Chapter Text
The stomping of the crowd above them caused tiny rock pebbles to fall around them. The rattle of the chains holding the prisoners’ hands and feet together couldn’t be heard over the noise above and before them through the small openings in the thick, metal bars. Out in front of them was the fighting arena, ground brown dirt, walls tall and thick up until a chain dome. Jonghyun scrunched his nose at the looming, dirty figures around him. He knew the people around him were the exact type his Father worked to eradicate, and he wondered what they would do if they knew who he really was. His thoughts, however, were mostly on his men that fought and died to protect him when they were attacked at the border. He should never have risked their lives following a group of bandits like that. He was taken from his thoughts when he could hear the grunts of the people around him, the clank of their metal cuffs, and the heavy breathing he had felt on his neck since he was pushed into this God forsaken holding cell. He pushed up on his toes to look over the shoulder of the man in front of him and he slowly figured why silence had fallen. The crowd had stopped cheering when the King just across from them stood up, announcing the reigning Champion. The metal gate to the left opened with a loud clang, but Jonghyun couldn’t see him from behind the few giant men in front of him. The crowd roared, so loud it almost masked the sound of the challenger’s gate. The sound only calmed down when the King yelled, “And Begin!”
He knew sooner or later he would be pushed into that arena to fight for his life and from what he heard from the group cell he was thrown into when he was first brought into the compound, he would be fighting the standing Champion. Apparently, one who’s stood undefeated for more than three months. He tried to look past the men in front of him to see the Champion, but all he saw was the person’s back. Jonghyun sighed and settled for just listening.
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The challenger kept circling, keeping her distance as her weapon was held with a tight fight. With a sigh, the Champion stuck one of his swords into the ground and leaned heavily on it. “Are we going to fight? I have a loaf of bread waiting for me when I kick your ass.” His voice was barely heard over the roar of the crowd.
Her jaw clenched with her gritted teeth and weapon being raised to point at him. A small smirk lifted on the corner of the Champion’s mouth when she charged him with a yell. He watched her feet as he waited to pull his second sword free from the dirt. She was unsteady, all the fear and rage changing her technique he could see she had with the way she was holding her long sword. He could cut her down fairly quickly and easily, but he was thrown into this for the entertainment of the King’s people, and he would give them all a show. He stayed leaning on his sword until she had her sword moving toward him, but before the blade could land on him he had his blades up blocking the blow. Her balance was off without a good foundation under her and with a shove, she stumbled away. “Is that all you got? I thought you were an Assassin… I feel cheated.”
She growled as she squared up again, “You’ll die this day Pirate.”
“Mm,” Jinki twisted his blades to stretch his wrists for a moment as he glanced at her with a smirk on his face. “That’s Captain to you.”
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That voice... He knew it. It was like a ghost from the past, going straight through him and taking his breath away. Before he could stop his feet from moving he was wiggling and moving around the men in front of him to have a clear look at the arena. He had to wait for the Champion to turn, but the moment he saw that smile his suspicion was proved to be correct. There stood Jinki. His hair was longer, but it was the same dark red tinted color he had as a child. His skin was darker, kissed by the sun, and there was a scar down his left cheek.
Jonghyun couldn’t breathe. Jinki was supposed to be dead. Thirteen years since he accepted Jinki was gone and would never be coming back, and there he was. Moving swift and agile as he cut his opponent down. Her blade never even was close to blocking his attack as it fell to the ground. Jinki pulled his blades from her chest, and Jonghyun watched curiously as the man kneeled down and closed her eyes. He mumbled something with his own eyes closed before he rose and walked back toward his entry point. He threw his swords into the dirt little ways from him and waited. His eyes never left the woman’s body until she was dragged away.
Jinki was alive and Jonghyun would probably have to fight him for his freedom.
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The holding cell he was put into was smaller than the other, but he wasn’t alone. He shared the space with 3 other captives. They were big, gross looking men and one woman who seemed to sit next to him. He knew what would happen to women put into cells with these types of men. He could peer through the small window of bars in the middle of the thick wooden door if he stretched his neck far enough, but there was much out there but stone and other cells. There were individual cells to the left from what he saw on the trip back from watching the fight. He wondered what cell Jinki was in. His thoughts barely left the man after the realization that he was alive hit him so harshly as he witnessed him cut his opponent down so swiftly.
