Archive of Our Own

Rumi's heart beat hard in her chest. It wasn't from adrenaline—not yet, at least—but from Zoey's lopsided grin, bathed in pink as tiny rips formed in the fabric of the honmoon.

A grin that she'd kissed a week ago. A grin that Mira had kissed moments after.

Her face had been pink then, too.

Zoey had been the one to initiate, drunk on the enormous success of their first international tour—every venue had been sold out—and feeling bold and reckless. She'd apologised when Rumi froze, excuses immediately forming on her tongue. Rumi had silenced them by kissing back.

Maybe she'd been a little drunk on success, too, but she was twenty and she'd had a crush on both of them since she was eighteen and the idea of letting the moment pass by and be forgotten was intolerable to her. What was even more intolerable was the way Mira had stepped back as if she was an intruder, an assumption Rumi corrected soundly with her mouth on Mira's.

They hadn't defined their relationship. They'd been unable to define it before—they were literal soulmates—and it wasn't like they could tell the world anyway, not when they had to keep their reputation squeaky clean, and Rumi-

Well. She couldn't be everything they wanted just yet. Not while she had patterns.

That, too, would be corrected soon enough. The honmoon wasn't showing signs of turning gold, but they were already encroaching on the popularity of the Sunlight Sisters—streaming services were a godsend—and their fans were dedicated. They'd be the generation to seal the honmoon, and then their reputation wouldn't be so important and they'd be able to figure out what they were to each other.

The sun had set several hours ago, and while the streets were still busy the tangle of alleyways they'd followed the honmoon into were mercifully empty. Demons rarely tore into their world out in the open—they preferred to stay hidden until they were ready to strike. That suited Rumi just fine, especially tonight, when her skin was buzzing with frenetic energy that was amplified by Zoey and Mira's own eagerness.

Celine had warned them to always fight smart, and they did.

Most of the time.

But if the stakes were low enough, if the tear was small enough, if the streets were empty enough, what was the harm in having a little fun with it?

"Whatcha think? Loser buys dinner?" Zoey asked, voice bright in the darkness of the alley.

Mira snorted, eyes still on the increasing damage to the honmoon. "Yeah? You got a notebook with you to take my order?"

Zoey made a 'pfft' sound. "As if you'd win."

"I won last time."

The last time they'd made it a competition had been before the tour, when a tear had opened in a national park in the middle of the night. They'd been up late, ostensibly working on their choreography, but by that point they were all too tired to put in any real effort and it had instead become the three of them trying to impress each other with acrobatics or, failing that, make each other laugh with ridiculous suggestions for dance moves. The energy of it had carried into their hunt, and-

Rumi furrowed her brow.

"Liar. It was a draw."

Mira pursed her lips. "Okay, fine. The important thing is that Zoey lost."

Zoey scoffed in mock offense. "Only 'cos your weapons are so much bigger than mine- wait- no- fuck- stop laughing!"

"There, there," Rumi soothed. "It's not about the size, it's about what you do with-"

The tension that had been building in the back of Rumi's skull snapped like a rubber band.

What had started as tiny rips had been growing, stretching across the empty air in front of them, straining to meet each other until they finally connected.

Reality tore like paper.

The first demon was dead before it even hit the ground.

Both Rumi and Mira whipped their heads around to look at Zoey, already summoning a replacement shin-kal for the one buried in the crumbling demon.

Zoey winked and took a step back.

Rumi groaned and hoped the heat that rushed to her cheeks wasn't too noticeable. That was- okay, it wasn't cheating, but it was playing dirty. Zoey did have a point about their weapons, though, so it made sense for her to use her better range to her advantage.

It was smart, and Rumi was going to kick her ass anyway.

She exploded into motion, all the coiled muscles in her body releasing at once as she launched herself at the nearest demon, sword at the ready.

That was one for her, but in her periphery she saw Mira swing her gok-do through two demons in a single, smooth movement. Another shin-kal whirred past her ear, followed by Zoey planting both feet on a demon's head and kicking off of it, launching herself into the air, back arching as she twisted to throw a fan of shin-kals at the demons that tried to follow.

Only one of them hit; both Mira and Rumi took advantage of the distraction to cut down one each. Rumi bit back a laugh when their eyes met and Mira's expression turned from surprised to mischievous.

"Hey!" Zoey shouted as she landed.

Mira chuckled, leaning out of range of a demon's claws and retaliating by driving her gok-do through its chest. "All's fair in love and war!"

If she'd been a fraction less competitive, she might've accepted what Mira was not so subtly offering, but she was competitive; she didn't want to make sure one of them lost, she wanted to make sure she won.

Besides, Mira would absolutely still be trying to beat her score, even if she was focused on stealing kills from Zoey.

Adrenaline sang through her veins and hummed under her skin. They were still working together, and they were still taking it seriously—mostly—so when Mira went low, Rumi went high, both of their blades swinging in wide, beautiful arcs that cut through the demons still scrambling out of the tear. Any that slipped past them were stopped immediately by a well placed shin-kal or, despite the competition between them, kicked back into their range by Zoey if they left themselves open to it.

Maybe she'd kiss her for it as a thank you. She could. She was allowed.

The competition was fun, but seeing the confident and controlled movements of her soulmates was better. They were incredible. They were perfect. They were hers—or they would be, just as soon as the honmoon was sealed.

She'd stopped counting Mira and Zoey's kills by the time the tear started to stitch itself closed, but only because she was fairly certain she was winning. She was close to double digits, and there hadn't been that many demons. It was simple mathematics—so long as she killed some of the stragglers, she'd stay ahead. The real problem was that Mira and Zoey seemed to have figured that out, too, and since she hadn't taken Mira up on her offer to team up that meant that Mira was free to team up with Zoey.

With fewer demons and less chance of things going wrong, they got bolder in the way they toyed with their prey. Mira let them slip closer just to get them out of Rumi's range and pulled them into headlocks to give Zoey easy targets. Zoey taunted them into chasing her and baited them right into Mira's warpath.

Suddenly, Rumi found herself not minding so much if she lost. Not when it meant she got to watch the easy way they worked together and catch the sly winks and cheeky grins they sent her way every time they stole one of her kills.

It didn't mean she wasn't going to still try to win. She gave an incredulous laugh when Mira paused to blow her a kiss, then turned away from them so she could focus up. She'd sensed the demon behind her like a breath on the back of her neck; if it thought it could sneak up on a hunter, she'd show it just how wrong it was.

She raised her sword and took a step forwards, ready to cut through it the moment it got close enough—and it would get close enough, she could see the wild hunger in its eyes, knew the look well enough to know that it was about to try and leap at her.

Something hit her shoulder hard enough to make her stagger, but she didn't have time to try and figure it out, she had to right herself and get rid of this demon before-

She blinked slowly. The demon was already crumbling, a shin-kal buried in its chest, glowing brightly in the dark. Zoey was such a cheater when she wanted to win.

It should've made her laugh—it was funny—but something was wrong. She couldn't make her mouth move the way she wanted it to, couldn't stop the hard breaths that pushed out of her lungs.

The pain hit all at once, a bright and hot agony in her shoulder that burned through her veins like wildfire and sent her reeling, nausea clawing up her throat and pooling in her mouth. Her head swam, thoughts stumbling over themselves as she tried to make sense of what was happening. When had she been hit? What had hit her? It wasn't a demon, it couldn't have been, but-

Her eyes slid to her arm, to the source of the sudden pain.

She was bleeding from her shoulder. It was pooling underneath her shirt and staining the fabric.

Why was she bleeding? What-

The image of Zoey's shin-kal glinted behind her eyes.

No, no no no, no- fuck-

The pain shooting through her exploded, furious and violent and spreading. Consuming. The honmoon howled in response, just as angry—no, not angry, afraid. Afraid, because while it tried to stitch the hunter back together it was simultaneously trying to peel the corners of the wound away and flay the demon.

She could hear someone shouting her name—or, at least, it sounded like her name. The ringing in her ears was too loud for her to be sure.

They couldn't see. They couldn't know she was hurt. She clasped her hand over the injury and cried out at the roar of pain that reverberated through her body.

The honmoon writhed, protesting even as it looped around the tender edges of the wound and pulled.

It was going to kill her. She was going to die because of a stupid mistake, and worse, she'd die a demon. She'd die hated, because Mira and Zoey would know. They'd figure it out. They'd see, and-

The world tilted around her, then she collided with something firm and warm. The impact knocked a single thought loose, allowing it to wade through the molasses of agony and fight past all the noise in her head.

She needed to hide.

"Oh fuck. Fuck. What- how- Mira, what did-" Zoey babbled as she rushed over to where Mira was kneeling on the ground, holding Rumi to her chest after she'd caught her when she collapsed.

From where she stood she could see the cut in Rumi's shoulder. It was deep, but she'd seen her shrug off worse.

And yet, even with Rumi's worrying pain tolerance, she was writhing in Mira's arms, letting out bitten off gasps and low, pained whines with every breath—sounds Zoey wasn't sure she'd ever be able to get out of her head.

Sounds that she'd caused, that she'd-

It just wasn't possible. Sure, she'd thrown her shin-kal a little close to Rumi, but she'd accidentally hit Mira with them before and all they'd done was bruise. They weren't sharp. None of their weapons were sharp. The only reason they could cut through demons was because they were made from the honmoon; to anything not demonic they were blunt.

Her shin-kals couldn't cut Rumi, but they had.

