Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Chan had misjudged the distance.

Honestly, that was really easy to do with a master-class spell like this. Traveling between dimensions required calculating motion using two entirely different quantifiable measures of distance under two entirely different laws of physics so, sometimes, his math could be a bit off. In layman’s terms, Chan was supposed to pop out of the fairy portal in the same place he'd gone into it; somewhere safe like the shop's front door. Instead, he'd popped out a good five or six feet in the air somewhere in his workshop.

“Great Big Blue,” he swore as gravity grabbed hold of him.

He fell through the air about as fast as a brick and landed on his work table with a terrible amount of noise. Pain shot up his back and he tumbled head over heels onto the floor. Everything went catastrophically wrong. His weight on the edge of the table flipped the entire piece of furniture over, sending a menagerie of glass bottles, beakers and vials flying through the air over his head and crashing against the stone floor. Chan held a hand over his face to keep glass bits out of his eyes. Thank the Big Blue Bird the bottles were empty! The world could have actually ended if the wrong potions got mixed together.

The door to his workshop flew open and tall, clumsy Hyunjin came charging into the back room. He shouted, “Hey! Channie-Chan! You're back. A little spun around and upside down but you’re back!”

Chan's ears were still ringing from the noise of all of the breaking glass. He hoped he'd only imagined the young witch's voice.

“Is this a new high score?” Hyunjin ran across the room, kicking glass pieces aside with his boots to clear a path to Chan. “You were only gone two and a half minutes! I saw you go in so I counted very carefully but then I lost count so I started over and counted again until I saw you.”

Two and a half minutes? Roughly? Thereabouts? Give or take a bit? Chan snorted with amusement. That was quite impressive. It felt like he had been in the fairy realm two and a half years but he’d gone and come back in a fraction of the time. Chan lowered his hands from his eyes and looked up at the giant of a boy leaning down over him. “What are you doing here?”

Hyunjin smiled wide. “I put a big ole pile of pillows for you to land on but I didn't think you'd pop back in the wrong room.”

“No. I mean, how did you get inside?” Hyunjin didn’t have a key. Or… he shouldn’t.

“I’m your apprentice!” Hyunjin said cheerily, as if that explained everything.

Chan scoffed and pushed himself to his feet, careful not to put his hands on any glass shards. “I have no apprentice. I told you already, Hyunjin. I'm not taking one in this year. Or next year. Or the year after. I don’t do apprentices.” He’d barely had the job half a year himself. How could he train anyone else?

“You'll change your mind,” Hyunjin confidently reassured him. “You’ll want to have me as an apprentice. I’m super duper positive. I can be quite helpful. All I do is help! Look.” He stooped down to pick up a few chunks of glass. He slotted them together so that it kind of looked like half a potion bottle. “I'll put this back together. It's such a simple spell.” He channeled a bit of magic. His fingers glowed like the last embers in a campfire.

Chan realized what was happening far too late. “No!” He rushed to the boy's side in an attempt to knock the glass from his hands. “You'll make it explode!”

“I can't make it explode.”

The glass bottle exploded.

Not just into pieces. It exploded. There was fire and smoke involved. Somehow. Both of the witches shrieked and jumped backwards away from the blast. The glass shards Hyunjin had been holding skittered across the floor, on fire. On. Fire. Chan blinked in disbelief. He just had to ask, “How do you even do that? How is that remotely possible?”

“Oh, don’t worry about it, Channing,” Hyunjin laughed the severity of the situation away. He stomped out the flames. “It’s first thing in the morning. I’m not warmed up yet.”

Chan grimaced. It didn’t matter what time of day it was. It didn’t matter how ‘warmed up’ Hyunjin was. Whenever the kid got too emotional or too excited or too eager or too scared, whatever he had immediately in front of him just… exploded. Calamity and destruction followed him everywhere he went yet, somehow, he had not discovered that he was the epicenter of the chaos. Ignorance was bliss but it was hell for everyone else.

“Your hat’s crooked, just so you know,” Hyunjin told him.

Chan raised a hand.

“Let me do it!” Hyunjin jumped at the chance.

“I can do it myself,” Chan objected. He was grown. He could fix his own hats!

“I’m your apprentice,” Hyunjin wailed.

“No you’re not!” Chan didn’t have an apprentice. Even if he had the knowledge, time and patience to teach a young witch, he did not have the available hours to put one on his payroll. He’d only had the shop fiveish months. He was still in his probationary period. The coven was breathing down his back making sure he crossed every t and dotted every i and signed every form in triplicate. Every tiny screw up was a possible point against him and hiring Hyunjin with his explosive tendencies was just asking for everything to go wrong. Chan needed this job and, yes, he struggled under the weight of running the shop all by himself but he’d manage if he pushed himself hard enough. Even if he wanted to risk taking on an apprentice, Hyunjin wouldn’t be his first choice. Hyunjin wouldn’t be any of his choices at all and Chan told him this but, everyday like clockwork, Hyunjin showed up bright and early at the shop in the all-black ensemble of a witch’s apprentice.

“Let me fix your hat,” Hyunjin pouted. “Pwease?”

Pwease? “Fine,” Chan gave in. He had a mountain of mail to go through and a conference call to sit in on but, now, he also had a workshop full of broken glass to clean up. “Be quick about it.”

Hyunjin stepped forward and happily adjusted the black, wide-brimmed witch’s hat that sat on top of Chan’s thick head of platinum curls. “Hats are so silly-looking and very, very uncomfy,” commented Hyunjin. Satisfied with his work, he stepped back. “Ribbons are so much easier. They don’t squeeze your head and they are very very pretty. The bigger the bow the better.” As if Chan could not see the thing with his own eyes, Hyunjin pointed to the plaid ribbon tied into his raven black hair. The obnoxiously large bow was cute and stylishly lopsided, if a little messy. Ribbons and hats and beanies and scarves weren’t just for aesthetics, they were an essential part of every witch’s uniform. The cloth they were made out of functioned as a magical antenna of sorts, letting witches easily draw on the omnipresent mana of the Big Blue Bird in the sky.

“The hat is classic,” Chan huffed, brushing past Hyunjin so he could stand in the center of the workroom. “Witches have been wearing them for centuries. Trends come and go, like capes did, but the hat is forever. The real hat, not all of these alternatives.”

“If you say so,” Hyunjin said, still fiddling with his ribbon.

Chan had to remember that Hyunjin was young and naive and probably did not care for the history of the craft. Maybe that was why he couldn’t cast a spell to save his life. “Stand back. I’m going to fix everything.”

“All at once?” Hyunjin made himself comfortable on a stool in the corner.

“Did you think I was going to do it one by one? There’s hundreds.” Chan searched the pockets of his witch’s uniform until he found his wand. It was long and narrow with a crescent moon curve. It was carved from petrified wood, white with striking black marbling with the faintest hints of aqua blue along the veins. For a spell this simple, he didn’t really need to plunge himself too deeply into the flow of mana but he decided to because his head was still spinning a little from the jump through the dimensional portal. Better safe than sorry.

“Should I take notes?” Hyunjin’s voice split Chan’s concentration wide open. “I should take notes.” He started to slide off of the stool.

“Don’t move,” Chan chastised him.

Hyunjin froze on the spot.

Chan shut his eyes. All it took was a bit of relaxation for him to be able to feel the magic in the air. It itched a bit on his skin like he had just walked through a spiderweb. He scrunched up his nose in confusion. “From the south? That’s weird.” He turned his body to better face the flow. There. Slowly, his body eased into the magic like he was getting into a nice hot bubble bath. The mana swept around his hat, swirling towards his body as if it was being funneled into him. “All of these broken vessels and shapes, repair them quickly so I won’t be late.” He held up his wand and guided the magic out into the room. There was a pop of light from the tip of his wand.

“Whoa,” Hyunjin exhaled in awe, his eyes big and wide. “Pretty.”

Around Chan, the glass bits were starting to float into the air, dancing around each other until they found their partners. They squeezed themselves back together with faint hissing noises, becoming whole once more with not even a line across the surface as evidence that they had been shattered. Chan formed another couplet in his head and spoke a new spell. “Now go back on the table where you belong, you remember the order you were in so don’t do it wrong.”

The large rectangular table righted itself in the center of the workshop and all of the repaired potion bottles and vials settled back on the wood, arranging themselves nice and neat.

Chan lowered his wand and sighed when his work was completed. He had exerted himself more than he expected to and now he was starving. What time was it? He checked his watch. It was later in the morning than he expected. In fact, it was right at opening time! Great Big Blue! Two and half minutes his foot! Chan had been in the fairy realm for nearly the entire night, not a few minutes! How badly had Hyunjin lost count? “Let’s open the shop, Hyunjin,” he said quickly, stashing his wand back in his pocket. “Don’t touch anything.” And then, to really prove he was serious, he repeated himself, “Don’t touch anything !”

“Okay,” Hyunjin sang out and leaped off of the stool only to trip over his own big feet and go careening into Chan’s favorite work chair which slid over the stone floor with a screech before hitting the floor. Fortunately, nothing else fell over. This time. Hyunjin laughed. “Sorry. I’ll get it!”

“Don’t touch it with your hands,” Chan shouted. He liked that chair. It was comfortable and didn’t make his butt ache when he was working. He didn’t want to watch it explode this early in the morning. “Don’t touch it at all.”

“But-” Hyunjin protested.

“I can get it,” Chan insisted. He sat the chair back on its legs and slid it in front of the workbench. He needed to get rid of Hyunjin. Preferably for several hours. He would not be able to focus on his work if he had a ticking time bomb wandering around the shop. “Do you remember where the bakery I like is?” He reached into the back pocket of his pants for his wallet. “Go get us a loaf of raisin bread.” He actually didn’t like that bakery all too much. He didn’t even like raisin bread but he always ordered it because there was never any out at the bakery so it always had to be made from scratch but the more time it took, the better. The longer Hyunjin was out of his hair, the better. Chan said, “Make that two loaves.” He almost handed the paper bill to Hyunjin directly but then hurriedly stuffed it into the boy’s shirt pocket instead.

“But it’s so far .” Hyunjin folded his arms across his chest and pouted. “I have to take three different trains.”

Exactly. “It’s worth it, though,” Chan told him, grinning. He softened his voice as if he were addressing a small child. “I’ll let you use the change to buy whatever you want.”

Hyunjin’s mood shifted immediately. “Okeydokey Chanachokie. I will be right back.”

“Take your time. Please.”

Hyunjin did the exact opposite and ran out of the workroom. Chan was right on his heels to ensure none of the shop inventory combusted. They raced through the shop, past row after row after row of shelves filled to the brim with plants, cauldrons, potions, gemstones, teas, stone statues and animal bones. Hyunjin tripped over the pile of pillows that he himself had put by the entryway and it was only Chan’s speed that got him to the door before Hyunjin’s head went through the glass.

Hyunjin tumbled out onto the sidewalk in a tangle of limbs but he laughed it off and got back up. It didn’t seem like he was too badly injured. Then again, the boy made things explode with his hands so maybe he just didn’t get hurt.

“Get going,” said Chan, purposefully pointing up the sidewalk in the opposite direction of the train station. “And don’t run.” Loyally, Hyunjin skipped off in the indicated direction and Chan didn’t relax until the boy was out of sight without a single fire or smoke trail in his wake. Sending Hyunjin to get bread usually took four hours so Chan had about that much alone time before the destructive hurricane of clumsiness and painfully good intentions found its way back to his peaceful life.

“Good morning, Chan,” a young witch called out as she passed by on the sidewalk.

Chan returned the wave and then crammed his hands under his armpits for warmth.

It was quite the chilly morning. The feathers of the Big Blue Bird in the sky were orange and pink with the start of a new day. There was a scent to the air that reminded Chan of snow. He needed to salt the walkway in front of the shop before he forgot and, Great Big Blue, Hyunjin had left his coat on the hook by the door! “Felix,” Chan called out. “Felix?” He looked up the sidewalk in both directions. Even at such an early hour, and even this close to the outskirts, Seoul was alive and bustling. Commuters were on their way to work, bundled up against the cold in their scarves and coats. School kids trudged by in their uniforms and big bubble coats. There was an orange cat snuggled on the sill of the big window at the front of Chan’s store but it was not the cat Chan was looking for. “Felix,” he called again, louder. “Where’d you go, boy?”

There was no response. Not even the quietest of meows.

“Guess he’s not here today either,” mumbled Chan. It didn’t matter. Felix technically wasn’t his cat. He flipped the sign of his shop from ‘closed’ to ‘open’ and then shut the door against the cold.

He grabbed all of the decorative pillows Hyunjin had piled by the door and tossed them into the big basket by the front window, out of the way.

Mondays had their own special kind of dreariness. It took a lot of effort to shake off the comfy sleepiness of Sunday and get back into the grind of the work week. Add on a pretty wild and time-warping trip to the fairy realm into the mix and Chan legitimately felt like he hadn’t slept in days. “This calls for coffee.” He stretched his arms above his head, yawned and moved to the back of the shop. He reached the counter where his coffee machine shared space with his cash register. His two most prized possessions. Chan grabbed the coffee pot and was about to go down the hall for water when he heard the landline in his office ring. “Ugh,” he groaned, glancing at the massive grandfather clock behind the counter. “Can you at least wait until eight oh one?”

Coffee pot in hand, he trudged down the hall to his tiny little office. He unlocked the door and crossed the room to sink into his desk chair. He reached for the landline, picking it up on the seventh ring.

He started, “Thank you for calling Chan’s Tchotchkes. This is Chan. How may I-”

“District Witch 9,” came the sharp voice of the Regional Manager from the other end. “It’s time for your report.”

It was Monday. The store had been open all of fifty-eight seconds. Fifty-nine. Sixty. There was nothing to report.

Before Chan could politely say this, the government official’s voice cut in, “Not the store report. I already have access to that information. I’m asking for your District Witch report.”

It was the first week of the month, Chan realized. December was officially here. This was the start of his last month on probation! If he could keep the District he was responsible for from blowing up, if he could keep increasing the shop’s profits, if he could keep the coven satisfied, then he’d officially be District Witch! His name would be on all official Seoul coven documents. He’d get to attend regional meetings and government functions. The pay increase would be insane. “I’ve made multiple visits to the animal shelter,” Chan began, “and they have finally agreed to stop giving strays to thirsty vampires.”

“Acceptable,” said the Regional Manager. Chan vaguely recalled the man’s name as Woo-something. “The number of undead dogs in the District was appalling. Still is.”

“At the very least, the growth in population should stagnate. Over time, it will get more manageable.” Chan took a moment to flip through the log book on his desk. The entries were in his careful handwriting but it felt like someone else had written these things, describing events that had happened to some other witch. Really, being in the fairy realm had messed with Chan’s perception of time. Most of these events he skimmed over had happened only a few days ago but it genuinely felt like months had passed since he’d sat in this chair and flipped through this book. “I put a stop to the shenanigans of the trolls under the bridge. I handed the wand smugglers over to the downtown office for disciplinary action. I’ve also tracked down the seller of those spoiled potions and slapped them with a fee. And that god-tree in the park that’s been sapping the nutrients out of all of the other trees? It took some work but I’ve rerouted its roots and given all of the trees their own space. The park should be gorgeous come spring.” He had tried to only report the positive things from the last month. He needed to keep this job. He needed it. But-

“And the rogue magic?” Woo-something prompted in a serious tone.

Chan gritted his teeth and bit back a swear. “That’s finicky.” Something in his District was disrupting the flow of the Big Blue Bird’s mana, making the energy sweep through his part of the city in unusual directions. There were times when it surged like ocean waves. There were times when the flow of mana stopped completely, as if someone or something was casting terribly powerful spells. “I just came back from investigating the fairy realm. I spoke to their leaders and, even with all of their trickery and foolishness, I was able to determine that they aren’t the cause.”

Woo-something was quiet on the other end of the line for some time. Perhaps he was writing. Or perhaps he was just listening. Thinking. “Getting to the bottom of the mana disturbances needs to be priority number one this month,” the Regional Manager ordered. “The mana flow in your District is becoming so disrupted that it is affecting the neighboring zones. Two other District Witches have already filed formal complaints and it is my duty to follow up. If the problem isn’t resolved by the end of the week, I have to fine you, Chan. It’s going farther up the chain of command now and I can’t keep holding back with this many eyes on me.”

Chan cut in, “Yes, sir.”

“It has already been several weeks. If you can’t handle this, if you can’t prove that you can do this, the coven will find someone else for the position.”

Ouch. “Yes, sir,” Chan muttered again.

A long pause. “That is all,” Woo-something said. There was a click and then the call went dead.

Chan sat there in a daze, listening to the dial tone flood his ears. Many seconds passed before he snapped out of it and dropped the phone down onto its cradle. “I’ve been trying,” he mumbled under his breath. Discovering the root of the mana flow issue had been his number one priority since October! “I’ve asked the gumihos to keep an eye out. I almost got my hand bitten off by a werewolf asking questions. I asked the members of the traveling caravan if they knew of anything. I nearly broke my neck just now asking the fairies. No one knows what’s happening.” He knew Woo-something could not hear him, he knew he was alone in his office, but just expressing his frustrations out loud made him feel better. “This is something entirely new and probably really big and I don’t know who else to turn to for answers. I don’t know what to do.”

It had to have been a kind of magic he was unfamiliar with. Alchemy, volatile and a touch on the forbidden side, didn’t rely on mana at all so there was no way it could have such a negative impact on the flow even if it was being performed incorrectly. Spirits leaving the mortal realm and drifting up to the Big Blue Bird in the sky didn’t disrupt the mana flow like this. Not even Hyunjin’s biggest explosion (a poor florist’s work van) couldn’t stop the flow of magic like this. Something big was happening in Chan’s District but what was more worrying was that weeks had passed and he still did not know where to start in his search.

He did not know where to begin . Still.

There was a mirror hanging on the wall of his office. He stood up from his desk and looked into the glass, taking in the sight of the handsome but sleepy-eyed witch staring back at him. He looked at his dark eyes. At his big and floppy witch hat. At the curly gray hair that grew out of his head. He had a duty. He wore this hat and this uniform for a reason. He had been chosen . Chan was the District Witch and that meant he had a job to do. A responsibility. A purpose.

He straightened his shoulders and smiled. Brighter. Wider.

Today was Monday but he’d own it.

He grabbed a pile of envelopes off of his desk and carried them out of his office and back into the shop. He made himself comfortable on the stool behind the cash wrap. He tore open one of the envelopes and freed the letter inside of it.

It was a request from a District resident. They were being pestered by a hobgoblin. Every single day, they woke up to all of the furniture in their home meticulously rearranged. Nothing ever went missing, they had determined, but it was annoying trying to relearn their way around their own home every time they started a new day. The problem had been funny for the first two weeks but after waking up with their bed perched precariously on the edge of the roof, they feared the hobgoblin housed ill intent. Chan knew how to take care of that. He pulled out his wand and used a minor spell to rearrange the words on the page so that the alphabet spelled out his reply: “I have just the thing! I have a powder made from iron shavings which will keep all fairies and related entities away. Sprinkle it around every door and window of your home, including interior archways and closets. If the hobgoblin is outside your home, it will not be able to enter and your problem will be solved. If the hobgoblin is inside your home, it will not be able to leave the room you trapped it in. If you catch it, please call me and I will personally escort it off of your property. All the best, Bang Chan.”

He stood up and circled around the cash wrap. If he remembered correctly, that particular powder was in the big ceramic urn between the marigold seeds and the quartz necklaces.

Chan went to Aisle 3.

His shop wasn’t the largest or the most organized place in Seoul. It definitely wasn’t like the huge mega-mart out in District 2 where you could buy even high-level spell ingredients in bulk. It didn’t even quite possess the old-timey charm of the elderly couple’s shop five Districts over. But that didn’t matter because it was his and he loved it and treasured it. There was no rhyme or order to the items on the shelves, but that didn’t stop him from knowing where everything was and it definitely did not stop his patrons from walking into the store and finding the one thing they didn’t know they were looking for.

“There you are,” he chirped, finding the urn of iron shavings. He grabbed it off the shelf and carried it to his workshop. The letter didn’t specify how large the house was but he figured that if there were enough rooms for everything to get rearranged every day, it had to be relatively large. Perhaps a one gallon mason jar would be big enough? He got one off of the bottom shelf and slowly poured the powder into it with one hand and stirred it with his wand using the other. Every now and then, he whispered a minor protection spell over the granules. Iron shavings were heavier than he anticipated. It would cost an arm and a leg to ship the tub through the post but he’d have to eat the cost if he wanted this resolved today. The letter was from Friday, he recalled, so he was already a day behind in his self-imposed one business day letter-answering schedule. The return address on the letter was at the very edge of his District, close to the national park. He’d have to close the shop for far too long during the day to deliver it himself, even on his broom. He’d ask Hyunjin but he didn’t even trust the kid to tie his own shoes without screwing it up so his only other option of delivery was the post. Ugh. Maybe he should get an apprentice? A proper one with actual potential. Perhaps if he made it through his probationary period, he’d find a way to work the labor costs into his budget. He already had a creative idea for a ‘help wanted’ sign.

With the mason jar filled, he screwed on the lid as tight as he could manage and carried it and the heavy ceramic urn back into the shop. The jar was heavy. Ooh, it would definitely cost a ton to have it shipped. That reminded him. He needed to make a label for the jar and write clear instructions to go with his reply letter.

“Maybe I can float it there,” Chan pondered. It wouldn’t be too tough of a spell. Levitate it just enough and hope it could follow simple directions. There was risk to that, though. With the flow of mana so backwards lately, it would probably wind up out to sea. “Or maybe I can just shot put it. I’ve been working out.” He laughed at his own poor attempt at a joke and then sat the ceramic urn back on its shelf. Then he carried the mason jar to the cash wrap. “Or… Or… I don’t know…”

“Or…” Came a voice from very close by.

Chan nearly jumped out of his skin. A high-pitched shriek left his mouth. The tub nearly leaped out of his hands. “Great Big Blue,” he swore. He thought he’d been alone in the shop this whole time!

“Or,” the voice tried again patiently, “you can call a courier. One flat rate per package. Probably faster and cheaper than the post.”

“Where are you?” Chan glanced around. He knew who it was but where were they? He saw no one among the aisles.

“Top shelf,” came the voice.

“Top shelf?” Chan looked up. Almost directly above his head, lying prone on the shelf with his hand under his chin, was a scrawny black-haired boy, his face dotted with freckles and his eyes slightly yellowish like the Big Blue Bird’s feathers at the end of a day. “Yongbok,” Chan exhaled, calming down. “You’re not wearing a coat in this weather?”

“I’ve got one. Somewhere.”

“How did you get up there?”

“Very carefully,” Yongbok replied with a smirk.

“How did I not hear you?”

“Because I was very careful.”

“How did you not knock anything over?”

“Because I didn’t do this.” Yongbok swatted at a book that was on the shelf near his head. It toppled over the edge and fell.

Chan watched it hit the floor and fall open. He was not as upset about that as he probably should have been. It was a book about coffee and the full-page spread it had opened to reminded him of something. He stooped down to pick it up, snapping it closed. “You want coffee?”

“You know how I like mine,” Yongbok accepted the offer. “More cream than coffee. Plenty of sugar.”

“Gotcha.” Chan put the book back on the top shelf, standing on his tiptoes to reach it and being careful not to swipe Yongbok in the head with it. Everything back in its place, he went to the back of the shop and sat the jar of iron powder on the wooden table next to all of the other things he’d yet to get delivered because the post didn’t run on Sundays. Where did he leave the coffee pot? Oh yeah. His office. He retrieved it and went down the hall to the fountain and filled it with water. When he was back in the shop, Yongbok was still stretched out on the top shelf, his eyes closed like he was dozing. It always surprised Chan how none of his rinky-dink shelves had toppled beneath the boy’s weight by now. Whenever Yongbok showed up, he was in some entirely impossible spot, hanging out as casually as can be. There was this one time where he’d gotten all the way up onto the rafters yet had almost been too scared to jump down onto the magical net Chan had constructed beneath him.

Yongbok also liked to break things. Where Hyunjin’s explosive talents seemed to be entirely accidental, Yongbok’s habit of knocking things over and tearing holes in things was extremely purposeful yet, somehow, wasn’t a hostile act. The only reason Chan put up with the boy’s eccentricity was because Yongbok was a regular customer and bought something nearly every day. “Yongbok,” Chan called out as he poured the water into the coffee maker.

“Hmm?” Yongbok hummed.

“Have you been in tune with the weird mana flow lately?”

“Of course,” the boy replied. “Can never sleep through the night because I can feel the flow flip-flopping every which way. Where’s the demolitionist?”

It took Chan a second to figure out who Yongbok was referring to. “I sent Hyunjin out for raisin bread.”

“Ahh.” Yongbok opened his yellowish eyes and glanced at the grandfather clock. He shut his eyes again. “Three and a half hours of peace left.” He sighed as if living the dream.

Chan searched under the counter for the bag of his favorite coffee roast. He got their conversation back on track. “Yongbok, do you know what can cause such harsh changes in the flow?”

“Nope.”

“You don’t even have a clue?”

“Nope.”

“Just take a wild guess. Do you know any witches that dabble in the dark arts?”

“Nope.”

This was getting nowhere. Yongbok could be so stubborn for absolutely no reason. Chan was making him coffee for crying out loud! “Will you let me know if you hear anything?”

Yongbok scratched at his nose.

Chan sighed and finished preparing the coffee maker.

“I’ll tell you,” Yongbok agreed at long last.

“Thank you,” said Chan. He felt a bit odd. He was the District Witch. Everyone should be able to come to him for answers. He shouldn’t be out begging everyone else for them! No wonder Woo-something was so willing to replace him over this. He wasn’t good enough.

The coffee maker began to bubble and brew and the shop slowly filled with the pleasant, earthy scent of good coffee.

Chan sat back down at the cash wrap and worked his way through more resident letters.

Someone was having issues with the plumbing in their kitchen. Chan prescribed a small wooden statue of a woman with a jar that would make the water drinkable if it was sat close to the faucet.

A man wanted a spell to make a woman he met at a bar fall in love with him. Chan suggested he try some good ole flirting first. Maybe some flowers. Primroses. They weren’t in season but Chan knew a great greenhouse all the way down in District 45.

An old woman was having difficulty remembering things. She couldn’t quite work out how to take notes with the app on her cell phone and she felt burdened and embarrassed scribbling things down with a pad and paper while she was out doing errands. Chan had just the gemstone for her. It could improve concentration so long as she kept it near her head, such as on her nightstand while she slept or on a necklace during the day. He recommended a craftsman in northern Seoul, up in District 18, who did good work with gems.

The gurgling of the coffee maker stopped. Chan took a break from his duties to pour himself a mug. As exhausted as he was from his trip to the fairy realm, he needed to have his black.

Yongbok, for a reason that Chan could not figure out no matter how hard he tried, liked to drink his super sweet and creamy coffee out of a round, flat-bottomed dish. Yongbok had brought it from home specifically to keep at the shop to drink out of while he was here. Chan prepared the coffee the way Yongbok liked and carried the bowl around the counter only to discover that Yongbok had left his spot on the top shelf of Aisle 3. It wasn’t but a short distance from the cash wrap. Chan had been concentrating but he hadn’t been so zoned out that he couldn’t hear a man almost as tall as he was climb off of a metal shelf. “How does he not knock anything over?” Chan mused. He looked up and down each aisle. He groaned. Perhaps Yongbok had gotten bored and left the shop entirely. Oh wait. No. There he was. Stretched out on the floor at the end of Aisle 10, his shirt raised up to his chest so that he could catch the light of the Big Blue Bird coming through the window on his belly. Chan sat the dish of coffee next to the boy, certain he was asleep, but as soon as he stepped back, Yongbok grabbed the dish and raised it to his mouth, taking slow sips. “You okay,” Chan asked him. Yongbok was so weird .

“Perfect,” the boy replied. It wasn’t clear if he was answering Chan’s question or making a comment about the coffee. He said nothing else.

Chan turned away and went back to work. In less than an hour, he’d finished replying to all of the letters and had sipped his way through two and a half mugs of coffee, the buzz of the caffeine like bees taking over his brain. He was starving something fierce now and, for once, he wished he hadn’t sent Hyunjin so far away. Should he order a sandwich from the deli at the end of the block? They’d walk it up the street for him if they weren’t too busy and they’d definitely be here faster than Hyunjin.

He checked the grandfather clock. It was nearly eleven in the morning. He had that conference call with the coven to sit through. Conference calls had to be his least favorite part about Mondays. All those government folks talked about was profit margins, law amendments and the extremely miniscule ways in which one District was superior to another District. Technically, Chan was a ‘government folk’ now, too, but he was different. He was a cool government folk. Or so he liked to think.

“You know,” Yongbok spoke up.

Chan shrieked and whirled around.

Yongbok was standing next to Chan’s stool. His empty coffee dish sat on the counter in front of him. “You know,” he began again, “I’ve always wondered why you open shop so early. Why not open at ten like every other shop on the block? It’s not like anyone comes in until brunch time.”

“I thought that, too,” Chan squeaked out. He’d catch a heart attack one of these days because of Yongbok. He wondered if he could put a bell on the dude. Maybe Hyunjin could tell him where to get a cute ribbon. “But since I am acting District Witch, this shop’s technically a government building and government buildings open at eight.”

“Oh well.” Yongbok pawed at his nose as if such an answer smelled bad.

“Why do you care?” Chan asked, but not unkindly. “It’s not like you work here and have to get up early.”

“I guess I do appreciate the quiet hours,” Yongbok mumbled sleepily. “I can nap to my heart’s content. More coffee.” He didn’t even say please. Not even pwease .

Chan frowned. He couldn’t even call Yongbok a freeloader because he actually did buy things! Speaking of which. “You know you can’t be behind the counter.”

“Whatever.” Yongbok stepped sideways and then plopped himself down on the floor a mere whisker’s length from behind the cash wrap. “You need to put a chair right here. That would be nice.” He scooted over a microscopic amount. “Or here. Right here.”

“It would block the hall to my office if I put it there.”

“You need to put it right here then.” Yongbok turned ever so slightly.

“And you need to buy something,” Chan reminded him. He poured fresh coffee into the dish and then stirred in a ridiculous amount of cream and sugar, turning the dark brown liquid almost entirely white.

Yongbok ignored him. “I can see through the window from here. And the heating vent is… good, it’s right there. Yes. I can have the most amazing naps if you put a chair here.”

“I’m not buying a chair and if I did I’m not putting it there.”

“You should,” Yongbok insisted.

“Just for you to nap in?”

“Yes.”

“You gonna buy something?” Chan sat the dish near Yongbok’s feet.

“I’ll take one of those.” Yongbok waved a hand in a seemingly random direction.

Chan followed the gesture with his eyes. There were about a million things in the vicinity but Chan’s eyes landed on the big woven rug hanging on the wall. Maroon and gold. Damask. Possibly magic. Chan couldn’t remember. “That’s expensive.”

“I’ll take two.” Yongbok didn’t even look up as he sipped from his dish.

“I’ll roll those right up for you.” Chan stepped over Yongbok’s body and crossed the shop to the hanging rugs. He’d better get them rung up fast before Yongbok changed his mind. He’d make his sales goal for the day in a single transaction if Yongbok was really going to drop cash on the things. That was another reason why Yongbok was so weird. His hair was always disheveled and a little dirty and his clothes were well-loved and worn out, but not once in the last few months had his card ever been declined for insufficient funds, despite his wild spending habits.

Chan pulled one rug down from the wall, rolled it up and then repeated the action with the second. Blue and off-white stripes. Possibly magic at one point but definitely not anymore. It took all of his strength to drag the things across the shop floor to the register in order to ring them up. He told Yongbok the rather exorbitant total and the boy handed over his card without interrupting his coffee drinking.

“How are you going to get these home?” Chan definitely didn’t want to send these through the post. The weight fees would eat his bank account alive.

“Courier service,” Yongbok mumbled. Even more cash. Did he not have a care in the world?

His nonchalance was a bit worrying but Chan wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth. If Yongbok’s purchases kept his bills paid and his daily sales plan met, he was not about to ask too many prying questions. “More coffee?”

“No. I want a nap.” Yongbok yawned and flopped onto his back right in the middle of the floor.

Maybe Chan did need a chair. A recliner . One that he could stretch out on and relax in. He didn’t have a single place to rest in the whole shop, he realized sadly. Every room was for work. “I’ve got a conference call,” he said after several seconds of staring at Yongbok curled into the fetal position. “Shout if there’s a customer.”

Yongbok made a noncommittal noise at the back of his throat.

Taking his chances leaving the shop unattended, Chan made his way to his office. It was a small room. Smaller than the workshop down the hall. Probably not even all that much larger than the employee’s only bathroom across the way. He tried his best to keep the shelves neat but there was just more paper and reports to keep track of than he had space for so everything was in piles. The process of making digital copies of all of the files was slow and tedious with his abysmal typing speed so it was easiest to just continue to let papers and books pile up.

Chan dialed into the conference call, put it on speaker and was surprised but not surprised to hear Woo-something’s voice taking command.

The Regional Manager was in the middle of giving out accolades, “-have increased sales by a whopping 58% to last year’s numbers. That’s almost unheard of. I’d like to congratulate District 24. You’re the number one District in the Region.”

Chan groaned. “Again?” The call was muted on his end so he knew Woo-something and the dozens and dozens of other District Witches in the call could not hear him. Oh. What he would give to be number one in the Region and be praised for all of his hard work! He probably couldn’t make it, though. Not with his middle-of-the-road sales and below average conversion growth but definitely not with this mana flow problem. “Will District 9 ever be number one?”

“I have to ask myself the same question,” someone sneered.

Chan sat upright in his chair like he was snapping out of a daydream. He was alone in his office but the voice had sounded like it was coming from inside the room. Right across from him. It sounded familiar. Exactly like Woo-something. But that couldn’t be right because the man was still in the middle of the conference call.

“-would like to push the rebranding of our spell ingredient products in the new year,” Woo-something was saying over the phone. “Test shops will start seeing inventory with the new designs on the labels delivered by or before the fourteenth. Please refer to your plan-o-grams on how to display the new merchandise. We already have deep sale events planned for over the Winter Solstice festivities so use those opportunities to inform customers about the quality changes. If the test stores meet the goal by spring, we’ll push products out to other promising shops in waves. Lower performing Districts may not get the new products at all.”

“You talking about me?” Chan couldn’t shake the feeling Woo-something was speaking to him directly.

“Are you really going to be this boring today?” The voice that sounded like Woo-something said.

Chan shook his head aggressively. It had to be the coffee buzzing in his brain and messing with his senses. He stood up and checked the hallway outside of his office. Yongbok was still in the same spot at the end of the hall. The black-haired boy didn’t seem to be asleep but he was lying very still. Very stiffly. Chan sat back down in his chair and let his mind wander. What was a good courier service? If it was a flat rate per package, how high would the total price be if he tried sending all of his weekend deliveries? Would it be easier and cheaper to just send it through the post? Even with the extra fees? Or maybe he could stay up half the night delivering all of the things by broom himself. That sounded like work he wasn’t cut out for. He could only carry so much at a time. He’d be in and out of the shop until the Big Blue Bird turned orange.

“If you’re being this unfun to observe, I’ll go then,” Woo-something’s voice said.

Chan startled. This was getting to be too much. He was hallucinating. Had he spent too long in the fairy realm and lost his grip on reality a bit? That was supposed to be a side effect of extended stays, he knew. He’d only been in there two and a half minutes… roughly… thereabouts… but time flowed so differently in the fairy realm. He smacked himself on the cheek in a bid to wake himself up. No. He wasn’t losing his mind. Too much caffeine. Not enough sleep. That’s all it was.

There was a loud noise out in the shop. A surprised yelp, a different surprised yelp, and then squeaky shoes on the hardwood floor.

Chan ignored it. Or tried to. Then there was the front door swinging open, the bell above it jangling loudly. There was a deep shout and heavy footsteps.

“Just great,” Chan groaned. “Of course I get rowdy customers now.” He stood up and left his office.

Yongbok had left his spot at the end of the hall. Perhaps it had been him that had made all of that racket? He was usually so quiet, though. Eerily so. The only person he knew that made that much noise was- “Hyunjin!” Chan shouted. How was he back this early? Chan should still have an hour of freedom left!

“Look!” Hyunjin came thundering down one of the aisles, his big boots tracking the grime of the city across the floor. “I’m back, Chan. I missed you. I missed you so so so much but I’m back and you’re here so now I don’t miss you because you’re here.” He swung an arm around Chan’s torso and hugged him tight.

Chan wheezed from the pressure around his middle and then wrenched himself free of the boy’s hold. Why was Hyunjin back so early? He checked the boy’s forehead with his palm. “You left without a coat. Are you feeling okay?”

“I’m peachy. No, wait. I’m Hyunjin.”

Certain that Hyunjin wasn’t feverish. Chan lowered his hand from the boy’s forehead. “How was your walk?”

“I got lost on my way to the train station. I usually never get lost. I don’t know what happened.”

Chan wondered where Yongbok went. He started peeking into the corners for him.

“And then,” Hyunjin continued, “I fell asleep on the train and missed my transfer but after doing a lot of walking, I found another bakery.” He lifted the plastic bag in his hand. “Isn’t their logo cute? Look. Look! It’s a duck! You’re not looking, Chanikins. You have to look.”

Distractedly, Chan wandered up and down the aisles in search of Yongbok. He was nowhere to be seen. The boy hadn’t gotten on one of the shelves and nor was he tucked away in one of the shop’s many nooks and crannies. Hyunjin followed behind Chan, right on his heels, tapping on his shoulder and begging for attention.

Hyunjin said, “They had banana bread, too! Now I don’t have to go all the way to the other side of Seoul. If I can just remember my way back to that place… I think there was a lion outside. He had a face like this. Look, Chan! Look. You have to watch me make the face!”

Chan stopped walking. Hyunjin ran into him and giggled at the impact. “I wanted raisin bread,” Chan corrected him, still not paying the boy much attention. He had circumnavigated the shop in its entirety but had not seen the freckled boy. Then he noticed that the rolled-up rugs leaning against the counter were gone. Chan relaxed. Couriers. “You should have gotten raisin bread.”

“Raisin bread?” Hyunjin parroted. “I thought you said banana bread. I was thinking banana bread the whole time. Aren’t they the same thing?”

“No.”

“Silly me, Chaisin Raisin.”

Chan could still hear Woojin’s nasally voice droning on from the conference call. He needed to get back to his office. Something actually important might be being discussed. He said, “That’s why I sent you to that particular bakery. They know I send you there quite often. They’d give you raisin bread even if you mess up the order.” He finally looked Hyunjin in the eye.

“Well,” Hyunjin reached into the plastic bag he was carrying and pulled out one of the loaves. It was wrapped in pretty brown paper and smelled delicious. “This is just as good, right?”

“Not really. I’m allergic to bananas.”

This made Hyunjin frown so bad that it looked like he was about to tear up. “I’m sorry, Chan. I was just trying to be helpful. I’m helpful all of the time! I didn’t mean to-”

“I’m not… really allergic,” Chan gave in quickly, patting the boy on the shoulder. “I just want you to pay more attention. To everything.” He wondered if Hyunjin was aware of the power that his pouting face held. Perhaps that’s how he got away with so much. Perhaps that’s how he wound up worming his way into Chan’s heart. “Tell me about this banana bread.” He leaned back against the counter.

Hyunjin smiled, his mood changing instantly. “This will go great with peanut butter! That’s what the girl at the counter said. She was very nice. She complimented me on my ribbon. Said I should try… What did she say? What did she say? Cerulean . What does that mean? Is it a snack? Is it a snack better than peanut butter? It can’t be a snack better than peanut butter. There’s no such thing.” Hyunjin walked up to the counter and began to take the loaf of bread out of it’s brown wrapper. “Oh no. It got kind of cold from the walk over here. Should I heat it up?”

Wait.

Chan almost didn’t catch it. There wasn’t a microwave or oven in the shop. How was he going to…

Wait!

“I know a spell. I can cast them like you do, Chan. I watch you all of the time so I know exactly what to do. Just let me…” Hyunjin trailed off. His fingers began to glow.

“Hyunjin!” Chan lunged towards him, trying to stop the inevitable.

The banana bread exploded. The noise was like a car crash. The force of the blast knocked Chan clear off of his feet, through the air and straight into the counter behind him. He landed on the floor in a heap. His witch hat fell off of his head and flopped to the floor at his side. Fiery bits of charred bread flew everywhere, sailing through the air in clusters like a flaming meteor shower. Smoke filled the shop to the point that the fire alarm went off.

“Chan!” Hyunjin shouted in a panic as the smoke thickened. “Where did you go? I can’t see you. I can’t see you, Chan! Where are you?”

“I’m right here,” Chan said. Or thought he said. His throat was so scratchy and he was very dizzy. Chan must have hit his head. His vision was even going dark around the edges. “I’m right here!”

Hyunjin screaming “Chan!” was the last thing that he heard before he blacked out.

Chapter Text

“Chan!” Someone called his name in a worried shriek. The voice sounded distant but it was warm and familiar like a nostalgia trip. A childhood friend he hadn’t met in years but still remembered and liked and got along with. Or something. Something kinda like that. “Chan, are you okay?”

He’d had an accident similar to this. Long ago.

Not as explosive but equally disruptive.

“Chan, are you okay?” It was his father’s voice. Loud, but not out of meanness. Loud because his father just didn’t know what being quiet meant. “You fell straight outta that tree, boy!” The neighbors could probably hear him shouting.

Chan lay in the green summer grass and looked up at the blue summer sky. His head was out of sorts from panic. He could feel his pulse rushing in his ears. It was mainly his ankles that hurt but he was dizzy from fright as well. He could still hear it. Feel it. See it. That thing he saw. That terrifying creature.

His father ran across the yard towards him. He’d seen his boy tumble from his spot on the back porch, newspaper discarded in a pile. The man shouted, “Speak to me, boy.” He shook his son but got no immediate response. “Can you use your words, boy?”

“I’m fine,” Chan coughed out. He was so wound up but now he was calming down, untying himself, and realizing that he was safe now. He let his father help sit him up. “It wasn’t that high of a fall. Really, dad.” He’d barely gotten up to the first proper branch during his climb. It was more like a high jump than anything else.

His father ran his big hand through Chan’s silver hair and then pulled back to check his palm for blood. He didn’t find any and he relaxed. “What made you fall?”

Chan glanced back up at the tree. Just thinking about it made his heart speed back up. “I saw a snake,” he answered.

That was years ago. He had been a child back then. Now he was an adult but that didn’t make getting knocked flat on his back any easier to deal with. “Great Big Blue,” he whispered to himself. He tried his very best to open his eyes. It was a hard task. Harder than it should have been. Chan was in pain and woozy and unsure of what had just happened. His thoughts were ‘fire!’ and ‘what was that loud noise?’ on repeat. Every now and then a ‘wow, what a headache!’ slipped in there, too. Chan managed to open his eyes but it was still hard to see. The smoke in the shop was too thick. The tears in the corners of his eyes were too thick. “Hyunjin,” he croaked out weakly. He should have been worried about himself but where did the boy go? “Hyunjin, where are you?” Was he safe? He could hear Hyunjin screaming his name but could not see him.

Chan tried to sit up.

“Good thing you aren’t dead,” said the voice that sounded so familiar. “If you were dead, I couldn’t be better than you.”

Chan knew who this was speaking to him but he didn’t know who this was. The smoke suddenly did some weird, swooping and swirling thing like someone large was passing through it. Was there a person kneeling next to him now? Why was it so hard to tell? He couldn’t see too much. Chan squeezed his eyes shut and opened them again.

“Chan,” the voice called out. Closer. From right next to him. They said something else. Several somethings. A whole string of somethings in an irritated grumble. Chan could hear the noise of their voice in the air but the ringing in his ears blotted out the words. It was all just trumpet sounds. Chan almost thought it was Hyunjin next to him but it wasn’t. The shape was all off. The smoke kind of pulled back a bit and Chan was able to see more of the figure next to him but now his eyes were stinging. He blinked. He blinked again. The figure reached a hand out towards him as if to grab him and shake him or just touch him but he felt nothing. He felt. Nothing. He was too numb from shock. Their face… Chan could see their face: a sharp nose, narrow eyes, a thin upper lip. They were… hazy and… see-through? No. Chan was losing it again. His mind, perhaps, but mainly his consciousness. He was… losing consciousness.

Darkness creeped back over him.

All he could think of were his years of training at the magic university. Semesters of lectures and research papers and weeks of agonizing over his thesis. Participating in study groups where there was always one particularly ambitious witch-in-training who didn’t particularly care if they left their classmates behind or not. Chan recalled the numerous tests and the annoying professors. Graduating. He did do that, didn’t he? Not quite top of his class but he walked across the stage and got his wand and that was what mattered. He was a witch just like all of the others in his class now. Being a witch… It had been all he wanted for years but obtaining it didn’t change his life like he had hoped. At least not right away. He had gone most of his teenage years striving towards that goal but then he obtained his dream and was left feeling listless. No amount of lectures or museum excursions or potion-brewing workshops or stressful presentation days had prepared him for the biggest question of his life:

What did he want to do after he became a witch?

He didn’t know.

There was the confidence-destroying job hunt where he’d spent months sending out his resume only to get rejection letter after rejection letter after rejection letter. He’d burned through his savings. Had to move out of Seoul and go back to the country with his father. Being District Witch hadn’t even been Chan’s goal. Or, rather, he had never thought it could be his goal. Being District Witch was the backup plan to his backup plan to his backup plan but he’d applied for the position on a whim and miraculously got a call back. He’d fumbled his way through the interview, as surprised and unprepared as he was, but he must have done or said something truly profound… His experience, or lack thereof, must have been just what the coven needed. He must have really aced the practical magic demonstration… or something … because now he was District Witch.

And he had to try his very best before he was no longer District Witch.

Chan came to.

There was a sharp pain in the dead center of his forehead. Something cold and pointy was pressing against his skin and it kind of felt like it was digging into his skull. Getting way deep on in there like it was going to take root in his thoughts.

Maybe he was growing a unicorn horn? Finally! He always wanted one of those. Secretly.

Then the object against his forehead zapped him and the fog in his head was instantly cleared. The pain in his limbs was erased.

“If you can hear me,” he heard Hyunjin say from somewhere close to his left, “wave all of your eyelashes individually.”

Chan opened his eyes. He was lying spread eagle on the floor of his shop. The air stank of burnt popcorn and there were scorch marks all across the floor around him but at least the smoke had dissipated.

Now he remembered.

The banana bread. Hyunjin’s glowing fingers. The explosion. Fire and sound and light. Chan looked around.

The first thing Chan noticed was that Hyunjin was not the only person leaning over him. The second thing he noticed was that the object being held to his forehead was the tip of a stranger’s wand. Disappointment hit Chan hard. He should have known he wasn’t turning into a unicorn. He’d never be that lucky. Chan sighed wearily and sat himself up.

“Hyunjin, are you okay?” Even when he was hurt, he was only worried about others. He reached out and squeezed the boy’s hand. He recalled Hyunjin’s earlier screams and found himself worrying. “Are you bleeding anywhere?”

“I’m super peachy,” Hyunjin replied. “Like a pie. A peach pie. I’m good as pie. Can we order a pie? I’m hungry.”

Chan turned to look at the stranger who was still holding his wand to Chan’s forehead. “Thank you for the help,” he said. Chan couldn’t see much of the stranger’s face because their hat cast a shadow across the majority of their features. All that was visible of his helper was their pink mouth curled downward into a mildly bothered frown.

“Think nothing of it,” the man said, stashing his wand back in his pocket. Chan caught the briefest glimpse of it: an elegant twisted coil of dark wood with a diamond-shaped hunk of rose quartz at the tip. Probably from a prestigious university. The man snorted. “I only saved you to stop all of the noise. It was disrupting construction.” Even his uniform was elegant, Chan noticed. All-black, obviously, but with sparkling silver buttons, embroidered details along the sleeves and feminine lace frills at his collar.

“What noise?” Chan asked. “The fire alarm?”

“Your apprentice wails louder than any fire alarm,” the stranger said matter-of-fact. “The noise he creates wakes the Big Blue Bird to start the day and that is not a compliment.”

Chan glanced up at Hyunjin with a concerned raise of his eyebrow.

“I went like this.” Hyunjin demonstrated by screeching Chan’s name at the top of his lungs right then and there. Absolutely no warning.

The stranger grimaced. Chan plugged his ears with his fingers until the noise stopped. Yup. That was the exact sound he’d heard earlier when he’d first hit his head.

“How distasteful,” the strange witch muttered when it was finally quiet.

Chan relaxed. He had feared that Hyunjin was hurt. Instead, the boy had only been trying to be helpful. “That was a smart idea, Hyunjin.”

Hyunjin beamed brightly. Proudly. “I kept doing that until someone came along.”

“Your apprentice did not stop for ten whole minutes,” the stranger explained. “I came in here and nearly sealed his mouth shut until I saw you on the floor.”

Sealing his mouth shut? That could work. Chan had to remember that in the future. “He’s not my apprentice,” he corrected.

At this, the stranger tilted his head back in confusion. The wide brim of his black hat moved and allowed the incandescent lights hanging from the ceiling to shine over his whole face for the first time. He had big round eyes and thick lashes like a doll. He had a cold, unfeeling stare like a doll. Even his skin was clear and glass-like like a doll.

Chan looked away. He felt judged beneath that stare. Impotent. Inadequate. Hold on. There was his hat! He grabbed it from where it had fallen on the floor, wiped dust off of the brim and sat it back on his head. Much better. “May I ask what your name is?”

“I suppose as a new resident, it’s my duty to formally introduce myself to the District Witch,” the cold-eyed man said. He shook his head, causing the thin silver earring dangling from his left ear to swing like a pendulum. “The name is Lee Minho.”

“Call me Chan.”

“I will call you District Witch like I am supposed to.”

Oh.

“But everyone calls me Chan,” Chan prompted.

Minho wasn’t having it. “I will call you by your formal title.”

Silence stretched on for several awkward seconds, marked by the tick-tock-tick-tock of the grandfather clock.

“Felix!” Chan suddenly cried out. “You came back.” He leaned around where Minho was kneeling to scoop the black cat with yellow eyes up into his arms. The cat let out a surprised yelp at the aggressive affection, even digging his claws into the skin of Chan’s forearm, but Chan gave his chin a good scritch and Felix immediately relaxed into the witch’s embrace. Chan cooed, “I’ve been looking for you all weekend! I’m glad you’re okay.”

“Kitty!” Hyunjin sang out in delight, rubbing the top of Felix’s head.

Minho crinkled up his nose. “You lost your familiar?”

Chan let out a nervous laugh and looked up at the handsome man. Handsome? Wait. He meant to think ‘handy.’ It was handy that Minho had been around! Yeah. Chan said, “He’s not my familiar. He’s just a scrawny neighborhood cat I at least attempt to keep fed.”

“And Felix?” Minho kept on. “What a distasteful name for a cat.”

“Hey. He likes it,” Chan protested. He lowered his gaze to Felix. “Don’t you, boy?”

Felix meowed and purred.

“He does!” Hyunjin squeaked, still petting Felix’s head.

The cat, a lean-faced Bombay if Chan had to guess, didn’t have a collar but he was well-groomed enough that Chan was sure that someone else took care of him. At least occasionally. “He first started hanging around the shop back during the summer. I named him and fed him and made sure he was up to date on his shots. Now he seems to call this place home.”

Minho made a face. “I don’t think I asked for the cat’s life story.”

Oh.

Chan clamped his mouth shut and focused on freeing loose bits of debris from the cat’s thick fur. Felix simply continued purring, uninterested in anything but the attention.

After a pause, Minho got to his feet and wiped off his black pants. “No apprentice. No familiar.” He sucked on his teeth disdainfully. “How are you District Witch?” He looked down at Chan. Literally, because he was standing and Chan was sitting. Figuratively, because Chan could feel the man think less of him in that moment. Minho continued, “Perhaps I moved to the wrong District.” Ouch. Then Minho smirked as if an idea had just occurred to him. “Perhaps I didn’t. Let’s go.” He turned smoothly on his heel.

“Go where?” Chan wondered, still cradling Felix in his arms.

Minho shot him a cold stare over his shoulder. “Not you. Not you.” He made his way towards the shop’s front door, each stride full of self-confidence and swagger.

That’s when Chan became aware of the fact that there was someone else in the shop.

A young man was casually leaning against a shelf. He had been so still and so quiet that he’d been impossible to notice. The boy was small and short. Probably Hyunjin’s age or close to it. His dark hair hung over his forehead like a curtain and eyeliner was smudged around his eyes with grungy imprecision. He wore a choker made of the same patterned material as Minho’s hat. His uniform was far simpler than Minho’s but his shirt had the same silver buttons. Giving nothing but a roll of his eyes, the boy silently followed Minho towards the door.

The apprentice.

Chan watched them walk away.

There was a thick, green and white scarf around the apprentice’s neck that didn’t exactly match the goth aesthetic… It also seemed to be moving? Writhing? The green and white pattern undulated a little. Chan gasped. The scarf wasn’t a scarf. It was an emerald tree boa! The snake licked at the air and continued to shift around the apprentice’s neck as it raised its head to watch Chan with judging, leering eyes.

The familiar.

A snake for a snake, huh?

Chan shivered in fright and fought off a few bad memories.

He felt inferior. He had no apprentice. No familiar. Up until now, he had always been quite alright with such absences in his life. He felt like he didn’t need them to perform the tedious desk work of District Witch. Besides, familiars were notoriously picky about when and where and why they chose to reveal themselves to their witch and an apprentice was a lot of work and a lot of time and a lot of money, not just in wages but in food and shelter and insurance and repair costs and, whew, Chan really couldn’t afford one until he was out of his probationary period.

He did not release the breath he’d been holding until the cold-eyed witch and his apprentice had left the shop, the bell above the door and a gust of frosty December air signaling their exit.

“They were nice,” Hyunjin said honestly. “I mean so nice.”

“You think so?” Chan grumbled. They were anything but nice. The apprentice hadn’t said a word but he was probably a jerk. A jerk witch would only accept a jerk apprentice, after all. “But did you see his hat, though? I told you they were classic and never went out of style.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Hyunjin said with a pout. “Ribbons will always be cuter.”

Felix leaped out of Chan’s arms and pawed across the floor, tail curling into the air. He moved in the direction of the hall to Chan’s office.

“Felix, where ya going?” Chan called after him.

The cat meowed back as if replying but, of course, Chan could not understand it. Felix disappeared around the corner.

“What time is it, Hyunjin?” Chan asked.

Hyunjin stood up to get a look at the grandfather clock. “Almost noon o’clock, Channie-Chan.”

“Great. Let’s eat lunch. We’ve still got a loaf of bread left.”

“And peanut butter!” Hyunjin called out.

“Yes. And peanut butter.”

★☆

After they ate, Chan swept up bits of burned bread, scrubbed the scorch marks out of the floorboards and the countertop and lit scented candles along the counter of the cash wrap to chase the smell of smoke out of the shop. Fortunately, the damage to his inventory had been minimal despite the size of the explosion. Business picked up and he tended to the numerous customers that entered throughout the day. In his moments of down time, he straightened up and dusted around the store and got the cobwebs out of the corners.

Hyunjin was playing one of Chan’s favorite games called Sit In This Chair And Don’t Touch Anything Or Else and he was, for once, playing it very well.

With the shop clean and spotless and looking exactly like there hadn’t been an explosion in it two hours ago, Chan made his way to the back of the shop near the entryway to the hall where a long, narrow table was getting absolutely overloaded with objects and letters that he needed to have mailed. It wasn’t particularly late in the afternoon but Chan was running out of time to get all of his deliveries in the post. The last collection for the day was in an hour or so and he’d yet to finish his labels. If it weren’t for today’s disaster, he’d have everything out by now but, at this rate, the earliest he’d be able to get all of this in the post was tomorrow and he was not looking forward to a wait at the post office first thing in the morning.

It was a little overwhelming, if he allowed himself to think plainly. All of the tasks he had to manage could get a bit much on their own but then add keeping track of resident requests on top of that and it was the recipe for many sleepless nights. When he first started this job, he could dash out on his broom and handle the odd delivery or request he received in less than half an hour and then be right back in the building to man the store. Now that he’d been in the position long enough for word to spread that 9 had a District Witch again, his inbox was always flooded with so many letters and requests that he feared he could not keep up one day and that ‘one day’ was closing in on him fast. “I think I’m going to follow Yongbok’s advice and use a courier service from here on out.”

“Oh, oh, oh! I can take it,” Hyunjin shouted earnestly, raising his hand like he was trying to be called on in class. “Pick me!”

Chan ignored him. “I wish he at least told me the name of the service that he uses. He seemed quite pleased with them.”

“Me! Me!” Hyunjin squirmed on his seat in the corner. “I’ll take it. I’m good at this, Chan. Trust me. I’m always helpful!”

Letting Hyunjin do deliveries was just a disaster waiting to happen. “Thanks but no thanks.”

“Aww!”

Chan browsed through an app on his phone, looking up service after service. He didn’t realize that there were so many couriers in Seoul. They all claimed to be the fastest, the most discreet and the most efficient. But how could hundreds upon hundreds have the exact same claim? Chan scrolled through some. Several services had numerous five-star reviews but they all read like dishonest, paid sponsorships so he scrolled right on past those. Some services had more believable three or four star ratings with a mix of satisfied and displeased customers. More services than he thought had one and two star ratings with customers rightfully upset about lost packages or damaged deliveries. Whenever Chan thought he’d decided on a service, something always stopped him from tapping ‘hire.’ He either realized that their delivery rates would put him in as much financial debt as his college education or, more commonly, the courier did not service Districts as far from the city center as his.

After a while, Chan asked Hyunjin, “Where’s Felix? Have you seen him lately?” The cat hadn’t showed himself in hours. Well, it was possible that Felix had slipped outside along with a customer. He always came and went whenever he pleased but at least he didn’t poop or piss on the floor anymore. That had been a disastrous week.

“No,” Hyunjin said. “I haven’t seen him. I can’t see much of the shop from this little corner. Want me to look for him? I’m really good at looking!” He started to hop off the stool.

“Don’t move,” Chan stopped him. “We’re still playing that game, remember?”

Hyunjin got comfortable on the stool again. He grinned. “Okay. How much longer do we get to play?”

“Until closing time.”

“Ahh, yes!” Hyunjin clapped his hands. “All day! I like this game. It’s hard but it’s fun.”

Chan looked up from his phone at the boy. It was hard to tell if Hyunjin was pulling his leg or not but Hyunjin was so bubbly and pure that he probably did not know what sarcasm was. He probably didn’t know how to fib either. Oh, how wonderful life must be for him! Chan longed to have such an easy time. He’d love the opportunity to escape a few of his responsibilities and just take immense pleasure in being able to sit on a stool all day. “Don’t you have somewhere to be?”

“No,” Hyunjin sang out. “You said we were still playing the game.”

“I mean…” Chan trailed off as he got lost in thought. Hyunjin wasn’t his apprentice so every day the boy came to the shop and offered ‘help,’ he hadn’t been getting paid for it. Not wanting to take advantage of him, Chan had encouraged him to go elsewhere but it was like Hyunjin did not want to be with anyone else. “Don’t you want to go out and find some other witch who can take you on as an apprentice?”

“No.”

“Surely you’d be happier working for someone better.” Like Minho. “Or someone famous.” Like Woo-something. “Don’t you want to follow some other witch?”

“No,” Hyunjin warbled, turning it into a bit of a song.

Chan sighed and let the matter slide. “I’ll just pick a service at random,” he decided, getting things back on track. He closed his eyes, used his thumbs to scroll up and down a bit and then tapped his screen. When he opened his eyes, he’d pulled open the information page of one of the courier services. The page had a shiny ‘New!’ icon in the upper right corner. So new, Chan noticed, that the account had been created today . At first glance, it all seemed a little sketchy. The logo was amateurish, like a kid still in school had slapped it together in a handful of minutes and then boldly claimed that graphic design was their passion. Additionally, their rates were dirt cheap, almost pitifully low, and the service seemed to be based in District 9. Low cost. Local. It was too good to be true and was possibly a scam but Chan was tired of searching and had wasted more time than he had intended. “Alright. Let’s hire us a courier.” He tapped the ‘hire’ button and was taken to a different but poorly designed page.

This was so sketchy. Numerous red flags were flying in Chan’s head. He was going to get scammed… but if he did get scammed, he could call Woo-something and slap a fine on the courier service for robbery of a coven official. That had to be a crime, right? In one of the law books, he was sure. It was a win-win situation. Either Chan got his packages delivered or he found his way back into Woo-something’s good graces by catching yet another criminal.

He filled out the basic form on the courier service’s website, typing in his name and address and the number and sizes of his packages. “Is this right,” he wondered. “Even when I increase the weight, the rate doesn’t go up.” He glanced over his shoulder. “Hyunjin, isn’t that standard?”

Hyunjin was still on his stool. “No. I’m sitting like you told me to.”

Chan smirked at the boy’s antics and turned back to his phone. Most couriers made their money by jacking up their fees with heavy objects. This particular courier must not have figured out that tidbit but, oh well, he’d already entered in all of his information. It would be a waste to back out now. He tapped ‘submit’ and received a confirmation email within moments but got a YOUR COURIER IS ON THE WAY notification before he’d even sat back down at the cash wrap.

“They are on the way already,” Chan panicked. “If I had known they’d be that fast, I’d have sent for them after I finished everything!” He rushed back to the delivery table, hurriedly scribbling out labels and stuffing letters into envelopes, jotting down all of the necessary tidbits in his log book as he went.

“You could have sent me,” Hyunjin whined from across the shop. “I’m very fast and slippery. I would have been there and back by now.”

“You keep thinking that.”

“Okay!”

In ten minutes, Chan had everything organized and ready and was back at the cash wrap.

The shop door swung open and a boy with radioactive orange hair stuffed under a black beanie literally rolled into the shop on a pair of roller blades. “Yo! Sup, witches!” He shouted as a… greeting? Was that a greeting?

“Hello!” Hyunjin called back cheerfully, flapping his hands in a wave.

The orange-haired boy gave Hyunjin a peace sign as he rolled by.

Chan watched the wheels leave twin trails of dirt across the floor he had just cleaned. No, no, grin and bear it, Chan. Grin and bear it. “Welcome to Chan’s Tchotchkes. What can I help you with today?”

The orange-haired boy rolled up to the counter. In his small hands was a sheet of crumpled notebook paper covered in what appeared to be a grocery list written in splotchy green Sharpie. “I’m looking for banchan.”

Hyunjin sat up excitedly. He knew that word! “Sorry, this isn’t a restaurant but I really wish it was a restaurant because I’m hungry. I just ate but I’m hungry. I want a big ole sandwich. Chanwitch, can we open a restaurant?”

“No.”

“Can we sell spicy ramen and beef dishes and kimchi and peach pie? We need peach pie.”

“We’re not opening a restaurant.”

“Aww. I wish we could. We’d have so much fun. Everyone would come and visit because you’re the best.”

The orange-haired boy obnoxiously cleared his throat so he could be the center of attention again.

Chan propped his elbows up on the counter, making himself comfortable. “As you heard, we don’t have banchan. Do you need directions to the nearest restaurant? There’s actually one diagonally across the street, sir.”

“Sir?” The kid asked with a huff. “I’m not an old man like you are. I’m looking for… Hex. I can’t read my own handwriting.” He squinted at his list, holding it right in front of his nose. “Baaaan-” He sounded out. “Hex! Why did I write this with my right hand?”

Chan offered, “Do you need me to help you read it?”

“Like hex I do. I can read as good as anybody else, you know. I’m not dumb just because I flunked out. I need to find B-something C-something.”

B-something. C-something. “Bang Chan?” Chan wondered.

“Hex! That’s it!” The kid slammed his list down on the counter triumphantly, startling Chan and making the flames of the candles along the counter flutter and dance. “So this is the right place after all. I was scared to come in here because I thought the hexing roof would collapse on top of my head.”

Chan smiled through the pain. He didn’t even mind the talk about his shop. It was near and dear to him but he thought it was a bit of a dump, too. District 9 hadn’t had a Witch in nearly two years before he’d gotten the job. The shop had sat abandoned all that time so he expected and had gotten used to the trash talk about the place. What Chan was most upset about was how much this kid cursed. Was that how kids talked these days? Had it been that long since he’d been that age? No. He wasn’t that old. Not yet. Great Big Blue. “What can I help you find, sir?”

“Don’t call me a hexing sir,” the orange-haired kid snapped. “Maybe when I’m twenty or something and I’m old and wrinkly. The name’s Jisung and I need all of these.” He slid his list across the counter towards Chan.

Chan looked at it. The thick swipes of the green Sharpie made the words extremely difficult to read but, if he just went cross-eyed a little, he could make out the shapes of the vowels and consonants through the sloppy handwriting. He was a little surprised by the oddities inscribed on the list until he caught on to the fact that the list was, word for word, exactly what he’d punched into the service app barely fifteen minutes ago! He gasped in horror. “You’re the courier.”

“Hex yeah!” Jisung agreed.

“Hex yeah!” Hyunjin mimicked him excitedly.

At this, Chan sat up straight and whirled around. “Don’t you dare repeat after him.”

Hyunjin smiled, “Okay!”

Chan looked back at Jisung. “You.” He could barely get his thoughts in order. “You.” His disbelief was through the roof. The kid was just that: a kid. Small and scrawny. Wearing a big, poofy, dirty sweater and scratched-up elbow pads. He had on a pair of highlighter yellow plastic glasses that clashed horrifically with his bright-as-the-sun dye job and a rustic, weatherproof hiker’s backpack hung over his shoulders. He was a bit of a shabby, mismatched mess and he smelled a little sweaty and earthy like he spent a lot of time outside. “You’re… a courier?”

Jisung grinned and puffed out his chest. “I’m starting my own business because hex school and hex the government. You’re my first customer and because you have so much hex, I’m going to have to ask for payment up front, old man.” He tugged his backpack off of his shoulders and unzipped it. The interior looked black and bottomless.

“Payment upfront?” Chan gasped out. “I’m the District Witch. I’m not going to scam you.” Because you’re definitely about to scam me, he added in his head.

Jisung shook his head. “Oh, I know who you are, old man, and it’s because you work for the hexing government that I’m asking for the cash up front.”

“You don’t trust the coven?”

“Hex them,” Jisung said, practically spitting the words out. “They screwed me over so now I spend my every hexing breath screwing them over. Where’s the hex that needs delivering?”

Was it too late to cancel? Could Chan still sign up for a different service? He’d have to ask Yongbok for a more… professional courier. “Umm, I’ve actually changed my mind so can you-”

“Is that the hex over there?” Jisung asked. He skated behind the cash wrap and glided towards the table of deliveries. Immediately, he began stuffing objects into his backpack. “Yeah this is it. I hexing remember the ugly statue and the fat chunk of rock.”

“Hey,” Chan jumped off of his stool and rushed up to the table after him.

“It’s too late for greetings, old man,” Jisung said, shoving another object in his pack. “I could use some gum. Got any gum?”

“This isn’t a convenience store,” Chan had to let him know. His anger and irritation were quickly replaced by fascination. A normal bag would have been crammed to bursting by now, not even enough room to zip it closed but, as Chan watched, Jisung’s bag never seemed to get full. “Ummm.” Chan looked the kid up and down. He was not a witch. Although he had on a beanie, Chan knew it was made of regular wool and not any type of material attuned to the mana of the Big Blue Bird. Nothing the kid wore was the black of the coven. Plus it seemed like he was against the coven to begin with. Chan just had to ask, “How are you doing that?”

“Government secret.”

“I thought you hated the government.”

“It’s not an actual government secret. Sheesh. Can’t take a joke?”

“If you’re against the government, why are you taking a job from me?”

“Stop breathing down my hexing neck, old man.” The whole while, Jisung just crammed more and more and more into his bag until he had emptied the table of its contents.

