SHINee Fic Mix 2011 - capebuffalo

[replaymods]

Title: Nursery rhyme of another summer
Author: capebuffalo
Pairing: Minho/Onew, Jonghyun/Key, Seohyun/Taemin
Rating: R
Author's Notes: Playlist used while writing. Thanks for the challenge, and hope you enjoy!

Original Work: To Be Free by kat-elric and argh


They decide to serve chicken.

Key didn't have an opinion about this, but if he did, he'd think that the wedding of the century deserved better fare. Cut and quartered, smearing butter underneath the skin, stuffing the cavity with onions, herbs, garlic -- all those fucking birds. It was the epitome of rustic.

Then again, Jinki had always been like that.

Lee Jinki. Key's eyes narrow at the thought of his friend, Lee Jinki of the mysterious everything. Presently in place as the bridge between two houses, both aligned in the fashionable trend of expanding empires; some kingdoms chose to fight, but the Lee family and House Seo believed in unions. After all, that was the point of having children.

"But you'll be serving something else tonight?" he persists, while Jinki does Seohyun's hair. A talent, even if it was an unusual one, and a rather useful icebreaker early discovered when Jinki had suddenly shown up at their doorstep, all those years before.

"I'm not going to take your advice," Seohyun replies serenely. Her eyes rise from her lap, meets his in the mirror, both their lips lifting simultaneously into matching smiles. "If it was up to you, it'd be drinks and nothing else."

"Chicken isn't party food," Key insists. He stands up, walks over to join them at the vanity. Seohyun reaches out, careful not to move her head, and straightens a button on his jacket.

"We'll put blackberries at the bottom of the champagne glasses," she tells him. "Something sweet for the bitter aftertaste."

"Aren't you lucky," Key says, addressing Jinki directly. He's not kidding. Jinki, however, is concentrating on pining tiny silken flowers to the gathered ends of Seohyun's hair, and doesn't bother to reply. Key's smile slowly morphs into a pout during the extended silence, and Seohyun laughs.

"Stop bothering us and go get ready."

"Well, what about Jinki?" Key asks, and finally succeeds in getting his attention. Jinki stares at him blankly, one of Seohyun's curls twisted around his finger.

"What about me?"

"Who will do your hair," he says, a hand darting out quickly to lift a stray piece of hair off his forehead. Jinki's eyes widen in alarm, backing up at the sudden intimacy. Seohyun rolls her eyes, boys, and Key gets to confirm once again, as he's had the opportunity to do so on occasion for the past five years -- a perverse sense of provocation, perhaps, but it seemed to underscore the strangeness of everything they knew about their most recent companion, which was practically nothing -- Jinki gets nervous to the point of anxiety if it's a man who touches him.

Mysterious indeed.

"It's going to be quite a night," he predicts, turning to leave. "Better look your best."

Choi Minho was driving him crazy.

They had called it a miracle, like Desdichado returning after more than a decade left for dead, but no one seemed to know what had happened, and every rumor was too vague to follow through, at least as far as he knew.

But when knowing everything is your profession, people like Choi Minho tend to be bad for business.

It'd have been better if they were friends, being similar in age, but Minho didn't seem to have time for friends. The disinherited son had turned into a soldier, on a quest for some self-identified holy grail: a person, a man, so important to him that he was abroad for most of the time. Jonghyun's men had bumped into the young lord himself on too many occasions to count, dropping inquiries and coins for information in the lower class living quarters of kingdoms near and far away.

"You look stressed," Jinki had told him the last time were in the ruins, a hangout from their younger days. They had first discovered it after getting lost, Jonghyun storming off into the woods without a proper sense of direction after an argument with Key, Jinki trailing behind trying to calm him down. Only with his help had they been able to find their way back home -- Jinki had shown surprising skill in being able to backtrack trodden-upon shrubs and bent branches of foliage -- but on their way, Jonghyun had spotted the abandoned cluster of crumbling stone. "A new client to deal with?"

"Not exactly." The ruins were his, like a treasure chest hidden beneath a secret floorboard, world maps and encyclopedias, paper musings of art and inventions and other items that people their age used to curb their boredom. It was mostly Jonghyun's things; Jinki had never got into the habit of accumulating too much. "It's Desdichado."

"Ah." Jinki smiled, tucking his hair behind his ear. "The disinherited one?"