So that meant Rumi was-

But she couldn't be. She wasn't. There was another reason, one dangling just out of reach of Zoey's scrambling mind.

"Zoey."

"I- I didn't mean to- they're not supposed to be able to…"

"Zoey."

God, she'd fucked up. Things were going good—better than good—and then she had to try and steal the last kill from Rumi just to show off, just to impress her, and now…

She tried to swallow around the lump in her throat.

"I'm sorry-"

Mira looked up from Rumi's trembling, whimpering form. "Hey, listen to me."

Zoey snapped her jaw shut with a click—except, her teeth were still chattering.

Oh. She was trembling, too.

"I don't-" Mira paused and swallowed. "I don't know how that happened, but we'll figure it out at home, okay?"

Zoey nodded jerkily. Right. They couldn't deal with an injury like that in a grubby alleyway in the middle of the night. She needed to focus, but dread trailed its cold fingers up and down her spine and tears pricked at the back of her eyes and Rumi yelped when Mira scooped her up so she could carry her because Zoey had hurt her, and-

"Rumi?" Mira asked softly, then again. She exhaled hard when she didn't get a response past another series of shuddering gasps and adjusted her grip so she could press her hand to the wound, applying firm and steady pressure. Rumi whined and tried, ineffectively, to curl up in on herself.

"We can't take the main street." Mira looked to Zoey. "Make sure the coast is clear and I'll follow."

"Yeah. Yeah, okay. I can- hold on." Zoey tugged her jacket from her shoulders and held it up. Mira raised a questioning eyebrow. "In case someone sees. It'll look like she's sleeping."

From a distance anyway. If someone got close they'd be able to hear those sounds-

Zoey hesitated. She'd have to tuck it under Rumi's shoulders to keep it securely over her, but would she want Zoey to touch her after what she'd done?

"Hey," Mira said firmly. "It was an accident, okay? She'll forgive you."

At least one of them was good in a crisis. Zoey gave another unsteady nod and draped her jacket over Rumi, tucking it around her before taking point in leading them back to the penthouse. It was pure luck that it didn't take more than ten minutes to get there, and if the security guards doubted their excuse of Rumi being tired they didn't say anything.

It made sense, she supposed. They were watching for external threats, so why would they think Zoey had hurt her? Why would they think Mira was lying?

They were just lucky that Rumi had stopped making sounds by the time they got there.

She tried to steady her breathing as they walked past the staff and into the elevator, but the moment the doors slid shut the breath she'd been holding escaped her lungs in a long, shuddering exhale, made louder by how silent Mira was as she watched Rumi, grimacing even in her unconscious—or mostly unconscious—state.

Maybe that silence was why she finally noticed it.

The honmoon was unsettled. Not like when demons tore into their world, it wasn't hurting, but it was wrong, humming anxiously around them like an overbearing parent. She glanced over at Mira, but if she could feel it she was keeping it to herself—staying calm for Zoey's sake, because they couldn't both be freaking out; one of them had to be sensible about this.

It wasn't fair that it fell to Mira, but she didn't know what to do. It was her fault, it was-

The elevator dinged as it came to a halt. As soon as the doors slid open, Mira stepped into the penthouse. "Get the lights and clear off the coffee table."

Zoey obeyed readily. Being given a task was good, it stopped her mind from wandering; Mira was right that making sure Rumi was okay took priority above all else. She winced when she turned the overhead lights on—they normally used lamps—but the brightness was needed if they were going to treat a wound. The coffee table, fortunately, didn't have much on it, just a few magazines that were hastily relocated to the floor to make room for Rumi.

Mira lowered her to the table carefully and pulled Zoey's jacket away.

The wound had bled more, enough that both the shirt and the jacket were probably ruined, but the bleeding seemed to have slowed down.

"I'm gonna get the supplies." Mira stood up. "Can you get her shirt off for me?"

Rumi wasn't as unconscious as she'd appeared to be, because the moment Mira said it she let out a pained, urgent whine and tried to roll onto her injured shoulder as if to protect it.

Both Zoey and Mira reached out to stop her, but Zoey was still crouched by the table and reached her first, putting a hand on her other shoulder and pushing her gently onto her back.

"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry." Zoey swallowed thickly. Now was not the time to start crying. "But we've gotta look. We're gonna fix it, okay? Mira's-… Mira's gonna do it. I won't touch you more than I have to."

A hand trailing over her back made Zoey startle, even though she knew it was Mira instinctively, but the moment her hand reached her shoulder and gave a soothing squeeze she found herself leaning into the comfort. It was the sort of warmth that lingered even after Mira stepped away, even after she left the room.

Okay. Okay, she'd been given a task, and she could do it. If Rumi had been wearing shorter sleeves she would've just rolled it up, but she was in a turtleneck and the cut was too high on her shoulder. Rumi's modesty would have to be put aside; something was wrong with that wound for it to be as painful as it seemed to be, and they needed to look at it as soon as possible.

She curled her fingers under the hem of Rumi's shirt and began pulling it up slowly. She'd really hoped the first time she got to do something like it would be under very different circumstances, but the concept of intimacy was far from her mind, especially when Rumi's breathing picked up again.

"N-no…" Rumi murmured.

Zoey's hands froze. Sure, Rumi was modest, and under any other circumstance she'd respect that—had been respecting that—but they didn't have a choice. Someone had to look at the wound, and the only other person who'd understand would be Celine, but she was in Jeju, and how the hell was she supposed to tell her she'd stabbed her daughter?

Nausea built in her throat; she had to swallow it back down before she could speak again.

"We need to look. I…" She glanced around the room, looking for anything that might make it easier for Rumi to handle. Her eyes landed on the blankets tossed haphazardly over the back of the couch. "I'll put a blanket over you, okay? But we have to see your arm."

Plus, if she could see her arms, she'd know. Know if she was- know that she wasn't demonic.

A sound escaped Rumi, one that sounded a devastating amount like "Please."

Zoey reached back and pulled a blanket closer anyway. The moment she took hold of Rumi's shirt she started whining again, another series of faint protests, another attempt to roll onto her injured shoulder, every movement making her flinch and hiss through her teeth.

But it had to be done. It didn't matter that neither of them wanted to do it.

She kept her eyes on Rumi's face as she pulled her shirt over her head. It wasn't easy to get it off her arms, not with Rumi resisting weakly the whole time, but she was determined, even if the process made her stomach turn. She'd be forgiven. It was necessary. It was necessary.

As soon as the garment was gone she took the blanket and draped it over her, leaving her arm exposed so she could get a better look at the injury-

Her thoughts stuttered. The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end.

Over Rumi's arm, crawling up her shoulder and to her neck, were dull, dark purple patterns. They were unmistakable. They couldn't be anything else.

Around them, the honmoon rippled; the patterns flashed in time with it, a wave of vibrant pink pulsing through them and closing in on the injury, only for the glow to be repelled and spread outwards instead.

The cold dread from before was back, pressing its frigid fingers to her spine. Her limbs were suddenly too heavy to move. Her brain buzzed with thousands of thoughts, too loud for any specific one to stand out.

It didn't make sense. It wasn't possible.

But then, neither was her shin-kal cutting Rumi.

She had to wrestle with her instincts, had to pin them to the base of her skull and keep them there, far away from where they could cause more damage. This couldn't be a demon; Rumi hadn't been out of their sight since she'd summoned her saingeom, and if it was it would've vanished when she hit it.

So it had to be Rumi, and that meant that Rumi was demonic.

With a start, she realised Rumi was watching her with lidded eyes, mouth slightly parted as she panted, expression twisted with what might have been grief or might have been fear—or maybe some amalgamation of both.

"Rumi…" Zoey said softly.

She wasn't sure what she'd been planning to say, but distant footsteps somewhere behind her stole the words from her anyway.

Mira.

If Mira saw patterns, she'd attack. She'd think Zoey was in danger. She wouldn't stop to ask questions. Or… or maybe she would? Maybe that was unkind to think, but it was a risk, and if Zoey felt sick for hurting Rumi how would Mira feel if she did worse, if she-

She covered Rumi's arm with the blanket and tried to ignore the bile that burned the back of her throat.

All she needed was a few seconds, just some time to think, time to convince Mira a demon hadn't appeared in the brief period she'd left the room. It wasn't lying. She wasn't lying.

Her hands were shaking. She squeezed them into fists, then relaxed them again. Her own breathing was loud and unsteady enough that she nearly missed the word that slipped from Rumi's lips.

"…Why?"

Zoey opened her mouth, then closed it again. She didn't know why. All her finely honed instincts were screaming at her to summon her shin-kals and kill the demon in front of her, but the rest of her remembered how Rumi's jaw had trembled when she kissed back, remembered how her eyes slid closed when she kissed Mira, remembered her shy, crooked smile and flushed cheeks.

Her shin-kals could only cut demons, but they'd cut Rumi. On being exposed, she hadn't transformed or attacked, only tried to hide, and now she was watching her like she didn't understand why she wasn't dead yet.

She'd summoned her sword. She'd been hurt by the honmoon—the honmoon that was wavering, twisting and turning on itself in its uncertainty of what to do with the problem in front of it.

There was only really one explanation that made any sort of sense, but it wasn't… she couldn't be…

Rumi's eyes slid up to something just past Zoey's shoulder, then closed, brow knitted tight like she was bracing herself.

"I think I've got everything." Mira dropped the first aid kit, alongside some towels and a bottle of disinfectant, onto the couch. Zoey tried to suppress her flinch, but of course Mira saw it anyway; she saw everything, she was too wonderfully attuned to their emotions to not. "…What? Did something happen?"

