Chapter Text
The present winter is cold and began earlier than it had the past seventeen years Taehyun had lived. He loves the season, his birthday is in winter, too where he and his family spend time together which is a seldom occasion, since all of them had to work full-time nearly every day. Taehyun sells self-made wreaths in front of his cabin, according to the seasons he makes them. Luckily, many townspeople enjoy the decoration and buy them all year around.
Still, there is a downside of winter, it‘s always incredibly freezing in their cabin if they didn’t collect enough wood to stoke the fireplace with. His family tries to be sparse when going in the forest for wood, because there are many people living in the village who need to keep their home warm as well. Taehyun hopes that nobody has to shiver much at this time of the year. You could buy firewood at the end of the village, too, but it is way too costly buying it for the whole season.
Now that winter arrived earlier this year, Taehyun‘s mother had requested him to collect some wood in the morn, before the forest would overflow with villagers. She is always concerned he might get lost in the labyrinthine forest.
Putting on his warmest jacket and fur-lined boots, Taehyun says goodbye to his mother and promises to come back before noon, it’s almost half past eight in the morning now, so that will be feasible, he thinks.
He exits the cabin and closes the door, seeing his neighbor and friend erect a stand for the weekly market on Sundays.
“Good morning, Soobin,” Teahyun greets friendly, “What are you doing out so early?”
Soobin halts, smiling when he sees his friend, “I could ask you the same, fellow neighbor. You know, the early bird catches the worm.”
“Indeed. I’m about to go to the forest. I heard the winter is going to be harsh.”
Taehyun walks closer to the stall, observing the dark brown wooden panel, a straw basket filled with cups and plates in it. “The panel is shining, did you purchase a new one?”
The elder looks conflicted what to say first, first nodding and then halfway shaking his head, “Yes, it is new, but no, a friend gifted it to me, seeing how shabby my old one was.”
“That’s quite generous, considering the material costs,” Taehyun remarks.
A faint blush appears on Soobin’s cheeks and he agrees. Taehyun doesn’t know if it was because of the cold or something else.
“You said you were going to collect wood, would you mind bringing me some as well? I believe I do not have time the entire day,” his friend asks after clearing his throat.
Taehyun knows how stressful the weekly market can be, his mother said she would take over his job for as long as he is gone, so he is lucky, but he knows that Soobin is on his own, since his mother sadly passed away giving birth to him and his father having died of sickness two years ago. He feels unbelievably sorry for him and Taehyun admires Soobin for being so responsible at such young age, only being two years older than himself.
With a determined nod Taehyun assures he will do so and Soobin thanks him gratefully.
“I owe you something, Taehyun,” Soobin walks up to the younger from behind the stall and hugs him, placing his chin on Taehyun’s head, the benefit of being enviously tall.
Taehyun strokes his back, “It’s not a big deal, Soobin.”
“But it is! You have to carry twice as much wood,” Soobin argues, pulling away from the embrace to look at the younger.
“I don’t mind at all. You’re all by yourself and I want to help you, so never restrain yourself from asking me for anything, okay?”
Taehyun notices Soobin thoughtfully biting his bottom lip before giving in, “Okay, thank you. If you ever need new tableware, you know where to find me.”
“I will,” Taehyun guarantees happily. He probably only owns his crockery, and he can confirm that it’s of splendid quality. Better than the other, way more expensive tableware vendor in the village.
As they haven’t seen each other in while, it was pleasant talking to Soobin again and Taehyun wants to try and nurture their friendship whenever he he can. Soobin is practically the only friend who is near his age and he doesn’t want to lose him.
Taehyun waves goodbye at Soobin and strikes off. The way to the forest is fairly far and it’s cold, making him stuff his bare hands into his pockets. He kind of feels like something is missing on his back, since he doesn’t have anything to stow away the wood later. But the length of branches are simply unpredictable and he doesn’t own a wicker big enough for them to fit.
He paces past a couple more cabins and reaches the junction with signposts. One arrow pointing into the direction Taehyun had just come from, signaling the way to the village, and the other one pointing to the right, showing him to the way into the forest.
Knowing his destination, Taehyun turns right. The wayside is decorated with all kinds of trees and if you look closely, you can see them being overcasted with ice crystals. It’s not the time for snow yet, but surely for frost. The usual muddy path is now occasionally glistening in the rising sun, being slightly slippery and Taehyun carefully walks step by step, lowering the possibility of slipping and hurting himself.
The only sound audible is the icy wind blowing around his ears, he can also taste the frostiness of the air.
Taehyun cannot pinpoint what it is, but something about the whistling of the wind sounds different. Like a sudden change.
Of course, the weather had changed so abruptly, but this can’t be it, it wouldn’t make his senses react so distinctly, absorbing the breeze so intensely and making his heart race for some reason.
He buries his hands even deeper into his pockets and hunches his shoulders, trying to ignore the strange feeling.
The amount of trees increases and they start standing tightly next to each other, but fortunately not blocking the sun and darkening the place, since most of the leaves have fallen, only a few conifers are seen sporadically around him.
Taehyun immediately perceives more thin than thick branches lying around. Wanting to pick up thicker ones, because they burn longer, he walks deeper into the forest. He hears a few branches snap underneath his feet and the coldness emphasises his breath in front of him, making it look like thinly spread clouds.
He proceeds to walk deeper into the wildness of trees, plants and flowers as well as the home for wild animals. A familiar wooden bridge appears in his sight, underneath is a waiting clear river, only as deep as two tall buckets of water, just enough dangerous for a child, but for him, the depth is nothing.
Casually, Taehyun crosses the bridge and admires how only two weeks ago, the forest had been full of colour, the trees were tangled with each other as if wanting to share the beauty that grew on them. Now, the trees are bare, stripped from any shades of red, orange and brown. Only the twigs are left stiffly swinging in the frosty wind.