"Reinstituted as soon as he proved that he was still very much alive. Though the last time I tried talking to him, he was as cold as a corpse." Jonghyun frowned, reached out to adjust a scroll stacked precariously on top of a pile of books. "He's looking for someone."

"Who is it?"

"I don't know -- he won't tell me much beyond his name."

"I thought you could find out anything."

"You're mistaking me for Key." Jonghyun let the bitterness naturally seep into his voice, even if sometimes it seemed as if their rivalry was the biggest denial of the century. "My specialty is to already know what Key doesn't. And his talent is apparently being good at keeping me out."

"It must be difficult," Jinki said, after a pause. His eyes were unfocused, recalling some distant memory. "Trying to find something that you lost."

Jonghyun shrugged. "Quite often it's simply the looking that counts. We weren't your final destination when you stumbled upon us on accident, right? Which, by the way, congratulations."

"Please," Jinki said in a strange voice, "don't." Jonghyun knew that look -- it spooked them all, quite honestly, when Jinki got lost in reverie -- and didn't push it.

It took him a minute, but eventually Jinki recovered enough to ask politely, "Are you coming to the party tonight?"

"Yeah." He tilted his head back, shards of light cutting into his vision through the leaves. "Perhaps I'll ask him to come."

This made Jinki sit up straighter, and Jonghyun hid a smile at the conditioning they all had in common with playing the perfect host. "Absolutely, let me send an invitation. Who is he?"

"I believe they're already planning to attend; his father is a good friend of your father's. The Chois -- they have a large estate on the south side of the city." Jonghyun furrows his brow, trying to remember. "Their coat of arms is the cross-quartered circle, a symbol of the sun."

"So many sons, and suns," Jinki commented enigmatically, then frowned. "Oh, the Chois. I've been to their estate before; I didn't know he -- Desdichado, you call him? -- was the one you were talking about. He was always gone, I assumed it was for business but I didn't know he was actually looking for a person." He turned a perplexed look onto Jonghyun, who began to laugh.

"Now you're curious too."

"Bring him, if you can." Jinki said earnestly. "I'd like to try and help."

It was easiest to call it business, and even then, it wasn't entirely a lie. The amount of traveling he did and the people he met made up for the fact that he had still achieved nothing with his search, no familiar name or face or sighting. It could almost be considered a miracle, how big the world seemed to grow within a span of five years ever since his escape, from the time he was kept on what he later learned was a tiny patch of land, fear and his own bad judgment as the fence and ropes, to these tedious hours of being weighed against your own words, productivity relying on something other than hauling in crops or firewood, or how much you sweat underneath the sun.

At least in this world, one equation for success held steady: the more people you knew, the more money you made.

So he thought carefully before he spoke, and shook hands and exchanged smiles and gained trust from all the right people. He made his mother worry, but at least he didn't have to worry about her, and felt a little less guilty every time his parents looked across the dining room table to see his bags packed, his coat on his shoulders. It was harder to explain how he continuously weighed that decision he had made in his mind, and while he couldn't quite regret convincing Onew to leave, it was the most ironic twist of fate that he had lost him in the end, anyway.

Still, he had to keep looking, even if it was out of pure desperation.

Impolite as it was to stare, this was fascinating. The tension holding Minho rigid, the hard set of his jaw, like a man bracing himself against a great shock. Which was exactly what had just happened, if Jonghyun was reading things correctly. He can see the way Jinki is trying not to glance back, he can see Seohyun pressing discreetly on his arm, keeping him in place.

He can see how the strength of Minho's gaze on his back draws him nonetheless.

Both are far too content to remain like this, struggling internally despite something that has clearly been activated, a change in the very air between them. If Jonghyun had been confronted with the face of an obsession that took the better part of five years to find, he'd have dragged him off to wrap things up no matter what, engagement garden party or a long line of congratulations from the entire nobility at their very doorstep be damned.

Honestly, it was almost hysterical.

"I feel like laughing," a voice murmurs close to his ear, and Jonghyun's smile freezes on his face. It's taken some practice, but he's finally at that point where he doesn't have to turn around and look.

"Because I was wrong?" he asks instead, unruffled. "Desdichado has turned into Aethelstane."

"Except he seems less enthusiastic about the wedding." They both watch as Minho jerks forward as if startled into movement, quickly cutting behind a group of well-wishers and disappearing back into the house. It takes a few seconds before Jinki notices, and even his reaction to that -- an almost invisible reel of uncertainty, something akin to panic -- is just as interesting as if Minho had still been there.