There had to be an extremely powerful spell cast on the bag itself, Chan decided. Was the bag far larger on the inside than it was on the outside? Or was there a whole pocket dimension in there? Either way, it was a master-class spell, maybe even genius-class, and Chan feared the numerous but equally illicit ways in which Jisung may have obtained such an item.

“Do you have the money?” Jisung asked, holding out his palm. “I take cash but I guess you can pay me through the app.”

Chan went to the counter for his phone. He was in an absolute daze. Was he still knocked out from the explosion and this whole afternoon had been one long lucid dream? This couldn’t really be happening. He paid through the app and, seconds later, Jisung’s phone dinged with a notification.

“Payment received,” Jisung said after checking the screen. He skated away. “I’ll be on my way. If I can hexing remember to update the app between stops, you’ll see how far along I am. Be sure to like and subscribe. I mean… be sure to leave a five-star rating and a big fat tip. I need it.” He was halfway out of the shop door before he stopped, skated back around and rolled up to the counter. “Almost forgot this.” He snatched his list off of the counter. “I hope I can hexing read these addresses. I’m not amber-dextry-doo so I need to stop trying to write with my right hand. See ya, old man. Thanks for being my first customer! I’d offer a coupon or something but I didn’t think of that until right this second. Old men like coupons, right?” He was out the door before Chan could say anything to defend himself.

“Amber-dextry-doo,” Chan repeated. That was the one thing that made sense out of this whole mess.

“It means he can write with both hands,” Hyunjin offered helpfully from his spot on the stool.

It… didn’t. But Chan supposed that’s what the word meant today. He stared out the shop door although Jisung was long gone. Then realization hit him. “I’m going to lose my job.” That was just fact and he would have to live with it.

“That’ll be amazing!” Hyunjin clapped his hands. “We can open a restaurant and I can help in the kitchen and we can make all of the peach pies in the world.”

Chan shook his head. Was it closing time yet? Could he send Hyunjin home? No. It was barely four in the afternoon!

“Great Big Blue,” Chan groaned. He wasn’t going to last until the end of the month. What did he do to deserve this? Hadn’t he tried hard! He imagined the Big Blue Bird in the sky, so big that she could surround and protect the whole world with her blue wings. She was always there, always watching like a wonderful mother. She cradled the earth like it was her last egg. She wasn’t too far away so why couldn’t she hear Chan’s pleas? He could feel her mana and he could see her light shining through the shop’s front windows but he wished he could feel her love. Exasperated, he announced, “I need coffee.”

Both boys heard the toilet flush. Hyunjin, forgetting about their game, hopped off the stool and ran up to Chan’s side. “It wasn’t me!”

“I know,” Chan consoled him.

The bathroom door across from Chan’s office swung open.

“Sorry,” Chan announced, “that bathroom is for employees only.”

Yongbok stepped out of the dark of the hall and into the bright glow of the shop. “Oh well.”

Hyunjin relaxed, pressing his forehead against Chan’s shoulder in relief.

“Yongbok,” Chan exhaled, “when did you get back?”

“I’ve been here,” Yongbok declared, wiping at his eyes like it hadn’t been long since he’d woken up from a nap.

“Really? I didn’t see you come back in.”

“I’ve been here,” Yongbok repeated. Then he startled and stopped moving.

“Yongbok,” Chan called out.

Yongbok didn’t respond. He didn’t move.

Chan looked at Hyunjin who just shrugged. Chan looked back at the black-haired boy. “You okay?”

Yongbok said nothing. He just stared at the empty space between aisles unblinking, his posture rigid like he wanted to run. But he didn’t run. He just stood there as still as a statue, staring at nothing. He was so weird .

Chan followed his gaze but he couldn’t see anything that required such a reaction. They hadn’t had a customer in a while and everything seemed to be in its right place on the shelves. Nothing odd seemed to be happening on the sidewalk outside. Even the light of the Big Blue Bird coming in through the windows fell across the hardwood floor at the same angle it always did this time of day.

“There’s something there,” Yongbok said suddenly. He blinked for the first time in forever.

“Where?” Chan asked. “I don’t see anything.” Was this a prank? But Yongbok would never be able to muster up the energy for pranks.

“It’s right there.” Yongbok lowered his voice to a whisper as if afraid of startling whatever it was he was looking at. “It’s… right there.” He pointed his chin in a slightly different direction than before.

Now Chan was starting to get weirded out. He had to know, “What’s right there?”

“It.” Yongbok didn’t move but he followed something with his eyes. Slightly to the right. Now back to the left.

Chan squinted his eyes. Was there something there? He reached into his pocket for his wand and tried to assemble a spell in his head. A spell that could reveal hidden things.

Just like that, Yongbok relaxed. A lazy smile crossed his face and he aimed his light eyes in Chan’s direction. “So are you getting a chair?”

“You’re getting a chair?” Hyunjin asked. “I like chairs. They’re like stools but… not stools.”

Chan was confused. He pointed down the aisle. “What about the thing you saw?”

“It’s gone so it’s whatever,” Yongbok said, waving a hand dismissively.

“It’s whatever? Was it dangerous?”

“No. It was just there.”

“What does that even mean?”

The bell above the door jangled. Almost by instinct, Chan called out, “Welcome to Chan’s Tschotskes.” He walked an aisle over so that he could see straight to the shop entrance. “How may I…” The words died in his throat. There was no one at the door. With a sigh, he turned back around and joined the other two.

“I’m telling you,” Yongbok pointed to the floor where he was standing. “Get a chair, Chan. Put it right here. I’m telling you, it’s the best spot for naps.”

“Naps?” Hyunjin practically vibrated with his excitement. “I love naps. I haven’t had one in so long, though. Chan never lets me take any.” He gave Chan a judging nudge. “He says the shop is not for sleeping.”

“It’s not,” Chan said. “It’s for working.” He looked down the aisle Yongbok had been staring at for a moment, wondering if he had missed it somehow. “What about the thing you saw?”

Yongbok ignored him. “That’s a bummer, Hyunjin. Naps are the best.”

“They are, aren’t they?” Hyunjin acknowledged.

Chan tuned them out. He was still thinking about the jangling bell. Perhaps the wind had gotten under the door and briefly snatched it open? That’s what Chan always worked it up to, as it happened often enough.

Yongbok said, “It’s especially great when you take naps in places meant for working.”

Hyunjin hummed in agreement.

“And you can’t take a nap without a good chair.”

“You can’t, can you?”

“We need a chair.”

“It has to be a big and poofy one,” Hyunjin said. “If it’s big and poofy, we can all sit on it and be warm and cozy and watch the snow fall.”

Snow. Chan snapped his fingers. That’s right! He needed to salt the walkway in front of his shop. The year’s first snow was forecasted for the night. He circled around the cash wrap and rummaged through the cabinets under the counter until he found the dark blue can of salt.

“See?” Yongbok said, slow and lazy and sleepy. He was continuing the earlier conversation. “Everyone likes chairs. Get a chair, Chan.”

“Yeah. Get a chair, Chan,” Hyunjin pressured him.

Chan crossed the shop to the coat hook at the entrance. He shrugged on his big, black jacket. “Maybe,” he vaguely promised and then went outside.

It wasn’t particularly late in the evening but since it was winter, the cold was putting the Big Blue Bird to sleep already. The light of the sky was dimming and her feathers were graying out towards the horizon, leaving only the faintest bit of yellow and pink to the tips. Now was usually the time of day when traffic on this street died down but, oddly, there was quite the crowd across the way and they were keeping up a significant amount of noise. Chan figured it was his duty to keep an eye on the gathering just in case things went sideways and he needed to step in as District Witch. Chan got to work. He sprinkled salt over the sidewalk to keep it from icing over, starting with the strip right in front of his door. Every few moments, he looked across the way to make sure the crowd wasn’t getting too disruptive. They seemed to be lining up, chatting excitedly, complaining about the wait. The deli diagonally down the street was popular but not that popular. Not for a line to stretch down the block. Chan squinted. Wait. They were lining up at the door of the shop directly across from his.

That was strange. That building had sat vacant and empty since late September when the used bookstore had moved out. That building had been empty just yesterday. Great Big Blue, it had been empty this morning . How had someone moved in already? They’d even painted the place.

MINHO’S TRINKETS AND TOKENS read the awning above the shop’s big front window.

GRAND OPENING read the banner fluttering in the chilly wind next to the door.

Abandoning his salting duties, Chan watched for traffic and crossed the street when it was clear.

“Back of the line is that way,” a gruff man near the front pointed down the block.

“I’m not in line,” Chan said, approaching the shop and peering through the display window.

Inside, he could see rows of nice wooden tables and solid-looking shelving units. The shop was gorgeously decorated and the inventory was nicely arranged and organized. It had everything! Gemstones, runes, spirit stones, ritual knives, herbal teas, pestle and mortar sets. Wow. Really nice pestle and mortar sets. He wanted one himself. Wait. No. This wasn’t a good thing. Anxiety twisted his stomach up just as harsh and quickly as the excitement had moments earlier. Chan gulped. He had been the only witch’s shop on the entirety of Thirteenth Street for the past five months. There were two cute clothing boutiques, a florist’s shop, a toy store, the deli, a karaoke place and a cram school on this street, but Chan never had to worry about another witch eating into his profits all of this time.

Now he did.

“It’s the perfect location, don’t you think?” That voice was neither Yongbok’s nor Hyunjin’s.

Chan spun towards the source.

It was Minho, the cold-eyed witch with the snake and the apprentice. He was leaning against the window of the shop as casually as if he’d been there this whole time. He hadn’t been. “A witch’s shop directly across from yours.” Minho tilted his head forward so that his hat cast dramatic and mysterious shadows over his face. “Everyone likes a bit of competition. You would have thought I’d done it deliberately.” He smiled nice and wide.

“Are you threatening me,” Chan asked. “Need I remind you that I’m-”

“I know you’re District Witch,” said Minho. “And since you’re District Witch, you should also know that there’s no law that says I can’t open up a competing shop directly across from yours.” He chuckled. “If anything, I should ask you if you’re threatening me right this second.” He pushed himself off of the window and drew close to Chan, leaning as close into the District Witch’s face as he could without the two of them bumping hats.

Good thing was, this close up, his eyes were visible again. Bad thing was, this close up, his eyes were visible again. They were big and brown and bored holes through Chan’s head.

Minho added, “No one likes a monopoly. They’re distasteful.” Without another word, he approached the door of his shop where the apprentice with the snake around his shoulders obediently opened the door and allowed him inside.

Chan shivered. It was as if the temperature had dropped around him. “I hate snakes.” This whole situation was going to give him a headache.

“He’s so nice,” Hyunjin said, pressing himself up against Chan’s left shoulder. “I mean, so nice.”

“A real piece of work,” Yongbok added, propping his elbow up on Chan’s right shoulder.

The witch hadn’t even heard the two boys come up behind him but their presence relaxed him. Grounded him. Reminded him that he was on the sidewalk somewhere safe and not eleven years old in his dad’s back yard staring down a hissing snake in his favorite tree. Chan shook the memories loose and, with sudden determination, he said, “Get your coats, boys.”

“Why?” Hyunjin asked, stars of excitement dancing in his eyes.

“We’re closing up shop early,” Chan announced.

Hyunjin jumped up and down. “Is this a field trip? Are we going on a field trip? I want to go on a field trip. Are we opening a restaurant? I want to open a restaurant.”

“Are we closing for inclement weather?” Yongbok questioned. The snow wouldn’t start for hours.

Chan shook his head. “No.” Yongbok’s talk of naps had made him crave one. “We’re going to go buy a recliner.”

Chapter Text

Bringing the boys shopping had been a mistake.

“Oh, oh, oh! Get this one, Chan! It’s all bouncy in the middle and we can put a bunch of pillows on it to make it even bouncier.”

“No. This one has wood details. Get this.”

Chan muttered to himself, “I don’t like either of those.” The one Hyunjin picked was awkwardly large and cumbersome. The one Yongbok had chosen had the exact opposite problem: it was too small with minimal cushion and padding.

The boys chose different chairs.

“This one’s big but not really poofy. We need one that’s big and poofy.” It was too modern for Chan’s tastes.

“Nah. Get this one over here. It swivels.” It looked… fragile. And fragile was bad around these two.

“Wait. This one’s green. We have to get this one because it is green. Green is my favorite color and I want a recliner that is my favorite color.” Not one that was puke green, though.

“This one’s made of leather.”

“Oooh, that one! That one! That one is also green but cuter because it’s got thingies on the side and I want a chair with thingies on the side.”

Chan watched Hyunjin and Yongbok fling themselves from one recliner to the next, working their way up one aisle and down another. One of the employees of the furniture store did not even pretend to hide the stink eye she was aiming in Chan’s direction as the two boys nearly fell over each other in their race to the next seat. Even the other customers shot the witch dirty stares as the two boys made a ruckus much like unsupervised children going wild in a toy store. Chan, to his credit, tried his best not only to act like he didn’t know the boys and hadn’t walked into the shop with them but also to not be too surprised by the sheer number of zeros on some of the asking prices of the recliners. “Great Big Blue,” he whispered under his breath. “That’s a whole month’s salary right there.”

Hyunjin wailed, “Ahh! This one goes back so far. What if I fall? Chan! What if I fall? Look at how far it goes. Look, Chan. You’re not looking. Chan, you have to look!”

“Ooh, this one is kind of plaid. Don’t you like plaid?”

“Not that kind of plaid. It has to be the other kind of plaid.”

There were other kinds of plaid? Chan scratched at his forehead. He wasn’t feeling any of the recliners that the two were picking out. Even if he ignored the price, he just didn’t like the way these recliners looked. They were either bulky and traditional and not at all his style or they were too sleek and modern and uncomfortable-looking for naps.

The two boys moved to another set of chairs.

“This one’s pretty and gray like Chan’s hair!”

“He’s like an Egyptian Mau.”

“Yeah! Just like a whatever moo!”

“Close enough.” Yongbok hopped into the next recliner down. “This one isn’t comfy. At all. I’d rather sleep on the ground.”

“I sleep on the ground sometimes. It’s cold and hard and isn’t fun all the time like the store.”

“The armrest on this one sits too high,” Yongbok critiqued. Now he was lying with his legs over one armrest and his head propped up on the other. “And I can feel a spring digging right into my back. It’s awful for naps. Next!” He jumped out of it and flopped onto the one next to it, squeezing in next to Hyunjin. “I like the way this one smells. Let me test its durability.” He dug his fingernails into the armrest and dragged them across the material like he was trying to rip tears into it.

This made Chan suddenly remember that he knew them. “Yongbok!” Chan shouted. He hopped over an ottoman and rushed up to the recliner. “Why would you do that?” He lowered his voice so that he wouldn’t be overheard by a pesky employee. “Don’t damage anything in here.” He pulled Yongbok’s hand away from the armrest.

“I have to test it,” Yongbok insisted, wriggling his hand free of Chan’s grip. The lights of the shop glinted off his eyes and they looked more yellow than usual.

“I can’t afford half the things in here.” Chan hissed. “Don’t tear up anything I haven’t paid for. Don’t tear up anything I have paid for.”

“But I need to do this,” Yongbok whined. He dug his fingernails in again. What a wretched sound! “I just need to. Don’t you understand?” He scratched the armrest again, his fingernails snagging on the fabric.

Chan grabbed Yongbok’s wrist again to stop him. “Enough!”

Hyunjin took advantage of his distraction by leaping up and hopping into the next recliner. “Oh,” he exclaimed, settling into it. “It massages. Get this one, Chan. It massages!”

Chan turned around and asked him, “Do you have ‘it massages’ money?”

“I don’t have any money,” Hyunjin boldly announced.

Such a proclamation made a few of the employees and even a handful of customers turn around to watch the spectacle. Chan dipped his head apologetically in their direction.

“How about we get a couch?” Yongbok asked, still trying to free himself from Chan’s grip.

Hyunjin loved that idea. “Oooh, a couch! Let’s get a couch, Chan.”

“We aren’t getting a couch,” Chan stopped their devious plans. “We barely have room at the shop for the recliner.”

“Awwww!” Both boys whined in unison.

“We can rearrange the shop,” Yongbok figured.

Hyunjin was on board. “Yeah! We can move all of the shelves out of the way! I always thought we had too many of them. We can push them all to one side of the shop and then we’ll have so much space for a couch.”

The District Witch let out one big sigh. He should have left the boys back at the shop but, then again, between the two of them, the building probably wouldn’t even be standing by the time he got back. Ugh. He really needed a nap. It had been such a long day.

Hyunjin found another chair. “Wait, wait. Green isn’t my favorite color anymore. It’s orange.”

And Big Blue Bird the chair was orange . Almost as fluorescent as Jisung’s hair. “No. Absolutely not,” Chan said, scrunching up his face in displeasure.

“Get that one, then,” Yongbok said, pointing. “Look at how tall the back is. It’s like a throne.” And the fabric it was upholstered in would probably bead up and shed all over the floor like cat hair.

This would take all night at this rate.

“Excuse me,” Chan called out to one of the employees. “Do you have anything cheaper? Anything on clearance?” Anything that he wouldn’t mind seeing explode.

The employee smiled at him pityingly, almost condescendingly, but she said, “We may have a couple of old display models in the back. I’ll show you.” She motioned for him to follow her towards the back of the store.

Chan glanced down at Yongbok, who he still had under control because of his grip on the boy’s wrist. “Stay here.” He let go and backed away.

Yongbok immediately leaped up from the recliner and dashed farther into the furniture store, laughing mischievously. He was usually so lazy and still. Where did all of this energy come from?

Chan groaned and nearly chased after him but the employee had gotten quite a ways ahead of him and he didn’t want to further annoy her. Praying to the Big Blue Bird that the boys wouldn’t destroy the whole store in the few minutes he’d be gone, he hurriedly sprinted after the employee to the far side of the showroom and followed her down a hallway past the restrooms. She pushed open a set of swinging doors that led to a small and narrow storage room of some kind.

She flipped a light switch and, after a bit of buzzing and ticking, several old light fixtures filled the room with a yellowish glow. “We keep all of the older stuff back here,” she explained, motioning to the interior. “Anything catch your eye?”

He glanced around the slightly musty, dimly-lit nook. All kinds of furniture like dressers and wardrobes and bed frames and loveseats had been wedged in together with little tags on them that read things like ‘scratched on the sides’ or ‘damaged: broken shelf’ or ‘torn upholstery on back.’ There was a recliner next to where he was standing. It seemed to be big enough for his needs but the fabric looked worn out and faded and completely out of style like it had been taken straight out of some poor grandmother’s living room. A little farther into the space, Chan spotted another recliner but there was a massive split in the leather right across the seat that would probably take more cash than he wanted to spend to get repaired.

“How much longer do you need,” the employee asked, clearly getting anxious.

Chan could hear Hyunjin’s high-pitched laughter even from this distance. He did not have much time to choose before he needed to get back to keep an eye on him. “Just one more minute,” he pleaded.

Nothing seemed to work for him, though. Everything he saw looked too torn up to invest good money in. He nearly gave up. It was just his luck that they didn’t have anything he could use. Chan couldn’t even be disappointed in the slim pickings. Buying a recliner had been a last minute decision so sifting through the dusty, torn up inventory in the back room of a furniture store was the best that he could do, after all. Not without coven approval and funding.

But...

“There. In the corner,” Chan pointed.

A flickering spotlight seemed to shine its cone of light directly on a recliner that was big and poofy and blue and perfect . There was just something about it that clicked in Chan’s head. It was like locking eyes with his soulmate or feeling the Big Blue Bird’s light shine through the window and touch his skin first thing in the morning. He felt warm on the inside and then that warmth kind of moved outside of him, too. Like a hug.

“I’ll take that one,” Chan told her. “How quickly can it be delivered?”

★☆

Chan could easily recall the morning he first met Hyunjin.

It was back in July and he’d only had the shop for a week or so. In fact, he was still so new to the District that he often got lost on his way to his own home. It had been early in the week. A Tuesday, maybe. He was on his way to the shop to open up for the day. A bad summer thunderstorm had rolled in during the wee hours of the morning so Chan had walked up Thirteenth Street with an umbrella instead of flying on his broom like he usually did.

Blocking the door to his shop had been a big black lump.

He hadn’t known what it was. A garbage bag? A very large, sleeping dog? He had almost been afraid to approach it but then the lump moved, sat up, stretched and yawned. It wasn’t a sleeping dog but a sleeping person wearing the all black of a witch.

Chan took a step forward to get a better look. “Good morning.” Then he wondered if the person was dangerous in some way so he took a step back.

The stranger smacked their lips and looked up at Chan with big, sleepy eyes. “Goo’ morning.”

Realizing that this must be an exceptionally early customer, Chan stepped towards the door again. “We don’t open until eight o’clock,” Chan let them know. “Can you come back in fifteen minutes?”

He got a good look at the stranger. A tall, gangly boy. Waifish and pale. “Is that peanut butter,” he asked, wiping the sleep from his eyes.

Chan just stood there with his keys in his hand and his umbrella over his head. It was such an odd subject change. “Huh?”

“I smell peanut butter,” the boy stated. He stood up and his eyes got all sparkly like the Big Blue Bird’s feathers at night. He grinned and pointed. “It’s right there. Can I have some?” He was already approaching Chan. Too quickly for the District Witch to react to, the boy shoved his big hands in the satchel Chan carried, rummaged around and then pulled free the peanut butter and jelly sandwich that was supposed to be Chan’s lunch. The boy unwrapped it from the plastic and bit right in.

Eyes wide, Chan sputtered out, “Hey. Don’t do that! Snatching is bad.”

The boy stopped chewing. When he spoke, his voice was unsteady like it was about to break into pieces. “I don’t want to be bad.”

“Well, you’re being bad.”

The boy stuck out his bottom lip. It legitimately looked like he was about to cry.

Chan sucked in a deep breath, held it and let it back out. “But it’s fine. Alright? Don’t get upset.”

It took a few moments but the boy’s expression straightened out. He took a second but far less eager bite of the sandwich.

Chan looked him up and down. The boy wore a plain black shirt that was too big for him in the shoulders and black pants that were a size or two too short for him considering how much of his ankles they exposed. The cap he wore also seemed too small for him. It bulged out awkwardly on top of his head noticeably enough for Chan to wonder if he was hiding something beneath it. Overall, it was a bit of a frumpy look to present to the world but the kid was young. Perhaps he’d just gotten into university or had just started an apprenticeship and he just didn’t have the money to splurge on a fashionable coven-black outfit. Chan knew the struggle. He’d been there. “If you don’t want to be a bad person, then you ask nicely before you take something that belongs to someone else. Okay?”

“Okay,” the boy said. He took a third bite. “Can I have your sandwich? It has peanut butter on it and peanut butter is my favorite so I would like to eat it.”

Chan sighed. It was probably too late to ask to eat something if half of what you wanted to eat was already in your stomach. Chan gently moved the boy sideways so that he could reach the shop’s front door and slot his key in the lock. “You can have the sandwich. I’ll eat something else. What’s your name?”

The boy replied with a low, crackling noise like fire snapping at fresh wood.

“I didn’t quite catch that.” Chan unlocked the shop’s front door and pushed it open. He walked inside, realized the boy was following him indoors but couldn’t move fast enough to stop him. Oh well. It was just fifteen minutes and he’d feel awful if he forced the boy to wait outside in the rain. “What did you say your name was?” He chalked up the weird noise he had heard to the boy attempting to speak with his mouth full. “Repeat that.”

The boy said it again but the thud of the closing door and the jangling of the bell above it disguised the sound.

Chan hated to keep pestering the boy but, “Huh?”

“That’s what my mom calls me,” the boy explained.

But what ? Chan shook his head. It was early in the morning. He was still kind of tired from staying up most of the night. The thunder was quite loud. He was punching in his code to the alarm system. Maybe he just didn’t properly hear. “What did you say your name was?”

The boy opened his mouth and said… something. Chan couldn’t catch the exact syllables over the noise of the pouring rain and the howl of the wind and the buzzing of the lights as he flicked on all of the switches.

“Hyunjin,” Chan tried to confirm, his voice soaring up an octave in confusion. That’s all he was sure he had heard. Or something close to it. “Your name is Hyunjin?”

The boy smiled wide. His cheeks went pink. He went from looking scolded and forlorn to pleased in a blink. “Yay! I’m Hyunjin.”

Chan nodded slowly. Maybe the guy just really liked his name. “My name is Chan. I’m the District Witch. Do you want coffee?”

“Okay,” Hyunjin sang out. His happiness seemed to flood the shop, reaching all the way up to the rafters.

The District Witch couldn’t help but smile. “And where’s your coat in this weather?” Chan took off his own and hung it on the rack by the door.

“I don’t have a coat,” said Hyunjin honestly, nibbling on his sandwich.

“You should get a coat,” Chan told him. “Even if it’s the summer, you still need one for days like this.” He pointed out the window at the downpour. Lightning flickered and thunder rumbled. The Big Blue Bird must have been in quite a mood.

“Okay. I’ll do whatever you say.”

Chan made his way down the aisle towards the cash wrap, deciding that he’d just call the deli up the street for lunch. It was money he didn’t really want to spend but-

“Channie-Chan,” Hyunjin called out, rushing up the aisle behind him.

Channie-Chan? Was that a nickname? They were on a nickname basis already? “What is it, Hyunjin,” he asked, turning around.

Hyunjin walked right up to him and wrapped an arm around Chan’s torso in a rather sudden hug. “You’re so nice,” Hyunjin said, his voice sounding like it was about to break again. He squeezed Chan a little bit harder. “ So nice.”

★☆

YOUR COURIER IS OUT ON DELIVERY.

Chan stared at the notification on his phone completely stupefied.

It had been quite some time since Jisung had left the shop. Hours even, but, apparently, the boy had only just started his deliveries. Or, hopefully, and Chan put up a little prayer to the Big Blue Bird, Jisung just didn’t know how to work the app. Chan bit his bottom lip, fretting that he may have actually gotten scammed after all. He had even paid in advance. He’d let a child talk him into paying in advance! That was a lot of money to lose. And a lot of precious items he would not be able to reorder any time soon. Even the letters that the District residents had written him were completely irreplaceable! It’s not like he could ask the people he governed to write the notes again. That was quite a lot of inventory to lose. He’d have to eat the cost! And all of those residents were counting on his replies and now they weren’t going to get them. What if a resident filed a formal complaint about his negligence with the coven? What if Woo-something-or-other called him in the morning and ranted about how he wasn’t fulfilling his District Witch duties?

What if he lost his job?

“If you keep frowning, your face will stick like that,” Hyunjin told him, shaking Chan’s arm to jostle him out of his stupor.

“I wouldn’t mind getting my face stuck like that,” Yongbok commented from a few steps ahead. He hadn’t even turned around to look. “Maybe everybody will keep away if I look really mean.”

This didn’t sit well with Hyunjin. “You should smile all of the time! If your face gets stuck in a smile, then you won’t have any secrets and you’ll always be bright and colorful and everyone will like you and you’ll have a thousand friends!”

“I don’t want to be liked by everyone and I definitely don’t want a thousand friends,” Yongbok said honestly. He propped his hands up on his head as he walked. “I only want to be liked by, like, two people. Maybe three. Four is pushing it. No, nevermind. Just two.” He glanced over his shoulder in Chan’s direction. It was brief, though. Too quickly for the District Witch to notice. “Okay. Only one. I only want to be liked by one person.”

“Am I that one person?” Hyunjin asked, putting a brand new hop in his walk.

“You like everyone so you don’t count,” Yongbok huffed.

“Oh,” Hyunjin said. Just that quickly, his hop left his walk. He pouted. “I want to count. I mean… I can count! I counted all the way to the thousands once. It was tough.”

“Don’t be mean to him, Yongbok,” Chan chastised, not taking his eyes off of his phone. He was still trying to figure out the courier app. It was a bit more complicated than it probably should be. Was there a way he could message Jisung and check up on him? The kid didn’t even have his location on. He could be anywhere with all of that money!

“I’m not being mean,” said Yongbok. “I just said he likes everyone. That’s being super nice.”

The trio turned at an intersection and found themselves on Thirteenth Street.

It felt like it was the darkest part of the night now but Chan had to remind himself that it wasn’t but seven in the evening. Barely that. Above them were the twinkling white lights of the city’s Winter Solstice decorations strung up on the lamp posts. Even higher above them, way way way up there, the faintest light blue glimmer of the tips of the Big Blue Bird’s feathers could be seen, poking through the dark in a beautiful, mystical pattern. That reminded him. He had yet to decorate his own shop for Winter Solstice and he wondered if he would ever have enough time this week to do so.

“Let’s stop by here first,” Chan said, pointing to Minho’s Trinkets and Tokens.

Yongbok made a noise of disapproval.

“Are we going to visit that really nice guy,” Hyunjin asked excitedly. “He’s like… so nice.”

“I want a new pestle and mortar set,” Chan explained himself.

This part of Thirteenth Street was always quite busy this time of night, as the train station wasn’t too far off and a lot of people liked to stop by the shops and restaurants during their commute home from work. However, things were much quieter tonight. At the very least, the huge line outside of Minho’s shop had dissipated and even the crowd inside had thinned, if a quick glance through the big window was any indication.

“I wonder if he has a rewards card program,” Chan mused aloud. “And if he does, do I need to get one, too?”

“I see what this is about,” said Yongbok. He leaned against the glass door of the shop and pushed it open with his body weight. An electronic bell beeped as he entered. “We’re scoping out the competition so that we can snatch their marketing tactics.”

“Ooooh,” Hyunjin sang out, looking at Chan with big, accusing eyes. “You told me snatching was bad!”

“We’re not snatching anything.” Chan pinched Yongbok’s arm who yelped and spun away from him, darting inside. The shop was warm and cozy. The scent of coffee was sweet and thick and heavy in the air and Chan’s tummy grumbled to let him know that he had not eaten since lunch. “I’m buying a pestle and mortar set,” he repeated, more to convince himself than the others. Now that Yongbok had put the idea in his head, Chan supposed he could at least look around and see how Minho had things set up here.

The place was rather neat and clean despite how large of a rush there had been for the opening day. The walls were freshly painted and decorated with large paintings of famous witches. Chan recognized Tzuyu and her trademark red and gold earrings. He spotted a portrait of the outstanding Suzy in her avant-garde hat. Even Jaebum had a portrait hanging near the far corner. All of the greats, Chan noticed. All of the legends.

He glanced around to look at the rest of the shop’s wares. There were bookshelves lined with grimoires and tomes and spell books from all over the world. There was even a small section devoted to clothing, with numerous racks of all-black ensembles perfect for the trendy, fashion-forward witch. Chan walked down one aisle with the boys on his heels, mesmerized by the dazzling collection of salt crystals that were on display.

“Welcome to Minho’s Trinkets and- Oh, it’s you.”

Chan glanced over in the direction of the voice.

“What are you doing here?” Minho was behind the cash wrap, elbows propped up on the counter with his chin on his raised fist. Even a position like that looked elegant, like he was posing for a glamour shot. Minho snorted, “Are you scoping out the competition?”

“Aha!” Yongbok exclaimed. “I’m not the only one who thinks so.”

“I’m here for a pestle and mortar set,” Chan explained himself again. “I saw one in the window that I liked.”

“Can we explore?” Hyunjin wondered. He didn’t wait for Chan to give him an answer. “Let’s explore!” He started tugging Yongbok into the next aisle.

“Don’t touch anything,” Chan warned as they left.

“I won’t,” Hyunjin sang out.

“You too, Yongbok. Don’t put your hands on anything!”

Yongbok’s voice came from the next aisle over. “I’d never do such a thing.”

With their absence, it was just Chan and Minho staring each other down.

Minho tilted his head just a tiny bit. “Witch to witch, what’s your specialty?”

“My specialty?” Chan repeated.

“Your area of study,” Minho exhaled, gritting his teeth with the last of his patience. “Of expertise. Come on, District Witch. Keep up. It’s not that complicated of a question.” He stood up from behind the counter and walked around it, approaching Chan with the graceful, powerful movements of a predator cornering prey.

“Dream interpretation,” Chan blurted out.

“I’m a bit of a palm reader myself.”

Before Chan knew it, Minho had one of Chan’s hands gripped tight with both of his own. Chan startled, “Hey, I-”

“It’ll only take a second,” Minho stated coldly, not taking his eyes off the District Witch’s hand. He ran his own thumbs across Chan’s palm, tracing the lines and grooves in his skin. He was right. It had only taken a second. As quickly as he had grabbed hold of Chan’s hand, he let it go, taking the heat of his body with him. “Changbin!”

The witch’s apprentice stepped forward, brushing past Chan and startling him. He held a hand to his chest to ease his racing heart. Had the apprentice always been leaning against that wall? Chan hadn’t even noticed him.

“Changbin, get our District Witch that S&K brand pestle and mortar set, would you?”

Changbin nodded and turned away. Even in his big, knee-high boots, his footsteps made very little noise on the hardwood. At least the snake wasn’t wrapped around his shoulders this time. That was one thing to be grateful for.

“You read my palm,” Chan stated.

“I sure did.”

“Do you want me to… interpret your dreams?”

“I don’t have dreams.”

Oh.

Chan stood there awkwardly. His nerves still tingled with the sensation of Minho’s thumbs drawing patterns into his palm. He felt numb like he’d just stuck his hand in ice water or like he’d gotten stung by a bee.

The silence was disrupted by Hyunjin’s wild, elated laughter and the sound of something heavy being dropped back on a shelf.

Minho raised an eyebrow. “If they break it you buy it.” There was a smug look on his face as if he actually wanted the boys to break something.

Chan definitely couldn’t afford to spend any more cash today. “I’ll keep an eye on them.” He learned his lesson. He would not take the boys out anywhere else. The next time he had errands to run, he would do them after he sent Hyunjin out for bread and maybe while Yongbok was catching a nap or something. “Are you going to tell me what you discovered reading my palm?”

“Oh, you’ll know,” Minho said cryptically.

They fell back into silence. Chan once again felt small and inadequate beneath Minho’s stare. The man was both pretty and creepy. There was an eeriness to his beauty not unlike that of a painted and detailed ball-jointed doll. Chan felt uncomfortable beneath Minho’s blatant scrutiny. “So… How was your first day of business,” Chan asked, trying to hide the fact that he was nervous.

“Spectacular,” Minho said.

Chan waited for the witch to elaborate further, maybe drop his sales plan percentage or his profit numbers or something , but Minho continued to stand there and stare with those soulless eyes of his. “Are you real?” Chan asked. He hadn’t even meant to say it and he definitely did not mean to word it like that but the question was out and it sat in the air strange and prickly between them.

Minho didn’t say anything for several seconds. Then, “Now for the results of your palm reading.”

“Here.” Changbin was suddenly standing next to Chan.

The District Witch jumped. First Yongbok and now this guy. He would never be able to relax! Did he have to tie bells around everyone’s necks? “Thank you,” Chan exhaled, grabbing the box the boy was holding out to him. It was the exact pestle and mortar set that had caught his attention earlier that afternoon but he did not want to give Minho the satisfaction of being right on the first try. “Actually,” he said, keeping his voice steady, “this wasn’t the one I was looking at.”

“Really?” Minho asked. He raised a hand to tilt the brim of his hat back a little, revealing more of his face. “I’m absolutely positive that’s the one you’re looking for.”

Chan thought back to the first time he glanced through the shop window earlier that day, trying to recall any of the other sets he saw on display. “The one I want is made of white marble.” He tried to hand it back to Changbin but the boy refused to take it.

Minho’s eyes widened in what may have been surprise but then he reeled it back into a blank expression. “How distasteful. White marble doesn’t suit you. It’s too flashy.” He approached Chan, getting close--too close--and looked him up and down. “I read your palm. I measured your lines and counted your chains. There’s no way I’m wrong. You’re basic and understated with absolutely no desire to stand out or be anything but just... adequate. Your almost primal need to seek validation from everyone around you stems from a childhood full of praise but an adulthood full of indifference so you surround yourself with people who walk all over you to sate your instinct to feel wanted. You lack self-confidence and have minimal ambition.” He paused to take a deep breath after his long-winded explanation. “Simple gray porcelain is more your speed.”

This made Chan a little angry. He just wanted a pestle and mortar set! He didn’t ask to be targeted like this. “Hey. I said I wanted the white marble.”

His display of emotion made Minho smirk. “I’m trying to help you out. Using my genius-level intellect and Big Blue Bird-given talent to match patrons with the exact products that suit them. The gray porcelain is the perfect fit. Extremely simple and plain. Like you.”

Chan swallowed hard. Was Minho starting a fight? Was he always going to be so unnecessarily cruel? Chan made himself calm down. “I’m telling you, I want the white marble. That’s what caught my eye.”

They stared at each other for a long, tense moment. The silence was only broken by giddy whispering and squeaky shoes a few aisles over. Minho snatched the box of gray porcelain out of Chan’s hand and took a step backwards, finally giving Chan some breathing room. He said, “I know you’re lying, District Witch... And I know that you absolutely hate that I got so much right about you but to save your little ego, I’ll let you have the white marble. Changbin!”

Wordlessly, Changbin turned away and headed back to the display to retrieve the proper set of tools.

“Let me have it?” Chan questioned. “I want to pay for it. I’m here as a customer.”

“Think of it as a gift,” said Minho. He sat the box on the counter behind him and folded his arms over his chest. The chandelier above their heads made his silver buttons sparkle. “Isn’t that the tradition? A new resident moves to the District and presents their name and a gift to the District Witch. I’ve given you my name. Here’s the gift.” The fact that he was so calm, so disinterested, almost bored, made Chan even more upset. Minho had just ruined Chan’s whole day with his harsh words yet he had the nerve to yawn like he’d exerted no effort or held any regret about doing so!

There was a low, delighted cackle from the other side of the store followed by an excited, ear-piercing squeal.

Chan raised his voice, “Put it back, you two!” He didn’t even need to see them.

“Okay,” Hyunjin called back, a dead giveaway to whatever hijinks they were getting up to.

“Get over here where I can see you,” Chan called out. “You too, Yongbok. Now.”

Minho’s apprentice returned as quietly as he had left and startled Chan all over again by holding up a different small box in front of him. Chan took it and switched it from hand to hand to test its weight. The white marble pestle and mortar set felt sturdy, even though it was still in the packaging. Truthfully, it hadn’t been the set Chan wanted, but he refused to allow Minho to read his palm as easily as a book. “Thanks,” said Chan through gritted teeth.

Minho waved a hand dismissively. “We’re about to close so swiftly exit. All of you.”

Chan bit his tongue to keep from saying something he’d surely regret. He was District Witch, after all. He had a duty to be a pillar of professionalism and modesty in this community. Instead of speaking all that he wanted to speak, he shouted, “Yongbok, Hyunjin, let’s go.”

“Is it nap time?” Yongbok asked. He came up to Chan with a cranky frown on his face.

“What? We’re napping!” Hyunjin came barreling up behind them and bodily collided with Chan in his excitement. “Do you know how long it’s been since I’ve napped ?”

“Good night,” Chan said over his shoulder, aiming the farewell in Minho’s direction in one last display of common courtesy.

“What’s so good about it,” Minho replied, not even looking his way.

★☆

Chan didn’t like to remember it but the first time Hyunjin made something explode was an event he would never forget. He would probably be eighty or ninety years old having forgotten everything else that had occured over the course of his life, but he’d remember that . He would be minding his own business, piddling around in the kitchen or sitting on the back porch with a paper like his father always did when the memory would jump to the forefront of his mind. He just knew it. He just knew that’s exactly how it would be.

That day had started like most others.

“You’re here again,” Chan had stated, surprised but not surprised. On his broom, he drifted down through the air towards the sidewalk outside of his shop.

Hyunjin was there. Of course Hyunjin was there. He had showed up on the doorstep of Chan’s Tchotchkes every single morning for the past three weeks without fail. “I’m here again,” Hyunjin said, flapping his hands in a greeting. “Why would I be anywhere else?”

“Because you have more important things to do?”

“What’s more important than being with you, Christopher?”

Chan wondered where Hyunjin’s infinite list of nicknames for him came from. He touched down on the ground and hoisted his broom up over his shoulder. The Big Blue Bird’s feathers were just turning orange and yellow on the horizon but it was already shaping up to be another hot and humid day. A month ago, he would have prayed for sun. Now, he was praying for more rain. “Where’s your hat?”

“I lost it,” Hyunjin answered. “Someone took it from me.”

“They didn’t hurt you, did they?”

“No. They just wanted to see my head.”

“Alright,” Chan said slowly.

The hat was indeed gone but in its place was a big, plaid ribbon that just barely succeeded in making Hyunjin’s wild, tangled hair look less than feral.

“Where did you get that ribbon?”

“I found it.”

“You didn’t snatch it, did you?” Chan fumbled around in his pockets for his keys.

“I didn’t snatch it. I promise.”

“Alright, then,” Chan said. He unlocked the door and pushed it open.

Hyunjin beat him inside. He had been watching Chan over the past few weeks, observing him and emulating him. Always saying that he wanted to be just like him. Hyunjin knew what buttons to press to deactivate the alarm. He knew which light switch controlled which set of lights. So he raced to the alarm system and punched in the code and then excitedly flipped on all of the shop’s lights.

“What about that shirt,” Chan questioned. It was probably the cleanest thing he’d seen the boy wear all week. “That’s new. Where did you get that?”

“I didn’t snatch it,” Hyunjin whined, pushing back the curtains that hung in front of one of the windows.

“Then where did you get it?”

Hyunjin stomped his foot. “You told me not to snatch so I didn’t snatch!”

“Okay, okay. I believe you. No angry yelling.”

Chan barely had his broom propped up in the corner behind the coat rack when Hyunjin rushed up to him and hugged him. His body heat encircled Chan like he was being enveloped in steam. Hyunjin bit Chan’s shoulder through his shirt in what might have been a display of affection. “I missed you, Chan.”

“You just saw me yesterday.”

“Whenever you’re gone, I miss you. I count the seconds that you’re not around. I lose count sometimes but I keep counting and I keep counting and then I lose count but I keep counting and then I see you and I stop counting because you’re here and nothing else matters. Not even counting!”

Chan peeled himself out of the circle of Hyunjin’s arms. He still wasn’t quite used to Hyunjin’s clinginess. It was as if the boy could not live without him. Based on his poor eating habits and his inability to perform most general tasks without having the simple instructions repeated multiple times, perhaps he actually couldn’t live without Chan.

Or maybe it was just too early in the morning.

“I brought breakfast,” Chan said. “Enough for us to share.”

“Yay!” Hyunjin exclaimed. He took off running down one of the aisles.

“Don’t run,” Chan called after him.

“Okay.”

Chan heard Hyunjin’s shoes squeal on the floor as he brought himself to a halt. The District Witch approached the cash wrap and turned his satchel over to get the big plastic bowl out of it. He had bought a rotisserie chicken from the deli last night so he had taken it home and cut it into strips to eat. A lot of them he had dropped into the salad he had threw together that morning. He snapped open the plastic lid and then rummaged in his bag for a fork.

Hyunjin walked up to the counter, gave the bowl an exaggerated sniff and then said, “Ew.”

“It’s not nasty. It’s healthy,” Chan responded.

Hyunjin crossed his arms over his chest and crinkled up his nose. “There’s no peanut butter in this.”

Peanut butter in a salad? Of course not. Not paying him much mind, Chan speared some lettuce and a crouton with his fork and shoved it into his mouth. It was tasty. If a little dry. He had forgotten the dressing. “Peanut butter doesn’t belong in a salad.”

“Nuh uh,” Hyunjin protested. “You can put it on anything.”

Chan had made sandwiches for the boy half the week so he had emptied his peanut butter jar at home. A salad was all he could think of to make for Hyunjin today. “You can’t have peanut butter all of the time.”

“Yes I can,” Hyunjin pouted. “I want peanut butter.”

“I don’t have any peanut butter,” Chan explained. He could use a coffee. Something strong and bitter. “Now eat.” He retrieved an additional fork from his bag and held it out to Hyunjin.

The boy didn’t take it. “I’m not hungry.” His stomach growled like a wild beast.

“Eat, Hyunjin. Please. I know you haven’t had anything since I fed you yesterday.”

“I want peanut butter, Chanut Butter. Pwease?”

“There’s no peanut butter.”

Hyunjin furrowed his eyebrows and slapped away the fork Chan was holding out to him. It fell across the counter with a clatter.

Chan sighed. It would be so easy to get angry but he just let it go. “Eat the salad. If you don’t make a mess in the shop today, I’ll get peanut butter in the afternoon.”

“No. I want some now.”

“You have to be patient, Hyunjin.”

“No!”

Chan scooped up another forkful of salad and ate it. “It’s good. You’re missing out.”

Hyunjin shook his head, practically fuming. “I don’t want that.”

“If you don’t eat this then I won’t get you any peanut butter.”

The boy grabbed the plastic salad bowl with both hands. He let out an impatient shriek, his cheeks flushed with anger. His fingers glowed orange like hot metal. There was a hiss, a sizzle and a pop.

Then the salad bowl exploded.

★☆

The recliner arrived shortly before eight. Despite how important it was, at least to the boys, its arrival was rather lackluster. A big pick-up truck simply pulled up to the curb outside of Chan’s shop and two men in overalls hoisted the blue recliner down onto the sidewalk in front of the door. They rang the bell, waited for Chan’s signature and then, just as quickly as they had arrived, drove away.

Snow started to fall around a quarter to nine. This was fine because Chan was absolutely exhausted once he’d maneuvered the recliner down Aisle 7 towards the back of the store. He wanted to do nothing but kick up his feet and rest. He did not expect Hyunjin to help. In fact, he purposefully didn’t ask the boy for help to reduce the risk of explosions. Yongbok, on the other hand, started to help but then went outside ‘for some fresh air’ and left Chan to struggle alone.

It took some doing but he managed to get the recliner to where he wanted it, taking Yongbok’s advice by angling it just so a short distance in front of the hallway.

Even with Chan insisting that Hyunjin go home first and then sleep in the chair tomorrow, Hyunjin refused to leave until he’d had at least one nap in the thing, even though it was far too late in the evening for a nap. So Chan and Hyunjin squeezed into the chair shoulder to shoulder and Chan eased the thing backwards, got his feet all propped up and relaxed into the soft cushions.

He was surprised by how comfortable it was but maybe the majority of that was due to the company.

Would it always feel so nice to hang up his hat, kick off his shoes and relax ?

Slowly, the seconds dripped by. The stress of the long day melted away, leaving behind molasses-sweet relaxation. Yongbok had been right. The heating vent blew warm air over the top of Chan’s head as he stretched out and, with all of the store lights turned off, he could see straight down the aisle and through the big shop window to the sidewalk outside. The snow fell in pretty, graceful flurries and he watched the people of the city hurry by, their coats and hats and umbrellas covered in the lightest layer of white.

Earlier in the evening, Chan had brewed a batch of coffee and sweetened it with sugar and cream and a light drizzle of chocolate syrup. The drink sat hot and comfortable in his belly and, ironically, made it very difficult to stay awake. It had been a long day and he was sleepy and could really use this nap. Just an hour or two, he reasoned. And then he’d be set to work through the night.

There were resident letters, of course. And a customer conversion rate report he had to prepare. A fresh truckload of new merchandise sitting in the workshop that he needed to start unboxing and getting on the shelves.

He had his work cut out for him but, right now, this chair was the most important thing to him.

Hyunjin was talking about something. Chan had tuned him out a while back but the boy kept on, his speech slowing and slowing and slowing as he began to drift off to sleep. “...and then… there was this man with a big, gold ring… and he… and he… he said that there should be a… a tag… but I didn’t know about a tag...” Perhaps the boy was recalling an odd dream.

If Chan had been listening properly, he could offer his interpretation of it.

“He said… there’d be trouble without it. He said… something…” Hyunjin’s words got thinner and thinner as he spoke. His eyes fluttered closed as sleep took hold of him. “I don’t want… to go away… I want to stay here.”

Chan tuned him out again. He had his own set of worries to contend with. His mind settled on Minho’s Trinkets and Tokens. He compared all of the ways the shop across the street was better than his own. It was better organized. It smelled nicer and newer. The windows were bigger and the shop had more display shelves. They carried more expensive brands. There were signs on everything! And that line out the door… Chan never had a line out the door. Clearly, Minho knew what he was doing by operating a business. Chan couldn’t say half as much.

And Minho himself… He was a better witch than Chan could ever be. Chan hadn’t seen him work a spell yet but he could just tell from the way the man carried himself. From the beauty of the wand he carried. Truly, he had to have gone to quite the school to earn something like that. And his uniform? Where did he get it? Chan didn’t care too much for the lace frills but the silver buttons were nice.

He wanted a shirt with silver buttons.

Hyunjin was still going. “...and then mom went very far away… and then my siblings went far away… I was by myself.”

Was he still recalling his dream, Chan wondered. It was difficult to tell. Hyunjin was so out of it that he was practically sleep talking, his sentences split into fragments by light snores and gentle moans. “...and then you were there. And I wanted to go where you went. I wanted to stay where you were.”

Chan turned his head to look at him. He was getting sleepy and there was no telling if he was dreaming up this moment himself.

Hyunjin opened his eyes. He let out a big yawn and pressed his face into the crook of Chan’s neck. “Night, Dad,” he mumbled.

All of Chan’s thoughts came to a crashing halt. He had been half-asleep but now his eyes shot open and his body went rigid. He was immediately back in the present. Back in the chair. Back in the dark, cozy store with soft white light spilling in through the windows. Wide awake. He kept his voice low. “Hyunjin, what did you say?” He was sure he hadn’t heard right. He had to have been dreaming.

Hyunjin snuggled closer. “Night, Chan.”

Before Chan could ask him anything else, before he could be sure , Hyunjin began to snore again, his whole body rumbling in the chair.

Chan had bought the recliner as a place to retreat to for naps but now he couldn’t sleep at all.

Chapter Text

Mana was like the ocean. Mana was like the wind. It had a flow. A tide. It was always there, even if you could not see it. Mana was always moving, always pushing ; a constant reminder of the Big Blue Bird’s presence as she shifted her wings and stirred the air, a constant reminder of her love. When the flow was right and a witch got right in the thick of it, the feeling was the same as being in a boat and hearing the wind fill up all of the sails and feeling the hull slice through the water at faster and faster speeds. That’s what mana was meant for. To fill things with motion was its purpose. But when the flow was off and a witch got right in the thick of it, the feeling was like being trapped in quicksand. Being stuck and stagnant. Unable to go forward .

Chan startled awake, feeling like he was choking. He clutched at his neck and gasped for air as sleep crumbled away beneath him.

He was still in the recliner. Hyunjin was cozied up to his side, snoring away. Innocent and unaware.

“It’s happening,” Chan muttered, feeling the mana twist and turn around him like a snake slithering over his skin. “Something’s messing up the flow. Something big.”

This went beyond a mild discomfort, this went beyond something that could be easily ignored. The air was so uncomfortable . It was like he was underwater, right there at the surface but unable to push his head through and breathe. He glanced up at the grandfather clock. He could hardly see its face in the dark but his surprise at the time woke him up completely. It was two in the morning. He had only intended to nap for a half hour so he could work through the night but he had been dead asleep for six straight hours instead!

“Great Big Blue, I have to find out what’s going on.” As gently as he could manage, Chan unwrapped Hyunjin’s arms from around his middle and stood up out of the recliner.

He was a bit irritated that most of the night had slipped right between his fingers without him having even a chance to get any work done but he was even more upset that he had nearly slept through such a massive disturbance in the flow. How long had it been going on? Seconds? Minutes? “Where’s my wand? My hat? My broom?” Hurriedly, he shuffled from one end of the shop to the other, gathering the items in question. He stashed his wand in his front pocket and propped his hat on his head. He carried his broom in one hand and rushed up to the coat rack to grab his winter jacket. Chan approached the door in a rush. He stopped short. A pair of bright yellow eyes peered up at him from the dark outside his door. “Felix! Oh, you must be freezing out there, boy.”

Chan unlocked the door and pushed it open. He expected Felix to dart inside to the warmth of the inner rooms of the shop but the black cat merely hopped up on two legs and dug his claws into Chan’s calf.

“Go inside,” Chan said, nudging the cat indoors with his foot.

Felix meowed in protest and returned to the space between Chan’s boots.

“I need to go on patrol. Get inside.”

Felix didn’t leave. He put his claws back into the material of Chan’s pants, almost pricking at his skin.

Chan didn’t have time for this. “Fine.” He shut the shop door, locked it back with his keys and then hoisted Felix into his arms. “You’re shaking,” he gasped out. “How long have you been out here waiting on me?” It had to have been for quite some time if he went by Felix’s snow-damp fur. Chan tried not to feel guilty. Surely, the cat could have found shelter elsewhere if he could not get into the shop. “I guess you have to come with me now,” said Chan. He needed to hurry up and find the source of the mana disturbance before he wound up with one of the coven’s hefty fees on his head. “Come on. Get in.” He unzipped the front of his jacket just a little and Felix hopped from out of Chan’s arms and nuzzled his way into the space between Chan’s uniform and the fabric of the jacket. The cat was large and bony and Chan could feel his little heart pounding and his little body trembling. “There, there. You’ll get warm soon. Hold on.”

He swung his leg over his broom and it hummed to life beneath him. The mana flow seemed to combat it, however, and the broom didn’t respond in any other way for several seconds. “Come on, come on. I’m right here.” He focused a bit, and tried his best to ease into the magic. The mana was rough. Chaotic. He could feel it circling around his hat like water circling a bathtub drain and it threatened to do his head in but he pushed it outwards like he was casting a spell. At the very least, he managed to stabilize the flow immediately around him and his broom positively responded. With just a little more coaxing, the broom pushed the witch upward into the air and, a breath later, they were flying.

Felix let out a low-pitched yowl.

“It’s okay,” Chan reassured him. “I’ve got you.” He took a hand off of his broom to more firmly hold Felix to his chest.

A classic sight, honestly. A witch on his broom with his cat. Except… Felix wasn’t really his cat.

They flew down Thirteenth Street, empty at this time of night, until the broom had picked up enough speed. Like a plane taking off, Chan angled upwards and the broom climbed into the air. They went up above the roofs of the nearby buildings and then kept going. Higher and higher. Chan squinted through the snow flurries and kept their noses pointed to the wind until he was high enough up to get a good aerial view of his District. It was nothing too fancy or upper class. Just sprawling suburbs, a library and a community center, criss-crossing roads and a shrine somewhere out east. He had flown over his territory countless times before and could spot the boundaries of District 9 nearly by instinct. To the north, he could see the post office and, a little bit farther, the elementary school and then, even farther than that, the tall and skeletal trees of the national park marking the edge of the city. To the south, he could see the wide and sprawling apartment complex and the washed-out glow of the mega-mart. The big bridge that crossed the river marked the line between District 9 and District 10.

Yet even from such a high vantage point, Chan couldn’t see anything out of the ordinary. He couldn’t see anything that could possibly be the cause of such drastic changes in the flow.

“What’s your professional opinion,” Chan asked Felix. He looped the broom back east and flew over his District again. “Where do you think the anomaly originates?”

Felix meowed from inside Chan’s jacket.

“I don’t know, either,” Chan sighed, pretending to understand the cat.

He eased up on their speed a little. The freezing wind bit at him even through his jacket but he ignored it and made himself focus.

In the air, the flow of the mana was more normalized. It didn’t become bumpy and move backwards until it was closer to the streets but even then Chan found it difficult to pinpoint the source. At times the mana dragged backwards like the tide pulling out to sea and he would think he’d narrowed down the location then he would feel a disruption on the opposite end of the neighborhood which would only confuse him again. Either something really big and really powerful was moving around his District at quite the clip or he had several big and powerful things to contend with.

Neither option excited him.

By then, the witch and the cat that wasn’t his had reached the far eastern side of the District so Chan spun them north for a third flyover. He groaned, “This isn’t going well.”

Felix answered him with an equally frustrated mewl.

If it was a powerful beast of some kind, Chan was certain he’d be able to see it from here. To be that strong it had to be quite large, right? Ignoring the snow swirling around him and the lights of the city bouncing up into his eyes, nothing looked out of the ordinary to him. Nothing caught his eye. No big shadows. Nothing with horns or wings. Were smaller beasts this powerful?

Was he going about this the wrong way?

Chan changed up his thinking. Was it a particularly powerful witch practicing the dark arts? No. If that were the case, he surely would have heard rumors. In a community this small and tightly-knit, you couldn’t do anything particularly untoward without alerting one nosy neighbor or another and no one could resist gossip. The pawn shop guys would have let Chan know about any strange or dark items being sold or bought and even the girls down at the market would have clued him in to any unordinary requests for a rare ingredient or animal or something. Chan may not have the best track record as District Witch but he at least had that level of respect as a person and a leader.

“Well, this was a bust,” Chan huffed. He’d flown over his District several times and nothing stood out to him as worthy of investigation. The streets were just quiet and dark and still like most places would be at two in the morning. “Let’s go back to the shop, Felix.” Chan aimed them down towards Thirteenth Street. It was visible even from such a height because of how bright the lamps along the street were. “I need to get to my workshop. Maybe I can craft some kind of monitoring device to help me track the flow of mana in the area.” That would take hours. He’d be up until the Big Blue Bird turned orange. The daunting task ahead of him weighed heavily on his shoulders. “I’m going to run out of coffee.”

Felix abruptly shrieked and wriggled against Chan’s chest.

“Easy, boy. We’re almost there,” Chan tried to calm him.

Felix would not be consoled. He shrieked again. Terrified. Felix’s fur stood on end. He fought against Chan’s hold on him.

“What’s happening, boy. What is it?” Chan nearly lost his grip on his broom trying to hold Felix still. “What are you afraid of? I’m right here. I’ll protect you.”

It was like Felix hadn’t heard him. He almost jumped clear out of Chan’s jacket and would have fallen a terribly great height if Chan hadn’t gripped the cat by the scruff of his neck to hold him still.

“You’ll hurt yourself or worse,” Chan chastised. “Calm down. We’re about at the ground.”

He was barely back at street level when he became aware of some kind of wailing noise. An alarm? It was high-pitched and dug right into his ears. An awful noise. Perhaps that was what Felix was reacting so negatively towards.

Chan touched down on the ground not too far from the door of his shop, digging his heels into the snow to slow down. The wailing noise was even louder now. He could feel the sound waves bouncing off the inside of his skull. “Is there a robbery?” Chan said, wincing at the sound. He couldn’t even hear himself think! “What’s that noise?” He barely had both feet on the pavement before Felix leaped out of his jacket and darted up the snow-covered sidewalk in a hurry. “Felix!” Although he shouted, the cat ran off without slowing down, vanishing into the shadows up Thirteenth Street. Oh well. Felix wasn’t his cat. He came and left whenever he pleased.

There were lights coming on in the windows of the houses down the road. Curious but angry townsfolk were stepping out onto their stoops in pajamas covered by jackets, looking every which way to try to find the source of the noise. Chan could hear their complaints, their grumblings. One woman yelled, “It’s a school night! My children are trying to sleep!”

“My apologies,” Chan shouted, hoping she could hear him over the cacophony. “As District Witch, I’ll get to the bottom of this.”

He started to fumble around in his pockets for his keys.

“You’re back.” The icy voice belonged to Minho who had just stepped out of the dark strip of shadow between Chan’s shop and the next building over. He had his wand out, pointed in Chan’s direction, and the tip of it glowed with the heat of a spell. “I never thought I’d be happy to see you.”

Chan turned his head, spotted the raised wand and held his hands over his head in surrender. His broom fell over onto the sidewalk, falling into the snow with a pathetic plop . “What are you doing?”

“I’m losing my mind,” Minho cried out, pointing at his temple. His face was usually so stoic and contained but his expression right now was complete agony. “My head aches so bad. Don’t you hear that noise?”

Of course Chan did. There was no way he couldn’t.

Minho sucked in a deep breath. “Some of us are trying to sleep .”

“Yes. I’ve been told,” Chan fired back. The District Witch took notice of Minho’s plain white pajama shirt and wool pants. He was wearing mismatched shoes and his hair was a ruffled, inelegant mess. The worst offense of all, Minho didn’t even have on a coat! The man had obviously rushed out of bed to stand here and complain but even something like this strange, grating noise was absolutely no reason to point a wand at someone. “Put your wand down,” Chan pleaded, his hands still up in the air. “We can use our words. Not our spells.”

“I’m not attacking you,” said Minho through gritted teeth. “I’m holding a silencing spell in place, you nincompoop.” He elbowed Chan aside and stepped farther up the sidewalk.

Chan was stunned. “A silencing spell?” And the alarm was still that loud? “Where’s the noise coming from?”

“Your shop!” Minho howled out the words as if the answer were obvious. He wiggled his wand the slightest bit to emphasize the fact that he had it pointed at the door of Chan’s shop. “It’s your blasted apprentice. Make him stop!”

“Hyunjin,” Chan exhaled the name. His breath met the cold December air and left his mouth in a fog. “Hyunjin’s making all of that noise?” It was the explosion in the shop all over again. Chan ran up to the door of his shop and fished around in his jacket pockets for his keys. It felt like it took ages to dig them out of his pocket and work the correct one into the lock. When he pulled open the door, the sound became amplified. It hit Chan in the chest like something physical, knocking the wind out of him. He took a step inside. He almost couldn’t handle it. The noise… The noise! He stepped back onto the sidewalk. Was that… crying? “Hyunjin!” He shouted. Or he thought he did. He could barely hear his voice come out of his own mouth. “Hyunjin!”

Chan peered into the shop. With all of the lights turned off, the metal fixtures that made up the aisles were just oblong shadows towering towards the rafters. The light from the street barely managed to pierce the darkness at the far end of the shop.

The District Witch cupped his hands around his mouth. “Hyunjin! Hyunjin, where are you?”

The noise petered out. “Chan?” It was a choked out sound, hardly audible over the ringing in Chan’s ears. “Chan?”

“Hyunjin?” That was really him making all of that noise? How was that possible? “What are you up to?”

Hyunjin came running up the aisle towards the door. The boy appeared out of the darkness like a shining light at the end of a tunnel. “Chan!” Hyunjin’s eyes were red and glassy and his face, always so pleasant and bright, was twisted up in complete despair. “I woke up and it was super dark you weren’t there and I was super scared and I thought I was going to be super alone again,” Hyunjin sobbed, his words pouring out of him almost too fast to comprehend. He crashed right into Chan, throwing his arms around the District Witch and pushing his face into the front of Chan’s jacket. He was trembling so hard he could barely stand. “I thought you were going to leave me forever.”

“I’m here,” Chan said, rubbing Hyunjin’s back.

Hyunjin only sobbed harder. “I’m sorry for always making messes, Chan. I’m sorry I don’t always understand the rules. I’m sorry-”

“Hyunjin,” Chan cut in. “I didn’t leave because of anything you did.”

“But,” Hyunjin choked out. “You were gone for so long! I couldn’t find you. I can always find you but I couldn’t and I was scared!”

Chan took in a deep breath. “I’m not leaving.”

“You’re not leaving,” Minho interjected, reminding Chan that he was still present, “but I am about to.” He had stepped up behind Chan in the moments Chan hadn’t been paying attention and he turned up his nose in contempt at the sight of Hyunjin’s crying face. “Goodness me. What a riotous night. Ugh. This is what I get for trying to save a couple hundred on rent in the suburbs. Changbin warned me that this sort of thing may happen. I should have listened. You suburban people are so strange. I should have just taken the downtown shop.” He tucked his wand into his pocket and then turned away, grumbling the whole while.

Chan watched him go, tempted to shout something rude at his back but deciding against it. Watching Minho walk away brought his attention to the fact that a sizable crowd had gathered on the sidewalk around them. “Sorry,” Chan apologized. “Sorry for the disturbance. The matter has been settled. Nothing to see here. Please go back home.”

Only a handful of people walked away, heading home to escape the snow and cold. Most of the crowd continued to stand and watch like showgoers anticipating a second act to the performance.

Chan turned his attention back to Hyunjin. “I didn’t mean to scare you, Hyunjin. I thought I would be back before you woke up.”

“Chan!” Hyunjin collapsed. His weight pulled Chan to the pavement along with him and they fell into a heap in the snow. Hyunjin was still crying, still sniffling, still choking back sobs.

Chan wiped the tears from the boy’s face. “What’s gotten into you,” he asked. He knew Hyunjin could be clingy but he did not know it was to this extent. “Why are you crying like this just because I step out for a moment? Aren’t you grown?” He shook his head, trying to make light of the situation. “How old are you?”

“Two,” Hyunjin choked out between sniffles.

“Two… decades?” Chan offered hopefully.

Hyunjin shook his head and said, “I’m two.” He sounded completely serious.

Chan gulped. Was this another of Hyunjin’s games? Along with calling him Dad? Chan was way too tired for this. Even after catching that nap, he felt heavy and sluggish like his bones had turned to stone. There was just too much going on. Today had stretched on forever . Nothing was making sense. All he wanted to do was crawl in his bed and sleep.

There was the noise of an approaching siren. Red and blue lights danced over the facades of the buildings as a coven car approached, stopping at the curb right in front of Chan’s shop.

“Great Big Blue,” Chan muttered. When would it end?

The doors of the sleek black car opened and two witches dressed in expensive-looking suits stepped out into the fluttering snow. One was an older woman, her hair tied up in a bun at the base of her neck with a black beret angled across her forehead. Her partner was a young, scrawny male in a similar beret, still wearing the white armband that signified he was in training.

“We received a noise report,” said the woman, crossing the sidewalk to stand over Chan and Hyunjin with her arms folded across her chest. “ Several noise reports.”

“I apologize,” Chan said. He found it difficult to look up at her and meet her eye with Hyunjin draped over him like this but his attempt to pull free of the boy’s grasp just made Hyunjin cling to him harder. “Everything’s fine. It was just a little bit of separation anxiety.”

“A little bit?” The woman parroted, even mocking his accent. “That noise could be heard all the way in District 10. This isn’t a small matter, young man. Back these people up.”

She had said that last bit over her shoulder to her scrawny partner, who stopped his note scribbling to wave the spectators back a few more paces.

Chan had never really been on the receiving end of any kind of coven inquiry like this. Did he need to show his badge? Weren’t they practically in the same field? “The matter is settled now,” he tried to smooth things over. “Now that I know what the problem is, I don’t think something like this will happen again.”

“Your speech was nice and all but now that I’m standing here, we’ve got problems far larger than all of that.”

Chan angled Hyunjin sideways so that he could look at the witch more directly. “A larger problem?” Was she referring to the mana flow disturbance? No. He only had to focus for a brief moment to pick up on the fact that the flow had normalized.

The female witch propped her hands on her hips, her fingers absently toying with the handcuffs at her waist. “That dragon cannot be outdoors without a collar and tag,” she informed him. Her eyes settled on the open door right behind them before she met Chan’s gaze again. “Even a hair’s breadth away from a door is classified as outdoors.”

It took a moment for Chan to process even half of the things he’d just been told. “What did you say?” Chan sputtered out. Was he still asleep? He had to be dreaming.

“That dragon,” she pointed at Hyunjin, “needs to remain collared and tagged while outside.”

Dragon? His brain was struggling to play catch up. It dropped something large like that completely in favor of focusing on the smaller chunks of information. Because… what? “He doesn’t have a collar or a tag,” Chan exhaled.

This made the female witch tense up and take a step back. “Are you saying your dragon is unregistered?”

Unregistered? What? Chan squeezed his eyes shut and then opened them again. This was happening much too fast. “My dragon?” But… What? Hyunjin was a person not an object. He didn’t belong to Chan. And what was all of this talk about dragons?

“We’ll have to take him down to the station so we can get him on the books,” the female witch said. She whistled to her partner to get his attention. “Put him in the back.”

Chan’s brain caught up with that though. They weren’t about to take Hyunjin away! “Wait,” Chan said.

His plea went unheard. The senior witch was already attempting to haul Hyunjin to his feet, her grip on his arms tight like a vice. “This could be a hefty fine, young man.”

Another fine? Chan tightened his grip on Hyunjin’s waist. “Hold on a second,” Chan attempted.