The more Taehyun looks around, the less he could recall what the place used to look like, but maybe that‘s good. Maybe this means he shouldn’t dwell on old things and accept new ones. It‘s also not like he won‘t ever see the colourfulness again.
To Taehyun’s delight, the sun is finally nearly towering over the treetops and the clouds are scattered on the sky, having turned in hues of oranges and reds. At least he could see colour there.
A mound of wood exposes itself at the other end of the bridge and Taehyun beams. He was afraid he would have to walk through the whole forest with isolated branches nestled in his arms and barely finding the way out again.
Taehyun approaches them purposeful only to be put off by a dull bang not so far away from his presence. He quickly turns his head into the sound‘s direction but not spotting anything. With furrowed eyebrows he leans forward, trying to catch a glimpse of something around the corner of the path which splits into two ways a little away from him.
Perhaps it was simply an animal rushing past the trees and bushes, making thick branches fall into the grass? Or a deer slipped trying to find food... if so, shouldn’t he look? No, his mother told him not to get near wild animals because of any diseases they carry.
But Taehyun‘s curiosity beat his common sense and he moves forward.
As he reaches the end of the straight path, he perceives a rustling, loud enough to dominate the quiet forest. More than that, Taehyun hears something, someone groan in pain.
Who in the world was that? As if someone would ever be hiding behind spruces on the coldest day the past weeks.
The most logical conclusion Taehyun could possibly come up with was a hunter looking out for deers and boars, since they are more susceptible in the cold. Still, what was the loud thud before the rustling - did they fall off of their hiding spot from the tree? If this was true, Taehyun must say, that this was a stupid idea in the first place; seating oneself on a tree full of fragile and brittle branches.
As if not already expecting it, Taehyun startles at a figure laying in a bed of feathers— wait. Feathers?!
Taehyun tries to stay composed for the sake of the hurt boy grimacing. His curly brown locks are totally disheveled and a few silvery feathers lying randomly on top of them. He lies there such comfortably that Taehyun would’ve thought he was sleeping if his face wasn’t turned into his direction.
“Are you alright?” Was the first thing Taehyun could think of saying. A little bit unintelligent since the boy was visibly hurting.
Before Taehyun could add anything, the boy opens his eyes and he sits up, making the feathers whirl around him. “Quite enough,” he answers. “The feathers didn’t completely soften the impact to earth, therefore my back kind of hurts.” The boy dusts off the feathers as he stands up, rubbing his arms, attempting to sooth any aching.
He is comparatively tall, when he stands in front of Taehyun, but at the distance between them, the shorter doesn’t have to look up.
“Did you fall off the tree?” Taehyun immediately asks. He is confused and notes to question the feathers on the ground, too.
The other cracks a smile, the pain seemingly forgotten. “What? Why would I fall off a tree? I am no bird.”
Is he making fun of Taehyun?
“I fell from heaven, of course!”
His answer seems so ordinary for something so unordinary which wilders Taehyun even more.
“Why are there feathers on the ground?” Taehyun questions in hope to receive a more usefull answer, only to be failed.
“They’re my wing’s feathers,” the boy answers, looking somewhat wistful.
His wing’s feathers? What was he talking about? Taehyun wasn’t able to come up with a more reasoned explanation, but what the curly haired boy claims to be the truth, surely cannot be true.
Taehyun is way too perplexed to eloquently respond to him, not knowing how to form words other than sounds of confusion.
Seeing the distress on Taehyun’s face, the taller in front of him helps him out, “You don’t know what I mean by wings,” he concludes and Taehyun nods as if it was a question. “I am an angel.”
Taehyun almost laughs out loud. But only almost, if he didn’t see the serious look on his face. His stomach turns uncomfortably at the statement. Sure, he has read all kinds of tales, but never believed any of them. They were all fictional texts, nothing close to reality, they weren’t even meant to be reality. Purposely being written to expand the children’s fantasy and nothing more, so he doesn’t know what to say.
Does he believe him? That would at least explain the feathers and the sudden impact from out of nowhere. But he could’ve planned this, also, throwing a heavy stone to the ground.
Taehyun looks to his left. Then to his right, but there was none.
His body starts tingling and he looks up at the other boy again who expectantly glares at him.
“Uhm... an... angel?” Taehyun barely pronounces. The noun sounding too distant for him.
To his surprise, the boy nods enthusiastically and the feathers fly around in a festive manner. Probably the wind, Taehyun quickly thinks, he is indeed shivering as well, but not as much as before. Then he remembers that he has something urgent to do.
“Ah... okay,” Taehyun turns around hesitantly. He doesn’t have time for this nonsense, the boy is merely playing jokes on him and he doesn’t want to fall for it. Feathers or not, angels do not exist.
But... do they really not? Writers must have somehow gotten inspiration when writing tales and - Taehyun isn’t sure.
Not even a second has passed that the taller calls him, making Taehyun halt in his steps.
“You don’t believe me, do you?” Hurt is disguised in the way he said that. Why was he hurt?
Taehyun shakes his head, “I don’t. It’s absurd, how could I believe that.”
“Let me make you,” the boy answers with a glint in his eyes.
There is something so confident and attracting to the grin the taller gives him that makes his heart beat in a novel way.
Didn’t he tell himself that it was good to give in to new things? Was this what defines ‘new things’?
Taehyun’s thoughts are quarrelling with each other, one wants him to say yes and lead something new into his life and the other one is scared of change and disbelieving in what he was told.
Before Taehyun could even decide for himself, his mouth answers for itself, “Okay.”
Taehyun doesn’t know why he agreed and why the boy is so persistent on proving him the impossible, but Taehyun can’t stop the excitement in his veins.