Chapter Text
"Taehyungie, I come bearing gifts!"
The cheerful voice ringing through his room brought Taehyung out of his concentrated state that he'd found himself in for the past hour now, brush halting from where it was adding a bit of shade to the cloud he'd been painting.
He blinked a few times to get rid of the strain in his eyes and turned his head to see where the voice had come from, his lips immediately tilting up into a smile when they fell onto its source.
"Good evening to you too, Jeongguk."
The figure sitting perched upon his windowsill straightened up, face splitting into a bright grin. "Good evening!"
Taehyung laughed at the enthusiasm in the other's voice and lifted a finger to his lips. "Inside voices, Jeongguk."
"Oh," The other smiled at him sheepishly. "Right. 'M sorry."
Taehyung shook his head, brown curls falling into his eyes, which he brushed away with a quick flick of his hand. "Don't worry about it. Mother and Father shouldn't come by for another hour or two." He nodded towards the pouch resting against Jeongguk's hip. "You talked about gifts. What did you bring?"
This had the other perk up again immediately and his eyes began to glow, eagerly pulling at the leather sack. He pulled out many different things, voice eager to explain all of the trinkets he had brought today to show to Taehyung.
But Taehyung couldn't really concentrate on what Jeongguk was saying at the moment, far too captivated by the afternoon light reflecting off the scales shimmering around Jeongguk's eyes and across his cheek, giving him a soft golden glow.
Months ago Taehyung would have been intimidated by the sight, not having believed there to exist anything like this.
Dragons. Shapeshifters.
Taehyung remembered the day he met Jeongguk well.
The younger had, quite literally, crashed into his room and had ended up tangled in his curtains, wings frantically flapping to go free somehow, but only ending up in more of a cocoon.
Taehyung had been terrified, awoken by the loud noises, and had barely concealed a scream when his tired eyes fell onto the mighty form of a (what he now knew, still growing) dragon.
He'd pressed his hands over his mouth, eyes wide in panic as he watched the creature writhe on his bedroom floor, desperately thinking of a possibility to get away.
His bedroom door was locked, only to be unlocked from the outside, so that hadn't been an option. The bathroom then perhaps, and he'd wait until the dragon would disappear or a knight would come and take care of the beast.
But, just as he'd begun to tiptoe away - desperate to not make a noise - he heard the dragon whine under its breath.
Taehyung froze, at first thinking it was a sign of a threat, but then the whine sounded again and it sounded more sad than anything else.
So he turned his head to look upon the now still dragon and his heart had swollen with sympathy at the miserable expression in those amber eyes. Longingly staring towards the window.
He'd carefully approached the other, gently shushing him when the dragon would growl at him - afraid to be hurt - and even held out his hand for him to be able to take in his scent.
It would take a few attempts for Taehyung to successfully untangle the dragon, but he eventually succeeded when the other finally seemed to understand that the young prince meant him no harm.
Jeongguk had been quick to leave after his confinements had been loosened, Taehyung watching as the dragon became nothing more but a dot in the sky.
But...
He'd come back.
At first quite hesitant and Taehyung had to suppress a giggle at the curious pair of doe eyes staring at him over the windowsill multiple times, before quickly disappearing when he as much as even dared to turn his head that way.
Then, one day, Taehyung began talking to him and slowly the dragon hybrid started to reciprocate.
Which led them to the here and now, where Jeongguk would proudly present Taehyung with what he'd collected on his latest run.
They'd bonded quite fast once Jeongguk got over his initial shyness and Taehyung would lie if he'd say that he wasn't enamoured by the other's youthful curiosity of the world.
He'd learned quite quickly that Jeongguk was a dragon shapeshifter (they both still laughed about the shriek Taehyung had let out the first time Jeongguk had transformed into a human right in the middle of his bedroom) and had only reached maturity a little while ago, which had allowed him to finally leave his colony and parents' nest to explore the world.
However, where his human body had already reached the age of 20, his dragon body - according to Jeongguk - would still be continuing to grow for quite a few years to come, which was why he had crashed into Taehyung's bedroom in the first place.
Having had hit a growth spurt not so long ago had made Jeongguk overestimate how much strength he would need to stay afloat, so he'd lost on altitude and found himself wrapped up in a curtain only minutes later.
"-hyungie. Taehyungie!"
Taehyung shook his head, snapping back into the present moment, and found himself face to face with a pouting Jeongguk. "Wha-what?"
"You weren't listening." The young dragon whined.
"Ah, I'm sorry, Jeongguk. I seemed to have been lost in thought."
"Obviously, and haven't paid attention to any of the pretty things I've been showing you."
Taehyung chuckled at the barely hidden sulking tone in the dragon's voice and proceeded to scoot closer to Jeongguk. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to ignore you. You have my full attention now.”
