Entry #24
Title: of wings and tophats
Pairing: qmihae
Rating: r
Summary: [steampunk] Kyuhyun’s living a perfectly ordinary, strings-free life with Donghae until the slave boy Zhou Mi comes into their care. The problem? Zhou Mi has wings.
It was a fucked up world he lived in.
Kyuhyun swung one leg over the other and tapped his fingers against the wooden arm of his chair. The meeting had been in full swing for three hours now and he still didn’t know why he bothered coming to these things anymore or why he even ran for office, when he knew it would just be the same problems debated year in and year out. The economy, if the sterling was up or down, the slave trade, sky ship tax, the Americas and whether they’d keep on bowing in obedience. It was repetitive. It was boring.
It was fucked up that he should have to sit here while grown men debated over whether or not it was ethical to attach wings to slave boys and girls.
When the meeting finished, he sprung out of his chair and headed for the oak doors, the footmen only just turning the handles as he reached them. His coat tails flew out behind him as he ran down the stairs and headed for the carriages. Home was forty minutes away, a town house with a painted lobby ceiling that his sister had picked out when he had said he needed a house in the city, and a Donghae Lee who had somehow just ended up there one day after visiting from the country and never going back.
The canary by the door announced his arrival to the empty house. He strolled into the parlour, shrugging his coat off and walking towards his writing desk when lowered voices caught his attention. They were coming from the kitchen, so he headed towards it, grinning at the thought of finding Donghae with one of his many paramours. The door creaked as he opened it so when he looked inside, two boys were already staring at him curiously.
And then his jaw dropped because - fucking holy mother of Jesus.
Wings.
---
The slave boy had soup on his cheek. It was bugging Kyuhyun, more for the fact that it was his soup and the boy was in his kitchen with his Donghae than anything else. Also it was bright orange soup and the boy’s skin was so white that it was kind of jarring. He cast his eyes away and settled his head on a hand, sighing slightly.
Donghae had found him on the kitchen doorstep apparently, eating the scraps of meat he left out for the neighbourhood cats. He’d thought Zhou Mi’s wings were some kind of cloak until he got him into the light of the kitchen, and then he’d not been able to let something ‘so pretty, Kyuhyun, look at how they sparkle!’ leave the house until Kyuhyun had seen them.
The wings were pretty, Kyuhyun had to admit, gems inlaid down the small nubs of bone and flesh and feather, breaking out from his back. Pure white but only reaching maybe four foot in breadth. Kyuhyun did some calculations in his head and knew that Zhou Mi would never fly. There was no way such a small wingspan could carry the weight of a human, let alone one as tall and toned as Zhou Mi. Just pretty decorations. He wondered what was worse, having wings, or having wings and not even being able to fly with them.
“- right, Kyuhyun?”
“Huh?” He zoned back into the conversation, looking over at the two boys sitting at the kitchen table wearing identical mega-watt grins.
“He can stay here, right?” Donghae’s grin grew wider and his hand reached for Kyuhyun’s arm, patting it.
Kyuhyun stared back. He couldn’t be serious. For one, he was blatantly against the slave trade, even if he had never made any speeches or rallies to that effect, and having one stay at his house would considerably undermine any authority he had on the subject. For another, Donghae wrote children’s books, which, while it kept the rent paid, was hardly enough to support another body. Even if that wasn’t enough, the gems inlaid down the nubs of his wings and the collar bearing Sir James’ insignia clearly showed that Zhou Mi had another owner.
He turned his eyes to the slave boy. “What about your master?”
Zhou Mi grinned big and wide, slightly desperate at the edges and Kyuhyun almost wanted to close his eyes against it. “I don’t have one.”
Donghae whistled loud and clear and then clapped his hands. “Well, if that’s settled -”
Kyuhyun’s voice cut through. “What about the collar around your neck?”
The slave boy shrugged and the wings rustled with him. He winced suddenly, as though the weight of the wings hadn’t entirely sunk in yet, and Kyuhyun noticed him hunched close to the table, and his arms shaking with effort as he moved his hands to fold together on the table. “I found it on the street, thought it looked pretty.”
It was a flimsy excuse, pretty much a parody of an excuse, really. Kyuhyun looked at the smudge of soup and the way his wrists looked too thin. The screech of the chair’s legs against the kitchen flagstones gave his exit a more dramatic edge than he wished, but he carried on anyway. “Fine. Donghae will show you to your room. You’ll have to pay your way eventually, so start looking into that.”
He tried not to think about it as he penned a letter to his father and sister, and then turned in early. His bed was soft, goose feather and silk. He wondered what Zhou Mi had been sleeping on before he came here, how desperate a man would have to be to scavenge day old scraps of meat from a cat’s bowl. He thought about the dark shadows of bruises he had seen around his arms when he lifted them to take another mouthful of soup, the careful measured way he ate that made it seem like he was holding himself back. He dreamt of feathers and moonlight and flying over stacks of hay and a checkerboard ocean.
---
“I have no idea what you mean, Sir James.”
The man’s stomach was rotund and covered in a gold and red waistcoat embroidered with dragons. Kyuhyun lifted his eyes from a straining button and shifted his expression from blank into bored. “My men saw him go into your house, Mr Cho. Now, I am a reasonable man and no one could ever accuse me of abusing my... employees.” Kyuhyun’s mouth twisted at the corner. “So I fully expect him to be back at my house tonight. I will not tolerate this any longer.” His walrus moustache bristled with righteous indignation.
Kyuhyun shifted his weight and eyed the man wearily. “I’m afraid you must be mistaken. I have no slaves staying with me at this period in time. In fact, I employ a cook. That is all. There has certainly been no one staying with me matching your description. And may I remind you that the legislature concerning wings attached to people has yet to be passed, so what you have just,” Kyuhyun coughed into his fist, juggling to keep his papers in one arm, “confided in me could actually land you in prison.” He waited awhile, let his words sink in. “Good day.”
When he got home, he did his paperwork in the laundry room, where the machines worked around him and where it smelled like lavender laundry detergent. The steam from the machines made the air muggy and his hair curl, but it reminded him of home.
Donghae was wearing goggles when he emerged. Kyuhyun pulled back the soft leather and let the thick glass thunk against his skull. Donghae scowled. “Wow, for someone so airheaded, it actually sounded like you have a brain in there.”
Donghae flicked Kyuhyun’s nose. “Shut up, you love me, when did you stop worshipping the ground I walked on?” Donghae turned to Zhou Mi, curled up in a couch corner and moving his mouth along with the words, frowning slightly. “Seriously, Zhou Mi, he used to follow me around like a puppy dog when we were younger, always insisting that we play cops and robbers and then never being able to go on a team opposing me. Cutest thing you ever saw.”