"No!" Zoey said quickly. "No, everything's fine."

Everything was not fine, but she didn't know what to do, especially not when Mira's expression dropped from concern to frustration.

Mira took a deep breath, the way she always did when she was moments away from snapping. "Zoey, we really don't have the time for this right now. What happened?"

"Um. So…" Zoey's eyes slid from Mira's face to Rumi's. "You need to not freak out, okay?"

"Nobody has ever said that and then said something that didn't make me freak out." Mira dropped to her knees by the table. "What happened?"

"I don't know, I- I swear she hasn't left my sight, not even for a second, so…"

It shouldn't have been as hard to say as it was, but the words stalled in her mouth and died on her tongue.

Apparently losing what little patience she had, Mira exhaled hard, shaking her head and reaching for the blanket. Zoey had to fight the urge to stop her—she was going to find out either way.

When the blanket fell away Mira recoiled, pushing herself to her feet and reaching for the honmoon—reaching, but not taking. Her fingers spread in preparation to receive her gok-do, but she hadn't called for it yet. Maybe she'd already started to put the pieces together.

Zoey scrambled between them anyway. "Wait-"

"What the fuck- why is there a demon here?"

"There's not, it's-"

"There's not-" Mira scoffed. "I'm looking at it. Get out of the way, what's wrong with-" Her eyes widened. "Where's Rumi?"

"It is Rumi. She's- I swear, this is Rumi."

Mira didn't look away from Rumi's patterns, but she took a few breaths and let her hand drop to her side. "Explain."

Zoey exhaled in relief and moved out of Mira's path to stand at her side instead. The patterns flashed again in an eerie echo of the way the honmoon rippled around them and Rumi gasped, eyes scrunching shut and back arching. Zoey dropped to her knees and put a hand on Rumi's forearm in an attempt to soothe. Mira twitched in her periphery, as if stopping herself from doing the same.

"I've been watching her the whole time, and demons just vanish when they get hit, and she used her saingeom, so-" Zoey paused and swallowed. She was right, she knew she was right, but that didn't make it easier to wrap her head around. "So this has to be Rumi."

She looked up just in time to see Mira's shoulders lower, just in time to catch the relief that crossed her face, too—either because it meant Rumi was still there, or that she wouldn't have to kill something that looked like her.

Another pained whine from Rumi brought Mira to her knees next to Zoey, hands outstretched but not touching.

"Fuck." Mira took a breath. "Okay, okay. We deal with this first, but…" she looked to Zoey. "Jesus, Zoey. What was your plan? Lie to me and hope I just… what, left it at that?"

Tears stung the backs of Zoey's eyes again, prompted by the sharpness of Mira's tone. She blinked hard and shook her head.

"No, no, I just- I panicked. I- I'm sorry. I don't know what I… I'm sorry."

Mira's jaw ticked with barely restrained anger. "Forget it. We'll talk about it later."

Zoey grimaced, but least they were on the same page about Rumi. Later was better, anyway; Mira's anger burned hot, but it also burned fast, so maybe by the time they were done she'd have calmed down and it'd be an easier conversation.

Another whine from Rumi drew their attention back to her.

"Clean the wound while I disinfect the tools." Mira flicked open the first aid kit—though it felt strange to call it a first aid kit when it was nearly a miniature hospital all on its own. Celine had imparted the need for them to be prepared to treat almost any injury, and after their first few hunts it very quickly became one of the rules they really understood.

Unlike the one about being careful around each other with their weapons.

That was a rule they were only understanding the gravity of now.

She had to go into the kitchen to wash her hands, and the hush of the running water helped quieten some of her racing thoughts.

But not all of them.

How could she have patterns? How long had she had them? How long had she been lying to them? She'd never gone to the bathhouse with them. Was that the reason, or was it actually modesty?

But if she'd made a deal with Gwi-Ma why was she still allowed to hunt and kill demons? Why did the honmoon still favour her? What would she have even made a deal for? What could've been so important-

The faucet had been running long enough for the water to turn hot, and the sharp sting of it shocked her back into the room.

Later. She could freak out later.

She finished washing her hands and pulled on a pair of latex gloves.

When she returned it was to the sight of Mira holding Rumi's shaking hand, long legs folded underneath herself and eyes focused on the way Rumi's face twisted with each wave of pain, her own expression much softer than it had been moments before. She didn't look away when she spoke. "The honmoon is hurting her, I think."

Zoey hummed and knelt by Rumi's shoulder. "Yeah, I think so, too." A moment passed. "What do we… do? About that?"

"I don't know." Mira's hand slid from Rumi's. Zoey didn't miss the way Rumi's fingers closed like she didn't want her to leave. "Treat it like normal and keep an eye on it. If it gets worse…"

"…Call Celine?"

Mira's eyes slid from Rumi to Zoey. "Only if we have to."

The words landed heavily between them.

Only if they had to, because they didn't know what Celine would do if they found out Rumi had made a deal with Gwi-Ma—and that had to be the case, because how else would she have patterns? If she'd been a demon the whole time Celine would've killed her by now. She wouldn't raise a demon.

Would she?

She shook the thought free—she just didn't have time to consider the implications of that—and finally really looked at the wound. The bleeding had slowed enough for her to see the clean edges of the cut, enough for her to see that even though it was concerningly deep—despite the fact that her knife should've only nicked her—it wasn't deep enough to justify the way Rumi had reacted.

Which meant their assumption was probably right—the honmoon was causing the pain, not the wound.

It didn't soothe Zoey's howling guilt. The blame lay with her either way.

She doused a sterile gauze in saline and began the process of slowly cleaning the area around the wound. The blood had spread further down her arm, but they could wash that away with regular water later.

Movement in her periphery confirmed what she'd suspected—that Mira had been waiting for Zoey to be watching Rumi, unwilling to not have eyes on her while she cleaned the tools necessary for fixing what Zoey had broken.

She wasn't sure what she'd been expecting when she pressed the gauze to the patterns to clear the blood away, but it wasn't for Rumi to jolt like a live wire. She had to scramble with her free hand to pin her back against the table, and the disoriented, terrified look Rumi shot at her was one she filed away as something that would haunt her for the rest of her life.

Zoey didn't speak. What could she even say? 'Sorry for stabbing you'? 'Sorry for taking your shirt off, I know you didn't want me to'? 'How dare you hide this from us'?

Instead, she choked back her guilt and soaked a new gauze in saline so she could start cleaning the wound itself.

Rumi's reaction to that was, predictably, worse; she let out a gasping, breathless whimper and strained against Zoey's grip hard enough that Mira looked over from where she was disinfecting the needle. She could feel her stare on the side of her face.

She was half way through dabbing at the wound when Mira finally said something, and her attempt at keeping her voice calm and even wasn't enough—Zoey could still hear the strain, the preemptive regret.

"I'm gonna need you to hold her down while I stitch her up, if she's acting like that just from it being cleaned."

Zoey chewed her lip. If a better option had presented itself they'd have taken it, but the wound was too deep to leave open, and they couldn't call Celine, and a hospital would have too many questions they couldn't answer, so…

"Okay."

She finished cleaning the wound in silence, aside from Rumi's gasps and whines, then shuffled around to Rumi's other side and waited.

Once Mira pulled on some latex gloves Zoey reached over Rumi to pin her beneath her weight, one hand on her shoulder and the other on her elbow.

The moment her fingers made contact with the patterns Rumi tensed beneath her—that small movement was the only warning she was given before Rumi bucked.

"Shit-"

It wasn't news to her that Rumi was strong, but she hadn't expected the ferocity with which she tried to get free. The only reason she wasn't thrown off completely was because Mira was already there, arm across Rumi's collarbones to force her back onto the table.

"We're trying to help-" Mira grunted as Rumi pushed against her. "Just stop- hey- hey!"

It could've been pain or it could've been panic, but it was clear in Rumi's wide-eyed, feral expression that she wasn't hearing them. The patterns on her shoulder pulsed again, glowing brighter—and, worryingly, for longer.

The honmoon wavered, a shock of pink rippling through the threads in time with Rumi's pained cry.

It took active effort for Zoey to not summon her shin-kals. There wasn't a tear forming—she'd have been able to feel it—so the honmoon was responding to Rumi. There was nothing dangerous in the room with her. Her hunter instincts were wrong, and for the first time since training she had to ignore them.

She could see the same conflict flickering across Mira's expression in the furrow of her brow and downward turn of her lips, but she also saw her come to the same conclusion—Rumi wasn't a threat, and they weren't going to hurt her.

Not on purpose, anyway.

With the way Rumi was struggling against the two of them—frantic and panicked, like a wild animal—the chances of them accidentally hurting her increased by the second.

"I know you're scared, but- but it's us, Rumi," Zoey tried desperately. "It's just us. We don't wanna hurt you."

"I can't stitch her up if she won't be still," Mira warned, grabbing hold of Rumi's wrist just as she reached up for Zoey.

She knew that, but they didn't have many options. The risk of infection was too high for them to just wrap the wound and leave it alone, and it was clearly causing way more pain than it should've as it was. They had to get it closed, and to get it closed they had to calm Rumi down.

Rumi's breaths were coming out in harsh, rasping pants, and the weight against her couldn't be helping, even if was for good reasons. Maybe if they gave her a few seconds she'd understand that. It was a long shot, but it was worth trying.

Zoey let go of Rumi and looked at her face.

