Chapter Text
There’s so much blood.
He’s too high up and he’s so scared but there’s way too much blood and he’s scared of that too but he can’t look away. The little boy sees the crying, the hugging, rows of covered stretchers being wheeled past. People are screaming, and he doesn’t know why. Is something wrong? But… They’re laughing. With tears dripping down their faces, they’re mouths are twisted ghastly in mirth. He doesn’t understand.
There’s a moment when the uproar dies down and then the boy sees him and then he’s running, crying and laughing, feet barely keeping up with his little body, pushing through the hugging crowd. The crowd of strangers threaten to block his view of the man he is running at, but he squeezes through, tiny mouth hanging open somewhere between a desperate shout and a whine. Everything’s chaos. The man turns around and catches his glance and then they’re collapsing into each other, all tired-limbed and teary-eyed and weak-kneed and together . Even as his knee gets caught on the hilt of a sword and his soft hands are stained by the blood leaking out of the man’s covered wounds, even as the ground threatens to shake with the tears that splash the mud and under the weight of the knees that smack the soil, the little boy finally feels safe.
The General is home.
Later that day, the General cleans up his wounds with gauze and thread and lets the blood drain into the bowl, smiling reassuringly at the boy kneeling in front of him, brows furrowed in worry and pink lips forming around the words he read out from an instruction manual.
“Wonho-ah,” The General calls gently, resting a clean hand on the back of the little boy’s head. Wonho doesn’t respond, blinking confusedly at the unfamiliar medical terms.
“Why do we have to press down on the wound? Won’t that hurt you more?”
The General can’t help but chuckle at the childish worry in Wonho’s voice. He puts away the medical supplies and pulls him onto his lap, wrapping the child in a soul-crushing hug. Wonho laughs, small arms flailing in an adorable attempt to fight his way out. He puts his hands onto the Generals chest and pushes so he’s further away, only to get pulled back in in a matter of seconds after dropping his guard due to his excitement over his tiny victory.
“You already won the war! Let me win this fight!” Wonho uses balled up fists to hit the General’s shoulders, regressing to angry baby-babble when his demands aren’t met. He digs his small feet into the General’s back, unknowingly right into a knife wound. Wonho’s anger immediately turns into worry when the General lets out a shout of pain. He paws at the General’s robes, pushing his feet further in in the process. Poor baby. He looks sad and confused as the General lifts him off, trying to crawl back into his lap to look for the source of hurt.
As children’s attention spans go, Wonho actually managed to hold onto his thought for quite a while. But even with his superior memory retention skills, he soon forgot about the wound and found a new topic.
“Why doesn’t the King go with you to war?” He asks this question to the floor, but with small furrowed brows and a pout and the same worried curiosity he had used when reading the healing manual just moments before. The General hesitates before speaking.
“I can’t bring the King with me into war because the throne is nothing without him. The world doesn’t continue to turn unless the King is on his throne. I can’t let any harm befall him.”
Wonho gives all of the General’s blood-stained bandages a once-over, “What about you?”
“What?”
“Then why do you go?”
“The world wouldn’t mourn me.”
At this, Wonho pulls the General’s rough hands into his soft ones, pushing the General’s hand to his lips and whispering into them, “I would.” The General feels Wonho’s eyelashes laced with tears, tickling his knuckles. The tear sinks into his heart like heavy rocks and threaten to rip it in half. He envelopes the child into his embrace and holds him there, hoping he doesn’t feel the General’s tears slip over his head. He wants to protect him from what he’ll eventually have to teach him.
That the King is the flower and the General is the grass. That the grass will yellow and be trodden on and die just so the lovers can get to the flower. That even though he’s being raised side by side with another little boy, in years to come he will kneel at his feet. That the General has died over and over again for the King’s every wish. That he’s written the King into his bones and it’s still not enough. The General wants to protect him from all of that, so he just holds him, body riddled by gashes, as his blood drips dark and red onto the floor.
Wonho falls asleep in his arms.
-
This better be about something important , Hyungwon thinks to himself, rushing out of his room, barely clutching his bag and his dignity as he walks out of the house with his feet tucked into his shoelaces instead of his shoes. He’s completely cool with Changkyun occasionally (and very rarely ) calling him to the office in the middle of the night, but this is the third time this week and Hyungwon needs his beauty sleep. (He looks at his reflection in a passing bus and swallows back his shame, freeing a hand from carrying his bag to brush his stray hairs back. God , he needs his beauty sleep.) He rushes along.
The room is a mess when he walks in, and it takes him all of 5 minutes to locate his boyfriend under a pile of books. What’s going on? Hyungwon forgets all this past shame about his looks when he sees poor Changkyun with his hair sticking up in every direction, a delirious smile on his face. In a matter of seconds, Hyungwon is attacked by wet kisses and while he loves Changkyun and his touch, he really wants to know what’s going on. He escapes Changkyun’s affection and grips him firmly by the shoulders.