She didn’t hold on. As soon as she pulled him out of Chan’s hold, Hyunjin began wailing again. Crying at the top of his lungs and making the very air vibrate with the noise of his unhappiness.

“Shut it, you,” the witch shouted at him.

Hyunjin did not shut it.

She pulled her wand out of her pocket and held it up to Hyunjin’s neck. She muttered a spell, too lowly and too quickly for Chan to catch, and Hyunjin’s sobbing turned into pained screaming for a long, terrible second before sound stopped coming out of his throat altogether.

Oh no. “Don’t hurt him,” Chan called out, pushing himself to his feet. “What are you doing to him?”

Hyunjin started crying again. Tears spilled down his face and his mouth was wide open with his wailing but not a single sound came out. Whatever silencing spell the witch had cast had absolutely muted Hyunjin.

On any other day, such quiet would have been a blessing but, for once, Chan longed to hear the boy’s voice.

The senior witch practically threw Hyunjin into the back seat of the coven car. The scrawny male witch nearly slammed the door shut on the boy’s fingers.

“Don’t hurt him,” Chan repeated, much louder. He put a hand in his pocket for his wand.

“Don’t you dare,” the coven witch growled out, pointing her own wand at Chan’s chest.

Chan froze up. His hands dropped to his side. His thoughts ground to a halt. Even his heart seemed to pause in its beating as his world ended. Chan wasn’t even sure what was happening anymore. None of this could be real.

Hyunjin beat his fists against the window. No sound came out of his throat but he was clearly crying out Chan’s name. Chan could read the boy’s lips even through the glass.

“Immobilize him before he blows up the car,” the senior witch ordered.

The scrawny witch recited a spell. There was a zap! in the air and then Hyunjin let out a silent scream, squeezing his eyes shut, before flopping over backwards onto the seat and out of sight.

“Don’t hurt him!” Chan attempted to rush up to the car but the female witch held out one strong arm and stopped him in his tracks before he could even get close. “Hyunjin!” Chan screamed. He couldn’t help that his own eyes were getting misty. He turned towards the female witch. “Where are you taking him?”

Although he had addressed the senior witch, it was the junior witch who answered. “We’re dropping him off at the station,” the scrawny male stated. “We’re going to look him up and if he really is unregistered, he’ll get sent off to be tagged and collared.”

Whatever that was sounded awful. “Don’t hurt him,” Chan shouted again, but his hoarse voice broke over the last syllable. Now he was crying for real. He pushed against the woman’s arms but she was so strong that she did not budge. “Let me see him. Let me talk to him.”

“Alright, that’s more than enough out of you,” the senior witch said. With a heave, she threw Chan off of her and he landed on his backside in the snow. His hat fell off of his head and went sailing. “Let’s get downtown,” the senior witch said to her partner. “That silencing spell won’t hold forever and if he regains consciousness and gets angry…”

“I’ll drive quickly,” the junior witch responded.

And then the two witches were in the coven car and speeding off down the road before Chan could even catch his breath.

Chapter Text

Chan woke up to an eye full of the Big Blue Bird’s glow and a splitting headache cutting straight through his skull.

Groaning, he rolled out from under his bed sheets and held his hand over his eyes to block out the light. His muscles were stiff and he could feel his pulse thump-thump-thumping away in his head. Was he… hungover? Was that what this feeling was? It would explain the bleariness of his thoughts. He didn’t remember drinking but he also wasn’t surprised that the stress of his job had driven him to do so last night.

Fragments of memories came to him: flying through the snow on his broom, red and blue flashing lights like he’d been at a club, a man wearing a big, gold ring grabbing him by the elbow.

Had he gone clubbing? And… brought someone home? No. That couldn’t be right. That couldn’t be right at all. There was no way. He hadn’t had enough spare time to go out in months . The shop kept him busy. Being District Witch kept him busy. Where would he have possibly found the time to not just relax but party ?

Chan shook his head to try and jostle the thoughts loose but it was as if last night’s events were purposefully remaining blurry in his head like fog in a mirror that remained thick no matter how many times he wiped the glass. He wasn’t even particularly sure of what he’d been doing before he’d gone out. He knew he’d been at the shop. He remembered settling down into the recliner for a nap but everything after that escaped him like a dream slipping away from him.

He had to have gone out somewhere, though, and come home too tired to change. He was still wearing his uniform!

“Oh well,” Chan mumbled. “Not the worst thing that could’ve happened to me.” He lowered his hand from in front of his eyes and squinted at the odd whiteness filling up his bedroom.

Chan pushed himself to his feet and approached the window across from his bed. The glow pouring in from the window was so bright that his head just couldn’t take it. He was about to draw the curtains closed when he caught a glimpse of the world outside. The neighborhood he lived in was quiet and still, covered in the heavy and undisturbed blanket of winter’s first snow. Everything was white. It was very pretty but he turned away from the sight. The Big Blue Bird’s light bouncing brilliantly off the white snow made his head pound. Leaving the curtains open, he decided he may as well get his day started.

He felt icky. His clothes clung to him uncomfortably, the fabric damp with his sweat.

He needed a bath and something hot to eat. Preferably some hangover soup. Coffee would also help because coffee always helped.

Ignoring the nagging feeling that he was forgetting something very very important, he went to his on-suite bathroom, ran a hot bubble bath and had himself a relaxing soak. He stayed in the tub until the stiffness in his muscles dissolved, then he emptied out the water, dried himself off and got dressed. Today, he chose a black turtleneck sweater and matching black slacks. He made sure his wand was in his pocket but decided against wearing the leather gloves. When he went out later, he’d complete the look with a trench coat. He ran a brush through his platinum hair but instead of taming his curls, he only seemed to intensify them. Satisfied with his reflection in the mirror, he left his room and went downstairs to the kitchen for breakfast.

The house the coven had set him up in when he took this job was large and spacious and far too big for him. He had asked for something smaller, something with only one bedroom, but the coven shipped all of his luggage to this big place anyways. The house was wide and yellow with big windows and two stories and it sat near the edge of District 9 with a great view of the river and the big ole bridge crossing over it into District 10. At night, Chan could see the twinkling skyscrapers of downtown. The house had come pre-furnished, which was absolutely fantastic considering how hard-pressed for cash he’d been five months ago. There were four bedrooms. Three more than he had need for. He didn’t need all three of the bathrooms, either. He also didn’t need the big patio out back, he was rarely at the place long enough to properly use the big ole’ fireplace in the living room, and this was probably the first and last time he’d ever live in a place that had a clawfoot tub , but Chan wasn’t about to complain because any kind of living arrangement was better than staying out in the country with his father. Anything was better than the narrow dorm with no privacy he lived in while in college.

Chan was in the kitchen and was halfway through the hangover soup he made before the hot food started to work to miraculous effect. His head cleared gradually. More and more of the pieces of last night began to fit together. He had been flying through the air on his broom because he was on patrol, fulfilling his duties as District Witch. The red and blue lights weren’t from some club but that still didn’t explain his hangover. The man with the gold ring, though. Where did he fit into all of this?

He raised his mug of coffee to his mouth and took a sip. He’d used too much sugar. It was far too sweet and caught him off guard. He coughed and scrunched up his face but took another sip anyways. It wasn’t much better the second time around.

Another little bit of last night came to him but then darted away just as quickly.

He told himself, “Come on, Chan. Think .” He had been outside his shop. Minho had been there saying mean things as per usual. There was a loud, screeching noise like an alarm. Chan had opened the door to his shop when-

When-

He lost it. He almost had it but he lost it. He remembered enough of the situation to recall that he had felt very sad and maybe very angry but what could have went down to make him feel that way?

“Great Big Blue,” he hissed, running a hand through his hair. “What happened last night?”

He looked up at the clock that hung on the kitchen wall. It was nearly eleven o’clock.

Chan went back to sipping on his coffee. It was gory sweet and bowled him over like oncoming traffic.

It took another second to hit him.

“I’m late for work!” Not by a few minutes but by hours ! How had he let this happen? He had taken his sweet time as if he had all day to get ready. What was his problem! “I’m so late!” Chan was still in his probationary period. Not opening on time was accruing points against his eligibility for permanency!

Chan leaped out of the dining chair and then dumped out his coffee and dropped his nearly-empty bowl of soup in the kitchen sink to deal with later. He grabbed his trench coat, hat and broom and was out the door in a blink.

The snow in his yard was pretty and undisturbed and he hated to ruin its picturesque qualities but he sent the snow flying in all directions when he swung his leg over his broom and performed a rather reckless takeoff straight into the air.

He had to get to the shop quickly!

At least the mana flow was stable this morning. He coasted over the gentle waves of magic effortlessly. Flying as fast as his broom would carry him, he headed past the different neighborhoods of his District. Down on the right hand side was the market, a long row of stalls owned by the families who lived in his territory. Apparently, the produce they sold was some of the best and freshest among the neighboring Districts but Chan couldn’t take advantage of it because he only sustained himself on coffee and chicken from the deli. The closer to the commercial area he flew, the uglier the snow on the ground became as it was left mauled by tire tracks and shoe prints from morning commuters, as it was dirtied by debris and half-melted by the light of the Big Blue Bird. There weren’t as many people out and about on the street this late in the morning, as most everyone was at either school or work, but there was still quite the crowd on the sidewalk, most of them lining up outside Minho’s Trinkets and Tokens.

Chan touched down outside of his shop and then carried his broom over one shoulder to the shop door. He fumbled for his keys in his pants pockets for several seconds only to look up and discover that the sign in the door had been flipped to ‘open’ and all of the lights inside were on.

He tried the door. It was unlocked.

Strange. Very strange.

He was positive he had locked up last night. He wouldn’t have gone anywhere else otherwise.

Had Hyunjin opened the store for him? No. The kid didn’t seem capable of that. Although he’d probably seen Chan do it enough times to be able to correctly imitate him. Hmm. Maybe.

Expecting half of the interior to be in smoldering ruins, Chan braced himself and pulled open the front door, causing the bell above his head to jingle. He sniffed hard. No smoke. He checked the corners. No scorch marks or damaged shelves. Nothing seemed to be on fire. Relaxing a tiny little bit, but still unsure, he shrugged off his trench coat and hung it on the rack by the door.

“Good morning, Chan,” an oddly familiar voice called out to him from farther inside. “I calculated that you would be arriving here at exactly this time.”

The voice was melodic and warm. Not low and sharp enough to be Yongbok’s. Not soft and round enough to be Hyunjin’s. Chan stepped down the aisle and approached the cash wrap cautiously until he spotted who was addressing him.

A man was sitting behind the counter. He had neatly-trimmed black hair, big ears and pleasant brown eyes. His smile, though genuine, was small like he was holding it back. The man wore a black and white houndstooth jacket over the black and gold brocaded uniform of a high-ranking coven official and his hat, though not as wide and floppy as Chan’s, was still the classic witch design and sat at a carefully measured angle on his head.

“I know you,” Chan gasped out, pointing. He heard that voice every Monday during conference calls. He saw that face every other month, smiling up at him from the editor’s letter section of the coven newsletter. “You’re-” Chan almost said ‘Woo-something-or-other’ out loud but he stopped himself at the last moment. That would have been embarrassing. “You’re…”

The man stood up. His square shoulders and rigid posture made him quite imposing. “Regional Manager Kim Woojin,” he introduced himself, stepping around the counter.

Woojin. Woojin! It was such a simple name. Why could Chan never remember it? “Bang Chan,” he announced. “Although I guess you know that.” He was a bit starstruck. The Regional Manager? In his humble shop? That was quite unheard of. The last time he’d seen Woojin in person was back in July, standing almost in this exact spot being handed the keys to this place. The strong sense of deja vu he got made him a little woozy. Chan’s other interactions with the man had strictly been through phone calls and impersonal emails so seeing him in the flesh was a tad like meeting a celebrity. If you considered Regional Managers for retail chains celebrities like Chan did.

Chan was almost afraid to shake the Regional Manager’s hand when the man extended it in greeting. He swallowed down his nerves. “It’s a pleasure to have you here, Woojin. Why are you here? Aren’t corporate visits usually announced a few weeks in advance?” Chan glanced around. It was quiet in the shop. There didn’t seem to be any customers but that wasn’t the only reason why.

Woojin released Chan’s hand and stepped backward. “Your shop has been quite the hub of activity lately. The coven directly requested that I visit.” He narrowed his eyes. “Immediately.”

“I see,” Chan said, exhaling. If the coven had wanted to check up on him, there were numerous names and faces they could have sent but someone as high up the company hierarchy as Regional Manager Kim Woojin? Visiting him personally? Something really big must be happening. Chan took a moment to think about it. Had he been doing better than he thought? Was he a better District Witch than he allowed himself to believe? Were all the sleepless nights finally paying off?

Then Woojin plainly said, “We’re concerned your District will go up in metaphorical flames.”

“I see,” Chan said again, but now he was completely deflated. His hopes crushed. He should have known.

Woojin said, “I am here to assess the situation, take preventive measures and turn things around before the problems get worse. I’ve compiled a report. The two of us have numerous-”

“Sorry I’m late,” Chan blurted out. It was the only thing he could think of to say. In the past five months, he’d opened on time every single day. The one time he was late, his boss’s boss had personally come to visit! His boss’s boss! And now his boss’s boss was telling him he was a screw up. Chan was going to lose his job for sure. Involuntarily, he began to shake.

“The two of us have numerous things to discuss,” Regional Manager Kim Woojin tried again. His serious and even tone did not alleviate Chan’s nervousness. “I did not realize the situation was so dire until I stepped foot in here.”

Chan squeaked out, “Dire?” That was such a strong word. It was the kind of word you used when everything you worked hard for up to now and was desperately trying to protect was about to be snatched away from you. “I wouldn’t say it’s dire .”

“Then what would you call it?” Woojin shot back. “It’s certainly unorthodox. Not counting the multiple problems in the store itself, you’ve been falling behind on your District Witch duties as well. Have you made any progress on the mana flow situation? Any at all?”

Chan gulped. He hadn’t. Not even a little bit.

Woojin took Chan’s silence as an answer. He sighed wearily and stepped past Chan to head down the aisle. His dress shoes had been polished to an impressive shine and made Chan’s boots look even scuffier than usual. Woojin made the slightest motion with his fingers. “Follow me.”

Chan trailed after the well-dressed man wordlessly. Now he realized why the shop was so quiet and still. Where was Hyunjin? This was the very first day since they met that Hyunjin wasn’t here.

Woojin approached the big window at the front of the store. Chan sidled up next to him and the two witches stood there for several moments before Chan realized Woojin was staring through the glass at the shop across the street. The man clasped his hands behind his back and said, “That is going to be a challenge.”

‘That’ being Minho’s shop, Chan figured. “He just opened yesterday.”

“I know,” Woojin stated. “Since he’s an independent business owner, I do not have access to his numbers.” He cleared his throat. “I do not have legal access to his numbers.”

Chan glanced up at him, wondering if he was correctly interpreting the man’s words.

“Don’t be too discouraged by the crowd outside,” Woojin stated. “Everyone is attracted to brand new, shiny things. They’ll come back.”

Chan decided not to mention that even when he was new in the neighborhood, his shop hadn’t attracted that kind of buzz. He had tried flyers, cupcakes, free tarot card readings. Everything.

Wait.

Chan squinted. Was that Minho glaring through the window of his own shop, staring right back at him? It was difficult to tell with the crowd and the snow and his nervousness. He wiped at his face, blinked a few times and then looked back across the street. What he thought had been Minho’s elegant frame was a display shelf stacked high with merchandise. He relaxed.

Woojin continued, “We’ve already had several fortune tellers make some predictions. The time frame varies but they all say the hype around his shop will die down and you will get your regular traffic flow back. Just be patient.” Woojin spun away from the window and glanced around Chan’s shop, going through a great deal of effort to keep his expression neutral. “When your customers come back, they won’t have much to come back to if things stay like this.”

“Sorry,” Chan said. “I know the place is old but I try-”

Woojin looked at him. “It’s not your fault. The District 9 shop has always been one of our older locations and it definitely fell down our priority list when it lost its District Witch two or so years ago.” His voice got a little raspy and dry. He cleared his throat and attempted to speak again but his voice retained its papery-thin quality.

This was his chance at redemption! Chan offered, “Care for something to drink? I’ll make coffee.”

“That would be splendid,” Woojin managed, holding a fist in front of his mouth to hide his cough.

Quickly, Chan made his way to the back of the shop and ducked behind the cash wrap to start up the coffee maker. He grabbed the pot and went down the hall to fill it with water from the fountain. By the time he made it back, Woojin had settled onto the stool behind the cash register like he owned the place. Perhaps he did. “I try my best to keep the place clean,” Chan picked up their earlier thread of conversation. “I use the workshop in the back for repairs and to fulfill resident requests.” He poured the water into the coffee maker and sat the empty pot beneath the drip. “And my sales aren’t too bad considering the location.” If he listed all of his good points, maybe Woojin would forget about the mana flow thing.

“I acknowledge that you’ve done the best with what you have but it’s about time we gave you more.”

“More?” Chan asked. He could barely keep his head above water now! What was he going to do with more ?

Woojin watched Chan fish a bag of light roast coffee from the cabinet under the counter. The man said, “Now that 9 has a District Witch again, we as a coven have decided that it’s prime time to give it a bit more of our attention. You probably did not know this, as it’s been quite a ways off in the pipeline, but District 9 is up for a store refresh.”

“Store refresh,” Chan repeated. He scooped enough coffee for a good sized batch into the filter and slotted it into the machine. He pressed the button to start the brew and cleaned up the counter with a cloth where grains of coffee had scattered.

“Yes. A store refresh. A bit of remodeling, if you will. We were going to wait until your probationary period was over to start the approval process and get all of the contracts signed. We were aiming for summer of next year but that shop across the street has raised the priority of this. It’s quite warm back here.” He started to peel out of his houndstooth jacket.

“I’ll take that,” Chan said, helping Woojin out of the article of clothing. The action made him pay attention to the Regional Manager’s hands and he immediately noticed the gold ring on Woojin’s middle finger. It was plain. Surprisingly so for a man who seemed so elevated and suave. The sight of the ring triggered a memory in Chan’s head--that same hand grabbing his elbow gently, those arms lifting him up, carrying him somewhere --and Chan got a sinking feeling in his gut that Woojin hadn’t showed up this morning but actually late last night. In an attempt to hide his sudden, flustered state, Chan bolted down the aisle towards the front door to hang Woojin’s jacket on the coat rack.

Woojin spoke up to be heard over the brand new distance between them. “The store refresh will bring this shop more closely in line with the coven’s values and our customers’ expectations. You’re already authorized for new flooring and new shelving fixtures.” He glanced around the shop again. “I can possibly pull some strings and get you new lighting. Perhaps even an exterior paint job.”

“Thank you,” Chan said, quite relieved. “This place needs a bit more care. There’s only so much that dusting and waxing can do.”

“There’s also a long list of procedures that you can start in the meantime,” Woojin said, as if Chan hadn’t spoken. “That’s actually the main reason why I am here. I’ve brought all of the necessary paperwork so the sooner we can sit down and get started on that, the better. I can’t be here all day.” His voice was now chillier and sharper, all business.

Chan moved back down the aisle towards him, eager to learn.

Woojin jerked a head in the direction of the big, poofy, blue recliner. “First, that needs to be moved immediately. It’s blocking the hallway. It’s a fire hazard.”

“Oh.” The air whooshed out of Chan’s lungs.

“And why is your merchandise so unorganized?”

“It’s not unorganized. I know where everything is.” Plus, Chan had carefully curated everything so that it looked straight out the aesthetic hashtag on Witch-tagram!

Woojin frowned. “You should have gotten a Quarter 4 plan-o-gram notebook in the mail at the end of last season. Your first task is to merchandise the store according to the guidelines and diagrams listed in it.”

“Yeah, but-” Chan started. The way the plan-o-gram demanded things be set up felt so wrong . It only prioritized the trendy one-off items, not the everyday essentials and it called for putting items next to each other that didn’t quite vibe on the same wavelength and, thus, mucked up the mana flow of the space. “-the way I am doing it right now is-”

“And,” Woojin cut him off, “that unregistered dragon of yours is a major safety concern.”

Just Woojin saying that seemed to clear another swath of fog out of Chan’s head. More memories from last night flooded his consciousness like water breaking through a dam. The red and blue lights he remembered had been an official coven car pulled up to the curb outside his shop and now he recalled Hyunjin being thrown into its backseat, bawling his eyes out while Chan could do nothing but panic and watch.

Woojin said, “We had to cut deals with most of the news stations and blogs to keep last night’s incident out of today’s headlines.”

Chan’s mood changed. Darkened. “Where is he?”

“Being collared and tagged,” Woojin replied casually. “An unregistered dragon is a punishable offense and can result in you being-”

“ Where is he?” Chan snapped, anger percolating in him just like the coffee was beginning to percolate in the machine.

Woojin exhaled through his nose, obviously losing his patience. “I already told you. He’s being handled and registered.”

“At the downtown station?” Chan reached for his wand and started towards the door.

Woojin hopped up off of the stool and raised his voice, “What are you going to do, Chan?” He didn’t sound angry, just extremely concerned. Worried, almost. “Do you plan on going to the coven office and pointing that wand at someone? What are you going to do?”

The District Witch paused at the door. What was he going to do? Every plan that popped into his head ended with him being tossed behind bars. “I won’t let you hurt him.”

“You should be more concerned about that dragon hurting others!”

“What’s he going to do?” Chan yelled. “He’s two years old apparently!”

“And still a dragon. Still dangerous. Still capable of harming everyone around him,” Woojin reminded him, holding up a hand in an attempt to ease Chan down from the precarious ledge of his temper.

“Harming?” Chan could barely fathom such a concept. “He wouldn’t hurt a fly.”

“So you think.”

“He just wants to play games and eat peanut butter. He’s not going to hurt anyone.”

“Chan,” Woojin snapped. “I don’t think you understand the severity of the situation. Dragons are dangerous creatures. Their size… their claws… their explosions… We register dragons as a way to keep their population in check and to crack down on unlawful breeding. If your dragon remains unregistered, the coven has no way to keep track of him and no way to stop him if he ever goes on a rampage.”

“There’s no reason to keep track of him,” insisted Chan. “He’s harmless. Mostly. And he was always here before he got-” Taken. He couldn’t bring himself to say the word.

“Regardless of your personal feelings, Chan, there are laws in place.”

“I didn’t know,” Chan whimpered. His emotions were a raging typhoon inside of him. “I didn’t know he was a-” But whether he knew Hyunjin was a dragon or not did not matter. What did matter was that Hyunjin was not here. “You’re not taking him away from me!” Chan resumed pushing open the front door. Cold winter air seeped into the store.

This made Woojin sprint the length of the shop and grab Chan by the elbow before he could exit the store. Breathless, Woojin said, “We’re not taking him from you. We’re registering him. There’s a difference. Once he’s through the system, he’ll be yours again.”

Chan’s voice came out smaller than he needed it to. “He’s not mine. He’s not a pet.”

Woojin either didn’t hear him or heard him and did not care. “Once he’s registered, he will be under your control. Any property damage he causes will be docked from your paycheck. If he hurts anyone, you’re responsible for all healthcare bills.”

“He’s not mine,” Chan reiterated. The icy December wind was numbing his knuckles. The chill was biting through his skin but he felt nothing. He felt nothing. “He’s just a child.” It was borderline impossible to believe that about the boy who had spent so much time in his shop these past few months but thinking that way made everything else make sense. His behavior. His clinginess. His tantrums. With no power behind his words, Chan said, “He doesn’t belong to me.”

“Are you renouncing all responsibility of him?” Woojin inquired.

Yours. Claim. Keep. Control. They were all such awful words. “He’s a person. I don’t own him,” muttered Chan.

Woojin sighed. “Just in the preliminary investigation, we’ve discovered that the dragon is broodless. His mother was already ill when she laid eggs. She died soon after. His siblings didn’t fare much better, her sickness having been passed on to them. I think only two or three made it through their first year but he’s the only one still alive now and that’s an amazing feat for a runt.”

Hyunjin? That giant of a boy was the runt? “How do you know all of this?”

“Because his mother was collared and tagged.” Woojin lowered his voice. “If her children had been registered, if the coven had proper access to all of them, perhaps we could have stepped in and saved them all from death. He wouldn't be alone now. That’s why registering is so important.”

Chan got quiet and still, staring at a smudgy spot on the wall near the baseboard that looked suspiciously like the print of a cat’s paw.

"Chan, look," said Woojin. The cold, sharp edge had left his tone. At least briefly. He said, “With no brood, with no registration, that dragon’s only connection to freedom is you.”

His words reached Chan but they did not reach Chan. Not even the cold reached Chan but that didn’t stop the temperature inside the shop from steadily dropping as he remained on the threshold of the open door.

Woojin made one more attempt. “If you do not claim him, Chan, if you do not take responsibility of him, he will be taken to a coven-sanctioned shelter and his comfort and livelihood will no longer be guaranteed. At least with you-”

Chan bit his bottom lip. “Fine! I’ll claim him.”

This made Woojin nod. Now the cold edge was back in his voice. “We’ll present all of the information I just went over to you in official documentation. There are multiple contracts that will need your signature in triplicate once registration is complete.” Even something as huge as adoption sounded like little more than a business transaction coming from him. “This is just the standard legal process. Perhaps I can use my pull to waive your fine for having him while he was unregistered. It will at least prevent this mess from affecting your probation and be one less negative on your plate.”

“Okay.” Chan acquiesced.

“Shut the door,” Woojin calmly ordered. “Come back inside. Let’s have some coffee and finish talking.”

What else was there to talk about? Chan sighed, shutting the door and blocking out the cold wind. Chan felt like falling apart but he allowed Woojin to tug him back towards the cash wrap and aid him onto the stool behind the register. Only then did the freezing cold seemed to reach his brain. He shivered. He flexed his hands to bring warmth back to his fingertips.

Woojin grabbed two mugs and poured them both full, steaming cups of coffee.

In a daze, Chan watched Woojin move, unable to take his eyes off the man’s large hands, off of the gold ring on his middle finger. Chan could get a better look at it this close up. The ring didn’t seem to be magical. Just luxurious. Despite its simplicity, the ring glinted in the light, shining with the intensity only something expensive could do. One more bit of last night came drifting to the forefront of Chan’s mind. It was hazy but he had definitely seen that exact hand clasping his elbow in the dimly-lit expanse of his bedroom, lowering him onto his mattress. Chan looked up and met Woojin’s gaze right as the man slid him one of the mugs of coffee. How did Chan ask this? How did he broach such a topic?

“You look like you have something to say,” Woojin prompted, raising the remaining mug to his mouth and taking a careful sip.

“Did you come home with me last night?” Chan asked, completely unable to stop himself. “Did we get drunk and sleep together-”

Woojin sputtered and spit quite a bit of his coffee back into the mug. His whole face went red. He cleared his throat. Woojin said quickly, “Yes. I escorted you home but nothing inappropriate happened, I assure you.”

Now it was Chan’s turn to go red in the face. He had been way off! Just his luck. Honestly, he would have been less embarrassed if something inappropriate did occur. But that didn’t change the fact that he was positive Woojin had been in his room last night. “Then, what happened? What did we do together?”

They fell into silence.

Woojin sipped his coffee again and it was so quiet in the shop that Chan could hear him swallow. It was a long moment before Woojin spoke. His voice was slow and calm. “After the coven witches took the dragon downtown, I was alerted of the incident. The coven wanted me on the scene so I immediately flew to District 9. When I arrived, you were outside of your shop in complete hysterics, making quite the ruckus.”

“Really?” Chan cut in. “I don’t remember that at all.” He vaguely recalled watching the coven car drive away, tires squealing, but he didn’t remember much else after that. It was like he had actually gotten drunk and blacked out. “Was I really that bad?”

Woojin nodded. “You wouldn’t listen to anyone. You wouldn’t calm down. The neighbors were very concerned. I had no choice but to cast a pretty powerful sleep spell on you but even that did not work instantly. You resisted for quite some time which is a miraculous feat. I suppose you were just that upset. When it finally started to make you drowsy, I locked up your shop and took you home. You were barely conscious long enough for me to get you inside and to your bed.”

Chan sighed. His memories made more sense now. Woojin carrying him effortlessly. The hand on his elbow. Relief swept over him. At least he knew the reason why his head had been so foggy when he woke up. Great Big Blue, forget sleeping spells. Now he wanted to go out and get properly drunk! “I’m so sorry,” he said, shaking his head. “I shouldn’t have been so blunt asking you if we… If we had-”

“You have the right to know,” Woojin supplied. “Usually, master-class or higher sleep spells require written consent from the target but you were so out of it that you couldn’t even tell me your name.”

Chan rubbed his hands over his face. Of course he’d been quite manic. Two strangers had snatched Hyunjin away from him and chucked him into a car like he was little more than a suitcase! Even in that moment, he was getting upset all over again.

“Now, about that mana flow problem,” Woojin spoke up, switching topics.

Chan squeezed his eyes shut and sent up a quick prayer to the Big Blue Bird. Why couldn’t she let up for a moment? Why did everything that could possibly go wrong, go wrong? He opened his eyes. Woojin probably had the worst impression of him now, not just as a District Witch but as a person , and if Chan even started to explain the troubles he was having pinpointing the source of the mana disturbance, Woojin would probably fire him right here on the spot. “The thing is-” he began, trembling. “What had happened was-” Where did he even start? How could he even explain himself? “We were calling on the name of the Big Blue Bird when-”

The shop’s front door swung open violently, banging against the far wall. The bell above the door jangled sharply.

Chan looked up. All he saw was a streak of nuclear orange. Not now. Not now! Anytime but now!

“Sup, witches!” Jisung hollered at the top of his lungs. “What the hex is up?”

Chapter Text

“Jisung,” Chan choked out. He never thought the sight of someone so small would fill his heart with such massive dread like this.

“How ya doin’, old man,” Jisung responded with a cheerful wave.

Chan groaned. “I’m not an old man. My hair has always been gray since I was a kid.”

Jisung barely let him finish. “Okay, old man.” Then he spotted Regional Manager Kim Woojin. “Oh, another old man!” He scrunched up his nose. “You look and dress like you’re thirty or something.”

“Like thirty is old,” Chan mumbled. He wasn’t exactly close to that age yet but time would slip by faster than he expected. He just knew it. He still couldn’t believe he’d been District Witch for nearly half a year. It felt like only a week or so had passed.

“Hex yeah, it’s old!” Jisung yelled. He was inside. There was no one in the store to talk over. Why was he screaming? “I’d rather die than not be a teenager anymore.”

Chan cringed and lowered the brim of his hat over his face, wishing he could disappear. Anything but this! Any one but this!

“You know this child?” Woojin asked incredulously.

“Unfortunately,” Chan muttered under his breath.

Jisung shouted for no other reason than to hear his own voice echo in the quiet shop.

Chan tugged his hat down farther over his head, wishing he could climb inside of it and be someplace else. Certainly there was a spell for that. “Why are you yelling?”

Jisung said, “Because it’s so hexing cold outside!”

“So… you decide to come inside and scream?”

“Hex yeah. What else would I do? I mean. It’s so cold outside. I never believed balls could freeze off until today.” He wasn’t wearing his rollerblades, probably due to the snow on the ground. The skates were tied together by their laces and draped around his neck. They were old and worn-out and had probably been green at some point but the skates were covered in numerous scratches and kind of looked like three different colors depending on how hard you squinted. Jisung looked a little more smudged than usual, as if he had literally just finished rolling around on the sidewalk outside. The orange-haired boy looked over at Woojin. “Is this an old man convention or what? You’re so uncool. Just wait until I’m twenty or whatever. I’ll show you two how it’s done.”

“I thought you didn’t want to be old,” Chan asked, pulling his head out from the depths of his hat. “Thought you’d rather die than be twenty?”

“Opinions change.”

“In less than a minute?”

“Stop giving me a hard time, old man!” Jisung lifted his rollerblades from around his neck and dropped them in the middle of the floor with a thunderous sound. In the same movement, he kicked his ratty old shoes down hard on the floor, sending powdery snow everywhere.

Chan’s eyes went wide in horror at the sight. “There are mats by the door, Jisung. Please.”

“I forgot, okay?” The orange-haired boy kicked snow off of his shoes again. “I forgot then, too,” he said preemptively.

Chan ran his hands down his face, pinching at his cheeks and hoping he’d wake up from this nightmare. “What are you doing here, Jisung? I didn’t call you.” At least he was sure he hadn’t.

The boy didn’t answer his question. He pointed. “Is that a recliner? That wasn’t there yesterday.” He took a running start and launched himself into it, nearly tipping the thing, and then got settled onto the poofy cushion. “Very comfortable. The fabric isn’t scratchy. It smells used. You know, that’s cool. Recycle. Reuse. Save the planet and hex like that.”

“Is this one of your… employees?” Woojin ventured. He was trying to keep his face blank but there was no hiding the disgust in his tone.

“Employee?” Jisung shrieked as if he’d just been called something far worse. “I’m a freelancer, old man. I have no employer. Hex school and hex the government!” He raised a middle finger.

Woojin recoiled like he’d just been struck with a brick.

Chan felt like dying. Leave it to Jisung to shout something as controversial as ‘hex the government’ while casually sitting right in front of a government official! Could his day get any worse? Could Chan’s luck get any worse? “Jisung, you don’t need to be here.” Then, realizing how harsh his words sounded, he backpedaled. “There’s nothing for you to deliver yet. I haven’t put anything together.” Then he realized something. “I haven’t even checked my mailbox this morning.”

Jisung’s face lit up. He sprang out of the recliner and approached the counter. “Good thing I dug around in it,” he proudly shouted. He slung his weatherproof bag over his shoulder and unzipped it. He reached in, his arm going farther into it than a bag of such a small size should physically allow, and when he pulled it free, his hand was full of envelopes. “Look at all the hex that was in there! Never would have guessed you were so popular.”

“Do all kids these days use curse words so freely?” Woojin muttered. Then he turned his eyes towards Chan, quietly judging and assessing, probably thinking even worse of him.

Chan could only sit there and watch in horror as Jisung dumped handful after handful of letters and small packages onto the counter. When he glanced up and met Woojin’s gaze, the Regional Manager’s face was scrunched up like he’d just taken a bite out of a lemon. Chan bit his bottom lip. He was going to lose his job for sure.

“I’m going to have to charge you a pickup fee for this,” Jisung declared. “Do you wanna pay now or do you want me to add it to your next delivery fee?”

“What?” Chan shrieked, whirling around to face him. “Why would you charge me?”

“All-you-can-eat buffets are hexing expensive.”

Chan was flabbergasted. “I didn’t ask you to bring me my mail or have buffets.”

“Look, old man,” said Jisung, “we’re all just trying to eat, alright? The world is cruel and blah blah blah. I need the money bad so are you paying now or later?”

Chan couldn’t believe he was about to let some kid who should be in school right now strong arm him out of even more money than he already had. “Who says you’re doing my deliveries today?” He desperately needed to find another courier service. Chan stood up off of the stool and leaned over the counter towards Jisung using his most intimidating face. “Did you even finish yesterday’s work?”

Jisung was not intimidated at all. He waved a dismissive hand. “Of course I hexing finished. Who do you take me for? I don’t know how to work that hexing app yet so give me a break.” When Chan’s face didn’t relax, Jisung groaned and said, “I did the work. Scout’s honor.”

Chan spared Woojin another glance. The man looked so appalled. So ready to leave . The Regional Manager had probably already come up with numerous reasons why the District Witch needed to be replaced. Immediately. Chan was going to lose his mind. “Do you have proof,” he asked Jisung.

“Proof?” Jisung repeated.

“Yes,” Chan pressed. “An invoice or something?”

Jisung took a step back and put a hand on his chest like he’d just been accused of murder. “Scout’s honor isn't enough for you?” He straightened to his full height. “Just because I flunked out doesn’t mean I don’t keep my word. I did all of those deliveries, old man. Would I be standing right in front of you trying to get another job if I’d ripped you off the last time?”

Yes. More than likely. Definitely. “You’re ripping me off right this second by trying to charge me for bringing my own mail inside.” His mailbox was right at the curb. All of eight or nine steps from the door.

“Fine, fine,” Jisung backed away from the counter but he still didn’t look too perturbed. “I won’t charge you for giving you your own mail. How about this: since you’re the only customer I’ve gotten since I started, how about I give you a loyalty discount? Whattaya say?” He was trying but failing to hide the desperation on his face.

Spending even less money sounded like the perfect plan but Chan found himself collapsing back onto his stool with a defeated sigh. “Don’t give me a discount,” he mumbled, rubbing at his face. If he was going to be a District Witch, he was going to be an honest and upstanding one. “Your rates are already too low as it is, Jisung. If anything, you should increase them.”

“Oh… and I thought I was shooting pretty high.”

Chan propped his elbows up on the counter and looked at Jisung until the orange-haired boy looked at him. When he had the boy’s full attention, he said, “Your rates are too low. That might be why you aren’t getting other customers. They look at your page and think it’s a scam.”

“A scam?” Jisung’s eyes went wide. “Who would think that?”

Chan lowered his gaze and cleared his throat. “Bottom line is, you should raise your prices. Or, at the very least, you should figure out how to work the app enough so you know how to increase the rate based on the weight of the package.”

“That’s probably a really good idea and all, old man, but that sounds complicated and I don’t want to do any of that.”

Chan looked back up at him. “Then don’t complain about not having money for food.”

“Just hire me every day and then I’ll have money for food,” Jisung suggested. He rushed up to the counter and smacked his hands on the surface. “I’ll be the District Witch’s personal courier!”

“That’s not even remotely close to what I just said.”

“But it’s a good idea, right? You need to have things delivered and I need things to deliver! It’s the perfect hexing match.”

Chan realized he wasn’t getting through to the boy in the slightest but how much more direct could he be? Did he just straight up say he’d rather choose any other courier in the city over Jisung?

“Actually,” Woojin interjected. “Several District Witches do have exclusive contracts with personal couriers.”

Jisung clapped his hands excitedly. “Hex yeah!” Then he fought back his own excitement. He turned his head to the side and tried his best to look cool and unaffected. “I mean, yeah sure. It’s a decent idea or whatever. I could go either way.”

Chan stood up. “That’s not what I’m saying at all.”

“So how soon are you going to be done with your letters?” Jisung glanced up at the grandfather clock. “I’d like to be done with my deliveries before dark.”

Chan hadn’t agreed to this but it would probably be better to just roll over and accept this turn of events instead of starting a full-blown fight in front of his boss’s boss. Groaning, Chan pointed to the front door. “It’ll take me a few hours so can you go now?” He’d never be able to finish his discussion with Woojin if he had to worry about Jisung. “I’ll message you through the courier app when I need-”

“You gonna finish that?” Jisung interrupted. He hoisted himself right up onto the counter just so he could reach all the way across it and grab Chan’s untouched mug of coffee. “Too late. It’s mine now!”

Woojin’s eyes went comically wide as the dirty, slightly smelly boy made himself comfortable on the counter as if it were a chair.

“Jisung,” Chan scolded, stepping back in surprise.

Jisung took a tentative sip of the coffee and then jerked back. “Blegh, you let it get cold. You got any snacks to go with this? Crackers and cheese or anything?”

Since Chan couldn’t get rid of Jisung without physically lifting him up and tossing him out, he wondered if he could get rid of Woojin. He turned to the Regional Manager. “Okay, so we talked about everything you needed to cover, right? Store refresh and all of that?” He none too gently nudged Woojin by the shoulder in an attempt to guide him around the counter and, he prayed, out the door.

Woojin would not be moved. He shrugged the District Witch’s hand off his shoulder and met Chan’s gaze. “We aren’t even halfway through the topics we need to discuss.” At least his attention was on Chan now and not on Jisung’s holey socks as the boy drew his feet up onto the counter so he could spin around and better lean into their conversation. Woojin continued, “Chan, this is no time for loafing off. Need I remind you that the coven is very concerned with your shop’s numerous issues.”

“Not just one issue,” Jisung singsonged, lowering the mug from his mouth, “but numerous .” He looked at Chan as if he couldn’t believe it. “As in multiple numbers, old man. Twenty, I bet.”

Chan just wasn’t going to catch a break. Great Big Blue! He needed this job so the rest of this visit needed to go far more smoothly than this. To Jisung he said, “Can you at least sit in the recliner instead of being up on the counter like you’re trying to be a cat?”

“That recliner needs to be removed, by the way,” Woojin reminded him. “It shouldn’t even be in the store.”

“I’ll move if you pour me a new cup of coffee,” Jisung demanded, holding out the mug. “And you’ve got to have snacks in here somewhere. I’ll eat anything. Even pretzels.”

Chan grit his teeth. There was too much going on at one time. Too many voices speaking to him at once. Chan looked up at Jisung, “I don’t have any snacks.” Not since he and Hyunjin had finished off that banana bread yesterday.

“You don’t have any snacks?” This was clearly a personal offense. Jisung wailed, “How can you not have any snacks?”

Well, there was peanut butter but Hyunjin would have a fit if--

Chan’s chest went tight. Jisung had almost completely distracted him from Hyunjin’s absence. “There’s no snacks that you can have. Why do you think you can just demand snacks?”

“Because I’m your personal courier!” Jisung announced, raising his fist like he was striking a pose. “And one of the benefits of such a lofty position is infinite snacks.”

A long, defeated sigh escaped Chan’s mouth. The temptation to whip out his wand and cast a spell to remove Jisung was strong, but Chan figured that such a display of magical malpractice would make him look even worse in front of the Regional Manager. He snatched the mug out of Jisung’s hand. “Fine,” he huffed, giving in. Just accepting the trouble would be far easier than trying to fight it. “I’ll pour you some hot coffee. You can be my personal courier.” His voice got louder and louder. “And I’ll swing by the grocer’s and get you some hexing snacks !”

Everything came to a halt.

The curse word felt odd on Chan’s tongue and even odder out in the air. So odd, in fact, that the air started to wobble a little and take on a purplish haze, thickening up like fog.

Woojin put his hand in his shirt pocket and pulled out his wand. “All of the foul magic that’s in the air, dispel it so that it doesn’t go anywhere.” His wand, small and narrow, hardly bigger than a fancy ink pen, glowed at the tip before letting out a zap ! Shortly after, the air in the shop stopped wobbling and then, a little while after, stopped being purple. When the spell eased, Chan let go of the breath he hadn’t noticed he’d been holding. Woojin turned around and stared at Chan. “Please refrain from speaking actual curse words, Chan.”

It was true. Hex was a powerful and dark word on the tongue of a witch. Chan had momentarily forgotten in his frustration. “My apologies.” He’d been spending too much time around Jisung. It had been less than a day and he was corrupted already.

“Yeah, old man,” Jisung needled him as if he weren’t the cause of Chan’s bad mood. “Witches can’t hexing say hex without hexing everything the hex up, you hexer. Now pour me a cup!”

Chan took in a deep breath and then let it all spill out of him in a weird whining noise like he was a leaking balloon. He stared into the mug in his hands. Jisung had completely emptied the cup of its contents so he went to the coffee maker and poured the boy a fresh cup. He couldn’t believe he was asking this but, “Cream and sugar?”

“Sugar,” Jisung stated. “And actual sugar. Not none of that hexing artificial mess. If my teeth are gonna rot out of my head, they are gonna rot out of my head.”

Chan opened a packet of sugar and used a small spoon to stir it into the mug before handing it back to Jisung. “Now go sit in the chair.”

Jisung did not go sit in the chair. He blew the steam off of his mug of coffee and then raised it to his lips. “Where’s the dragon?”

Chan thought his heart might stop. “What dragon?”

“You know, about yay high,” Jisung raised a hand above his head, “curly hair, easily excitable, big eyes that look at the world like everything’s new and wonderful.” He was obviously describing Hyunjin.

Chan glanced over at Woojin but the Regional Manager kept his expression blank. Chan looked back at Jisung. “How… do you know Hyunjin’s a dragon?” Chan asked carefully.

Jisung rolled his eyes. “You for real, old man? I know you thought you were slick trying to hide them under that stupidly large ribbon of his but I could still see his hexing horns so maybe you should try a little harder keeping them secret if you’re not gonna get him a collar.”

Chan slumped in his seat. How had Jisung caught that before he had? He’d only met Hyunjin once! Chan had known Hyunjin for months and didn’t have the slightest clue. “You knew Hyunjin was unregistered?”

“As big as those collars are, it’s obvious when they don’t have one.” Jisung took another sip of his coffee. “Ahh, nice and hot. Now that’s the stuff.”

Flabbergasted, Chan could only sit there. His world had been turned completely upside down by the discovery of Hyunjin’s lineage yet no one else seemed to be remotely surprised. Really. How was he the only one who couldn’t tell? Chan pressed a hand to his forehead as if checking for a fever. “I know nothing.”

“You got that right,” Jisung readily agreed. “Oh man, this definitely fights away the cold.” He noisily slurped on the coffee some more. He hummed in delight and smacked his lips. “So where is he?”

The District Witch stared off into space, zoning out. There was nothing real left in the world.

Woojin spoke up, “The dragon is being collared and tagged. Chan’s agreed to take ownership of him.”

This made Jisung look up. “You can just do that? Aren’t dragons like super hexing expensive? There’s waiting lists a mile long even for celebrities to get their hands on one.”

“Hyunjin’s broodless,” Woojin explained. “And unregistered. It’s a rare case. Normally, the coven would keep him regardless until he became of age and then add him to the selection like any other dragon but because he is still so young, giving control of him to the District Witch is the best option for all parties involved. It’s an exception to the rule.”

“Well, that’s hexing cool.” Jisung whistled, truly impressed. He turned his dark eyes towards Chan. “You get a whole entire hexing dragon for free, old man. And since he’s no longer unregistered, you can stop hiding his horns under that big hexing bow.” Jisung took another sip of his coffee, missed his mouth somehow and wound up with most of the dark liquid dribbling down his chin and onto his shirt. Instead of asking for a napkin, he scooted across the counter so he could reach past Chan for one, a hair’s width away from elbowing the District Witch in the jaw. Jisung wiped at his mouth, “If I had a dragon, you best believe I wouldn’t hexing hide their horns. I’d show ‘em off because, hex yeah, I’ve got a dragon!”

Chan found himself getting annoyed. Hyunjin was a person. Not a luxury status item to be bought and displayed. “Go sit in the chair, Jisung,” Chan tried again with all of the patience he could muster.

Jisung turned his body to better face Woojin. “So can I get a dragon for free? Come on, man. You’re just handing them out, right?”

“I told you,” Woojin said, taking a step back as if he hated even the idea of being directly addressed by the boy, “it’s a special case. My reputation is at stake so don’t go around telling people.” Woojin fixed his eyes on Chan. “I only suggested such an uncouth plan because the dragon is young and has already imprinted on Chan.” Instead of just looking at Chan, he spoke to him. “You saw and heard what happened last night, Chan. That dragon is dangerously attached to you. Not even celebrities develop that kind of bond with them.”

“I practically raised him,” Chan agreed. And he called me-- Chan couldn’t even bring himself to think it even in the privacy of his own head.

Woojin kept on. “Yes, it’s risky to have a dragon in the possession of a civilian who hasn’t undergone the proper ninety hours of training but forcefully separating you and Hyunjin for any longer than we already have would pose an even greater threat to the handlers at our facilities.” His eyes went a little unfocused like he was being haunted by a terrible image. “Bright and early this morning, I received a call that the dragon has already destroyed two holding cells and it has only been one night.”

“Destroyed?” Chan repeated. He let out a nervous laugh. “Hyunjin wouldn’t do something like that. He’s just… He’s only… He wouldn’t do something like that.” He stuck the nail of his thumb in his mouth and bit it as he was hit with nerves. “Would he?”

“He would and he has,” Woojin let him know. “The officers, and highly-trained ones, might I add, went through a significant amount of hardship and had barely managed to transport the beast to the downtown headquarters when they called me this morning. There aren’t enough holding cells in Seoul to keep him contained while you undergo proper training. That is time we do not have. That’s why I made the decision to just give the dragon to you, Chan. No professional handler training. It’s not the safest option in the grand scheme of things but the faster he is back with you and becomes your full responsibility, the faster the damage he causes in his rampages stops coming out of my paychecks.”

Chan was still having great difficulty reconciling the word ‘rampage’ with the smiling, giggling image of Hyunjin in his head. He just couldn’t believe it. It couldn’t be true. “Is Hyunjin really that dangerous?”

Woojin said, “Much like animals in the wild, dragons become far more unpredictable when they are under extreme emotional distress. Dragons are already large and strong. Get them frightened and, like any other wild creature, they will fight to keep from being cornered. Their explosive levels of magical power just exponentially increases the threat they pose to their surroundings when they are under such chains of duress. As a direct result, their ability to--”

Jisung unceremoniously burped. Right then and there. He didn’t even cover his mouth or excuse himself.

Woojin pinched his nose to keep from inhaling the smell.

“Jisung,” Chan scolded. Great Big Blue, did the boy not have even the most basic of manners?

The orange-haired boy huffed, “I’m going to be real with you, chief. I flunked out so I only understood, like, a tiny bit of what you just said.”

Woojin waved his hand in front of his nose and stepped out from behind the counter as if he’d finally reached his limit and had to get away.

Chan didn’t think he’d ever get used to the humiliation. He had to step in or this corporate visit would dissolve even further. “Basically, Jisung,” he translated, “Hyunjin gets to stay with me because it would be dangerous if the coven placed him anywhere else.” He recalled Hyunjin calling him Dad the other night and he still didn’t know how to feel about that. Should he be afraid or proud? He turned his attention to Woojin. “Speaking of which, when do I get to see him? When can I bring him home?”

“When the registration process is complete,” said Woojin, “and when you’ve signed all of the necessary contracts. It’s just like anyone else trying to obtain a dragon.”

“Except you don’t have to wait five hexing years or pay a hex-ton in fees,” Jisung provided.

“What he said, I suppose,” Woojin sighed. “And then there’s the added benefit that the dragon is already acclimated to you and these surroundings. The fact that he’s so young helps with that so at least we can avoid all of that kind of stress.”

Chan at least knew that much about dragons. Half the reason why the waiting list to obtain one was so long was to allow the hatchlings time to mature and grow out of their highly emotional and highly untameable life stages.

Hyunjin was right in the middle of that terrible age, unfortunately. In fact, he hadn’t even gotten to the worst of it.

The grandfather clock began to chime the time, sounding out twelve counts to mark that it was noon o’clock.

Woojin stated, “The coven should be able to wrap up the legal process sometime today. I’ve seen to it that they feel pressured into prioritizing the task given the dangers of extended separation. When I got the call this morning, I made doubly sure that everything would be drawn up before the day was over. I’ve asked the downtown team to contact me directly when everything is done. You’ll have your dragon again before closing time, if my estimations are correct.”

“Can you talk like you care, please?”

It honestly seemed like something Jisung would say which was why Chan hadn’t even realized that he had said his thoughts out loud until Woojin sputtered out, “I beg your pardon?”

Chan snapped out of it. He quickly corrected himself, “I would appreciate it if-” He couldn’t even think of a nicer way to say it, “-if you spoke like you cared about this.”

Regional Manager Kim Woojin stood up straight and flattened his mouth into a firm line.

Sensing the drama, Jisung slid across the counter so that he could be closer. “Ooh, this is gonna be good,” he stage-whispered into his mug of coffee.

“I am on your side, here,” Woojin spat out. “In fact, I am one of the few people in the coven who is still on your side. The fact that your District’s mana flow problem has persisted for nearly six weeks and now the fact that, unknowingly or not, you’ve been harboring an unregistered dragon has turned most of the coven against you. They’ve already tried replacing you today but I’ve blocked their request using your rising profit margins and exceptionally high approval rating as the reasons you should keep your badge.”

It was like being punched in the gut. Chan felt winded and weak. He had pressured himself to work long hours and burn himself out over the past few months using his fear that he could easily lose his job as motivation but he hadn’t realized how true those fears had been.

The coven had actually attempted to boot him out already and he had not known! He had come so close to losing everything he had worked hard for. The blood and the sweat and the tears he had poured into his work over the last several months wouldn’t have mattered because one mistake--one silly little mistake that one of the higher-ups had blown out of proportion--would have shattered all he had done.

The mana flow disturbances weren’t that awful. Right?

“The coven…” He said, his voice tiny and fragile. “...are they all against me?”

Woojin began pacing back and forth, back and forth, getting his thoughts in order. “Their faith in you is shaken, yes. You’ve ignored the mana issue for an extended period of time and let it grow out of control. I told you already that it affects the neighboring Districts and that several official complaints have been filed about it, both from residents and other District Witches. Ignoring the criminal implications of housing an unregistered dragon, having so many official complaints on your plate is a fireable offense but I stepped in and blocked the order.”

He paused, both in his words and in his anxious pacing, taking a moment to catch his breath and wet his throat with a sip or two of coffee.

“I’ve actually stuck my neck out for you already on a few matters that I kept from trickling down to you. The coven think I’ve lost it. That I’m overstepping my bounds. Especially with this dragon issue. They’ve even been pressuring me to step down citing negligence.”

He looked up at Chan, meeting the District Witch’s gaze for the first time in quite some while.

Woojin said, “I do care, Bang Chan. I’ve worked very hard to get to this position at my age and I still work hard now. That unregistered dragon technically should have had you locked up and possibly stripped of your uniform and wand but I convinced the coven to just register the dragon and have you keep him since he was throwing such a fit at the station without you. The mana issue is also unprecedented and the only thing keeping me from being able to help you solve it is the coven blocking my every attempt to fund a research team. I care, Chan. I probably care more than you do.” He realized he’d nearly been yelling so he lowered his voice to a near-whisper. “So I do apologize,” he said flatly, “that speaking like I possess any amount of education or professional decorum makes you feel uncomfortable-” He hooked his eyes in Jisung’s direction. “-or willfully ignorant.”

A tense silence fell over the shop.

The weight of Chan’s disrespectful behavior collapsed on top of him and he raised both of his hands to his face in exasperation. “I’m sorry. I’m more than a little stressed,” he admitted. Just saying it aloud made him aware of how tense every muscle in his body was, how strained and thin his emotions felt. “I just miss him.” He hadn’t even known that was the cause of all of this until right then.

He missed Hyunjin. He missed the boy’s happy babbling, his big ole’ smile, his absolute joy from just being alive. He missed all of the noise Hyunjin made and, oddly, he missed the tension of always expecting something precious to blow up . He had grown used to it over the months. Complacent. He’d began to take it for granted and now that Hyunjin was gone, Chan now knew how important the boy was to him.

After a long moment, Chan said, “I miss my boy.”

Frustrated, he lowered his hands from his face, stood up, brushed past Woojin and flopped down onto his big, poofy, blue recliner. He pulled the lever and kicked up his feet and just laid there, staring at the ceiling.

The silence in the shop was only broken by Jisung knocking half of the pile of mail to the floor as he hopped down off of the counter. The orange-haired boy eased himself into the recliner next to Chan, forcing the witch to inch over and give him room.

Woojin said nothing. He just propped a hip against the counter and folded his arms across his chest with absolutely no emotion on his face.

Chan wondered if Woojin’s outburst was the last straw. Did the Regional Manager just give up on him completely? Would he lose his job?

His head became inundated with numbers. Did he have enough cash saved up to find his own apartment? Would he be able to afford a place with how high safety deposits had gotten this year? Would it look better on his resume if he willfully resigned from the position instead? He’d have to write an official letter of resignation with an official coven letterhead and a wax-sealed envelope and everything.

How quickly would he have to move out? Could he at least stay in that big ole house until Winter Solstice? There was no way he’d find a new place during the holidays.

Ugh. Who was he kidding. He hadn’t managed to save up that kind of cash. Not when he was still on probation. Chan feared that after being fired, his only option would be to return to his father’s home a complete failure. Again.

The door to the shop opened, signaling the arrival of a customer.

Chan was so despondent that he didn’t move to greet them. He didn’t even open his mouth to welcome them. Chan just kept staring at the ceiling and tried to come to terms with the fact that, despite how annoying Hyunjin’s antics and clinginess could be, he had also gotten extremely attached to him over the past five months.

If he lost his job, he was positive that he would lose Hyunjin as well.

“Oh sweet,” a low voice sang out. “It’s nap time already.”

Chan lowered his eyes from the ceiling just in time to catch a glimpse of Yongbok’s smiling face before the black-haired boy legitimately crawled onto Chan’s lap. “Oof,” Chan gasped out as Yongbok’s bony limbs dug into him. “There’s not enough room on this thing for three.”

“There sure is,” Yongbok corrected. He stretched his legs out across one armrest and propped his head up on the other, effectively pinning Jisung and Chan to the chair. “See?”

“Another employee?” Woojin asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Definitely not,” Chan said quickly. “A customer. A very friendly customer.”

Yongbok fell into his role easily. “I’ll take one of those.” He waved a hand off to the right in the direction of one of the shelves. “And I’ll take two of those.” Another nonchalant hand wave towards a different shelf.

Chan met Woojin’s eyes.

Woojin got the message immediately. “You want me to get it?”

“I’m stuck,” said Chan, gesturing with his chin to the two boys squeezing him into the chair.

“You heard the old man. Chop chop,” Jisung urged.

Woojin stood there looking completely put upon for several seconds. Then his expression smoothed over. Surprisingly, he actually turned around to fetch items in the general direction of Yongbok’s hand waves.

The District Witch returned his attention to his current problem. “We’re gonna break this thing, Yongbok. I just bought it. You were there.”

Yongbok booped Chan on the nose with a finger. “It’ll be fine. I’m not heavy.”

“I completely disagree.”

Yongbok took no offense from the insult. He just transferred his head from the armrest to Chan’s chest and shut his eyes.

“Hey,” Chan cried out. “Don’t actually go to sleep. What if one of us needs to move?” He turned to Jisung, begging with his eyes for the boy to agree with him.

Jisung shrugged with just his shoulders since he couldn’t move his arms as they were trapped beneath Yongbok’s legs. “I literally have nowhere to go until you finish up your work.”

“See?” Yongbok said, not opening his eyes. “No one has to get up. Stop worrying, Chan. Start napping.”

If Hyunjin were here, he’d cheerfully repeat after him: Stop worrying, Chan. Start napping .

“I can’t nap,” Chan realized, glancing up in Woojin’s direction. “I have work.”

The Regional Manager was sitting a collection of items up on the counter, scanning them one by one. The look on his face was one of… amusement. “How will you be paying, sir?”

“Credit not debit,” Felix announced. He shifted around enough to fish his wallet out of his back pocket and chucked his card up onto the counter like he was tossing a ninja star.

“Don’t throw things.” Chan squirmed beneath Yongbok’s weight, trying to get into a position where Yongbok’s pointy hip wasn’t digging so painfully into his thigh.

“Stop moving around,” the boy protested. “Ugh. Just when I got all cozy. You made me lose my spot.”

Chan didn’t have time for this. He had a pile of mail to read and reply to, he had who knows how many plans to go over with Woojin, and he certainly couldn’t just nap while the store was still open. He had a business to run! “Up,” he ordered, patting Yongbok on the bottom since it was the only place he could reach with the guy on top of him like this. “Up, up, up.”

Yongbok growled in protest. His whole body vibrated. “You’re so snug , though.” Why was he so weird? “Stop moving so I can get comfy again.”

“Look… How about this?” Chan had a plan. “I get up and then you two can share the chair?” Perhaps if they actually fell asleep, he could get some work done. In peace.

“No,” Yongbok said, pushing himself more firmly against Chan to keep him in the chair. “It won’t be the same if you’re gone.”

Woojin’s cell phone rang. He turned away so that he could answer it in semi-privacy.

“Get up,” Chan insisted, putting a little more authority in his voice.

It didn’t help. “I’m not moving,” Yongbok whined. “I haven’t napped all day. I’m overdue for one.”

“Let him stay,” Jisung mumbled. His own eyes had drifted closed. “He’s warm like a blanket and-” He yawned, his mouth looking as wide and bottomless as his backpack. “-and a nap sounds so good right now.”

Chan groaned. “What did I do to deserve this?”

His luck chose that exact moment to change for the better.

Woojin turned back towards them, stuffing his phone into his pocket and genuinely smiling for the first time all morning. “That was the downtown office,” the Regional Manager stated. “You can go pick up Hyunjin now.”

★☆

Calling it a bit of a diplomatic emergency, Kim Woojin offered to cover for Chan and remained behind at the shop to tend to customers and use his inside connections to draw up a more streamlined checklist of things the District Witch needed to do to get back into the coven’s good graces.

Chan would have preferred to have the radioactive-haired boy within arm’s reach of him at all times but Woojin forcefully volunteered Jisung into the task of removing the recliner from the shop and taking it to Chan’s housing. Chan somewhat reluctantly left the shop, turning his back on the rather hilarious image of Jisung attempting to shove the recliner into his backpack.

“Let’s fly,” Yongbok suggested as they stepped out into the midday crowd on the sidewalk.

Chan was immediately against the idea. “I can’t fly with a passenger.”

“Don’t you remember? I’m light,” Yongbok said. “You won’t even know I’m there.” He draped his arms over Chan’s shoulders and hopped up onto the witch’s back. Chan definitely knew he was there. “Either we fly or you carry me. I’m not walking and I hate taxis.”

Chan groaned under Yongbok’s weight. He couldn’t even go two steps with Yongbok on his back, let alone walk anywhere like this. He reached an arm back to poke Yongbok in the side. “Get down.”

Yongbok climbed up a little higher, wrapping his twiggy arms around Chan’s neck and putting his twiggy legs around Chan’s hips. “I’m not walking.”

“I’m not walking, either,” Chan stated. “I legitimately can’t .” Even just standing still was testing his balance and upper body strength. He was a witch, not an athlete!

“Then I guess we aren’t going anywhere.”

“That’s not an option. We have to go. We have to get Hyunjin.” The downtown office was on the far side of District 10. It would take hours to walk but mere minutes to fly. “You don’t have to come with me. You don’t need to be there.”

“I want to go.” Yongbok was persistent. “I miss Hyunjin, too.”

That much was true. Yongbok had been a loyal customer about as long as Hyunjin had been a loyal not-really-an-apprentice. “You’ll see him when I bring him back.”

“I want to see him now .”

“Then get off so that we can take a taxi or something.”

“No. I can’t stand cars.”

“Yongbok.”

“Just fly.”

“Please.”

“Just. Fly.”

They literally were not going to get anywhere like this. “Fine.” Chan put his broom between his legs and concentrated. He could feel the mana moving around him, pulling towards his hat.

The snow on the ground began to lift up into the air and swirl and swirl around the two of them in a tight vortex as the magic was redirected. The broom began to rise up into the air with a sound similar to a musical chord. Chan’s left foot left the ground and then, a second later, his right foot rose up off of it as well. The broom rose higher still. Unlike last night, Chan couldn’t take off at street level. There were too many people. Too many cars parallel parked along the road. He’d have to get to at least roof height before they could really move.

Yongbok loosened his hold on Chan’s body and eased backward so that he could sit on the broom behind Chan, his arms around the witch’s waist to keep from falling.

“Hey, stop moving or you’ll tip us,” Chan warned.

“I’m not moving,” Yongbok said even as he continued to slide backward and unwrap his legs from around Chan’s waist.

They tipped dangerously, the broom’s handle pointing up towards the Big Blue Bird’s big blue feathers.

Chan felt Yongbok start to fall. “Yongbok,” he cried out.

“I’m not moving,” Yongbok protested. At least now he was telling the truth, squeezing the life out of Chan’s torso.

The District Witch made some adjustments and got them leveled out again. By then, they were above roof height and clear for a smooth take off. It was way out in the distance but Chan could see the tall metal bridge to District 10 on the other side of the buildings and trees. “Please hold on,” said Chan. “We’re going to move fast.”

Yongbok tightened his arms even more around Chan’s middle and pressed his face into the center of Chan’s back. “I’m ready.”

After a moment to center himself, Chan accelerated. Slowly and cautiously at first but then with more force to compensate for the additional weight. There was little response for a second or two and then the broom catapulted forward, leaving Chan breathless from the force. Then they were flying through the air, faster and higher as they soared.

Yongbok yowled in delight behind him.

Even Chan let out an excited whoop. It was fun to fly and even more enjoyable to do so when the weather was clear and there were no awful mana disruptions mucking up his concentration. He turned them south and, in no time, they were flying over the bridge and heading into District 10.

The socioeconomic difference from one side of the river to the other was immediate and obvious. On the south side of the bridge, the houses were nicer, larger, newer. The office buildings were taller and the brands slapped on every billboard and bus stop were for far more expensive brands. None of that mattered. Chan only had his eyes on the downtown coven building; a big, modern, blocky, and borderline hideous thing with its own grassy plaza out front.

Chan took them close to the ground but even with a dramatic drop in speed, Yongbok’s weight made them fly clean past the plaza. Chan had to spin them into a u-turn to try again but at least their speed was low enough for him to dig his heels into the slushy snow on the sidewalk and drag them to a stop.

Yongbok hopped off. “This place smells fantastic! Everything is wonderful.”

Chan sat his broom up on one shoulder and walked towards the coven building’s front door. “It smells regular.”

“No, it doesn’t.”

“Let’s get inside.”

“Something’s fishy.” Yongbok’s expression brightened. “Something’s fishy .” He sniffed at the air, then his eyes widened. He pointed. “There’s a seafood place across the street. Let’s go.”

“We don’t have time,” Chan said. The front doors slid open as he approached. He looked over his shoulder at Yongbok. “Come on. We have to get Hyunjin.”

“Can we have fish tonight?”

“Have fish?” repeated Chan.

“For dinner,” Yongbok said with a frighteningly toothy grin.

Chan sighed. “Let’s get Hyunjin first. One thing at a time.” He had to grab Yongbok by the wrist and haul him through the sliding door. The boy probably would have taken off running to the seafood spot if he hadn’t. Then again, maybe he should let Yongbok go. Chan forgot that the guy had his own money. Better yet, he had money that Chan hadn’t given him.

Inside the building, the sterile, all-white interior made Chan feel dirty and maybe a little stifled.

He craved the cluttered mess of his shop.

“Welcome,” the pretty receptionist behind the desk sang out. “Do you have an appointment?”

Chan reached into his pocket for his official coven badge. He slid it across the desk towards her. “I’m here to pick up Hyunjin.”

The receptionist didn’t even look down at his badge, she just smiled up at him vapidly.

Chan realized that she probably wouldn’t know his name. “I’m here to pick up-” His throat tightened around the words. “-my dragon.”

Her eyebrows shot up so high that they vanished behind her bangs.

“Regional Manager Kim Woojin said he’s been attending to the matter personally.”

At long last, the name drop got the receptionist moving. “Ahhh yes! That special Priority One case. It’s all we’ve been talking about.” She typed on her computer at a ridiculous speed, her eyes scanning the screen like she was speed-reading a book. She found what she was looking for and punched a number into the phone near her elbow.

It was on speaker and Chan recognized the voice that answered as the senior witch with the bun that had apprehended Hyunjin last night.

“I have a witch here about a dragon,” the receptionist said, unable to hide her awe as she gawked up at Chan. “The Priority One case.”

Chan realized that she must have thought he was some celebrity or someone extremely rich with money to spare. If he was anyone else, he’d probably think the same thing. The Regional Manager, of all people, had apparently made him a Priority One case. “It’s not that big of a deal,” he whispered to her, trying to deflect some of her awe.

“Send him down,” the senior witch’s gruff voice came through the speaker. “The dragon’s in the fortified holding cell but is probably about a minute or two from busting out of it. I knew that witch would be trouble the second I laid eyes on him. My hunches are usually right. He’s a bad luck magnet. I can feel it. He’s got a-- Wait. Do you have me on speaker? Is he standing right there?”

The receptionist hurriedly hung up. “She’s talking about some other witch, of course,” she said, smiling far too wide and laughing far too obnoxiously. She pressed a button on her desk and the sliding doors off to the left of the lobby beeped and then slid open. The receptionist handed Chan back his badge and pointed the way. “Just go down that way, around the corner, up the hall to the left,” she said, “and then down the stairs and you’ll be there.”