And then she recoiled, jerking away and landing back on her haunches.

Rumi was looking at her, one eye the same deep, warm brown Zoey loved. The other eye was a bright, glowing, demonic gold.

"What-" Mira looked from Zoey to Rumi. Her hand slid from Rumi's shoulder. "Oh, fuck."

Another ripple through the honmoon, another echo through the patterns. For a moment the room was silent except for the combined sounds of their panting breaths, and then Rumi screamed.

The sound spurred Mira and Zoey back into motion, both of them reaching to hold Rumi against the table as her back arched. It took Zoey a moment to notice it through the haze of panic, but when she looked back at Rumi's arm she could see it—the patterns were spreading, travelling down her arm and across her chest like cracks in an iced over lake.

She didn't have time to process it, to accept that Rumi was becoming more demonic the longer they waited, because the wound was bleeding again, filling until it spilled over, then filling again, torn further in their mad scramble to stop her from moving—or maybe made worse by the honmoon.

Mira exhaled hard. "I'm gonna give her the stuff Celine got for emergencies. Hold her still."

Zoey blinked. Celine had given them nasal sprays for times when they couldn't swallow pain relief and couldn't stay still enough for injections—they'd never asked how she got them, and they doubted she'd tell them even if they did—and this definitely counted as an emergency, but forcing Rumi to take fentanyl made nausea climb in Zoey's throat again. It was bad enough that they'd taken her shirt off, but drugging her was…

"Hey. Look at me." Mira waited for Zoey to follow her instruction before continuing. "I don't want to do this either, but we can't help her when she's in this much pain, okay? She'll understand."

"I know, but-"

"I'm gonna do it, not you. If she's mad, she'll be mad at me."

It didn't make her feel better, but Mira was right. Of course she was. There'd always been an unspoken agreement that if Rumi wasn't around to give orders that role would fall to Mira—Zoey wasn't cut out for making the hard decisions.

"…Okay." Zoey got back to her knees and replaced Mira's hands with her own, holding Rumi down by her shoulders as she let out another pained cry. "I've got her."

She felt the loss of Mira's strength the moment she moved away and had to brace herself as Rumi jerked underneath her, but she was clearly in too much pain to put her full force into getting free—if she had been, there was a good chance that even with both of them they wouldn't be able to hold her still.

The spray wasn't something they kept with their regular medical supplies in case Bobby ever looked in the first aid kit, so Mira had to leave the room to retrieve it.

Which left Zoey alone with Rumi.

Rumi, who was their leader. Rumi, who was somehow a demon. Rumi, who she'd kissed a week ago and had wanted to kiss again—still wanted to kiss again, if she was being honest with herself. The love she had for both her and Mira had taken root in her heart a long time ago, and she was pretty sure this—whatever this was—wasn't enough to shake it.

"It's gonna be okay," Zoey said as softly as she could when Rumi squirmed underneath her again. "We'll figure this out. We've just gotta… we just need you calm, okay? It's just pain relief."

She wasn't sure if she was trying to convince Rumi or herself, but she wasn't succeeding either way.

Not that she was given much time to think on it. Rumi jerked upwards and she had to brace her forearm across her collarbones to keep her torso pinned while she held down her hips with her free hand.

It didn't even seem like she was trying to get free anymore. Her struggling was becoming less coordinated, her sounds more pained. An unwise glance at the patterns confirmed what Zoey was afraid of—slowly but surely, they were still spreading. The violent pink glow was still pulsing brighter in intervals, but the glow wasn't fading. Whatever was happening was getting worse.

Mira didn't take long to retrieve the spray, and as soon as she was back she dropped to her knees next to them. "You okay?" After a heavy pause, she continued. "Zoey. I'm asking you."

Zoey blinked. "Um. Yeah- yeah, I'm good. Just…"

Her eyes trailed down to the patterns.

Mira sucked in a breath, then swallowed audibly. "…I know. Just hold her still, please?"

She took a moment to adjust, to make sure her hold on Rumi was as secure as she was going to get it, then nodded. "Okay."

Mira didn't waste any time—thank god—though her first attempt was met with Rumi pressing her chin to her chest in an attempt to keep Mira's hand away from her face.

"C'mon, Rumi," Mira pleaded.

Instead of responding, Rumi twitched her head away again, trying to curl onto her side—an effort that was stopped by Zoey pushing back against her.

Mira exhaled hard, a sound that was almost a sob, then cupped Rumi's jaw with her palm. She forcibly tilted her head back, holding one nostril closed with her thumb as she pressed the spray into the other and pushed the plunger down.

With her mouth held open—probably to stop her from biting through her tongue—there wasn't anything to block the raw, urgent, terrified scream, a sound that sent shivers down Zoey's spine and made tears burn the backs of her eyes. The honmoon recoiled, rippling pink before it limped back into place. The weight of it was heavy in the room, draping over Zoey's shoulders like it needed to use her for support. The honmoon had felt euphoric before, it had felt anxious before, but she'd never felt it so tired.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," Mira murmured, body jolting with the force it took to keep Rumi still as she tried to jerk her head from side to side in an attempt to get free.

One of Rumi's hands slipped from Zoey's grip, and she had to slam it back against the table with enough force to bruise in order to stop her from grabbing Mira's arms. She wanted to be gentle, she wanted to be kind, but Rumi was strong and if Zoey let up it'd be Mira who suffered for it.

It didn't make Zoey any less nauseous when Rumi's back arched as she strained against her, or when she made an awful, wet choking sound in her throat as her body tried to reject the painkillers.

After a few agonising seconds, Mira let go, an action Rumi immediately took advantage of by curling up and rolling onto her side with a series of hacking, spluttering coughs.

Instead of forcing her back down Zoey relaxed her grip and let her, because what if it made her vomit? What if she choked?

Rumi's shoulders heaved with the force of her panting, even after the coughing fit faded. Tears slid down the bridge of her nose and dripped onto the hardwood floor.

Zoey wasn't stupid enough to believe it was just from the spray—no, the betrayal must have stung just as much.

Eventually, still gasping and wheezing, Rumi slumped back against the table. After maybe ten minutes her head to lolled to the side, her unfocused, glassy eyes sliding to Zoey.

Not even the drugs could hide the fear that still laced her expression. If anything, the way she became more muted as her body relaxed only made the fear louder, more apparent.

And underneath that, the hurt.

Mira was wrong—Rumi was going to hate them for what they'd done, and she'd be right to.

An ugly sort of frustration simmered underneath the surface—if they'd known then none of this would've happened. Zoey never would've taken that sort of risk if she'd known it could actually hurt someone she loved.

Then again, if she'd known, would she have fallen in love in the first place?

She swallowed the thought down alongside the thick lump that had formed in her throat. Of course she would've. If Rumi was a demon, that just meant that not all demons were bad. If she'd made a deal, she must have been desperate. It was stupid, but they'd find a way to fix it—just as soon as they got her coherent again.

The first step to that was treating the wound.

It would've been kinder if she could say she forced herself to look away from Rumi's face, but she didn't have to force herself at all—not having to look at that scared, wounded expression was a blessing.

She put on clean gloves and applied pressure to the wound again until the bleeding slowed, then dabbed the fresh blood away, a process that was much easier to do now that Rumi wasn't fighting back.

A quick look at Mira told her she wasn't coping with what they'd done any better, even if her expression remained flat. Zoey simply knew her too well to know when she was trying not to cry.

Mira cleared her throat thickly. "The uh- the dose is safe, but keep an eye on her breathing."

"Right." Zoey sat cross-legged next to Rumi's head and tried not to look too closely at her face, instead resting a hand on her chest, just below her collarbones, to feel the steadying rise and fall, something that had soothed her to sleep during dozens of sleepovers but now only made her feel unsettled, the calm made eerie by the chaos moments prior.

She watched Mira swap to a fresh pair of gloves and disinfect the tools again, then carefully take one edge of the wound between the forceps so she could push the needle through. Rumi twitched, but she didn't make any sound of protest. Still, Mira hesitated for a moment before she pulled the needle the rest of the way through and secured the stitch with a knot.

Interrupted stitches, then. That was probably wise—they had no idea what was wrong with the wound, or the effect the honmoon would have on Rumi's natural healing. It'd be safest if they could remove any problematic stitches without reopening the whole cut.

The patterns were still pulsing pink, though less frequently than they had been a few minutes ago. It felt like a good sign, but, really, it could've meant anything. She'd never looked at patterns for longer than it took to kill the demon they belonged to. She didn't know what any of it meant.

The soft furrow of Mira's brow confirmed that she was just as lost.

Mira's eyes flicked up, then back to Rumi's arm. "Focus on her, not me."

Zoey grimaced. For the first time in her life she didn't want to look at Rumi, and of course Mira would see right through her. She was right, anyway—safety was more important than discomfort, and she had to make sure Rumi was breathing normally.

She wasn't surprised to see that Rumi had swapped to watching the careful movements of Mira's hands, but it would probably be easier for Mira to focus if neither of them were staring at her, and seeing her own glowing patterns couldn't be a good idea, so she gently pressed her fingers to Rumi's jaw and turned her head.

"Hey," Zoey murmured. "We're helping, see? I'm sorry we had to- to do that, but it was so we could help."

Rumi furrowed her brow, but her eyes were still unfocused, sliding from Zoey's face to the room around them. If they were lucky she wouldn't remember any of it. They'd still tell her, but at least she wouldn't look at them and remember being held down and drugged.