Kyuhyun kicked Donghae’s ankle as he sat down on the other side of the couch. Zhou Mi’s eyes flicked up warily, and he drew his feet in closer. Kyuhyun suddenly felt awkward.
Donghae was playing with a mini train kit on the floor, tiny railways spread over the expensive rug imported from India. He placed a little figurine by a water cooler, precariously balanced on stick-thin scaffolding, and then set the train going. Kyuhyun watched it as it rattled past his bookcase, the fireplace, the sofa seating him and Zhou Mi, and then the water cooler. He watched with detached resignation as the sudden disturbance of air was too much for the scaffolding, and it folded under itself, little stick legs breaking. The figurine ended up face down in water.
Kyuhyun lifted his eyes to Donghae’s. Donghae held the gaze for a sheepish moment and then snapped the goggles over his eyes, grinning weakly and making an excuse about having a date.
Two pairs of eyes watched as he left the room, and then settled back on the disarray of the broken train set.
There was the sound of movement from his left and Kyuhyun looked over to see the slave boy grabbing a cloth from the side and trying to mop up the mess, placing the broken pieces in delicate little piles. Kyuhyun raised an eyebrow.
“What are you doing?”
Zhou Mi looked up startled. “Uh. Cleaning.” He continued to dab at the carpet.
“Don’t. It’s Donghae’s mess, he’ll clear it up.” He watched Zhou Mi’s stricken expression, bottom lip caught between teeth.
“But, uh, cleaning, sir. It’s all I know how to do. Well. That and the, uh, other duties that- I want to pay my way. Sir.” He was earnest and smiling and Kyuhyun noticed a slight cadence to his voice that hadn’t been there before.
“Are you foreign?” He asked, a non sequitur. The boy’s hands stilled.
He nodded and looked a little wan. “Chinese, sir.” The fire crackled behind its grate.
Kyuhyun hummed, thought of the way his people had stormed into Hong Kong and ransacked the place in the name of the Empire. “How old are you?”
“26, sir.” He was two years older than Kyuhyun. He sighed.
“Stop cleaning up his mess, Zhou Mi. And drop the honorific. I’m younger than you, and in my eyes, you’re exactly the same as I am.” This wasn’t strictly true, but the way the Chinese slave suddenly grinned brighter than the flames made it seem worthwhile to tell a white lie. His knees cracked as he got up from the floor and he stumbled a little bit, as though his balance still wasn’t used to such an extra weight on his body. The wings glowed amber in the firelight.
The silence settled uncomfortably and Kyuhyun rolled his shoulders, lolling his head onto the back of the couch. He heard Zhou Mi settle himself back on the seat, reading his book again. Eventually the silence grew familiar and Kyuhyun relaxed. He woke up two hours later with his quilt pulled up around his chin and his pillow cold on the back of his neck. He heard his door close and frowned. Donghae would still be out, which left only one person to carry him upstairs. He turned onto his side and tried not to smile.
---
The next day was a Sunday and the bells rung out at six thirty in the morning. It was wintertime and still dark outside, and the floorboards were cold where his feet touched them. He wondered how much of his clothing Zhou Mi had removed last night and then figured that in his line of work, he would have seen plenty of naked male bodies.
He wasn’t sure if that was supposed to make him feel better or worse.
He supposed, as he got dressed in his best suit, that it was the sexual aspect of the slave trade that he hated the most. He figured that a house and some food was enough repayment for the simple act of keeping the house clean, but couldn’t justify making someone bend over and give themselves completely. An image of Zhou Mi’s smile flashed into his head, frayed at the edges and just too wide to be natural. He couldn’t justify that kind of damage.
The buttons of his waistcoat were small and fiddly and it took him a few moments to do them up. Pocketing the silver wind-up watch, he opened his door and was one step away from the stairs when he heard the door down the end of the hall open. He looked over and had to bite his lip to keep from gasping. Zhou Mi looked pale, drawn and terrified.
He opened his mouth to say something but Zhou Mi caught his eye, started and then pasted a strained smile over his features.
“Morning, s- Kyuhyun.”
He slipped past him to go to the bathroom, and Kyuhyun followed the movement with his eyes. He frowned. Stepping backwards, he turned up the hallway and walked towards Zhou Mi’s bedroom. He peered inside, but there was nothing there, just rumpled sheets and an open window. He shrugged, figuring it for a nightmare, and walked into the kitchen.
The cook had the weekend off, and Donghae was trying his hand at cooking. Kyuhyun opened the door just as Donghae exhaled sharply, jerking his hand back. He grinned, but the lingering memory of Zhou Mi made it slightly sick at the edges.
“Hey.”
Donghae turned and grinned, scampering over to give Kyuhyun a hug. He still smelled like last night, perfume, cigarette smoke and saloons. “Hi there sunshine. How are you on this fine, beautiful, unparalleled morning?” Stepping back, he gave Kyuhyun’s hair a ruffle.
Kyuhyun raised an eyebrow but couldn’t help the smile tugging at his lips. He moved to the table and picked up the newspaper, scanning the headlines. “I’m good. I can tell you had a good night last night.”
Donghae hummed an old tune from the opera and for a moment, Kyuhyun felt content, the spitting on the frying pan, the soft sound of Donghae’s voice, the birds outside. He closed his eyes, then opened them again as Donghae continued. “Mm, actually, last night was boring, all everyone was talking about was Sir James and his lost slave boy. Big news, apparently.” Kyuhyun nodded, though his heartbeat increased slightly. “What makes me so happy is the sun, your cute little face, and the fact that I found my two favourite boys cuddled together on the sofa last night, fast asleep.”
Kyuhyun coughed on the mouthful of coffee he’d just taken. He dabbed at the spilt drink with a napkin, looking up at Donghae warily afterwards. “Sorry?” The small dip of disappointment in his stomach was excused away as hunger pains.
Donghae clapped his hands gleefully, and then frowned quickly and turned back to the hob. “Uhm,” he said, distracted. “You like crunchy eggs, right?”
Kyuhyun laughed. “I’ve had time to acquire a taste for them.”
Donghae whirled around, frying pan in one hand, spatula in another. “Hey! They’re not always crunchy!”
Kyuhyun was grinning when he said, “If they’re not burnt, they’re raw. Trust me, I prefer them this way.”
The door creaked open and Zhou Mi poked his head in, that same strained smile on his face from earlier. “Morning, Mi!” Donghae grinned, waving the spatula enthusiastically. Kyuhyun dodged the oil spinning off in fat globules.