“I’m going to be completely professional now so you can stop being embarrassing and tell me what’s going on.”
Changkyun looks like he’s barely keeping it together as he forces himself to stop smiling and stand up straight.
“Im. What’s. Going. On. Why’re you so happy?”
It’s then that Changkyun drops all pretence of being calm. He ducks out of Hyungwon’s grip and runs to the other end of the room, returning with his laptop that’s open to a news article.
REMAINS OF SON KINGDOM TO BE DESTROYED .
Why was Changkyun so happy about this? Hyungwon glances from the laptop to his boyfriend, brows raised, waiting for the ball to drop. Then he sees the letter on the messy desk.
He picks it up and reads it aloud,
“Dear Mr Im Changkyun,
Now that we’ve disseminated the news of the remains of the Son Kingdom being torn down, we have been authorised to allow you and Mr Chae Hyungwon to-”
“EXPLORE AND STUDY THE KINGDOM GROUNDS AND ARTEFACTS!”
With that shout, Changkyun throws himself into Hyungwon’s arms. Hyungwon doesn’t know how to feel. The Son Kingdom was being torn down… But he and Changkyun had been granted a pass to study it before it’s destruction. It’s all they ever wanted, right? He wraps his arms around Changkyun (who’s wriggling into his chest as if there’s room to put more happiness if he could just find it) and feels excited for the first time in a while. Time to uncover history.
He sees Changkyun rolling up his sleeve and laughs. This is going to be good , he thinks. But he feigns annoyance.
“Changkyun, we’ve both been studying the Son Kingdom for years. Do you really have to teach me about it every time-”
“Bup, bup, bup, bup.”
Hyungwon kisses the finger Changkyun has pressed onto his lips, and watches in satisfaction as Changkyun yelps and moves away.
“Not right now, Chae.”
Changkyun is hilarious.
“So. The Son Kingdom. Myth or reality?
“Legend says that centuries ago, there was a powerful kingdom, thrice undefeated. Desperate to hold onto this power, the King sought out a higher power to keep his Kingdom strong. Something no other nation had.
“KRATOS, God of Power. He had been dormant for years, but smelt the King’s ambition and awoke from his slumber. Licking his hungry lips, he offered the King something he could not refuse:
“Power. Infinite power.”
Hyungwon knows to gasp just at this moment. It keeps Changkyun going. What a nerd. Changkyun narrows his eyes mysteriously, leaning forward until Hyungwon can feel his breath brushing his face.
“With only one condition.”
“And what’s that?” Hyungwon responds, just as Changkyun wishes.
“That the balance of power be maintained. Only then could the Son Kingdom be stable. Only then could they maintain their fiery victorious streak. And! If that balance should… tip over, a seed of evil would be planted,”
Changkyun locks eyes with Hyungwon.
“The Son Kingdom would be torn to shreds.”
They kiss.
-
Shownu shifts in his palanquin, careful to keep his body upright and his expression calm. He’s actually itching to jump off and join the eager citizens lining the streets. How wrong that he gets carried along, waving regally at the people as if it’s him they’re celebrating. Is it? He wants to jump off of the throne and run back. Are they okay?
All he was told was that they had won the war. A new era of strength for the Son Kingdom, they tell him. The Generals fought well, he was told. But are the Generals okay? He tugs nervously at his robes, ignoring the annoyed click of the tongue from his chamberlain. Is he okay?
When he’s carried into the courtyard, he can finally see the rows of stretchers being carried past. His ear unblocks with a pop and suddenly the sounds of screaming and wailing overwhelm him. Is it happy? He locks his eyes onto every stretcher that’s hurried past him, praying desperately not to see the man he’s looking for. He sees the families that recognized their loved ones on the bloody stretchers and his heart threatens to rip and sink out of his chest. It almost makes him guilty that he’s relieved it’s not him.
“Ladies and Gentlemen, the First General of the Son Kingdom: Minho.”
He sees the First General kneel at his father’s feet and then press a kiss to his hands. If they wanted any more affection from each other, they don’t show it. Shownu steels himself to do the same when his time comes.
“The Second General of the Son Kingdom: Wonho.”
He feels his heart stop in his chest and the blood stop running through his veins. Jelly-legged and dry-lipped, he sits up straighter as he sees his best friend walk towards him. Wonho looks tired and pale, small and large scratches and gashes lining his body. He’s lost a lot of weight, his cheekbones looking painfully pronounced. But he’s here. And he’s alive. And he’s back.
Wonho’s home.