Those were quite the convoluted directions. Were they supposed to go left or right? Too embarrassed to ask, Chan pulled Yongbok with him through the sliding doors and down the indicated hallway.

They passed door after door. Nameplates on the wall described all sorts of managerial positions. Were one of these rooms Woojin’s office? Or did his position put him in the main HQ building way over in District 17? Chan hadn’t thought to ask.

“Do you see stairs around here,” he wondered. “I don’t see stairs around here.”

Yongbok made a noise. “I feel a change in air pressure. I think they’re up ahead.”

The two of them turned left around a corner. They walked past a wall of glass. On the other side of it was a conference room where a meeting seemed to be in session. Several witches sat around the long, rectangular table in their stylish all-black ensembles and hats of varying sizes. If Hyunjin were here, Chan would show him proof that ribbons weren’t as popular as he thought.

Yongbok stopped suddenly, yanking Chan backward. “What is it,” Chan asked, trying to keep his voice low so as not to disturb the meeting.

“It’s… It’s shiny , Chan.” Yongbok was staring through the large glass window into the conference room, admiring the glittering watch of the man leading the meeting. “I want it.”

“You definitely can’t have that,” Chan told him, trying to pull him along.

Yongbok put his fingernails against the glass and slid them just enough to make a screeching noise. “I want it,” he repeated.

Chan got war flashbacks to the furniture store and Yongbok digging his fingernails into the chair’s armrest. He pulled on the boy’s wrist more incessantly. “You’re not going to get that. Legally.”

“Aww,” Yongbok sighed, finally allowing himself to be pulled away.

They resumed their trip down the hallway and made another turn at the corner. Chan grunted in frustration. “She at least could have called someone to escort us. Wow. There’s not a single wayfinding sign anywhere.” He looked left and then right. “Have we come down this hall already?”

“No. My ears just popped,” Yongbok said. “The stairs are close.”

Fortunately, the door at the end of the hall was clearly marked ‘stairs’ and when Chan opened the door, the only way to go was down. “Well, the sooner we get him, the better,” Chan mused, hopping down the stairs two at a time. “This place gives me the creeps. It’s like being inside of a machine.”

They reached the first landing.

“I can smell him,” Yongbok chirped. His excitement turned to horror in an instant. He then faltered on the stairs, nearly tripping. “I can hear him, too.”

“Hear him?” Chan asked. He let go of Yongbok’s wrist so the boy could grab at the handrail and right himself. “I don’t hear anything.”

“Trust me, I hear him,” Yongbok said. He grimaced. “Sorry. I can’t get any closer while he’s making all of that noise.”

“Is he hurt?” Chan asked. He couldn’t hear anything. Why couldn’t he hear anything?

“It’s like last night but worse because his lungs are ten times bigger.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“He’s making a lot of noise,” Yongbok reiterated. “Like last night.”

Chan looked at him for a long moment. Yongbok hadn’t been at the shop last night when Hyunjin had lost his cool. How did he know what the boy sounded like when he was upset? Then again, the senior witch on the scene had said the noise Hyunjin made could be heard far and wide. “Is he hurt,” Chan asked once more, tightening his grip on his broom.

Yongbok clutched at his head like a headache was coming on. “He’s... quite distressed.”

That was all Chan needed to hear. He threaded his broom between his legs and hovered off the ground. “I’ll get him.” He took off, leaning forward and pointing the broom down the flight of stairs. Without Yongbok’s weight at the back, speed came easy.

When Chan reached the second landing, he had to plant his foot on the wall and kick himself backwards so that he could make the sharp turn without face planting. He repeated the process at the next landing. And then the next. And the next. He was going quite the distance underground.

What had that witch on the phone called the place? A fortified holding cell? That didn’t sound pleasant at all.

Chan urged his broom to go even faster and nearly hurt himself making the turn. He was circling down to the next landing when he finally became aware of an all-too-familiar wailing noise. It was distant but it was the exact same thing he had heard last night. Grating. Soul-crushing. Full of agony and loss. “Hyunjin,” Chan gasped out. At least the coven had removed the silencing spell from Hyunjin’s throat or it had worn off one. Chan would rather take this awful noise than to see Hyunjin mutely scream his name.

Chan reached the bottom of the stairs, finally, and hopped off his broom to shoulder-check the stairwell exit door. On the other side was a rather short hallway with an entire wall being nothing but a large glass viewing window.

A row of men and women in all-white outfits sporting clunky safety goggles were standing in front of the glass window, snapping photos with professional-looking cameras and muttering to each other.

At first glance, they looked like a squad of scientists but Chan saw the badges pinned to their shirts and wondered if they were all simply reporters. Journalists. Considering the situation, he would have preferred scientists. Hadn’t Woojin said he’d kept the press from getting involved? Or was that just about the incident in front of his shop?

The floor shook like there was an earthquake, bringing his thoughts to a halt as he and the photographers struggled to keep their balance. A bright light filled the hall. Brighter than the lights hanging from above.

Chan held his arm up over his face to protect his eyes from the flash.

He could hear Hyunjin’s desperate crying plain as day now but where was he ?

“Are you the owner?” Asked one of the photographers over the noise. She had noticed Chan approach even with all of the commotion on the other side of the glass.

“Yeah,” Chan said, absolutely despising the foul connotations behind such a word.

She nodded. “A wonderful specimen.” She tapped the pen in her hand against the glass as the light on the other side began to die down. “I’ve never seen a dragon with color-changing scales before. Must be extremely rare.”

Chan peered through the thick glass. On the other side of it was a white-walled room. Or, at some point, the walls had been white. Now they were scorched black from fire. Huge chunks of the stone had been ripped out by fearsome animal claws. At the center of the room was a small cloud of smoke but, even as he watched, the cloud thinned and thinned, apparently being vacuumed out of the room by an industrial fan in the ceiling. When the smoke cleared, Chan saw… something .

A dragon.

A dragon !

It was large and majestic. Its scales were beautifully iridescent, shimmering with a touch of pink one moment, a touch of blue the next, a touch of green the next. Its wings were spread but the room was far too small for the beast to turn around in, let alone take flight. Its mouth was wide open and the screeching it made sounded just like Hyunjin in tears.

Chan’s instincts took over. He dropped his broom and took off running towards the door at the end of the hall.

“Don’t go in there,” the same white-clothed woman shouted after him. “He’ll burn you alive.” Then she changed her tune. “Wait, let him burn you alive. That’ll make a great photo.”

Chan ignored her. He reached the end of the short hall and shoved open the door. He nearly fell flat on his face as he entered the white-walled room but he righted himself and approached the towering beast.

This close up on it, the noise was unbearable. It flooded his ears and went straight to his brain, the sound pulsing and pulsing like it would turn his mind to mush if he allowed it. Even slapping his hands over his ears did not lessen the pain. Chan gagged. The air still held quite a bit of smoke and the room reeked of burning things.

“Hyunjin!” Chan had to scream at the top of his lungs just for a chance at being heard over the dragon’s wailing.

The air around the dragon was getting extremely hot. The dragon’s claws were beginning to glow like embers. Chan recognized that light. He’d seen it countless times before as Hyunjin’s hands lit up in the breath before whatever he was holding exploded.

Now all of the scorch marks in the room made sense.

Now the woman’s warning of being burned alive made sense.

Chan braced himself, fully expecting to get hurt in the blast. “Hyunjin!”

An explosion popped apart in front of the dragon’s open mouth. The noise was like thunder cracking. Chan felt the vibration of it all the way in his bones. All the way in his soul.

This is what Woojin meant by rampage. This was why he kept stressing safety and damage control. Hyunjin was just a wild-eyed thing, his claws digging out chunks of the holding cell wall with what seemed to be very little strength. The explosions that burst in front of him were larger than anything Chan had seen. Even larger than the florist’s work van erupting.

Chan didn’t have the strength or the breath to keep yelling so he spoke normally. “Hyunjin, it’s me. Channie-Chan. Calm down, will you? I’m here.” He didn’t even know if Hyunjin could hear him through his pain and sadness. “Hyunjin, please.”

The dragon continued its tantrum.

It wasn’t chained or bound in any way but the room’s small size made it noticeably difficult for the beast to move. It swung out an arm. Its claws slammed into the glass viewing window with such intense force that it clouded over as if it had shattered into a million pieces. There must have been a powerful spell on it because, in a breath, the window was clear again and Chan got a good look at all of the white-clothed people staring in at him. They seemed absolutely fascinated by the dragon’s rage. The flash bulbs on their cameras went off as they searched for the perfect shot. They didn’t care. They just wanted a show.

Chan turned away from them. His chest tightened with emotion. Seeing Hyunjin like this broke his heart. Seeing him in so much pain… In so much despair. “Hyunjin,” he croaked. “I’m right here. I promised I wouldn’t leave. I’m not leaving.”

The dragon’s roaring seemed to increase in volume. The noise dug into Chan’s ears. He couldn’t think. He couldn’t hear himself think! He was certain he might pass out.

The air around the dragon heated up. Fire sparked in the air in front of it. It was like the glass potion bottle the other day. It was like the loaf of banana bread. It was like that salad bowl all of those months ago.

The air itself seemed to just heat up and burst apart like fireworks.

Chan tried his best not to be afraid.

He tried his best not to flinch when flames sizzled in the air, whizzing past his face so close they singed his hair. There was no need to be afraid, he told himself over and over and over. There was no reason to duck or cower or panic. This was his boy. And his boy wouldn’t hurt him. “Hyunjin,” Chan scolded with bravery he didn’t know he had. “Hyunjin, if you don’t calm down, we won’t have peanut butter for the rest of the day.”

There was no noticeable effect.

Chan put his hands on his hips and put a firm, parental edge to his words. “You’ll have to wait until tomorrow and then you’ll only be able to eat the smooth kind not the chunky kind.”

Miraculously, the dragon’s tantrum ended. It stopped throwing its weight around. It stopped crying out. Chan’s ears rang with the echoes of it’s screams and his body shook with phantom tremors.

The dragon turned towards Chan, as if only just now becoming aware of his presence at the holding cell door. It made a high-pitched chirping noise that didn’t sound like anything at all but Chan heard it as his name. “Yes. It’s me,” Chan confirmed with a gentle laugh. He held out his arms. “I’m here now so be good and let’s go home, okay?”

The dragon began to shrink and shrink, right before his eyes. Its scales shimmered, grew transparent, and then melted into pale skin. Its wings folded down onto a tall, slender, smooth back. Its claws shrank to the size and shape of human hands. But those eyes stayed the same. Those big, big eyes and that big, big smile. Those would never change. Even the squeaky noise that came out of its mouth stayed the same. “Chan! Channie-Chan-Chan!” Hyunjin was running towards him, naked as the day he was born, but he was here and he looked unharmed. Unharmed but haggard. Tired. Exhausted from his crying. “I knew you’d come get me. I knew you would. I knew you would!” Hyunjin crashed into his open arms and Chan scooped him up in a hug.

Chan felt a pang of relief hit him so hard that he did not care that tears sprang to his eyes. “Hyunjin,” he exhaled, pressing his face into Hyunjin’s dark hair. “I’m here. I’m here. I’m so glad you’re okay.”

The coven had done what they said they would do. A thick leather collar was now around Hyunjin’s neck and the tag that dangled from it had some kind of computer chip embedded in one side of it and a long string of numbers on the other. The coven had also cut Hyunjin’s hair considerably shorter and neater, and without the big plaid ribbon tied into the boy’s hair, the curved black horns protruding from the top of his skull were all the more obvious.

Honestly, how had Chan never noticed?

Hyunjin giggled and pulled back to look at Chan’s face. If Chan hadn’t seen it himself, if he hadn’t heard it repeatedly over the past day, he never would have believed that what he had seen a minute ago, that big dragon, was the same being as what he was holding in his arms right then.

“I calmed down so can we have peanut butter?” Hyunjin asked calmly, as if he hadn’t been rampaging just a few moments before. “The chunky kind?”

Chan swallowed hard. Woojin’s words about having to pay for property damage and healthcare bills echoed in his head and the fear of such responsibilities had him feeling as open and exposed as the room was with its massive viewing window. The only thought that calmed him was that Hyunjin had never transformed while he had been at the shop, even during his worst tantrums. Perhaps he wouldn’t transform and hurt anyone as long as Chan was there to keep an eye on him.

Perhaps.

Hyunjin pushed his forehead against Chan’s. “Why are you so quiet? Why aren’t you saying anything? You should say something because saying something is way better than saying nothing. Are we having peanut butter or not, Chan? We have to have peanut butter because you said we could.”

Chan wiped a stray tear from his cheek. “We can have peanut butter.”

Hyunjin jumped up and down. “Straight out the jar?”

“Yes, Hyunjin. Straight out the jar.” Chan pulled Hyunjin close.

“I’ve got something better than peanut butter planned,” Yongbok said, his voice cutting into the room.

Chan and Hyunjin both looked up to see the yellow-eyed boy leaning against the room’s open door.

“What can possibly be better than peanut butter straight out the jar?” Hyunjin asked with wide-eyed curiosity.

“Fish. Fish is better than peanut butter straight out the jar. Don’t give me that look. I can prove it.” Yongbok held Chan’s broom out towards the witch, who took it and grabbed hold of it like a lifeline. “I just called in delivery from that seafood place,” Yongbok explained. “I got one of those big platters that comes with like eight different sauces, a big bowl of clam chowder and a whole buncha sides.”

“You didn’t have to do that,” Chan told him.

Yongbok scoffed. “You better sign all of those contracts real quick because if we aren’t back at the shop by the time the delivery folks get there, I think she said twenty minutes, then we don’t get a notch in the punch card and we have to get a notch in the punch card.” He held up the card he was clutching in his hands like the thing had been printed on solid gold.

Maybe it was just the weird lighting in the holding cell playing tricks on Chan’s mind but he could have sworn Yongbok’s eyes were yellower than usual. Like, really yellow.

Yongbok said, “If we get five notches, we get a free tuna dinner and I suddenly love tuna.”

This fact absolutely delighted Hyunjin. “I’m sure tuna loves you, too, Yongbok! Ahh! Chan! You’re squeezing too tight.”

The District Witch didn’t loosen his grip. At some point during the last five minutes, he had swore to the Big Blue Bird herself that he would never let anything scary separate him from Hyunjin again.

“Want to know what would be super duper great?” Hyunjin asked, his eyes twinkling with the best idea ever. “What if we put peanut butter on fish?”

Chapter Text

It was the middle of the afternoon and although the Big Blue Bird was out and shining, there was a gray wintry dullness to the sky as dark clouds made themselves comfortable on the eastern horizon. More snow hadn’t been in the forecast for Tuesday night but that didn’t mean much if the Big Blue Bird changed her mind.

She could do that. She was allowed. Even the most powerful of fortune tellers weren’t always correct when predicting the Big Blue Bird’s moods.

Back in District 9, Chan flew over the familiar suburbs and markets of his territory with Hyunjin, safe at last, clinging to his torso on the broom behind him. Nearing Thirteenth Street, Chan slowed down his broom and dipped them low until he was just beneath roof level. The street between the shops of the two witches was relatively empty, for once, but Chan came to a sudden halt when he realized something was in his way. Or, rather, some one . Minho stood in the middle of the sidewalk on Chan’s side of the street, his hands up on his hips and his dark, angry eyes leering up at Chan.

“Thank the Bird’s claws you’re here,” Minho shouted up into the wind.

Chan, hovering in the air a short distance above Minho’s head, stared down at the sidewalk below. “Good afternoon to you, too.”

“Oh, it’s that super nice guy,” Hyunjin said. He lifted up a hand to wave.

Minho ignored the boy. “District Witch!”

“What do you want,” Chan asked, bringing the broom closer to the ground. “Why are you here? Don’t you have a store on your side of the street to tend to?”

Minho furrowed his eyebrows. “Trust me. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t absolutely have to be.”

Chan paused in his descent. Whatever Minho had to say could not be good. Chan had spent all morning in a terrible mood and had only now risen out of his slump. He was not about to fall back into it because of the pretty, mean and pretty mean witch across the way.

Minho noticed his hesitation. “Get down here.” He pointed to the snowy pavement in front of him. “We need to talk.”

“Your scary face is preventing customers from entering!” Chan snapped. He lowered the broom the rest of the way to the sidewalk. If Minho could be mean, he could attempt to be mean as well. “If you’ve got beef with me, keep it between us and not our businesses.” He dug his heels into the snow to bring the broom to a halt. “I know we’re competitors and all but that’s-”

“Hush.” Minho cut him off. He barely gave Hyunjin and Chan a chance to hop off of the broom before he was grabbing the District Witch by the collar and shaking him. “Do you know how frustrating this is? You’re always causing trouble. Make these people go away.” He started tugging Chan across the street.

“Slow down,” Chan squeaked out. He nearly slid and fell on the icy pavement.

“Chan! Wait up.” Hyunjin called after them.

“Stay right there,” Chan warned, barely able to turn around enough to look at the boy.

Hyunjin’s bottom lip trembled. “I want to come with you!”

“I’m not going far. I’ll stay where you can see me.”

“But-” Hyunjin took a step forward.

Chan called out, “Don’t cross the street without me.”

Hyunjin backed away from the curb.

Chan turned his attention to the witch manhandling him up onto the opposite side of the street. “Minho, what is this about?”

“You’re always getting into things that disrupt my day. If I did what you did, a proper District Witch would have fined me or booted me out. Look!” He pointed to the group of people loitering in front of his shop. “They barge into my place of business and demand I pay some exorbitant bill for all of this food. Take care of it!”

“Why should I do anything?”

“Because if absolutely anything goes wrong on this street, it’s because of you and your little zoo of wild children. Of unsupervised youth. Of stray kids. Now solve this!”

In front of Minho’s Trinkets and Tokens was about four or five people in bright blue coveralls with an obnoxiously loud print of shrimp and fish and lobsters on the material. Chan recognized the logo on their chest as the one from the seafood restaurant outside of the coven building. “Ahh,” he sighed. “Now things make sense.”

“Nothing makes sense when you’re involved,” Minho huffed. “Absolutely nothing.”

“Yongbok ordered dinner,” Chan explained. But where was Yongbok?

“And had it delivered to my shop? See. This is what I mean, District Witch. You’re always complicating things and finding new ways to annoy and frustrate me. I won’t stand for this.”

“Hush,” Chan hissed.

Minho’s eyes went wide. “Wha- What! Did you just shush me?” He let go of Chan and folded his arms across his chest. “I have the right to be angry, you know. These people swear up and down that all of this blasted food is for me and they refuse to leave my shop until it’s paid for. I told them I wasn’t paying for anything and now they have grouped in front of my store to block my customers.”

Chan was only half listening. Where was Yongbok for real? Chan glanced up and down the street looking for him. The boy should be here since he was the one who had ordered all of this. Chan thought back to the coven building and the surprisingly stress-free process of signing the numerous contracts and agreements to be legally allowed to keep Hyunjin. To be Hyunjin’s guardian. Since there had been no room on the broom for three, Yongbok had said he’d find his own way back to the shop. If Yongbok hated walking and taking cars, though, whatever method he’d come up with must have been quite marvelous.

“District Witch,” Minho brought Chan back to the present moment. “Make these hooligans go away. They’ve been here five whole minutes and it has been the most distasteful experience of my life! I want them out of here. Three o’clock is peak profit hours because that’s the start of the evening rush and I need to hit my numbers today.”

“Don’t we all,” Chan grunted.

Minho narrowed his eyes and leaned towards Chan’s face with a scowl on his lips.

“I’ll take care of it,” Chan told him, looking away from Minho’s gaze. He approached one of the colorfully-uniformed girls. “Umm, excuse me,” he called out to her.

She glanced over in his direction, readjusting her fuzzy blue winter hat. “How can I help you, sir?”

“I think there’s a bit of confusion. A man named Lee Yongbok placed a large order with you, right? Not quite half an hour ago.”

She stiffened a little, glancing in the direction of her coworkers as if she wasn’t positive she should divulge such information or not.

Chan tried a different approach. “He ordered something with eight different sauces, clam chowder and a lot of sides?”

She seemed to relax at that. “Yes. Yes. Our party catering special. We were told to drop it off here.” She pointed to Minho’s shop.

“I’m positive that delivery is for me and not the outstanding, super polite man standing over there with the kind smile on his face.” He gestured to Minho, who looked anything but outstanding, polite or kind. When the witch realized Chan was referring to him, he rolled his eyes. Chan turned back to the girl. He asked, “Can I see the address? Yes. See, I know the building looks a little run down but I assure you that’s the place you’re looking for.” He hooked his thumb towards his humble shop across the way.

That was all the delivery girl needed to know. She shouted a quick order to the others and they began gathering all of the metal delivery boxes and bags of food, waited at the curb for a break in traffic and then carted everything into Chan’s shop on the other side of the street.

The delivery girl fumbled around in her many pockets until she found the hole puncher she was looking for. “Can I see your punch card?”

Chan thought about the card Yongbok had treasured back at the coven building, the one that would give them a free tuna dinner after five deliveries. Yongbok had taken it with him, right? He was that excited about receiving his first punch so he wanted to be the one to hand it over when the delivery arrived. However, when Chan reached into his pocket, he felt a piece of thick cardboard against his fingers he was certain hadn’t been there before. He pulled it out. It was the punch card. He stared at it quizzically, wondering when Yongbok had ever given it to him, when the boy ever had the time to slip it into Chan’s pocket.

The girl didn’t find this strange at all.

She pulled the card out of his hand, punched it and handed it back to him. “Sorry for the hassle. I’ll take the price of the clam chowder off of your bill to make up for the trouble.” She dipped her head apologetically and started off across the street, taking the last big catering box with her.

Minho stepped up to Chan and purposefully bumped shoulders with him. “You’re the most incapable, annoying District Witch I’ve ever had to live under,” he groaned. “And that is saying a lot because I’ve lived under at least five during my studies.”

“That was the most minor of inconveniences,” Chan told him, “and I handled it very well.”

This didn’t please Minho. The witch turned up his nose. “That attitude of yours...” He turned away and stomped into his shop, not even sparing a backwards glance or a proper goodbye.

“ My attitude?” Chan questioned. Oh well. All of that was behind him now. Chan made his own way across the street when traffic allowed.

“He’s so nice,” Hyunjin commented, grabbing hold of Chan’s arm as soon as the man was safely back on the sidewalk. “You should be friends with him!”

“Why should I, Hyunjin?” Because Chan just needed to know.

“Well,” Hyunjin began, “it’s because you’re super nice and everybody in the whole wide world wants to be friends with you.”

Chan looked over his shoulder in the direction of Minho’s shop. “Minho doesn’t want to be friends.” He didn’t know why he felt sad saying it.

“Of course he does! He always says things to you whenever he sees you.”

He always said mean things. Mean was the operative word. Chan led them to the shop’s front door. “Not everyone likes me, Hyunjin.”

This made Hyunjin shake him in protest. “Nuh uh! Chan, you’re the bestest most super duper most wonderfulest person ever and everybody likes to be around you. Why else is the shop always full of people? They all want to be close to you.”

Chan didn’t believe him completely but he smiled brightly at the boy and pulled open the shop’s front door.

“Okay, you’re like the best hexing old man ever,” Jisung called out when he spotted Chan come in. “Your timing is impeccable. Just when I was getting hungry!”

Chan peeled his jacket off of his shoulders and hung it up on the rack. “You’re still here?”

“Hex yeah,” Jisung shouted.

“Hex yeah!” Hyunjin repeated giddily.

“Don’t say that, Hyunjin,” Chan scolded. “It’s a bad word.”

“Okay,” Hyunjin pouted.

Chan turned his attention back to Jisung as the orange-haired boy walked up the aisle towards them. “Why aren’t you… anywhere else?”

Jisung poked Chan in the chest. “I’m gonna stick to you like white on rice until you’ve got deliveries for me.”

“So you’ll only leave me alone if you’re out on a job?”

“Yup. And then I’m gonna be right back here waiting on the next job. And look at you. You got your dragon back!”

“Hi!” Hyunjin waved.

Jisung looked the boy up and down. “He looks different. I can see his hexing horns! Oh, and he doesn’t have that big ribbon. And he’s wearing color!”

“He’s not a witch,” Chan spelled out. He glanced at the simple coat, blue sweater and jeans Hyunjin was wearing that he’d bought for him on their way home. The clothes matched his collar and tag quite handsomely. Chan said, “He shouldn’t wear a witch’s uniform if he’s not a witch.” He wondered where Hyunjin had gotten the other black clothes and the plaid magic ribbon he’d worn up until this point. Chan hoped the boy hadn’t snatched them. Hyunjin probably would have done anything to look and be just like Chan. “I should have figured out he wasn’t a witch far sooner.” Hyunjin didn’t have a wand. He could make things explode without whispering even the first stanza of a spell. He could say hex without creating a curse in the air. The signs were right there, glowing as bright as neon, but Chan hadn’t seen them.

He wondered what other things were happening right in front of him that he did not notice.

“Well, I just thought it was all part of the cover-up,” Jisung stated. “You know… Disguising him so that dumb people don’t think he’s a dragon.”

Chan joked, “And you’re so smart?” He circled past Jisung and walked farther into the shop.

Jisung followed behind him, right on his heels. “Hex yeah! Just because I flunked out doesn’t mean I can’t use my two eyes.”

Chan looked over his shoulder at him. “Well… Not everyone can see things right in front of them. Whatever. Everything’s legit now. There’s no longer a reason to hide.” The District Witch reached the back of the shop by the cash wrap where the delivery girl was making Woojin sign the receipt. “Woojin!” Chan gasped when he realized what the Regional Manager was doing. “You don’t have to pay. Yongbok should pay. It’s his meal.”

“It’s the least I can do,” Woojin said. “You’ve been through a lot in the last day or two. A hot plate of food shared with good company will make everything more pleasant.”

“The truest hexing words you’ve said all day,” Jisung agreed, joining them by the counter. He aimed his gaze accusingly at Woojin. “And you’ve said a lot of words today.”

“Is this alright?” questioned Chan, completely ignoring Jisung. “Woojin, is it okay to do all of this in the middle of the business day?” He waved a hand at the caterers bustling about.

It was as if Woojin knew Chan would ask that. He already had an answer prepared. “When I put you under that sleeping spell last night, I figured that today wouldn’t be your most efficient of days. I have already made critical adjustments to your sales-per-hour calculations and have lowered today’s sales goals to compensate for the skewed productivity but, tomorrow, you’ll need to meet your plans once again. Business as usual.”

“What the hex did he just say?” Jisung spoke up.

Chan translated, “He made it so that it won’t look like I did a bad job today.”

Jisung turned to Woojin, slapping his hand on the counter. “See? Is talking regular all that bad of a thing to do? He said what you said with just five hexing words! Talk regular. You can put in so many less words and get out so much fewer effort.”

“Now it is my turn to only understand a fraction of what you just said,” Woojin replied calmly.

“Can we eat?” Hyunjin interjected, turning everyone’s attention to what was truly important.

It wasn’t until then that Chan looked down at the floor and realized just how much food had been delivered to his place. What had Yongbok actually ordered ? And how had the restaurant prepared so much in so little time? The delivery crew had set up dozens of dishes and plates and cutlery sets and pitchers of tea on a wide, circular tablecloth as hideously patterned as their coveralls and, even as Chan stood there gaping at the royal fishy feast, the crew was heading out the door, their job done.

The delivery girl called out, “We’ll pick up all of the crates and plates in a few hours. Please leave them by the front door for us,” and then she was outside and gone, one last gust of chilly air seeping in as the door swung closed behind her.

“It smells so good,” Hyunjin noted. He started to go behind the counter. “I’m gonna get the peanut butter!”

“Take your coat off,” Chan suggested.

“Okay.” Hyunjin changed directions, skipping towards the coat rack by the front door.

Jisung slapped his hands together in what might have supposed to be a prayer, “Thank you for this food we’re about to eat.” He flopped down on the floor to claim his spot around the circle.

“Can we wash our hands first?” Chan attempted.

“Your bathroom door says employees only,” Jisung said, grabbing a pair of chopsticks.

“So you can read?” confirmed Woojin with a smug smile.

Jisung took the barb in stride. Or maybe he didn’t. He tossed the chopsticks down. “You wanna go, old man? Just because your bones are brittle doesn’t mean I’ll go easy on you. I’ll knock the hex out of you.”

“Please excuse him.” Chan’s damage control probably came way too late.

Woojin only laughed. Genuinely. “It’s fine. For now. He reminds me of me when I was younger.”

“Really?” Jisung’s mouth fell open in shock. “You actually had a personality at one point?”

Hyunjin returned, his coat stashed away.

Chan said, “Let’s wash our hands.” He stared hard in Jisung’s direction. “Everyone.”

Jisung and Hyunjin groaned in unison but they followed after Chan into the bathroom where the District Witch helped Hyunjin with the dirt under his nails and checked and double-checked that Jisung actually used the hand soap. Even Woojin crowded in around the sink so that Chan could wipe a soapy cloth over his palms and fingers, Chan taking special care to avoid getting the man’s expensive ring too wet.

With their hands clean and smelling lavender fresh, the crew exited the bathroom and returned to the shop floor only to discover a black-furred cat sniffing around the plates of fish.

“Felix,” Chan admonished. “Get away from that!”

The cat, more startled by Chan’s volume than anything, leaped away from the food.

Jisung rushed back to his spot around the tablecloth. “Let’s dig in.”

“Let’s dig in,” Hyunjin parroted, yanking Chan down so that they could sit on the floor next to each other.

“Where’s Yongbok,” Chan asked. “He bought us this food. He should be here.”

Felix hopped onto Chan’s lap and made himself comfortable.

“Well, he’s not here so that means more for us.” Jisung was already scooping up shrimp with his chopsticks to sit on top of his bowl of rice.

Woojin eased down between Hyunjin and Jisung, groaning like he actually was an old man. “This is a lot of food. Even for a big group like this. Surely you won’t eat it all tonight.”

Jisung snorted. “Well, his fridge at the house is empty. He sure could use some leftovers.”

“You went in my fridge?” Chan’s eyebrows shot up in surprise.

“Do you know how hard it was getting your recliner out of my backpack? I thought I was going to tear the zipper. The least I thought I could get was a glass of orange juice or something but you didn’t even have that!”

Chan asked the question he probably should have started things off with. “You went into my house?”

“How the hex else was I going to get the recliner in there?”

“I gave him a spare key,” Woojin offered.

Chan let out a shaky breath and relaxed. Technically, it was the government’s house so Woojin handing out a key shouldn’t have felt so intrusive but the last thing Chan needed was the orange-haired boy coming and going into the house as he pleased when Chan got enough of him at the shop. But that was a discussion the two of them should have when they weren’t in front of his boss’s boss. “Where did you put the chair? Hopefully not somewhere silly.”

“Just because I flunked out doesn’t mean I don’t know a thing or two about intentional decorating.”

“Interior decorating,” Woojin smoothly corrected.

“Where did you put it?” Chan repeated.

“By the fireplace,” said Jisung.

That was acceptable. Chan sighed in relief. He didn’t know why but he feared that Jisung would have sat it on the back patio in all of the snow or that he would have attempted to put it in the kitchen or something. “Well,” he said, “thank you for moving it, Jisung. I know that you- Ow!” He looked down. Felix had attempted to snatch a piece of fish out of his hand but had gotten the tip of his finger as well. “You want some, boy?”

Felix meowed in reply.

Chan tore off a tiny piece and fed it to the cat in his lap.

“Speaking of correcting glaring errors, I attempted to reply to a few pieces of your resident mail today,” Woojin stated, “but when I realized that I could not locate anything in your shop, I gave up and stacked the letters in your office. I am telling you, you need to re-merchandise your shelves. Follow the plan-o-gram. That’s why we send it to every coven store at the start of each financial quarter.”

“Blah blah blah. Boring! Can we only talk about fun things,” Jisung complained. “None of what you said sounds fun.”

Chan defended himself, “The store isn’t unorganized. I know where everything is. Name something. I’ll prove it.”

Woojin paused to place a shrimp on his tongue. “Knowing where everything is in this place doesn’t prevent it from being a mess and asking you if you’ve memorized item locations isn’t going to make me feel any better about your ability to follow directives and adhere to coven guidelines.”

Jisung grumbled. “I bet you’re both single. Are you both single? It’s because of hex like this that you’re still single, you know.”

“If you can’t follow direct orders, Chan, maybe I--”

“Nothing is wrong with the way I have my inventory set up,” Chan interrupted him.

“You’re both so boring,” Jisung whined. “Just start dating and bore each other to death.”

Woojin put two fingers near his mouth, grabbed hold of the empty shrimp tail there and dropped it in a bowl off to his right. “Essential oils.”

Chan sat there for a precious second before he realized Woojin had given in and was testing him. “Aisle 6. Fourth shelf down. Next to the quartz.”

Woojin gave him another one. “Bat bones?”

“Aisle 1. Top shelf. Next to the dried herbs.”

“Pink salt.”

“Aisle 8. Bottom shelf. Between the volcanic rock and the tree ash.”

“This isn’t fun, either,” Jisung griped.

“I think it’s fun,” Hyunjin piped up. He turned around to look at Woojin. “I want to try. Ask me something! Ask me something!”

Woojin glanced towards Chan as if nonverbally seeking permission. When Chan gave him a nod, Woojin looked back at Hyunjin and said, “Mermaid scales.”

Hyunjin’s eyes lit up. He knew this one! “The really really sparkly things that smell like salt? They’re in the middle thingy! Oh oh oh! The thingy that’s on the left of the middle thingy. On the one… two… three shelf! Chan puts them all in little bitty bags so that the colors match but they are all really pretty even if they don’t match.”

Woojin bit the meat off another shrimp and tossed away the shell. He actually looked more annoyed than impressed. “Do you two really know your way around this mess?”

“It’s not a mess- Ow!” Chan yelped. “Felix! Stop with the teeth. You’ll choke on a bone if you don’t wait for me to peel them out first.” He held up another chunk of fish. Felix bit it and began chewing, letting out a content purr. Chan looked across the circle at Woojin. “It’s not a mess. Everything has its place. Everything has its purpose.”

The Regional Manager didn’t look satisfied in the least. He grabbed yet another shrimp and bit into it.

Jisung nudged him in the side and whispered, “You gotta dip em in the tomato sauce first, old man.” When Woojin did not do so the next time he took a bite, Jisung grabbed a shrimp off of Woojin’s plate, dipped it in the sauce and held it in front of Woojin’s face. “How can you eat them without putting them in the sauce?”

“Leave him alone,” Chan warned.

“Not until he tries the sauce.”

“Jisung.”

“He has to try the sauce.”

Fortunately, Woojin’s bad mood eased a little and he took the sauce-covered shrimp from between Jisung’s fingers and bit the whole thing out of the shell in one bite. It took a few seconds but the flavor hit him and his eyes widened, first with shock and then with pleasure.

“Now we’re talkin,” Jisung congratulated him, slapping him on the shoulder.

“Oh! That reminds me!” Hyunjin climbed to his feet and slipped around the counter to retrieve his jar of chunky peanut butter from the cabinet next to the coffee. He returned to his place next to Chan, unscrewed the lid and stuck one of his shrimp straight in the stuff. When it was sufficiently covered, he bit into and his face lit up. “Yummy!”

Just when the mood around the tablecloth had lightened, Woojin spoke up, “Your shop has numerous problems, Chan. A few of them are cosmetic but most of them are things that you are doing or, should I say, refusing to do. Re-merchandising is the simplest thing you can do but most of your items don’t even have proper labels or pricing information. I don’t think there’s a single sign in the place.”

“Come on,” Jisung whined. “We’re eating. No business stuff.”

Woojin stiffened. He stretched his mouth out into an angry frown.

“Jisung,” Chan said, trying to head off the storm, “this is important and I know you don’t care about it, but I need to hear this so I can keep being District Witch.”

This made Jisung roll his eyes. “I don’t care about what you two talk about. It’s just a heap of boring government hex and I can’t believe I’m going to wind up a mindless sheep like you two when I turn twenty.”

“That’s not how aging works,” Woojin mumbled.

“Jisung,” huffed Chan, “if I lose this job, you’ll have to find other customers. You’ll have to be some other District Witch’s personal courier.”

This harrowing information seemed to get through to the orange-haired boy. He clammed up quickly and lowered his head so that he could concentrate on eating his food.

Impatiently, Felix pawed at Chan’s empty hand. The District Witch reached for his plate to grab another strip of fish, peeled it into smaller and more manageable chunks to insure there were no bones, and then held the fleshy white meat out for the cat to nibble on.

Chan figured that this standoff with Woojin wouldn’t end until he backed down under the weight of Woojin’s superior authority, but he had to prove his case. “I can do the signing and update all of the pricing information. It’ll be tedious but doable. I can’t change up the store, however. I placed the items in this order because it improves vibrations. If the mana doesn’t move properly, I don’t put things next to each other. Easy as that. That’s why I don’t follow the plan-o-gram.”

“The plan-o-gram is key,” Woojin argued. “Following it means the customer experience remains the same no matter what coven store they enter. This kind of uniformity is necessary because, no matter the size of a store, things have to stay the same across the board or the customer will be uncomfortable and confused and our profits will plummet. As much as magic plays a part in our daily lives, this is still a capitalist society so--”

“This is so unfun!” Jisung objected. “You two are so boring. I’d rather watch paint dry. I’d rather find the needle in a haystack.”

Hyunjin was also getting bored. “Ask me something! Ask me something! I know where everything is.” He nudged Woojin’s knee. “Ask me. Ask me. I know everything. Chan taught me everything!”

Despite their audience, the Regional Manager and the District Witch continued to stare each other down like they were about to point wands at each other. In a low voice, Chan said, “I don’t follow the plan-o-gram mainly because it doesn’t feel right. The store doesn’t feel right when I set it up the way you want me to.”

Woojin replied, “Who cares how it feels. You should do as you are told. That is why there are rules. Laws. Need I remind you that upholding these rules in the magical community is the baseline of your job. Governing other people and tending to their needs is the reason why you are a District Witch to start out with so it confuses me that you are so against doing something as simple as following diagrams in a book.”

“Ask me something!” Hyunjin continued to pester the Regional Manager. He poked the man’s knee, his thigh, his side. “Ask me where the spooky rock statues are. They’re over there! Look! I’m right. See?”

“Is there no way you two can compromise?”

It took several seconds for everyone gathered around the food to recognize that this was a brand new voice that had spoken.

Changbin was sitting between Chan and Jisung, chewing on a piece of fish dipped in one of the sauces. His goth outfit and smudged eyeshadow should have made him very noticeable, but-

Chan startled, choked on his mouth full of food and had to slap his chest repeatedly to free up his windpipe. “How long have you been sitting there,” he wheezed.

Changbin speared another chunk of fish with his chopsticks and raised it to his mouth. “Since the beginning.”

Upon hearing this, Chan glanced around the circle. Hyunjin was back to dipping his shrimp in his peanut butter jar but now he was also adding the sauces. Chan made a mental note to buy a fresh jar. Woojin was calmly scooping rice into his mouth. Jisung was licking one of his bowls clean while trying to pour himself a cup of tea at the same time. Felix seemed to be the only one even remotely paying attention to the newcomer, his ears perked up in Changbin’s direction.

Chan just had to ask, “You all can see him, right? Right?” He glanced over just to make sure Changbin was still sitting next to him. “He’s really there and I’m not imagining him, am I?” He gave the boy’s shoulder a poke.

It was Hyunjin who said, mouth slack in awe, “He’s very sparkly but like… backwards sparkly.”

Chan asked the circle, “Has he been here the whole time? Really?”

Jisung tilted his head to the side. “You know what, now that you bring it the hex up, I can’t remember. I think I slid him some pepper? Or was that salt?”

“Who is he?” Woojin asked, not seeming to mind either way.

“The apprentice of the witch across the street,” Chan explained.

“The super nice guy,” added Hyunjin.

Chan thought back. Had Changbin been making himself comfortable while the caterers were bustling about? Chan tried to remember if Changbin had also been waiting in line to get his hands washed. He couldn’t recall. Oh well. The details weren’t important so long as the guy wasn’t making a fuss. It was too much food just for the four of them anyways. “I’m sorry. What were we even talking about?”

“Plan-a-ram-a-ram-a-rams,” Hyunjin called out with a mouth full of food.

Woojin sighed as if the weight of the world had just settled down on his shoulders.

Jisung sensed what was about to happen, “Let’s not talk about any boring hex until after we finish eating. Only fun stuff allowed. Capiche?”

“Yes,” Chan agreed, “let’s just enjoy the food.” He glanced up at Woojin across the circle. “And if I’m really doing so awful, then they’ll just get someone else to do the job.”

The Regional Manager visibly stiffened but he did nothing, he said nothing. He just scooped more of his food into his mouth and chewed quietly.

Felix shifted around in Chan’s lap. Chan looked down at the cat to see that quite a few pieces of shredded fish had wound up in the fur around the cat’s mouth. He took a few seconds to pick them out of Felix’s fur only for the cat to lick the pieces up off of his fingertips before he could toss them. “Maybe you also deserve a bell collar,” he mumbled. “And a tag with your name on it.”

“Do it, do it,” Hyunjin cheered. “Then me and him can match! We’ll be best friends forever!”

Felix started hissing.

“What? You don’t like that idea,” Chan wondered.

Felix’s whole body stiffened. He jumped up.

“Ahh, Kitty!” Hyunjin slid backwards.

“Felix, what is it?” Chan asked.

Felix’s fur began to stand on end. He hopped out of Chan’s lap, darted around Changbin and began hissing at… nothing.

Chan wouldn’t have thought much of it if Felix hadn’t screeched loudly and swung his paws forward as if striking at something.

“Is there a mouse?” Woojin asked, preemptively lifting up his plate of food.

Jisung spun around to look at the cat. “I don’t see anything. He’s just staring at that wall.”

Now everyone was turning to look, watching curiously as Felix faced off with his imaginary opponent.

The cat lunged forward again with a menacing screech, his claws out and swiping at the air. He must have scared whatever it was because now he was chasing it down one aisle and up the other, yowling the whole while. The front door of the shop opened and Felix sprinted outdoors into the late afternoon cold.

They all sat there dumbfounded. It was Chan who broke the silence by saying, “Did that door just open by itself?”

“No,” Hyunjin said, pointing, “it’s the super nice guy.”

The front door opened farther and, sure enough, Minho stepped into the place. He tugged the brim of his hat back to reveal the sharp features of his face, the thick green snake was draped over his shoulders, coiling and uncoiling.

Chan tensed.

Minho took four steps up the aisle towards them before he spotted his apprentice. “Changbin, what are you doing?”

“Having fun,” Jisung said, dipping his voice low and gravelly to sound just like Changbin. “For once in my life.”

Either Minho hadn’t heard him or he was using the last of his grace to ignore him. To Changbin, he said, “Why would you willingly choose to exist in a place of such squallor?”

“What did you call me?” Jisung snapped.

By then, Minho had reached the end of the aisle and he took a moment to stare down at the brightly patterned tablecloth and the spread of food. Minho furrowed his eyebrows and frowned. “Are you all having a… a picnic ? Indoors? How distasteful.”

“Go away,” Jisung replied. “Literally no one here wants to see you.”

Minho pursed his lips and hooked his eyes in Jisung’s direction but he chose not to reply. He turned his attention back to his apprentice. “Changbin, come back to the shop. I need you for the evening rush.”

“I should go,” Changbin said to the others. He dipped his head apologetically. “I’ve stayed too long.”

“You should stay longer!” Jisung was all about rebellion and anarchy.

“You should stay longer!” Hyunjin was all about new friends and more company.

“He’s still on the clock,” Minho told them. “If he is going to take a meal break, it shouldn’t be on company time.” To his apprentice, he said, “Come now. I don’t have time for your attitude.”

Chan swallowed hard. It always felt a little awkward to watch an apprentice be disciplined like this. Chan only hoped he didn’t sound so heartless and cold when he reminded Hyunjin about the rules. “Ease up on him, will you.”

“It’s okay.” Changbin stood up. “I shouldn’t have come here without asking.” He walked down the main aisle to the front door.

Minho hovered over them a moment longer. He met Chan’s gaze. “I refuse to allow my apprentice to spend time with such,” he glanced around the circle, “ riffraff .”

Woojin, who had clearly been avoiding attention up until now, sat up straight and twisted around to glare up at Minho.

The two witches stared each other down for a brief second before Minho scoffed. “Do you think I’m afraid of you? You aren’t my boss.” He spun away and strutted down the aisle.

The snake around his neck twisted and untwisted. Its beady eyes met Chan’s and seemed to bore right into his soul. A lick of cold fear shot down Chan’s spine and even when he squeezed his eyes shut, he could still see those pitch black eyes leering at him. He involuntarily shivered, blaming it on the cold air that swept in as witch and apprentice swung open the door and disappeared outside.

The door swung shut, jingling the bell, and the remaining diners sat quietly for several moments before Woojin decided to stand up. “Well, would you look at the time? It is about to be the end of the work day,” he said. “I still have things to finish up at the downtown office. I had- Wow. I really had not intended on staying here all day. I only meant to look after the shop while you recovered from the sleep spell but now look at what’s happened. Just my luck, right?”

Chan only barely managed to open his eyes again. The snake was gone but the fear lingered. He shivered again.

Woojin stooped down to stack all of the plates and dishes he used into one neat pile. “Chan, I left the folders of information you need on your desk. It should be clear enough for you to be able to handle it on your own but if you have questions, I left you my card. Please call me on my direct line. Good evening.”

Jisung said, “Good riddance. Oops, did I say that out loud?”

“Bye bye, Woo-something-or-other,” Hyunjin cried out, clearly mimicking Chan.

As if knowing this, Woojin turned his heated gaze in Chan’s direction who just lowered the brim of his hat over his face to hide himself.

“Come back later,” Hyunjin said, waving. He seemed to be entirely immune to the foul energy that had been in the air since Minho’s arrival. His evening didn’t seem spoiled at all.

Chan listened as Woojin’s footsteps retreated across the floor. “Wait,” he realized. He pulled himself out from under his hat. “Jisung, give that spare key back to Woojin.”

“Awwww,” Jisung whined. “Come on, old man. I’d only use it responsibly!”

“Just give it back to him, please. You don’t need it.”

“I nearly forgot.” Woojin circled back around and held out his hand for the item in question.

Jisung groaned and rolled his eyes but he dug the key out of his pants pockets and tossed it up to the Regional Manager who nearly dropped it in his nonathletic attempt at lunging to catch it.

“I’ll be in touch,” Woojin stated, tucking the key into one of his pockets. “I will be back again this weekend to do one last follow-up on that mana flow problem. Please have that taken care of by then, Chan. Please.” He was standing at the door putting on his coat but he let his voice drop to a brand new kind of softness. “I won’t be able to save you again if you fail at this. I won’t even be able to save myself.” With those cryptic words, he departed.

Chan frowned. He had the worst luck! Not only was he about to lose his own job, he was also about to be the reason Woojin lost his.

Hyunjin pushed another peanut butter-covered shrimp into his mouth. “He’s so nice, Chan. So nice.”

Chan stared at the front door even though Woojin was long gone. “You know, Hyunjin, I’m really starting to think that you don’t know what that word means.”

Chapter Text

Chan hadn’t meant to take his work home with him that night but with such a large stack of undelivered letters and unread files on his office desk after (if he was being quite honest with himself) a day of doing absolutely nothing at the shop, Chan had quite a few tasks to double down on before those tasks doubled down on him come Wednesday morning.

He sat in his bed, lamplight warm and bright off to his left, his comforter pulled up snuggly to his waist. His bedroom, though furnished, was relatively empty and devoid of clutter and personality. He simply spent most of his waking hours at the shop so that’s where most of his things tended to gather.

Of course, there were a few personal effects in his room that nearly anyone would collect over the course of living in a place for several long months: bills that still needed paying, forgotten grocery lists, crumbled up receipts, a random six-sided die he could not remember how he obtained, and other miscellaneous things and papers he convinced himself that he shouldn’t throw away only to never need them.

He had a small bookshelf in the corner where most of his college textbooks on magical theory, philosophy, spellwork history and business management were gathering dust. At the foot of his bed was a large leather trunk stuffed full of the colorful clothes and ripped jeans he wore before he received his wand and had to wear the all-black uniform of a graduated witch. He didn’t need most of those things in his current life but he liked to keep them around as a reminder that he had actually achieved his goals, somewhat, and that this time last year, he wasn’t in so good a place.

Maybe if he could actually manage to keep this District Witch job in the new year, if he actually survived the last month of his turbulent probationary period, then he’d be brave enough to properly let go of the past and finally be able to throw away what he no longer needed to keep.

Maybe.

Propped up with his back against the headboard, Chan sat with dozens of letters and envelopes and packages scattered around him on his comforter, organized into rough ‘read’ and ‘not read’ piles. Hours ago, one pile had been stacked high while the other only had one or two things in it. Now the roles were reversed with his ‘not read’ pile down to one single item. He had spent all evening in that exact spot on his bed, replying to all of the resident requests he’d received in the mail, marking envelopes with light blue sticky notes to remind him of which item he was prescribing for each resident so that he would know what to pack when he got to the shop in the morning.

He had long ago decided that Woojin’s large stack of reports and analytics for him could wait until… much later.

It was almost midnight o’clock but this was fine. Ever since he had gotten this title, Chan had become used to pushing through days on minimal sleep. Besides, he had a hot cup of coffee on his nightstand to keep him company.

Or he thought he had a hot cup of coffee.

He didn’t find out until after he had reached for it and raised it to his mouth that he had already drank the last of it. With a weary sigh, he sat the empty cup back on his nightstand and focused his attention on the last resident request letter for the night.

A young university student was greatly concerned that she had magically fallen for the whims and charms of a classmate who she suspected to be an elf. She found herself putting up with behavior from him that she wouldn’t tolerate from anyone else she would choose to date, she found herself spending time getting dressed up when she usually didn’t put such effort into what she wore, she found herself spending money on gifts and going out on dates that threatened the precarious balance of her savings account, but, more importantly, and probably most dangerously, she feared that her attraction to the guy and even the depths of their relationship was… false. Untrue. Magically coerced. Forced.

She feared the worst.

Was she dating him because he was genuinely a nice guy or because she was under his actual spell?

Chan thought long and hard until he had come up with a solution for her. He had a hand mirror in his shop somewhere, not too much larger than a regular makeup compact. He could cast a magic-nullifying trap on it. If the elf was indeed magically charming her, his spell would hit the mirror and the force of it would shatter the glass and, hopefully, his hold on her. It was risky, he warned, so Chan specified in his reply that she never bring the mirror close to her face when she met up with her elf beau. He signed the letter, stashed it back in its envelope and used a sticky note to remind himself to put a spell on that mirror in the morning.

Chan sat the envelope in his ‘read’ pile and was about to settle down and go to sleep when he spotted one last envelope that had gotten wedged between his hip and one of his pillows.

With a yawn (and with barely the strength to keep his eyes open) he unpeeled the envelope and freed the letter inside, expecting it to be another simple request.

He was wrong.

He was very wrong.

The letter was short but its words were brutal and scathing. The resident asked in bold, scratchy black ink why the mana flow problem was still persisting even after six long weeks. They demanded answers for the delay and listed all of the problems and complications the mana issue was causing in their household. What hurt Chan the most was the letter’s last line: “I have decided to give up on you and will be moving out of your District by Friday.”

Chan leaned back against the headboard and allowed the last of his energy to seep out of him in one big sigh. It hurt.

It hurt to know that all of the good that he had done these past five months just hadn’t been enough to make up for this one big, bad thing.

It hurt to know that something out of his control had made someone hate him like this.

It hurt to be told so bluntly, so openly, that he just wasn’t worth believing in anymore.

In his head, he heard his father’s loud and booming but encouraging voice.

“I know, I know,” Chan mumbled in response. “I’m doing everything I can but I… I suppose it’s not good enough.” It’s not like Chan did not care. The mana flow problem was always there. This large, looming error was like a dull headache, a minor but constant and thrumming pain that he could not ignore for long. His District’s mana flow issues only seemed to be getting worse as time went on and he hated himself for still not having a single lead on its cause.

His dad said something else, words eerily similar to the message in the letter.

Chan sighed, “What do you suggest I do? Start going door to door?”

He couldn’t even think of a way to reply to the letter. Did he apologize profusely? But if the resident was this mad at him, if they had this skewed of an opinion on him already, would apologizing even make things any better? Did Chan claim to have a handle on the situation? No. He did not want to make promises he could not keep but how else could he buy himself a little more time? If one resident felt this way about him strongly enough to write a letter, surely other residents felt similarly.

Or they would soon.

“Tomorrow,” he told himself as sleep dragged heavy on his eyelids. He pinched the bridge of his nose in an attempt to earn a few more moments of alertness. “I’ll make it priority number one tomorrow.” With one last hurrah, he pushed himself up, gathered all of the letters he had replied to and stacked them up as neatly as he could manage on his nightstand.

The hate mail he stashed under his pillow as a physical reminder of the great District Witch he was failing to become.

Just as he was laying down for the night, he heard his bedroom door creak open ever so slightly.

Chan still had to get used to the fact that he was no longer in this big house alone. “Hyunjin,” he called out calmly.

The dragon boy pushed the door open all of the way. He hesitated in the doorway but when Chan motioned to him, he dashed into the room and hopped up onto the bed. “Chan,” he squeaked merrily.

Chan grimaced as the mattress bounced beneath him from Hyunjin’s body weight. “It’s past your bedtime, you know.”

Hyunjin snuggled up close to him. “It’s past your bedtime, too.”

Chan dropped his head back onto his pillow. He could feel the flat surface of the envelope hidden there and he was unable to stop replaying the hurtful words written on it in his head. “Your room’s not too cold, is it?” Chan asked the boy.

“It’s fine.”

“Are you hungry? You know where the kitchen is.”

“No. I’m fine,” hummed Hyunjin.

“Did you have a bad dream?”

“No.”

Chan frowned, slightly irritated. “Then why are you still up this late?”

“I heard you talking.” Hyunjin pressed his forehead against Chan’s shoulder. “And you sounded so sad.”

“I hope I didn’t wake you up,” Chan said. Now he felt awful for getting upset so quickly. The kid was only looking out for him. “I’m sorry for being sad, Hyunjin.”

“You can be sad if you need to.”

Chan laid there a moment, staring up at his ceiling. “Are you sad, Hyunjin?”

Hyunjin shook his head a little. “No, Chan. I have you.”

Oddly, such a phrase only increased the weight of the burden on Chan’s heart. “Where did you sleep before, Hyunjin?” He swallowed, ashamed of himself for knowing Hyunjin for so long without actually knowing him. “Before I told you that you could live here, where did you sleep before?”

“Mom’s nest is gone so I just-” Hyunjin paused to yawn. “-slept wherever.”

He had been homeless. That made sense. From his ill-fitting clothes to his desire to stay inside Chan’s shop everyday knowing that he wasn’t being paid, the signs had been there. Now that Chan thought about it, Hyunjin had even mentioned sleeping on the ground as recently as their trip to buy a recliner the other evening.

How hadn’t he noticed? The puzzle pieces were all right there but Chan had been unable or unwilling to correctly slot them together.

Chan turned so that he could stare at the top of Hyunjin’s head and the two curved horns that rose out of his skull. Hyunjin must have sensed Chan’s eyes on him because he tilted his own head to look back at him. “I’m sorry,” Chan muttered.

Hyunjin smiled a little. “I told you before that you can be sad if you need to. You just don’t have to be sad by yourself.”

“Thank you, Hyunjin,” Chan said. He reached out and placed his palm on the top of the boy’s head.

Woojin had said the boy was broodless. An orphan. Even his siblings hadn’t made it. Hyunjin probably didn’t have a home or a family until tonight. Or, maybe, Chan had been Hyunjin’s family all of this time. Papers or not. Afraid to handle such thoughts this late at night, Chan mumbled, “I’m tired so go sleep in your own bed, okay?”

“Okay,” Hyunjin responded. He crawled to the edge of the bed and then stood up. He gave Chan a wave as he walked towards the bedroom door. His tall, lanky frame looked quite strange dressed up in Chan’s too-small-for-him pajamas. “Night night, Dad.”

“Goodnight, Hyunjin,” Chan replied. He watched as Hyunjin closed the door behind him, open it again and peer in as if to make sure Chan hadn’t disappeared or something, and then shut it once more. Chan didn’t relax until he heard the door across the hall click shut.

With a sigh, he turned off his bedside lamp and got comfortable beneath his sheets in the dark of his room.

He just felt like he was in over his head.

The Regional Manager he was sure he could handle. The merchandising issues at the shop he could handle. Managing the resident requests was easy compared to everything else. The witch across the way would take some doing, but Chan could handle him, too.

Even this mana flow issue was something he was positive he could get to the bottom of if he had enough time.

No. None of that bothered him. None of those things were an issue.

It was the idea of being Hyunjin’s caretaker that was upsetting him.

Sure, he had looked after Hyunjin over the past five or so months because the boy spent every day in the shop standing at his side but things were different now. He was responsible for Hyunjin now. There were official documents that said so. All Chan could think about was the money he would have to spend buying Hyunjin clothes and shoes and food and toys. The obligation was sudden and he hadn’t asked for it but that didn’t change the fact that he would do anything to keep the boy safe.

He had found some ‘Your Dragon & You’ blog earlier that night and he had dug through its archives reading everything he possibly could about the rare and luxurious ‘status pets.’ Some of the info was stuff that he knew, like the basic history of dragons and their diet that probably shouldn’t consist exclusively of peanut butter. Most of the information he read was stuff he was finding out for the first time, like anatomy and behavioral psychology and how easy it was for early researchers to believe that dragons breathed fire when, in reality, they just made the air in front of their mouths superheat.

All of that information he could handle. He could commit those facts to memory with no problem.

What worried him, what ate away at him, what threatened to keep him up all night, was that after scrolling through nearly a hundred Q&A posts on the ‘Your Dragon & You’ blog, he had discovered that not a single curious reader’s question was about what should be done if your dragon ever called you ‘Dad.’

★☆

Chan dreamed of Minho.

That should have been dangerous enough.

The two of them were in a brightly lit room, their all-black outfits jagged smears of darkness in the space. There was nothing between them. No shadows. No secrets. Just white light and infinite space.

Minho raised his arms as if beckoning to him over the great distance between them. Chan could not help but be drawn towards him. Slowly. Slowly. His every instinct told him he should be running in the opposite direction but he could not help himself. He moved faster. With each step he took towards the man, he hesitated less and less until he was walking. Jogging. Running.

The white space around them seemed to stretch on forever in all directions.

One moment, Minho was impossibly far away. The next moment, they were right on top of each other.

He collided with Minho and the elegant witch wrapped his arms around Chan, pulling him into a hug that provided far more warmth and comfort than Chan ever would have imagined. He allowed himself to relax into the touch as if Minho were lifting some great and terrible burden from his shoulders.

He cried. Just a little.

Minho’s hands traveled to his face and wiped away his tears.

Then the dream began to change.

All at once.

The light around them dimmed until the room was almost entirely dark save for one solitary shaft of light coming down on them from above. Chan pulled away from the hug, confused. Worried. He gazed up at Minho.

Minho smiled. Then he laughed.

The joy didn’t suit his face.

Everything got cold. The darkness thickened. A high-pitched hissing noise flooded Chan’s ears. It was familiar. It was dangerous. It made him squirm.

The floor around their feet had filled with snakes, hissing and slithering and sliding over one another in their race to encircle the witches.

Chan yelped at the sight. They were everywhere. Yellow. Green. Red. Brown. The snakes tangled themselves together like chains and wrapped themselves around the legs of the men. Around their waists and arms and necks. The snakes tied Chan and Minho to each other.

Chan panicked. The fear surged up in him from the bottom of his heart. His chest hurt and he felt lost and alone.

Every time he loosened one snake’s body from around his leg or arm, two others crawled forward to take their place.

In seconds, Chan and Minho were buried under a mountain of snakes, their weight forcing the witches to their knees. Even what little bit of light left in the room could not reach them through the undulating bodies of the snakes. Chan cringed every time a snake’s tongue brushed against his neck, every time cold, dry scales scraped over his hands.

Why wouldn’t they let him get away? Why couldn’t he pull himself away from Minho?

He tried and tried but it was like the farther away from Minho he wanted to be, the closer the snakes forced them until they were body to body. Sharing breaths.

Chan was so scared. He screamed and shivered and fought but the snakes just tightened their bodies around them.

Minho was so calm. Despite everything. He was calm and cold as if he wanted this. His soulless eyes chilled Chan to the bone.

Once again, Chan tried to wriggle free. He shoved Minho away and tried to push his body through the ocean of snakes. He cowered every time one opened its mouth and he stared down its pink, bottomless throat. He screamed every time one’s tongue brushed over his ear.

His heart raced but he kept pushing. He kept crawling his way through the living, twisting nightmare tunnel.

He saw light. At last!

He had made it out.

Chan pushed and pushed until he broke through the tightly-wound ring of snakes only to find himself right back where he started, crawling into Minho’s inviting arms.

Minho’s eyes were narrow and shone like gold, his pupils mere slits. When he opened his mouth, it was full of sharp, long, crooked fangs. His long pink tongue slithered out, tasting the air between them.

Minho said something then. Something wicked and cruel because that was who he was.

Chan screamed, or tried to, because now Minho’s tongue was in his mouth. Minho’s hands were on his cheeks. Minho’s lips were against his. Gently at first but then ravaging. Minho pulled back, turned his head sideways and then went for it again. Those fangs of his grazed Chan’s tongue and pumped his body full of venom.

The snakes closed in on them, tightening around like a vice, like they were trying to squeeze the very life out of Chan.

Minho pulled back, breathing hard, his eyes unfocused. Venom and spit dripped from his mouth and he laughed in Chan’s face as the witch’s body went numb from the poison.

Chan was drawn out of the chaos of his nightmares.

He opened his eyes and sat up straight with a start.

Where was he? What time was it?

He was breathing hard. He was sweating.

Tingles crawled over his skin as his nightmare continued to cling to him. His thoughts were only about Minho. Only about the things he feared most.

When he blinked, he saw Minho’s slit pupils. When he inhaled, he felt Minho’s venom closing up his throat.

It still felt like he was neck deep in that snake pit.

Chan coughed and breathed in sharply in an attempt to calm himself.

His specialty was dream interpretation yet he did not seem capable of deciphering the symbolism behind his own night terror. He knew snakes represented people who could be cruel and merciless. He knew that snakes could also symbolize the feeling of being overpowered but, already, the details of the nightmare were slipping away from him.

He clutched at his chest, feeling his heart thrash beneath his ribs.

Chan heard a loud, earthquake-causing snore. Clearly not his.

He looked down, surprised but not surprised to see Hyunjin curled up right next to him on the comforter, the heat that emanated from him warm like a fire. Such a simple sight was enough to calm Chan. Ground him. Remind him that whatever he’d seen in his dreams had not hurt him. Could not hurt him.

Just like that, the panic left over from his nightmare eased. The twisted images faded from his mind completely and he was left with the wide, sweeping sensation of feeling complete.

His voice still croaky from sleep, Chan groaned, “I thought I told you to sleep in your own bed?”

Hyunjin’s only response was a snore.

Chan raised a hand and ran it through the boy’s hair. He nearly forgot about Hyunjin’s horns and almost pricked the tip of his finger on one. He jerked back his hand and hissed at the sharp pain digging through him. He gently squeezed his index finger to ensure he hadn’t actually punctured the skin. Being more careful, he returned his hand to the top of Hyunjin’s head and moved it in slow circles. Hyunjin’s snoring seemed to ease up in response.

The moment was tranquil. Oddly. He knew he had to get ready and dressed for work but what was one extra minute of peace if it felt like this?

Well… It seemed like he couldn’t even afford those precious few seconds.

There was a loud banging noise downstairs. It sounded like something being slammed shut.

Hyunjin stirred in his sleep.

Chan carefully freed himself from the tangle of his sheets and crawled to the edge of his bed. He grabbed his wand from off the nightstand and went on tiptoe to his bedroom door. He stuck his head around the doorframe just in time to hear another bang followed by the distinctive raspiness of a person’s voice. Chan’s entire body tensed. There was someone in his home. There was someone in his home .

His heart sped up faster and faster as adrenaline pumped through his body.

The fight or flight response was triggered in him. Perhaps it was because Hyunjin snored peacefully behind but his instinct was to fight.

Chan started down the hall on quiet, bare feet. He pointed his wand in front of him. Just in case. At the end of the hall past the bathroom and the two empty bedrooms, he waited at the top of the stairs until he heard another noise. Whoever was intruding on his home was in the kitchen and it sounded like they were rifling through all of his cabinets and drawers.

It was dangerous to go down there, he knew. There could only be one person or there could be several people down there. They could all be armed. Yet Chan just couldn’t think that logically this early in the morning. He couldn’t think like that with Hyunjin sound asleep, needing to be protected.

Then he heard the microwave ding. That’s what pushed him over the edge.

Chan took the stairs swiftly, running through a list of spells in his head. Something to paralyze the intruders? Something that could pin them to the floor? He had just settled on the right phrasing when he reached the bottom of the stairs and charged around the corner into the kitchen--

--only to find Jisung making himself comfortable on one of the stools at the kitchen island, the plate in front of him piled high with leftover fish, shrimp and rice.

“Jisung!” Chan screamed at the top of his lungs.

The orange-haired boy nearly leaped out of his skin. He shrieked and whirled around to face him. “What the hex, old man! Why would you hexing do that?” His eyes were still wide from fright but at least he managed to get the high-pitched shrill out of his voice. “Your bed hair is ridiculous, by the way.”

Chan could only stare wide-eyed at the boy, lowering his wand down to his side. “Why would I-- What are you doing here.” He specifically remembered seeing Jisung hand the spare key to this house back to Woojin. “How did you get in here?”

Jisung dug his spoon into his rice and started eating. “Yongbok let me in.”

“Yongbok?” Chan repeated lamely. Was he still dreaming? Was this still part of the nightmare? He pinched himself just to be sure. Sadly, he did not wake up in bed with the nonsense in front of him left behind. “Where is he?”

“Up here,” Yongbok’s voice floated down to him.

Chan followed the sound. Above his head, Yongbok was stretched out on top of the kitchen cabinetry. Not on top of the counter but the cabinetry! “How did you get way up there,” Chan asked, but even as the words left his mouth, he knew Yongbok would nonchalantly answer:

“Very carefully.”

“Okay… Well, how did you get into my house?”

Yongbok shrugged. “Hyunjin let me in.”

Of course.

It was like an infinite loop. A sing-along game about stealing cookies from cookie jars. Who me? Yes you. Couldn’t be. Then who?

Chan had to at least try. “I would really appreciate it if you two didn’t just waltz into my house without permission.”

“But I had permission,” Yongbok whined. “Hyunjin’s.”

But did that count? Did it? Really?

“Aren’t we friends, old man?” Jisung asked, a hand raised to his chest like he had been hurt by Chan’s words. Overly dramatic, he wailed, “After all the hex we’ve been through… Are you saying none of that mattered?”

Chan shook his head. “ Are we friends? You do nothing but insult me.”

“I insult you out of love,” Jisung explained himself.

“Do you break into my house and eat all of my food out of love, too?”

Jisung frowned. “I didn’t break in.” He bit into a hunk of fish and started chewing with his mouth open. “I knocked last night and Yongbok came to the front door and was all ‘come on in’ so that’s exactly what I hexing did.”

Chan wiped his face with his hands. He should get more sleep. He was clearly delirious and hallucinating that so many people were in his house. “So,” Chan sighed, “how long have you two been inside?”

Jisung said, “Hmmm, I swung by at like two or so in the morning. It was just too hexing cold to be outside. I needed a few hours of shut eye so I borrowed one of the beds.”

Outside, the Big Blue Bird had only just begun to stir and wake, the sky slowly brightening as she rose up from her slumber.

Chan took a moment to stare at the wacky scene in front of him: Jisung with bits of food on his cheeks, eating fast. Yongbok way up on top of the cabinets, cool as can be.