“Morning.” Zhou Mi pulled a chair from the table and turned it towards the stove. “Do you want me to cook?”
Thirty minutes later they were feasting on bacon, eggs and fried tomatoes and Zhou Mi sat down beside them. Kyuhyun looked over and then frowned, swallowing his mouthful. “Where’s your plate?”
Zhou Mi’s eyebrows almost reached his hairline, before a grin, much better than that sickly thing he was sporting, blasted across his face. “I’ll just, uh, fix myself something.”
Donghae waved a hand from where he had speared his tomato on his fork and was busy examining it in the way a scientist would examine an unusual mechanism. “Good, because if we want to catch morning service, we’re going to have to hurry.”
Kyuhyun watched the lines of Zhou Mi’s back stiffen. “Are we - Are we all going?” He asked as he flicked the gas switch on the stove and lit up a hob. The angles of his face burnt orange, and Kyuhyun’s attention shifted to the wings, mind flashbacking to last night. They were looking dirty, and Kyuhyun wondered how you would reach around them to wash.
Donghae was busy slathering butter on toast so Kyuhyun answered for him. “Yes. Do you,” he coughed, “Do you want to go?”
Zhou Mi turned around and it was back, that smile Kyuhyun hated so much. “If you wish.” He could see him physically restraining himself from saying ‘sir.’
Donghae caught Kyuhyun’s eyes, the gaze serious and thoughtful. Kyuhyun returned it, then, laying down his knife and fork, said, “Actually, it would probably be better if you didn’t go. Sir James’ men are on the lookout for you, who knows what will happen. Stay at home and don’t answer the door for anyone, okay? The canary will sing if me or Donghae turn up, but other than that, you stay in here.” Zhou Mi was nodding and Donghae was smiling softly as he bit into the toast.
They left twenty minutes later, as dawn broke over the city and made silhouettes out of spires and turrets, weathervanes and chimneys. Donghae fiddled with the top hat and scowled, announcing in annoyance, “I wish I had worn my goggles.”
“Sunday best, Donghae.”
The absent answer was met with derision. “Once upon a time you would have run back to get me those goggles. Once upon a time, Kyuhyun Cho, you were a fun little lad, just a whip of a boy, who would kiss me in fields and tree houses and over the table at your sister’s tea parties.” Donghae clasped his hands by his head, looking wistful, and then cast them down and scowled again. “But you haven’t kissed me for weeks, you arse.”
Kyuhyun grinned, grabbed Donghae wrist and pulled him close in the street. A horse and carriage thundered past as Kyuhyun leant closer, lips brushing skin as he moved and whispered, “You’re such an attention whore.”
Donghae’s hand moved from where it was grabbing his forearm to the stray curls of hair at the nape of his neck. “You love it,” he whispered back, eyes fluttering.
Kyuhyun smiled against his lips, and kissed him deep and sweet. “Something like that.”
Donghae’s hand went to his hat as he opened his eyes, and grinned. “So, Zhou Mi.” And Kyuhyun stepped back, rolling his eyes. They walked in step to the Cathedral. “Why do you think he’s so scared of church?”
Kyuhyun bit his lip, still tingling from Donghae. “He’s scared they’ll take one look at his wings and ship him off to the Vatican?”
Donghae hummed. “You know, I didn’t even think of that.”
“Shocking.” He guided Donghae around a puddle and wondered, not for the first time, why Donghae could only focus on one thing. Then he remembered nights of being the only object of that focus, and shivered.
Donghae carried on as though he hadn’t heard him. “I think it’s something to do with that James fellow.” Kyuhyun smiled at the informal way he spoke about Sir James. Donghae had never been that hung up on status or hierarchies.
“Oh?” he said to prod his friend along.
Donghae was frowning under his top hat, and the sunrise caught the plane of cheek and the dip of his lips. Kyuhyun felt something twist in his stomach. “Well, we all know why men like James buy pretty little slave boys like Zhou Mi, and it’s not because they make a spiffing fried breakfast.”
“Did you actually just say ‘spiffing’?”
“Yes. It’s called expanding your vocabulary. Try it.” Kyuhyun could only laugh. “Anyway, like I was saying. Sir James was the first son so he never really got a choice as to what he would do, you know? But word around the town is that Sir James is one of those deeply religious men who feel the rapture whenever he so much as says the word God, and that he once tried to bribe his brother into swapping places with him. But his brother’s now a bishop and we all know how much money they make.” Kyuhyun nodded. “Anyway, I was talking to Sooyoung last night and she was saying how the men down the Market had been talking about Sir James a few weeks before, about how he was wanting a boy with wings, or the technology to give a boy wings. Well, as dumb as most of the slave traders are, none of them were willing to be illegal, and they just gave him the technology.”
“What’s your point, Donghae?”
Donghae cast him an exasperated look as they walked through the large oak doors and found a pew. They slid along the wooden bench and Donghae leaned in closer to whisper in his ear. “Come on, religious fanatic gives his slave boy, who performs unsavoury duties, wings. What does that say to you?”
Kyuhyun looked at Donghae’s eyes, uncomfortably close to him. “Oh.”
“Yeah. No wonder the poor thing’s worried about this place. The very thought of God probably brings back images of nights spent with that fat heathen.”
They rose for the first hymn.
---
Zhou Mi was curled up on the couch when the first lot of men pounded at the door. He pulled a cushion over his ears and counted the pieces of railway that hadn’t been picked up.
---
The bishop had decided to go back to basics and start with Genesis. Kyuhyun listened to words saying they were all made in God’s image and of clay, and wondered what Zhou Mi was made of.
---
The third time they came around they started battering the door and Zhou Mi gave up on colour coordinating the books and wandered downstairs into the laundry room. He tried to wedge himself in a small space between the wall and a machine, but his wings were too big.
He bit his lip and counted backwards from a hundred.
---
The service ended with the usual fanfare and Kyuhyun and Donghae managed to get out with only five handshakes and a couple dozen nods across pews and musty tapestries. They walked home talking about how Mrs Lawly was getting even more touchy-feely now that her husband had passed on to ‘the Good Lord’ and how her twitch was as disconcerting as ever. Donghae noticed the men first.
“Hey!” He shouted, in the middle of laughing, stopping abruptly in the street and then running off down cobbles and straight through puddles. “Hey, what the hell! What are you doing? Get the hell off of our door!”