That was a weight Zoey and Mira could carry alone.

It took her a moment to realise Rumi was speaking—or trying to.

"M'sorry…"

Zoey's throat tightened. She brushed the backs of her knuckles across Rumi's cheek; there wasn't any point in trying to figure out what, in particular, she was sorry for, so the best she could do was offer comfort. "We'll talk about it later."

Despite the rapid beating of her heart, Rumi's breathing started to deepen as the drugs took hold.

"…'kay."

Around them, the honmoon started to settle down—it still wavered with uncertainty, but it wasn't the same frantic song it had been moments prior, and for a while the only sound in the room was the soft sound of fabric shifting as Mira continued to stitch the wound closed.

Silence had always been a struggle for Zoey. Mira and Rumi could abide by it—enjoyed it at times, even—but Zoey needed something. Music, or conversation, or some TV show she'd watched dozens of times just to be background noise. She'd been working on it, if only to spend more time with Rumi and Mira; she liked watching them at peace, liked seeing them lounging on the couch and reading together, and she didn't want her presence to disrupt that every time.

The weight of this silence was far too all consuming, too suffocating, for her to try to sit with it, but Mira needed to focus and Rumi couldn't hold a conversation, and it wasn't like Zoey could strike up a casual conversation with her right now even if she could comprehend it.

She hadn't even realised she'd been humming until Mira's hands paused.

Zoey winced and stopped.

"No, no- keep doing that." Mira looked up from Rumi's arm.

"…Humming?"

Mira nodded. "Look." She leaned back slightly. "The patterns stopped glowing."

Zoey looked over to Rumi's arm, then raised her eyebrows. The patterns had settled down to a dull purple, the same as they'd been before the glowing started.

"That's… good, right?" Zoey asked.

"Maybe. Rumi?"

It took a few seconds for her to indicate she'd heard them, but when she did it was with a faint mmh?

"Do you want her to keep humming? Is it helping?"

Another pause, then a weak, croaky, "…S'nice."

Zoey and Mira exchanged a look, but they didn't need to exchange words. They were upset with Rumi for keeping the patterns from them, however she ended up with them, but she was hurt, and she was afraid, and they'd just drugged her, so the least they could do was offer this comfort.

While Mira prepared the needle for another stitch, Zoey hummed softly, nonsensically, the same way they did when they were brainstorming a new song.

The honmoon hummed, too, relaxing against them, sighing with an emotion Zoey had felt from it before, but never so strongly.

Relief.

Mira grunted with the effort it took to move Rumi from the coffee table to the relative comfort of the couch. Taking her upstairs was a risk—if she started struggling she might drop her—but they could at least get her comfortable while they waited for the drugs to leave her system.

The drugs that Mira had forced her to take.

Her throat tightened. Guilt, hot and sticky and acidic, dripped from her ribs and pooled in her stomach.

It had been for Rumi's own good. She didn't have a choice. That exact sort of situation was why Celine had given them intranasal painkillers—she'd even told them it was an option that didn't require cooperation. It was the right thing to do; it had allowed her to stitch up the wound, had allowed Zoey to soothe her.

Rumi would understand. Mira had said as much to Zoey, and she meant it.

She just wished she believed it more.

With nothing to do but wait, she perched on the coffee table and watched the slow rise and fall of Rumi's chest under the blanket Zoey had draped back over her after wrestling her uncooperative and limp body into a clean t-shirt. It only reminded her of how she fought against them, of how desperately she wanted them to…

Well. Mira wasn't sure what she'd wanted, actually, and she got the feeling Rumi didn't know either—it wasn't like she could ask, not when Rumi seemed to have fallen asleep. She'd wanted to get away, maybe, but she'd curled up to Mira's chest when she was carrying her to the penthouse, and Zoey's humming had anchored her to them and calmed her down, so maybe she didn't want to be away from them.

She was probably just afraid of them seeing the patterns.

As if Mira hadn't already figured it out the moment Zoey's shin-kal cut her. Sure, she'd denied it to herself, she'd pretended there was any other reason, but she knew.

She knew, they both knew, and then Zoey tried to hide it.

Anger bubbled up through the tarry guilt, but did she really get to be angry at anyone when she'd been so willing to drug someone she loved?

Her hands itched with the phantom sensation of Rumi struggling underneath her, an echo that she wasn't sure she'd ever be able to escape. Nausea bit at her throat.

She'd drugged her. She'd seen her afraid and in pain and, instead of spending more time trying to calm her down, instead of trying to soothe her, she resorted to- she'd held her down to-

All the emotion she'd been locking down burst free. Rumi may have been a demon—maybe—but she'd never hurt one of them like that. That was something exclusive to Mira.

Her hand flew up to cover her mouth as she choked back a sob.

An abrupt warmth enveloped her. She knew instinctively it was from Zoey wrapping her arms around her, but even if she hadn't she'd have figured it out by the way she was tugged insistently into the embrace.

Mira exhaled shakily, turning to bury her face into Zoey's neck as if she might be able to replace the coppery tang of blood with the light, citrusy scent of her fading perfume. "I'm okay."

She wasn't fooling anyone and she knew it.

"I'm not," Zoey croaked.

It felt like permission. Mira wanted so desperately to take it, to curl up into Zoey's side and cry over what she'd just done, but something inside of her stood rigid and unfeeling, refusing to bend to her wants. A metal rod she'd shoved through her own spine moments ago when she realised how few options they had, lingering even after it'd served its purpose.

She forced the grief through the thick layer of guilt and bundled both emotions away. When Rumi woke up she'd need to be as levelheaded as possible—someone would have to be, and she doubted it'd be Zoey or Rumi. Not when Zoey was so upset already and Rumi would have to explain how the hell she had patterns.

Zoey had some explaining to do, too, and without a fire blanket to cover it her anger roared back to life.

She pulled away from Zoey and looked her in the eyes.

It was a surprise to see that she wasn't crying either—not properly, anyway, though her eyes were wet with unshed tears.

"You lied to me." Mira's attempt at tamping down her anger was only partially successful, even to her own ears.

Zoey's eyes slid away, over to Rumi's unconscious form.

"…I did."

It wasn't that she expected Zoey to deny it—she couldn't even if she'd wanted to; she'd been caught red handed—but she'd expected some kind of explanation at least, a reason for why she didn't trust Mira with the truth.

"Did you… were you just gonna keep that from me?"

Pressing her heels against the edge of the table, Zoey pulled her knees up to her chest and propped her chin on them. She was making herself smaller, the same way she always did when people were angry with her, and Mira wished it did anything to release the pressure in her chest, but it didn't. It only made it coil tighter.

Zoey didn't look away from Rumi as she spoke. "I wasn't gonna keep it secret, I just… I didn't know what to do."

She wanted to trust her, but she'd trusted Rumi, too, and that clearly hadn't been the right call.

There wasn't any way for either of them to prove it, and she found she didn't have the energy to hold onto her writhing anger. She let it slip through her fingers with a harsh sigh and rested her elbows on her knees.

"You should've told me."

Zoey rested her cheek on her knee and looked to Mira with sad, glassy eyes. "I was scared."

Mira's stomach dropped, leaving a cold vacuum in the space it had once been. "…Of me?"

"No! No, not- not exactly? I just thought… if you saw before I got a chance to explain? I didn't want you to,"—her breath hitched—"to do something you'd regret, like…"

Oh.

A wave of nausea passed over her. "I wouldn't attack Rumi."

Zoey shook her head. "No, I know, I- but would you know it was Rumi? If you walked in and just saw patterns? I only knew it was her 'cos I hadn't looked away, but you'd left the room, so…" Zoey planted her feet back on the floor and turned to face her properly, reaching out to take Mira's hands in her own—an act with the sort of gravity Mira was unable to pull herself away from. "I know you, Mira. You'd have protected us. You always protect us, so I- I didn't trust myself to tell you fast enough. I trust you. If you hurt her, you'd never forgive yourself."

Mira swallowed hard. She'd nearly drawn her weapon even with Zoey begging her not to. If she'd seen patterns years of hunter training would've kicked in, the same way it always did.

With an unpleasant jolt, Mira realised that Zoey wasn't wrong. She really might have attacked first and asked questions later, and if Rumi was in this much pain from being hit with a shin-kal, what would happen if she got stabbed with a gok-do?

Would Mira have killed her?

Zoey, ever unable to abide by silence, continued, voice shaking. "I just needed a few minutes to tell you, and then I panicked, and I- I'm so sorry, Mira. God, I just- I keep- I'm not trying… fuck."

A different kind of instinct took over. Mira wrapped an arm around Zoey's waist and pulled her into her lap, her other hand coming up to cup the back of her head and gently guide her towards her shoulder in a mirror of the position they'd been in moments before.

"Okay," Mira murmured. "Okay. I get it. I'm not- I'm not happy about it, but I get it."

A sharp inhale against her skin as Zoey's hands grasped at the back of her shirt acted as a warning of impending tears. She threaded her fingers into Zoey's hair to scratch lightly at her scalp. Her own chest felt uncomfortably tight, her heart stretched thin by the enormity of the emotions she was locking away, but it was easier to ignore now that she had something to focus on.

She pressed a kiss to the crown of Zoey's head and let her cry into the crook of her neck. She'd held it back long enough—longer than Mira had expected her to. Longer than Mira would've, if it'd been her to strike Rumi.

"I ruined everything," Zoey said, voice thick with tears and so quiet that it was nearly inaudible.