Chan desperately needed to have a talk with Hyunjin about just letting strangers into the house in the middle of the night but he guessed that, to Hyunjin, the boys weren’t strangers. They were his best friends. Chan exhaled sharply. It seemed like he was destined to wake up every single day this week smack dab in the middle of a peril but even with his privacy invaded like this, he found himself unable to stay mad. “Do either of you want coffee? I can make a batch.”

“Coffee and fish, old man? That’s an awful combo,” Jisung supplied.

“I’m still trying to nap,” Yongbok answered. “So I’d rather not.”

Chan nodded. Then he noticed that Jisung seemed to be the only one enjoying the food. He said, “Yongbok, have you eaten?”

“Mmmhmm,” the black-haired boy hummed. “Earlier. The food was great. I knew that restaurant would be a good choice. I could tell by the smell.”

“Where’s Hyunjin,” Jisung asked, shoveling more food in his mouth.

“Upstairs asleep.” Chan should probably wake the kid up so he could have breakfast. Chan glanced at the clock on the kitchen wall. He was going to be on time today. No he was going to be early to make up for yesterday and that meant he had all of half an hour to be showered, dressed, prepared and on his way out of the house. “You two have thirty minutes.” He pointed first at Yongbok and then at Jisung. “You don’t have to go to the shop with me but you have to get out of here.” They definitely weren’t about to run rampant in his house unsupervised all day.

“Didn’t I say I’m sticking to you like glue, old man,” Jisung said. “I’m going to the shop with you.”

That reminded him. Chan said, “Jisung, I’ve got deliveries for you today. Quite a few.”

“Hex yeah!” Jisung exclaimed.

“It’s all upstairs. I’ll bring it down. We can take care of that first thing.”

“I’ve been waiting for another chance to show off my sick as hex skills.” Jisung nearly choked on his mouth full of food but that didn’t stop him from trying to chew and talk at the same time. “I’m gonna be the fastest courier in Seoul. Just you wait.”

“What about me,” Yongbok piped up, still lazing about on his spot way up near the ceiling. “I want to do something for you. Give me something to do, Chan. But not anything hard.”

“You can…” Chan rummaged through his head for a simple task, one that would keep Yongbok out of his hair while he got the shop opened and ready for business. “You can take a nap in the corner by the window.”

“Sweet,” Yongbok exclaimed. “Exactly what I was thinking.”

Chan backed out of the kitchen and started up the stairs. Behind him, Jisung and Yongbok started chatting and laughing away, cracking jokes like they had been friends forever.

For some strange reason, Chan started smiling.

★☆

At the shop, Chan walked up and down the aisles on a mission. He used the blue sticky notes he’d written out last night as a guide to gather the materials he needed to fulfill the resident requests.

He found the stems of two certain types of plants that he could mash together into a digestive aid. He did some digging to find a palm-sized rock with a natural hole in it that would allow someone to look into it and see through the fairy magic that always made them get lost on their way home. He pulled together the ingredients necessary to brew a potion that could ease headaches and relieve joint pain. He tracked down that small hand mirror he knew he had tucked away in a small basket at the end of Aisle 8.

With each item he found, he carried it down the hall to his workshop where he prepared it, put the proper spell on it and then packaged it in the appropriate vial or box or case. Then he attached the envelope with his reply to the parcel.

The last bit of his process involved scribbling down the details of the transaction in his log book and then heading back out into the shop to give the item to Jisung.

The orange-haired boy had a process of his own, stashing the items away in his small-but-large backpack and then fiddling with the courier app on his phone to calculate Chan’s new payment. The boy would sometimes get distracted chatting with Hyunjin or Yongbok, but Chan remained patient and honest and constantly reminded Jisung to add a new package to the fee when it needed to be done.

Even Hyunjin found a way to become involved in this morning routine. He greeted customers with a pure “Happy Wednesday” as they entered the shop and, when they needed to find something, he shouted things to Chan like “They’re looking for the thingies that go whoosh when you throw them but the cute whoosh not the scary whoosh” or “Where are the things that do the thing when you put the thing in the thing that does the thing” and, somehow , Chan would always know what the boy was describing and could help the customers purchase what they were looking for.

Yongbok, by contrast, offered ‘moral support’ by sitting on a stool in the corner with his more-cream-than-anything coffee and criticizing the ways the others did things without lifting a finger himself.

Their well-oiled machine ran smoothly… or as smoothly as a machine like theirs could, until, just shy of ten o’clock, the front door swung open. The bell jingled. The chilly air of December swept in.

Chan looked up with a cordial greeting on the tip of his tongue. Then he spotted who had entered his shop and his jovial mood plummeted. “Oh, it’s you.”

Minho stomped down the main aisle, his pretty face screwed into an expression of barely-contained rage. “Where is he?”

“Good morning to you, too,” Chan attempted.

“Where is the boy,” Minho repeated. He could even make being angry look elegant and refined, his Adam’s apple bobbing beneath the lace collar of his shirt.

“The boy?” Chan glanced around his shop. Jisung was zipping up his magical bag. Now that he had the addresses for all of the deliveries of the day, it seemed like he was about to leave for his run. Yongbok was behind the counter pouring himself a new dish of coffee. Hyunjin had tuckered himself out and was taking a break on the stool by the window. Chan turned back to Minho. “All of them are here. None of them are bothering you.”

Minho folded his arms across his chest and got right up into Chan’s face. “Where is my apprentice?”

Chan thought back to the other day and remembered one of the first things Minho had said to him when they had met. He smirked at the chance to use the same line on Minho. “You lost your apprentice?”

“I know he’s in here,” Minho said, ignoring Chan’s biting tone.

“He’s not,” Chan told him. “I would have seen him.” Maybe. Possibly. Surely.

Minho said, “He’s supposed to help me open today but he has not shown up yet. Where is he?” Minho started to head towards the back hallway, shouting for Changbin.

Chan chased him down and grabbed hold of his shoulder before he got too far. He spun Minho around. “Like I said, I haven’t seen him. He’s not here.”

Minho swatted Chan’s hands off of his shoulders. “You’re going to help me look for him, District Witch.”

“I refuse,” Chan shut him down. “Get out of my shop and stop making so much noise.”

“No,” Minho snarled. Something about the look in his eyes triggered a thought in Chan’s head.

A mouth full of fangs coming towards him.

Chan shook the image away and it faded like the remnant of a dream.

“I’m not going anywhere until you help me find him.”

“What? Why should I help you do anything?”

Minho scoffed. “Didn’t I tell you before? Everything that goes wrong on this street is your fault. You’re a bad luck magnet. Help me look for him and fix up what you’ve messed up.” He grabbed Chan by the wrist and started tugging him towards the front door.

“Hey,” Chan complained. “I can’t just leave .” Not with three volatile boys alone in his shop, ready to wreck absolutely everything if they found themselves without supervision!

“Your shop will be fine,” Minho told him. “No one comes in here anyways. Not even to shoplift.”

“That’s not true,” Chan fired back. His sales numbers said otherwise. Minho was still pulling him. “Let me grab my coat, at least.” He pried his hand free of Minho’s grip and took his coat off of the rack and slipped it on.

“Where are you going?” Hyunjin asked when he spotted Chan with his coat on.

“Yeah, old man,” Jisung piped up, coming up behind the two witches. “Where are you going? I thought we worked out this whole pay-in-advance thing. Where’s my hexing money?”

“We’re finding my apprentice,” said Minho sternly, barely giving the boys the time of day. He turned back to Chan. “You don’t have a choice. You’re coming with me.”

“The last thing I want to do is be alone with you,” Chan admitted.

“We won’t be alone because we’re going to find my apprentice.”

“I still don’t see why you have to get me involved,” Chan said. “I told you again and again that I haven’t seen him.”

Minho spun around to face him, once again getting right up in his face. “You’re the District Witch, aren’t you?” His voice got the tiniest bit screechy. “And I live in your District as a resident. And as a resident, I am making a formal request for your assistance.”

“Which means I am obligated to fulfill that request,” Chan mumbled the last half of the District Witch creed like he was reading off his own prison sentence.

“Good. You know your place. Now help me.” The elegant witch was trying to keep his voice icy cold and emotionless like he usually did, but this close up on him, Chan could plainly see the worry in Minho’s eyes.

If Minho was this concerned about something, then his anxiety must run deep. It was a more serious matter than expected. Just like that, Chan’s mood shifted. His hesitation turned to determination. He turned around to look at the boys. “Jisung, I’ll pay you when you get back from your run.”

“What! No the hex you won’t!”

Chan ignored him and turned to the next boy. “Yongbok, can you keep an eye on the shop?”

“Yeah, sure, whatever.”

“And Hyunjin, stay put. I will be right back.”

“Okay,” Hyunjin sang out. “I’m going to count the seconds. Don’t be gone long because it’s really really hard to get up to the thousands.”

Chan turned back to Minho. “Are you sure he’s not at the shop with you?” It was possible. “He can be… hard to notice.”

“I’m sure,” Minho huffed. The vulnerability that had been in his expression earlier was gone now, sucked back beneath the big, brown emptiness of his pretty doll eyes. “Changbin hasn’t showed up today and I need him for today’s sale set. All of the signs need changing, there’s three new display shelves that need to be put together and we just got a truckload of deliveries that we need to get unpacked.”

Chan stepped past Minho and opened the shop’s front door, letting in the cold. He knew Minho would never say it, would never act like it, probably would never admit to himself that he felt it, but Minho was clearly concerned about Changbin’s unusual absence. Chan sympathized. He knew how it felt to be separated from the person who always stood right beside you. “Okay, let’s go.” He started out the door.

“What are you doing,” Minho snapped, grabbing him by the hem of his jacket. “Get your broom. You’re flying.”

“Seriously?” Chan asked, doubling back to grab his broom.

“You expect me to do all of the work? When he’s gone because it’s your fault?”

“It’s not my fault.”

“Everything that goes wrong is your fault, District Witch”

Chan remembered the spiteful words of the letter tucked under his pillow back at home. “Everything’s not my fault,” he whimpered. The sharp, argumentative edge had left his tone.

Minho didn’t let it slide. “We’re wasting time squabbling. He could be anywhere dilly-dallying. If he does not show up for work, he will not get paid. That’s true for any apprenticeship.”

Chan knew Minho was just rambling and fussing to mask his fear. The sooner the two of them got going the better. Changbin could actually be hurt somewhere and every second they wasted was crucial. Chan steeled his resolve. “Let’s go find him and bring him home safe.”

With that, he pulled Minho with him outdoors into the wintry chill.

Chapter Text

If Chan had first met Hyunjin in the middle of a thunderstorm, then he had first met Yongbok in the middle of a heat wave. It was the tail end of July and the fortune tellers were positive that the high temperatures would break before August.

Chan had spent the last week and a half getting used to having Hyunjin’s painfully clumsy but pure-hearted presence in his shop but that didn’t mean he was always prepared for the things that would start happening on Thirteenth Street.

And if he didn’t know what Hyunjin was when he had first laid eyes on him (A bag? A dog? A thief?) then he immediately knew what Yongbok was when he saw him:

A customer.

The bell above the door jingled as someone entered the building. Chan looked up from his log book at the sound of approaching footsteps. Then, from around the corner of one of the fixtures came a short, twiggy fellow. The boy had dark, unkempt hair and a pretty face dotted with freckles. He had a small, button nose and an odd yellowish tint to his eyes.

He almost looked like a--

“Kitty!” Hyunjin cried out excitedly, nearly tripping over himself to rush down the aisle towards the boy.

Chan tilted his head in confusion at Hyunjin’s outburst until he spotted the fat, orange cat trudging down the aisle behind the newcomer. That same cat always hung around his shop, usually sitting on the big windowsill and hissing at anyone who tried to pet him. Chan sighed. It would take forever to get the big lazy bones back outside.

“Kitty, kitty, kitty,” Hyunjin chanted, hopping up and down.

Chan glanced up from the orange cat to stare at the black-haired boy who had just come to a stop in front of the counter. “Welcome to Chan’s Tchotchkes,” Chan greeted him, standing up from his stool behind the cash wrap. “Looking for anything in particular?”

The twiggy-armed boy plainly asked, “You’re Bang Chan, right?” He smelled a little odd, now that Chan was this close up on him. And his shirt bulged in front of his stomach where he was clearly hiding something.

Chan forced a smile. “Yes. That’s me. How do you do?”

“Kitty!” Hyunjin patted the newcomer on the head, his smile about as big as his face.

“Don’t touch him without asking first,” Chan warned.

Hyunjin pouted but he drew back his hand. Then, “Kitty!” With his exclamation, he ducked behind the counter where Chan couldn’t see him for a dangerously long moment and then he stood back up with the big, orange cat struggling and squirming in his arms. “Another one!”

Chan didn’t have time for this. “Take him outside, will you,” he asked.

“Will that be helpful,” Hyunjin asked excitedly. “All I want to do is be helpful.”

“Yes, you’ll be helpful.”

“Yay. I’m helping.”

“And refill the water dish outside.”

“Okay!”

Hyunjin started walking down the aisle towards the door, struggling to maintain his grip on the flailing feline.

Chan watched with bated breath until Hyunjin had wrestled the cat around the corner and out of the front door, taking the cat outside. With one disaster averted, the District Witch turned his attention back to the customer. “Sorry about all of that. Did you have a question for me?”

The black-haired boy leaned an elbow up on the counter. “You’re the new District Witch, right?”

“Yes,” Chan said, worrying suddenly. The boy didn’t look particularly intimidating and he wasn’t wearing the all-black uniform of a witch but there was still something about him. Something strange. Something a little off-kilter. Chan glanced down at the boy’s bulging shirt and braced himself for the very real possibility that he was about to get pranked.

“I’m a new resident,” the boy said with a mischievous smirk that did nothing to assuage Chan’s fears. “And isn’t it Seoul custom for a new resident to bring the leader of their District their name and a gift?”

“Yes. That is the custom,” Chan said. Slowly. Unsure. He didn’t know why his heart was filling with dread.

The boy with the freckles said, “My name is Lee Yongbok and this is my gift.” He pulled something out from under his shirt and laid it on the counter.

First, Chan was taken aback by the twisted up shape of it. Then he was made queasy by the smell. It took Chan a moment longer than he probably should have to recognize what it was:

A crow. A dead crow.

Chan clamped his hand over his nose to keep from inhaling the stench. As calmly as he could, he asked, “Why would you bring me this?”

Yongbok used a finger to nudge the bird’s corpse a little so that it was lined up a bit more straight on the counter. “I saw it flying around and I thought you might like to eat it.”

So he was getting pranked. “I don’t think I want to eat this.”

“Why not,” Yongbok asked, sounding completely serious. “You should eat. You’re so skinny, Chan. Clearly, you wouldn’t have been able to catch the food yourself. I’m helping.”

I’m helping . Such a simple, benign phrase shouldn’t have filled Chan with such fear but over the past ten or so days, he’d been conditioned to expect something terrible to happen every time he heard those words.

Hyunjin came back inside. “Kitty scratched me,” he announced as casually as if commenting on the weather. “There’s red stuff coming out of my finger and it tastes weird.”

Chan stood up straight. “Come here. Quickly.” While Hyunjin skipped up the aisle, Chan rifled through the cabinets under the counter until he found the first aid kit. It was a tiny, white, metal box and he lifted it up onto the cash wrap. Inside, there were bandages, packs of gauze, cotton swabs and a tincture of medicine made from a combination of herbs he’d ground together himself.

Hyunjin circled around the corner of the counter and ran straight into him, nearly knocking him over.

“No running inside,” Chan told him as an afterthought.

“Okay.”

Chan grabbed Hyunjin’s right hand to inspect it. It was fine. “Let me see the other one.”

Hyunjin switched hands.

The gash was across Hyunjin’s ring finger. It didn’t seem too deep but the wound was fresh and blood oozed from it like water from a leaky faucet. Chan dabbed his herbal medicine onto a cotton swab and swiped it over Hyunjin’s cut.

The boy gasped.

“Does that hurt?” Chan asked, stopping.

“Is that dinner?” Hyunjin pointed at the dead bird.

“See? This kid gets it,” Yongbok said. “No need to get all upset when someone brings you food, Chan.”

“Dinner!” Hyunjin shouted.

“Why would you think that’s dinner?” Chan had to know. He went back to tending to Hyunjin’s injury.

“Mom used to bring stuff home for us to eat all of the time before she went very far away,” Hyunjin said.

“My mother, too!” Yongbok’s eyes caught the light and they glinted bright yellow for a brief there-and-gone moment.

Chan couldn’t even correct them on that. Technically, his dad brought raw meat to the house, too. They just cooked it before they called it dinner.

“I eventually learned how to find food on my own,” said Yongbok. “So now I have to teach this guy the same thing.” He looked up at Chan. “Look at how skinny you are.”

“Look at how skinny you are,” Hyunjin repeated delightfully.

“I eat just fine,” Chan interjected. He applied a little bit of pressure to Hyunjin’s finger with a fresh cotton swab to slow the bleeding.

“Do you?” Yongbok wondered. “I mean, you’re turning down a meal right now.” He pushed the dead bird across the counter towards Chan.

“If you don’t want it, can I have it,” asked Hyunjin. He was already reaching for it.

What was the kid going to do? Bite into it feathers and all? Chan pushed the bird out of Hyunjin’s reach, sending it over the edge of the counter.

“Hey,” Yongbok cried out, catching it before it hit the floor. He narrowed his eyes at Chan. “This is a gift .”

“I love gifts,” Hyunjin said. “They’re so nice.” His eyes got all sparkly. “Can I have it, Chan?”

“You’re not eating that,” Chan stayed firm. He peeled a bandage out of its packaging with his teeth and wrapped it around Hyunjin’s finger, being careful not to bind his knuckle. “If you want meat, we can go to the deli diagonally across the street. You’re good to go.”

Hyunjin took off running.

“No running,” Chan called after him. Then he glared up at Yongbok. “And a dead animal is not a gift.”

“Of course it is.”

“A dead animal is not a gift for me,” Chan corrected.

“What about money?” Yongbok asked, rummaging in his pants pocket for a moment. He had the dead bird in one hand and a ridiculously thick wad of cash in the other. He dropped both on the counter as if ready and willing to part with them both. “Is money a gift?”

Chan only had to glance at the bills for a second to make an educated guess at how much cash that was. “I can’t just take that.”

“You’re the weirdest District Witch ever,” Yongbok complained. “Why won’t you accept any of my gifts?”

“Why won’t you accept any of his gifts,” Hyunjin pressured him from across the shop.

Chan closed up the first aid kit and put it back in the cabinet where it belonged. If he took all of that money, he could pay off the entirety of his student loan debt and still have enough left over to move to District 17 but... he hadn’t even been District Witch for a month yet. He had done nothing to deserve such a generous gift.

“How about this, Chan...” Yongbok jerked his thumb over his shoulder and said, “Since you won’t take the bird and you won’t take the cash, how about I buy every single thing on that shelf, instead?”

★☆

As soon as Chan stepped out into the December cold with Minho right behind him, he regretted his decision.

He took one look over his shoulder at Minho, at this witch who was like a black rose with dozens and dozens of sharp and prickly thorns surrounding him, and let go of him. Really? Why should he help the guy? Just because he was the District Witch didn’t mean he had to put up with everything! Chan was ready to run back inside. Flee . He even took a step towards the door and said, “I’m afraid to touch you.” That wasn’t even what he’d meant to say!

Minho blocked his path with an outstretched arm. “I don’t want to touch you, either. But…” He drew close. “We have to find my apprentice.”

Chan took an involuntary step backward. “Are you sure you can’t fly on your own?”

Minho’s top lip twitched. “I’m sure.”

Chan tried to step around him. He got a hand on the doorknob of his shop before Minho stepped up towards him and slapped his hand on the door to keep it shut. Chan startled and looked up at him. Minho’s face, even like this, seemed to be carved from marble. Pure art. The work of a master artisan from the Renaissance. Softness and hardness existing in the same space. Without thinking, Chan said, “Are you real?” Then he realized what he said and corrected himself. “Are you for real? Why do we have to look for him together? Why can’t we go our own ways?”

“I need your--” Minho stopped, swallowed and started again. “You are going to assist me. It is your duty as the leader of this neighborhood.”

“But why do we have to go together ? We can cover more ground separately,” Chan suggested. “I’ll take the east and you take the west.” He turned away from the door and started down the sidewalk.

“District Witch,” Minho stopped him by grabbing the back of his jacket. “I don’t know where he is. How can I look for him?”

“I don’t know where he is either yet you somehow expect me to find him.”

“As talented as I am,” Minho said, “even I can’t fly a broom and concentrate on a location spell simultaneously.”

“If that was your plan, why didn’t you say that first? Now going together makes sense.”

Minho narrowed his eyes. “Stop being difficult and get on your broom, you imbecile.”

Chan swung a leg over his broom but as soon as Minho came close, he lost his nerve and stood up straight again. He didn’t know why he was acting like this. Something about Minho’s big, wide eyes made his heart do weird flips in his chest. “I can ask some friends to help you look for Changbin instead. I have some errands I need to--”

“We don’t have time for all of that,” growled Minho. He moved up behind the District Witch and wrapped his arms around Chan’s waist so confidently that Chan’s breath hitched in his throat.

The District Witch squeaked out, “Don’t you hate me?”

Minho laughed. “Of course I do. You’re a loser but I’m forced to ask for your help because the Big Blue Bird has cursed me with you as my District Witch.”

“I’m… not a curse.” Chan’s mood soured. “And you chose to live here. Weren’t you going on and on about how you’d be better off downtown?”

Minho hesitated. His entire body went rigid.

Chan’s shoulders went slack. Now he really didn’t want to help Minho. The only thing that kept him standing there on the sidewalk was the nagging possibility that something terrible may have happened to Changbin and he doubted that he would be able to relax until he saw that the boy was safe. “Has anyone ever told you that you’re very mean? Because you’re very mean.”

“I’m so hurt,” Minho vocalized, clearly not hurt. He pressed closer, putting his chest to Chan’s back. “Enough with the sentimentality. Get us up into the air. Quickly.”

Chan stared at the lamp post up the street, grasping for a way to explain himself out of this without tossing Minho to the ground and running. “I’m not used to flying with passengers.”

“I saw you earlier with the dragon boy,” Minho recalled. He tightened his arms around Chan’s middle. “You looked like quite the pro. Now let’s go. Stop delaying. Every minute my shop is closed is a wasted opportunity to make profit.”

There was no way out of it now. Minho clearly had no intention of letting him go, figuratively or literally. Chan eased his broom back into position and focused. His broom positively responded. Magic swirled around them, kicking up snow and making the air sparkle. After a few seconds, the broom began to lift the two witches up off of the ground. Shakily at first but more quickly as Chan’s confidence increased. They floated into the air, higher and higher until they were above the roofs. Chan eased them forward and then they were soaring above the streets, looking for Changbin.

Honestly, the flying bit was the easiest part. The location spell bit would be more complicated. There were so many ways that it could be done that actually narrowing it down and choosing a method would probably take a long time. Chan asked, “Are there places where Changbin likes to visit?”

Minho huffed, “Why are you asking that?”

“Because he may have gone to one of those places right now. Do you know his favorite places?”

“No.”

“How can you not? He’s your apprentice.”

“Exactly. He works in my shop. I’m not his father.”

Chan bit his bottom lip. He needed a different approach. “Do you know where he lives?”

“Of course. I required he give me an address before I took him on. And, yes, I have called the shrine and checked. The maidens said he left this morning around his usual time.”

Chan tried to think of what he’d do if Hyunjin simply decided not to show up one day. He would panic, of course, but there would be numerous ways to find him. Well, besides the whole collar and tag thing, there were plenty of magical resources that a witch could tap to find a missing person. Chan tried to dredge them up from his memory. Tried to. It was hard to think even about the simplest of things with Minho squeezing the absolute life out of him.

Chan tried to focus on keeping them sailing smoothly over the gently rolling waves of mana. “Have you tried calling him?” He shouted so that his voice could be heard over the wind as he took them higher into the air.

Minho’s voice was sharp and acidic in his ear. “Don’t you think I would have tried that first, genius?”

“If you call him, you can use a spell to trace his location.”

“The problem with that is,” Minho stated, “he has to answer my calls for the spell to work.”

“Hmmm,” Chan hummed. “With your good manners and pleasant attitude, I wonder why he doesn’t want to talk to you.”

“Hush.”

Chan gritted his teeth and kept on, flying them in wide and sweeping circles just above roof level. “I’m just trying to help,” Chan offered. “Sometimes we forget the easy things when we’re stressed.”

“Only incompetent people forget things as basic as phone calls.”

After they finished circling one neighborhood, Chan changed directions and started them in a wide loop around another. He stared down at the sidewalk below, barely managing to catch hints of faces in the morning crowd. He wasn’t sure he’d be able to spot Changbin at this speed. He couldn’t even spot the fellow when Changbin was sitting directly beside him! What was he supposed to do? “Does Changbin have something of yours,” Chan suggested. “You can put a spell on it that will draw us to him like he’s a magnet.”

“Why would I let him keep anything that belongs to me?”

“I think the spell can work in a similar way if you have something of his.”

“Why would I carry anything of his on my person?”

“You’re his witch. He’s your apprentice. Do you not share anything? Anything at all?”

Minho scoffed like the very idea was preposterous.

Chan tried to stay patient. The worry Minho had briefly showed half an hour ago in the shop had been genuine despite how rude and mean the man was acting now. Chan pressed, “You have to have something we can use.”

“I don’t!” Minho shouted back at him over the wind.

“Then how do you expect us to do this,” Chan asked. “How do you expect us to use a spell to find him when you don’t have anything of his, when you don’t know any of his hobbies or habits, when you can’t even get him on the phone with you?”

“I’m just his employer.”

“Exactly!” Chan screamed. He was getting far more emotional about this than he anticipated. Perhaps being separated from Hyunjin had affected him more deeply than he realized. Calmer, he said, “How is he your apprentice when you know so little about him?”

“He’s only been in my employ ten months. How much about him can I know?”

“A lot!” Chan squeaked. “Ten months is a long time to get to know someone.”

“I don’t see how that’s my fault.”

“Great Big Blue. You knowing so little means that we can’t use a location spell.”

“We can’t use a location spell that you would know.”

What was that supposed to mean? Chan asked, “We can’t fly up and down every street looking for him. That will take all day.”

“I know a spell, dimwit.”

“How can you when-”

Minho cut him off, “I know a forbidden spell.”

Chan’s breath caught in his throat. He gripped the handle of his broom harder. The wind was cold but he found himself sweating.

As if things weren’t already bad enough, Minho lowered his voice and added, “It will let me see where he is through his eyes and then I can describe the place to you.”

That could work but… “That sounds like a master-class spell. Genius-class, even.”

“You say that like it’s something I can’t easily manage with my spectacular skills.”

Chan gulped. Forbidden spells were forbidden for a reason. They tainted the mana around them even when they were cast successfully. Failed spells cursed the air much like a witch muttering the word ‘hex.’ Forbidden magic was probably the reason the mana flow in his District was so backwards and crazy. Chan sat up straight, fear yanking hard on his spine like he was but a puppet on a string. “Minho,” he asked quietly, “Do you tamper with forbidden magic often? Do you-”

“Of course someone like you would think so simply,” Minho snapped.

“My job is on the line here. If you’ve been cutting corners by tapping into the dark arts-”

“I’m not the cause of your mana disturbances, fool. In case you’ve forgotten, I’ve been living in your District all of three days.”

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“According to gossip, your little mana problems have been going on nearly two months. How could I have anything to do with that if I haven’t even been on this side of the city for that long?”

Chan went quiet. He knew he was desperate. Grasping at straws. Willing to shove any two puzzle pieces together whether they fit or not but… it was always a possibility. Right? Minho seemed like the type to knowingly sew destruction.

As if sensing his thoughts, Minho grunted, “One witch casting one forbidden spell isn’t going to muck everything up, District Witch. Let me cast it.”

This would probably find its way to Woojin somehow, but… “Alright. Cast the spell, then.”

Minho’s voice took on an uncharacteristic hesitance. “W-when I c-can.” He cleared his throat and then he was back to sounding normal; biting and cold. “Just concentrate on keeping us in the air. Your commentary is unneeded.”

Perhaps Chan should stop speaking. That would lower the amount of ammo at Minho’s disposal. They flew over a park in complete silence.

Yet, even then, Minho managed a, “Do you always tilt so much when you fly?”

Chan tightened his grip on the handle of his broom so much he thought he might snap the wood in half. “I told you, I’m not used to having passengers.”

In all honesty, he was struggling quite a bit. Carrying Minho was completely different from carrying Yongbok or Hyunjin but Chan could not figure out why. The process should have been similar and the weight wasn’t too far off, yet why was his concentration pulled taut like this, keeping him on the very edge of control? His first thought was that it was because the mana was being drawn to his own hat but, also, to Minho’s hat right behind him. It was like sucking up a milkshake through two straws, not particularly efficient, and definitely making things more lopsided and airy than they needed to be. Chan also knew that he was being silly and that that wasn’t quite the reason for his troubles. There was something else about Minho being this close to him that was wrecking his focus.

But what?

At least they were in silence. Minho hadn’t said anything in ages. A world record.

Chan looked down. They were on the southern edge of the District, traveling along the river. All of the melting snow had brought the waters up almost to the rim of the bank. He turned them more directly east, towards the trees that marked the edge of town. The two of them had been flying for over an hour now and it wasn’t until then that Chan realized that Minho had not loosened his hold on him this entire ride. He didn’t know how his organs hadn’t been crushed. Chan peered over his shoulder. Minho hadn’t even gotten his wand out of his pocket. “Are you even looking for Changbin?”

“You tilt so much,” Minho complained, his eyes squeezed shut. “I’m dizzy.”

“I’m not tilting,” Chan lied. He was. But not by much. He swore!

Minho cracked open an eye, met Chan’s gaze but only briefly before he squeezed his eyes shut again. “I’m afraid I’ll drop my wand and we’ll never find it out here in the sticks.”

The neighborhood below them was thinning out, becoming broken apart by trees and empty lots. Soon, they weren’t over a neighborhood at all and were flying over the forest, the bare limbs of the trees reaching up to them as if trying to snatch their dangling boots.

Chan had to at least try to defend himself. “I’m not tilting… that bad! You can still cast spells. See?” He demonstrated by pulling his own wand from out of his front pocket and waving it around. It wouldn’t take all that much effort to fling a spell or two so why was Minho making such a huge deal out of a little bit of multitasking? Why was Minho acting so atypically afraid? “Do you want me to cast the spell instead?”

“No,” Minho chastised. “I want you to put both of your hands on the broom and fly like you have some sense.”

Chan stashed his wand back in his pocket.

Minho eased an eye open again only to catch Chan still turned around. “Face forward. We’ll run into a tree. Stop looking at me.”

Chan couldn’t help but look. There was something about Minho that made it difficult to look away. Something about his face, about his frowning mouth. Something about his gritted teeth and furrowed eyebrows. Was he that afraid of a little tipping? Chan was a little confused. So confused that he did not watch where he was going.

His broom began to list sideways, tilting them to the left and putting them into a sharp, banking turn. It was a harmless move, really. The broom dipped a little, flying past the thick trunk of a tree. Close, but not close , yet Minho wrapped his arms even tighter around Chan’s waist and braced himself like he thought they would crash.

It took a split-second for Chan to figure it out. For once, he was able to see what was right in front of him! Still turned around facing his passenger, he asked, in all seriousness, “You can’t fly, can you?”

“I’m perfectly capable,” Minho bit out, forcing his eyes open. “I just choose not to.”

“You don’t know how,” Chan guessed. “Because you’re scared to.”

Minho loosened one arm from around Chan’s waist only to punch him quite forcefully in the gut.

Chan hadn’t been expecting it. He wheezed, spun around to face forward and gasped for air. “Don’t assault me while we’re ten meters in the air!”

Minho grabbed a handful of the front of Chan’s shirt, his fist tightening in fear. “If I could reach my wand, I’d send you to Timbuktu.”

This was too good. “So are you admitting that you don’t know how to fly?”

“Hush.”

He was admitting it. Chan started laughing. He couldn’t help it! Out of all of the things he expected Minho’s weakness to be, a broom wasn’t even on his list. He figured Minho would be terrible at making potions or maybe he couldn’t brew something in a cauldron without scorching the liquid at the bottom but to not know how to fly on a broom? “How does that even work?” Chan questioned, still laughing. The infallible Minho wasn’t entirely invincible after all. “You can have a huge snake wrapped around your neck like it’s a fashion accessory but you can’t handle heights?”

“Daisy isn’t frightening.”

“You named your snake Daisy?” Chan shook his head. “And you said the name Felix was distasteful.”

“Timbuktu would be too kind for you. Maybe I’ll wipe your memory instead. Make you forget we ever met.”

Chan just laughed harder. “That wouldn’t be too bad.”

“I’ll do it,” Minho threatened.

“Please do,” Chan invited him. Then he laughed even harder. A big, rumbling belly laugh that echoed through the trees below them. He let his concentration slip farther and the broom lost significant altitude.

Minho warned, “Stop tipping.”

“I’m not tipping.”

“You are. You’re wobbling. We’re losing speed.”

He was right. The broom beneath them was dipping up and down like a boat being tossed about by ocean waves. Chan focused again and tried to aim them higher up into the air above the trees. The broom did not respond. They continued to drop. “No. No. No,” Chan spat out. A tree branch yanked at his foot, turning them into a spin. He knew what was happening immediately. “The mana flow! Why now? Why right now?”

“Chan,” hissed Minho. “Stop messing with me.”

“I don’t care enough about you to scare you on purpose.”

“Chan.” No sooner had the name left Minho’s mouth than the mana around them surged . “Don’t tell me…” It was like a tidal wave bowling them over. Capsizing them. The broom flipped under the sudden change in pressure.

They were upside-down for a terrifying second.

Then they were plummeting.

“Sorry,” Chan screamed as he lost control. “This isn’t me!”

“Chan!” Minho screamed, losing his grip on Chan’s middle as they tumbled through the air.

Gravity pulled on them, separated them, yanked them farther and farther apart. A tree branch scratched at Chan’s arm as they fell, flipping him. The District Witch had just enough sense left to hold out his broom and use it to bridge the gap between them.

Minho grabbed hold of the end of it, barely, and Chan immediately began pulling them closer together. They were falling faster and faster. The ground was rushing up to them. They had seconds--mere breaths--before impact. Chan wrapped his arms around Minho, tugged the witch’s body close to his chest, and then angled himself so that he would hit the ground first.

It was his duty after all.

It was his job to protect his residents.

Chan squeezed his eyes shut, sent up a prayer to the Big Blue Bird and held his breath, waiting for the pain to hit. Waiting for it all to be over. Waiting for his dreams to be snatched away before he could even reach them.

The Big Blue Bird was paying attention to his prayers this time.

A sudden, strong gust of wind blew through the trees and altered the trajectory of the falling witches at the last possible moment, sending them just a tad bit more eastward, and, with an oomph, the two of them landed directly on a great big pile of snow in the middle of the forest.

The snow didn’t exactly soften the landing, as hard-packed and clumped together as it was, but anything was better than landing directly on the ground. Anything was better than breaking every bone or... worse.

Chan groaned, slightly dizzy. He clutched at the body in his arms as if it were something precious to be protected, even though the danger had passed.

Minho did not stir. Not at first. His body was oddly still.

“Minho,” Chan tightened his grip on Minho’s waist and shook the man. “Minho, are you alright?” He should have been worried about the pain crawling up his own back, but- “Minho!”

“Hush,” the elegant witch hissed. He twisted in Chan’s arms until they were chest to chest, his knees on either side of Chan’s torso, then he put a hand on the District Witch’s shoulder and used it as leverage to sit himself up. “This is why I don’t fly.”

“Hey,” Chan said.

Minho grunted and looked down at him. “What?”

“Earlier… I just realized that you finally called me by my name.” Chan didn’t know why that made him happy.

“It will never happen again,” Minho hissed.

Chan’s face fell.

Minho sat up a little more and then he attempted to stand. The action made him wince and shut his eyes. “Well, that hurts.”

“What is it?” Chan eased his arms from around Minho’s waist. His hands, numb from the cold and the shock of their fall, settled on Minho’s thighs that were pressed snug on either side of him. The thighs were toned beneath his palms, far more muscular than he would have expected. Not really meaning to... no, definitely not meaning to, he rubbed his thumbs in slow circles, pressing them into the flesh of Minho’s thigh through the man’s expensive-looking wool slacks. Wow. Did Minho work out? How many squats did he do daily to get quads like these? Absently, Chan squeezed the man’s legs a little harder.

Minho gasped.

“What,” Chan asked, pulling his hands away like they’d been burned, his cheeks flushing. “What’s wrong?”

“I thought I’d snapped my wand in two,” Minho muttered. He was holding it in his free hand. The elegant wood still seemed to be in one piece. “It’s fine. Surprisingly. I landed right on it, I thought.” He stashed it back in his front pocket and stared down at Chan underneath him for several seconds. His hat was gone, Chan noticed, and without it, his hair looked silky and shiny. Shampoo commercial worthy.

Chan raised a hand as if to run his fingers through Minho’s hair. He mumbled, “your hat.”

Minho pushed Chan’s hand away. “It’s over there.” He jerked his head in a direction past Chan’s head, somewhere he couldn’t see. “Yours is still on. Probably because your head’s so big. How does it feel?”

Chan glanced away from Minho for the first time since they landed. He was still reeling from the impact. He had to have been. Everywhere he looked, there was a soft and bright edge to everything. His bones felt like they were still rattling around under his skin and Minho’s presence was making his chest feel all constricted as if Daisy were strangling his lungs. Blinking, Chan opened his mouth to say ‘it’s fine’ but Minho beat him to the punch:

“How does it feel to have a head so big but have absolutely nothing of substance in it?” Minho smirked at his own joke but his smile morphed into a wince. He leaned more of his weight down onto Chan beneath him.

“Hey,” Chan exhaled. “Watch the fingernails.”

Minho loosened his grip. “I’ll check yours.”

Chan’s eyes widened. “Huh? My fingernails?” He glanced down at his own hands to double check he hadn’t gripped Minho by his thighs again.

“No, your wand,” Minho offered, already pushing his fingers into Chan’s front pocket. He grabbed hold of the wood and pulled it free. “Oh dear,” he whistled.

“How bad is it?” Chan asked with a defeated sigh. Yet another big stack of cash he’d have to spend.

Minho rolled his eyes. “It’s perfectly fine. Just absolutely horrendous.” He dropped the unharmed wand onto Chan’s chest. “Like its owner.”

“Hey,” Chan said. At long last, his head was clearing and common sense was coming back to him. He grabbed his wand and pushed it back into his pocket. “If you’re going to be this rude, get off of me.” It surprised him that Minho hadn’t jumped off of him already.

“I’d like to,” Minho said cryptically. He still had his hand on Chan’s shoulder, pinning the District Witch to the hard snow beneath them.

“But?” Chan prompted.

A strained, high-pitched sigh escaped Minho’s mouth.

Chan squirmed a little beneath Minho’s weight. “Uhhh… Can you not?”

“Hush,” Minho squeaked. “I swear to you on all five million of the Big Blue Bird’s feathers that-” He shifted a little on top of Chan and grunted, “--what you think is happening is not at all happening.”

“Then what is it?” Chan asked, still unsure, still trying to worm his way out of the vice of Minho’s thighs. “Why won’t you get off of me?”

“I hate to inform you of this but I cannot move.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Exactly what I said.”

“You’re really heavy,” Chan said. It wasn’t really true but he’d say anything to get Minho off of him.

“This is already embarrassing. Stop calling more attention to our situation than you need to.” Minho leaned down a little, bringing their faces terribly close... and then his expression contorted with mild pain. He grimaced, baring his teeth. Chan recoiled as if the man had grown fangs. Minho said, “I may have twisted my ankle in the fall.”

Oh.

That explained it.

Chan sighed in relief. He sat up, forgetting their positions that quickly, and accidentally smashed their foreheads together. Ouch. Chan’s hat fell off.

“Ow,” Minho hissed. “Why would you do that?”

“I don’t know.”

“Maybe that hat really is too tight. Cutting off the circulation to your brain and all.”

Chan ignored him. He sat up all of the way and wrapped an arm around Minho’s waist for support.

“Unhand me,” Minho exhaled, his breath light against Chan’s cheek.

“Which one,” Chan asked.

“Clearly the arm you’re using to hold me captive.”

“No. Which ankle? Which one hurts?” Chan used his lower body strength to roll Minho off of him and onto the mound of snow next to them.

“It’s the right.”

Finally free of Minho’s body weight, Chan crawled forward a bit and gingerly poked and prodded at Minho’s calf.

“My right. Not your right, dimwit.”

Chan switched to the other leg. He had barely put a hand on Minho’s calf when the witch hissed and jerked away from him. “Sorry,” Chan apologized.

Minho’s pain wasn’t enough to keep his snark and bad attitude completely away. “It’s because you’re bad luck,” he decided. “First you make my apprentice go missing and you traumatize me with your terrible flying and then you break my ankle.” He shook his head as if he couldn’t believe it. “You’re a walking, living, breathing curse. An omen.”

“I’m not bad luck,” Chan shot back. Despite Minho’s mouth, he still treated the man gently. He raised Minho’s pant leg and lowered his sock until he could get a better look at the purple, swelling ankle underneath. “You’re just mean.”

Completely serious, Minho commanded, “Then name one good thing that’s happened to me since I met you.”

They met each other’s gaze. Chan couldn’t answer him. He didn’t have the words. How was he supposed to answer something like that? What could he possibly say? Instead of saying anything, he pulled his wand out of his pocket and pressed it to the ball of Minho’s ankle.

Minho grilled him a little harder, “If you do this even slightly wrong…”

Chan ignored him. He took a deep breath in and out and focused on the task at hand. His hat was gone, forgotten in the snow behind him, but without it, he couldn’t feel the messy mana flow half as bad. “Reset the bone, wipe the frown from his face, make it so that he can safely walk all over the place.” There was a zap! in the air, a static charge.

Minho let out a blood-chilling yell.

Chan tensed, immediately believing he’d done it wrong. He reached for Minho’s wrist. “Are you okay? What’s wrong? How can I fix it?”

“It’s fine,” Minho said, shoving Chan’s concerned hands away. “Can’t take a joke?”

Chan sat back, feeling like he’d just been hit. “I didn’t think you were capable of joking.”

Minho bent his knees up to his chest and tested his ankle by putting a little bit of his weight on it. Finding it acceptable, he started to push himself to his feet. He hesitated, for so long that Chan feared the spell actually hadn’t worked correctly, but then Minho stood up and trudged across the ground to pick up his hat. “I just bought these pants, too,” he muttered loud enough for Chan to hear.

Well, if his clothing was all he could think about, he must have been okay. Chan crawled over the mound of snow and propped his own witch hat back on top of his platinum curls. Instantly, the noise of the disrupted mana was back in his head. Amplified by the hat. Pounding against him like falling hail.

No, no, he had to push through it. He had a mission. He stood up, fighting back a headache. “If I cast the right spell while I’m down here in the thick of it, perhaps I can locate the source of the disturbance.” He was already lifting his wand.

“Did you forget why we’re out here in the first place?” Minho shouted at his back. “We’re looking for Changbin!”

“I have to find the source of the mana flow problem,” Chan hissed. He recalled Woojin’s last words before he left the other day. “My job depends on it.” He stepped towards the darker part of the forest. The mana seemed to be surging outwards from that direction. It made no sound. It created no wind and it did not move the trees but that didn’t stop things from feeling like he was being bowled over by typhoon winds, from being thrown beneath violent ocean waves.

Chan pointed his wand towards the maelstrom, easing his body into the chaotic flow. Almost instantly, he felt cold. Colder than when he was lying in the snow. Something was out there. He could feel it. He could almost see it.

Right there.

No. Right there!

He could see it. Way, way, way back there. So far away and yet so close. It was almost impossible to see with the mana flow doing his head in but he could at least tell what direction it was in. He could at least tell that it was staring right back at him. It was so black that it seemed to suck in the shadows of the forest around it. Chan squinted. His brain could almost give the thing shape. He could almost tell what it was.

“District Witch!” Minho’s hand was on his shoulder, whirling him around and snapping him out of his trance. “I don’t care about any of this mana flow stuff right now. We have to find my apprentice.” He seemed to remember that he wanted to play this icy cool and disaffected. He eased up on the volume of his voice. He leaned back and crossed his arms over his chest. “I told you, I have to set that sale this morning. I could have been open and ready for the lunch crowd by now but instead I’m out here wasting my time watching your incompetent buffoonery.”

“You didn’t have to ask me, remember,” Chan shot back. “I’m nothing but bad luck, as you keep reminding me. You should have gone to some other witch.”

Minho reached out and dug his fingers into Chan’s shoulder. The smug mask he always wore crumpled in an instant. “You’re the only other witch I know in this District.” Then, far quieter, “Help me find him.”

Chan peeled Minho’s fingers off of him. “Minho, it can wait. I need to put an end to this.” He turned back towards the trees, stepping closer and closer to the mana storm. “Even if my job wasn’t on the line, I would still be stepping up and doing this. These disturbances are screwing with the whole District. Maybe even the whole city.”

Minho was at his side again. His attitude was back in full force. “Are you really suggesting my missing apprentice isn’t as important as your selfishness?”

“Can’t you feel it?” Chan asked. He walked farther into the woods, each step growing more difficult as the mana flow battered against him as if trying to keep him out. “It’s so close. It’s like we’re right near the origin of it all.”

“I don’t care.”

“But-” Even as Chan stood there, the mana surge was dying down, becoming less distinct, shifting and moving as if the source were relocating. The shadows of the forest seemed to lighten as whatever that had been watching him fled. Chan took a step forward in an attempt to chase after it. “Great Big Blue, I need to-”

“District Witch,” Minho’s voice was cold and firm. A glacier.

When the District Witch turned around, Minho had his wand raised in his direction.

Oh.

“Minho,” Chan said back. He almost raised his hands in surrender but two could play that game. He shifted, repositioning his own wand so that it was pointed towards Minho’s chest. This was dangerous. For both of them. “Don’t make me do this to you.”

Minho’s expression did not change. He didn’t budge at all. His determination would have been admirable if his behavior wasn’t about to get either of them killed.

“Lower your wand, Minho, or I’ll-”

“You don’t have the balls,” Minho snapped.

Chan almost lost his nerve. “Neither do you.”

“Try me.”

Chan came up with a spell, “The branches and the snow, the rocks and the wind-”

Before he’d even gotten the rest of the phrase out, Minho said sharply, “You there, sit there!”

His wand glowed. There was a zap in the air.

Gravity seemed to increase. Chan fought against it for all of two seconds but could not withstand the force. As if being pulled down by some unimaginable power, he dropped straight to the ground, landing flat on his back.

The snow did little to ease up the pain that shot through his spine. “How…” Chan gasped out, the wind knocked out of him from the fall, “How did you do that?”

Minho lowered his wand to his side and stepped across the snow towards him. “You don’t need poetry,” he stated, “you just need a rhyme. Please tell me you were taught that in university.”

Chan tried to move but the force of Minho’s spell was still strong. Still new. His bones felt like they were forged from heavy iron.

The elegant witch kneeled next to him and leaned into Chan’s face. He snarled, “You are going to help me find Changbin.”

“But-” Chan squeaked out. “I was so close to getting to the source of the disturbances. I almost had it figured out. Maybe I can still…” He tried to grab hold of even the tiniest current of mana flowing around them but things had grown still and placid. The mana storm was long gone and his chance to figure out its mystery was gone along with it.

“What were you going to do?” Minho asked him. “Run off into the woods and leave me out here all alone?” He waved a hand off to his left, indicating the dense trees around them.

Chan’s expression must have changed because Minho eased up, backed away and showed the faintest hint of mercy. The spell’s shackles around Chan’s limbs vanished, gone as quickly as they had come. Chan sucked in a deep breath for the first time in what felt like minutes. Hours.

Wordlessly, his big doll eyes unblinking, Minho watched the District Witch cough and sputter. Then the witch came to an awful decision. “Sit still. I’m going to cast that forbidden spell on you.”

“What?” Chan shrieked, still choking. He put a hand to his chest to ease the thrashing of his panicked heart.

“That spell that lets you see through someone else’s eyes. I’m going to cast it on you.”

“Why me? Didn’t you say you were going to cast it on yourself while we flew?”

Minho approached him with rapid speed. “I thought more about it. I’ve barely been in this District for 72 hours. If Changbin is lost somewhere out here, I doubt I’d recognize any signs or landmarks. Sit still.” He was already putting a hand on Chan’s shoulder to pin him down, pressing the tip of his wand to Chan’s temple. “It doesn’t hurt, I’ve been told.”

“No!” Chan gasped out, pulling his head away from Minho’s wand. “Can’t you at least wait until I tell you yes or no?”

His distress stilled Minho’s hand. The witch let him go and stepped backward.

Chan got himself to his feet. He knew Minho was at his wit’s end and willing to try everything. He was familiar with that feeling. Chan remembered how hotly his own desperation burned in him when he found out what had happened to Hyunjin. He remembered that dark, frigid emotion that encased his heart in ice when he’d approached the front door of his shop, willing to face down the entire coven to get his boy back. But, with all of that in the past, Chan now better understood how irrational it was to act on such impulsive, dangerous feelings. He was glad he had managed to stop Minho just like how he was glad Woojin had managed to stop him back then.

“I’ll help you,” Chan said. “You can cast your dark little spell on me. I’ll tell you where your apprentice is.”

For several long seconds, Minho did not move. It was as if he were second guessing himself. For a time, it looked like he might run away from everything, give up on everything, but then he seemed to remember that there was nowhere to run to.

Out here, they only had each other.

Slowly, Minho rose to his feet and approached Chan. “You may feel a little nauseous during the whole experience,” Minho warned him. “So if you feel like you can’t take it anymore, pull on my shirt and I’ll break the spell.”

As if afraid his hand might burn, Chan slowly brought his hand to Minho’s front. He slipped his fingers beneath Minho’s too-thin-for-this-weather jacket and grabbed hold of the man’s silky shirt. “Okay,” Chan breathed out. He did not know what to expect. Or, rather, he only expected things to go horribly wrong.

His luck was terrible, after all.

With one hand, Minho grabbed the back of Chan’s neck. With the other, he pressed the tip of his wand between Chan’s eyes. “Are you ready?”

“I suppose.”

“I need a better answer than that.”

“Yes. I’m ready.”

They both stood there a moment. Concentrating. Feeling. The words of the spell hadn’t even been spoken yet but the mana was already reacting to them, swirling around and around. It thickened enough that it began to affect the snow, making the flakes fall upward into the air, coating their coats and hair in sparkling crystal white.

It was a beautiful moment. Almost.

There was a darkness to this. Chan felt the mana twisting and churning around him.

Rotting.

Screaming.

His bottom lip trembled. He knew such a spell was forbidden but it wasn’t until that moment that he realized just how dark it was.

By contrast, when Minho next spoke, his voice was soft like a lullaby. Sweet unlike every other part of him. He almost sang the words right into Chan’s ear. “Through these brown eyes, see far and wide; show the location of my apprentice, wherever he may hide.”

Nothing happened.

Even after the tip of Minho’s wand sent a jolt of power through Chan’s system and made him slump forward a little against Minho’s solid frame like he’d been shocked.

Nothing happened.

Even after the snow fluttered back towards the ground and the dark tinge of the mana dissipated as the flow gently carried it away.

Nothing happened.

The two witches were still standing in the snowy woods, their breaths forming clouds between them. Minho’s hand was freezing on the back of Chan’s neck. Minho’s nose was pink from the chill. His teeth were beginning to chatter.

Gradually, gradually, gradually, Chan became aware of the fact that something was happening. No. That something had been happening all of this time. He wasn’t looking at the same set of trees anymore. They were very similar: snow-covered, bare, gray. But they were different . Arranged in different ways. Not as thickly clumped together. There were hills. A large stone fence. Chan couldn’t see Minho, even though the witch was supposed to be right in front of him, even though he could still feel Minho’s hand on his neck.

Something happened.

Chan’s vision swam. It felt like he was in two places at once, trying to operate too many arms and too many legs. Where was he? Didn’t he know this place? Yes. Indeed. He knew this place. But how? His eyes stung but he couldn’t blink. His thoughts started whorling but he didn’t give in.

Something happened.

Now Chan was looking down at a pair of legs that weren’t his, staring at small hands that weren’t his. There was a silver ring on his thumb. Black fingernail polish. A bouquet of bright bright red in blinding contrast with the snow.

Minho had been right about one thing: Chan felt nauseous. Sick.

It was like he had been shrunk down three or four sizes. The world looked different. Larger. He felt no sensation, he heard nothing, tasted nothing. He had no control. He was forced to sit in the ride, helpless, while it spun him one way and then the other, threatening to spill him onto the ground.

He caught another look at the legs that weren’t his. The knee-high boots with their dozen buckles. The black, form-fitting clothing.

Wait.

Chan really truly was looking through Changbin’s eyes!

He could see what the boy was seeing. He couldn’t hear anything or feel anything but Chan could see and that was more than enough. The apprentice had just knelt down in the snow, his eyes going wildly unfocused as he looked, but then tried not to look, at the large stone slab in front of him.

The spell wore off.

Chan was thrown back into his own body, forced to look back through his own eyes. Minho was there. Minho was there . Close. Chan pulled away from him. Spooked. Dizzy. He managed one step and then a second only to trip over his own feet. He barely had the chance to hold his arms out in front of him before he hit the ground, spitting and coughing.

Minho knelt next to him, putting a hand on his back in some small semblance of comfort as Chan’s insides churned with the aftermath of such a powerful, dark spell.

Ages seemed to pass before he was able to look up and meet Minho’s eyes. Or, maybe, only seconds had ticked by.

“Well,” Minho asked, catching the haunted emptiness in Chan’s eyes.

“I know where Changbin is,” Chan said when he’d caught his breath. “But I don’t think he wants to be found.”

Chapter Text

Chan figured that the safest place to land out here with all of this snow on the ground was at the top of the hill next to the large mausoleum. He lowered the broom’s speed and angled them around the tall and reaching branches of an evergreen so that he could come down for a landing.

“Are we there yet,” Minho asked, clinging to him. It was the hundredth time he’d asked.

Chan slowed them down a bit more, circling around the mausoleum. “We’re here.”

“Finally,” Minho declared. “We’ve been up in the air for hours.”

“Minho, it was a five minute flight. If that.”

“Are you sure he’s here?”

“I saw this place through his eyes.”

“Are you positive? That spell was only active for a few seconds.”

Chan honestly should have been used to the overwhelming amount of doubt in Minho’s voice by now. “I’ve run this District for five months, you know. I would hope I’d know it.” He glanced over his shoulder to give Minho a look. “Unlike someone else out there who knows someone for ten months but can’t even name their hobbies.”

“One thing that you are not going to do is hold that over my head. You don’t even have an apprentice, need I remind you.”

“If I did have one, they would be more than just an employee to me.”

“Maybe that’s why you don’t have one. You don’t know where to draw the line.”

The two witches touched down on the ground. Chan’s boots disturbed the perfect layer of snow as he brought them to a halt. When they had finally stopped, they both stood up. One on a shakier set of legs than the other.

“Solid ground at last,” Minho whispered.

For a moment, they just stood there calf-deep in snow. Chan had to take a moment to get his bearings. He usually didn’t have to come so far into this place and he was grateful for such a high hill giving him quite the vantage point. If he correctly recalled what he saw through Changbin’s eyes, he would have to be-

“Are you really sure Changbin doesn’t want to be found?” Minho cut into his thoughts. “That’s such an odd thing to say.”

“Based on where we are, I’m sure he wants to be left alone. It’s quite the private place.” Chan pulled his broom out from between his legs and propped it up on his shoulder. He attempted to take a step forward but Minho still had quite the grip on him.

“Where are we, then,” asked Minho.

“Open your eyes,” Chan told him. But more importantly, “And let go of me.”

Minho unwrapped his arms from around Chan’s waist, took a step or two backwards and blinked open his eyes. He had to squint against the brightness of the snow as he looked around.

The cemetery around them was utterly still on nearly any other day but cover it in a thick layer of snow and its stillness became otherworldly. Mystical. Even the wind had stopped blowing. It was as if they were inside a snow globe. A rather macabre one but a snow globe nonetheless. They were the only two witches in the world, it seemed. The trees and grave markers and statues around them were both eerie and beautiful in the midday light, but-

“What in the Bird’s claws?” Minho gasped out, holding a hand to his chest. “You’ve lost your mind, District Witch. There’s no way Changbin is in such a distasteful place like this.”

“He’s here,” insisted Chan. He recalled the vision he’d seen through Changbin’s eyes. The hills. The stone fence. The stone slab. This was the place. Even if he’d only seen it for a handful of seconds, he knew this place.

His mother was here, after all.

“But why would he be here?” Minho started walking to the edge of the hill where a set of stairs were barely visible beneath the snow. He took one step down them and nearly slipped, yelping and holding his arms out for balance.

“Please don’t fall,” Chan rushed forward and grabbed the man’s arm, temporarily forgetting that he was with Minho and not with Hyunjin or Yongbok. They stared at each other for an awkwardly long moment before Chan let go of him. “Or do fall. Break a leg. I don’t care.”

Minho rolled his eyes. “Let’s just find him. I’ve had enough of you for one day.”

“Well, I had enough of you the second you walked through my door this morning.”

“Oh? I had enough of you since you stole my apprentice to eat fish on the floor.”

Chan furrowed his eyebrows. “I’ve had enough of you since you made such a big deal about that pestle and mortar set!”

“I’ve had enough of you since your apprentice nearly set your shop on fire.”

At this rate, they’d go back and forth all day. Chan sighed and said, “Let’s hurry and find Changbin. I don’t think he’s hurt but it’s dreadfully cold out here and his jacket definitely isn’t heavy enough for this weather.” He eyed Minho’s own too-thin jacket.

Minho folded his arms across his chest. “Well, let’s get on with it.”

They walked down the stairs, taking their time to traverse the slippery stone. At the bottom of the hill, the ground leveled out and it became a lot easier to walk. It was so quiet in the graveyard that their footsteps sounded as loud and massive as those of a forest giant. The place seemed to be empty. No one else had come here since the snow had fallen if the pristine whiteness around them was any indication. The stonework path wound them around row after row of grave markers.

Chan hadn’t been out here in a while. Months. Not since he’d started this District Witch job.

He paused at an intersection of paths and stared off to his right in the direction of his mother. “Sorry, mom,” he muttered. “I should come and visit more often. Being busy is not an excuse.”

He and his father lived way out in District 1, almost up in the mountains, but his mother and her family were from District 9. It was pure coincidence, or maybe even plain bad luck, that led Chan to becoming the witch of District 9.

Bad luck was probably more likely.

His mother’s family thought he was the cause of his mother’s death.

“District Witch,” Minho spoke. He had gotten quite some distance ahead before he realized Chan was no longer next to him. “What are you doing? We don’t have time to stand around.” He stomped through the snow until he was standing in front of Chan and poked the man in the chest. “What’s with that look in your eye? Did you get the place wrong? Is Changbin not here? Do we have to fly again?”

Chan looked over at him. “This is the place.”

“Then where is he? We’ve been walking around for ages.”

“Minho, we just got here.”

“I don’t care. Can we get going? We’ve missed the lunch rush but I refuse to miss the evening rush. You must be out of your mind.”

Chan turned back to his right. He knew his mother wasn’t lonely. She was up in the sky among the Big Blue Bird’s feathers, warm and holding hands with everyone, but he just wanted to see her. He wanted to see the place where she lay. He started walking down the path.

“District Witch,” Minho hissed. He grabbed Chan’s wrist to stop him. “I can tell you’re getting distracted.”

“Changbin is this way,” Chan lied.

“He’s not,” Minho said. “You’ve got this look in your eyes... You don’t care about him that much.”

Chan whirled on him. “Why won’t you let me do this one thing?” Chan’s voice was far shakier and desperate than he needed it to be.

Minho took advantage of such displayed weakness. “Because we aren’t here for you. We’re here for me.”

The wind blew.

It howled through the trees and stirred up the snow, running them over with frigid air.

Minho’s teeth chattered. Instinctively, he stepped forward and pressed himself into the material of Chan’s jacket, shivering.

Chan gently spun them so that his back was to the gust, shielding Minho from the cold.

It didn’t take long for the wind to die down.

Then Minho came to his senses. He shoved Chan away. “Just take me to my apprentice, District Witch,” he grunted, shoving his hands in his jacket pockets. “I’m sick of spending time with you.”

“The sentiment goes both ways,” Chan said. There were a million people other than Minho that he’d rather spend his time with. He switched his broom from his right shoulder to his left shoulder and went back to leading the way towards Changbin. Every step that took him farther away from his mother’s resting place hurt him a little but he pushed forward.

The two of them arrived at another intersection of paths and Chan led them left and up and over a hill.

The grave markers here were newer. The stone shinier. The statues weren’t as faded and the trees, more recently planted, had yet to grow to their full heights.

“I’m starting to believe you’re wasting my time on purpose,” Minho spoke up from a few paces behind Chan.

“He’s here,” Chan shot back. “Or at least he was here when I was looking through his eyes.”

They were reaching the far side of the cemetery now and Changbin was running out of places to be. Chan knew the boy was somewhere in this newly expanded area but they’d walked almost its entire length without seeing a single soul. Just when Chan was starting to let Minho get to him, just when he was beginning to doubt himself and his knowledge of his own District, out of the corner of his eye, he spotted a lightning strike of black across the whiteness of the snow.

“There,” he whispered, pointing.

Changbin, standing out in his all-black clothing, was a short distance away, kneeling with his eyes closed in the snow in front of a grave. His hands were clasped in front of him in prayer to the Big Blue Bird. A bouquet of bright red roses lay at the base of the grave marker.

Minho took a step forward and sucked in a breath, probably to scream and yell and be rude as usual.

Chan grabbed him by the shoulder and stopped him before his meanness spoiled Changbin’s peace. Surprisingly, Minho allowed himself to be pulled back and he did not say a word.

The two witches waited. And waited. One far more patiently than the other.

Nearly ten minutes passed before Changbin lowered his hands and opened his teary, red-rimmed eyes. Respectfully, he placed his hand against the grave marker in front of him, his fingers trailing over the grooves of the name engraved there.

Chan stepped forward first but stopped short when he realized Minho had a handful of the hem of his jacket. He turned around, fully expecting the witch to have grown a sense of shame and to suggest they leave before they were spotted, but-

“So you do know what you’re doing,” Minho whispered.

Oh. “You could always say ‘thank you’ like a normal, grateful person.”

“I’m supposed to thank someone who didn’t want to help me?”

“You didn’t want to ask me for help.”

Minho changed the subject. “If you say anything about me being afraid of heights, I will turn you into a frog.”

Chan snorted. “He doesn’t know?”

“A frog, Chan. No, wait. A toad. I’ll turn you into a toad. They’re uglier.”

“Why? You gonna feed me to Daisy?”

“And ruin her nutritional intake? Never in a million years.”

“Are you two done?” This was Changbin. While the witches had been bickering, he had appeared directly in front of them.

Chan jumped in fright. That did it! He was going to make bell collars for Changbin and Yongbok as soon as he was back at the shop. His heart couldn’t take this!

“You heard us,” questioned Minho, his eyebrows raised high. “How? We were whispering.”

Changbin rolled his eyes. “Hardly.”

“Sorry,” said Chan. “We didn’t mean to intrude on your private moment.”

“Actually, we did.” Minho stepped forward. He almost put a hand on Changbin’s shoulder but then reconsidered the action at the last moment and dropped his arm to his side. “I was worried-” Minho paused, took a breath and then started his sentence again. “We have a sale set today. You were scheduled for ten in the morning.”

Changbin did not look surprised. “I have the day off.”

Minho sputtered for a second before regaining his composure. “What makes you think so?”

“It’s the first Wednesday of the month.”

That didn’t mean too much to Chan but it must have meant something to Minho because his eyes went wide and his mouth hung open in the silent recognition of a big mistake. “Oh.” He slapped a hand to his forehead and groaned. It was probably the most inelegant thing Chan had ever watched him do. “Oh, Bird’s claws!”

Chan put two and two together. He pointed an accusing finger. “You forgot he had the day off? He wasn’t missing at all?”

“You thought I was missing?” Changbin asked, sounding oddly hopeful.

Minho must not have heard him. He whirled on Chan, red in the face and embarrassed. “The process of moving the shop must have spun my head around.”

“You forgot,” Chan reiterated.

“No. That’s not it at all. You’ve got everything wrong.”

Chan gasped. “You made all of that noise and dragged me out of the shop because you-”

“Not a word of this to anyone,” Minho interrupted him. “If you bring this up in front of your little zoo, I will turn you into a mouse and then I will feed you to Daisy. Stop laughing. I’m serious.”

“I can’t help it.” Chan tried to fight back his giggles. Really. What a way to spend the day. He almost couldn’t be mad.

Minho fumed. “Changbin,” he said, turning away from the District Witch, “do you really come here of all places on your days off?”

Changbin hesitated for several seconds before nodding. “Yes. I make it a point.”

Chan got a handle on his laughter. In a much kinder tone than Minho’s, he asked, “Who do you come here to see?”

Once again, Changbin took a while to answer. “My old mentor.” His eyes darted from Chan to Minho and his voice became ever more unsure. “The witch I had before Minho.”

Chan’s smile faltered. Even Minho seemed a bit taken aback. The weight of such words made them all stare down at their shoes in the snow.

To be an apprentice meant to have two families. One you were tied to by blood or papers and the other you were tied to by craft. Losing family was always hard, despite it being a natural part of life. You couldn’t choose the family you were born into but the love and the loss was still the same. A witch losing their apprentice or an apprentice losing their witch held a special sort of significance, however, because that was the one family you could handpick.

That was the one family you could create just for you.

The three of them fell into a tense quiet before Chan heard the distinctive snap of a twig breaking under the weight of a foot.

The District Witch spun in the direction of the noise. In the soundlessness of a place like this, the snap had been sharp and unmistakable. Louder than anything he’d ever heard. His eyes darted left and then right, from one row of grave markers to the next. He went still. Chan saw, or thought he saw, a shadow move just behind the wall that separated the cemetery from the surrounding woods.

“What’s over there,” Minho asked him, peering in the direction Chan was staring in.

“You didn’t hear that?” Chan asked. Minho’s question had distracted him. Now he wasn’t sure if he had seen anything at all.

Minho said, “I’ve had enough of this place. Can we leave? Are you done playing games?”

Chan wiped at his eyes, blinked them open and stared out past the wall again. There was nothing out there. He sighed. “Maybe I just need more sleep.” Chan turned back around to face Changbin. Now that he was paying attention, he noticed that there wasn’t a single footprint in the snow between the grave Changbin had been kneeling in front of when they had first found him here and the place where he was standing right now. Odd. “Well, what are you going to do with the rest of your day off?”

Changbin replied, “I’m going back to the shrine. The maidens will worry if I’m late and I promised I would start shoveling the snow off of all of the stairs before dark.” He turned away, heading up the path towards the cemetery entrance.

“Fine,” Minho stated, even though the boy was now too far away to hear him. “I give you permission to slack off.” He still seemed a little shaken. “You can go do that. Sure.” He rolled his eyes and swiped his bangs away from his forehead as if he hadn’t just interrupted everyone’s day by throwing a fit. “I’ll just set the sale myself, Changbin. At least then I know it will be done correctly the first time.”

Chan turned to Minho and said, “Changbin’s alright. We see that now.” He lowered his broom from his shoulder and swung a leg over it. He held out his hand. “Minho, need a lift?”

Minho stared at Chan’s extended hand for several seconds before slapping it away. “No thanks,” he huffed. “I think I’d rather walk.”

★☆

YOUR COURIER HAS DELIVERED [6] PACKAGES.

“Only six?” Chan stared at the notification on his phone in disbelief before shoving the device into his pants pocket and out of sight.

