Chapter Text
He hears footsteps approaching behind him and he tenses, ready to mutilate the offender if they got too close. Instead, the footsteps stop just beyond his reach.
“Are you okay?”
Kuroo freezes, hands lowering just a fraction. He doesn’t respond, but instead presses his fingers into the drip-drip-dripping of crimson seeping from his side. Closing his eyes, he leans into the cold stone wall of the cave he had been taking shelter in for the past day. He was tired, so tired. When was the last time someone had ever asked him that question? They were all the same, and he understood why, he really did. No one likes an abomination, after all. No one likes stories of monsters hiding in the shadows of the night, ready to abduct their children, curse the villages, poison the crops and sicken their livestock. There is nowhere in this world for an existence such as himself. He hears the footsteps draw closer and Kuroo, for the first time in his life, doesn’t fight back. He slumps against the ground. Everything turns fuzzy around the edges.
Everything fades.
--
Briefly, he wakes. There is an odd sensation that he doesn’t recognize for the longest time. He tastes something bitter upon his tongue and hisses, ever so slightly, turning his head to spit out whatever the offending substance was. Again, he feels something foreign on his skin.
“Sleep.” A voice says, low, smooth, gentle.
It clicks. Someone’s hand is on his face, caressing his cheek ever so slightly. Brushing the hair out of his face. Tracing the curve of his nose. Pressing into the furrow of his brow. Skimming the tips of his eyelashes. A thumb, swiping gently across his lips.
The sensation of human touch.
--
Kuroo wakes yet again, and immediately groans out into the darkness. The blunt edge of pain spreads throughout his body and he struggles to sit up, running a hand through his perpetually messy hair. Drearily, he blinks the sleep out of his eyes before he realizes that something isn’t right. He’d been sleeping. How long? Since when? He doesn’t sleep, not really, hadn’t in nearly a century. It was too dangerous to let down his guard for too long, after all.
“How are you feeling?”
Damn near jumping out of his skin, Kuroo leaps up, fangs bared, hand outstretched to tear flesh from bone. A figure sits, back leaning against the stone wall of the cave, a fire crackling in front of him. “No need to react like that,” the man chuckles, staring into the flames. “If I had wanted to hurt you, I wouldn’t have saved your life.”
“Saved my life?” Kuroo echoed distantly, trying to recall what little memories he had of recent events. He looks down at his abdomen, hiking his shirt up to reveal a neatly cleaned and dressed wound, bandaged with care. He shifts his eyes toward the man in suspicion. “Why would you help me?”
The man only shrugs. “Why not?”
“Because! Look at me!” Kuroo snaps, golden eyes blazing. “At what I am!”
“What you are?” The man repeats, finally turning in his direction. That’s when Kuroo sees the man’s eyes- empty, vacant, a distinctive milky white. “You are, or rather, were, someone on the brink of death. And I was someone who had the power to save you. That’s why I helped you. Now sit down before your wound opens again. I worked hard on that.”
Kuroo isn’t sure why, but he obeys and lowers himself slowly back onto the makeshift bed he had woken on. “What are you?” He asks slowly, eyes fixated on the man.
Again, the man laughs. “Y’know, most people would just express gratitude that they aren’t dead.”
“I never asked for your help.”
“True,” the man smiles, “maybe I stuck my nose in where it didn’t belong. But I’m glad you’re alive.”
A flash of something unidentifiable buzzes through Kuroo’s veins, burning him on the inside. “You don’t even know me.” He scathes, eyes narrowed.
“Also true. Well, to answer your question. I’m Daichi. I’m a healer of sorts. Kinda just wander wherever life leads me, really. Not much to know beyond that.”
Kuroo blinks, stares at the man just a little longer. “I’m Kuroo.” Is all he finally manages to say.
“Well, Kuroo. Do you want something to eat?”
“Fish.” He responds, immediately.
Daichi’s laugh reverberates throughout the cave, bouncing off the walls. Later, as Kuroo munches through his third fish that Daichi had roasted over the fire, he realizes that for the first time in a long, long time, he felt warm.
---
“Back again?” Daichi asks, smiling.
“Not that you’re complaining.” Kuroo hums with a smirk. “I brought you the lavender you wanted.”
Daichi’s face lights up, and he quickly reaches into his burlap bag to bring out various herbs and plants as well as a mortar and pestle for grinding. Immediately he gets to work, bringing each component to his nose before adding it to the mixture.
It had been weeks since Daichi first saved Kuroo from death’s grasp. Kuroo, being what he was, healed quicker than any human would and had promptly vacated the cave that Daichi ended up turning into his temporary abode. He camped out among the tree tops for a few days, keeping a suspicious eye on the healer. Sawamura Daichi was, he discovered, a very simple man. He had been right when he told Kuroo that there wasn’t much to know beyond what he did as a healer. Every day he would go out to collect plants before returning to the cave and meticulously making bundles of medicine bags, small pots of different pastes, ointments and pills and smoke bundles for burning.
And yet at the same time, Kuroo would discover, there was so much more than just that. The simple joy that crossed Daichi’s face when he found a patch of the right plants he had needed. The way he would close his eyes as he smelled each medicinal plant to make sure it was the right one. His blistered and bruised hands working tirelessly to make medicines that would conquer death itself. Strong ropes of muscles tensing from the position he would sit in for hours to make sure each concoction was just right. Milky white eyes that saw nothing and yet so much more than anyone Kuroo had ever met. And so, after a few days, Kuroo returned to Daichi’s side. He would leave before nightfall, return the next day, and each time Daichi would smile and ask in a slightly exasperated voice, “back again?”
Kuroo, each time, would respond with characteristic sass, and the days went on.
---
“You’re gonna kill me some day, y’know.” Kuroo moans, burying his face in his hands.