Wonho doesn’t kneel at his feet but embraces him instead: a reminder that for the first time in their lives, they were of the same status. The Crown Prince and the General, second only to the King himself. He lets himself go in Wonho’s arms. God, he had missed him. He had missed this. It’s not like Shownu hadn’t thought of him every day or held on to every little bit of warmth he received pretending it was from Wonho or gotten through every day knowing Wonho was getting through a day too. But actually having him here, breathing him in and feeling his smile push his cheeks into Shownu’s neck, feeling his fingers grip into Shownu’s robes and pull as if he’s worried it’s all going to slip away— He had missed it so much.
He had missed being able to take Wonho in, instead of taking what he remembered of him and rationing it out for every single day so he didn’t forget his eyes, or smile, or how his tears seemed to follow a specific route down his cheeks. He lets Wonho overwhelm him and pull him close and fit the crooked edges of their tired bodies together and he thinks, some things exist just so Wonho can do them best. He thinks people like him were born only to melt at Wonho’s every touch. He thinks, I’m never letting you go again.
(He has to eventually, but he begs Wonho’s scent to linger on him just that much longer.)
When the chaos has died down and the crowd has cleared out, Shownu all but breaks into Wonho’s room. True to himself, he sits quietly in a corner, and Wonho can feel him watching, eyes intense as they follow the gauze and his fingers, trailing up and down the wounds on his best friend’s body. Wonho doesn’t meet his gaze, choosing to focus on the injuries instead. It feels... wrong. Every waking moment of the two years that Wonho was away, every little inch that his life took a step in any direction, his first and most painful instinct would be to share that with Shownu. (He swears it hurt more than a knife wound every time he remembered there was no way to do that. He swears it hurt every time he laughed and didn’t hear Shownu’s quiet chuckle echoing him. And he swears it hurt like hell every time he reached out for a warm hand in the night and his fingers came back empty.) It feels wrong because, despite all of that, he has nothing to say. He’s crossed the land and the seas and back again, just seconds away from the man he’s been longing for, and now he’s tongue-tied. Funny how that works.
He startles a bit when Shownu’s fingertips brush his, but he relaxes into the touch. They sit there in the silence that slowly becomes comfortable again, fingertips pressed together in just the right way, pulses beating against each other as if sending a message through their veins: I missed you. Will you come closer? Shownu complies with Wonho’s silent wish, shuffling closer, and Wonho feels the tears come charging up to the surface like soldiers marching to the frontlines. (Their enemy? His dignity.) He leans slightly backwards into Shownu’s space and wonders how the soft warmth of his body can burn up all of Wonho’s insides. Best friend withdrawal symptoms sure are bad.
Once again true to himself, Shownu hugs Wonho from behind without warning. It was welcome, but definitely not expected, and Wonho has to stop himself from accidentally maiming the well-meaning crown prince by instinct. In the panic, his needle slips from his hand and bounces off of his thigh. It doesn't pierce his skin, but it shocks him.
“Shit. Fuck.”
Wonho takes just a second to process his excellent choice of first words to say to his best friend after two years of not meeting him.
“Shit.” Shit. Wonho tries to hide his face in shame and decides to launch his head into Shownu’s abdomen instead. Soft tummy: best hiding spot. He smiles into Shownu, who rests his arms on Wonho’s back, rubbing circles into his muscles as if that’s what they’ve been doing all along. He hums and his tummy moves up and down with every breath and easily takes Wonho into the melody with him.
Wonho adds this to the list of things he’s re-learning about him.
It’s like meeting Shownu for the first time all over again, and Wonho’s excited to cut and file down every jagged part of theirs until they fit seamlessly with each other again, to memorise Shownu from the inside out again so he can tell a story just by reading a slight curl of his finger, to give back all of himself to his Prince. He had promised him that before he went to war: I’ll give you everything. Victories and continents weren’t enough. It’s never enough. Wonho will give him everything.
He kisses Shownu’s stomach and straightens up at last, switching position so Shownu now lies on his lap. He runs his fingers through Shownu’s hair, looking at him properly for the first time since he got back. Shownu looks older, obviously, but is otherwise unchanged. His brows are stil raised high and forever questioning, his lips are full and red and inviting. He’s beautiful , Wonho thinks, as his fingers map Shownu's smile. If he had died in the war, any bit of Shownu would have been a worthy justification. If he had died in the war, any time a breath of air slips past Shownu’s lips would have more than made up for his loss. Wonho thinks, if he ever dies for Shownu, any mourning for him should just be a celebration that Shownu lived. Because, God, he is Godsent. And boy, does God send nice gifts. Shownu reaches up and holds Wonho's hands to his neck, and Wonho can just feel their pulses meet and start to align again.
They spend the rest of the night in that position.