchor for the unwanted emotion to cling to.
You tell yourself that of all people, Namjoon can handle it. More than that, you’ll make sure he gets a good deal out of this. You’ll work as hard as you possibly can, be the best student you can possibly be, make sure you never once make him regret helping you. You’ll give him everything you have for three weeks, and with Namjoon’s help you’ll grow stronger and better out of the dark relationship you can’t shake by yourself. He’ll be holding your heartache – but in a way, he’ll be holding more than that, too.
Somehow, somewhere in the process of arguing with yourself, you’ve been persuaded; everything is abruptly easier. The flow goes fast, and then faster and faster, until everything pulling from your chest blends together into an indistinguishable white mass. Eyes tightly shut, you welcome it, welcome the hollow sensation that quickly fills in the spot that pain had chiselled out. It feels like stretching, small pain promising far greater satisfaction, and you stretch more and more and more and –
“Y/N.” Namjoon’s voice is a light switch, plunging you into darkness, and suddenly you can’t feel any of the throbbing energy that had surrounded you just seconds before. You feel the loss, intensely at first but then fading, growing fainter until it’s more like an uncertain memory, one you grope to find but can’t quite latch on to. The sensation is unnerving, and your eyes fly open.
Namjoon is still standing across from you, but now his head is down, his eyes shut. His hand hovers uncertainly over his chest, and as you watch he touches himself, gingerly, just where his heart is. You stare for a long moment before you realize something – you feel something strange when you look at him. Not nervous, or happy, and certainly not sad. There’s a haunting echo humming in your veins, something you’re supposed to remember but don’t – and you don’t feel sad. The grin that splits your lips is automatic.
“You did it,” you tell him, and though you expected an exuberant note it comes out a little flat.
The witch stirs, and when he looks up, his face has gone white. “I did it,” he agrees unevenly, his voice hoarse with fatigue, and then he’s swaying. Your alarm is immediate and forceful, and you help him into one of the chairs pushed unceremoniously to the side of the kitchen, heedlessly breaking through the lines. Something tells you they don’t matter anymore, and nothing happens.
Namjoon is still clutching at his chest, and you feel that strange sensation again. In your current state, you don’t really care; your heartache is completely, utterly gone. “Thank you, Namjoon,” you say, and this time you manage the right amount of sincerity. “I – I didn’t imagine what this would feel like. It’s wonderful.”
Wearily Namjoon lifts his head up, considering you as his fingers rub against his collarbone. “Does it?” he asks quietly. “Feel wonderful?”
His question is so grave you pause, considering. The way he asks it makes you think he knows something you don’t, something he wants you to figure out for yourself. There is definitely something strange about not having your heartache, about not having that heavy weight. It’s like you’ve lost your anchor, and now you’re floating, weightless and free. It is not an entirely pleasant experience, but it’s definitely better than the alternative… Isn’t it?
You lift your head defiantly. “It does,” you insist. “I – I can’t feel the pain anymore.”
“That’s good. Tell me… what can you feel?”
Again you need to pause, again you need to consider. Beyond the weightlessness, you just feel – what do you feel? That hollow space inside of you is bigger than you expected, bigger than you thought your heartache would be. It’s a little bit frightening, blindly scrabbling inside looking for something that has always been there, and you find yourself biting at your lip, rocking back on your heels as your search gets more desperate. Your memories are all there, but some of them are strangely impersonal – and not all of them involve your ex.
After a moment, your eyes meet his. “I don’t know what I feel,” you confess. “Is this – did something go wrong?”
His hand tilts back and forth, a tired ‘so-so’ motion. “No… and yes. I took your heartache… I think it was more than you expected it to be. Much more.” After a moment, barely above a whisper, he admits, “More than I expected, too.”
“What does that mean?” you demand, suddenly frightened, and Namjoon smiles. The fatigue pulls at his eyes, sets them heavy and shadowed in his face, but his smile is enough to calm you down – and you feel something responding in your chest. It’s small, incredibly small, but it’s warm and you think it has the potential to grow.
“I’m sorry, Y/N,” Namjoon says gently. “I meant to take your heartache – it seems I also stole your heart in the process.”
Before you can react, the witch is suddenly slumping, and you’re catching him and frantically whistling for the familiars. It takes several tries, but eventually you get the right note, and Koya and Ryan are there, anxiously flitting around their master. Together you lift the unconscious man and struggle to his bedroom – the effort is a blur. You’re far too disoriented to pay any attention, but the truth of Namjoon’s words are a different kind of weight in your stomach, far too heavy to shift, impossible to refute.
Koya disappears for a time, and you sit next to Namjoon, watching the rise and fall of his chest. Ryan doesn’t seem overly distraught, but then again it’s very hard to read anything on the lion’s blank face as he curls against his master. Namjoon is breathing evenly, peacefully even, and Jin’s told you it’s possible to use so much magic your body has no choice but to shut down to recover. Something even deeper than that knowledge tells you not to worry about the witch, at least not too much, and you accept it numbly.
Eventually the koala returns, and with him are two men you’ve never seen, but you think you remember from the photos. One, short, round of face and with a brisk air, shoos you out of the room. “I’m a healer,” he explains matter-of-factly before shutting the door in your face. Behind the wood he adds, “I’ll have Namjoon hyung up again in no time.”
The other one leads you to the kitchen, sits you down at the hastily organized table and, judging by the smell, begins fixing some tea scavenged from the multitude of drawers. “Don’t mind Jimin,” he tells you cheerfully. “He’s just very intent when there’s a job to do; he’ll be happy to meet you later.” A yelp announces him burning himself on the kettle he’s using, and he stares at it reproachfully as he adds, “I’m Taehyung, by the way. It’s nice to meet you, Y/N.”