He hoped that Jisung had actually delivered more than six packages by now. He hoped he hoped he hoped! Chan would be better off delivering the things himself if Jisung was really moving through town this slowly. Even if the boy had to go on foot due to the snow, he had almost an entire day and only six deliveries was shameful.

“I need a new courier,” he muttered aloud.

To calm his nerves, he raised his mug of coffee to his lips and took a sip. The warmth of it soothed his throat and settled in his stomach like a hug. When he’d emptied it, he lowered the mug from his mouth and went back to staring out his shop’s big front window to Minho’s Trinkets And Tokens across the street. He’d been looking for about fifteen minutes now.

Minho had said he would walk back from their little outing, which had sounded like a decent idea back in the cemetery but now Chan was certain he shouldn’t have actually allowed Minho to do it because he’d been back at his shop nearly an hour now but Minho had yet to return to his and Wednesday was nearly over.

“It’s not like I’m worried or anything,” he tried to convince himself. “I just… want to know… where he is.” It’s just that it wouldn’t be a fair competition! How could his store be better than Minho’s when Minho wasn’t there?

“You know,” Yongbok began.

Chan yelped, startling so bad he nearly dropped his coffee mug.

“You know,” Yongbok started again, pausing to slurp at his own cream-filled coffee, “it’s kind of weird watching you stand there and stare at nothing.”

Chan turned away from the window long enough to give Yongbok an incredulous glare. Had he heard right? Yongbok, of all people, was calling him weird for staring at nothing? “I’m not staring at nothing. I’m staring at the ‘closed’ sign hanging on Minho’s door.”

Yongbok took another sip. “That’s… the least interesting thing you could stare at.”

“Got a better suggestion?”

“Your untied shoelace.”

Chan glanced down. The laces on his left boot had come undone. “Untied shoelaces are interesting?”

Yongbok nodded. “You didn’t know? I’ve been waiting for you to walk again so I can watch it flop around.”

Chan stooped down.

“No,” shrieked Yongbok, “don’t tie it. You’ll ruin it!”

Chan sighed and stood back up. Yongbok was so so so weird. The District Witch went back to staring out the window.

“You could just… go over there, you know,” Yongbok suggested.

Chan let out a nervous squeak of a laugh. “I have no reason to.”

“You keep thinking that,” Yongbok said. He backed away from the window. “You never should have let that Woojin guy talk you into getting rid of the recliner.”

The subject change nearly caught Chan off guard. “I didn’t get rid of it. It’s just at my house now. It was in the way while it was here.”

“I haven’t taken a nap in it yet, you know.” Yongbok started down the aisle, head tilted back to get the last drops of his creamy coffee out of the dish.

“Too bad.”

“I won’t be able to rest until I get to sleep on it.”

“It’s just a recliner, Yongbok.”

“ Just a recliner?” Yongbok scoffed and then turned the corner at the end of the aisle, out of sight.

Chan sighed. He wasn’t sure he’d ever properly understand that boy. Whenever he thought he’d put the pieces together, Yongbok would do or say something so off the wall that it was like completely restarting the process of getting to know him. Figuring it would be best to get back to what he was doing before he stared out the window, Chan took his empty mug down the aisle towards the cash wrap.

On the counter, he had laid out all of the materials that he would need for his little project: some fancy ribbon, as blue as the Big Blue Bird; a pair of scissors; two tiny bells; and two flat metal disks.

He had said he’d make noise-making collars for the two quietest boys on the planet and he meant it! He sat his empty mug down and made himself comfortable on the stool behind the counter. Chan wasn’t the most crafty of witches, but he could at least do something this simple. He threaded the ribbon through the loop of one tiny bell and then cut the ribbon with the scissors. He repeated the method a second time with the other bell. He knew Changbin preferred a choker to a witch’s hat so he cut the ribbon intended for the apprentice significantly shorter. Perhaps Changbin could wear it as a bracelet or something? He didn’t know.

He hadn’t actually thought this all the way through, as impromptu as a decision as it was.

Reciting a simple spell, he turned the tip of his wand into a bit of a soldering iron and wrote ‘Yongbok’ on one metal disk and ‘Changbin’ on the other. Like the bells, he threaded the ribbon through their hoops and, when everything was complete, he sat back on his stool and admired his handiwork.

“I’m not wearing that,” Yongbok said from right behind him.

Chan yelped, so surprised he nearly hopped off of the stool. “Where did you come from,” he squeaked out.

Yongbok shrugged. “I’ve been standing here watching you the whole time.”

He hadn’t been. Chan was sure of that. “This is exactly why I’d like for you to wear it. I’m tired of you scaring me.”

“I don’t do it on purpose,” Yongbok said. “You just never pay attention to me.” He pouted a little.

“I’m paying attention to you right now,” Chan tried to reason.

“But never when it matters.” Yongbok stuck out his bottom lip. “Never when I try to show you things.”

Chan grabbed Yongbok’s ribbon off of the counter and then spun around on the stool so he could more directly face Yongbok. “Let’s just try it,” he attempted. “Please? Maybe it’ll save me a heart attack or two.”

Yongbok frowned deeply but he said, “Okay,” anyways. He stepped forward.

Gingerly, Chan leaned up to close the distance and wrapped the ribbon around Yongbok’s neck. He took a moment to ensure the bell was centered at the base of Yongbok’s throat and, when he tied it, was careful not to loop it too tightly. “Does that feel okay?”

Yongbok’s face was screwed up like just having the collar on him ruined his day. “It feels fine. Not too tight.”

“Okay. So what do you think of it?”

“I guess it is kind of pretty,” Yongbok said, swatting at the bell and making it sing. “And I do like the sound it makes.” He swatted at it again. His frown eased up and slowly morphed into a big, toothy grin. “You know, this won’t be too bad, Chan.” He flicked the bell with his finger over and over and over and over and over again.

Chan grimaced. Somehow, he hadn’t considered this possibility.

Bells made a lot of noise. A lot of high-pitched noise that made the insides of his ear vibrate. The noise grated on his nerves. “Actually,” Chan began, reaching for Yongbok’s new collar, “on second thought…”

“No!” Yongbok cried out, backing away from Chan’s hand. “It’s mine and I love it.” He flicked the bell with his finger again and again, grinning wildly.

“Take it easy,” Chan said, cupping a hand over his ear. “The point of that is so that I can hear you coming, not to hear you all of the time.”

“Oh well,” said Yongbok with a giggle. He circled around the counter and skipped out onto the sales floor, jingling the bell constantly.

Chan just put his face in his hands, regret pouring out of his every orifice. With his hands over his eyes, he couldn’t see Yongbok but he could hear the boy walk from one end of the store to the other. The bell’s noise was aggravating. A constant jangling like the bells of the people in red aprons who stood outside of the doors of the department stores downtown, silently begging for donations to be added to their big, red buckets.

One minute passed. And then five. Ten.

The noise was going to drive Chan mad. He needed some time alone.

“Hyunjin,” he called out. “Hyunjin!”

He heard footsteps pound up the aisle. The tall boy nearly ran into the counter in his excitement. “Yes, Channie Cheese?”

“Let’s play a game.”

Hyunjin perked up. Even more. “A game? I love games. Especially the ones you come up with. What’s this one called?”

“It’s called,” Chan announced, “Sit On This Stool And Holler If A Customer Comes In. How does that sound?”

“That’s a new one, Chan. We’ve never played that one before. What are the rules?”

Chan stood up and gave the stool he’d just been sitting on a pat. “You sit on this stool and you holler if you see a customer come in.”

Hyunjin scratched his head, frowning. “That sounds hard.”

“You can do it, Hyunjin. I believe in you.”

“Okay.” With his attitude changed that quickly, Hyunjin circled around the counter and hopped up onto the stool. “When do we start?”

“We’ve already started. You’re doing good.”

Hyunjin clapped excitedly. “I like it when I do super good at the games. I like it when you’re proud of me.”

“I’ll be in my office for a little while, okay?”

“Okay. Wait. Wait. Don’t go yet. What was the other rule of the game again?”

“Holler if you see a customer come in.”

“Alright. I got it now.”

Chan gave the boy a pat on the head and went down the hall to his office. As soon as the door shut behind him, the noise of Yongbok’s collar eased. Great Big Blue. Chan crossed the room and sank down into his chair. The room was chillier than usual today and he shivered a little as he got comfortable. Where was that packet of papers again? There. Beneath the pile of receipts and the spreadsheet he’d been using to track yesterday’s expenses. He’d been putting all of this desk work off all day but there was quite a lot of data he needed to go over with the Regional Manager.

On his landline, he called the man’s direct number and was pleasantly surprised by how quickly Woojin answered.

His voice came through a little scratchy over the speakerphone: “It’s Kim Woojin.”

“Hey,” Chan sputtered out a greeting. “I mean, hello. It’s District Witch 9, Bang-”

“Chan,” Woojin finished for him. “I know.”

“Oh.” Chan fumbled through the papers and folders on his desk until he found the action plan Woojin had left for him after the corporate visit. “I hate to call you out of the blue like this but I ran the numbers you gave me and I came across a few discrepancies that I absolutely need to bring up with you. Do you have time?”

Woojin was quiet for a while. Long enough that Chan thought the man had hung up on him. Then, “Yes. I have time. What page has these inaccuracies?”

Chan directed him to the page in question and they spent time going back and forth about the data on the graphs. There was a lot of fact-checking, calculator-punching and report referencing. Woojin even briefly made a phone call to the Accounting department to double-check some things. The conversation simmered at the very crest of Chan’s understanding sometimes, reminding him of his days back in university, his head full of mud while the witches around him discussed complicated topics with ease.

At the end of it all, Woojin had determined that there were exactly two typos and one decimal place error that he would be going through the official files to fix but all of the other issues were just Chan’s rusty math or bad handwriting.

“Wow… that’s,” Chan choked out, “that’s embarrassing. Apologies for wasting your time.”

“You didn’t waste my time, Chan,” replied Woojin. “We actually did discover a few errors and the two of us caught them in time to prevent the issue from snowballing.”

Chan still felt awful. He knew the Regional Manager was busy and he was aware of how thin the ice their professional relationship stood on. At this point in the game, any grievances he caused could wind up being the reason Woojin simply fired him. “I should have made sure I had everything on my end ready before I called you.”

“Chan, it’s fine,” Woojin insisted. “I don’t want you thinking you can never call me out. Your questions are fine. In fact, they are welcome. I’m just happy to see you cracking down and making an effort to improve your standing with the coven. You’re going to need such favor to stand even a chance at making it through the remainder of your probationary period.”

Even though they had wrapped their discussion up so plainly, Chan found himself not wanting the conversation to end. He didn’t want to hang up even though he knew Woojin was busy. Even though he himself was busy. Sure, he had Yongbok or Hyunjin or even Jisung for company, but it was so different speaking to someone… who wasn’t Yongbok or Hyunjin or Jisung. “I’ve been meaning to ask this,” Chan said in that brief phone silence where all other conversation had died and someone was about to say ‘well, I should probably go.’

“Yes, what is it,” Woojin asked.

Chan hesitated for a while but then let the words spill out of his mouth all at once, “Were you in the shop on Monday when Hyunjin made the bread explode?”

“When Hyunjin,” Woojin repeated slowly, “made... the bread... explode?”

“You sound like you don’t know what I’m talking about.”

“I do know. Dragons can magically superheat the internal structures of all substances in front of them, usually resulting in fire-”

Chan cut him off, “Not about how dragons work, I mean about the explosion in the shop. You sound like you don’t know.”

“This is the first I’m hearing about it, yes.” Chan could practically hear Woojin’s disapproving frown. The Regional Manager said, “There is paperwork you’re supposed to fill out in such cases.”

“It wasn’t all that bad,” Chan stated. “I cleaned up the soot and got everything straightened out. Nevermind all of that. Were you in my office on Monday?”

“No.”

“That’s what I figured with the conference call and all… but I could have sworn I heard your voice.”

“On… the phone? Chan, are you getting enough sleep?”

“I heard you on the phone but I also heard you in the shop, speaking to me directly as if you were standing in my office.”

Woojin’s voice got soft with concern. “I need to speak to HR and get you a few more payroll hours banked so that you can hire an employee or two. You’re clearly overworked.”

Chan shook his head only to belatedly remember that Woojin could not see him. “It’s not a case of being overworked. I heard you in my office. You were responding directly to what I was saying.” And now that Chan thought more about it, he had also heard Woojin’s voice when that banana bread explosion had knocked him flat on his back. He had even seen Woojin kneeling on the floor next to him. Well… kind of. The face was a little different. Maybe. A little see-through. Probably. “You don’t have to get me any more hours. I can handle the shop on my own.”

“Chan.”

“I mean it,” Chan said, forcing himself to sound bubbly and not-tired-at-all. “I’ve worked out an exclusive contract with a reliable courier and everything. I’ve added the service to my expenses spreadsheet. Did you see my email? I even projected how much it’ll be a month. Cheaper than the post, right?”

There was silence on the line and then, “Look… Chan, I think you’re taking this-”

Hyunjin screamed. His voice echoed down the hall like a siren.

The noise jolted through Chan like electricity. He stood up. “Woojin, I have to go.” Before the Regional Manager could respond, Chan disconnected the call and dashed out of his office and up the hall, fully expecting Hyunjin to be hurt in some way. “Hyunjin,” he shouted, charging out into the main shop. “What’s wrong?”

Hyunjin sat on the stool behind the cash wrap right where Chan had left him half an hour ago. The boy grinned wide and called out, “I’m playing the game!”

“The game?” Chan repeated lamely.

Then it hit him.

Sit On This Stool And Holler If A Customer Comes In. Chan relaxed. Maybe next time, he should change the title of the game so that it would not involve sudden ear-splitting noises. “Where’s the customer?”

Hyunjin shrugged his shoulders up to his ears. “I don’t know.”

“You don’t know? The store’s not that big.”

“I don’t know,” Hyunjin repeated. “Yongbok said there was someone in the store so I hollered like you told me to.” He gasped. “Did I win the game? I won, right? Is there a prize, Christopher Robin? There has to be a prize when you win a game. That’s the rule!”

“How about we make hot chocolate tonight? Is that a good enough prize?”

“That’s the bestest prize ever, Chan-Chan-Chan. I’m glad I won.”

“Me, too,” Chan sighed. Hot chocolate sounded spectacular. Especially if Chan drizzled a little whiskey into his. He would need it after a day like today. “Where’s Yongbok?”

Hyunjin pointed towards Aisle 2.

Chan went to the indicated location prepared to help a customer but Yongbok was the only person standing in the aisle. The black-haired boy stood still and tense, his eyes narrowed and his fists clenched. In a low voice, he said, “There’s something there.”

“Again?” Chan asked. He really didn’t have time for Yongbok’s weirdness.

“Yes,” the boy said. He pointed his chin towards the other end of the aisle, near the right. “It’s standing right there.” Now he was pointing his chin towards the left. “It’s... right there. It knows I’m onto it. It’s backing away.”

Chan would have given up and gone back to work if he hadn’t seen it. No, if he hadn’t almost seen it. It was a little blur in the air. Subtle. Like steam rising above a pot of boiling water. There and gone but there enough to convince Chan that Yongbok was indeed right. There was something there. Chan formulated a plan. “We’ll corner it,” he whispered out of the side of his mouth to Yongbok.

Yongbok made an affirmative noise in the back of his throat.

“Hyunjin,” Chan called out, not turning away from the spot he’d last seen the blur. “Come here.”

He heard Hyunjin’s merry footsteps on the hardwood floor behind him.

“We’re going to play another new game.”

“Yay!” Hyunjin shouted.

Chan shushed him.

“Yay,” Hyunjin repeated at a much lower volume.

“Here are the rules. Go stand in front of the shop door, okay? Go down Aisle 3.”

“Okay.” Hyunjin skipped down the aisle, temporarily gone from sight, and then reappeared at the far end of the shop. As he was told, he stood in front of the shop door.

“Now make your scariest face,” Chan told him.

“Roar,” Hyunjin yelled excitedly, making claw shapes with his hands and scrunching up his nose. The end result wasn’t scary. In the slightest. But that was okay.

“Stay here,” Chan whispered to Yongbok. “I’m going to go around to the other end and box it in.”

Yongbok made another noise in his throat. The incandescent lights hanging from the ceiling hit his eyes at just the right angle, making them turn a bright yellow for the briefest of blink-and-you-missed-it moments.

Chan rushed down Aisle 1, made a turn at the end and stood at the opposite end of Aisle 2 from Yongbok. “Is it still there?”

Yongbok nodded. Hard enough to make the bell on his collar jingle.

Chan pulled his wand free from his pocket and held it out in front of him, already stringing together rhyming words he could use to reveal whatever strange guest was in the shop. He took a step forward and then another and another. If he could just reveal whatever this thing was, he could find a method to get rid of it. “Bright as copper, bright as gold, shine a light so bright that-”

It seemed to happen in slow motion. His untied shoelace, caught beneath his other boot as he stepped, tripped him up. He was thrown forward. Off balance. He had plenty of time to think as he fell. ‘I’m falling,’ he thought. An ‘I should have tied my shoelaces. Why did I let Yongbok stop me?’ slipped in there. He also had no time to think. One moment he was upright and the next he was on the floor, limbs spread around him like he was a starfish as pain jolted up his chest and legs. His wand popped out of his hand and skittered across the floor in front of him, the tip of it glowing with an unfinished spell. Behind him, he heard Hyunjin start to laugh and laugh and laugh at his expense. Above him, he heard more laughter.

Yet… not Yongbok’s.

Someone else’s. Light and crackling where Yongbok’s was low and flat, where Hyunjin’s was big and round.

There had been no one in the aisle in front of Chan a moment ago but now there was someone .

They were a little see-through at first, a little blurry and wavy like smoke, but the harder they laughed, the more solid they appeared. The less see-through they became. It was like laughing broke whatever camouflage spell they had cast on themselves. They laughed a little bit harder and sank to their knees, clutching their stomach like they’d just been told the best joke. “You…” The no-longer-see-through person squeaked out, pointing in Chan’s direction. “You- You fell flat on your face! Oh… oh… You fell like a tree! The- The noise you made.” They could hardly speak the words because they were laughing so hard.

Hyunjin came up the aisle behind Chan. “Hey. How are you? I’m Hyunjin. Are you nice? If you’re nice, let’s be friends! If you’re not nice, can you be nice so that we can be friends?”

“Hold on, Hyunjin,” Chan grunted. “Let’s figure out why he’s here before you go around introducing yourself.”

The stranger kept laughing. Slapping his knee like a fall was truly that hilarious to watch.

His face bright red, Chan pushed himself to his feet, grabbed his wand off of the floor and stomped up the rest of the aisle towards the young boy. “So it’s you who has been causing trouble in my shop?”

The boy’s laughter died out. With his camouflage spell broken and his form completely corporeal, he just looked like a child. When he caught sight of the wand pointed in his direction, he stared up at Chan with big wide eyes and a nervous smile showing off crooked teeth. He held up his hands in surrender, “I’m not causing trouble! I swear. I just like to observe.”

“You just like to observe? How creepy is that?” Chan looked past the boy towards Yongbok, who had come up the aisle behind him to keep him from trying to run. “Is this the thing you’ve been seeing in the shop, Yongbok?”

“The smell is the same,” Yongbok confirmed, scrunching up his nose.

“Hey, I’m not a thing. I’m a person.” The boy jumped up to his feet but in the brief moment it took him to do it, his face had changed. Even his body shape had changed. No, his entire being had morphed into something else.

Chan found himself looking into the eyes of a mirror image of himself. Curly, silver hair. Sleepy brown eyes. A tired grimace. Even the details of his witch’s uniform had been copied. All the way down to the untied shoelace. “Great Big Blue,” Chan whispered, his eyes wide in awe. He lowered his wand and shook his head like he could not believe what he was seeing. “Would you look at that? We’ve got ourselves a mimic.”

Chapter Text

“We’ve got ourselves a mimic,” mimicked Fake-Chan in Real-Chan’s voice and Real-Chan’s accent. Fake-Chan pointed his finger at Real-Chan in a real, mocking manner.

“This is actually kind of amazing,” said Real-Chan, unfazed now that he knew what he was up against.

“This is actually kind of amazing,” mimicked the mimic.

“Do you know how rare mimics are?”

“Do you know how rare mimics are?”

“What’s a mimic?” Hyunjin asked, propping his chin up on Real-Chan’s shoulder.

Chan was pleasantly surprised the boy wasn’t terrified. Or maybe Hyunjin was a little bit braver than Chan always thought. Or, and this was far more likely, more Chans meant more fun. Real-Chan tilted his head to look at the dragon boy. “They are mystical creatures that can hear a voice and perfectly copy that voice, see a face and perfectly copy that face. Loosely related to fairies, I think.”

“Chameleons wish they were so talented,” Yongbok piped up.

Fake-Chan frowned. “We aren’t remotely related to chameleons or fairies. That’s not how we work.”

“That’s not how we work,” Real-Chan got him back.

“Okay, you can’t do that. That’s unfair.”

“But how come you can do it,” Chan asked with a grin. “You come into my store and copy my face and my voice but I can’t have a little fun?”

Yongbok folded his arms across his chest. “He can’t copy your smell, though. He kind of stinks.” Then he corrected himself. “Not kind of. He does stink.”

Fake-Chan turned to look at Yongbok. “I take offense to that.”

“Good,” Yongbok said with a smirk, “because I was definitely trying to offend.”

“Yongbok, are you saying I smell nice?” Chan questioned.

Yongbok nodded. “Like home.”

Oh. “Well…” Chan’s voice died in his throat.

Fake-Chan stepped close to Real-Chan. “Are you scared? You should be scared. You’re in the presence of a mimic. I am you and you am I.”

Real-Chan tilted his head to the side. “Hmm. Why is that something to fear?”

“Don’t humans freak out when they are faced with themselves?”

“Their innermost thoughts, yeah. Their secret desires, probably. Someone who looks like them? Probably not.” Real-Chan shrugged. “What are the chances?”

“Well, you should fear me,” said the mimic.

“Why?”

“Because I’m evil.”

Hyunjin stepped forward. “Hi, Evil! My name is Hyunjin. I think I told you that already. Do you want to be friends?”

Fake-Chan frowned. “No. My name’s not Evil. I’m trying to be evil. My name is Jeongin.”

“Hi, Jeongin! I’m Hyunjin. You’re so nice. Everyone Chan meets is super nice. I tried to tell him that but he won’t believe me. You’re nice, right?”

This made Fake-Chan get creases in his forehead as he scowled harder. “I’m not nice. I’m evil.”

“If you’re so evil,” Yongbok pointed out, “what are you doing here in the most not-evil place in Seoul and not, I don’t know, at the driver’s license place or something?”

Jeongin, still wearing Chan’s face, said, “An attack against a District Witch is the most evil of evil deeds, right? That’s why I’m here.”

Yongbok looked genuinely perplexed. “ This is an attack? More like an annoyance.”

Tapping his finger to his chin, Real-Chan took a close look at Fake-Chan. He really should have been more concerned about the fact that an actual mimic--a borderline legendary being--was in his shop but wasn’t this one of the few opportunities he’d ever get to look at himself the way other people looked at him? Without the strange lens of a mirror to get in the way, without the bias of his own skewed perspective. He leaned in close. Hmmm. Were the dark circles beneath his eyes really that pronounced? Did his butt always look so big in his work pants? And… “Is that what my forehead looks like with a hat on?” Great Big Blue, sometimes ignorance was bliss.

“I think it’s a pretty accurate representation if I do say so myself,” said Fake-Chan. Proudly, he poked and prodded at his not-face. “I’ve been slipping in and out of here for weeks now. Observing.” He stepped close and poked Real-Chan in the chest. “And I’ve learned some secrets about you and your past that I’m sure you don’t want getting out.”

Hyunjin let out an excited shrill and bounded excitedly up to Fake-Chan. He threaded his arm around Fake-Chan’s elbow and then spun around and did the same to Real-Chan. “I just realized! Now I have two dads!”

“That’s not how that works,” Real-Chan corrected him.

“That’s not how that works,” Fake-Chan mimicked.

“Aww. I wanted two dads.” Hyunjin looked back and forth between the two Chans, his eyes big and wide. “Oh, which one is which? Chris, where are you?”

Real-Chan raised his hand.

“Of course!” Hyunjin laughed. “I knew that.” He propped his chin up on Chan’s shoulder. “I knew! I’m not playing a game. I knew the whole time.”

Fake-Chan stomped his foot. “None of you are taking this seriously. This is an attack and I will strike fear into your hearts.” He raised his voice almost to a shout. “I am going to destroy Chan. And then I’m going to become Chan. And then I’m going to take over the District! And then, after that, all of Seoul will be beneath my thumb!”

No one moved.

Yongbok jangled the bell on his collar.

Chan cleared his throat. “You think District 9 is a good place to launch your world-domination scheme?” It was like speaking to a child with a hyperactive imagination. “How… exactly are you going to do that?”

Jeongin glared. “Isn’t it obvious? I’m a mimic. If I get you mad enough, I can consume your soul and become the real you.”

Yongbok snorted and leaned against the shelf, clearly entertained. “Did you really do all of this-” he waved a hand up and down the aisle, encompassing this whole absurd situation, “-just to make Chan mad? That Chan over there?” He pointed. “ That one? You definitely don’t know what you’re doing.”

“Yeah, you definitely don’t know what you’re doing,” Hyunjin cheerfully added, pressing his forehead against Chan’s temple.

Fake-Chan pried himself loose of Hyunjin’s grip and spun towards Real-Chan. “Wait, you’re not mad? You’re supposed to be mad. I could ruin you. With the things I know. I could destroy you with the things I can reveal.”

“Chan doesn’t get mad,” Hyunjin explained. “Not even when I make really big messes.”

Yongbok chuckled. “You’ve got that right. I try my best to annoy him but he just goes ‘ugh, I need some coffee’ and then he goes and gets a coffee.”

“Well…” Chan couldn’t even argue with that. He drank a lot of coffee. He needed it. If there was a way to replace his blood with the stuff, he’d do it. “I can’t say I never get mad.”

“You don’t,” Yongbok told him. “You just sigh and ask the Big Blue Bird for strength really quietly like I can’t hear.”

That felt just a tad personal but Chan figured he also did that too often to argue that point either. “I suppose I do. And I suppose she does give me the strength. From time to time.” Never when he truly needed it, but...

Fake-Chan put his hands up on his hips. “How do I make you angry?” He leaned into Real-Chan’s face. “I need you to get angry, you know. I feed off of confusion and rage. It fuels me. How do I upset you?”

Chan had to laugh. The kid sounded more like a child throwing a tantrum than any kind of wannabe evil overlord.

“I’m serious,” Fake-Chan huffed. “I’m going to make you mad, turn that emotion against you and see to your downfall!”

“Oh, that sounds like a very fun game,” Hyunjin said, squeezing Chan’s arm. “Are there a lot of rules? I’m not good at games with a lot of rules. Rules can be so much to remember and I’m not good at remembering.”

Yongbok leaned off of the shelf, stepped forward and motioned the others close. They all leaned in, hands on shoulders, like they were in a team huddle before a big sports game. “One way to get on Chan’s nerves is to wait for him to ask you to do something and then,” Yongbok lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper, “you don’t do it.”

Hyunjin’s eyes went wide with realization. “I do that all of the time because I forget!”

“But I don’t really get mad,” Chan said urgently.

“Exactly,” Yongbok agreed. “That’s my point.” He turned to Fake-Chan and patted him on the shoulder almost pityingly. “You’re never going to get him mad. He just goes ‘hey, that’s enough cream’ and then he takes away the cream.”

“Or or or or,” Hyunjin jumped up and down, sending their huddle sideways, “he says ‘no more peanut butter’ and then he takes away the peanut butter!”

Chan turned to Hyunjin. “I didn’t take away the peanut butter, Hyunjin. You just forgot where you put the jar.”

“Where is it, Chan? I’ve been looking all over!”

“It’s on the table in front of the big map because that’s where you were sitting when you were on your snack break.”

“Oh yeah! Okay. Now I remember. I still have a lot of crackers to eat.” Hyunjin unwrapped his arms from around both Chans, broke away from the huddle and bounded off down the aisle to retrieve his favorite treat.

This wasn’t a joyous moment for everyone, though. “How come he gets his peanut butter back but I don’t get my cream back,” Yongbok whined, looking significantly put upon.

“Because I’m responsible for Hyunjin. You just… come in here a lot and use up all of the cream.”

This made Yongbok frown and slink away. “I don’t use all of it. I always leave you some.”

“Barely enough,” Chan shouted at his retreating back.

“I’m going for a walk,” Yongbok said, approaching the shop’s front door.

“Where’s your coat?” Chan warned. “It’s freezing out there.”

“I’ve got a coat,” Yongbok hollered back, pushing open the door and stepping outside in nothing but a dark gray sweater.

None of this pleased Fake-Chan at all. He stepped close to Real-Chan again, getting right up in his face like a witch across the street always did. “So do you have some infinite supply of patience or something?” He narrowed his eyes. “How do you do that? How do you just smile through it all? I’ll find a way to wear you down and break you.”

It should have been a powerful threat but, honestly, Chan worked in retail. He was already worn down and broken so such words felt hollow and meaningless to him. “You’ll need to try a different approach, Jeongin. Or!” A spectacular idea popped into his head. “You can go bug the witch across the street!”

Fake-Chan grit his teeth. “I’ll think of something. I’ll find your weakness and exploit it. Just you wait. You’ll cry for your mother when I’m done with you.”

“Why?” Chan had to know. “Why would you go through all of this trouble? I’ve done nothing to you. I don’t even know you.”

“It’s what we mimics do. We trick and fool and deceive. It’s what we’re born to do. We’re evil!”

“Sure,” Chan said. He supposed. It would be just his luck that a creature as rare as a mimic would show up in his shop only to want to annihilate him or whatever. He waved his hand dismissively. “I still highly recommend you go after the witch across the street. He’s about this tall, really big eyes, really sharp nose. You can’t miss him. Do to him what you’re doing to me and you’ll get all the anger and frustration you can stomach if he doesn’t magic you to Timbuktu first.”

The front door swung open with a bang. The bell above the door jangled and Jisung announced his arrival by screaming for no reason. He rolled into the shop, his bright orange hair like a beacon. “Sup, witches!” On his rollerblades, Jisung came up Aisle 2 and skidded to a stop in front of the two Chans. “I finished all of the deliveries and before you hexing say a word, I don’t know how to use that app!” He looked from one Chan to the other without batting an eyelash, without being concerned at all about there being two identical District Witches standing in front of him. “Hey, old man,” he swung his backpack off of his shoulder and then reached into it elbow-deep. “I brought you your mail. No charge this time.” He pulled his arm free and shoved a handful of letters into Real-Chan’s hands. “I’ve got a hex-ton more. Give me a sec.”

Chan tried his best to grab all of the letters and small parcels before they fell to the floor. “How did you know I’m the real one?”

Jisung looked at Fake-Chan and then turned back to Real-Chan. “That one over there looks too hexing mad. You never get mad.”

“See? I told you,” Hyunjin shouted, listening in from the other side of the store. “Even when I make a mess he doesn’t get mad!”

Smiling, Jisung said, “Yeah, even in an army of mirror images, I think I’ll always be able to tell which one is the real you. You don’t get angry, you just sigh a lot, old man. And your eyes do this sparkly thing like you’re always about to hexing cry like a baby or something.”

Chan probably should have taken offense to all of that but, in some odd and roundabout way, it felt like a compliment coming from Jisung. He said, “I guess emotional states can’t be copied, either.”

Jeongin growled out, “Ooh, I’ll learn everything about you, alright. I’ll watch and I’ll get better at copying you and, eventually, no one will be able to tell a difference and then I’ll take over your spot as Witch and rule the District!” He raised his hands to the ceiling dramatically. The pose would have been far more effective with a lightning flash outside and a deep rumble of thunder echoing in the distance.

All he got as background noise was a burp from Jisung.

Chan couldn’t help but giggle. Great Big Blue! Could he have one normal day? Just one ! It was all he asked.

“Stop laughing,” Jeongin protested. He wagged a finger in Chan’s face. “I’ll show you the darkness of a mimic’s curse! I’ll send you straight to the depths of melancholy and despair and then I’ll feast on your-”

“Are you done?” Jisung interrupted him, frowning.

“I’m not done. I’ll never be done,” Jeongin intoned.

“Excuse him,” said Chan. “He’s just a mimic doing mimic things, I guess.”

Jisung pulled another handful of mail out of his backpack and shoved it into Real-Chan’s arms. “That’s really a mimic? Holy hex on an altar! Can we sell it? Do you know how much hexing money we’d make on the black market for one of these things?”

Fake-Chan’s earlier bravado vanished instantly. He backed away and let out a nervous laugh. “Let’s not do anything hasty here.”

Jisung shoved the last bit of mail on top of the towering pile already in Chan’s arms. He said, “Mimics are rarer than dragons. Aren’t they in danger? Endangered? Chan, if I sell it I can get some fat hexing stacks of cash! I can retire and maybe I’ll give you a couple bucks. You know, as a finder’s fee or something.” Jisung spun around on his skates and rolled up to the mimic, reaching out like he was ready to grab Jeongin and haul him off somewhere right then and there.

“Okay, how about we don’t do any of that,” Jeongin laughed again, backing away from the orange-haired boy’s reaching hands. He didn’t quite succeed. Jisung grabbed him around the middle and Jeongin’s laughter broke his illusion. Chan’s face morphed and changed and turned back into the childish visage Jeongin wore earlier. “This is inhumane treatment!”

“Inhumane treatment?” The District Witch shifted his weight from one foot to the other, struggling beneath the cumbersome stack of packages and mail in his arms. “Weren’t you just going on and on about being evil and wanting to take over my District,” Chan asked, his tone firm like that of a teacher’s. “Don’t you think that’s inhumane treatment?”

Jeongin let out a panicked yelp, ducked under Jisung’s arms and fled towards the shop door. “I’ll be back! With a plan so heinous your eyes will bulge out of your heads. You won’t be laughing at me then.” The bell signaled his hasty exit.

Chan sighed. He attempted to relax only to remember the stack of mail in his arms. He straightened up again. “Thanks for helping me get rid of him, Jisung.”

Jisung groaned and pointed at the door. “The hex are you talking about? Are you kidding, old man? I wasn’t trying to help you. I was trying to get rich quick! I’d never have to work another hexing day in my hexing life if I turned him in.” He started to skate down Aisle 2 towards the cash wrap. “Where’s Hyunjin?”

“You’re not going to sell Hyunjin,” Chan told him.

“You really think I hexing would?” He glanced over his shoulder. “Don’t look at me like that, old man. I bought him a toy for hex’s sake and I wanted to give it to him.”

“Does it make noise? Please tell me it doesn’t make noise.” He’d had more than enough noise for one day.

Jisung rolled around the corner of the aisle and out of sight. “It doesn’t make noise.”

Chan raised his voice to be heard over the new distance. “Does it not make noise or are you only saying it doesn’t make noise because I told you to tell me it doesn’t make noise?”

There was the distinctive squeak of some kind of plastic toy. And then there was the distinctive squeak of Hyunjin squeaking in unadulterated happiness.

It was going to be a long afternoon. “I need coffee,” Chan muttered aloud.

★☆

By closing time, the Big Blue Bird’s feathers had darkened enough outside that Chan could see all of the lights on inside of Minho’s Trinkets And Tokens across the way.

Sometime earlier that afternoon, when Chan hadn’t been paying attention (not that he was paying attention!), Minho had returned. Chan could see the silhouettes of customers through the glass and, at one point, even watched Minho himself redo the entire window display, taking down the pestle and mortar sets and replacing them with tarot card decks, star maps and palmistry charts. There was even a moment where Minho had paused his work to stare through the window and look directly at Chan as if he knew the District Witch had been watching but Chan made himself believe it was just coincidence.

An hour later, shortly after six in the evening, Chan saw the lights cut out as Minho began closing up shop for the night. Chan really only needed to see one thing. It wouldn’t take long.

“Why are we still standing here, old man,” Jisung complained, shivering in his coat as the trio stood at the curb outside of the shop. “Didn’t we close like an hour ago?”

“Be patient,” Chan chastised.

Jisung wasn’t having it. “We could have been at your place by now. We could have had fried chicken delivered!”

Hyunjin squeezed the tummy of the teddy bear in his hands and it let out a cute, bright squeak. He had to have squeezed the fluffy thing a million times over the course of the afternoon yet, every single time he did it, his eyes lit up like he was hearing the noise for the very first time all over again.

“We’re just waiting,” Chan stated. Waiting to see if Minho was… okay. Chan rubbed his palms together for warmth and tried to think back to any time in the afternoon where he had said or did something to imply that Jisung was invited over for dinner. “It shouldn’t be much longer.”

Jisung moaned with annoyance. He shoved his hands in the pockets of his coat, his rollerblades slung around his neck. “Can you at least tell me what we’re waiting on? I’m tired and have been up on my feet all day.”

“You don’t have to wait with us, Jisung,” Chan told him. “You can head home whenever you feel like it.”

“But you made me give the key back to Woojin!”

“Not to my house,” Chan said.

Jisung muttered something under his breath that sounded dangerously similar to “Where else would I go?” He raised his hands to the beanie on his head and pulled it down a bit farther to cover more of his red-from-the-cold ears. He asked again, “Why are we waiting? Is something bad going to happen?”

“No, it’s… it’s not that important.”

“Important enough to stand out here and freeze our hexing balls off, though.”

Chan looked up at him. “I told you, you can go on somewhere without waiting on us.” Chan tried his best to strongly suggest Jisung head to his actual home.

Jisung heard the message loud and clear if the dark, troubled expression that crossed his face was any clue. “Why can’t I stay at your place?” He bit his bottom lip and his cheeks flushed with shame. “Why can’t I call your place home?”

He had asked it so quietly, the noise of traffic had smothered his voice so thoroughly, that Chan was positive Jisung hadn’t meant to say that aloud. Chan glanced over at Hyunjin but the boy was still occupied with his new toy. He turned back to Jisung and lowered his voice. “Do you not have a home?”

Jisung laughed sharply, but it wasn't as if there was any joy behind the noise. He kept his eyes on the public bus driving past them. “Just because I flunked out doesn’t mean I’m homeless.”

Chan let the tension seep out of his spine. He knew Jisung was lying but he also knew the headstrong boy was too proud to admit something like that when directly asked. The District Witch said, “Fine. You can come over for a visit.”

The smile that played across Jisung’s lips was microscopic but Chan knew that it’s true size expanded greater than the Big Blue Bird’s wingspan.

Chan turned his attention back to the building across the street.

Another set of lights had been turned off inside Minho’s shop and he could see the black shape of Minho’s hat drift from one end of the shop to the other in one last walkthrough. Chan knew the deal. Looking into every nook and cranny, looking up and down every aisle, just to make sure before you left. Making sure of what was hard to say but it was impossible to walk out the door at the end of the day without making sure . Chan had done that exact process himself an hour ago.

Hyunjin squeezed his teddy bear again, smiling brightly at the sound it made.

The District Witch looked over at him. Waiting in the snow didn’t seem all that bad to Chan. If only because seeing Hyunjin smile like that kept him warm inside. He spun to look at Jisung, not knowing why he hadn’t said this sooner, “Thanks for getting him that.”

“Old man, don’t get mushy.” Jisung turned up his nose in an attempt at disgust. “And definitely don’t mention it.”

“If you want, I can get you something.”

“It’s a hexing gift ! I didn’t buy it to get anything in return.”

“That’s surprisingly selfless of you.”

“I said, don’t mention it,” Jisung reiterated. He visibly shivered from the cold. “It’s the least I can do after… well, everything.”

“We don’t have to wait much longer,” reassured Chan. It was nearing six fifteen. If Minho’s process was in any way similar to Chan’s, they were down to only a handful of seconds. Not even that. Chan turned his gaze back to Minho’s shop just as the witch he was waiting on stepped out into the night. Silently, Chan watched as Minho locked up his shop. A turn of the key. A pull of the latch. A flamboyant twirl of the keyring. Minho then tipped the brim of his hat down over his face, hiding most of his features in shadow, and walked up the sidewalk in the direction of (Chan could only assume) his home. Chan sighed. “He really needs a thicker jacket in this weather.”

“Huh?” Jisung asked. “You say something?”

Chan shook his head. “Nothing important.” He reached up and patted Jisung and Hyunjin on their shoulders. “Alright, boys. Let’s go.” He started down the sidewalk, headed towards the edge of the District where his house stood. He would have flown. He should have flown. Honestly, he needed to get used to carrying Hyunjin around, but the thought of leaving Jisung behind hurt him even if he’d just been trying to shoo the boy away. As Jisung filed into step next to him, Chan reached out a hand behind him to keep the wonderfully distracted Hyunjin within arm’s reach.

Jisung tried his dinner idea again. “Hey, can I order take out?”

“Jisung, we have plenty of food at the house.”

“I have money.”

“My money,” Chan pressed.

“That you gave to me so now it’s mine.”

He had a point. “We have plenty of leftovers, Jisung. Save your money.”

“Fine, fine. Well, can we light up the hexing fireplace tonight? The house is a little drafty at night.”

“We can do that,” Chan acquiesced. Spiked hot chocolate and a nap by the fire sounded like the perfect combination to relax his shoulder muscles and rest his eyes a little before he stayed up half the night replying to resident letters and coming up with an action plan that would satisfy Woojin and the coven.

“Are you sure we can’t order anything,” whined Jisung. “That’ll be fish for breakfast and dinner today and, hex, probably fish for breakfast and dinner tomorrow, too.”

Chan gave in. “I’ll get something tomorrow after work. I promise. We have plenty of food and shouldn’t waste it.”

“You better not forget, old man, or I’ll check you into a retirement home.”

They fell into a comfortable silence as they walked.

Chan didn’t want to get too sappy and sentimental, so he kept the thoughts to himself, but he found himself wondering why Jisung, Hyunjin and Yongbok just couldn’t seem to leave him alone. Not in a mean way. He was genuinely curious as to what parts of him they saw that made them want to stay. Why had he found Hyunjin on his doorstep? Why had Yongbok brought him that dead bird? Why was it Jisung who ended up being on the other end of that courier app?

Such connections should have been tenuous at best, he thought. Hyunjin should have taken the sandwich and then asked for food from someone else. Yongbok could have been like any other resident and just gone about his normal daily life after offering his name and gift. Jisung should have only come to the shop when called upon to do deliveries. It all seemed so transient to Chan. They could have met once and moved on but by some strange twist of destiny, they all decided to just cling to him.

It was almost as if they chose him. Like a witch chooses their apprentice. Like an apprentice chooses their family, regardless of blood or papers.

Family. What a big, heavy word.

So big and so heavy that Chan was certainly thinking about it all wrong.

Hyunjin might have been a bit different but, surely, Yongbok and Jisung were only taking advantage of his kindness. Right?

The answer to that question was even bigger and even heavier than family, bigger than what he was equipped to deal with, so Chan just let it go and prayed the thought wouldn’t come back.

They had reached the far edge of the District by then.

Snow was still piled up across the street corners of the quiet, suburban neighborhood and the street Chan lived on was lit up in multiple colors due to everyone’s Winter Solstice decorations. Almost everyone’s. Chan’s house was still dark and bare, a black hole in the center of all of the bright, festive lights.

One day, he promised himself. One day he’d decorate. Not just the shop but his house, too. When he wasn’t so exhausted when he got home after work. When he wasn’t feeling like he barely possessed the strength to make it upstairs to his room at the end of the day.

One day.

“Kitty!” Hyunjin shouted, rushing forward and pulling out of Chan’s grasp.

Chan looked up. Sitting on the porch, tail swaying back and forth casually, was Felix. “This is new,” Chan exhaled. “You usually only hang around the shop. How’d you find out where I live?”

Felix meowed as if in reply.

Hyunjin hopped up the stairs two at a time and then dropped to his knees to pet the black cat.

“Hey, Felix!” Jisung called out, following Hyunjin up the front steps.

Felix meowed again like he was saying ‘hey’ back.

“Meow if you want take-out,” Jisung bribed him with a scritch under the chin.

Felix just looked at him, the metronome of his swinging tail not slowing for a second.

“See?” Chan said, fishing his keys out of his pocket. “He knows there’s food at the house.”

“The one time you don’t meow,” scolded Jisung.

To spite him, Felix meowed.

“Traitor,” Jisung hollered. He stopped petting Felix and stood up, folding his arms across his chest as if having fish and rice and clam chowder again was that terrible of a thing to have to do.

Chan got the right key in his hand but then paused as he found himself worrying if Minho also made it home alright. His mind conjured the image of the snarky witch pulling the brim of his hat low and rushing off down the street, probably to some fancy apartment where he lived alone with that massive, hideous snake. Well, at least Chan had seen him since their romp in the cemetery and Minho seemed to be okay. Maybe his absence earlier in the afternoon was completely harmless. Perhaps Chan was just worrying for no reason. It did tend to be a thing he got stuck in often but that was a side effect of keeping an eye on Hyunjin, Yongbok and Jisung all of the time. The boys always made him worry. Just in different ways.

Chan unlocked the door and pushed it open.

Hyunjin rushed into the house first, squeezing his new teddy bear repeatedly and making it squeak.

Jisung charged in immediately after.

“Shoes!” Chan shouted.

He saw one of Hyunjin’s shoes fly through the air towards the foyer. Then the other.

“Coats,” Chan called out.

Jisung yanked his coat off of his shoulders and dropped it to the floor, then he ran down the hall in the direction of the living room.

“No running indoors,” he yelled, but it was probably too late for all of that.

Chan realized he was still standing at the front door as if something had compelled him to stay rooted to his spot on the porch. He was forgetting something. Chan looked down.

Felix sat a short distance away, yellow eyes staring big and gleaming up at Chan.

“Where did you get that,” Chan asked him.

Under Felix’s paw was the pale blue ribbon he had given Yongbok. Felix meowed as if to explain himself and then he turned his head towards the inside of the house as if silently asking for permission to enter.

Chan gave in. “Okay. Come on in, boy.”

Felix stepped back, grabbed the ribbon in his mouth and then darted between Chan’s boots, disappearing into the warm, cozy glow of the house.

Chapter Text

It was getting late.

Chan was sitting up in bed with plenty of hot beverage within reach this time. Fresh-made hot chocolate. He’d gone out to buy the milk and dark chocolate and had supervised Jisung at the stove to teach him how to make a batch. A little bit of brown sugar sprinkled in. A touch of honey for flavor. Of course, when mugs were filled and marshmallows were dumped on top, Chan drizzled a little whiskey into his.

He was only halfway through responding to his pile of resident letters when his bedroom door swung open.

“Jisung!” Chan yelped, looking up. Then he remembered what hour of the night it was and dropped the volume of his voice. “Don’t you knock?”

Jisung padded into the room on bare feet, wearing a loose-fitting shirt and boxers. He was carrying a stack of papers and his yellow plastic glasses still managed to make him look uncharacteristically studious despite his nuclear hair. “Like you’d ever do anything in here but paperwork, old man.”

That was probably true, but… “That’s not the point,” Chan scolded. “This isn’t your room.” Or your house.

Felix, curled into a ball near Chan’s elbow, sat up a little to watch Jisung cross the room towards them.

“Anyways.” Jisung flopped down next to Chan, not caring that he was squishing letters underneath him and knocking packages aside with his knees.

Chan rushed to move his things out of the boy’s way before something wound up damaged or torn. “Is there something that you need? Because I’m kind of in the middle of something.”

Jisung propped himself up on the headboard, just like Chan was doing. “Would I come all the way to the end of the hall if I didn’t need something?” But then he proceeded to just sit there quietly, thumbing through his papers, marking them up with the pencil in his hand.

Felix nuzzled his head against Chan’s elbow and went back to purring nice and low.

“Did you need help?” Chan tried again.

Jisung kept sifting through the papers he had brought in with him, acting like he hadn’t heard.

Giving up on receiving any kind of answer from Jisung, Chan went back to his own work:

A high school student wanted to cheat their way through their final exams and demanded a spell that could help. Chan suggested the boy get a library card, as they were free, and to use the library’s generous resources to study between now and his finals. Another letter asked for a surefire way to nail a job interview because, surely, there was a charm for that. Chan did a little research and then replied with a list of the right questions to ask your interviewer and a list of the wrong answers to give. A third resident had been in a romantic relationship for nearly a year and was desperate for their partner to pop the question, preferably with a big ring. Chan suggested the ancient art of communication, figuring that a conversation about engagement may start the couple on the road to diamond rings and wedding bells.

Chan knew that many of his residents were writing to him for magical ways to coast through life’s many setbacks and even he had to admit that it was quite tempting to help them do it. He could take a couple of hours to work up spells for all of these rather mundane situations but it wouldn’t have been worth it in the long run. What was life without gaining the experiences of being challenged ? How fun could life really be if all of its problems could be solved with a rhyme and a trick? Even Chan had his moments of weakness, wondering if he could solve all of his issues with spells but he wasn’t a genie who indiscriminately granted wishes. He was a District Witch with a duty to guide, lead and protect his community. A duty he could not perform by simply handing powerful spells over to just anyone who asked for them.

Magic wasn’t about shortcuts, despite the general public’s belief to the contrary.

After a while, perhaps about half an hour or so, Chan reached for the hot chocolate on his nightstand only to smack his hand against Jisung’s shoulder because he had forgotten that the boy was sitting next to him. Chan was surprised. This was his first time realizing Jisung could sit still and be quiet long enough for his presence in a room to be forgotten.

“Sorry,” Chan said, giving Jisung’s shoulder a pat where he had hit him.

Without looking up from his papers, Jisung reached over to the nightstand, grabbed the mug of hot chocolate and handed it to Chan. “You let it get cold,” he mumbled.

Chan took the mug. The marshmallows had congealed into a thick, terribly gooey, sugary cloud on top but the chocolate beneath was savory and still a touch above room temperature. Regardless, the whiskey he’d poured in, not much but enough , lit the smallest of fires in his belly as he drank.

Chan glanced at the clock on his nightstand. He wasn’t prepared for the fact that it was nearly two in the morning. He looked at Jisung. “Why are you still up?”

“Why are you still up,” Jisung shot back.

Before Chan could take another swallow of his spiked hot chocolate, a yawn escaped him. He knew staying up all night wasn’t the healthiest of patterns but sleeping just felt like a waste of time. Maybe if he caught a really quick nap, he could finish replying to these letters before he had to get ready for work in the morning.

The only good thing about running a government building, Chan thought, was that the shop was closed on the weekends. This should have been an amazing concept but all he could think about was the fact that if he didn’t have his District’s mana flow problem solved by Sunday, he wouldn’t have a shop to go back to come Monday. He had let the deadline crawl another day closer and he still had no clue how to find the source of the mana disturbance.

Perhaps he should have spent the night on patrol rather than in the kitchen teaching Jisung how to make hot chocolate?

Ugh. Just when he thought he was doing enough.

“I’ve been thinking it through,” Jisung said, spreading the papers he’d been scribbling on out in an arc across Chan’s comforter, “and I’ve actually come up with the ideal route.”

“What are you talking about?” Chan asked. He hoped Jisung hadn’t been talking to him this whole time. He had not been listening.

“My deliveries, Chan.” Jisung pointed at his papers. “Look.”

Chan glanced down at the pages. At first glance, it just looked like smudged chicken scratch spread across numerous sheets of paper, like some kind of abstract painting that belonged in a museum, but as Jisung made minor adjustments to the angles that the papers sat and then slotted them closer together like puzzle pieces, Chan realized he was looking at a map. Just… not one he’d ever seen before. “Wouldn’t it have been easier to use a District map instead of trying to draw one from memory?”

“Hex no,” Jisung said. He ran his fingers along the graphite lines and corners and shapes he’d drawn. “Official maps are complete hex. They don’t account for any of the slippy spaces.”

“Slippy spaces?” Chan repeated.

“Yeah.” Jisung pointed to a particularly tight bundle of lines. Chan didn’t know how, but he recognized it as the intersection near the elementary school. “A regular map would only account for these two streets but my map includes that empty lot over here,” he pointed, “the break in the fence along here,” his stubby finger slid to another bundle of lines, “and the alleyway between the bathhouse and the laundromat.”

Chan could only nod. “So you really do your job?”

Jisung grinned and met Chan’s eye. “I know these streets like the back of my hand. I’ve got no other choice.” His smile faltered a little and then he looked away. “I mean, it’s why I decided I should give this courier thing a shot.” He worked his smile back onto his face. “I’m doing good, right? The best courier you’ve ever hired, right?”

“You’re the only courier I’ve ever hired,” Chan said.

Jisung looked up at him again. “Then that means I’m automatically the hexing best!”

“Keep your voice down. You’ll wake up Hyunjin.”

“Anyways,” Jisung said, not lowering his voice at all, “we’re business partners now. We understand each other. I see you, you see me. So I’ve got a proposal.”

Chan just took another sip of his hot chocolate.

Jisung must have sensed his doubt. “I’m the District Witch’s personal courier! I’m the actual hexing best.”

“You keep thinking that,” Chan replied. Sending Jisung on deliveries still felt like he was hurling all of his money and mail straight into the river never to be seen again, yet here was, planning on letting the boy handle another day of deliveries.

Maybe he’d grown addicted to the stress?

Chan sighed and glanced down at Jisung’s drawings. He could really only get the bare minimum of visual information from Jisung’s map. Sure, the scribbles kind of looked like the District from twenty or thirty meters up in the air but it was clear from the stretched proportions that Jisung had never seen the District from above roof level. It was also clear that not ever seeing the District from above roof level gave Jisung access to information Chan didn’t know about, that he couldn’t obtain from the back of a broom. Chan couldn’t quite tell, as all of the lines looked the same to him, but there seemed to be alleys and tunnels he had no clue existed.

He wondered if there was a way to transfer most of this information to a more traditional and far more accurate map.

“I’ve come up with an idea so hear me out,” Jisung explained. “Your shop is here, kind of on the lower east side. I thought going in one big counterclockwise circle would be the bee’s knees but, hex, let me tell you, it’s almost all uphill. So I thought going the other way around would be best but actually-” He paused to draw his finger up, then to the left and then diagonally right to form a wide-based triangle. “--this is the best way to go.”

“But you’re leaving out most of the outer District,” Chan pointed out, gesturing to the stray lines that led up to the edges of Jisung’s drawings.

“Look, old man, all of this is just trees.” Jisung circled an area up to the north with his finger. “There are paths here but they’re all dirt and the only one that really matters is the one that leads to the shrine and this one over here that cuts by the orphanage.” Then he put his palm down on a section towards the west. “Over here’s some factories and the woodmill but no one works or lives out that way anymore after the fire three or four years ago.”

Chan frowned a bit. “Alright. Considering all of that, your triangular route has you cutting across quite a few busy roads. Even the highway! You can’t do that on rollerblades.”

Jisung pointed at a series of dark spots and x-marks on his map. “I thought that, too, but I looked and there’s a series of back roads and side streets I can take that’ll zoom me safely past all of that traffic. Really, I’ve been working on this all week, Chan. This is the best route for deliveries. This path cuts by all of the main neighborhoods. I can get packages anywhere.”

For a long moment, Chan looked up at Jisung and just watched him as he explained things, going on and on about how it was sometimes best to stick to paved roads even if they went out of your way because it wasn’t always faster or safer cutting through grass fields or trying to hop a few fences. For the very first time, Chan got the feeling that Jisung may have actually known what he was doing. “And you’re telling me all of this because ?”

“I’m saying,” Jisung huffed, rolling his eyes because how come Chan didn’t get it already, “that I’m ready to do more. If I go this way, I can cut down my time a lot. I can fit a whole lot of other stuff in my day now.”

“Jisung, you already do all of the resident letter deliveries.”

“And I want to do more ,” Jisung repeated. “I want to deliver other things now, too.”

There was a noise at the door.

Felix perked his head up and let out a high mewl.

Chan looked up to watch Hyunjin shuffle into the room. The boy’s eyes were half-lidded with sleep and he smacked his lips as he teetered across the floor. Chan said, “Oh, sorry. Did we wake you up? I told Jisung to keep it down.”

Hyunjin replied with a sing song “I’m sleepy, Chanathan,” and then he flopped down and stretched out his long and lanky body on the bed, curling up on the corner where Chan’s letters weren’t piled up. “Kitty,” he hummed, reaching out a hand to scratch Felix behind the ears. Then he relaxed onto the bed. It took all of ten seconds for the dragon boy to start snoring, the vibrations making the whole bed shake, his brand new bear gripped tight in his arms.

Not too long after, Felix laid his head down and added his purring to the mix. It was oddly tranquil. Relaxing white noise. Chan found himself getting sleepy.

“I’ve actually tried coming up with other services we can do,” Jisung continued, attracting Chan’s attention once more. “Maybe we can start doing other kinds of item exchanges. Maybe people can start ordering from the shop through an online system and I can promise same-day delivery.”

Chan wasn’t convinced. He sucked down the last of his hot chocolate and then reached behind Jisung to sit the mug back on the nightstand. “We don’t need to do that.”

Jisung had a secret weapon. “I bet Minho doesn’t do same-day delivery.”

This made Chan look at him with every ounce of his attention. “Tell me more.”

Jisung grinned and began to explain the basics of his idea.

★☆

Chan fell asleep thinking about his business so he dreamed about his business.

No, he had nightmares.

First, Hyunjin set fire to the shop. The boy pranced about, laughing, completely oblivious to the explosions going off at his fingertips. No. He was completely aware of what he was doing and that made his joyful laughter take on a sinister edge. “Look, Chan,” Hyunjin called out, happy as can be. “You’re not looking. You have to look!” Fire exploded from between his fingers. The metal shelves melted as the flames licked up their sides. The wooden rafters caught fire and came crumbling down on top of the District Witch. Chan couldn’t move. He could only watch and choke as everything he had worked hard for burned. As this tiny little dream that he’d achieved went up in smoke.

Then the nightmare shifted.

The flames vanished. The shelves righted themselves. The smoke cleared. The crushing weight on Chan’s shoulders disappeared and he was sitting on his stool behind the cash wrap.

Woojin opened the shop door. He walked in wearing a luxurious coat over a fancy suit and tie. He not so much as strolled but floated up to the counter, growing taller and taller and taller as he approached. His head reached the rafters. His body was massive. He leaned down into Chan’s face, his visage huge and blocking out all of the light. His large hands came down on the counter, splintering the wood and leaving holes in the floor.

“You failed, Chan,” he said. His voice was so loud.

Chan shrank away from him in fear.

“You’re a horrible District Witch, Chan.”

Woojin’s voice echoed in his head, telling him that he was awful over and over, listing off the numerous ways in which he had failed.

The giant Woojin shook his head. “Why did I ever hire you? Why did I ever think that you could amount to anything?”

Chan couldn’t move. He could only sit there and listen to this man call him incompetent and unworthy, berate him for his simple mistakes, and refuse to forgive him for not being perfect.

The nightmare shifted again.

The giant Woojin was gone. The palm-shaped holes in the floor were gone. The counter was whole again.

The shop’s front door opened and Chan watched Minho enter, the witch wrapped up in heavy shadows. Daisy slithered around the man’s arm and neck, the thick green snake undulating and hissing. There was a bright red apple in Minho’s hand and he offered it to Chan with a sweet smile as if Chan could not see the poison dripping from the red.

But Chan took the apple anyway and he bit into it. He could not move.

The veil of sleep lifted away from Chan but only by a little bit.

Enough to allow him to pull his head out of the stormy ocean of his subconscious for the briefest of moments. Chan blinked open his eyes. The bedside lamp was on. His chest was tight. His forehead was damp with sweat.

Movement on the other side of the bed had woken him, Chan guessed, as even then the mattress was still bouncing underneath him as Jisung settled down on top of the comforter next to him. The boy must have just come back into the room. If Chan trained his ears, he could hear the toilet still flushing down the hall. Chan turned his head and looked towards his right. Hyunjin was there, his head and arm draped over Chan’s legs, his thumb in his mouth. Chan shifted on his pillow and tried to flip over so that he was on his right side but he could hardly move. It was probably just sleep paralysis. Right? Slumber was closing in on him quick. His eyes were shutting. Wasn’t that Yongbok curled up next to him? One of his twiggy little legs and one of his twiggy little arms were thrown over Chan’s torso, keeping him from moving much.

Jisung shut the light off and the bedroom tumbled back into blackness.

Not too much longer afterward, Chan was asleep again and back in his head. Back in his nightmares.

Now he was walking through the snow-filled cemetery with Minho at his side. “Changbin,” he called out, hands cupped around his mouth.

“Changbin,” Minho shouted.

The deathly still place was colder than it should have been. Icicles hung from the bare tree branches and covered the stone path under their feet.

They were lost.

Stairs led to where they shouldn't. To where they couldn’t . The two witches went up and up and then down and down. Upside down. Curving impossibly. Paths turned in on themselves like snakes eating their own tails. The hills spread farther in every direction than they were supposed to. There were bridges where there shouldn’t be. Statues where there couldn’t be. There were more and more rows of grave markers dotting the snow than should have been possible.

Chan knew this place. Or he should have. He knew which paths to turn at and which stairs to go down so why was it that he could not find his way? Why was it that the simplest of places had turned into a labyrinth?

Now they weren’t lost.

The two of them were standing at the big stone gate that marked the entrance to the cemetery. Changbin was standing there and then he wasn’t. Daytime was there and then it wasn’t.

Everything was so dark. And quiet.

The sound of snapping twigs broke the silence. There was something out in the woods beyond the gate. Chan could feel it. It was closing in. Bearing down on them fast. It was a black shadow swallowing everything in front of it. Its bright white, glowing eyes peered through the darkness at Chan, ready to sink its teeth into him next.

And then the two witches weren’t in the cemetery. They were in Chan’s bedroom.

Minho turned to Chan. As always, he was calm. Cold. Elegant. “I love you,” he told Chan. His lips were as red as an apple and when he smiled, his snake fangs appeared. He leaned close and offered his lips to Chan as if Chan could not see the poison dripping from the red. Chan could see it but he took the offer regardless. He caught Minho’s mouth with his own and swallowed every drop of venom.

He could not move.

And then he could not breathe.

Chan woke with a start.

There was something large covering his face. It sat heavy and hot across his mouth and nose. He panicked and reached for it. His hands dug into soft warmth. Felix yowled and jumped away from Chan’s cold hands, letting Chan breathe. The District Witch sat up, gasping for air. “Great Big Blue! Why would you sleep across my face, Felix? You’ve got the whole bed!”

Felix looked up at him from the comforter with startled eyes as if he were the victim in this mess.

Chan flopped back onto his pillow. His nightmare still clung to him. Even though the details were already beginning to fade, he could feel the cold claws of fear wrapped around his heart. He had seen and heard numerous distressing things but the most terrifying thing of all were the three words Minho had said:

“I love you.”

Chan shuddered. “You hungry, boy,” Chan asked as his own stomach growled. “We should still have plenty of fish.”

The black cat meowed in response and rolled over into a more comfortable position next to Chan, stretching out his legs.

Chan wiped at his face, still feeling like he was being suffocated a little. His head was muddy with the remnants of his dreams. His specialty as a witch was dream interpretation but as good at it as he was, he still found it difficult to analyze his own dreams. The images faded too quickly! All he could remember was a pair of glowing white eyes staring at him from the dark of the forest but even that frightening snapshot was fading away from him even as he tried to cling to it and remember every detail of it. Wasn’t that the same thing he had actually seen in the forest during the mana storm? Those white eyes looked so dreadfully familiar but what they looked like slipped farther away from him until it was gone, leaving Chan with nothing but the aching sense that he hadn’t actually slept that well at all.

He checked the other side of the bed. Jisung was gone. Even Hyunjin had gotten up and left.

Chan glanced at his alarm clock. It didn’t feel like it but more time had passed while he slept than he expected. He barely had time to sit down for breakfast before he needed to bathe and get ready for work. Perhaps that was Jisung he could hear downstairs.

Felix meowed at him as if urging him to go get his food.

“I’m not your maid,” Chan said, reaching out to pat Felix on the head. “If you aren’t in the kitchen when I make your food, too bad. I refuse to bring it up here to you.”

Felix meowed in response but did not move. In fact, he rolled a bit more to the side and seemed to get even more comfortable among the tangles and folds of Chan’s bed sheets.

“You don’t believe me?” Chan asked him. He slid to the edge of his bed. “Try me.” He didn’t know why he was doing this. Why was he having a full-on one-sided conversation with his cat? And not even his cat. A cat!

He laughed at himself and blamed the fact that he had just woken up, that he was still exhausted and still felt like he was walking through a dream.

“Felix, if you stay up here, you won’t get fish.” Chan pulled on a pair of socks. “I’m leaving.” He peeped over his shoulder. The black cat peered over at him looking absolutely bored and unthreatened. Chan tried again, “I’m giving you one last chance.” Still no response. Chan stood up and walked across his bedroom. He paused for good measure at the door. “I’ll feed your portion to Hyunjin, then.”

There was a soft noise. Paws on hardwood floor. Then Felix slipped between Chan’s legs and took off running down the hall towards the stairs.

★☆

The end of the work day was rapidly approaching.

Chan was straightening up the shelves after the evening rush when District 9 got another mana flow surge.

It was sudden and overwhelming. No warning. Everything had been calm one moment and then it was all a maelstrom the next. The mana pulled and pulled and pulled as if trying to suck the very life out of everything.

The sensation was so strange. The phenomenon wasn’t physical like an earthquake. It didn’t cause the shelves to shake or the windows to rattle like some big thunderstorm. It was all in the magic around them, swirling chaotically and making Chan wince with a sudden headache.

“Chan,” Hyunjin squealed in panic. He came around the corner at the end of the aisle, rushed up to Chan and threw his arms around the District Witch’s shoulders. “It’s so scary, Chan.”

“I’m right here,” Chan reassured him, patting Hyunjin’s back in an attempt to soothe the boy’s trembling. “I’m right here.”

“Make it stop!” Hyunjin whined.

But Chan couldn’t stop it! What was he supposed to do?

The mana pulled back even more forcefully. It felt like someone or something was peeling away at Chan’s layers, chipping away at who he was and leaving him feeling hollowed out and unmoored.

“I’m scared, Chan,” Hyunjin shrieked. Tears spilled out of the corners of his eyes.

Chan almost said that he was scared, too, but he had to be strong. For the both of them. “It’s going to be okay, Hyunjin.” He squeezed the boy a little harder, hoping that the gesture was reassuring. Hoping that Hyunjin couldn’t feel him shaking, couldn’t feel his heart thrashing with fright.

Yet even when he should have been worried about himself, Chan was only concerned about the others. Jisung was out right now trying to perfect his map. Yongbok hadn’t showed up at all today. He hoped the boys were alright.

He hoped they weren’t scared and alone.

A commotion started up outside. The crowd on the sidewalk dissolved into a panicked mob. Car horns blared. People screamed.

The mana flow changed directions. Instead of pulling, it felt like it was pushing. It poured over the shop like a tidal wave.

The lights flickered off. Once. Twice. Then the power cut out completely. It was late enough in the evening that the outdoors fell into blackness. The panicked shouts outside increased in volume. Only the headlights of a passing truck seemed to give the world definition and shape.

Was the mana flow getting so choppy that it was negatively affecting the city’s infrastructure now? What was going on ?

“Make it stop, Chan. Make it stop!” Hyunjin wailed. His tears were streaming down his face relentlessly now. Snot pooled in his nostrils and he clung to Chan so tightly that the District Witch could hardly breathe.

Chan reached into his front pocket for his wand and held it out in front of him. Trying to call mana to his hat was like attempting to catch a waterfall in a thimble. Most of the mana just roared past him without stopping. What did he think he could he do, though? He was just one tiny little witch facing off against a churning storm! No. He had to focus. He had to be brave and stand on his own two feet. All he had to do was think up a spell that could make this all stop. Something master-class. Something genius-class, even! It didn’t truly matter what he did. He just had to try .