Jonghyun exhales, unaware he had been holding his breath. "Have you spoken with Seohyun yet?"

Key shrugs. "The whole world wants to speak with Seohyun. I'll wait until after the party. Just because some people are prone to forget decorum at the sight of a long lost -- what is he to him again?" It was a loaded question, coy and full of meaning, a question poised to Jonghyun before, but concerning another pair in question.

The day he had found the ruins, as it turns out, had been a day full of discoveries.

But even though it's been years, he still doesn't have a good answer. Jonghyun chooses to ignore the double entendre, answer the question directly. "A friend, is what I heard."

"Friends?" Key echoes, not bothering to hide the disappointment in his voice. "That doesn't bode too well. Nothing changes faster than friendship."

By the time Jonghyun can think of something to say, Key is no longer there. And unlike Jinki, he hadn't sensed a thing.

He tries to pretend it doesn't bother him, but it doesn't work too well.

As much as he hated to admit it, the person who taught him the most about anticipation was Jonghyun. Jonghyun, who was supposed to know everything but, Key thinks unapologetically, kept it well-hidden. A steady gaze and a smile weren't just tools to disarm, he had shown him, but a way to extract information.

Key has gotten very good at this.

His mistake was thinking that Jonghyun could be tricked. And that was where he learned about anticipation, about defensive barriers that he didn't even know were in place. The day that he had tried to find out how Jonghyun felt, maybe Jonghyun was right. Maybe he should have just asked.

Then Jonghyun had disappeared somewhere with Jinki, and Key had tried not to be jealous, had failed spectacularly.

It's not Jinki's fault by any means, but sometimes it's hard to resist not holding it against him just a little bit, especially in circumstances such as these.

"He is," Jinki was saying carefully, "like a brother to me."

He's nervous, Key notes. His hands were the tell; there was a bowl of candy on the table, beautifully wrapped Swiss chocolates encased with thick paper and gold foil. Jinki had taken a piece but seemed more interested in the wrapper than the candy itself, if only because it kept his hands busy. And that was five minutes ago.

"Brothers don't look at each other the way you look at him," Key replies shortly. He sets the teacup on the saucer with a soft clink. The rustling has stopped, the wrapper torn into pieces in his lap; Jinki's restless fingers finally run out of things to mangle, to twist.

"How do I look at him," he asks, staring across the patio, and Key makes a noise the equivalent of an eyeroll in the back of his throat.

"Like he's your last hope for breakfast." You know this, he doesn't say. You know the way emotions can spill out, all the words you refuse to say aloud still present as words written in the air, heavy with weight. Key sits up suddenly, startled by a thought. What if it was the same with him? What did his face look like, every time he thought of Jonghyun?

Pathetic, he thinks uneasily, and reaches for another piece of candy.

The library was his favorite room at the Choi estate, Limnoreia. Limnoriidae, the scientific term, is a crustacean that burrowed into old wood, turning it from something sturdy into something diseased, degraded. He had looked it up in one of their books.

He still marvels at his ability to read. His arrival had meant that the Lees had gained a son, but it wasn't long before he learned that the Chois had lost one, long ago. Since his father was close friends with the head of the household, Jinki had spent a few afternoons here and there, elbow deep in lined paper, fountain pens and bottles of ink, open volumes resting on top of each other, pages bent and folded with his thumbprint marking the corners. Reading and writing had taken a lot of time and effort, but he made sure it was the first thing he learned.

He had missed the stories, you could say.

It sends a chill up his spine, as he runs a finger idly along a row of agricultural manuals -- it was always a good idea to learn new techniques, and his mind files the titles away for later -- that their son had been breathing the same air, walking the same halls all this time.

Paper, he reflects, has always been precious, a luxury. He picks a novel at random, flipping through the pages, bound together with thread and leather. The tools he had used for his own education during his childhood were considerably different, earth and water and raw materials, and ceaseless time stretched out before him with no constraints but also no ambition. It was the work that had--

"What are you doing."

Jinki almost drops the book, fumbles to catch it and ends up clasping it against his chest in a last minute save. Anyone else would have laughed, but Minho remains silent -- almost as if he's steeled himself against giving anything away, from face to limbs to the words that he says. Despite that, Jinki immediately feels something set off by the sound of that voice, like a stone rolling off the edge of a cliff, or a pendulum swinging. He can hear the blood rushing to his ears. The very air seems to hum.