The dragon hybrid glanced at him. “You promise?”
“I promise.”
“Okay!” Jeongguk brightened again immediately and reached out for one of the objects he had brought. “I was at the beach today, and found this shell. Isn’t it pretty?” It was; iridescent colours reflecting in the late afternoon sun and even more so when Jeongguk moved it around to show off the multitude of different colours. “There are so many down there, just waiting in the sand to be collected. I wish you could see them.”
Taehyung carefully took the shell in his hands when it was offered to him, fingertips dancing across its edges. “I wished so, too.”
“Then why not go see them now?”
The young prince was startled, looked up to find Jeongguk grinning at him with bright eyes. “What?”
“Yeah! Go down to the beach and take a stroll. Maybe watch the sunset together.”
“Jeongguk,” Taehyung sighed, his eyebrows pinching together. “We’ve been over this. I can’t-”
“Can’t go out, I know. But,” The dragon hybrid leaned forward, a mischievous glint in his eyes. “No one ever said anything about leaving through the door.”
Taehyung needed a moment to catch on, but when Jeongguk nodded out the window his eyes widened to the size of saucers. “No! Absolutely not.”
“But Tae-”
“We’re not going to jump out the window.”
“We wouldn’t jump. I would carry you! I’ve been practising. I can now partly transform myself.” And as if on command a pair of wings sprouted from Jeongguk’s back, their golden colour glittering in the sunlight. “See?”
“I don’t know…”
“Taehyungie, please,” Jeongguk leaned forward again, his eyes big with earnestness. “Aren’t you tired of always just having to paint the outside? Don’t you want to experience it, too?” He reached out his hand to take the prince’s in his own, giving it a reassuring squeeze. “I promise I won’t let anything happen to you. We’ll be back before your parents will make their nightly round.”
Taehyung bit down on his bottom lip, because - frankly spoken - Jeongguk was right. He /was/ tired of only getting to paint the view from his window, or paint from artbooks that would depict places further away from where their castle lay.
They’d talked about this many times before, the first time being when Jeongguk had found out that in all his 22 years of living, Taehyung had never left the castle. He hadn’t even left this room for the past 10.
You see, 20 years ago a great tragedy took both of his older brothers’ lives.
Taehyung couldn’t remember them well, only having been barely two years old when everything happened. (The most memories he had was from the stories servants would share with him on the rare occasion he got to talk to them.)
But he did remember and could still see to this day how the loss of his siblings had changed his parents. Filled them with fear of losing Taehyung too.
And in an effort to protect him, keep him safe from the cruelties of the world, they had first only prohibited him to leave castle grounds. He’d still been able to go into the kitchen to secretly bake with their head chef and his son, Seokjin. Had still been able to train with the sword and spar with two of the knight’s sons that were about his age, Jimin and Hoseok.
But that all changed again when an assassination attempt could barely be prevented during the festivities that had been held for his 12th birthday.
He still remembered the bloodcurdling scream his mother had let out when the knife had barely missed his heart - he still bore the scar from the stab wound - and the angry yells of his father as he commanded the knights to take the man away.
From then on out this room had been prepared for him, and he’d lived here ever since, only getting visited by his parents twice a day - once in the morning and once in the evening - and the occasional maid or servant that would bring him his food and freshly washed clothes or clean his room.
“Okay.”
Jeongguk stopped in his tracks, currently having gone off on a tangent of reasons that hopefully would convince Taehyung to come with him, his wings folding up in surprise. “What?”
“I said,” Taehyung took a deep breath, his hands shaking a bit as he pressed past the following words. “Okay. We can go down to the beach, but…you got to promise me, to not leave my side.”
The hand around his immediately tightened, Jeongguk’s eyes shining with trust and determination. “I won’t.”
Taehyung smiled up at Jeongguk, letting himself be pulled into a stand. “Alright, then how do we do this?”
“Simple,” And before Taehyung could ask what the dragon hybrid meant, he felt his legs being swept away from under him, causing him to let out a shriek of surprise, his hands shooting out to find leverage on Jeongguk’s shoulders. The dragon hybrid grinned at him, sharp canines glinting. “I’ll carry you. Ready?”
“Wait, wait, give me a moment,” But Jeongguk wasn’t listening to him, already stepping onto the ledge. “Jeongguk. Jeongguk!”
His pleas went unheard and he could simply wrap his arms tighter around Jeongguk’s shoulders when he unfolded his wings, and pushed off the windowsill.
Oh gods.
All he could hear was the joyous laugh of the dragon hybrid as the wind rushed through his hair, his heart threatening to beat out of his chest.
Oh gods, he hoped he would survive this!