He concentrated and then spoke the words. “Worse than any caving avalanche, more hungry than a raging sea, show me the source of this awful mess so I can put a stop to this calamity!” He held his wand high but there was no spark. No glow. No zap .

Nothing.

His wand hadn’t responded at all! Chan grit his teeth and tried to sink himself farther into the magic so that he could obtain more power but the moment he attempted to, the mana just tumbled over him, making him shiver like ice water had just been dumped down his back. His wand remained dead in his hand.

Chan felt empty. Weak.

Even in the past when he had struggled, he had never been so small or powerless.

He looked over at Hyunjin. The boy was crying his eyes out and Chan hated himself for being so unable to stop those tears. His wand slipped right out of his hand and skittered across the floor but he didn’t care. “I’m so sorry, Hyunjin,” he exhaled. Tears threatened to burst from his own eyes. He raised his hands to Hyunjin’s cheeks, his thumbs brushing away the boy’s tears. “I don’t know what to do.” He wasn’t even sure Hyunjin could hear him. He wasn’t even sure the boy would understand what he meant by any of this. Chan wiped away more of Hyunjin’s tears but they fell faster than he could catch them. Chan said, “I don’t like seeing you so scared but I don’t know what to do! I’m so sorry, Hyunjin.”

The mana disruption eased. Slowly. Slowly. It took ages, it felt like, but things returned to normal around them like the surface of a lake growing placid and glass-like after a rainstorm.

The lights came back on. The hum of the heater started back up again. The cash register let out a series of angry beeping noises as the computer booted back up.

Hyunjin unwrapped his arms from around Chan’s shoulders, his eyes wide and dazed and glassy. His tears still tumbled down his face no matter how hard he sniffled.

Chan wiped his thumbs through the salt trails on the dragon boy’s face, smearing them away. “Are you okay?” Chan asked him, feeling guilty and ashamed.

Hyunjin only stood there and looked at him.

Chan only hoped that he was imagining the disappointment in Hyunjin’s empty stare. “Do you want a nap,” he attempted.

Hyunjin frowned and shook his head.

“How about a snack? Do you want a snack?”

“No,” Hyunjin said quietly.

Chan let out a deep sigh. He could feel the dam in him about to break. He could feel the tears about to come. Great Big Blue, he could not do this! He pulled his hands away from Hyunjin’s face, feeling like a failure. “I’m sorry, Hyunjin. I’m so sorry. I know you were scared.” He swallowed hard, fighting back his emotions with the last of his strength. “I’m the worst dad on the planet, aren’t I?”

“It’s not your fault, Chan,” Hyunjin said. He reached over and put a warm hand on Chan’s cheek. “Don’t cry, Chan.”

“I’m not crying.” But he was. Chan pushed Hyunjin’s hand away gently. If he could just take a moment to breathe --

The landline in his office rang.

He couldn’t even rest for a moment! “I’ll be right back,” Chan told Hyunjin, his voice breaking. “Start turning off all of the lights, alright? It’s almost time to go.”

“Okay,” Hyunjin said. His bubbly happiness was back. The fright of the mana flow disturbance was behind him already.

Chan wished he had it that easy. “Only flip three of the switches,” Chan reminded him. “Not all four.”

“Okay,” Hyunjin called out. He rushed up one of the aisles and out of sight.

Chan moved down the hallway to his office. He was tempted to let the phone ring and ring unanswered but guilt made him pick it up and hold it up to his ear. Months of working in retail had trained him to shove all of his personal distress and mental exhaustion deep down inside of him where they couldn’t be found in the time it took to inhale. “Thank you for calling Chan’s Tchotchkes. This is Chan. How may I help you?”

“Chan, are you alright?” It was Regional Manager Kim Woojin.

Chan forced a smile even though he was on the phone. “I’m fine, Woojin. How are you?”

“I’m not calling to chat.” Woojin’s voice went flat and emotionless. “You know why I’m calling, don’t you?”

“Unfortunately,” the word slipped out of Chan’s mouth. “I mean, yes, I do.”

“I felt that flow disturbance and I’m over in District 17 right now.”

“I know.”

“Chan, this is a big issue. This is going to start negatively impacting the whole city at this rate.”

“I know.”

“If you don’t do anything about this in the next two days, the coven will vote you out.”

“I know.”

“Do you have a plan?”

“I know.”

“Chan, are you listening? Are you actually listening to me?”

“I’m trying,” Chan said. His emotions bubbled up in his throat. “Do you know how difficult this is for me? I can’t fly or cast spells to find out why this is happening because the mana flow is so disrupted that absolutely nothing works!”

“Chan, I’m not mad at you. I’m just worried about you.”

“There’s no way,” Chan choked out. He didn’t hear Woojin at all. “There’s no way I can have this problem solved by Sunday.”

Regional Manager Kim Woojin’s voice hardened into stone. “Chan. You can come up with a solution. I know you can.”

Woojin’s voice was just static in Chan’s head. He was deep in his emotions. “I’ve been thinking about this all day,” Chan said, “and it’s sudden and cowardly but it’s the one idea I keep coming back to.”

It was as if Woojin knew what Chan was about to suggest. “Don’t do this Chan. Please don’t.”

Chan still didn’t hear him. He said, “I’ll send you my letter of resignation by courier tomorrow morning.”

“Chan!”

Chan dropped the phone back on its cradle, cutting off Woojin’s shouts of his name.

Feeling heavy, Chan cut off the light in his office and walked through the dark, shadow-filled store to the front door where Hyunjin was waiting for him with a big wide smile. Chan took his coat off of the rack and draped it over his shoulders. He felt empty inside. Even standing there in the store didn’t feel real. “Let’s fly home tonight,” said Chan. He didn’t have the strength to walk.

Hyunjin grabbed Chan by the wrist. His smile turned into a worried frown. “Chan, are you okay?”

No. “Yeah,” Chan said, giving his best smile. “Just tired.”

Chan swung open the front door and led the way outside. The lights of the city were back on but the night sky felt wider and more oppressive tonight. As they stepped out onto the sidewalk, the lightest flurry of fresh new snow began to fall. Chan locked up the shop behind them and shoved his keys in his pockets. Just as he was about to swing a leg over his broom, a dark shape stepped out from between his shop and the next building over.

It was Minho. His silver buttons seemed to sparkle like new snowflakes in the light of the lamp post above his head.

Chan was so distracted, so lost in his despair, that he didn’t even see the witch until Minho stepped directly in front of him. “Great Big Blue,” Chan cursed, jumping back in fright.

Minho was unbothered by his reaction. “I’ve had enough,” he snapped.

He didn’t even need to elaborate. Chan knew he was talking about the disturbance in the mana flow. “Are you going to up and leave my District, too?” Chan huffed, not in the mood. He went back to preparing to fly home. “Feel free to go. I won’t stop you. I’ll help you pack, even.”

Minho propped his hands up on his hips. “I’m not going to leave your District.”

Chan didn’t spare him a glance as he got his broom prepared. It began to hover above the ground, humming with magic. “Shouldn’t you, though? Don’t you want to rub this failure in my face?”

“As amazing as a feeling as that would probably be, District Witch, I have taken it upon myself to use this opportunity to just be better than you. Clearly, you can’t solve this mana flow issue without my genius-level intellect and superior knowledge of witchcraft so I am going to step in and assist you in the matter.” Minho held out his hand as if waiting for something to be placed into his palm.

Changbin (had he always been standing right there?) stepped forward and placed a large grimoire in Minho’s hand.

“I’ve done some research,” Minho began. “And I am absolutely positive that I know what is causing the mana flow issue.”

Chan rolled his eyes. “Do you want to be District Witch in my place, Minho? Get your application in. The position will be vacant before the week’s out.”

Minho’s expression hardened and he placed himself more firmly in Chan’s way.

“Move, Minho,” said Chan in a low, dark voice. “I’m trying to go home. Hyunjin, hop on.”

Obediently, Hyunjin swung his leg over the broom behind Chan, wrapping his arms around the witch’s waist.

“District Witch,” Minho shouted. He grabbed the handle of Chan’s broom to keep the man from running away. “Don’t you dare pass up this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity! I usually don’t offer my services for free like this because I’m just too talented and all, but this is a special case because, Bird’s claws, I can’t stand the way mana disruptions feel . This isn’t just your problem. It’s all of ours.”

“Minho, if you don’t move, I’m going to run you over.”

“District Witch!” Minho stepped closer and none-too-gently popped Chan on the side of the head with the book he was holding.

Chan looked at him. Really looked at him.

“I’m trying to help you here, you nincompoop,” said Minho now that he had Chan’s full attention. “We’re going to get through this together.”

Chapter Text

Chan lost his mother when he was very young.

So young, in fact, that he really only had one prominent memory of her.

It was early summer. Chan could have only been six. Maybe seven. The two of them were sitting on the big white rock that jutted out into the river, the big weeping willows draped their long leaves into the gentle flow of the water. This far away from the city, everything was quiet and still and beautiful. The grass was so green and so thick and the air smelled sweet like honeysuckle. The two of them sat and watched the river pass by, their skin warmed by the morning light of the Big Blue Bird.

It was a special day. Unlike any other.

Chan had told his father that he didn’t want to get his hair cut short anymore and, for once, his father had listened to him. Chan liked his platinum curls because they made him look like his mom and he didn’t care what kinds of names the neighborhood kids called him. It was nothing to be ashamed of and letting it grow out made him less sad than getting it shaved off every three weeks. Of course, his mom had taught him to say all of these things but even if she hadn’t, he felt these things in his heart. His hair was his favorite part of himself but it was his mother’s words that allowed him to understand why . His dad hadn’t been happy though, so now Chan and his mother sat on the rock by the river, enjoying some quiet time while his dad cleaned the house from attic to back porch like he always did when he was upset.

“Chan,” his mother said, reaching into the pocket of her all-black dress for the deck of tarot cards she always kept there. “Do you want me to read your fortune?”

“Of course, mom,” Chan called out excitedly.

Chan’s mother shuffled her tarot card deck and carefully spread the pretty cards in an arc in front of them. She looked up at him with big brown eyes and a big white smile. Her witch’s hat was wide-brimmed and fashionable and her hair was streaked with gray even though she was not old.

“I'll pick a card, Chan,” she said, “and it'll tell me your future.”

Fortune-telling was her specialty, after all.

This must have been a really special day, Chan thought, because his mother never liked to read Chan’s future. Every time he asked, she always said that she feared what she might see. He saw nothing wrong with it, he saw nothing that should be scary about it, but whenever he got stubborn, she just said “you’ll understand one day.” His mother never even read her husband’s fortune which was odd because she read everyone else’s fortunes whenever they came by her shop and handed her money but Chan was still too young to understand what reasons she would possibly have to fear the futures of her family so much. The futures of strangers, it seemed, didn’t seem to scare her. With shaky hands, she held her hand out over the spread deck of cards. Then she moved her palm. One way and then the other. She didn’t touch them. Not really. Her fingertips hovered just above the cards and then she just… stopped. Her breath caught in her throat. She laid her hand down on a card and picked it up like it was heavier than the rock they sat on.

“Turn it over,” Chan whined. “Let me see!”

She flipped the card over so that it was face up.

It was an illustration of the Big Blue Bird, Chan realized. She was bigger than anything. Brighter than everything. Mother of all things. Her wings were spread wide and light radiated off of her in waves and kept the darkness at the edges of the drawing away.

His mother chuckled. She closed her eyes and nodded to herself as if she expected this. “The Sun,” she named the card.

“What does it mean,” Chan asked, unable to take his eyes off of the pretty picture. “What will be my future?”

“You will shine very bright, Chan,” she told him.

He reached for the card and she allowed him to take it. He held it close to his face as if trying to commit everything about it to memory.

She continued, “Everything the Big Blue Bird touches becomes bright and warm. That will be you one day. You will be a light in the darkness. You will be warmth when it is cold. You can’t be anything but your true self which is why so many people will want to be around you.” She looked at him with a proud, beaming smile. Her eyes twinkled with relief. “Just like the two of us being out here on this sunny day, people will come out of their shells and be drawn to you because that’s just how full of light you are.”

Chan frowned. That didn’t sound very exciting or lovely at all. No! He wanted his future to be full of fun and adventure and excitement and magic! Being the sun didn’t sound fun. Being like the Big Blue Bird didn’t sound fun. “Mom, can I read your fortune?”

She immediately stiffened under the weight of the question. “I would rather not know.”

“But you told me mine,” he cried out, pouting. “And I want to be a witch like you. I want to read fortunes and cast spells and fly like you do.”

She sighed but her shoulders remained tensed and the worry did not leave her eyes. “I suppose now is as good a time as ever to see if you have an affinity for the craft.” Finally, she relaxed. “Okay. Show me my future.”

He put The Sun back with the rest of the cards and then he swiped them up and shuffled them in the same way he saw his mother always do. He spread them out into a wide arc just like she did.

“Let the card pick you , Chan,” she said quickly when Chan reached out to grab one without much thought. “Wait a moment and you will know.”

So Chan waited. He was impatient and eager to finally be allowed in on this world of futures and cards and magic so waiting was very hard. But he waited. Seconds passed. Minutes. He stared down at the cards, fighting back the urge to just grab the one closest to his hand. What did his mom mean by the card picking him? What did she mean when she said he would know ?

He almost didn’t notice it when it started happening.

One of the cards seemed to glow and vibrate before his eyes. Its corners trembled as if it were trying to leap up into his hand. When he reached for it, he honestly believed it had reached for him and when he held it between his fingers, it was as if he could feel it breathing.

“Turn it over,” she suggested.

Chan was suddenly afraid to. The excitement he had just a moment earlier had been replaced with anxiety. What if the future he revealed was very bad? Is this why his mom didn’t like to read his fortune? But if she read his and he got something wonderful like The Sun, certainly hers would be just as good? Right?

Right?

But dread began to grip his heart. He didn't want to know. He didn't want to know! It was hot outside but he suddenly felt cold. The card should have been thin and light but it suddenly weighed a great deal and he could not bring himself to turn it over and reveal the future.

“That’s how it feels,” his mother mumbled. "All of the time." Her voice was so quiet that it was like a thought in his own head.

Forcing himself, Chan flipped the card over.

Where his card was very bright, his mother’s card was very dark. The illustration was full of shadows and jagged edges, a black hole sucking in all of the sunshine and life around it.

“Death,” Chan read the name of the card.

His body felt numb. His fingers trembled. The world got very, very large and seemed to collapse in on him. Burying him.

His mother sighed. “It’s alright,” she whispered. “Death isn’t always literal.” She looked away from Chan, staring out at the river right as one of the tree limbs of the weeping willows snapped and dropped into the water, carried away by the rushing current. "Death can also be figurative. Conceptual. It can mean a transformation. Or the process of letting go of regrets. Moving on from the past." She turned to look at him. "It doesn't mean I will actually die."

There was a look of calmness on her face, Chan realized. Acceptance .

That image of her tranquil expression was the last thing about her he would be able to remember.

Not even a moment later, a large, black and yellow snake, a king cobra, reared its ugly head from out of the grass nearby and turned its beady eyes on an unsuspecting child.

★☆

Minho unceremoniously dropped his grimoire on top of the coffee table in Chan’s living room. The heavy thump! of it echoed like a door slamming shut.

Chan walked back into the room from the kitchen right as the man did it. His eyes went wide. “That tabletop is glass, you know,” he chastised. “Don’t crack it. Please .” As he passed the couch, he leaned over the back of it and handed Changbin one of the fresh cups of hot chocolate he was carrying. Plain. Not even marshmallows. Thick from almost too much chocolate. “Here you go.”

“Thank you so much,” Changbin whispered, settling back on the big blue couch and taking a sip of the steaming beverage.

Chan circled around the coffee table towards his new but old recliner. “If you need anything else, don’t be afraid to ask.”

Changbin nodded, too engrossed in the hot chocolate to use his words.

Next to Changbin, Minho crossed one leg over the other at the knee. He took a hearty swig of his own hot chocolate, a little bit of whipped cream with cinnamon sprinkled on top and a generous helping of whiskey, and then sat the mug down on the table. “Do you have candy or anything,” he asked but clearly decided not to wait on an answer. “Something sweet to chew on?” His dark eyes searched the surface of the coffee table, roving over the fake succulent and the decorative jar that served as the centerpiece. He reached out a hand. “These better not be those disgusting soft peppermints.” He lifted up the lid of the decorative jar but then gasped when he found the container completely empty. “All of the candy is gone. That is a real shame but it’s also… expected.” With a heavy sigh, he sat the lid back on the jar and leaned back onto the couch cushion. He met Chan’s eye from across the table. “You’re just like this jar, District Witch. Everything about you seems promising on the outside but is highly disappointing on the inside.”

“Thank you,” Chan said because, Great Big Blue, how else was he supposed to respond to that?

“Is that a compliment,” Hyunjin chirped from the floor in front of the crackling fireplace. He blew the steam that drifted upwards off the top of his mug of hot chocolate. Extra marshmallows. Too much whipped cream. A couple of gingerbread men sitting in the mess on top. “Minho’s so nice, Chan.” He took a noisy slurp of his drink, leaving a line of whipped cream across his upper lip. “He always has something to say about you.”

Mean things , Chan added in his head. He pulled the lever on the recliner to prop up his feet. “There was never anything in that jar, Minho.”

“Then why have it sitting here being misleading?” Minho pointed at the jar like it might grow teeth and bite him. “You see a container like that on anyone else’s coffee table and there are definitely mints inside. Mini cookies. Those red candies wrapped up in the packaging that looks like strawberries. Anything .”

“Well, I’m not like anyone else.”

“I can see that. Sadly.”

“You never let up for a second, do you?” Chan raised his mug to his mouth, being careful not to spill his hot chocolate. Light on the whipped cream, heavy on the whiskey. “Are you satisfied with your drink, at least?”

Minho nodded. “At least you’ve got decent taste in liquor. That’s one good thing you’ve got going for you.”

Okay. “Thanks.” Chan stared down at the drink in his hands. It was warm and smelled pleasant and sugary sweet but the flavor barely managed to dig through his cross mood. Minho and Changbin had been here hardly twenty minutes and he was already exhausted. Changbin he could handle. The boy was so quiet he practically wasn’t in the room. Minho was the one giving him problems. It had been a long day and Chan did not know how much more of Minho’s mouth he could take. There was skillful precision to Minho’s poisonous words like a surgeon with a scalpel cutting at Chan’s skin bit by bit. Minho was doing it on purpose, Chan knew, but he couldn’t figure out why. Still, he tried to be cordial. “If you want a heavier drink, I can skip the milk and chocolate next time.”

“I’m not trying to get drunk ,” Minho said with an airy wave of his hand. “We’re not staying that long.”

Thank the Big Blue Bird! Chan tried not to laugh with delight. “Alright, then. Let’s get down to business.” The faster the two of them came up with a plan, the faster he could kick Minho out of his house. “What did you want to show me?”

When Minho spoke next, his biting tone had vanished, replaced by cold and emotionless reasoning. “After that little excursion to the cemetery, I took a trip to the library and I looked up documentation on the frequency of the mana disturbances and tried to find a pattern there. You know, to see if they were tied to any particular time of day or phase of the moon.”

“They’re not,” Chan cut in. Just talking about the mana disturbances reminded him of how rocky they made him feel. “Sometimes it happens during daylight hours, sometimes at night. Sometimes it starts down south, other times it originates in the west. It can last for minutes or it can come and go in only a handful of seconds. I attempted to keep track of all of that. In the beginning.”

Minho took a long sip of his drink and stared across the table at Chan, more upset about being interrupted than anything else. “As I was saying…” He sat down his mug and continued as if Chan hadn’t spoken, “The frequency and randomness of the events keeps it from being a natural occurrence. This is good. We can count a lot of things out. The events being hard-confined to District 9 is a sure sign that the problems with the flow are being controlled, though. Think about it. If they were truly random events, the epicenter would be in District 10 sometimes or even way out in District 27. All of the disturbances start in District 9 and, until recently, only affected District 9. The disturbances are being caused by a person or a thing that’s in this place specifically.” Minho uncrossed his legs and leaned forward on the couch cushion. His hands, slender and graceful, found the old and rough corners of the book’s pages as he flipped it open. The grimoire’s tattered spine was barely keeping the ancient thing together as Minho attempted to find the passage he needed. As he worked, he said, “I went across town the other day to ask a friend as she’s a bit of a creature specialist. Thanks to her library of bestiaries, I’ve narrowed down the culprit to about eight or nine species.”

“Eight or nine doesn’t sound too narrow,” Chan piped up.

Minho didn’t miss a beat. “Compared to the great number of things that could be causing this issue with the flow, eight or nine is next to nothing.”

“So what are these nine things causing trouble?”

“Nine possible things,” Minho corrected. “The problem is caused by only one of them. Come on, Chan. Keep up.”

“That wasn’t-”

“I bet you wouldn’t have a clue what creatures could possibly disturb the mana flow like this.”

“I’ll take you up on that bet,” said Chan. Although the book was old and at rest, every time Minho flipped a page, Chan could feel the way the flow of the mana in the room shifted. It wasn’t painful and chaotic like the disturbances. It was actually warm, almost hot, like a bath. The tingle of popping soap bubbles danced up and across Chan’s skin.

Minho sighed. “I don’t want to just take all of your money, District Witch. Stop interrupting and let me explain.”

There was a loud popping noise as one of the logs shifted in the fire and the flames licked at the new fuel. Chan turned his head to look at the fireplace, at the soot gathering on the bricks, at the embers glowing in the ashes. Instinctively, he focused on the proximity of the sleeve of Hyunjin’s shirt to the snapping flames. “Hyunjin, don’t sit too close to the fire.” Chan wondered if there was actually any point in getting on a dragon about fire safety .

“Okay.” Hyunjin stuck his fingers in his mouth to lick up the whipped cream on them and then inched away from the hearth until he was right next to the coffee table. He gasped, “Does this book have pictures? I hope it has pictures. It would be awesome if it had pictures.” The boy reached for it with his sticky hand.

Minho hastily slid the grimoire across the table and out of his reach.

Not offended in the slightest, Hyunjin asked, “What are you two talking about? Your faces are super serious.”

“We’re trying to keep the scary mana problems from happening again,” explained Chan.

Hyunjin nodded slowly. “Oh, that sounds like a lot of work.”

“It is,” Chan replied, “which is why I couldn’t do it by myself.” He looked across the table. “Minho, I appreciate the help. I really do.”

Minho lifted his mug to his mouth and took a sip. “I had to step in. The District is about to sink like the Lusitania because of this nonsense and I can’t have that happen. Despite how agonizingly long these last few days have felt, it hasn’t even been a week since I’ve opened my shop. The bank loan was enormous but so are those interest rates. I’ll be in debt up to my eyeballs until next summer and that’s only if I can keep meeting sales goals.” He took another sip of his hot chocolate, casually slow in comparison to his angry ranting. They all waited for him to finish. “There’s no way I’m going to let my dreams fall apart like this. I can’t afford to move to another District yet so I need to ensure things don’t go belly up while I’m here.”

“I see,” Chan sighed. Minho’s long-winded explanation wormed its way into his mind and then laid eggs.

“I see,” Hyunjin repeated after him. He squinted across the room. “But I don’t see too far.”

Chan glanced up at Minho. The elegant witch was sitting in his living room not to offer any kind of selfless help but to keep his own behind safe. Of course Minho wasn’t trying to help him out of the goodness of his heart. There probably wasn’t any goodness in there to start off with! Chan attempted to get their discussion back on track. “So what are the eight or nine creatures you’ve narrowed it down to? Is one of them a dragon?” He glanced towards Hyunjin. Then a second thought crossed his mind. “Is one of them a mimic?”

Minho looked up from the pages of the grimoire to stare up at Chan with a frown on his face. “Mimics aren’t real, Chan. They’re extinct.”

“Oh oh oh oh,” Hyunjin bounced up and down. “I’m friends with a mimic! And Yongbok says he stinks!”

Without turning his head, Minho hooked his eyes in Hyunjin’s direction. His frown deepened for several seconds before he focused his attention back on the book in front of him. “On this page, there’s a paragraph on the migration patterns of-”

“Someone’s at the door,” Changbin said over the rim of his mug.

He had said it so abruptly that Chan and Minho could do nothing but turn and stare at him. Chan barely got the syllable out, “Wha-”

There was a knock at the front door. Loud and aggressive.

Chan sat there stupefied. He wasn’t expecting company. He glanced over at Minho. He wasn’t expecting more company. The knocking came again. Thwak thwak thwak . Unrelenting.

“I’ll get it,” Chan said to his guests and then, louder, “Coming!”

He got the recliner back upright, sat his mug of hot chocolate on the coffee table and then left the living room to answer the door. The knocking only increased in tempo and volume as he stepped across the length of the foyer. “I’m on the way,” Chan shouted over the noise. By the time he reached the front door, it sounded like whoever was on the other side was practically kicking the door down. Chan fiddled with the locks and then swung open the door, letting in a blast of freezing December air. “Is there something that I can… Jisung!”

“ Finally , old man,” Jisung groaned. “I was this hexing close to just throwing myself through the front window.” The orange-haired boy, wrapped up in his big coat, had two large red and blue cardboard boxes stacked on top of each other in his arms. “Do you know how hexing heavy these things are? I oughta be stacked like a hexing bodybuilder after this.”

Chan looked at the boxes, at the faint clouds of heat rising from beneath the lids. “What is all this?”

“Thursday dinner,” Jisung announced, “because I knew you would forget yesterday’s promise to buy us something. You gonna move out of the hexing way or… Nevermind. I’ll let myself in.” He pushed his way past Chan and entered the house.

“Hey. Jisung! I have company over.”

Jisung left wet, powdery footprints across the hardwood of the foyer before remembering to kick off his shoes. “I brought enough to share. Chill the hex out.”

That wasn’t the point. “Jisung!” But the boy had already turned the corner and disappeared into the living room.

“I brought dinner,” the orange-haired boy shouted.

Hyunjin applauded his approval. “Yay! Din-din!”

Chan mumbled, “You would think he lives here.” He started to shut the front door but was stopped by a small hand pressing hard against the wood.

A voice asked, “Does he?”

Chan whirled around, startled. Standing on his front porch was Yongbok. The boy had on a large winter coat but, even then, he shivered in the cold. Chan looked him up and down. “Yongbok, you’re here, too?”

Yongbok’s mouth twitched up into a smile. “Yeah. I sure am.” He lowered his hand from the door. “So does he live here?”

“Jisung doesn’t live here.”

“Could have fooled me.” Yongbok attempted to duck under Chan’s arm to enter the house.

Chan stopped him. “And neither do you.”

“Aww,” Yongbok whined.

“I’m actually busy at the moment. I’m in the middle of… I guess you could call it a business meeting... and I don’t need the distractions.”

There was the sound of something fragile breaking into numerous pieces somewhere in the house behind them. Then, a split-second later, Jisung shouted, “I didn’t do it!”

Chan exhaled slowly, not even bothering to turn around. “I don’t need more distractions,” he told Yongbok.

“I’ll be really quiet,” the boy said.

Chan glanced past Yongbok and stared out into the night. The snow was falling harder now. The air was thick with snowflakes and the fresh white was already starting to fill in the numerous footprints on the porch. The fortune tellers hadn’t predicted this. They had announced there would only be a ‘light dusting’ of snow but it seemed as if the Big Blue Bird was serious about proving them wrong tonight. Chan let his eyes focus on his new visitor once more. “What are you doing here, Yongbok? Seriously. Now isn’t the best time.”

The black-haired boy took a moment to think about it, worrying his bottom lip with his teeth. “I want a nap?”

That sounded about right.

“Fine.” Chan stepped backwards, granting Yongbok entry into the house. The boy wasted no time scooting past him, kicking off his shoes and rushing around the corner. With a defeated sigh, Chan shut the front door and followed Yongbok into the living room.

The two boxes Jisung had carried inside were pizza combos from the place right on the other side of the bridge. The spread was laid out from one end of the coffee table to the other, napkins and cups of marinara sauce scattered all over the place. The smell of the pepperoni pizzas, lemon pepper chicken wings and garlic breadsticks melded into something that should serve as the backdrop to a football game, not a discussion about mana flow disturbances and esoteric cryptids running amok.

Chan walked up to his recliner and poked Jisung in the side of the head. “I was sitting there.”

Jisung barely stopped chewing to shout, “Move your feet, you lose your seat!” To hammer in his point, he pulled back the lever on the recliner and propped up his feet. “Go make me a hot chocolate, would you?”

Chan’s eyes went wide. Now the disrespect was blatant .

Jisung must have realized the same thing. He swallowed his food and then softened his tone. “Please? Pretty please? With marshmallows on top? And candy canes? Please ?”

“Fine,” Chan surrendered. “Do you want a hot chocolate, Yongbok?”

“Uhhh… no thanks,” the boy answered. “Not a big fan of the stuff.”

“Fine with me,” Chan said. He turned around and headed into the kitchen. Behind him, he could hear Jisung and Hyunjin chatting excitedly, both of their voices getting squeaky with excitement as they discussed their days. Every now and then, Yongbok would add to the conversation and, surprisingly, Chan caught the floating sound of Minho’s voice as well. Chan stepped up to the stove. The milk in the pot on the back burner was still hot from the batches he had made earlier so he poured Jisung a mug of it, broke off chunks of chocolate and dropped them in. He stirred it all with a spoon until the chocolate melted into the milk, changing it into a warm, beautiful brown color. The smell was sweet and comforting and calming. When it was all well-mixed, Chan dumped two handfuls of marshmallows into the mug and then went to the cabinet to grab two candy canes out of the box. He peeled the plastic off of them and jammed them into the cup and then carried the chocolatey feel-good potion back into the living room.

In the time he had been gone, everyone had gotten comfortable and settled around the table. The conversation had petered out to allow space for pizza and hot chocolate. Chan handed Jisung his mug. “What did you break earlier?”

“Hey!” Jisung frowned but he graciously accepted the mug. “I told you I didn’t break it.”

“Which means that you broke it. What did you break?”

Minho cleared his throat. “When he swung open that box, he knocked over that jar with no mints in them onto the floor.”

“Hey,” Jisung whined again. “Why’d you sell me out, you hexing snitch? This is why no one likes you.”

Minho shrugged. “Not that being liked or disliked changes anything about my life.” He looked up at Chan with such an odd look in his eyes that the District Witch had to glance away. Minho continued, “I don’t blame you, Jisung. I wanted to break the thing myself. It’s nothing but lies, promising one thing but being the exact opposite.”

Chan’s eyes went wide, suddenly realizing that the jar had to be in a hundred pieces on the floor somewhere. “No one’s hurt, right? That thing’s made of glass. Did anyone sweep up the pieces yet? Watch your feet. Please don’t step on-”

“Lower your blood pressure,” Minho cut in. He leaned forward to reach for something under the table and then he raised it up in his hand. “It’s right here, you fool. I fixed it. Good as new.”

“Thank you.” Chan stepped forward and grabbed the jar from Minho’s outstretched hand. There wasn’t a scratch on it. In fact, it looked newer . Relieved, Chan carried it to the fireplace to sit it on the mantle where it, hopefully, wouldn’t be in the way and cause more heartbreak. “Sorry about the interruption, Minho. I didn’t know they were coming over.”

Minho blew a lock of hair out of his eyes. “No worries. I’ve learned that it’s best if I sit patiently and just wait for things to go awry while I’m around you.”

“I’m not bad luck. I swear it,” Chan defended himself. But if he wasn’t bad luck, how had the night turned into something like this? He had only wanted it to be himself and Hyunjin tonight so that, for once, he could relax and sleep. Now it seemed like everyone he knew was making themselves at home in his living room. Most of them uninvited, might he add. He half-expected Regional Manager Kim Woojin to pop up out of nowhere next. “Can we go back to talking about the issue at hand?”

“What’s the issue at hand?” Yongbok questioned.

“Trying to find the source of the mana flow disruption,” Chan replied.

Jisung blew a raspberry. “Are we talking about boring hex while eating again? I’m sensing a pattern here. Old man, can’t you do something else? We gotta teach you some new tricks.” He shoved more food into his mouth and chewed noisily. “I would rather talk about anything else. Anything !”

“Boring things tend to be important,” Chan told him. “And I need you out of my chair.”

“You shouldn’t have got out of it then.”

“I got out of it to let you in the house.”

“Your problem, not mine.” Jisung shoved yet another bite of pizza into his mouth even though he was hardly through with what was already in there. When he spoke, crumbs flew everywhere. “If I had a key, you’d never have to get up to let me in.”

Chan asked him, “Why would I let you have a key? Why would you need a key?” Then he remembered that they were in front of company and that now wasn’t the time or place to discuss this. “Minho, if we can keep this brief… What are the possible sources of the disturbance that you discovered?”

Minho, chewing on a mouth full of pizza, looked Chan up and down. “Can you sit down? You’re making me nervous.”

Chan rolled his eyes. “I’m not doing anything. We just need to talk.” Before more things spiraled out of his control.

“And you need to sit. You’re the only one standing and it’s very strange,” Minho stated. He pulled his feet up onto the couch and folded his legs underneath him. He relaxed back on the cushion with a look on his face as if he were the host and Chan were the guest. “Stop being rude.”

Chan glanced around the room. With Jisung in the recliner, he realized with a mounting sense of horror that the only other place left to sit was on the couch. Yongbok had wedged himself in between Changbin and the armrest on one side of the piece of furniture which meant that the only available position was next to Minho and there definitely wasn’t much room to sit there without having to do something untowards like touch thighs or share elbow room.

Chan would rather sit on the floor.

So he did.

He got comfortable on the hardwood with his back to the fireplace and reached across the table for the mug of spiked hot chocolate he’d sat down earlier. As if his body were magnetized, as if the boy were always drawn to him, Hyunjin immediately scooted over until he was right next to Chan and then propped his chin up on the District Witch’s shoulder.

“Chanana Banana,” Hyunjin sang out.

With just those two words, the stress in Chan’s body eased considerably. It was as if Hyunjin had managed to cast a spell on him. An uncontrollable smile slipped over Chan’s lips and he reached out a hand to wipe whipped cream off of Hyunjin’s top lip. “Hyunjin Onion,” he sang back.

Pleased with this nickname, Hyunjin squealed and wrapped an arm around Chan’s middle and hugged him tight. “Christopher Mister Fur.”

“Hyunnie Honey Bunny.”

“Channy Wanny!”

Chan felt like several big helium balloons had been tied around him and he was about to drift up to the ceiling. “Hyun-”

Minho ruined the moment. “Your house is absolutely devoid of any personality or defining characteristics. A cheap motel room has more impact.”

His words popped the balloons and sent Chan hurtling back down to earth.

Relentlessly, Minho plowed on, “Didn’t I tell you that gray porcelain was more your speed? And you actually tried so hard to convince me that you were attracted to something as flashy, high-end and elegant as marble. Tuh!”

Chan found it difficult coming up with the energy to even argue. “The place came pre-furnished.”

“You could still make it look like a place people live in.”

“The house is… not that important.” Now that Chan thought about it, in the past five months, he barely even came into the living room. Before this night, there wasn’t much of a reason to use the space as he never had guests over that needed entertaining. “The place looks fine the way it is.”

“You would think that.” Minho scoffed and rolled his eyes. “This place is about as lifeless as a funeral home but perhaps that suits you.”

“Burn!” Jisung shouted. “Get some ice for that one, old man.”

On a hot streak, Minho continued, “Maybe you deserve something even simpler than gray porcelain. I’ve changed my opinion of you, District Witch. Plain hammered aluminum is what you need.”

“We aren’t here to talk about pestle and mortar sets,” Chan huffed. Why was Minho always so mean? What reason did he have for saying all of this? “I thought we were past all of that.”

“I don’t know, old man,” Jisung spoke up. “I like this guy’s comedic timing.”

“We’re here,” Chan said loudly, hoping to take control of the discussion, “to talk about how to stop the mana disruptions within the next 48-hours so at least that problem is solved before I go.”

“Go where?” Hyunjin asked. “Are we going on vacation? You always say you need a vacation.”

“It’s a vacation. Of sorts,” Chan mumbled. He could call it an early retirement.

Minho’s expression hardened. “Oh… so you were serious about that?”

Hyunjin’s eyes lit up. He pulled away from Chan to get a better look at his face. “Are we opening a restaurant? Are we going to make a million peach pies?”

“Serious about what?” Jisung jumped in. He’d just picked up on the serious exchange. “Where are you going, Chan?” He looked from Chan to Minho. “What’s he serious about?”

This wasn’t going how Chan needed it to. To help him power through the rest of this conversation, Chan took a big swig of his drink, and then another and another. He emptied his mug, not caring about the fire of the whiskey as it shot both up and down, towards his belly and his head. “The bestiaries,” he prompted, switching topics, “what did you find in them, Minho? What creature is destroying my District like this?”

There was a long moment where Minho stared at Chan and Chan stared at Minho. Both of them wanted to ask entirely different questions. Both of them wanted to have entirely different conversations. Minho looked away first. “When creatures disturb mana at high frequencies like this, it is usually for the sake of consumption.”

“So it’s a creature just… going around eating mana?” Jisung theorized.

Minho took a sip of his hot chocolate. “Not so much eating as gorging itself. Gathering power.”

“Gathering power to do what,” Chan asked. He thought about that silly mimic who had disturbed his day. “Is it trying to take over the world or something?”

Hyunjin trembled. “Scary,” he whispered. “Super duper scary.”

Chan patted the boy on the head in a gesture he hoped was reassuring.

Minho let out a groan. “If you all could stop interrupting me with your mindless, plebeian questions, I could actually tell you what’s going on!” Stillness swept over the living room. Minho looked at Changbin next to him and then stared across the table at Jisung in the recliner. Finally, his eyes settled on Chan. “What I’m trying to say,” said Minho now that he had everyone’s attention, “is that I’ve used this information to-”

“Someone’s at the door,” Changbin interrupted.

Chan looked up at him. Then something clicked in his head. They were missing someone. “Hey. Where’s Yong-”

There came a knock on the front door. Light and courteous.

Convinced it was Woojin, Chan peeled Hyunjin’s arms from around him and stood up to answer the door. “Coming,” he called out on his way.

As he left the heat of the fireplace behind him, he could feel the temperature drop. Even as he walked across the foyer, the bite of winter seeped in beneath the door and grabbed at his ankles like something alive. When Chan swung the door open and peered out onto the porch, Yongbok was there.

It didn’t compute.

Chan blinked rapidly. “Huh?” Had he poured more whiskey into his hot chocolate than he realized? “What are you doing out here? And where’s your coat?”

“I have a coat,” Yongbok dismissed Chan’s concerns. Yet, clearly, he didn’t have one. The top of his head and his sweater-covered shoulders were draped in fine, white snow as if he’d been walking through the falling flakes for quite some time now. “And I came here for a nap in that recliner. I told you I wanted one.”

Chan was so stunned that he stepped backwards and allowed Yongbok inside without question. The black-haired boy kicked off his shoes, the action made the bell around his neck jingle. “It smells in here.”

“Jisung brought garlic breadsticks,” Chan tried to explain.

Yongbok stretched his arms above his head and yawned. “I guess so.”

“Jisung’s also sitting in the recliner.”

“It’ll still be a nice nap,” said Yongbok, then he wandered into the living room like he didn’t have a care in the world.

The sense of deja vu that overwhelmed Chan nearly bowled him off of his feet. Hadn’t he just lived through this? He couldn’t be that drunk yet! Chan shut the front door and followed Yongbok into the living room and then counted the people gathered in his house. Changbin was on the couch, looking exceptionally sleepy even though it couldn’t have been but seven or eight in the evening. Minho looked stuck-up as usual, head held high and shoulders straight like he was an idol prepared to be photographed at any moment. Jisung was forced to inch over to allow room for Yongbok to squeeze into the recliner. Hyunjin had gotten close to the fireplace again.

Everyone was here.

Chan squeezed his eyes shut and opened them, counted again and then decided that he was just more drunk than he first thought. Odd. He’d only had one mug and never in his life had he been such a lightweight. Perhaps it was just the stress. Oh well. Deciding not to worry more about it, Chan crossed the room, gripped Hyunjin by the arm and gently slid the boy away from the hearth.

Hyunjin let out a happy little yelp as he was pulled across the floor on his bottom. “Do it again, Chan! Faster this time. Faster!”

“Stay right there,” Chan exhaled, pointing to the place where he’d deposited the boy. “You’ll overheat sitting that close to the fire.” He looked over at Yongbok who looked nice and cozy squeezed into the chair next to Jisung. “Did you want a hot chocolate?”

Yongbok shook his head. “Nah. I’ll just get warm milk later.”

“Okay,” Chan breathed out. He was thankful that he could sit for at least a little bit now. “There should be a few mugs left on the rack above the sink.”

“Gotcha,” Yongbok confirmed. With his bright yellow eyes, he watched Chan circle around the table towards the couch, moving farther and farther away. “Where are you going? Join us.”

“Three can’t fit in that chair,” said Chan. “I told you that.” Then, despite every part of his body recoiling at the very thought , he approached the couch and flopped down on the cushion next to Minho. “If we can steer the conversation back to-”

“I’ve had the worst day,” Yongbok declared. “You wouldn’t believe.”

“What happened,” Jisung asked him. “Did you freeze your balls off standing in line at a food truck for 45 minutes only to get to the front and find out they just ran out of what you were about to order? Because that’s what happened to me today.”

Chan tensed. “Guys.”

They didn’t hear him. Yongbok said, “Wow, okay. That actually sounds worse than what happened to me.”

“Well, what made your day bad,” prompted Jisung, nudging Yongbok in the side.

“I don’t want to say because yours sounds worse.”

“You can’t just hype us all up for some terrible story and then chicken out!”

“Boys,” Chan attempted. “Kids.”

“I had a super duper day,” Hyunjin chimed in. “Chan taught me how to sweep and I made friends with the spider who lives in the corner of the big window and I caught a fly that was bothering Chan and put it in her web and she gave me this as thanks!” He stuck his hands in all of his pockets until he found what he was looking for.

Chan squinted at it. “A pin?” It was a small, cheap thing. A child’s trinket.

Hyunjin nodded. “She said it’s been sitting on the sill for days and every time she looks at it, she’s reminded of you.”

Chan held out his hand for it.

Hyunjin crawled across the floor and dropped it onto his palm.

Now that Chan could get a better look at it, he realized it was a golden sun with a smiling face on it. It was so simple. Silly, really. Almost stupid. But it brought a smile to Chan’s face. It reminded him of his mother. For some strange reason.

“Actually,” Jisung spoke up, “my day wasn’t all that bad at all. Sure, I froze my hexing balls off but if I had gotten what I wanted from the food truck then I never would have gone to the pizza place. And if I had never gone to the pizza place, they wouldn’t have screwed the hex out of my order twice. And if they hadn’t screwed my order up, then I wouldn’t have gotten a free combo and we wouldn’t be eating lavish right now.”

Chan laughed. He never would have thought of pizza and wings as lavish. “I’m glad you decided to look at things on the bright side,” he told Jisung. “Changbin, how did your day go?” He turned to his right when he didn’t get an answer.

Changbin, bless his heart, had propped his head up on the armrest and was out like a light, snoozing away.

More shocking than that, though, was the fact that Minho was looking at Chan. Smiling at Chan. Only for him to realize what he was doing. Promptly, Minho wiped the smile from his face and looked away, occupying himself with the process of dipping a breadstick in a marinara sauce cup.

Chan glanced back across the armrest. “What about you, Yongbok? Can you look on the bright side? Name one good thing that happened today.”

“Ugh,” Yongbok groaned. “Well, if you’re gonna put me on the spot like that…” He took a moment to pick the olives off of his pizza slice before he continued. “Earlier today, I found this really nice box so I sat in it.”

Chan waited. He half-expected for there to be more to the story. There wasn’t.

“That’s it,” Jisung wondered. He was thinking the same thing Chan was.

“Yeah,” Yongbok said. “It was very comfortable. Just the right size.”

Chan threw his head back and laughed. He couldn’t help it! Yongbok was so weird .

“I want to sit in a box,” Hyunjin called out. He grabbed Chan’s wrist. “Get me a box, Chan. Get me a box!”

“Boxes are great,” Yongbok agreed. “Everyone should sit in one.”

“I don’t plan on sitting in a box until I’m dead,” Jisung chimed in.

“Jisung,” Chan shouted, but he couldn’t even sound too mad because he was still giggling.

“I’m just being real,” said Jisung.

Chan finally got a hold on his laughter. He stared down at the sun pin still in his hand. Something very deep inside of him wanted to keep it but, technically, Hyunjin had found it. He held it out to the boy.

Hyunjin shook his head. “The spider told me to give it to you.”

Chan looked at it again. It probably came off some young customer’s bookbag or sweater. The color was a little faded and the edges were rounded and scuffed with age. It looked well-loved and he hoped that whoever it belonged to wouldn’t miss it too much.

“What about you, Chan,” Yongbok asked.

The District Witch snapped out of it. He looked up. “What about me what ?”

“Name one good thing that happened to you today.”

Chan could only think about the horrendous mana flow disturbance that had ruined his entire night. Just the thought of it threatened to crush his mood but he forced a smile. “Having you all here right now.”

“Boo,” Jisung heckled him. “Gross!”

“Yay,” Hyunjin had the exact opposite direction. “Being with you makes me happy so it’s super good that you being with us makes you happy.”

Jisung cringed. “I very suddenly have hexing diabetes. Maybe I'll be sitting in a box sooner than I thought.”

Chan wondered about how lonely he would be right now if he had been at the house with nothing but his troubled thoughts. He was always grateful for Hyunjin’s company and he was also happy that Yongbok was here. He was even glad Jisung was around, despite his crassness. Chan chuckled. It definitely must have been the whiskey softening his heart. He sucked in a breath to speak.

“If you say another mushy thing, old man,” Jisung cut him off, “I’m going to tear all of my hair out.”

Yongbok snickered. “Well, this is amazing, right? We all had good days in the end.”

True. Even Chan could say that he had a good day. Despite everything.

Well, there was one person they hadn’t asked. Chan turned to look at Minho. “This may be an impossible task for you but can you name one good thing that happened to you today?”

Minho was looking at him again. Smiling at him again. His big, soulless eyes were still big but they didn’t seem half as soulless as usual. At least for a second. Once more, Minho realized what he was doing and was immediately horrified. He looked away hurriedly and disguised his smile behind a coughing fit. “What did you just ask me?”

Chan patiently asked him, “Did you have a good day, Minho?”

The elegant witch shrugged. “It was passable.”

Conversation around the table continued pleasantly. Jisung wanted everyone to know that he’d been promoted to business partner and could now participate in shareholder meetings with Chan. Chan was in so good a mood that he didn’t even contradict him.

Hyunjin told everyone about the bear Jisung had bought for him and then Yongbok complained that no one had bought him a bear.

Changbin snored, completely unperturbed. Maybe he had the right idea. Chan found his own eyelids drooping. It was getting later than he realized.

“Did you eat something,” Minho’s voice was cool like peppermint in Chan’s ear.

The District Witch shivered. He blinked open his eyes and then startled, not expecting--or, rather, having briefly forgotten--that Minho was sitting right next to him. “No. I haven’t.”

“You should eat,” Minho insisted.

“I’m not hungry,” Chan said. He was just tired and a little buzzed and a nap sounded really good right then.

“You’re the only one who hasn’t eaten,” Minho pointed out. He sounded uncharacteristically concerned. “Don’t think I haven’t noticed.” He was already reaching for a napkin and using it to grab a slice of pizza out of one of the boxes. He handed it to Chan who took it and examined it like he’d never seen pepperoni before.

“You didn’t poison it, did you?” Chan just had to ask. Despite his worry, he took a bite anyway. As he ate, he realized he was far hungrier than he realized. His stomach growled even as he chewed and swallowed and took another bite. He glanced up at the clock on the wall, caught sight of the time and was shocked to find out that they had all sat around this table for over an hour without discussing the reason why they were gathered around the table to begin with. “We should talk about the beast. No more interruptions.”

There was a low, howling noise that made everyone at the table go quiet.

To Chan’s sleepy mind, it sounded like a big, bad wolf sitting right outside the window. Calling to the Big Blue Bird.

“Is that the wind,” Jisung asked. He attempted to turn around in his seat to look out the window but Yongbok didn’t give him much room to twist.

Hyunjin got up and approached the big window on the other side of the room. He fiddled with the blinds for a few seconds until he remembered how to twist them open. Outside, the snow was falling so thick that it was almost impossible to see the house across the street.

“It’s really coming down,” Chan commented, not thinking much of it.

“Oh no. Oh no.” Minho got to his feet. “No. No. No.”

“What is it,” Chan asked. “What’s wrong?”

“I’m leaving,” Minho said abruptly. He grabbed his tattered grimoire from where he’d placed it on the floor beneath the coffee table. He wedged it under his arm, turned to go and legit startled when he spotted Changbin sprawled out on the couch. “ We’re leaving.” He shook Changbin’s shoulder in an attempt to wake the boy. “We have to go. Now.” When Changbin didn’t stir, Minho gave up on him and made a beeline to the foyer. “I’m out of here.”

“What’s gotten into you?” Chan pushed himself upright and followed after Minho, almost right on his heels. “What do you mean you’re leaving? We have so much to discuss. You said you would help!”

Minho worked himself up into a near-panic. His words tumbled out of him. “Oh no. You’re not fooling me anymore. I told you that I wasn’t staying long and yet you’ve somehow stolen the entire evening from me. I’m not getting stuck here for the whole night. I’d rather burn at the stake.” He grabbed his too-thin jacket from the rack and started to put it on, switching the grimoire from one hand to the other to get his arms through the sleeves.

“You can’t just leave without finishing our discussion.” Chan tried to block his path. “At the very least, just tell me what creature is at the heart of everything so that I can come up with a plan.”

“I’m not staying here a second longer. We can talk about it tomorrow,” Minho told him. He put his hand on Chan’s chest and pushed the District Witch aside. “I’ll come by before I open the store.” He fiddled with the lock a moment and then swung open the front door.

Freezing cold air poured into the house like a tidal wave. The howling wind got inside, carrying a thick flurry of snowflakes in with it. Chan and Minho both raised their hands in front of their eyes to block their faces from the cold. Chan squinted against the whiteness of the snowflakes. In the amount of time that had passed since he’d last looked outside, his entire porch had become covered in freshly fallen snow. He couldn’t even see the road and the weather didn’t look like it would let up any time soon.

Chan moved first. He pushed past Minho and slammed the door shut. The noise of the howling wind was reduced to a dull roar on the other side of the heavy wood. The snow that had gotten inside took several seconds to flutter through the air and settle on the floor.

“Oh no,” said Minho, coming to his senses now that his surprise from the sudden turn in weather had subsided. “I refuse to stay here.” He squeezed his feet into his dress shoes, not caring he was putting them on the wrong feet. “Why did you shut the door, District Witch? I’m leaving. I’m going home. I can’t be close to you.”

“You’re really going to try to go out in that mess?” Chan asked, shivering at just the thought. If he was this cold standing in his foyer, it had to be freezing outdoors. “Would you really be more comfortable out there than in here?”

“Yes!” Stubbornly, Minho reached for the doorknob and swung open the door once more.

Again, the blizzard wind raced inside, forcefully enough to knock Minho back a step or two and send his shoulder against Chan’s chest.

The District Witch asked, “What about Changbin? You’re going to leave him?”

“He’s off the clock. He can do what he wants,” Minho said. He took a step past the threshold of the door and all but vanished in the flurry of snowflakes outside.

Chan squinted. He couldn’t even see Minho’s silhouette. “What about your hat?” Chan shouted. “It’s still on the coat rack!”

Several seconds passed with no response.

“Hey,” Jisung shouted at the top of his lungs from farther inside. “Shut that door! The whole living room’s freezing now!”

Chan started to close the front door but then Minho was suddenly charging back into the foyer. He knocked Chan aside in his rush to get indoors and warm.

“Bird’s claws,” Minho cursed through chattering teeth. The wind had stirred up his hair something fierce and his nose was bright red even from those short few seconds in the chill. “I can’t believe this. I can’t believe I’m stuck here.” Snow had covered him from head to toe. Stiffly, like a prison inmate about to face the death sentence, he peeled out of his shoes and stripped off his jacket, dumping copious amounts of snow onto the foyer floor.

Chan shut the door behind him and then put his hands on Minho’s shoulders. “Come on, let’s get you in front of the fire.”

“This is all because of you,” Minho huffed, shrugging Chan’s hands off of him. “I’m trapped here because of you.”

“Trapped is a strong word.”

“It was barely snowing when I arrived, District Witch. You and your bad luck have snowed me in!”

“This isn’t because of me,” said Chan. His voice came out louder and sharper than he intended. “I have no control over the Big Blue Bird.”

Minho shook his head, still in disbelief. “They say she doesn’t give you more than what you can handle. Well, I definitely can’t handle this!”

Chan groaned. He was tired of Minho acting like this when all he was doing was trying to be nice. He pointed to the front door. “If you want to go, go !” He hadn’t meant to yell but it was too late to stop now. “If you hate being around me so much, you don’t have to stay.”

Minho turned to look at the door as if seriously considering braving the inclement weather. Even as the two witches stood there, the howling of the wind increased in volume. Louder and louder. Even the house itself shuddered, the old wood creaking and shifting around them as the snow came down harder. After quite some time, Minho hung his coat on the rack and lined his shoes up alongside everyone else’s. When he looked up at Chan, his face was blank and cold and not just because snow still covered his skin and hair. It was impossible to tell what Minho was thinking. Wordlessly, the elegant witch slumped his shoulders and made his way back to the living room.

Not too much longer afterwards, Chan followed him to the couch.

Chapter Text

“Okay, Hyunjin. It’s bedtime,” Chan announced at ten o’clock on the dot.

Hyunjin folded his arms across his chest and pouted. “But I don’t wanna go to bed. I wanna stay up and talk with all of you!”

Chan sighed. It wasn’t as if they were having a very compelling conversation but he did feel a little bad about sending Hyunjin upstairs alone. But if he allowed it this once, Hyunjin would expect or even demand that he do it again. Chan stood up. “Come on. It’s ten o’clock. Upstairs. That’s our rule.”

“Yeah,” Jisung teased, not helping matters at all, “kids have to go to bed early!”

“I don’t wanna go to bed!” Hyunjin cried out.

“Stop being mean, Jisung,” said Chan. He approached Hyunjin and attempted to pull the boy to his feet but he resisted. “Please don’t be like this, Hyunjin. It’s bedtime.”

“I don’t wanna go to sleep!” Hyunjin whined.

“You have to,” said Jisung. “And then the rest of us can stay up all night.”

“What do you have against sleeping,” Yongbok asked Hyunjin with big, yellow eyes. “I’d love to go to sleep right now.”

“I don’t mind sleep, either,” said Changbin. Sometime in the past minute or so, he had woken up but it clearly looked like he was a moment away from falling asleep again.

“We should all call it a night,” said Chan. Some of them had jobs, after all. “I still have work I need to do before bed.”

“I’ll only go to sleep now if you go to sleep now,” Hyunjin persisted, sticking out his bottom lip.

Chan didn’t have time for this. He let go of Hyunjin’s hand. “Let’s wash up and go to bed, everyone.” If everyone had to go to bed, he figured, no one would feel left out.

Minho sat up. “Wait. Hold on. You keep talking about sleeping but where is this all occurring? Don’t you see how many of us there are?”

“The house has four bedrooms upstairs,” Chan explained.

“And I have my own room,” Jisung shouted.

“And I have my own room,” Hyunjin repeated after him, delighted.

“I’ll sleep wherever,” said Yongbok. “I’m not picky as long as it’s warm.”

Changbin sat up on the couch and stretched. “I’ll take whatever’s left, then.”

“Alright, then,” said Chan, assuming the room assignments were finished.

“Hold on, hold on, hold on,” Minho waved his hands. “I’m not sleeping with Chan!”

Stuttering over his words, Chan choked out, “W-w-what?”

Minho’s face went red. “In the same bed, you dolt.”

“You don’t have to,” Chan said quickly. “That’s not even what I suggested.”

“Where else would I sleep,” asked Minho. “You’ve given that one his own room.” He waved a hand in Hyunjin’s direction.

“He lives here,” said Chan.

“What about that one,” Minho pointed at Jisung.

“I live here,” Jisung explained.

“Since when?” Chan had to know.

“What about that one over there,” Minho looked at Yongbok.

“I just come and go as I please,” answered Yongbok honestly.

Minho frowned. “I’m not sleeping in the same bed with you, District Witch. I’d rather stick my wand in my eye.”

Chan grit his teeth. “For the second time, that’s not even what I said. You can sleep in the same room as Yongbok.”

“With some stranger? How untowards,” Minho exclaimed, holding his hand to his chest as if he were absolutely scandalized.

It was as if everyone in the room had morphed into a child. Chan got a sudden craving for coffee. “How about this? Yongbok can share Jisung’s room.”

“With whose permission?” Jisung folded his arms across his chest.

“Changbin can have the guest room,” Chan suggested. “You take my room and I’ll sleep on the couch.”

“Hold up, hold up, hold up,” Minho said, waving his hands even more furiously this time around. “I still don’t want to sleep in a bed that you’ve slept in with your smell and your germs and your bad luck all over everything.”

“Stop being difficult,” Chan told him.

Minho clamped his mouth shut and fumed.

“I can take Chan’s room,” volunteered Changbin. “Minho, you can take the fourth bedroom.”

Hyunjin attempted to do the math on his fingers. “That still leaves you on the couch, Chan.”

“That doesn’t seem fair,” Yongbok said. “It’s your house.”

Chan shook his head. “You’re my guests. You can take the beds.”

Yongbok shook his head. “Still doesn’t seem fair.”

Jisung hopped up off of the recliner. “For hex’s sake, Minho, just sleep with Chan already!”

Both of the witches turned towards him. In unison, they shouted, “What!”

Jisung coughed into his fist. “I mean, uh, sleep in the same bed. That way no one has to sleep on the couch.”

“I’m not going to do that,” Minho said in a low voice. “I’d rather be cursed for all of eternity then have to share a bed with this fool.” He jerked his head in Chan’s direction.

Hyunjin looked up at Chan seriously. “Why is he being so loud? What’s so wrong with sleeping together?”

“Yeah. Sleep is great no matter what,” Yongbok advocated. “I vote we just do it in one big pile. Right here.” He pointed to the floor in front of the fireplace.

“Let’s not,” Chan stated firmly. He was amazed at how quickly such a simple discussion had spiraled out of his control. He’d never get any work done if they couldn’t solve all of this. Maybe it was a good thing they’d all be upstairs. It would be quiet down here in the living room. He could stay up as long as he needed to. “I don’t mind the couch, really. I can do all of my work in peace.”

But peace didn’t seem like something he’d be able to obtain any time soon.

Hyunjin tilted his head in wonder, “Is something bad going to happen if Chan and Minho sleep together?”

“If they sleep in the same bed,” said Jisung with a mischievous glint in his eyes, “you’ll get a baby brother or sister, Hyunjin!”

“That is not how that works,” Chan said, eyes wide.

Hyunjin’s eyes sparkled. He grabbed Chan’s hands. “I want a thousand baby brothers and a thousand baby sisters!”

“You heard the boy,” Jisung egged him on, waggling his eyebrows first in Chan’s direction and then Minho’s. “Get to work. Chop chop.”

Minho grabbed a handful of his own hair and pulled. “Bird’s claws.”

“Jisung, stop being inappropriate,” said Chan, putting a bit of authority into his tone. Then he looked at Hyunjin. “Just think of your bear as your baby sister.”

This satisfied Hyunjin. “Okay!”

“Why does Yongbok have to be in my room,” Jisung exclaimed.

“It’s not your room,” Chan reminded him.

“It is,” Jisung insisted. “I claimed it. All of my stuff’s in there.”

“I’m really fine sleeping wherever,” Yongbok stated.

“Same here,” said Changbin. “Really. I can take the couch if everyone will stop arguing.”

“How about this,” Minho suggested. “I can just go home. Problem solved.”

“But-” Chan started.

Minho stood up and pointed out the window. “The snow’s stopped. I can go.” Now that he had the idea in his head, he seemed excited by the prospect of leaving. Smiling, he crossed the living room. Almost as an afterthought, he added, “You coming, Changbin?”

“I was looking forward to the sleepover, though,” mumbled Changbin.

“At least let me walk you out.” Chan hurried after Minho.

In the foyer, Minho gathered his jacket and hat and then slipped on his shoes.

As he did so, Chan fiddled with the lock and opened the front door. Chan blinked. “Great Big Blue,” he cursed and slammed the door shut again.

“What’s all of this commotion, District Witch,” asked Minho.

“See for yourself,” Chan told him, stepping back from the door.

“I’ve had enough of your games for one night. Stop being cryptic and just answer the question.”

“You won’t believe me if I told you anyways. Just look,” said Chan.

Minho groaned impatiently and walked up to the door. He pulled it open. He blinked. “Bird’s claws,” Minho cursed and, just like Chan before, he slammed the door shut again.

Changbin was suddenly standing between them. “What’s going on?”

Chan jumped and held his hand to his chest.

“The snow is piled up higher than the door,” Minho informed him.

It was only the grace of the Big Blue Bird that kept all of that snow from caving in on them when they swung open the door.

Chan stepped forward and locked the front door securely. “I’ll have to call Woojin in the morning and tell him we’re properly snowed in.”

“This is all your fault,” Minho insisted.

Chan raised his voice. “This has nothing to do with me or my bad luck or whatever.”

“I just want to go home, District Witch, but every time I try, you keep me here.”

“I can get you a shovel and you can dig your way out.”

“And work up a sweat? I don’t think so. I’m just tired of all of the nonsense you attract.”

“I can’t control the weather. I’m not the Big Blue Bird.”

“Please don’t fight,” Changbin muttered. “Again.”

Chan exhaled and stepped past the witch and his apprentice so that he could get back into the living room. He was no longer in the mood for games. The sooner everyone was upstairs and out of his hair, the sooner he could finish all of the reports and research he needed to have done before the week was out. The sooner he could start working on his official resignation letter. To everyone gathered, he said, “Hyunjin go to your room. Jisung and Yongbok can share. Don’t look at me like that, Jisung. I can sleep on the couch. Changbin can take my room. Minho can have the spare. That’s final . No more whining. No more complaining. No more nasty jokes. Just get to bed. All of you.”

There was a chorus of groans and sighs as Hyunjin, Jisung and Yongbok all shuffled across the living room and climbed up the stairs to the second floor.

Suddenly, Hyunjin whirled around, “Will you tuck me in?”

He had almost forgotten. “Yes, Hyunjin, I’ll tuck you in,” Chan told him. “Give me five minutes.”

“I’ll be counting,” Hyunjin said and then bolted up the stairs with a gleeful giggle.

“Good night,” said Changbin from beside him. “And thank you for letting us stay.”

“Night,” Chan called back. He then looked over his shoulder at Minho, who had just took off his hat, shoes and jacket again. “Good night, Minho.”

“What’s good about it,” Minho snapped, and then started up the stairs.

Chan watched them all turn the corner and disappear down the hall. This had all been very sudden. For the past five months, he lived in this big house alone. In less than a week, it had somehow become full of laughter and voices and life. The idea should have warmed him but all he could think about was that he’d lose this house when he quit being District Witch. He'd probably lose his connection to all of them as well but it would be far easier to stop everything now and leave quietly.

Before he got too attached.

★☆

Chan didn’t remember exactly when he fell asleep but when he woke up, the living room was completely dark--the fire in the hearth snuffed out long ago--and the couch was stiff and uncomfortable beneath him. His back was killing him. His neck hurt. His left shoulder was stiff. Chan wiped at his eyes. He had fallen asleep in the middle of working and, right now, he had woken up because of… a sound? From very close by?

He heard it again: The creak of the floorboards beneath feet. The crinkle of paper.

Chan squinted into the near-dark. There was just enough light coming in through the open blinds from the street lamp outside the front window for him to see the tall silhouette of someone flipping through the pages of his reports and profit spreadsheets and notebooks as if searching for something.

All Chan spotted was dark hair and a long, pale neck before he almost went to sleep again. Hyunjin? He floated back into consciousness. His eyelids still heavy, his brain only slightly cottony from the whiskey, Chan reached out a hand, reached and reached, and then grabbed Hyunjin by the wrist.

The boy gasped at the sudden contact and startled away from the touch but Chan pulled a little harder.

“Hey, don’t put your hands on that,” Chan lectured, tightening his grip. “Don’t go touching other people’s things without asking them first. It’s not nice. Okay?” He let go of Hyunjin’s wrist, already drifting off to sleep again. Each time he blinked, his eyes stayed closed longer and longer.

Hyunjin approached the couch and sank down to his knees onto the floor next to it. Chan felt the couch cushion beneath his head squash and tilt as Hyunjin propped his elbows on it and leaned his weight against it.

The movement was enough to jolt Chan away from sleep. He opened his eyes and blinked. When had Hyunjin’s hair gotten so thick and long again? Hadn’t the coven cut it just the other day? Chan raised a hand and ran it over the top of Hyunjin’s head soothingly until he felt the boy relax. Chan closed his eyes. He didn’t realize until then how cold he had been alone on the couch. He didn’t realize it until he felt someone else’s body heat slowly wrap around him like this. He stopped shivering. Sleep started to settle over him like a blanket. He let himself sink a little lower into it. The rhythm of his hand over Hyunjin’s hair did not change for several seconds.

Chan’s whole body stilled as realization hit him.

He snapped awake, sat up on his elbow and opened his eyes wide just to double check. He patted the sides of Hyunjin’s head. Left side. Right side. There were no horns. There were no horns !

The figure in front of him lifted their head from the cradle of their folded arms.

Now Chan could properly see their face. A pouty mouth frowned up at him. Thick eyebrows furrowed downward in mild irritation. It was Minho. Not Hyunjin like he had thought this whole time but Minho! Chan’s heart felt like it had come to a complete stop in his chest. He pulled his hand away from Minho’s hair like his skin might burn.

They stared at each other for a moment. Chan all heavy breathing. Minho the embodiment of calmness.

“Why did you stop,” the elegant witch whispered into the dark. He didn’t sound upset at all.

It took a long moment for Chan to realize what he meant. “Do you want me to continue?”

Minho nodded. “It feels nice.”

Slowly, tentatively, because this had to be a dream, Chan reached out his hand and placed it back on the top of Minho’s head. He let his fingers card through the witch’s black hair slowly. Back and forth. Back and forth. Minho’s hair was so soft and smelled faintly of sandalwood. Every now and then, Chan’s pinky finger brushed against the shell of Minho’s ear. Minho simply hummed and leaned into the touch. This was… pleasant. Chan felt… wanted . The whole time, Minho’s warm, bright eyes did not leave Chan’s for a moment. They followed his every slight movement, watching everything.

“How do you do it,” Minho asked quietly. Even though he spoke so low that the words barely formed sounds on his tongue, the faces of the two witches were so close that it was impossible not to hear him.

“How do I do what?” Chan asked.

Minho looked at him for a long moment, as if the question was right there but he could not word it properly.

Chan tested something. He lowered his hand from the top of Minho’s head down to his cheek, his thumb dancing right at the corner of Minho’s mouth. It felt so real to him, so warm, but he was positive he was asleep and dreaming. He was positive that Minho would never ever let him do this. He was positive that he would never ever do this to Minho. That he would never ever want to do this. But…

It felt nice.

“How do you take care of so many other people but have no one here to take care of you,” asked Minho, his eyes oddly sad.

The question sat heavy in the limited space between them. For a while, there was only the sound of their breathing in the room, their faces so close that they were practically sharing air. Chan didn’t know how to answer Minho’s question because he just did not know. He didn’t know how he was doing this. He didn’t know how he was juggling it all by himself. Keeping up with the shop and managing his duties as District Witch. Chan was always moving but, right now, he was very very still and now that he was very very still, he realized just how exhausted he was. How did he get through the day when he had Hyunjin to keep an eye on and had Jisung to keep under control and Yongbok to look after and Woojin to impress and the coven to win over… and… Minho…

Chan swallowed hard. He mustered every last bit of his bravery to speak this: “Do you want to take care of me?”