Mira exhaled softly. "You didn't. This is just… it's a fucked up situation. It's not your fault."

"But I-"

Mira had always been the sort of person who preferred action, so, with a gentle push on Zoey's shoulder, she separated them just enough to give her room to press a kiss to her lips, soft and chaste and kind—a more tangible sort of evidence that, even though she was upset, she wasn't angry at her. Not really.

She felt Zoey's shuddering exhale against her mouth, and then she was being kissed back. It wasn't like the kiss they'd first shared a week ago, where the shaking—from both of them, even if Mira was yet to admit it—was from nerves and adrenaline. This kiss was just as needy, but in a different way, and it sapped some of the tension from Mira's shoulders as well.

Maybe she'd needed it just as much.

"I'm sorry," Zoey whispered, still so close that Mira felt the movement of her lips on her own.

"I know. I'm… I forgive you, okay?" When she felt Zoey nod, she continued. "When Rumi wakes up, she can explain, and once we know what the situation actually is we can fix it."

She hoped they could fix it. If she was being honest with herself, she didn't even know where to start. The only thing that made sense was that Rumi had made a deal with Gwi-Ma, but that just didn't add up. Demons didn't have free will, but Rumi still did—she had to, or she wouldn't have been able to continue to kill the demons he sent through.

A small, cruel, suspicious part of her wondered if that was even true. Maybe Rumi had been conned into playing the long game with them, and this had all been part of Gwi-Ma's plan. To tear them apart just as things started to go really well.

An even worse part of her wondered if Rumi had wanted to kiss them at all. She'd initiated, but had Gwi-Ma made her…?

No. She wouldn't do that. She might have been lying, but she'd never play along with a plan to manipulate their feelings. She knew Rumi, and she knew she would never hurt them like that—she'd die before she let Gwi-Ma make her so cruel.

Mira had met enough monsters to know that Rumi wasn't one, no matter what.

The thought took root in her mind as she watched Rumi sleep.

She'd never seen her look so relaxed before. It would've been cute if she hadn't been so pale and clammy, if the reason hadn't been the drugs.

At some point Zoey unfolded herself from Mira's lap and wandered into the kitchen to get a glass of water for each of them, something she gratefully accepted. She hadn't even realised she was thirsty until the first drop of cool, clean water trickled down her throat, and then she was draining the entire glass in one go. She knew she should've sipped it—had reminded Zoey of as much several times when they were dancing—but her body suddenly remembered that before she'd been carrying Rumi she'd been fighting demons, and she was exhausted.

They needed to eat, too, but the idea of that only made her feel nauseous.

Instead, she and Zoey sat in silence, leaning against each other like they were the only real things in the room, and waited.

After what felt like an hour, Rumi groaned softly, brow furrowing tight as she shifted and rolled onto her side—thankfully not onto her injured shoulder.

Mira sat upright, all the tension that had slowly started to seep from her spine in Zoey's presence returning full force. "Rumi…?"

Rumi smacked her lips and grimaced, then slowly opened her eyes.

Brown, not golden.

Human, not demon.

She stared at the two of them for a moment, then propped herself up onto her elbows slowly and opened her mouth with a faint rasping sound. Zoey leaned forward and held the water up to her lips, letting her take a few sips before she tried to talk again.

"What… happened?" Rumi slurred, looking around the room warily. When Mira and Zoey only exchanged an uncertain glance, she continued, "Why'm I on the couch?"

Mira looked back to Rumi, but she could feel Zoey's stare lingering on the side of her face. Pleading.

She didn't blame her for not wanting to be the one to say it—Mira didn't really want to say it, either.

"What's the last thing you remember?"

Rumi's throat clicked as she swallowed, eyes flicking between the two of them uncertainly. "Um. Fighting demons?"

"Nothing else?" Mira prompted.

Rumi furrowed her brow tighter. "I… think I took a hit? From- from…"

Mira saw the exact moment the memory came back to her in the way her eyes widened and her shoulders tensed.

She also saw the moment Rumi decided to lie.

"From a demon, just before Zoey killed-"

"Don't you dare," Mira hissed. She knew Rumi was a deft liar, but seeing it happen in real time brought was a flint to the ashes of her anger, and she had to fight to keep the new blaze controlled. Yelling wouldn't help, and even if it made Mira feel better the relief of letting her frustration out had only ever been temporary—a balm that did more damage than it healed.

Rumi looked between the two of them, mouth opening and closing, opening and closing, opening and closing. Her eyes slid to the mess of bloody gauze still on the coffee table. Her breath hitched.

If Mira hadn't been fighting so hard to not shout at her, she would've seen the way her muscles coiled, would've gotten a warning before Rumi was launching herself over the back of the couch, stumbling briefly as her feet hit the ground, and running to the elevator.

"Fuck-!" Mira scrambled to her feet, but Zoey was faster—she always had been—and managed to get to the elevator door half a second before Rumi did, blocking it with her body.

Rumi moved for the buttons anyway, an action mirrored by Zoey, arms outstretched and palms open in a valiant attempt at a placating gesture. "We just want answers!"

It gave Mira time to circle the couch and put herself between them and the stairs just as Rumi turned to make a break for them.

Rumi was stronger than both of them, but Mira was bigger and Zoey was faster. Even in her panicked state, she had to know she wouldn't be able to get past them.

She hoped she knew that, at least—the alternative was that she tried to get past them anyway, which would no doubt result in more injuries, and Mira couldn't do that again.

Easy exits blocked, Rumi's head whipped around to try and keep them both in her line of sight as she took several steps away, backing up towards the window as her breath escaped in harsh, shallow pants.

"We're not gonna hurt you," Zoey tried again, imploringly.

The patterns had spread down to Rumi's elbow in the time it had taken for them to calm her down the first time; now they were visible even with her t-shirt on, pulsing a vibrant and nauseating pink again in a way that made the hairs on Mira's neck stand on end and her hands itch for her gok-do.

But it was Rumi.

Mira had always known hatred, had always known anger, but neither could ever truly overpower the way she loved—and she did love Rumi. She had for years, and she still did, even with the night's terrible revelations.

"Take a breath," Mira said as softly as she could manage, taking a step closer.

Rumi took a step backwards.

For a horrible, dizzying moment, Mira thought she might've been about to smash through the window and jump. Instead, she pressed her back up against it, the glow of her patterns glinting off the reflection and haloing her in pink.

"I'm sorry, I- I'm- I'm not- please… please, don't…" Rumi whined, voice catching and stumbling over each word.

The memory of Rumi struggling underneath her bullied its way to the forefront of Mira's mind, displacing the remainder of her spitting, snarling anger and shoving it back into its cage. There simply wasn't space for it when Rumi was so scared.

"Rumi." Zoey took another step closer, palms still open. "Listen to what we're saying. We just wanna talk, that's all."

Mira watched Rumi's throat bob as she swallowed again, watched her look from Zoey, to Mira, to Seoul's skyline behind her, watched the way her eyes lingered on the fall, watched the nervous way she looked back at the two of them, breath coming out rapid and shallow.

She did not want Rumi so close to the window. Not when she was being so unpredictable.

She took another step closer.

"Come here," Mira said firmly, but not unkindly—at least, she hoped it wasn't unkindly.

Rumi looked to the window again. The muscles in her arms tensed, fingers curling into a fist, as if…

Mira made a decision.

She heard Zoey's startled "Rumi-!" in the split second between her legs moving and her torso colliding with Rumi's, arms wrapping around her in a facsimile of a hug as she twisted and swapped their positions, putting herself between Rumi and the window and then pushing forwards until they were both a few steps away from it.

That was all she needed to do. Just put some space between Rumi and a free fall.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry-"

It took a moment to realise she was the one speaking, murmuring senseless apologies over and over again; for drugging her, for grabbing her while she was freaking out, for not noticing what she was hiding, for being angry when she was in so much pain.

Rumi twisted in her grip and, even contending with hospital grade pain relief, even groggy and sluggish, Mira had to adjust her grip to keep hold of her.

After an eternity of seconds, Rumi's movements slowed further, then her knees buckled. Mira grunted at the sudden change in weight, but she didn't drop her. Instead, she eased her to the ground and, when she made a strangled sound in her throat, let go.

It was, apparently, the wrong choice, because the moment she wasn't touching her anymore Rumi's hand shot out and clasped around her wrist, squeezing tightly, urgently. Mira blinked, unsure of which way she was supposed to move. A quick glance at Zoey—now at their side—was met with the same confusion.

"Rumi…?" Zoey tried.

The words came out of Rumi's mouth in a devastatingly weak rush of air. "Please don't go."

Mira didn't even have to think about her response. She sank to her knees and wrapped her arms around Rumi's torso, holding her so tightly to her chest that she could feel every tremble as it passed through them both. "We're here, okay? We're not going anywhere."

Rumi's breath hitched.

Fabric rustled, and then there was a familiar, comforting warmth next to her.

"We still love you." Zoey murmured, hesitating briefly—unsure if she was allowed to touch her, maybe—before draping herself over Rumi's back, resting her cheek against her spine as she wrapped her arms around her. "We're just confused."

With Rumi's face so close to her shoulder, Mira felt Rumi start to cry as much as she heard it.

She pressed her jaw to Rumi's head and nuzzled into her hair, encouraging her to rest her weight against her, to just let go, to-

The shock of Rumi's clenched fist against the window finally hit Mira's system.