“Oh really,” Daichi responds, voice monotone. “And why is that.”
“You’ll kill me with your hotness. I know you can’t see yourself, but I can.” Daichi had just returned from bathing in the nearby lake, and he hadn’t bothered to put his shirt back on before returning. Kuroo promptly choked on his own spit. “How does a healer have that kind of a body?”
“Keeping your body in good physical condition is an essential part of good health.” Daichi answers simply. The red tips of his ears doesn’t escape Kuroo, however, who dons a positively wicked smile and leans in close.
“Healer-san, I think I’m dying.”
“Then just die.”
“But you have the perfect medicine to fix me.”
“I have no such medicine for the likes of you.”
“But you do,” Kuroo smirks, teasing. “A kiss would save me, I’ll bet.”
Without a word, Daichi turns his head and presses his lips against Kuroo’s, swiping his tongue over Kuroo’s bottom lip and ending the kiss with a bite. Kuroo is speechless for the first time in his life, much less rendered speechless by a human. Daichi returns to his task quietly, wordlessly, and Kuroo doesn’t miss the slightest upturning of his lips at the edges. He groans, burying his face into his hands once more.
“Seriously, you’re gonna kill me.”
---
“I was thinking of heading west soon.” Daichi says one day, out of the blue. “I heard lemon balm grows well further out west, and it would be great to get my hands on some.”
Kuroo’s head snaps up, a cold feeling of despair flooding through his body. He freezes, seconds of silence passing before he draws the strength to answer. “Oh…I see….well, yea, you did say that you were just passing through, I guess.”
“I’ve already stayed here much longer than just ‘passing through’, Kuroo.” Daichi smiles, shooting Kuroo a look of confusion. As if he doesn’t understand why Kuroo is acting strange about this. As if it was only natural that he’d leave eventually. As if staying wasn’t even a thought that had passed his mind. A sharp flare of anger spikes in Kuroo’s chest. What a fool he had been. What a desperate, idiotic fool he had been to even consider getting close to a human, of all things. To even think that Daichi might have possibly felt anything towards him, towards the past few months. Kuroo rubs at his face, embarrassed and ashamed.
“Yea, that’s true. Well, if you’re ever back in this area maybe we’ll see each other around.”
There’s silence at first, and then laughter. Kuroo whips around, eyes ablaze with fury.
“What kind of nonsense are you spouting now, you idiot?” Daichi laughs, face contorted in disbelief.
Kuroo withdraws further, pupils narrowing to slits, fangs bared against his will. He knows, he knows he’s an idiot. For even thinking Daichi would ever want to see him again, for even thinking that this meant anything at all-
“You’re coming with me, aren’t you?”
And then the anger is gone, and everything is calm and everything stops. “Wha- what?” Kuroo manages, weakly.
“Aren’t you?” Daichi asks again, tilting his head. Suddenly it dawns on him. His eyes widen in realization. “Don’t tell me you thought I was leaving you behind?”
Kuroo is speechless. He stares at Daichi, at this beautiful, beautiful man who had captured his heart and he curses himself because he would never admit that tears start to prickle at the edges of his eyes.
“You idiot.” Daichi breathes, closing the distance between the two of them in an instant. “God, how much of an idiot can you be?”
Kuroo numbly wonders how Daichi always seems to know exactly where he is and how to reach his lips when he’s blind, but then Daichi is kissing Kuroo with a feverish desperation and any silly thoughts like that dissipate instantly. Kuroo lacks the strength to kiss back, lets himself be kissed and lets Daichi twine his fingers through his hair, the other hand steady on the nape of his neck.
“You actually thought I’d just leave?” Daichi whispers against Kuroo’s lips. “You actually thought I would give you a casual wave goodbye and say ‘see you around’? Just like that?”
“Well, why not?” Kuroo exhales, throat hoarse. “Why wouldn’t you just leave? I don’t understand.”
Daichi pushes away from Kuroo, and Kuroo swears that Daichi sees into his soul (though he doesn’t have one, Kuroo thinks with a bitter laugh) at that very moment, with eyes that can’t see and yet see everything all at once. “Because, you idiot. I lov-”
“Wait!” Kuroo yells, untangling himself from Daichi’s arms. “You can’t say that.”
“Why not?” Daichi huffs, exasperated.
“Because, I’m not what you think I am.” Kuroo says, nervously.
“And what is that?”
“I’m not…I’m not human. I’m sorry. I took advantage of the fact that you can’t see what I look like and I never told you. I’m despicable. So it’s better if you don’t say what you were about to say and-“
Daichi is laughing again, and Kuroo is starting to get really damn annoyed because this had all been plaguing him on the inside for months. Months of agony and all Daichi seems to be doing is laughing.
“I know. Of course I know. You thought I didn’t, this entire time?”
“You…what?”
”Well, what difference does it make?”
“What do you mean what difference? I’m a monster! I’m a demon, for god’s sake!”
“You’re Kuroo.”
With just those two words, Kuroo sinks to his knees. He sinks to his knees and then he’s laughing, because holy shit, Daichi managed to singlehandedly upturn his entire existence with just two words. And Daichi is looking at him like he’s crazy, like he’s the crazy one for thinking that no one on this god forsaken earth would ever come to love a damn demon.
“You’re insane. You’re absolutely insane.” Kuroo laughs, staring at Daichi incredulously. Daichi huffs and crosses his arms in annoyance.
“Whatever. Can I say it now?”
“I love you.” Kuroo says, without missing a beat. Daichi blanks, taken aback.
“You’re gonna kill me one of these days.” He finally sighs, rolling his eyes.
“I know a good medicine for that.” Kuroo smirks.
“Do you.”
Kuroo pulls Daichi forward without another word.