If the words of the woman were to be taken as the truth Jinki was a pirate, a captain at that. Is that where he had gone when he disappeared all those years ago? Is that where he had been for the three years Jonghyun searched for him before giving up? How could he give up the life they planned together for one of pillaging and murder on the sea? His head hit the stone behind him as his eyes fluttered close and his thoughts drifted to how Jinki glowed against the green of the grass in the hills behind the castle they used to ride down, how rich his hair was swirling in the waters of the sea as they swam where the castle curved around the shore, and the way he made hands rough with years of work feel so smooth and soft against Jonghyun’s skin.
He was almost losing himself in his thoughts when the woman shifted roughly against him brought him from them. His eyes snapped open to find the bigger of the two men had approached the woman and was trying to touch her where she did not want him to. Jonghyun could tell she wasn’t a fighter like the woman who died in the ring with Jinki just before, just an unfortunate soul who got sold or captured into this horrible mess. Her eyes were big and pleading as she turned toward him. She wanted his help and Jonghyun wasn’t about to witness a cruel act if he didn’t need to.
He grabbed the man’s wrist and with his other hand slammed the side of it firmly against the inside of the man’s elbow. “She does not want this.”
The other man across the room growled, “Don’t get involved in something you cannot handle Little man.”
Jonghyun sighed, “You just had to mention my size.”
By the time the guards got the door unlocked and open the two big men were unconscious on the floor and the woman was helping to stop the blood dripping from the cut on Jonghyun’s cheek with a piece of cloth ripped from her tunic. He spit onto the dirt dusted stone floor as he glared up at the guards, “Maybe next time separate the men from the women.”
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Jinki sat on the floor just by his cot, softly rubbing his wrists and hands as he stared where the floor and the cobblestone wall met just across from him. The woman’s face was still so fresh and present in his mind. Her bright green eyes, the scar on her left eyebrow, the heat in her gaze and the confidence of her step, flashing through his vision in tiny little images. She would fade, just like the rest, but not for some time. Not until the next week when another captive was thrown into the ring with him and he would again have to kill them for his own life.
With his eyes closed, he pressed his palms against his temples and deeply breathed to try and calm down. Life on the sea wasn’t exactly moral, but unnecessary killing was something that seeped deep into his bones and shook him to the core. What made his life any better than those he was taking? What made his life worth enough to keep adding people to the list of opponents he had to cut down to still be here? He growled, anger bubbling up in him, as his hands curled tightly into fists. He had met cruel people, a few were apart of his crew, but none viewed death and killing with such amusement and entertainment as the King and his people watching these fights every week. His assassin enjoyed death, but it was more the rush of excitement, the exercise of his muscles going in for the kill, and always the target was given a proper death. Jinki knew his opponents were lucky to have dirt thrown back over them once they were tossed into the ditch dug for them.
Soon the season would come to an end and someone would be given their freedom. Jinki was determined to be that someone and no one was going to come through that metal gate that would change that.
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The next two fights were over before they even begun. Jinki was tired of putting on a show for longer than he needed to. Each time his opponent was cut down Jonghyun could see the flame inside his eyes dim just a little more. After the second was killed and crumbled onto the ground Jonghyun felt thick hands grip his shoulders and tug him through the men. Standing before him was the King’s Guard Captain, the man who controlled the fights. He sneered, “The next fight is the last. The winner will receive their freedom, and what better final opponent than a Prince.”
Panic filled Jonghyun’s chest as he was tugged through the underground of the stadium toward the opponent’s entry gate. He swallowed thickly as the body of the most recent challenger was dragged from the arena. He heard the announcement over the roar of the crowd barely. Jinki’s back was toward him, shoulders squared and head held high as he listened for the crowds’ reaction to whoever was standing in the opposite gate. The gasp confused him and when he slowly turned what he saw was not what he expected.
“And for the final fight, to whom the winner will be granted their freedom, the Champion’s challenger is a neighboring Prince, Jonghyun Kim of Yohal.”
Jonghyun first saw fear in Jinki in the almost month he had watched him fight when their eyes locked across the arena.
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