Maybe she'd misunderstood, maybe she'd overreacted, but if she hadn't, if that twitch of muscle was what she thought it was, then Rumi had-

Words were tumbling out of Mira's mouth before she could even try to stop them.

"You've- you've got to stay too, okay? We're not going anywhere but you can't- that means you can't go anywhere, either."

After an agonising pause, Rumi nodded weakly against her shoulder. A hand on Mira's cheek startled her, but it was only Zoey, watching her from where her face lay against Rumi's back with red, glassy eyes, reaching up to gently swipe at her cheekbone with the pad of her thumb—a thumb that came away damp.

Oh.

Mira was crying, too.

She leaned into Zoey's hand and let herself weep for what she'd done, for what she'd nearly failed to do.

They stayed like that—crumpled into a heap on the floor, trembling fingers digging into clothes and skin as they grasped desperately at each other—until sky started to lighten, turning from a shade so dark it was nearly black to a dull, sallow blue.

Reluctantly, once Mira and Zoey's sobs died out and Rumi's turned into faint hiccups, Mira pulled away—only enough to cup Rumi's face in both hands and gently tilt her face upwards, but not enough to dislodge Zoey, who stubbornly held on and nuzzled her face even further into Rumi's spine.

"What happened?" Mira asked hoarsely.

Rumi's eyes slid away, looking at some unseen speck on the floor next to them. She felt her jaw tighten as she swallowed and smoothed her thumb over her cheek in an attempt to comfort.

Seconds passed, trickling through the space between them like tar.

At the lack of response, Mira did what she did best—she pushed. "If something was wrong, why didn't you come to us? Why go to him?"

Brow furrowing, Rumi looked back to her. "To… go to who?"

The coarseness of her voice—worse now than when she'd woken up—made Mira wince. She'd always taken such good care of it, and hearing it so rough felt wrong. Wrong enough that Rumi's confusion didn't even register until Zoey spoke.

"Gwi-Ma? That's… your patterns." Zoey sat up, trailing her hand around to Rumi's waist so she could lean into her view. "That's where they came from, right?"

Rumi blinked slowly, her thoughts gathering at a pace that was almost visible until her eyebrows raised.

"I… no. No, that's isn't- I didn't…" Rumi's breathing picked up again, eyes flicking between the two of them. "I wouldn't- I'd never- please-"

"Okay, okay, you didn't make a deal. We believe you," Zoey soothed, then her eyes flicked up to Mira's. "Right?"

Mira's hands slid away from Rumi's face. She wished she could say yes, but… but she wasn't sure she did believe her—what was the alternative? Celine had told them the only ways humans became demons was by giving their soul to Gwi-Ma. Either Celine was lying then to protect Rumi, or Rumi was lying now to protect herself, and she couldn't figure out which was more likely.

How was she supposed to trust anything when two of the people she'd trusted most were under suspicion like that?

"Mira," Zoey said, more urgently.

She clenched her jaw, then exhaled slowly—shakily. "I want to,"—Rumi flinched—"but… I don't understand. If not that, then…?"

"Born with them," Rumi mumbled weakly.

That was even more confusing.

"But…" Zoey frowned. "That doesn't- demons can be born?"

Rumi gave a lifeless, one-shouldered shrug, eyes fixed on the floor again. "…Don't know. I was. It's… my father was…"

Mira sat back on her haunches, shoulders lowering.

Half-demon. So Rumi wasn't lying now, and Celine hadn't lied either. Not directly. Not about that.

A small, selfish part of her was relieved, relieved that her trust hadn't been completely misplaced, that Rumi hadn't made a deal, that the reason she hadn't noticed was because it was something she didn't even know she should've been looking for.

That Rumi had wanted to kiss them.

She let that relief sink its claws into her heart and let out some of the pressure before it reached a breaking point.

"…Okay."

Rumi's eyes shot back up to Mira's, but it was Zoey who spoke. "Okay…?"

Eyes still focused on Rumi, Mira exhaled hard. "Swear to us this isn't a lie."

"I swear," Rumi said immediately. "I'm- I swear I'm not lying. I didn't make a deal. I'm not a demon, not- not fully. I promise."

"Then I believe you," Mira said softly—softly, because if she spoke too loudly she was worried she might cry again. Her emotions had become tangled and complicated, looping around each other until it was hard to tell where one ended and another began, but Rumi was being honest, and she was still injured, and that was a task she could focus on. "Can we sit back on the couch? You need to drink something."

Rumi only nodded in response, but her attempt stand on her own was met with her stumbling so hard that the only thing that stopped her from falling was Zoey's reflexes as she caught her and guided her to the couch.

In the kitchen, Mira eyed their selection of teas over. A hot drink would help with her throat, but it might unsettle her stomach. She took a bottle of water from the fridge and returned to find Rumi curled against Zoey on the couch, cheek resting on her shoulder as she stared out at Seoul's skyline.

Warmth bubbled up in her chest, but it caught in the web of everything that had happened and didn't quite make it to Mira's face. She wordlessly opened the bottle and passed it to Rumi, then took a seat next to her while she sipped at it.

Eventually, Rumi spoke again. "I'm sorry. For not telling you."

Zoey wrapped an arm around her shoulder. "It's fine- I mean, it's not fine, but it's okay. I wish you'd told us, but I think I get why you didn't—like, I'm not even sure I'd have believed you? It's kinda hard to believe now."

Mira hummed in agreement. "I'm pissed that you didn't, but… honestly? I'm just glad you're okay. You really scared us."

Rumi murmured another apology as Zoey curled her arm so she could run her fingers through Rumi's hair idly, and Mira wanted to join in, she wanted to offer her own comfort, but…

"Were you going to jump?" Mira asked abruptly. "You looked like you were gonna smash the window."

Zoey's fingers froze. Rumi's breathing froze, too.

"I… I don't know. Yes? But- but not in the way you're thinking. I just…" she trailed off, jaw working as she tried to find words. The reluctance made Mira's stomach turn cold.

"Wanted to escape?" Zoey's fingers resuming in their soothing motions—Mira knew exactly how nice it felt to have someone play with her hair, and judging by the way Rumi relaxed a fraction it was something that she was enjoying, too.

"…Yeah. The honmoon would catch me, so…"

Mira rested her elbows on her knees and looked out the window, frowning. "Any other day? Yeah, I'd agree. I'm not sure it was interested in saving you an hour ago, though."

The memory of the way Rumi's patterns had been glowing, the way the honmoon had been whining, sat unpleasantly at the base of Mira's neck.

Her patterns weren't glowing now, at least. They'd settled back to a dull purple.

"What was the honmoon doing to you?" Zoey asked. "I mean, we thought the honmoon was hurting you, but it isn't anymore, right?" After a pause, she added, "Wait, is it hurting you? Are you in pain?"

Rumi shook her head. "No, no pain. Just… tired."

That made sense. Even without the drugs, she'd been through a lot in the past hour or so—all three of them had.

"It's… um. It's just what happens when weapons made from the honmoon cut me." Rumi continued. "Our best guess is that it doesn't know if it's supposed to heal me or kill me, so it tries to do both."

So their assumption was right, at least-

Mira frowned. "Our best guess?"

It was a pointless question. She already knew the answer.

Rumi hesitated before speaking. "…Celine. It was… I did it, not her." Before Mira could even open her mouth Rumi quickly added, "Not on purpose. I just wasn't being very careful during some drills when I was younger."

When they'd first met, Rumi had been an earnest, if awkward and poorly socialised, sixteen year old. The first time this happened she must have been younger than that.

She tried not to think about it, tried not to think about a child being in that much pain, and focused on the other part of the sentence instead.

It figured that, if Rumi had been born this way, Celine must've also known the whole time, so the fact that they'd both been keeping it secret wasn't really a surprise.

The knowledge still burned Mira's throat as she swallowed it down.

If Celine knew, why would she tell them that all demons were evil? That everything with patterns had to be killed? If Rumi had always been that way, why would she echo the sentiment?

"What was the plan?" Mira found herself asking. "If they could spread, you had to know we'd see eventually."

"Turn the honmoon golden." Rumi looked down at her arms, at the patterns that had travelled to her elbow. "Then they'd be gone, and I'd… I'd be able to tell you."

The brief hesitation wasn't lost on Mira, but arguing about what Rumi would have done if all of this hadn't happened was a waste of energy—energy that none of them had enough of to begin with, and what little they did have was better used elsewhere.

Like making sure Rumi was actually okay.

"Will it heal now?" Mira asked.

Rumi nodded. "Yeah, it- yeah. It healed last time, just slower."

Mira hummed. As long as it did heal, they could make sure she didn't pop the stitches.

"Um." Zoey started. Both Mira and Rumi looked to her. "When we- when Mira was stitching you up, your eyes—eye, actually—changed colour? It went all…" Zoey gestured vaguely with her free hand. "Demon-y. Has that happened before?"

The sight of it had made Mira feel sick—not with disgust, but fear. Fear that it meant they'd run out of time.

Rumi blinked once, twice, then furrowed her brow and shook her head. "No, but… the only other time it happened it made my patterns spread a lot." She glanced down at her arm again. "Not as much as it did this time."

Her voice still sounded rough, but she had been screaming. The coughing fit she'd had after- after, probably hadn't helped, either. A moment passed, then Mira handed Rumi the bottle of water back—something she accepted gratefully.