Minho’s eyes widened with shock.

Chan’s heart sank. His hand stilled on Minho’s cheek. He wondered if he’d asked the wrong question.

But then Minho said, almost breathily, “Of course, Chan.”

Relief swept over him. Chan exhaled as the weight of the world slipped partially off of his shoulders. Now what? He was looking at Minho. Minho was looking at him. Was this the moment he should step up and change everything? It felt like it. So he did. Chan gulped down the last of his fear and leaned forward, bridging the gap between their mouths.

Minho tensed. Then he pulled back, away from Chan’s mouth, away from Chan’s hands.

Then Minho laughed.

And laughed. And laughed.

Chan could only blink, confused.

“Oh, now I know. Now I know ,” Minho said, choking on the words because he was laughing so hard. “I knew I would find it. You took me by surprise there so I was just going with the flow but I never would have guessed your weakness would be something so easy .” And then he wasn’t Minho anymore. In an instant, he was Jeongin, sneering in Chan’s face, his crooked teeth white and dangerous in the low light.

The District Witch sat up straight.

Anger. Regret. Desperation.

The emotions bubbled up in him so quickly that he could not control himself. Before he realized it, Chan put his hands on Jeongin’s shoulders and shoved , knocking Jeongin to the floor, his head swinging dangerously close to the coffee table. The kid’s laughter only escalated into high-pitched yet nearly silent wheezing.

“You… You like him,” Jeongin squeaked out. “Yet you refuse to tell him! How disgustingly human of you but the turmoil… Yes. The turmoil is delicious.”

Chan felt betrayed.

His tiredness had made him vulnerable and, for once, he had put his heart on his sleeve... yet now his heart had been stomped on and tears sprang to his eyes faster than he could stop them. “Get out,” he demanded, pointing towards the foyer. He tried to sound mean but he was so defeated and so sad that his voice just came out weak. “Get out of my house. Leave me alone!”

Jeongin’s laughter promptly stopped. “Yes, that’s it,” he said. His tone had become hungry. “That rage. So hot that it’s white!” He inhaled sharply and his eyes rolled to the back of his head. “That’s the stuff.”

Chan stood up. He reached into his pockets but his wand wasn’t there. He had left it upstairs on his nightstand, not thinking he would need it. “Get out,” he screamed. It was the next best thing.

Jeongin just opened his mouth and slurped at the air as if he were actually physically eating Chan’s words.

Chan stopped himself, vaguely recalling Jeongin saying that mimics subsisted off of such angry, negative emotions.

This had to be a dream! It had to be. If he just went to bed, this nightmare would end! Chan ran across the living room and charged up the stairs, taking them two at a time. If he could just sleep then everything would be okay.

Minho lurked at the top of the stairs like a snake about to strike at its prey. “Do you know what time it is, District Witch,” he hissed, stepping into Chan’s way. “You’ll wake up the whole house.”

Chan shoved him aside, not caring that he sent Minho’s shoulder into the wall. Desperate for solace, he ran down the hall. He just needed to be alone. As he ran to the end of the hall, he could see the light of his lamp cut on, sending a rectangle of light out into the hall from beneath the door. Just as he reached for the knob, the door swung open.

Changbin stood there, wiping at his eyes and yawning. “What’s all of the ruckus about,” Changbin asked.

Chan didn’t have the heart to explain or even apologize for what he was about to do. He grabbed Changbin by the shoulder, dragged him out into the hall and rushed into his room. He would have slammed the door shut behind him if a certain elegant witch hadn’t come in right behind him, stopping the door fast.

“What’s gotten into you,” Minho asked. “I’ve never heard you raise your voice like that.”

Chan leaped away from him. “Get out,” he vocalized, still shaky from the event downstairs.

Minho did not get out. “We’re trying to sleep. You’re disturbing everyone with all of your yelling and stomping around and attempted door slamming.” Minho came into the room and pushed the door shut behind him. He approached the District Witch. “Do you want to talk about this like adults?”

Chan stepped even farther away from him, practically cowering.

“Did you have a nightmare or something?” Minho asked, scrunching up his face. “Don’t be such a child about it. How distasteful.” He took another step closer to the District Witch.

Chan screamed, “Get away from me!”

Minho shushed him. “If you make that dragon boy start wailing with all of your noise…” Minho threatened. “Calm down.”

Chan attempted to calm down but he could not. He couldn’t trust his eyes. Was he looking at Minho or was he looking at Jeongin disguised as Minho? Was his heart racing with fear or did it thump in his chest because, even for a moment, he had let himself long for something that he knew he could not have? “Are you real,” Chan asked before he could stop himself.

Minho’s eye twitched with irritation. He took one long step towards Chan so that they were face to face. “Do you know how many times you’ve asked me that same question this week? Do you think I’m a homunculus or a golem or a phantom or something?” He grabbed Chan’s wrist and, despite the District Witch’s struggling, placed the man’s palm against his chest. “Do you feel that?” Minho asked seriously.

Chan could feel Minho’s heart go ba-dump ba-dump ba-dump under his palm and it scared him because now he knew for certain that this was no dream.

“I assure you, that pulse is completely natural,” said Minho. “My heart is real. Not an alchemical reaction or mechanical function in the thing so stop asking me if I’m real, District Witch.”

If this was real, if this wasn’t a dream, then the longing Chan had in his heart for the man standing in front of him was also real. It had been the tiniest of flames, sure, and it had been extinguished about as quickly as it had caught, but fire was fire. Pure shame filled Chan from head to toe and his cheeks flushed with color. He used his palm on Minho’s chest to push the witch away. Just the thought of being close to Minho, the real one or the fake one, horrified him. With far more control than he thought he had left, he asked, “Can you leave my room, please?”

“Can you promise to stop screaming, please? It’s three in the morning.”

“I’ll stop screaming,” Chan exhaled. He was certain Jeongin was still in his house. They were snowed in. Jeongin could be anywhere right now. He could turn invisible, after all! He was probably in the room right at that moment. Watching. Observing. Thinking up brand new ways to torture Chan now that he had found his ‘weakness.’ Paranoid and humiliated, Chan stepped forward and pushed Minho again. Harder.

“Hey,” the witch cried out. He stumbled backwards. His knees hit the edge of the bed and he fell onto his back on the mattress. “What was that for?”

“Laugh,” Chan ordered suddenly.

Minho looked up at him. “Huh?”

“Laugh,” Chan repeated sternly. “Or I’ll make you.”

“You can’t make me do anything.” Minho tilted his head and narrowed his eyes. He was starting to guess that Chan’s attitude stemmed from something far larger than a simple nightmare. “What is all of this about, District Witch. Have you lost it?”

Probably. “Laugh, Minho.” Chan needed to know if this was Jeongin or not before he even pretended to relax.

“I’m not going to laugh just because you tell me to do so.” Minho slid back on the bed and then let out a surprised gasp. “This mattress is exquisite. It’s like sitting on a cloud. Bird’s claws, I probably should have taken the room when you offered it.”

“I’m being serious, Minho,” said Chan. “I need you to laugh.”

“And I need you to stop being creepy,” Minho replied smoothly. “How do you expect me to laugh in such an awkward situation?”

Minho’s stubborn refusal made Chan even more suspicious. Was this Jeongin after all? Frowning, he approached the bed. “I’ll make you laugh, then.” He held up his hands.

“I’m not even ticklish,” said Minho, sliding even farther back on the bed, completely undisturbed. He dropped his head on one of the pillows. “And if you place your hands on me in an attempt to put that theory to the test, I will turn you into a toad.”

For a split second, Chan was back on the couch, running his hands through Not-Minho’s hair, leaning forward to kiss Not-Minho’s mouth. Just the idea of it sent a cold chill up his spine. “Trust me, I don’t want to touch you.” It took everything in his power not to scream and yell. He was certain the boys were sleeping peacefully on the other side of the hall and his desire not to disturb them was the only thing keeping Chan from hurling Minho out of his second-story window. “Get out of my room, Minho. Weren’t you completely against the idea of being in here just a few hours ago?”

“Was I? If I had known this bed was so comfortable...” Minho started to sit up only to stop short and gasp. “What’s this?” He reached his hand into the case of the pillow beneath his head and had the letter that had been tucked away there unfolded before Chan even realized what he was doing.

“Minho,” Chan gasped out, his eyes wide and his heart racing. “Don’t read that.” He crawled onto the bed and rushed up to the witch but he failed in his attempt to snatch the letter from Minho’s hand as the man rolled away from him. “Minho,” Chan said again, reaching for the paper a second time.

As if this were all a game, Minho just rolled even farther out of his reach, devouring the words of the letters with his eyes, a shockingly serious look on his face.

“Stop playing around,” Chan huffed, exasperated. He just wanted to be alone. He didn’t need any of this. Especially from Minho. He reached for the letter again.

“I see,” Minho said, looking up. This time, he allowed Chan to snatch the letter away from him. “Because one random person is upset with you, you want to quit being District Witch?”

Chan crumbled. He sat back on his haunches and stared at a spot on the wall. His secret was out and it felt so awful having it exposed. The only thing Chan could manage to say was, “Keep your voice down.”

There was a beat of silence before Minho asked, “You genuinely want to resign?”

Chan shut his eyes. He wasn’t brave enough to say it out loud.

Minho sat up on the bed and crossed his legs, leaning towards Chan. “A little bit of hate mail has you this stressed out?”

“If you think you can do so much better, you can apply for the position. I told you earlier that the spot will be open soon.”

“I don’t want to be District Witch. I want you to be District Witch.”

Chan held up the mean letter close to Minho’s face. “I don’t deserve it. Clearly, I don’t work hard enough. The Big Blue Bird gave me this opportunity and I suppose I wasn’t grateful or humble enough because now she is taking it away from me.”

Minho pushed the letter away. “Is she taking it or are you walking away from it?”

“If I don’t have this mana flow problem solved by the weekend, it will be taken from me.”

“We’ll have it solved by the weekend, District Witch.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“Because I am a genius and this silly little problem of yours is but a mere ant beneath the boot of my superior talent.”

Chan rolled his eyes.

“Doubt me if you dare. We’re going to get to the bottom of this issue tomorrow.”

“And then I can quit and let someone else take over.”

“You’re not going to quit.”

“What else can I do?” Chan asked. He waved the mean letter in the air. “Everything they said was true. I’m a terrible person and an awful District Witch.”

“Did you read the same thing I did? Because they didn’t say any of that. They only said they’re moving out.”

“Because of me,” Chan stressed. “They are moving out due to how terribly I’m handling the responsibilities of this job!”

“Chan,” Minho’s voice was firm. “Quiet down.”

They sat in silence for several moments. Chan’s anxiety had all of his muscles vibrating, had his fingers feeling cold and numb, had his lungs feeling tight like he couldn’t catch a deep breath. He twisted the hate mail in his hands, pulling at the paper like he wanted to tear it but, like the piles of useless things he had in his room, he just needed to keep it. Remember it. Maybe even learn from it.

“Dwelling on it isn’t going to help,” said Minho.

Chan didn’t know the witch was capable of sounding so thoughtful. “But if one person feels like this about me, won’t other people?”

“It’s just one letter. I bet you get plenty of mail from residents and most of it is from people who like you and what you do, otherwise they wouldn’t seek out your guidance.”

“But they kind of have to. I’m the District Witch.”

“They can go to any witch’s shop in the District, including but not limited to mine, and ask the witch there the same thing they ask you… but they don’t. They want your advice.”

Chan shook his head, still wrestling with his doubts. “I’m not special. I’m not good. Someone else can do my job better than I can.”

“They can do it better, but can they do it the way you do, Chan?”

It was oddly frustrating, Chan realized. He had fully expected Minho to bash him and tease him and lord this humiliation over his head but it seemed like Minho had a response for every negative thing Chan wanted to say. “Did you just give me a compliment?”

“That’s debatable.”

Chan chuckled. Once. That was closer to the Minho he was familiar with.

Minho pulled the letter from out of Chan’s hands and smoothed out the numerous creases and wrinkles Chan had put into it. He read it again, far more slowly this time, absorbing the words. When Minho spoke again, his voice was quiet and melodic like violin song. “No one is going to be perfect at this job. Why else do you think I’ve moved so many times in the past few years? Every District Witch has their issues and is bound to make mistakes because they are human. Well… most of them. Some mistakes are grave things while other mistakes are just mountains made out of molehills. Some apologies work while other apologies don’t cut it. People are going to react because everyone has thoughts and emotions and experiences and opinions. It’s impossible to please everyone, dangerous to believe that you can please everyone and foolish to consider yourself a failure just because someone isn’t pleased by you.” Minho propped his chin on his raised fist and looked over the letter another short minute before growing bored of it and tossing it aside. He looked up at Chan. “If everyone stopped doing what they did because someone they didn’t know had a problem with it, we’d have a lot of people sitting around doing nothing and doing nothing…” He trailed off.

Chan picked up the quote, “...is the last thing the Big Blue Bird wants us to do.” That’s why she blessed the world with mana. That’s why mana always moved .

Minho continued, “Even if you somehow manage to do everything perfectly without making a single slip-up personally or professionally, someone out there is going to have a problem with you and whether they keep it to themselves or they tell all of their friends to convince them to feel the same way or they write a strongly-worded letter to you directly, you can’t let the hate stop you.” Minho scoffed and leaned back on his hands. “Do you know how many times I’ve been told by someone that they have a problem with me? Just in the last year?”

Chan glanced over at him with a grin. “Hundreds? Thousands? Millions?”

Minho smirked. “And have I let that stop me?” His smirk faltered and he looked away from Chan quickly. “Yes, actually. A few more times than I’d like to admit, sure, but I kept going because as long as I know who I am and where I stand and what I believe in, I’m not going to let someone who doesn’t know me at all get the better of me.”

The silence that they fell into was far more pleasant than Chan expected it to be. “You called me by my name again,” he said, not knowing why that made him happy.

Minho’s head whirled in his direction. “What?”

“Earlier,” Chan pointed out. “You called me by my name even though you said you never would again.”

Minho crawled to the edge of the bed and stood up. The moment that they had, if it could even be called that, shattered instantly. “You’re the absolute worst, do you know that?” Minho walked to the bedroom door and swung it open. The hall beyond the door was dark and empty and quiet. Perhaps the others hadn’t been disturbed by Chan’s outrage. Minho muttered, “I take the time out of my busy life... I interrupt my usual nine hours of sleep to bless you with some spectacular and life-altering advice and you don’t even have enough functioning brain cells to listen to what I tell you because you are so caught up on hearing me say your blasted name.”

“I heard what you said,” Chan stated, not even minding Minho’s insults. “And it really helped me out.” He met Minho’s eyes and found himself smiling. “Thank you.”

This just made Minho scrunch up his nose as if he’d just bitten into something terribly sour. “Disgusting,” he huffed and then shut the door in a hurry.

★☆

The next morning, Chan called Regional Manager Kim Woojin.

It was still early, just a touch after seven, but Woojin picked up on the third ring.

“Ahh, hello,” Chan said, laughing nervously. He actually hadn’t expected the man to pick up.

Woojin asked, “Chan, what is it?”

Chan peered out of the living room’s big window. He couldn’t see a thing. “Do I have to open the shop today?”

“Are you sick,” Woojin’s voice filled with worry. “Did you catch the bug that’s been going around?”

That wasn’t the reaction Chan had been expecting at all. “No. I’m fine. Not even a sniffle. It’s just that I can’t go to work. I can’t leave the house.” There was a tap on Chan’s shoulder. He turned to look. Jisung was standing behind him. Chan motioned to his phone to indicate that he was busy and turned back to look out the window.

“Why can’t you leave? Is your dragon sick?”

“No. He’s fine, too. I physically can’t leave the house. I’m quite snowed in.”

Woojin was silent a moment. And then he said, “Chan, it didn’t snow very hard last night. If you’re hungover or something, that’s your responsibility. Regardless of your choices, you’re still obligated to-”

He wasn't hungover at all! “The snow is piled up past my window,” Chan exclaimed. “I can’t even see outside!” Jisung tapped Chan on the shoulder again. Chan barely spared him a glance, motioning to his phone again. “I open my door and it’s a wall of snow.”

“Chan,” Woojin said. Chan could practically hear the man grit his teeth. “I’m looking outside of my office window. There’s barely enough snow to cover the ground. The plows have already cleared the roads. You need to open on time today.”

Chan sighed. He decided to take photos of the winter wonderland outside and send them to Woojin as email attachments. He was not a liar and he was not making up excuses.

Jisung tapped him on the shoulder a third time. Practically stabbing Chan with his finger.

Irritated, Chan spun towards him and then remembered something else. “I’ve got that delivery for you, Woojin,” he said into the phone. “The snow may delay him a bit but my courier should be there before the end of the business day.”

“Please think about this a little longer, Chan,” Woojin urged him. “Don’t make big decisions like this when you’re emotional.”

“Thank you for the opportunity, Woojin,” Chan told him. “You took a chance on me and I’m very grateful. Goodbye.” He hung up and shoved his phone in his pocket. He looked up at Jisung. “What’s the matter?”

Jisung was usually so vibrant and loud but in that moment he looked uncharacteristically somber. “Are you really leaving,” he asked directly. “Are you really quitting?”

Chan gulped. It hadn’t been the kind of question he expected to be asked first thing in the morning.

“Last night,” Jisung said, “I overheard you and Minho talking in your room. He said you were thinking of resigning.”

Chan wasn’t used to Jisung speaking so quietly. Even when he was talking about his delivery routes. “There’s no use lying to you,” he admitted. “Yes.”

“Aren’t you giving up everything,” Jisung asked.

Upstairs, Chan could hear Hyunjin and Yongbok excitedly talking to each other. Across the hall, Chan could hear Changbin and Minho eating breakfast and discussing something in serious tones. This was a dangerous conversation to have at the moment, with everyone so close. Chan didn’t want anyone else to know about this. He just wanted to leave. “I guess so,” he admitted.

Jisung frowned. “Please don’t do this.”

Chan folded his arms across his chest and leaned his back against the window. The glass was freezing cold against his skin.

“I’m just a kid so whatever I think and feel probably doesn’t mean much but please don’t leave.”

“Jisung,” Chan breathed out. This was exactly why he didn’t want too many people finding out. He didn’t want to be confronted like this. He didn’t want to hear people beg and plead. He just wanted to do one selfish little thing and quit in peace!

“You want to know why I hate the coven so much?” Jisung didn’t wait for an answer. “Do you want to know why I gave up on the government? Because they gave up on me first.” He stuck a finger in his mouth and chewed on the nail. It was clear that he was unsure if he should say what he was truly thinking or not. After a few seconds, he decided. He pulled his finger out from between his teeth. “I’m an orphan,” he revealed. “And for as long as I can remember, I lived in that orphanage on the outskirts of the District. I waited and waited and waited but no one wanted to adopt me. No one wanted me.” He stared down at the floor. “As soon as I aged out of the program, the coven kicked me out on the streets. I tried school but that didn’t work. I tried getting a job but I was still too young for a lot of places. How can that be? How can I be too young and too old at the same time?”

Chan opened his mouth. He wanted to speak but he couldn’t. He wanted to cut Jisung off but he couldn’t. Something about the moment made him realize that this was probably the first time Jisung had even expressed such thoughts aloud and he had chosen to confide in Chan. The weight of that made him shut his mouth and listen.

“Everywhere I went, adults treated me like I was the dirt on the bottom of their shoe. They looked down on me. They ignored me. Or made fun of me. But you… You, Chan. You gave me a chance and a job and a roof over my head and now I have friends and can do something as simple and stupid and impossible as buy dinner for them.” Jisung looked up at him. “Years in that orphanage and no one chose me but… I chose you, Chan.”

Chan swallowed hard. He knew he should be feeling guilty but he hung on to his pride stubbornly. Chan had to stare at the ceiling to ask this question. “Did you choose me or did you choose my house?”

Jisung’s bottom lip trembled but he got a hold of himself. “You could live in a mansion or in a shack, Chan. We could live on the streets together and I wouldn’t care. It just has to be you. It has to be you, Chan, so please don’t go.”

Chan felt lightheaded. It was the strangest thing for his thoughts to attach to in such a moment but not once had Jisung called him ‘old man.’ Chan’s eyes tingled like he might cry. He kept staring at the ceiling, feeling like he was about to break.

“And if me asking you to stay isn’t enough,” Jisung went on, “can you at least stay for Hyunjin? I need you but… he can’t live without you. He can’t live without you.”

As if summoned, Hyunjin appeared at the top of the stairs. “Channie Chan,” he called out. “Look what me and Yongbok found. Look, look, look! You’re not looking, Chan!”

Chan sniffed hard and wiped the dampness from the corners of his eyes. He pushed himself off of the window and approached the railing of the stairs. “I’m looking,” he called out. “What did you-” His words stopped dead in his throat.

Yongbok and Hyunjin were standing at the top of the stairs. Between them stood Jeongin, his arms and legs bound by numerous shirts tied together.

“What?” Chan choked out.

Jisung was at his side. “It’s the hexing mimic!”

“What’s all of this shouting about?” Minho groaned, walking out of the kitchen to stand at the base of the stairs. “Can’t you hoodlums use your inside voices when you’re inside? That’s why they’re called inside voices. Who is that?”

“It’s the mimic,” Hyunjin shouted.

“Mimics are extinct,” Minho debunked the claim.

“Yongbok says he stinks,” Hyunjin rebutted.

“He does smell,” Yongbok chimed in. “Like sneeze.” He and Hyunjin started to guide Jeongin down the stairs, something that was proving difficult to do considering how tightly they had tied up the boy’s legs.

Minho’s eyes went wide. He looked in Chan’s direction. “Very peculiar things go on in this house, let me tell you that.” His eyes darted back up the stairs, morbidly curious.

“I didn’t ask them to do this,” Chan defended himself. “I didn’t even think he was still in the house.”

Jisung shouted, “You knew he was here?”

“He antagonized me last night,” Chan explained. “Woke me up and everything.”

“And you didn’t tell me?” Jisung’s mouth hung agape. “And you knew how badly I wanted to sell him on the black market!”

Minho still looked horrified. “Does no one else find this strange? Am I the only sane one in the room? You all have tied up and gagged some child and are having a casual discussion about selling him.”

Changbin squeezed himself between Chan and Minho. “You really don’t see these kinds of things every day.”

“You shouldn’t see these things any day,” Minho declared.

By then, Yongbok and Hyunjin had managed to wrestle their strange parcel down the flight of stairs and now everyone stood in a loose semi-circle around them, gawking like showgoers at the theatre.

“Well, we tied him up to keep him from running,” said Yongbok, not helping their case at all.

“And we’re going to sell him,” added Jisung, ”because he’s gotta be worth a couple million.”

“This is so amoral,” Minho mumbled, shaking his head.

“He’s a mimic. He deserves it,” Jisung pointed out.

“And he stinks,” Yongbok added.

“And his hair is nice,” Hyunjin wanted everyone to know.

“Great Big Blue,” Chan whispered under his breath. He couldn’t escape it. It really did seem like he was going to spend every single day navigating some brand new pile of nonsense. He hung his head in his hands. “Give me strength.”

“You all keep calling him a mimic,” said Minho. “Your imaginations must be extremely vivid because mimics haven’t been spotted or registered in decades.”

“Oh, I’m a mimic, alright,” Jeongin gasped out. He had finally managed to work his mouth free of the shirt that had kept him mute. “I’ll show you.” He let out the tiniest grunt of effort and then he was no longer Jeongin. He was Jisung.

“Strike me down now,” Minho said. “Just take me completely out. Right now.”

Changbin nodded slowly. “We’ve got ourselves a mimic.”

Chan laughed because that had been exactly what he’d said.

Minho’s entire attitude changed. “Let’s sell him.”

“Hex yeah,” Jisung shouted.

“Hex ye- I mean, woohoo,” Hyunjin called out.

“Wait, hold on.” Jeongin worked one of his arms free of his binds. “We can talk this out.”

“I wouldn’t even risk trying to meet up with an underground seller,” Minho said. He tilted forward so that he could look past Chan at Jisung. “I say we take him to the coven. They’ve been trying to revive the population of endangered species for centuries.”

“Hex the government,” Jisung snapped.

“Do you know how much they’ll pay, though,” Minho asked him. “We’ll get peace prizes for this.”

“We?” Jisung parroted. “You aren’t getting a slice of the pie no matter how big it is.”

“There’s pie?” Hyunjin queried. “Is it peach pie? I hope there’s peach pie. I love peach pie.”

“Guys,” Yongbok said, but no one heard him.

“I’m the one who came up with the idea. I better get a cut,” Minho growled.

“We’re the ones who found the mimic,” Jisung shot back.

“Technically, I found it,” Yongbok pointed out. “None of you believed me when I said that something was there. But that’s not the point. Look!” He pointed.

“He’s getting away,” Jisung yelled.

Everyone turned in the direction that Yongbok indicated just in time to watch Jeongin, now wearing his own face, swing open the front door and run square into the wall of snow outside.

“Oh,” Changbin let the syllable slip out of his mouth. He held a hand in front of his lips like he was fighting back a laugh.

“You’re all meanie poo-poo heads,” Jeongin wailed.

“Nuh uh,” Hyunjin pouted. “I’m nice. Tell him, Chan. I’m nice!”

“He’s nice. Sometimes.”

“All of the time, Chan. I’m nice all of the time!”

Jeongin started clawing his way through the pile of snow, swinging his arms wildly but not necessarily getting too far. “All of you are insane. I should report you.”

“Go take over someone else’s District,” Jisung shouted at his back.

“You haven’t seen the last of me. I’ll get my revenge,” Jeongin called out. “You’ll never see it coming.”

No one took his threat seriously. “How quickly do you think we can get the money?” Minho asked. “It’s about to be the weekend so the banks are going to be closed. Do you think we can handle all of the paperwork today?”

“We’re going to be so rich!” Jisung raised a fist in the air.

“We should go see a movie to celebrate,” suggested Changbin. “I mean, we caught a mimic.”

“Or we can save a ton of money by watching something here,” said Chan, forever frugal.

Minho shot the idea down. “And spend more time in this crazy house than I have to? I don’t think so.”

“Who said you were invited?” Jisung asked.

“Who said you were invited?” Hyunjin copied him.

For once, Minho looked completely flustered. “It’s only natural that I be there. You’ve all gotten me forcefully involved! I didn’t want any part of this but now I’m an accomplice in a kidnapping.”

“We didn’t kidnap him. He broke in. It’s self-defense,” Jisung reasoned.

By then, Jeongin had made a Jeongin-sized hole in the snow wall and was still thrashing his way to freedom.

“So is anyone gonna stop him, or…” Yongbok prompted.

“I mean, you have to admit that the way you handled the situation was very strange.” Minho glanced up the stairs, taking in the sight of the colorful shirts strewn about. “There were more efficient ways to restrain him.”

Jisung scoffed. “You don’t sound like an unwilling participant now.”

“I’m merely adapting to the situation as attempting to maintain any sort of moral high ground here will only make me look idiotic.”

“Even more idiotic,” Chan whispered under his breath.

“But didn’t you think that our plan was silly like five seconds ago?” Jisung asked.

Minho said, “That was before I discovered that you all had actually managed to get your hands on a mimic. I didn’t believe it until I saw it with my own eyes!”

“We tried to tell you that he stinks,” Hyunjin said.

“So how do we sell him?” Even Changbin was getting excited about this. “How do you… go to the black market?”

“You gotta know people who know people who know people who know people,” said Jisung.

“I can’t get involved with the black market,” Chan didn’t know why it took so long to realize this. “I’m a coven official! I can’t do anything illegal without risking my badge.”

“That’s why we sell the mimic to the coven,” Minho reiterated. “More opportunities will arise.”

“And here I was thinking you’d be all for shady, underhanded dealings,” Jisung stated.

Minho rolled his eyes. “Just because I am bored with life in the suburbs doesn’t mean I’m ready and willing to embark on a life of crime. I’d rather have my name on a fancy plaque or something.”

Jisung tapped a finger to his chin. “Now that I think about it, a peace prize doesn’t sound too bad.”

“Hand him over to the black market,” Minho warned, “and the only thing you’ll get is money. Go about things legitimately and you get the one thing that’s more important than cash: prestige.”

“I can’t spend prestige, though,” Jisung said with a frown. “Can’t even put it in a bank.”

“What’s prestige?” Hyunjin asked, doing a little happy dance for no other reason than just because. “And can you put it in a pie?”

“Prestige pie sounds like a disease,” mentioned Chan.

“I’ll be out of debt in a flash once that check comes in,” Minho thought about it. “And then I can take out another loan and open up a second location!”

Chan tsked. “My, my. You dream big. Shouldn’t you tend to your first store first?”

“Guys,” Yongbok pestered them. “He’s legitimately getting away. Keep this up and no one is going to get anything.”

“Actually, he’s already gone,” said Changbin, turning around.

The Jeongin-shaped hole had turned into a Jeongin-shaped tunnel and as the boys rushed up to the door and peered through, they could see down the tunnel and all of the way outside.

“Aww,” Jisung whined. “All of our money got away.”

“I’ve got a feeling we’ll see him again,” Yongbok stated.

“This is a good thing,” said Chan. He stepped towards the coat rack and grabbed his jacket. “He actually provided us with a way out. Come on, everyone. We’ve wasted a lot of time. I have to be at the shop in less than twenty minutes.”

The six of them gathered their things, pulled on their coats and hats, put on their shoes and, one by one, crawled through the Jeongin-shaped tunnel towards freedom.

Since Yongbok was in front, he had reached the end of the tunnel first. He called back, “Chan, hurry up. You’re not going to believe this!”

Hyunjin was out of the tunnel next. He squealed in delight. “Look, Chan, look. Hurry up! Hurry up! You have to look.”

Jisung was next. He nearly fell climbing out of the end of the tunnel and when he righted himself, he looked around and then screamed. “Holy hex! Old man, get your dusty bones moving. You have to see this hex.”

Changbin climbed out afterward. His reaction was far more subdued. All he did was raise an eyebrow.

Minho reached the end of the tunnel. Unlike Jisung, he did fall climbing out and then smacked Changbin’s hand away when the apprentice attempted to help him. When he spotted what everyone else was looking at, he let out a choked noise. “Bird’s claws. District Witch, I knew all of this was your fault.”

Last but not least, Chan pushed himself out of the end of the tunnel and joined everyone in their pointing and staring.

He saw it. His jaw dropped. Sheer awe swept over him and he slapped a hand across his mouth in surprise.

Woojin had been right: it hadn’t snowed much… everywhere else.

Chan’s house was the only one in the neighborhood absolutely buried under snow, the white stuff almost piled up to the roof. All of the other houses had only a light dusting of fresh snow across the yards.

“How is this even possible,” asked Yongbok, breaking the silence.

“Is this some kind of cosmic joke?” Chan asked, glancing up at the sky. The Big Blue Bird’s feathers were a bright, brilliant blue. Not a cloud was in the sky. Chan glanced back down at his house. He was amazed that the roof hadn’t actually caved in on them, that’s how thick the snow was piled up on top of his home.

“The snow is legit only like this on our house,” said Jisung, snatching off his beanie and running a hand through his bright orange hair. “It’s like the snow meant for the whole city only came down on us.”

Minho propped his hands up on his hips. “I’ve been telling you all since the start that he’s bad luck. Do you see now?” He jerked his head in the direction of the house that was barely visible from underneath the snow mountain. “Now you all can see that being around him will have adverse effects on your well-being!”

“Is this some kind of divine punishment?” Chan kept on. Had he not prayed enough? Did he not offer enough penance the last time he visited the shrine? Why else would the Big Blue Bird play such a trick on him?

“I think it’s a good thing,” said Yongbok.

“How so?” Changbin asked.

Yongbok shrugged. “I don’t know. I just do.”

Hyunjin jumped up and down, “We wouldn't have had a super duper fun awesome wonderful time if it weren’t for the snow!”

“Trust me, it was only wonderful for you,” said Minho. “The rest of us merely suffered.”

“Hey, I had fun,” Yongbok contradicted.

“Me, too,” Jisung added.

“Me, three,” said Changbin.

“So the only two party-poopers here are the two old men,” Jisung said, narrowing his eyes accusingly.

“I… wouldn’t call it a good time,” Chan admitted, “but I suppose I had some very important discussions with people who are very important to me.”

“Eww, gross,” said Jisung, screwing up his face.

“Disgusting,” Minho agreed.

“See? Everything happens for a reason,” said Yongbok, nodding his head vigorously.

“Including me about to be late,” Chan asked, suddenly remembering. Not waiting for the others, he took off running down the sidewalk. Everyone chased after him, hooting and laughing, asking him to wait up. Everyone except Minho, who was too dignified to move at anything faster than a casual walk.

There was something in the way the Big Blue Bird’s light was warming Chan’s skin as he ran that had him feeling warm and bright, lighter than air.

“I’m going to be late,” Chan yelled, but he was laughing.

And, for once, it felt like the Big Blue Bird was laughing with him, not at him.

Chapter Text

Chan sneezed, barely managing to catch the grossness in a tissue.

“Bird bless,” said Yongbok, absently swinging a leg back and forth from his spot on top of the counter.

“That’s sneeze number four eleventy nine, Chanathan,” Hyunjin counted, gazing across the counter, his eyes all big and curious.

“He means number twelve,” Jisung smoothly corrected from his spot behind Chan.

“They’re getting closer together,” Yongbok mentioned. “Maybe we should perform surgery?”

Chan wiped at his nose and then chucked the soiled tissue in the trash can beneath the counter. “There’s no need for surgery.” A little bit of phlegm got caught in his throat and he coughed and swallowed it down. “Yuck.”

Jisung asked, “Are you coming down with something?”

The District Witch sniffled. “I’m fine. I’m fine.”

“Your nose is all red,” said Yongbok. “We definitely need to do surgery.”

“I don’t need surgery. Stop worrying. All of you.” Chan attempted to resume his work on a resident request but now that he was aware of how closely the boys were watching him, their eyebrows raised with various levels of concern, it was difficult for him to get back into the swing of things. “Guys, can you not?”

“I want surgery!” Hyunjin cried out.

“No, you don’t,” Chan said quickly. “Can you guys find something else to-” His sentence was interrupted by another sneeze. He got a tissue in front of his nose just in time.

Yongbok said, “Bird bless.”

“Number thirteen,” Jisung declared.

Chan groaned and tossed the tissue in the trash. Perhaps if he just ignored them, he could work. No. That wasn’t going to fly, either. They had knocked him so far out of his groove that he didn’t even remember what part of his reply he was writing. He had to reread a paragraph and, even then, he managed to write only one more sentence before he promptly ran out of steam. He needed peace. “Do you wanna play a game, Hyunjin?”

Hyunjin shook his head. “No.”

Chan glanced over at Yongbok. “You in the mood for a nap?”

“Nah,” Yongbok swiftly replied. "For once."

Chan sighed and spun around on his stool to face Jisung.

Before he could say anything, Jisung said, “I’m waiting on you to finish that last letter.”

“Right,” Chan said. “Right.” He turned back to his letter but only got halfway through another sentence before he felt another sneeze coming. His tissue box was too far from his hand to safely reach so he pinched his nose just in time to prevent things from getting messy.

“Bird bless,” Yongbok said again.

“Number thirteen plus one,” Hyunjin let him know, propping his elbows up on the counter.

“Are you all okay,” Chan asked, feeling ganged up on. He looked them all in the eye in turn. “Can you stop staring at me?”

Yongbok said, “We’re just making sure you’re okay.”

“I’m fine. It’s just chillier in here than usual,” Chan excused the matter.

“It’s actually hot as hex in here,” Jisung commented. “You kept turning the thermostat up.”

“Hot?” Chan repeated. Then why was he shivering? He sat up a little and shifted around on the stool so that he was in a slightly more comfortable position. He felt heavier than usual, as if his limbs were weighed down. His muscles were sore and his chest hurt from all of his sneezing. But if he could just finish this letter...

“Really, are you okay?” Yongbok asked. “You’re shaking.”

Chan said, “I’m fine.” No sooner had the syllable come out of his mouth then he felt another sneeze rush up on him faster than he could stop it. He buried his mouth in the elbow of his shirt with barely a second to spare.

“Bird bless,” Yongbok said one more time.

“That’s a hundred sneezes, Chan,” Hyunjin said, worried.

“And that’s snot all over your shirt,” Jisung pointed out.

“Guys, I am okay.” The District Witch reached for a tissue and wiped the mess off of his shirt.

“You’re sick, Chan,” said Hyunjin. The boy frowned deeply and reached a hand across the counter to put it on top of Chan’s.

“I’m fine.” Or maybe Chan actually was coming down with something. This was all so odd. Two hours ago, he had been clear-headed, if a little tired and stiff, but now his sinuses were clogging up and a headache as wide as the Han River was settling between his ears. “And are you all that bored that the only thing you can think of to do is stand around counting my sneezes?”

“I’m sitting,” Yongbok corrected. “But you’re right, it is boring today.”

“I can give you things to do,” Chan suggested, already coming up with a list of chores in his head.

“Want me to go get bread,” Hyunjin asked, bouncing around. “We haven’t had bread in so long. So long, Chan!”

Sending him on a bread run didn’t sound too bad. That would be the peace the District Witch needed. Chan was about to agree to this and hand Hyunjin money when Jisung spoke up. “Hyunjin isn’t going anywhere. He’s going to keep an eye on you.”

Hyunjin leaned across the counter and, with his great height, managed to press his forehead to Chan’s forehead. He repeated, “I’m gonna keep an eye on you.” Then he recoiled, stepping back and wiping a hand over his face. “Eww. You’re all sweaty and yucky and hot and gross.”

Before Chan knew what was happening, Yongbok’s small, soft hand was on his forehead, prodding at his skin. “You’re feverish. Like… really feverish.”

“You are coming down with something,” confirmed Jisung. “A cold! Maybe something more serious than a cold.”

“No.” Chan sniffled hard and then swatted Yongbok’s hand away. “Maybe. But can you all find something to do other than gawk at me? I feel like I’m an animal in a zoo.”

Completely serious, Jisung said, “We’re looking after you because we hexing care about you and don’t want you to hexing go anywhere without telling anyone or saying goodbye.”

Chan knew he was talking about the resignation letter.

Hyunjin didn’t though. “Can a cold take you somewhere,” the boy thought aloud. Then he gasped. “I want a cold!”

“No, you don’t,” Chan told him.

“I take the best naps when I have a cold,” said Yongbok.

Chan turned around and looked at Jisung. The orange-haired boy was leaning against the table where Chan usually piled up his deliveries. Fortunately, Jisung made no other passive-aggressive comments but his frown definitely made Chan feel guilty enough that he had to look away. “Minho had some preparations to make,” Chan said as a way to change the subject. “Once he is finished, he’ll be coming to the shop to finalize our plans to stop the mana disruptions. We should be able to take care of it before the end of the day.”

It was obvious by the following silence that none of the boys cared about that even half as much as they cared about Chan’s health.

Chan continued, “I don’t know how rough it is going to get out there so I actually want you boys to stay here.”

“You should stay here,” said Jisung.

“You should stay here,” Hyunjin repeated after him, but they were talking about entirely different things.

“I’ll ask Minho to bring some medicine,” Yongbok said, hopping off of the counter.

“Don’t,” Chan huffed. Minho was the last person he wanted to see. “He won’t lift a finger to help me.”

“Isn’t he already helping you with the mana thing?” Yongbok’s question was very sensible and since Chan could not come up with a sensible rebuttal, the black-haired boy went down the aisle towards the shop’s front door.

“Wear a coat,” Chan shouted.

“I don’t need a coat,” Yongbok shouted back. The bell above the door jingled as he left.

Chan put a hand to his forehead. He felt cold everywhere else but his face was indeed hot. He grabbed a few tissues out of the box and blotted the droplets of sweat off of his skin. What was this mess and where had he picked it up? He thought he had been careful! Wasn’t he the one always telling everyone else to wear coats so they wouldn’t catch cold? It would be just his luck that he’d come down with something instead. And on an important day like this, too. “I can just take a headache pill and I’ll be alright,” he mumbled.

“Chan,” said Jisung, “you’ll hurt yourself or worse if you keep pushing yourself like this.”

“I’m just sitting here,” Chan insisted. “If I get help from Yongbok with the customers, then I won’t have to move too much.”

“Just rest, Chan,” Jisung huffed.

“Just rest, Chan,” Hyunjin repeated. At least now they were talking about the same thing.

“I’ll be fine,” said Chan, making sure to look them both in the eye. “So give me some space before you catch whatever it is I’ve got. It’s probably quite contagious.”

It didn’t seem like the conversation was going any farther. Fortunately. However, neither Hyunjin nor Jisung heeded his warning and they continued to hover around him. With a sigh, Chan went back to his work but between his headache and his souring mood, he was barely able to focus. The contents of the letter blurred in his head. Something something mean boss at work. Something something power dynamics. Something something HR department. Chan was so out of it that he wasn’t even sure exactly what he replied even though he had just finished writing it. He signed his name, sealed up the envelope and handed it to Jisung. “Alright. Last one.”

Wordlessly, Jisung took it and stashed it away in his bottomless backpack along with the rest of Friday’s mail. He started to skate away.

“Oh. I have one more letter,” Chan realized, stopping him. He reached into the pocket of his uniform and pulled out a taupe-colored envelope with the coven’s official wax seal keeping it closed. He stared at it for a moment and then came to a decision. He looked up. “You’ll have to go to District 10 for this one,” Chan instructed. He held it out to the boy. “Save it for last?”

Jisung swatted the envelope away. “I know what that is. I’m not taking that.”

“It’s not what you think.”

“Don’t hexing lie to me. Please don’t lie to me.”

“Jisung,” Chan pleaded. His headache was getting too bad for this. He pressed a finger to his temple until it eased up again. “I’ll tip you.” He attempted to hand the letter to his courier a second time. “A whole lot. In advance.”

Once again, it was swatted away. Suddenly angry, Jisung said, “Take it yourself, you coward.”

“What is it,” Hyunjin asked, looking back and forth between the two. “Is it something scary?”

Chan fought back a cough and lowered the resignation letter to the countertop. He knew he’d had that conversation with Minho and that discussion with Jisung just last night about not quitting, but he was still emotional. Things were too hard. The hurt was still fresh. His new sickness also wasn’t helping the matter, making him feel physically awful in addition to the emotional distress. It had been a rough week and he doubted the resignation letter would succeed in making him feel better but the urge to hand it in and wash his hands of everything was still strong.

Jisung was right. He was a coward.

“I’m going on my run,” said Jisung when the silence stretched awkwardly thin. “I’ll probably be back around noon o’clock. Want me to bring lunch?” He pushed himself off of the table and rolled around the cash wrap on his skates.

Chan stood up and circled around the counter after him. He got halfway down the aisle and then promptly ran out of energy. “Just take the letter, Jisung,” he called out. Maybe if he just tried one more time...

Jisung skidded to a halt. “No!”

Out of instinct, Chan said, “No angry yelling.”

“No,” Jisung repeated, but at a much lower volume. He balled his hands into fists and visibly struggled to get a handle on his emotions. Through gritted teeth, he hissed, “I’m never gonna hexing deliver that letter.”

“Why is he so upset, Chan?” Hyunjin asked. “I don’t like it when my friends are sad.”

Chan stepped forward, raising the letter. “Jisung-”

Jisung whirled around to face Chan. He opened his mouth and sucked in a breath, probably to reveal everything.

The front door of the shop swung open. The bell jingled and heavy, hurried footsteps pounded across the hardwood.

Jisung clamped his mouth shut as the customer approached.

“Welcome to Chan’s Tchotchkes,” Chan announced on auto-pilot. “How may I-”

His words came to a dead halt in his throat when Regional Manager Kim Woojin stepped around the end of the aisle. “District Witch 9, Bang Chan,” he said in an oddly formal tone, breathing heavy as if he’d run a mighty distance. “I know it’s a little unorthodox for me to arrive unannounced but this was quite urgent and it really should not be discussed over the phone or through email.” He was in his black and white houndstooth jacket and other spiffy coven finery but he didn’t look as well put together as usual. His hair was a mess, stubble was growing through on his chin and there were noticeable dark spots under his eyes as if he hadn’t slept. “I’ve been on the phone since five in the morning with…” He paused, both in his words and in his steps. Woojin’s eyes zeroed in on the envelope in Chan’s raised hand. He spotted the official wax seal and recognition spread across his face like wildfire. Just like Jisung, he also seemed to know what the letter was, what it meant. His tone immediately softened. “Please don’t do this, Chan. We’ve talked about this. Think about it some more.”

The bell above the door sounded again as Yongbok arrived. “Minho said he’s on his way,” he announced. “Told me he’s got just the thing.” Then he came around the corner and saw everyone standing in the aisle.

“Chan…” Woojin said quietly, eyeing the brown envelope as if it were something dangerous. “You don’t need to go so far. I know you’re upset and throwing everything away sounds good now but if you do this, I know you’ll regret it later. You’ll wish you had stuck things through.”

“Why are you all making this so hard for me,” Chan had to know. Why couldn’t he just go back home?

“Because you’re making this hard for us ,” Jisung snapped.

Yongbok stepped around Woojin and then circled around Jisung in his attempt to get down the aisle towards Chan. He tried to defuse the situation. “Maybe if we just took a nap or two... Maybe if everyone calmed down...”

Chan’s one thought was that maybe he had great luck after all. If Jisung was being a brat, he could just skip the middleman and give his resignation letter directly to its recipient! He turned his attention to Woojin. “I’d like to hand you this,” he said firmly, holding it up in the Regional Manager’s direction.

“Don’t you dare hexing take it,” Jisung told the man. “If he gives it to you, don’t read it. Throw it the hex away. Burn it!”

Yongbok came up beside Chan and effortlessly snatched the envelope out of Chan’s hand. “How important is this? Why all of the fuss?”

“Yongbok,” Chan warned him. “Don’t.”

It was too late. Yongbok sliced the envelope open with a fingernail and pulled the letter out. He scanned the words on the page but he didn’t have to get too far to understand what the remaining paragraphs had to say. He looked up at Chan, hurt in his yellowish eyes. “Are you really resigning?”

“Sigh-knee? What does that word mean,” Hyunjin asked, joining them in the aisle. His big, wide smile made it clear that he was the only one in the group who hadn’t picked up on what the letter’s contents were.

Woojin stepped around Jisung and closed in on Chan. His face contorted with stress as he reached out a hand and slapped it down hard on the District Witch’s shoulder. “Is it something that I did, Chan? I know I may have overstepped my bounds at times… but as your leader, was there something that I did wrong? Was there a mess that you found yourself in that I couldn’t help with?”

“It has nothing to do with you,” Chan admitted, wiggling his shoulder out from beneath Woojin’s hand.

The Regional Manager wasn’t done. “Does this have to do with the coven? They aren’t perfect but if you have any issues, it is my duty as your leader to appeal to them and at least ask about solutions to shop problems. If this has anything to do with that missing shipment last month, we’ve already started an investigation and-”

“This has nothing to do with that and everything to do with me and my weaknesses,” said Chan.

Woojin audibly snapped his mouth shut.

Chan looked at Yongbok and took in the sight of the torn-up envelope in the boy’s hand with a sigh. He’d have to redo everything now. Wax seals were so annoying. “You guys are making too big of a deal out of this.”

“You’re not realizing how big of a deal this is,” Woojin fired back. “Do you know how large of an administrative mess this is going to be until we get a replacement? We’ll have to halt all of the funds and contract work we’ve already got allocated on the store refresh. Some things we can stop but for the rest, we’ll have to eat the cost. The coven will have to take all of this inventory back to the warehouse or perhaps transfer it to other stores and-”

“More importantly than all of that hex,” Jisung interrupted, “we’re going to miss you, Chan.”

“District 9 won’t have a Witch like you again,” Woojin added.

If Hyunjin didn’t understand nearly everything else that was being said, he understood that . “Are you going somewhere, Chan?” He grabbed the man’s arm and shook him. “Chan? Are you going somewhere without me?” His voice got a little screechy. “You promised you wouldn’t leave. You said I wouldn’t be super alone again!”

Chan pulled his arm free of Hyunjin’s grasp and wiped at his nose. He was hot one second and cold the next. His headache seemed to shift to right behind his eyes. Every time someone spoke, it was like sharp nails being hammered into his brain. “You’ve all made it clear how this affects you,” he said, his voice breaking, “but none of you have asked how this affects me.”

The front door of the shop opened yet again.

It was Minho who came around the corner of the aisle next. Under one arm was the old, ratty grimoire. In one of his hands was a small thermos. He said, “Alright, I’ve ground together some herbs and flower petals and mixed it with my special blend. That should help you. We can…” His voice stopped in his throat when he caught sight of the situation in the aisle, when the tense mood in the store washed over him. “What’s all this about?”

“Chan’s leaving,” Hyunjin wailed, getting teary-eyed.

Minho rolled his eyes. “Chan, we’ve talked about this.”

“Can you at least tell us why you want to resign?” Woojin asked. “We’re all reasonable people. We’ll hear you out.”

Being asked so directly, Chan felt a little part of him break. Somewhere deep down. His eyes got a little watery. “Because I don’t think I’m cut out for this,” he admitted. “I thought I could handle it at first because I wasn’t all that well-known but now more people know who I am and there are so many resident letters and so many spreadsheets and so many reports and I’m barely meeting sales goals and now this mana issue is about to get me fired and I’ve got competition that has moved in across the street and I can’t help but compare myself to him in every way and-” He sniffled, but not because of his cold. His eyes got even more watery and he pressed the heel of his palm against his eye in a feeble attempt to hold back the tears. “-and I’m so stressed out that I can’t sleep and my house is buried under a mountain of snow and I’m being terrorized by a mimic and I’m this many years old and still don’t have a familiar and still can’t afford an apprentice and now, suddenly, I’m a dad and I’ve got all of these boys who look up to me and expect so much of me but I don’t know what I’m doing and I don’t even know what to expect out of myself because I’m not special. I’m just Chan and I can’t do any of this alone!”

It was quiet for a long moment as everyone gathered in the shop slowly processed Chan’s flood of emotions. Chan felt empty. Beneath their quiet stares, he felt judged. He stared down at the floor, suddenly wishing that he hadn’t said anything at all.

Woojin spoke up first. His voice was firm but there were no hard edges to it. “Chan, you are not alone.” He waved a hand. “Look around you. Don’t you see all of these people? Everyone under this roof is on your side, Chan. We all have your back. We’re all here for you and we all want the best for you.”

“I love you, Chan,” Hyunjin squeaked, sniffling back his own tears. He wrapped his arms around Chan’s torso and squeezed very hard, pushing his face into Chan’s shoulder. “I love you so so so much and I want you to be happy forever because you make me happy forever!”

“I love you, too,” Yongbok said, nudging Chan in the side with his elbow.

Jisung tried his best to fight back his smile but failed. “I guess you’re okay, old man.”

“You’ve been a big help,” said Changbin, suddenly standing near Chan’s elbow. “More than you know.”

Another silence settled over them but this one wasn’t as cold as before.

One by one, several eyes turned towards Minho. The elegant witch’s face went bright red beneath the sudden scrutiny. He huffed. “Don’t look at me. I hope you don’t expect me to say anything soft because I’m definitely not participating in all of this buffoonery.”

It was the best they were going to get out of him.

Chan fought back a laugh only to lose his grip on it and laugh anyway.

“See?” said Woojin, salvaging the moment. “You’re not alone, Chan. It may feel that way sometimes... but we’re all human and we all get overwhelmed. Just don’t forget us, Chan. We are with you.”

“We’re your friends, old man,” Jisung stated.

Woojin smiled fondly. “When I first met you back in July, you were quiet and shy and had no confidence but just in the time I’ve been here this week, I have witnessed how you have grown and changed for the better. Look at you now. It’s really easy to get hung up on our shortcomings but just think about how much you’ve accomplished as District Witch.”

“Your high approval rating is the reason that I moved here,” Minho admitted. “I wasn’t impressed with you at first but after these last couple of days, I think I get why people gravitate towards you.”

Changbin added, “You’re a great and kind leader.”

“You’re so bright, Chan,” said Hyunjin. “ So bright.”

“Like the sun,” said Yongbok.

Chan squeezed his eyes shut. Those words brought back the memory of his mother and the tarot card that she said represented his future. What she said back then had come true and he hadn’t even realized it until right then! The tears he’d been holding back all of this time finally spilled down his cheeks.

Woojin stepped forward. “Stop thinking that you have to shoulder everything by yourself, Chan. We all want to help you.”

“And not just because you have a big house,” Jisung said firmly. “But because we really care about you and because you really care about us.” He lowered his voice considerably, speaking at a near-whisper. “Because you might be the only person who does care about us.”

“We wouldn’t exist without you,” Yongbok added with an odd gleam to his eyes.

Hyunjin squeezed Chan even harder and then bit his shoulder in some odd display of affection. “You taught me how to be nice,” he mumbled with a mouthful of Chan’s shirt. “And you taught me that messing things up sometimes is okay.”

Chan sucked in a breath, trying not to outright sob. His headache had eased the tiniest bit. The heaviness in his limbs had lessened a small amount. It was something to be relieved about but now he was hot. Hotter than he had been. He was beginning to feel dizzy.

“If you need help,” continued Woojin, “everyone here will do anything you ask. If I give you more payroll hours this time, will you actually use them to hire an employee or two?” He raised a hand and gently put it on Chan’s cheek, his thumb swiping away Chan’s tears. “We’ve only talked in person briefly over the last five months, but I think that I’ve…” He paused. His expression soured. Woojin furrowed his eyebrows. “You’re burning up.” He lifted his other hand and smoothed it over Chan’s pale forehead. The heat under his palm made him hiss. “You’re sick.”

Chan looked up at Woojin. “So I’ve been told,” he attempted to joke. He barely managed to bite back his oncoming cough.

“You did catch that bug going around.” Woojin gasped out. “Why didn’t you say so earlier? You look terrible, Chan. You need to lie down. If you want, I can-”

“Excuse me,” Minho grunted. He physically elbowed his way between Woojin and Chan, barely managing the task since Woojin seemed so unwilling to step back. “Coming through,” Minho gave a second attempt. He none-too-gently pushed Woojin backwards, finally separating him from the District Witch. “I’ll take care of him,” said Minho, aiming a pointed glare over his shoulder in Woojin’s direction.

“Oh,” Woojin exhaled, looking stunned.

“He is my rival,” Minho said, pointing at everyone gathered as if to insure no one got the wrong idea. “And if he’s out of commission, I’ll have no one to squash under my foot so I will see to it that he fully recovers.” Minho placed his grimoire on the counter, then he grabbed Chan by the shoulder, spun him around and steered him behind the cash wrap. Chan allowed himself to be guided, the world shifting beneath his feet with every step as his headache throbbed with each beat of his heart. Minho helped Chan onto the stool with an uncharacteristic amount of gentleness. To Chan, he said, “I made this just for you.” Minho unscrewed the lid of the thermos. The liquid inside smelled medicinal and sour. It was so hot that it steamed. “Take careful sips or you’ll burn the roof of your mouth.”

He handed the thermos to Chan but the District Witch could hardly hold it up to his face without his hands shaking and threatening to spill the liquid all over the floor.

“I’ll do it,” Minho told him. He took the thermos from Chan and then raised it to his lips, tilting it back enough for the liquid to flow.

Chan could hardly taste it, he was so stopped up, but he could feel the heat of it as it slid down his throat and settled in his belly. It burned about as sharply as alcohol but there was also a sweetness to the herbal medicine that Chan did not expect. He couldn’t help but gulp it down.

“Slow down, you dolt, or you’ll choke,” Minho warned him, easing the thermos away from him.

Chan sucked in a deep breath and relaxed back onto the stool. “Thank you,” he croaked out, his voice failing him.

“Winning against your shop won’t be fair if you aren’t here to run it,” huffed Minho.

Chan smiled and tried to laugh. He shifted back on the stool, feeling the medicine soothe and relax him. Perhaps he got too relaxed. Gravity grabbed hold of him and sent him tumbling off the edge of the stool. His head swam. His vision darkened. He heard several voices scream “Chan!” before he toppled over onto the floor.

★☆

Chan dreamed.

Or thought that he dreamed. What was real and what wasn’t blurred easily as he fretfully dozed.

Familiar faces leaned down over him.

“I have determined that his cranium did not strike the floor before he was caught so there should be no other external factors weakening his health.”

“Just say he didn’t hexing hit his head, Mr. I Eat Dictionaries For Breakfast.”

“You can stop freaking out now, Minho.”

“I’m not freaking out . I would never. You must have me mistaken with someone who lets themselves be ruled by petty emotions.”

“Sure.”

“We will take turns watching him. Monitoring his temperature is key. It must stay within manageable levels. Everyone saw the number that I showed you before, correct? If the thermometer gets higher than that, let me know immediately and we will procure a way to get him more professional treatment.”

“Why can’t we just stick his hexing head in the snow?”

“That’s… not even an option worth entertaining.”

“Keep him cool and if he wakes up, don’t stress him out. I’m sure that he’s even in such a state because he worries so much and works so hard that he does not take care of himself.”

“Is Channie gonna be okay? I don’t want him to be sad.”

“I’m certain that the illness will pass within a reasonable amount of time. In the future, he’ll be fine as long as he allows himself to ask for help from time to time. Well… as long as the people around him remain reliable.”

“Hey! Why the hex are you looking at me for? He’s even more unreliable. Right, Hyunjin?”

“Yeah! I’m un- Whatever you said!”

“Don’t be mean.”

“Gross. Now you’re starting to sound like him, too.”

Chan felt exhausted. His body was covered in sweat and he just could not get cool enough. His eyes drifted open and closed as his illness drained him of his energy. There was a cool hand against his forehead. Chan wasn’t sure who it belonged to.

“We still have to keep the shop running. He’ll blow a hexing gasket if he doesn’t make his numbers or whatever the hex he’s always whining about.”

“I will take care of the shop. I’ve performed such duties once this week already.”

“Channie-Chan’s gonna be okay, right? Like, really really?”

“Yes. He’ll be fine. He’s just overworked. His high levels of stress simply compromised his immune system so a common cold has broken him down like this.”

Chan couldn’t quite remember the last time he was this ill so he forgot how much it ached . His fever was like a physical thing, a boiling-hot creature that gripped his wrists and made his hands numb. It stirred his thoughts into a frenzy, dredging up old memories and then displaying them in his head through warped, skewed lenses. It was hard for Chan to tell if he was awake or dreaming. The medicine in his system fought valiantly against his illness. He could practically feel their war in his veins, sending shivers across his skin. His teeth hurt. His chest hurt. His nose was a runny mess.

Chan opened his eyes.

Woojin was next to him. They were no longer in the shop but somewhere darker and cooler and quieter. Woojin flipped through the pages of a book whose title was too finely-printed for Chan to read from this distance. Woojin looked up and saw that Chan had opened his eyes. “You’re awake.” Woojin breathed out a sigh of relief. “It’s been hours.” He closed his book and then reached out a hand, exchanging the cloth on Chan’s forehead for one that was cool and fresh. “Your fever is still high,” the Regional Manager told him. “No. Don’t try to sit up. You are still unwell.”

The District Witch hardly had the strength to speak. His throat was tight and dry.

Woojin lowered his voice. “Did you need water?” He was already reaching for a tall glass near his hand. He helped Chan sit up enough to drink from it. “Careful.”

Slowly, the water cooled him and Chan found it much easier to breathe.

Woojin laid him back down and let a small but almost sad smile play across his lips. “I guess I waited too long, huh?”

Chan wasn’t sure what the Regional Manager meant by that. He closed his eyes and opened them again.

Jisung was beside him but if he was supposed to be watching Chan, he was doing a poor job of it because he was asleep himself.

Chan reached out a hand and ran it through the boy’s bright orange hair. Guilt ate away at him. All of this time, he had thought of Jisung as little more than a nuisance but now that he knew Jisung’s story, he hated himself for thinking that way. Yet, despite all of that, he had still been willing to snuff out the boy’s hope and run away.

The weight of responsibility came down hard on Chan. His hand dropped away from Jisung’s hair. “I’m an awful role model,” he croaked out, his voice tiny from disuse. “So why do you all look up to me?”

He shut his eyes and then opened them again.

It wasn’t easy to tell if a few moments had passed or if hours had slipped by.

This dream was so realistic, Chan figured. He could feel it, taste it, smell it. If he were experiencing the dream so lucidly, could he change it however he wanted?

He made a wish for the thing that he wanted most.

“You’re awake,” came a voice.

Chan tilted his head.

“I almost thought the medicine wasn’t working but I made it so of course it’s working.”

It was Minho next to him, Chan realized, and he was very very close which meant that this was a nightmare and not a dream but when Minho smiled at him, his snake fangs weren’t there which was odd because Chan always dreamed of Minho with snake fangs.

“Hush, Chan,” Minho said, as if in response to Chan’s thoughts, “you’re feverish and not making any sense.” He put something cold against Chan’s forehead which instantly soothed him.

Changbin was standing next to Minho. He may or may not have been there the whole time. He asked, “Since when did you start caring so much about him, Minho?”

Minho snorted. “Hush, Changbin. You’re foolish and not making any sense.”

Chan closed his eyes and opened them again.

He was beneath a bright light. It stung his eyes and made him squeeze them shut for a moment. He eased them open again.

Yongbok was there. He had a pair of white gloves on his hands and a white paper mask over the bottom half of his face.

“We have to hurry,” came Jisung’s excited voice.

Chan turned his head enough to see the orange-haired boy standing next to Yongbok in a pair of gloves and an identical mask.

Jisung said, “If Minho comes back and catches us in here again...”

“Don’t worry,” Yongbok told him. “I’ll hear him coming down the hall.”

“Yeah right.”

“I will !” Yongbok raised his hands palm up, close to his face like the doctors on television before they walked into the operating room. “We’re just doing a little surgery. It won’t take long.”

“Alright, doctor.” Jisung fell into character effortlessly.

Yongbok squatted down so that he was next to Chan. “We’re going to completely remove his hatred of naps.”

“And his addiction to making everything boring,” Jisung added.

“It’ll be a difficult procedure. How does he look?”

“Vitals are stable. We can proceed.”

“Scalpel,” Yongbok stated, holding out a gloved hand.

Jisung leaned forward and placed the proper utensil onto Yongbok’s palm. If a plastic butter knife could be called the proper utensil for this. “Scalpel.”

Yongbok leaned down over Chan’s body. “I see it now. All of his unfun is right there between his lungs.” He squinted. “I’m going to start with a small incision,” he stated.

“Yes, doctor,” Jisung confirmed.

Yongbok held up the plastic butter knife and then pressed the edge of the tool against Chan’s chest. “There’s so much other stuff in the way,” he groaned.

“Like what, doctor,” asked Jisung.

“His inability to see that he needs to put a snack bar in the shop.”

“Yes, you’re right.” Jisung nodded his agreement.

“Candy,” Yongbok demanded.

Jisung dropped a bright red hard candy, already unwrapped, onto Yongbok’s outstretched hand. "Candy."

The ‘doctor’ lowered his mask and popped the candy in his mouth, sucking on it noisily. He glanced up and met Chan’s eye.

Chan felt sleepy. His eyelids got heavy.

Yongbok gasped dramatically. “Nurse, we’re losing him!”

Chan closed his eyes. Everything around him faded. This was the oddest dream. He could feel everything so clearly. More importantly, what he dreamed did not scare him. The last few nights, his dreams only terrified him but this one didn’t. It calmed him. Made him want to laugh, even. It was as if everyone important to Chan were taking turns showing up in his mind, coming over for a visit. He wondered who else he would see.

After a while, his fever loosened its hold on him and he opened his eyes.

Changbin was there. Minho was not.

Then Changbin wasn’t there. Perhaps he’d never been there. Or maybe Chan had closed his eyes and the dream had changed again.

Chan blinked. Or thought he blinked.

Hyunjin was next to him now, his arms draped over Chan’s torso like he was trying to keep the District Witch from going somewhere as if Chan even had the strength to sit up. “My mom was like this,” the boy said quietly, probably not aware that Chan had woken up, “she was just like this before she went very far away.” He leaned down and put his ear against Chan’s chest as if listening to his heartbeat. He closed his eyes. “But you’re not going very far away... Right, Dad?” His voice made Chan’s whole chest vibrate as he spoke. “You’re not leaving, are you?”

A silly thought. Chan wasn’t going anywhere.

“Good,” Hyunjin mumbled, as if he had heard Chan. As if he had said the words aloud. Hyunjin opened his eyes and the two of them made eye contact. “I don’t want you to leave now that I’ve found you, Chan.”

Chan smiled but his fever wasn’t done with him yet. It gave one last hurrah, yanking Chan back into a shallow, uneasy, restless sleep.

Chan opened his eyes.

His workshop was quiet and still. Along one wall was his bookshelf crammed full of spellbooks and mason jars full of potion ingredients. Over in the corner was a crate of brand new merchandise that he had yet to unbox. On his desk in the corner was all of his half-finished projects. In the center of the room was the table with his empty vials and potion bottles. Just glancing at it reminded him of his catastrophic exit from the fairy realm earlier that week.

He was no longer dreaming, if he had been dreaming at all. Now, he was certainly awake.

Chan felt much better. Lighter. Cooler. Stronger. His head felt clear and his sinuses were no longer clogged.

His illness must have passed.

Chan coughed.

Perhaps it hadn’t.

He coughed again.

No. The weight on his chest was something physical pressing down on him, not his sickness weakening him from the inside.

It took a moment for Chan’s eyes to focus in the nearly dark room but, even then, Felix’s black fur was the perfect camouflage. Chan could really only see his yellow eyes catching the light of the lamp across the room. “You’re heavy, boy,” he grunted.

Felix mewled as if in protest.

“You are heavy to be so twiggy,” Chan made sure he knew. “So I’d appreciate it if you’d move. There are better places to sit.” At least Felix hadn’t been curled up on his face again. He doubted he would have lived through that a second time.

Felix continued to sit on his chest, watching him intently, tail swaying back and forth casually as if he’d rather be no place else.

Chan asked, “Where are the others?”

The cat meowed.

“Asleep?” Chan gasped, eyes wide. Then he gasped for an entirely different reason. He must have been losing his mind or he was still in the throes of his fever. Had he just understood Felix?

Felix meowed again.

Chan relaxed. No. He hadn’t understood the cat. That meow sounded like all of the other meows. Thank the Big Blue Bird! Chan lowered his head back onto the pillow. He took a few seconds to get used to where he was. The others had laid him out on the floor of his workshop. Not the most comfortable of resting places, honestly, but with the numerous warm blankets and pillows they had piled up beneath him, it was far more comfortable than the couch in his living room. Oddly. “They must have closed the shop if it’s so quiet,” Chan mused, glancing in the direction of the workshop door.

Felix yawned and then curled up into a ball on Chan’s chest, purring in contentment. Not quite asleep but resting.

Chan let out a deep breath. How long had it been since he last woke up feeling so refreshed? Felix was warm and soft like a big pillow and his purrs were constant and gentle. Chan attempted to raise his hand to pet Felix on the head but found himself unable to do so as his right hand was pinned down by something.

He looked around. His eyes focused on the shape wearing all-black just a little bit farther away than the all-black cat.

Minho sat cross-legged beside him, elbow on his knee and chin propped up on his left fist. A blanket was strewn haphazardly across his shoulders to keep him warm in the drafty workshop. Minho was fast asleep, Chan noticed, and had probably been sitting next to him for quite some time. He looked… different. Calm. Peaceful. Almost happy. Only when he was asleep did his permanent, displeased scowl seem to disappear.

Chan attempted to raise his hand again and nudge Minho awake but he still could not move it. He looked down at his hand. Minho was holding it. Gripping it quite tightly even as he slept.

Chan’s face flushed. His hand fit so perfectly in Minho’s. Slip poured into a mold.

It felt nice.

He blamed the brand new tingling sensation in his heart on Felix’s weight on his chest.