Kyuhyun blinked and then ran after him, not knowing if he was going to try to pull Donghae off of the big burly men attempting to use their shoulders as battery rams, or join in. He saw his fist take a swing at some guy’s face and mentally shrugged. He guessed his body was making the decision for him. It was a furious couple of seconds, and he ended up with a bruise on his spine from where someone shoved him into an elbow, and a broken lip from where someone had shoved a fist into his face, but they left eventually when they realised who they were.
Kyuhyun caught hold of Donghae’s jacket so he couldn’t run after them, and dabbed at his lip with a sleeve. The cufflink was cold against the heated skin. “Well.”
Donghae laughed, short and high. The canary sang inside and they waited for the door to open.
---
Zhou Mi was on 23 when the canary started singing, and it took him five seconds to realise what it was, in amidst his own brain and the clanking and hissing of the machinery. He plastered on a smile as he stumbled up the stairs, the wings still making it hard to walk. He wondered when their weight would be normal and when the knot of muscle in his back would go away. He also wondered if it would be terribly improper to ask one of the two men if they could help him wash, and decided that if he was going to try either of them it would be Donghae. There was something intimidating about Kyuhyun.
He opened the door and the canary started another bar. Blinking as he took in their dishevelled appearance, he asked, “What happened to you?”
Donghae shrugged, eyes bright, one now black from a sock to the eye. “There was this rhinoceros, dastardly thing.”
Kyuhyun’s lips were upturned when he said, “Knocked down two stalls back down Church Street, you wouldn’t believe the uproar.”
“A woman offered me her comely daughter if I caught the beast, but to be honest, I caught sight of the daughter, and I’d rather marry the beast.”
Zhou Mi was laughing even though blood was crimson on Kyuhyun’s lips and Donghae looked like he was swaying on the spot. He stepped back and the two young men walked inside, heading for the kitchen. “Do we have any steaks in the larder, Kyuhyun?”
There was an exasperated noise. “Right. Ask the only one here who didn’t try their hand at cooking this morning.”
Zhou Mi spoke as he watched morning light stream through the kitchen window and hit Kyuhyun’s lips as they stretched into a smile. “We have a couple.” He wondered, suddenly, if it was okay to say ‘we’.
Kyuhyun was dabbing at his lip with a cloth and spoke vaguely, “Don’t suppose you could get one for Donghae, could you? Nasty hit to his eye.”
“Blasted beast.”
“Spiffing right hook, though.” Donghae laughed, long and loud and Zhou Mi saw the first proper grin on Kyuhyun’s face that he’d been privy to as he emerged from the larder, steak in hand.
He pressed it gently to Donghae’s face, stepping in-between swinging legs while Donghae sat on the table and hummed old nursery rhymes. “You’ve never heard Kyuhyun sing, have you?”
Zhou Mi cast a quick glance to Kyuhyun and saw the man rolling his eyes. “Uh. No?”
Donghae clapped his hands suddenly, making Zhou Mi jump and Donghae reach out to steady him. He blinked at the warm sensation of Donghae’s grip on his forearm and wondered if he should roll his sleeves down. Donghae started tapping his fingers on Zhou Mi’s skin and his feet stopped.
“Kyuhyun! Sing! Sing like the angel you once were.”
His reply was dry. “No.”
Zhou Mi tried not to grin and feel disappointed at the same time. He ended up with a weird amalgamation of the two feelings and a crooked smile on his lips. Donghae paused his tapping for a moment, and Zhou Mi looked up to find Donghae’s one visible eye fixed on his lips. His breath caught and then Donghae was bright and lively again.
“Oh come on, it’s hardly fair! I was graced with it this morning, I don’t see why Mi should miss out.”
Zhou Mi looked over to see Kyuhyun testing his split lip with his tongue, and swallowed against the curl of arousal low in his stomach. “My lip’s split. You try singing like that.”
Donghae hummed, and then grinned, leaning forward slightly into Zhou Mi’s personal space. “Back home, Kyuhyun was in the church choir.” There was an answering groan from where Kyuhyun was leant against the stove. Zhou Mi bit back a grin. “The priest was constantly telling his parents he should be a eunuch.” Zhou Mi burst out laughing and Donghae’s one visible eye widened and then crinkled into a smile.
Kyuhyun cleared his throat and then said, with quiet aplomb, “Donghae used to think he could talk to animals.” Donghae squawked in indignation and flailed a little on the table. Zhou Mi gently pushed him back when he looked like he was in danger of falling off.
Zhou Mi said, quietly, “I used to sing in a choir.” He smiled at Kyuhyun, got a small answering upturn of lips.
Donghae said, matter-of-factly, “I bet you didn’t get chucked out for looking up the organ player’s skirt.”
“Donghae!”
---
They were back in the parlour, Donghae commandeering the study to write some more of his latest book. Zhou Mi had yet another book out that he was trying to read when Kyuhyun decided to broach the subject.
“When did you get them?”
Dark eyes glanced down at him from the sofa, and Kyuhyun played with tufts of weaved carpet, warming his hands against the fire.
“The wings?”
Kyuhyun snorted. “No, your stunning good looks.” He tossed a grin over his shoulder to show that was a joke, and Zhou Mi relaxed a fraction. It was only a fraction but it was there, and it was a little closer to how he was when Donghae was nearby.
“About three weeks ago.” The smile was wan.
Kyuhyun hummed, ran his tongue along his lips and tasted copper. He pulled a face and looked up to see Zhou Mi watching him. He blinked, carried on regardless. “Did it hurt?”
Zhou Mi closed the book, a finger trapped between pages to go back to later. “I guess. They gave me an injection, and then cut the skin there. I don’t know the science of it, but I started growing bone from the cuts, and when the bone reached a reasonable length, the rest of the wings were attached. The feathers and most of the bone’s artificial, just metal covered in white porcelain. The gems hurt the most going in, since they’re in some of my skin as well as the bone. But. I’ve had worse things.” He blinked and then suddenly seemed to regret what he’d said, hurriedly adding, “Not that I’m complaining, I’m a slave, I know that it’s -”
Kyuhyun cut him off. “Are they bothersome?” He knew the science behind the injections. There was a gene in the body’s DNA that was switched off or on, depending on whether there was the need for new bone to be grown. The injection switched that gene on, and it responded to the wounds that the men then caused, bone cells instead of plasma and white blood cells rushing to the scene.
Zhou Mi shrugged and the wings rustled behind him. “Sometimes. I can’t sleep on my back, wash properly, lean back against sofas like this. But, no, not really.” There was something wistful in the small smile he offered. “It’s kind of disappointing, to have wings but not be able to use them.” Obviously the wings didn’t contain nerve endings, and Zhou Mi effectively had no control over them. If he wanted them unfurled, someone would have to do it manually.