She cleared her throat before continuing. "Celine said the patterns only stopped spreading once I calmed down, and the cut didn't start healing until after that, so…"

It sounded a little unlikely, but the entire night had been a little unlikely, so Mira accepted the new information and stored it away—just in case. Maybe her demon half reacted to her emotions and the panic made it stronger, and that's why it made the patterns spread and made the honmoon hurt her more than it healed her. The why didn't matter as much as the tangible effect of it.

If it happened again, their first step would need to be calming Rumi down—something Zoey's humming had been capable of doing.

Knowing what to do soothed her, just a little.

Zoey's voice pulled her from her thoughts. "I'm sorry." When Rumi and Mira only peered at her, she continued. "I should've been more careful, I… all of this is my fault-"

Rumi cut her off. "It's okay."

"It's not," Zoey insisted. "I hurt you. I could've killed you. Why- why would you let me do that?"

Mira sighed softly. "It was an accident, Zoey. I told you she wouldn't blame you."

She'd never be mad at them for an accident.

For what Mira had done, though…

"No, I mean…" Zoey's expression shifted, jaw tightening as she slid her arms away from Rumi so she could face her properly. "You let me think my weapons couldn't hurt you. I never would've… if I'd known, none of this would've happened."

Oh.

It hadn't even occurred to her. It wasn't a risk associated with Mira's weapon—not really. Zoey was usually out of her range, and Rumi was good at predicting what she was about to do and making sure she wasn't in the way of it, even when Mira didn't call out to give her a heads up.

She'd trained them, after all. Their best instincts and tactics came from her.

But Zoey…

Once she gained confidence with her—frankly incredible—aim she didn't become reckless, but she knew she could take risks if the reward was greater than the minor price of giving Rumi or Mira a bruise on the off-chance she missed—something she hadn't done since their early days of training, but still.

How many times had this nearly happened?

How often had Rumi shrugged off nearly being hit with something that could kill her?

Without the contact from Zoey, Rumi curled in on herself, pulling her knees up to her chest and wrapping her arms around them. "I wasn't worried," she said, eventually. "I trust you—both of you."

Trust.

Mira's eyes trailed over the patterns peeking out from Rumi's shirt. She exhaled a bitter laugh. "Well I'm glad you trust us."

She'd expected Zoey to chastise her; it was a bit of a surprise when, instead, Zoey looked down at her lap.

Rumi's fingers grazed over her shoulder, where the stitched up wound hid beneath layers of fabric and gauze. On any other day she might've bitten back—she rarely took Mira's temper lying down—but this time she simply wilted. "That's… fair. I… I know it was a risk, but it was a risk I was taking."

"Bullshit," Mira hissed, far sharper than she'd intended. "You made Zoey take that risk, too."

That made Rumi stiffen. "No, I didn't." She looked to Zoey. "I didn't."

"…You kinda did," Zoey said softly.

"I'd never put you at risk." Rumi straightened up, looking between them with wide eyes. "Either of you. I… you were safe."

It did something complex and painful to Mira's heart, for that to be the assumption Rumi made—that she was dangerous. It softened the sharp edges of her frustration and, on instinct alone, Mira reached out to rest a hand on her shoulder. "That's not what I meant. We weren't at risk of getting hurt, we were at risk of hurting you."

Rumi blinked slowly, brows pulling close in confusion.

"Look at us. Do you really think we're okay with hurting you? What if we'd-… god, we could've killed you. What do you think would've happened then?"

She watched as Rumi's mouth worked, lips forming the beginnings of letters that never fully extended into words, as if she hadn't even considered it.

Her being willing to risk jumping from the penthouse window suddenly made a horrifying sort of sense—the kind that was so thick and oily that it'd cling to Mira for the rest of her life.

When Rumi did manage to find words, they came out so weak and fragile that Mira found herself holding her breath just to make sure she didn't miss anything.

"You'd have realised I was a demon and- and you'd hate me." Her breath hitched. "You hate me."

Zoey responded before Mira could fully process the chasm between the truth and Rumi's thoughts—she was still stranded somewhere above the hollow free fall, teetering between crying and shouting.

"Hate you? We don't… is that what you think this is?" Zoey took Rumi's face between her palms. "Rumi, we love you."

Rumi's breath hitched again. "Why?"

Mira's body decided which way it was going to fall, even while her mind was still reeling. She blinked away the sting in the backs of her eyes as she pushed herself off the couch and dropped to her knees in front of both of them. Zoey's hands slid from Rumi's face enough to let her look.

"We love you," Mira echoed, voice cracking. "We love you so much. I'm so fucking mad at you for lying, but not enough to stop loving you. Never enough to stop loving you."

Rumi's hand shot up to cover her mouth as she choked on a sob.

"I'm- I know I should've told you, but I couldn't- I was- I thought- I'm sorry."

Zoey leaned against Rumi's side, her hand trailing down between them to interlock their fingers. "We'll work through it, okay?"

With an unsteady nod, Rumi relaxed a fraction into Zoey's touch.

Mira wanted to join in, to hug Rumi like she had when she'd pulled her away from the window, but now that the situation wasn't so immediately dire she found herself unable to—not until she made sure Rumi remembered, not until she made sure she knew who she was letting touch her.

"I'm sorry, too," Mira said weakly. "For- for drugging you." Zoey looked to her, eyes widening. "It was my idea. Zoey was against it."

It wouldn't be fair to let Zoey take any blame for Mira's choice.

Zoey frowned—apparently, she disagreed. "Neither of us wanted to do it, we just… we had to."

"Oh." The column of Rumi's throat bobbed as she swallowed and tensed as she sniffed, but eventually she continued. "Why?"

"You were in too much pain," Mira said tightly. "I couldn't stitch you up with how much you were moving."

"Mira tried to get you to take it on your own but you- she couldn't, and we- we didn't know what was happening," Zoey added immediately, unsatisfied with Mira's summation of events. "We couldn't keep waiting and hoping you'd calm down."

Rumi nodded slowly. "Okay. That's… that's good."

"Good?" Mira asked, incredulous. "Rumi, I held you down while I drugged you, how is that good?"

"Because," Rumi said slowly, as if the answer was obvious. "You didn't have to do it to stop me from hurting you."

That's what she was worried about? Hurting them? After everything they'd done, her only concern was that she'd hurt them in the process?

Zoey sat upright. "You were just trying to get away from us, not hurt us."

It really shouldn't have been a shock that Rumi was still putting their safety first. She'd always been that way—it was one of the many things Mira loved about her, even when it frustrated her to no end.

Still…

"How are you not angry about this?"

Rumi ducked her head down, eyes dropping to the floor. "…You wouldn't do it if you didn't have to. I meant it when I said I trust you." She paused. "I don't really remember much of it, anyway. Just… pain. And being scared. I thought…"

She'd already told them what she thought, and they'd already told her it wasn't true, but if she didn't blame them, if she still wanted their touch, they had a new option to make her believe it.

Where Rumi faltered, Mira stepped up.

She pressed a hand to Rumi's jaw gently and waited, waited for any sign she didn't want to be touched, any sign she wanted Mira to back off, but she was instead met with Rumi's eyes lifting to find hers and softening, despite everything.

For a moment it felt exactly like they were in that hotel room from a week ago, when Zoey took a step none of them had been brave enough to take before and Rumi met her boldness with her own brand of it. When she'd seen Mira accept that she'd be their keeper, a role she could live with but not the role she wanted, and chose to pull her close before she could retreat.

Mira swallowed, then leaned in and kissed Rumi with lips tasting like salt.

After a second of hesitation, Rumi kissed back.

It was a wet and sloppy kiss, all things considered—not her finest work—but it was what they both needed. The reassurance, the warmth, the contact.

When Mira pulled away Rumi followed, but only to press their foreheads together.

"I'm sorry," Rumi whispered again.

Mira's answer was so immediate it surprised even her, but it was the truth. "I forgive you."

It would take a while for the trust to regrow, but it wasn't starting from scratch—the roots were still there, buried somewhere deep in her heart. She did forgive her; even if she disagreed with her choices, she could sort of understand Rumi's reasoning. That was good enough when she had Rumi and Zoey in front of her, alive and well, because nothing was more important to her than them.

A relieved exhale ghosted across Mira's lips, then cool air rushed into the space between them. She let her hand fall to the side and opened her eyes to understand why Rumi had moved away.

Her heart softened.

Zoey's hand had found the same spot Mira's had, fingers flexing slightly against the side of Rumi's neck as their lips met.

Mira sat back on her haunches and watched with an unrelenting sort of fondness as, when the kiss broke, Rumi pressed her forehead to Zoey's as well.

"I forgive you too, okay?" Zoey said softly. "But you have to be honest with us. No more lying."

"No more lying," Rumi echoed. She pulled away further to look at Mira, then back to Zoey. "I love you. Both of you."

In a flurry of movement driven by a sudden inability to stomach even those scant few inches between them, Mira pushed herself up to pull them both into a hug, fingers digging into their shirts and head pressed to their shoulders as she breathed them in.

Later, they'd have to talk about the next steps. They'd need to figure out what the golden honmoon would do to Rumi—Mira had her doubts about the claim that it would make her patterns go away—and decide how much they'd tell Celine. They'd need to monitor the injury to make sure it was healing okay. There would be a web of lies to untangle, too—an entire lifetime of them, if they wanted to really understand why Rumi had hidden for so long.

But for now Rumi was safe. She didn't hate them, didn't blame them—instead, she loved them.

All those other problems could be fixed, because she loved them, because they loved her.

In that moment, as the first beams of sunlight crept over the horizon and the penthouse filled with light and warmth, nothing else mattered.