That’s enough to make you stir, and you look at him dully. “Oh, Koya told me your name,” the man explains. “Actually, he told me everything. That’s a very smart koala.” A laugh leaps carelessly from his lips. “I suppose that’s no surprise, since Joonie is the one who made him.” The irreverent name stirs you even further, and there’s a vague flicker of interest, growing stronger at the strangely heartening cheer Taehyung exudes.
“Everything?” you echo. “He told you… everything?”
“Yup.” Taehyung clatters around the cupboard, noisily hunting down several mugs before beginning to fill them. “Well, he told Tata, my familiar, and Tata told me. Familiars can only talk to each other and their masters, y’know.”
“Then you know… about how it went wrong?”
At that Taehyung, his hands filled with mugs, cocks his head. “Went wrong?” he asks as he sets the mugs on the table. “I dunno about that. Seems weird Joonie got knocked out, I guess, but it’s not unheard of with spells of that level. I’ve heard taking stuff from people is crazy difficult.”
You consider that, hands curling around the pleasantly hot mug, and then you carefully question, “Is it possible he could have, maybe, taken something more? Something he wasn’t supposed to?”
Again Taehyung’s head tilts, a boxy grin crossing his lips. “If it was some two-bit witch just out of the nursery? Sure. But Joonie? Gotta say that’s unlikely. He takes exactly what the person allows him to take.”
“That’s not tr-” you begin, almost heatedly, before cutting yourself off. Your mind flies back to the spell, to your thoughts. Your thoughts, not entirely focused on just giving Namjoon all of your heartache. Your thoughts, which had flitted over how much you wanted to give Namjoon all of your effort, all of your focus and emotion over the next while. With growing dismay, you remember your exact thought – that he’d be holding your heartache, but something more as well.
Falling silent, you take a sip of the tea, the warm, soothing taste making a hum of appreciation thrum in your throat. Before you can assemble your thoughts into anything remotely resembling a coherent sentence or question, Jimin appears, snagging the remaining mug from the table and pulling it close to himself. He looks tired, too, though not in the way that Namjoon had.
“I’ve done what I can,” the healer says to Taehyung’s inquisitive look. “At the very least, hyung won’t wake up with a headache to rival all hangovers. He’s tired, though. Too tired.” You’re a little startled when his dark eyes focus on you. “What happened? What did you do?”
You want to bristle at the slightly accusatory tone, but you can’t manage it – because a part of you is becoming more and more convinced that it’s true. Maybe you did do something.
“I…” You don’t know how to word it, but Jimin doesn’t hassle you any more, just sits in expectant silence, Taehyung wide-eyed and curious next to him. “I think I gave him something more than I expected. More than he expected, too.”
Pushing back his bangs in one slow, considering sweep, Jimin asks his next question more neutrally. “You were giving him your heartache, right? Because you couldn’t handle it? What else did you give him?” It was hard to tell if there was judgement in the second question or not, but you skim over it, too tired and empty to chase it.
“I’m sorry, I’m – I’m not sure. I think that I – I might have given him my…” It felt stupid to say it, but you don’t know how else to describe it. “I might have given him my heart.”
There’s a sharp intake of breath from Jimin, his eyes slightly widening, but Taehyung laughs. “Your heart?” he repeats with good-natured mockery. “Did you put a bow on it too?”
That makes you shift, but Jimin growls before you can respond, short and impatient. “Aish, Tae, it’s not literal. And I think – I think it could be possible. If she was thinking in the wrong way, at the wrong time… And it would explain why hyung is so exhausted – you can’t take that kind of energy and just walk it off. Actually, if it hadn’t been Namjoon, but someone else…”
Taehyung shrugs, easily admitting defeat and ignoring the solemnity of that statement. “Eh, you know more than me, hyung. I’m just a druid – what do I know ‘bout spells? Although seems to me that we should be glad this isn’t exactly permanent.”
After a moment, the tense lines of Jimin’s face relax, and he seems to take some solace from Taehyung’s flippant tone. For your part, you’ve paused with the mug halfway to your mouth, ears straining to hear more. “You know enough,” Jimin concedes. “I doubt it’s permanent.”
“Really?” Your question jilts awkwardly between them, but you can’t care and they don’t seem to mind.
“Really,” Taehyung assures, and Jimin nods, too.
“Yes,” the healer says. “For your part – if your heart, or most of your heart, really is missing, it’s only a matter of building it up again. Of filling in the empty space. With friends, with love, with work and passions and the like – you can do that, pretty easily.” Abruptly he smiles, and the expression transforms his face, taking away the almost sulky cast and leaving something empathetically pleased in it’s wake. “It won’t be the same, but, well… Who knows? Maybe it’ll be better.”
Maybe it’s that seed that Namjoon’s smile planted, or maybe it’s a remnant of whatever remains, but something is in your chest, warm and growing. You return Jimin’s smile, before your gaze pulls to the door, as though you could see through the layers of wood into the witch’s bedroom. “And Namjoon? Will he be okay?”
“Namjoon is the best of us,” Jimin replies, almost fiercely, and Taehyung seconds the words by lifting up his mug. Jimin continues more smoothly. “Transfers last forever, but they don’t have the same impact as time wears on. He’ll always have your heart – but it’ll become a part of him, too.”
Koya ambles around the corner, and you find the koala scaling your leg and then settling in your lap. You stroke your hand through his soft fur, and you think of the witch sleeping upstairs, the witch who took your pain and knew he could be getting far heavier a burden than just that. You think of what Namjoon had said about magic giving, but asking a great deal in return.
My heart, you think to yourself. He stole my heart.
Somehow, sitting in the flickering light cast by the candles, listening to Taehyung and Jimin bicker playfully back and forth, you find yourself content with the price that magic has asked you to pay.