“You can’t wash properly?” Zhou Mi started and a light blush dusted his cheeks.
“Well. Uh. They’re hard to manoeuvre around.” He muttered, finger feeling numb from holding his place in the book.
Kyuhyun fell back against the rug and looked up at Zhou Mi. “I can help you with that, if you want.”
Zhou Mi’s mouth went dry. “Sorry?”
Kyuhyun coughed and he looked away, almost embarrassed. “Well, where is it that you can’t reach?” He frowned. “Why are my books in little piles?”
“I was colour coordinating them,” he said, inattentively. “In between my shoulder blades, I guess?” He was frowning.
Kyuhyun said brightly, “Well, that’s no trouble. Heat some water and take your top off, I’ll clean you now.” There was a pause. “Colour coordinating them?”
“Uh.”
Kyuhyun was already heading towards the door, and Zhou Mi followed him with helpless eyes, marking the page in the book by turning down the corner and placing it on his seat. Kyuhyun was staring at the knobs on the stove as though he didn’t know how to use them, and, Zhou Mi surmised, he probably didn’t. He leant over the man to turn the gas on, and flicked the flames to life. Kyuhyun made a soft sound of amusement, and then turned around, almost bumping noses with Zhou Mi.
“So! Shirt.”
Zhou Mi hesitated, and then said, “I’ll need your help getting it off. The rips in the back get caught on feathers.” There was a pause and Kyuhyun’s lips tightened, and then he was smiling, forced cheer.
“Of course.” He stepped around to the back of Zhou Mi and he wondered how that was worse, not seeing Kyuhyun but feeling him in the disturbance of air around him and the heat from another body.
They worked together, teasing fabric over feathers, and then there was silence on Kyuhyun’s end. Zhou Mi wondered how the wings looked from the back. All he could see from the mirror in the bathroom were small fluffy mountains sprouting from his shoulders. He sucked air in quickly as a soft touch down surprisingly sensitive skin shocked him, and there was an oddly terse voice going, “We should probably put some water on now.”
Zhou Mi moved to do so, and they waited fifteen minutes for the water to heat up, opposite sides of the kitchen table. “Was he a bastard to you?” Kyuhyun seemed to be on a roll with probing questions popping out of nowhere.
Zhou Mi grinned. “I’ve had worse?”
Kyuhyun frowned and picked imaginary fluffy off of his shirt. His expression cleared and he started rolling his shirt up to his elbows. “Well. That won’t happen again.”
Zhou Mi’s breath froze in his chest, and he started coughing, body bent over and, shit he really wasn’t used to the wings’ weight. “Sorry?”
Kyuhyun passed him to get the water, and Zhou Mi got a gust of the scent of musty books and ink. He imagined scripture written across Kyuhyun’s body and then felt physically sick, a reminder of Sir James springing images to the forefront of his mind. “Well, you’re here now. There’ll be no more of that kind of business.” The sound of the water trickling into a bowl was strangely calming and he felt some part of him relax.
“He still has my papers.” The ‘sir’ was bitten back on reflex.
He watched as Kyuhyun pressed a small cloth into the water and then wrung it ‘til it was only damp. “Not for long.” The press of something warm to the sensitive nerve endings sent a warm rush of pleasure over his body and he felt his eyes drift close.
“Oh.” He managed faintly, and there was a soft snorting sound behind him, as though Kyuhyun was laughing at him.
He ignored it for the feeling of deft fingers trailing over the definition of his rib bones, knuckles bumping over the ridges in his spine, and a soft, warm cloth washing away the last traces of his owner.
---
It took a while before Zhou Mi became comfortable with them, long enough that Kyuhyun let him clean when he could and was considering firing the cook, long enough that Donghae no longer gave them weird looks when he walked in on Kyuhyun sponging away dirt from his wings or his back.
Being comfortable didn’t mean knowing how to react on opening the door to Kyuhyun licking a stripe down Donghae’s throat, didn’t mean he knew what to do with the image of Donghae looking utterly wrecked, bitten red lips, tousled hair and pupils blown, hands grasping for a purchase on the stove and clicking gas off and on and off again. It didn’t mean he knew what do when he found himself hard inside his breeches, and the image of Kyuhyun’s dark eyes and the strong lines of his back wouldn’t leave him alone.
---
Kyuhyun’s quill skidded across the page when Zhou Mi suddenly, and shrilly, screamed like a little girl. He looked up, levelling a glare at the man. He took a moment to admire the view, new clothes that Zhou Mi had bought without their fashion guidance fitting just a tad too tightly to his body to be decent and his pose making for a very compelling argument for why Kyuhyun’s Gaze Should Never Leave These Thighs. And then Zhou Mi shrieked again and Kyuhyun threw his quill down, lamenting in his head that the whole letter would have to be rewritten now, a long thick black line streaking through the entire first half of the page.
“What are you doing? You’re not playing that game again, are you?” Last week Donghae had come back from a saloon, bottle in hand, and proceeded to get Zhou Mi completely smashed, resulting in a game where they shouted various profanities at a higher decibel than the other.
Zhou Mi looked like he might be scowling under the mask of fear. “No.” He shifted away from the corner of the couch, peering over the edge.
“Then what, pray tell, is it? Pansy.”
Zhou Mi glared back, and looked like he might retort (which in itself would be hilarious, because Zhou Mi hadn’t quite got the hand of insults yet, and tended to say things like ‘rose picker’ or ‘porridge lover’ with as much vehemence as a man of the cloth would say ‘sinner’), but then he drew in a quick breath and toppled back against the padded back of the sofa. “There is a mouse! In this room!”
Kyuhyun stared. “You are joking, right?”
Zhou Mi looked at him, all indignant anger and irrational fear, and Kyuhyun felt the side of his mouth twitch up.
“Stop laughing at me, this is entirely reasonable!”
Kyuhyun lowered himself to his knees and tried to look under the couch. “It’s about as reasonable as that rose-patterned shirt you bought.”
Zhou Mi looked crushed when Kyuhyun raised his eyes. “I thought you liked that shirt?”
Kyuhyun blinked and felt stupidly guilty for a second. “I do. I love that shirt.” He left the unspoken for a girl in his head.
Zhou Mi’s face brightened, and then dissolved into horror again just as Kyuhyun clocked a grey blur from the corner of his eye. “Blimey, fast little bugger, isn’t she?”