When he turns around, Minho is no less of a vision than he was two nights ago, and part of Jinki is frightened at the strength of his own reaction, at accepting and in turn yearning for this man standing before him, looking as though he belongs within this backdrop of vaulted ceilings and vertical walls of books, the sun streaming through stained glass, its light softened by the polished floors. He looks as though he's belonged here his whole life.

Which wasn't exactly untrue.

"I came here to look for you," Jinki says, slipping the book back into its place on the shelf. "But they told me you were away."

Minho doesn't looks at him when he speaks, and his words are formal, abrupt and unfriendly. "My business was complete, so I came home early." Then his voice takes on a different tone, deliberately indifferent. "And yours will be soon too, I should think."

He freezes; it takes all of his training not to react defensively. "I'm not sure what you mean--" he begins, but breaks off when Minho finally meets his gaze, and everything, everything the other man is not saying overwhelms Jinki, who stands rooted to the spot, unable to look away.

"What I mean," Minho intones slowly, "is congratulations. Love and duty," he adds. "Those are fine things to live for."

"That's right," Jinki says, and bites down hard on his bottom lip. "That's right," he repeats, "because I had lived."

"So did I," says Minho, and there it was, the anger simmering beneath the surface, and Jinki found himself in the unique position of not wanting to blame him, but blame him he did -- if they hadn't tried to escape, if they had just stayed -- but no. And now, there they were; like he said, still driven by love and duty. But now there were different loyalties.

He opens his mouth to speak, but a loud sound echoes throughout the building -- a servant dropping something, perhaps, or the natural settling of the house's foundation. Either way, it reminds them both of the presence of other people. How a life of luxury also had a price, whereas before, when they didn't own their own lives at all, at least when it came to what they meant to each other, they had always been free.

Minho bows slightly before walking away without another word, a mocking gesture that Jinki knew held no sincerity. For the second time, he has to watch him leave; unsurprisingly, it doesn't hurt any less.

"Something happened," Jonghyun states confidently.

"Something is happening," Key corrects.

Jonghyun scowls. "I wasn't aware it had anything to do with you."

Key doesn't even blink. "Have you found out yet, the reason why they know each other?"

"I know why they know each other," Jonghyun says, but before the other man can comment, he quickly admits, "but I don't know how they met."

"What?" Key stares at him accusingly, as if he was being stupid on purpose. "How is that not the same thing?" Jonghyun's scowl deepens.

"I told you, he said that they were friends--"

"Before you two start bickering like our mothers," a third voice begins, and Seohyun sweeps into the room, walking over quickly to join them, "I'll just tell you: he was a slave. They both were; when Minho was captured as a child, he was sold to the same property where Jinki had been born. They grew up together, and they -- they've known each other for years."

They remain silent as they take a moment to digest her words. But Key's the first to notice that Seohyun is breathing heavily, as though she's trying to calm herself down; he pulls out a chair, takes her gently by the elbow and leads her to it. She sits down, clasping her hands, fingers curling around themselves tightly, a habit most likely picked up from her fiance.

"I don't know what to do," she says finally. "There's more there than what they're willing to tell me, I can feel it. I think Jinki believed that he was dead this whole time -- it makes sense, with what I heard from the Chois -- otherwise he'd have never chosen this for himself."

"This," Key repeats, with a strange edge to his voice. "You mean, you."

Seohyun looks up at him, says unflinchingly, "Yes."

It was only a subtle difference, but Jonghyun could tell that Key was angry at her choice of words. "It shouldn't be like this, Seohyun. The choice is as much yours as it is his."

"You don't understand," she says, then surprises them both by laughing. "The way he looks at him! Jinki would follow Minho anywhere. An accident must have occurred that brought him here to us." She sighs then, her smile disappearing. "But we had discussed this union, not just with each other but with our families. This marriage was supposed to facilitate closer cooperation between the two kingdoms. Half of our merchants already trade alongside theirs, so it only makes sense to use that to our advantage, for future political stability and economic progress."

"How many times have you recited that to your dinner guests?" Key asks, and Seohyun gives him a small smile, doesn't say anything further.

Jonghyun, who had been listening silently, suddenly speaks up. "Do you love him?"

When she turns to look at him, it's the angriest that he's ever seen her, entirely contained within her eyes. "How can you even ask that," she says softly. "Do you?"

"I do," Key says.

Jonghyun sighs, deflating. "I do. Of course I do."

"So does Minho," Seohyun says. "The difference is that Jinki loves him back."

They go on with the rehearsal dinner as planned, but Jinki is distracted, even moreso when Minho walks through the doors with his mother on his arm, the perfect representation of wealth and long titles with his tall, lean body and handsome features.

"Why was he invited?" Jinki all but hisses, and Seohyun stiffens minutely, struggles to bite back what would be too soon an accusation because technically, nothing has happened. Yet.

"His family is an important ally," she tells him instead, "and his father and yours became close friends while growing up." Not so different from you and him, she thinks. "So their presence can hardly be avoided, as much as you seem to dislike him."

"I don't--" Jinki catches himself, a smile slipping back onto his face as he greets the next set of guests, nodding his head in their direction. "I didn't say that I dislike him."

"No, you didn't," she concedes, and leads him to the table, where they begin immediately.

Later, when the guests are wandering between the main hall and the veranda, Seohyun slips upstairs -- though not before laughing at Key making a face at the remaining chicken on his plate -- in order to write a letter.

Jinki had disappeared as soon as dinner was over, and though she had seen the Chois mingling with other friends of the family, the absence of their son was the first thing she had noticed.

Taemin, she begins after picking up her pen. When are you coming home?

The library at the home of the Lees was a little smaller than theirs, but the volumes were well-worn, collected and organized with care -- a more inviting space to begin with, less academic. The= Lees had always considered family as an integral part of their interior design, whereas the Chois had, for the past fifteen years, had done all they could to distract themselves from their loss.

Once more they were alone and surrounded by books; they were arguing, and it was unpleasant, as it had always been. Only this time it's Onew who's angry -- and that, that was a first.

"You died, don't you understand? You died, and I knew I had to live, that was it!"

"I remember," he replies, forcing out the words, painful as they were. "I remember, and when I could breathe on my own again, the first thought I had was of you."

Onew's shaking his head, his bangs falling into his eyes; Minho has to clench his teeth in order to resist the urge to brush them away from his face. "Are you seriously accusing me of anything less? You have no idea, you haven't been here--"

"Because I've spent every waking hour looking for you!"

"And I had to relearn everything! They never understood--" Unconsciously, Onew's hand drifts down to his chest, tugging at the chord around his neck to reveal a peculiar shape carved out of stone, like a shell, like the origin of a fractal, neverending. "They gave me books and paper and pens, and all the time I needed. But it took years to undo all that you and I--" Onew's voice wavers, but Minho, eyes fixed on the stone being turned over and over between his fingers, barely notices. "It took years," he continues. "Everything I knew, from our last days as children. I had to talk in order to be heard, instead of keeping quiet. I had to make messes, not clean them. I had to learn of the impetus behind behavior, the double edge to etiquette. There was art, and science, and language -- intonation. They gave me everything." Onew's knuckles turn white around the necklace. "I didn't want any of it."

"That was the hardest thing to accept. That no matter how beautiful the words were in a poem, how accurately they described my emotions -- learning how to breathe life into color with a brushstroke, or traverse the logic behind what makes something strong, resilient -- all these pieces of you still wouldn't bring you back to me."

"Meanwhile, you went beyond my expectations and lived. And yet, even with the world at your disposal -- however would you like to put it, as far as the sun can reach? You still didn't find me. Which is why I'm a little puzzled," Onew gives him a smile then, quick to appear and well-practiced, an expression not quite reaching his eyes, resentment building up behind his words, "how you think you should be so angry at me."

It was a creature transformed, this man standing before him. In a way, Minho felt proud; Onew had everything he had ever deserved, and it was satisfying to know that all that cleverness and kindness shown by him in their younger days had helped shape him into a benevolent ruler who could overtake any blood-born royal.

But it was still so hard to accept that he wasn't his best fit, the one to enable him to his fullest potential. It was hard to accept that it had been him who had made a promise, before he had broken it.

"I'm not angry," he says, and Onew's eyes widen at his change in tone. "I'm happy for you," he tells him, as gently as he can. It's not nearly enough, not with the way Onew's eyes instantly turn a little too bright, how light reflects even more when there's moisture; the way his mouth drops open, yet he's at a loss for words.

But it's all he can do not to drop to his knees and beg and plead and single-handedly destroy every shred of upstanding conduct that he's built as a reputation for himself within the past five years; then there was also Onew to think of, and Seohyun and their guests. So he does what he's become increasingly good at recently, and walks away once more.

The moment she sees the opportunity, she takes it.