Donghae’s voice came from the door. “What’s this? Kyuhyun on his knees for Zhou Mi? I thought I’d only see that in my dreams.” Kyuhyun flushed a little and walked on his knees to the coal bucket, face away from Zhou Mi. The squawk from Donghae and the soft thud told Kyuhyun that Zhou Mi had thrown something at him, possibly a cushion. He shrugged his jacket off, placed it over a quivering grey lump and lifted it up to show to the room at large.
Zhou Mi blinked at him. Kyuhyun looked back, unimpressed. Donghae whistled. “Wow. Well done, Kyuhyun. You caught a jacket.” They both gave him a look. He sighed. “Well hey, don’t welcome me home all at once now.”
Some moments later, Zhou Mi was crowding around a saucepan, complete with an old cuddly toy that Kyuhyun claimed must have found its own way into his luggage when he was moving here, and some cheese shavings. The mouse was tucked into his chest, courtesy of his arm and a finger gently lulling the little rodent into complacency.
Kyuhyun wrinkled his nose from where he stood by the door. Donghae caught the look and grinned. “Oh come on, look at him. He’s as happy as Larry.”
“I never understood that phrase.”
“You’ve never met Larry.” Kyuhyun turned a dry look on Donghae. He grinned back, unrepentant.
Kyuhyun folded his arms. “Still.”
Donghae huffed a sigh and wrapped an arm around Kyuhyun’s waist. “Look at him. He just needed something to love.” Kyuhyun couldn’t help the stray could have loved me. He switched his expression to blank a second too late and Donghae’s eyes widened, startled. “Oh, you are kidding me.”
“Don’t.” He pushed Donghae’s grip off and turned to walk down the hallway.
“What? Why? This could be beautiful.” Kyuhyun rolled his eyes and reached for his coat. Donghae moved in front, and Kyuhyun could see two mini-hims in the goggles. He looked to the side.
“What?” He said, sullen, and for a moment he thought Donghae would laugh at him, and make some comment about how that was more like the boy he used to know, holed up in his bedroom playing board games and mastering chess.
Donghae’s grin was blinding. “What do you mean, ‘what’? You haven’t seen the way he looks at you? It’s, god, it’s intoxicating, all respect and affection and at times, pure lust. You’ve seen it, right?”
Kyuhyun closed his eyes and rocked back on his heels. He hadn’t. Sometimes he got so caught up in politics, in his sky shipping business, in himself that he forgot to look at the people around him, even the ones with wings.
Donghae was looking at him when he opened his eyes, a small bit scornful and a lot amused. “You are a blind idiot sometimes.”
Kyuhyun gave a weak shoulder shrug. Donghae adjusted his goggles, gave Kyuhyun’s hair a quick ruffle and said, “So go get him.” And smiled.
Kyuhyun frowned. Donghae looked blank. “What?”
“You don’t think I’m doing this alone, do you?” His fingers formed a loose circle around Donghae’s wrist and pulled him close. Donghae’s eyes dropped to Kyuhyun’s lips, flicked back up again.
“Oh.” His voice was lower than before.
---
Donghae had insisted that Kyuhyun be the one to initiate something, and that was how Kyuhyun found himself with Zhou Mi’s mouth opening under his, his tongue a slow drag against Kyuhyun’s. He shuddered, reached up to get a hold of Zhou Mi’s hair and licked into his mouth, moaning when Zhou Mi sucked on his tongue and pleasure made him heady.
It hadn’t exactly been the way Kyuhyun had wanted it to go; he’d expected maybe a cup of tea, some casual chat, getting to the point and then some easy persuading, maybe with a blowjob on Zhou Mi’s part. Instead Zhou Mi had been cooing over the mouse in the saucepan and turned to Kyuhyun to say something, and instinct had just taken over.
He shifted, placed his thigh in-between Zhou Mi’s and grinned when the mouth under his went slack at the slight friction against his groin. A hand slipped to his hip to steady him, and Kyuhyun felt his heart clench a little at the gesture. He pulled back.
His hand was still in Zhou Mi’s hair, and the mixture of that and Zhou Mi’s red lips and flushed cheeks almost made him pull him closer. Instead he bit his lip and ignored the twist of his stomach as Zhou Mi’s eyes tracked the movement. “There’s something I’ve got to tell you.” He started cursing himself for being so cliché but was distracted by the way shock and guilt flitted across Zhou Mi’s expression as he started to back away. Kyuhyun hooked an ankle round Zhou Mi’s and said, maybe more strongly than he intended, “No.” He slipped his hand down to Zhou Mi’s hip, reminded of the warm weight of Zhou Mi’s hand, and pushed up his shirt a touch, rubbing with his thumb at the skin there. He was too close to miss the way Zhou Mi’s breath caught. “It’s not, well, it could be - just.” He sighed, and looked up, tried to start again.
“Donghae.” Zhou Mi said, and it wasn’t a question, but it should have been.
Kyuhyun blinked. “Yes.”
Zhou Mi gulped and stepped out of the neat embrace Kyuhyun had had him in, sitting down on a kitchen chair instead. Kyuhyun’s hand dropped lamely to his side. “You’re with him.” There was a finality about that that Kyuhyun didn’t like.
“Sort of.” Zhou Mi’s head jerked up. “Donghae’s not really a one person kind of boy. He likes to have his fun, he likes to go out and see someone he likes and not worry about bringing them home.” He stopped when Zhou Mi opened his mouth.
“You deserve better than that.” And really, Kyuhyun reasoned, people shouldn’t be allowed to go around saying statements like that.
Kyuhyun shrugged, smiled crooked. “Donghae’s who he is, I love him like that. But, you see. I want you.” He paused, breathed past the lump in his chest. “So does he.” He moved closer, sitting on a chair beside Zhou Mi’s. “We both do. Together. Want you, that is.” He swallowed and looked up, taking in Zhou Mi’s shocked expression.
“What?”
Kyuhyun sighed, stood up suddenly and then sat down in one fluid movement, a leg swinging over Zhou Mi’s, and then the other settling comfortably on the other side of his thighs, bracketing him in. He kissed him, sweet and heavy, felt their chests knocking together and the wet, hot slide of their mouths as it became not enough friction. He rocked forward and watched as Zhou Mi broke away with a hiss of pleasure. “We want you, like this.” He rocked forward again, bit his lip as his eyes fluttered closed at the sensation. “I want to do this,” and he slid a hand down to Zhou Mi’s inner thigh and squeezed, “with him watching.” Zhou Mi blinked drowsily up at him and Kyuhyun smiled as he bent down to lick at his lips, as he moved to whisper in his ear, “I want to suck you off while he takes me from behind, want you to fuck my mouth while you -” He was broken off when Zhou Mi moved to crush their mouths messily together and push him forward, his hands on Kyuhyun’s cheeks. He shuddered at the sensation and the slight vibration of Zhou Mi saying ‘yes’ against his mouth at every roll of their hips.
---
Kyuhyun was tapping his quill against the table in front of him and wondering whether or not he should offer an opinion on the debate when the air around him shifted, and he looked to the side to see Sir James sitting there.
He looked back to the front and tried to ignore him. The older gentleman leaned forward. “They’ve passed the legislation for wings, you know.” Kyuhyun did know, had been keeping up with that piece of legislation since six foot of man and wing had landed in his kitchen one day. He made a non-committal noise. “So I would like my boy back now.”
Kyuhyun shifted in his seat so he was angled as far away from Sir James as possible. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” He murmured, chin in his hand and speaking through his fingers.
Sir James shifted closer and said, “Is he being good to you? Getting down on his knees and making you feel like God? Are you fucking him into your bedsheets every night?” Kyuhyun bit back the retort on his tongue, stood up and gathered his papers.
“If you say such vile things to me again, you will live to regret it.” It would have been a good parting shot, if Sir James’ hammy fist hadn’t descended upon his arm and the old man hadn’t continued.
“If you are, you know, you’re no better than me. Maybe you don’t have the papers, but he’s hardly a free man, kept up in your pretty little gilded cage. Got yourself a pretty little bird there. Little parakeet.”
Kyuhyun swallowed back sour-tasting saliva and walked away. The words didn’t stay in the room; they followed him out and into the cab, so that when he got home he was a mess of too-straight lines, tension coloured in carefully. Donghae and Zhou Mi were in the living room, Donghae’s hand looped around Zhou Mi’s ankle and rubbing at the bone. Zhou Mi’s eyes were dropping shut and he smiled sleepily at Kyuhyun.
---
The words stuck in his head.
Over a week he couldn’t help but notice that Zhou Mi treated Donghae with a special kind of reverence, soft and unassuming. Kyuhyun didn’t even notice it until he looked for it. Zhou Mi cleaned and cooked and climbed into bed with Kyuhyun sometimes like he didn’t have any choice in the matter. Kyuhyun found himself curling away from Zhou Mi in the morning, found himself uncomfortable in the kitchen when Zhou Mi stood at the stove and hummed old hymns.
When Captain Heechul came back from his voyage for Kyuhyun’s company, he went to the sky port to see if any damages had been done to his ship and then took Kangin and Shindong round to Sir James’ house.
It had been a day since the latest threat to Donghae’s body if Zhou Mi wasn’t returned, and Kyuhyun was tired. He knocked on the door.
Sir James looked jovial when Kyuhyun was shown in by a butler, sitting on a love seat in a French Provincial themed room. Kyuhyun hated how he knew this stuff now, because of Zhou Mi and his interest in interior decorating. “Ah, Mr. Cho. How pleasant to see you again.”
“I’ll buy him,” Kyuhyun said, standing with Shindong and Kangin flanking him. He saw Kangin reach down from the corner of his eye and itch at his leg where a bandana was tied.
Sir James put down his cup of tea and waved a hand carelessly. “Now, I couldn’t possibly have any idea what you mean.”
Kyuhyun gritted his teeth, and then lounged backwards, affecting nonchalance. “Right. Of course. However, if you did happen to have the papers of a certain young slave boy that went missing a few months ago, theoretically of course, you would be willing to sell them, correct?”
Sir James’ moustache quivered above his smile. “Incorrect.”
Kyuhyun sighed, a little surprised but not much. He looked back at Kangin and the sky sailor immediately headed towards the desk, tearing out the drawers and emptying them on the couch. Shindong started sorting through them, ignoring Sir James’ shouts of protest and for his guards. “They won’t come. They’re being investigated about an assault that took place outside of my house a few Sundays ago.”
Sir James sat down slowly. “So, this is what it comes down to. You’re going to steal the boy.”
Kyuhyun managed a humourless twist of his lips. “No.”
Sir James stared and then started chuckling. “Of course. This is all theoretical.”
Kyuhyun shifted, nodded a thanks to Shindong when he placed a wad of papers titled Ownership of Live Good #3478 and a key in his hand, and met Sir James’ eyes. “No. That’s not why.”
He walked out of the room, nodded politely to the butler and flagged down a carriage. Kangin and Shindong started walking back towards the docks. He said, before the carriage left, “Heechul’s got your money, come find me tomorrow if he’s wasted it away on those exotic dancers.”
He took a deep breath inside the carriage, sandalwood and cheap fabric, and when they reached home, he’d almost stopped himself from shaking. Almost.
They were both in the kitchen, laughing over an article in the paper and eating sundried tomatoes. Kyuhyun opened the door further and just stood for a moment, wondering if this would be the last time he would see this. Then he moved forward and cleared his throat.
They looked up and Donghae went, “Hey, Kyuhyun, look at this right, some kid found a funny veg -”
“Later.” He almost winced, because he hadn’t meant for it to sound that brisk and Donghae frowned and started taking closer notice. “I’ve got something for Zhou Mi.”
Zhou Mi’s eyes were wary, hand reaching out as though Kyuhyun was going to drop something disgusting in it. But when Kyuhyun placed the copies of the ownership onto the palm, it shifted into something confused and then something relieved and then Kyuhyun couldn’t see anymore because he was wrapped in a hug and Zhou Mi’s face was buried in his shoulder.
“You’re. This is yours now. You can leave if you want.” Kyuhyun’s voice was vaguely muffled, because of the fabric in his way and the panic in his throat constricting his words.
Zhou Mi tightened his grip and said, “Do you want me to go?”
Donghae said, “Don’t be daft,” at the same time Kyuhyun murmured, “No,” and thought never.
Later Donghae said to him, “You actually doubted us?” Like it was the most incredulous thing in the world, and Kyuhyun felt like a twat. He just shrugged and Donghae said, “You’re lucky you give good head, because fucking hell, with a brain like yours, you’re not going very far.” Kyuhyun laughed weakly and pushed him away. Zhou Mi’s neck looked cleaner without the collar.
---
Zhou Mi was outside in the garden for the first time in four months. It was sunset and his wings were soft orange and amber. Kyuhyun couldn’t feel less deserving. He had raised the issue of slavery today at work, and felt like he made barely a dent in the age old traditions of men who were too tight to pay a pittance for a servant. There was a sound at the garden door and Zhou Mi turned his head towards it, sunlight sliding over the planes of his face and battling with shadow.