The necklace is dangling from her hand when she bumps into Jonghyun and Key on her way out; for all their supposed rivalry, they seem to be spending a lot of time together lately.

Idiots.

"He loves him," she says firmly, before they can say anything. "He loves him, and someone needs to do something, because Minho seems to have given up and Jinki just isn't as reliable as he thinks he is."

Key opens his mouth, but all he can offer is a weak protest. "He told me they were only like brothers--"

"Perhaps they were, but then they became lovers." And speaking of lovers; Seohyun takes a deep breath. "Also, Taemin is coming home."

"He's what?" they both exclaim simultaneously, and Seohyun allows herself a small moment of triumph.

"He's coming home, and we're getting married. I can't marry Jinki, any more than I could marry you--" She looks pointedly at Key, then holds up the necklace. "Do you know what this is?"

Jonghyun leans closer, peering at the strange pattern before identifying it correctly. "It's the crest for the Choi family heir. Wait--" he looks at her, eyes widening in alarm. "Where did you get this?"

"It's Jinki's," she says simply. "He's been wearing it ever since we first met. I'm returning it to the original owner, and if he still feels the same -- well," she shrugs. "I'm sure Jinki will get it back."

"But Seohyun," Key says urgently. "You can't just trade one brother for the other, that's not -- how are you going to explain things to Taemin?"

"Do you remember the day Jinki showed up? And Taemin was the last to learn about his new brother because they couldn't find him?" They nod, and Seohyun smiles. "It's because he was in the garden with me. He had just given me this--" and she reaches underneath her collar to pull out a necklace with a pendant similar to the one in her hand, except instead of a strangely shaped stone, hers was made of an exquisite metal.

"This is the crest for the Lees," she says unnecessarily. "I was given it years ago, before Jinki became an impetus for--" her smile widens, "oh, just so many things."

For some reason, that sets them off. Five minutes later, Jonghyun's still clutching his sides while Key wipes his eyes with the heel of his hand, and Seohyun, straightening her coat once more, playfully forms a salute and throws them a wink.

"Well, wish me luck," she says, and Key smiles at her, full of affection.

"Just as long as you promise to change the dinner menu."

The necklace gets returned later that night.

It takes a few hours for them to continue the conversation, however, because Jinki is busy trying to undo the twelve thousand buttons down the front of Minho's shirt, and Minho, preoccupied with marking the smooth, white column of Jinki's neck, means that both of them are too out of breath to talk.

Frantic in their movements even before their clothes fully come off, Jinki groans as Minho presses his lips against the pulse at his throat, hands clutching fast to his shoulders, sliding up to cup the back of his neck as they fuck, both of them pushing closer all the while, trying to make up for lost time. The air they exchange as their mouths meet is like a proof of life, something they hadn't known they needed to be reassured of, not since Minho had rejoined the ranks of the living and Jinki had tried to fool himself into thinking there were more important things than this.

Later, with the pendant warm against his chest, Jinki reaches for Minho's hand, links their fingers together. His hands remained still for once, he reflects, and it's probably because they belonged here, just like this.

Seohyun had told them that Jinki had yet to leave, but after half an hour of standing outside on lookout duty, Key is starting to think that maybe, just maybe, she had lied.

"This is ridiculous," Jonghyun says a few minutes later. "What the hell are we doing? Why has this become some kind of mission?"

"I don't know," Key says, "but I'm cold."

Wordlessly, Jonghyun pulls off his jacket and hands it to him; the gesture reminds them instantly of necklaces, of secrets well-kept and the true meaning of sacrifice. But Key barely manages to put it on before it suddenly begins to rain. Even though there's barely a two second pause as they stare at each other before sprinting for the house, by the time they're both inside, they're soaked.

Key is shaking his head, shivering and wiping his face with one of his sleeves. "Mission?" he mutters. "We're the mission; she's tricked all of us."

It was strange; the thought had only just occurred to Jonghyun. "We should work together," he says on impulse. "What with the kingdom doubling in size and all.

Key, who had been all ready to refuse, stops and reconsiders. "...I hadn't thought of that."

Jonghyun shrugs. "Me neither."

"Hm," says Key. Experimentally, he reaches out to pick a leaf from Jonghyun's hair.

Experimentally, Jonghyun leans forward and kisses Key on the lips.

"Maybe we should take it slow," Key suggests when he steps back. "A week ago, I still kind of hated you."

Jonghyun rolls his eyes. "Fine, then give me back my jacket."

Key smirks. "Not until you get me a necklace."