For a second, Kyuhyun was worried he’d never be good enough. And then Donghae was knocking into him from behind and Zhou Mi was smiling, that beautiful bright and unrestrained smile, and he was being pulled towards it. His feet moved and his heart stuttered, and he thought he’d always be stuck on this, the feeling of Donghae’s arms around his waist and the force of that smile aimed at him, beautiful and sweet when it curved into a kiss.
Pairing: qmihae
Rating: r
Summary: [steampunk] Kyuhyun’s living a perfectly ordinary, strings-free life with Donghae until the slave boy Zhou Mi comes into their care. The problem? Zhou Mi has wings.
It was a fucked up world he lived in.
Kyuhyun swung one leg over the other and tapped his fingers against the wooden arm of his chair. The meeting had been in full swing for three hours now and he still didn’t know why he bothered coming to these things anymore or why he even ran for office, when he knew it would just be the same problems debated year in and year out. The economy, if the sterling was up or down, the slave trade, sky ship tax, the Americas and whether they’d keep on bowing in obedience. It was repetitive. It was boring.
It was fucked up that he should have to sit here while grown men debated over whether or not it was ethical to attach wings to slave boys and girls.
When the meeting finished, he sprung out of his chair and headed for the oak doors, the footmen only just turning the handles as he reached them. His coat tails flew out behind him as he ran down the stairs and headed for the carriages. Home was forty minutes away, a town house with a painted lobby ceiling that his sister had picked out when he had said he needed a house in the city, and a Donghae Lee who had somehow just ended up there one day after visiting from the country and never going back.
The canary by the door announced his arrival to the empty house. He strolled into the parlour, shrugging his coat off and walking towards his writing desk when lowered voices caught his attention. They were coming from the kitchen, so he headed towards it, grinning at the thought of finding Donghae with one of his many paramours. The door creaked as he opened it so when he looked inside, two boys were already staring at him curiously.
And then his jaw dropped because - fucking holy mother of Jesus.
Wings.
---
The slave boy had soup on his cheek. It was bugging Kyuhyun, more for the fact that it was his soup and the boy was in his kitchen with his Donghae than anything else. Also it was bright orange soup and the boy’s skin was so white that it was kind of jarring. He cast his eyes away and settled his head on a hand, sighing slightly.
Donghae had found him on the kitchen doorstep apparently, eating the scraps of meat he left out for the neighbourhood cats. He’d thought Zhou Mi’s wings were some kind of cloak until he got him into the light of the kitchen, and then he’d not been able to let something ‘so pretty, Kyuhyun, look at how they sparkle!’ leave the house until Kyuhyun had seen them.
The wings were pretty, Kyuhyun had to admit, gems inlaid down the small nubs of bone and flesh and feather, breaking out from his back. Pure white but only reaching maybe four foot in breadth. Kyuhyun did some calculations in his head and knew that Zhou Mi would never fly. There was no way such a small wingspan could carry the weight of a human, let alone one as tall and toned as Zhou Mi. Just pretty decorations. He wondered what was worse, having wings, or having wings and not even being able to fly with them.
“- right, Kyuhyun?”
“Huh?” He zoned back into the conversation, looking over at the two boys sitting at the kitchen table wearing identical mega-watt grins.
“He can stay here, right?” Donghae’s grin grew wider and his hand reached for Kyuhyun’s arm, patting it.
Kyuhyun stared back. He couldn’t be serious. For one, he was blatantly against the slave trade, even if he had never made any speeches or rallies to that effect, and having one stay at his house would considerably undermine any authority he had on the subject. For another, Donghae wrote children’s books, which, while it kept the rent paid, was hardly enough to support another body. Even if that wasn’t enough, the gems inlaid down the nubs of his wings and the collar bearing Sir James’ insignia clearly showed that Zhou Mi had another owner.
He turned his eyes to the slave boy. “What about your master?”
Zhou Mi grinned big and wide, slightly desperate at the edges and Kyuhyun almost wanted to close his eyes against it. “I don’t have one.”
Donghae whistled loud and clear and then clapped his hands. “Well, if that’s settled -”
Kyuhyun’s voice cut through. “What about the collar around your neck?”
The slave boy shrugged and the wings rustled with him. He winced suddenly, as though the weight of the wings hadn’t entirely sunk in yet, and Kyuhyun noticed him hunched close to the table, and his arms shaking with effort as he moved his hands to fold together on the table. “I found it on the street, thought it looked pretty.”
It was a flimsy excuse, pretty much a parody of an excuse, really. Kyuhyun looked at the smudge of soup and the way his wrists looked too thin. The screech of the chair’s legs against the kitchen flagstones gave his exit a more dramatic edge than he wished, but he carried on anyway. “Fine. Donghae will show you to your room. You’ll have to pay your way eventually, so start looking into that.”
He tried not to think about it as he penned a letter to his father and sister, and then turned in early. His bed was soft, goose feather and silk. He wondered what Zhou Mi had been sleeping on before he came here, how desperate a man would have to be to scavenge day old scraps of meat from a cat’s bowl. He thought about the dark shadows of bruises he had seen around his arms when he lifted them to take another mouthful of soup, the careful measured way he ate that made it seem like he was holding himself back. He dreamt of feathers and moonlight and flying over stacks of hay and a checkerboard ocean.
---
“I have no idea what you mean, Sir James.”
The man’s stomach was rotund and covered in a gold and red waistcoat embroidered with dragons. Kyuhyun lifted his eyes from a straining button and shifted his expression from blank into bored. “My men saw him go into your house, Mr Cho. Now, I am a reasonable man and no one could ever accuse me of abusing my... employees.” Kyuhyun’s mouth twisted at the corner. “So I fully expect him to be back at my house tonight. I will not tolerate this any longer.” His walrus moustache bristled with righteous indignation.
Kyuhyun shifted his weight and eyed the man wearily. “I’m afraid you must be mistaken. I have no slaves staying with me at this period in time. In fact, I employ a cook. That is all. There has certainly been no one staying with me matching your description. And may I remind you that the legislature concerning wings attached to people has yet to be passed, so what you have just,” Kyuhyun coughed into his fist, juggling to keep his papers in one arm, “confided in me could actually land you in prison.” He waited awhile, let his words sink in. “Good day.”
When he got home, he did his paperwork in the laundry room, where the machines worked around him and where it smelled like lavender laundry detergent. The steam from the machines made the air muggy and his hair curl, but it reminded him of home.
Donghae was wearing goggles when he emerged. Kyuhyun pulled back the soft leather and let the thick glass thunk against his skull. Donghae scowled. “Wow, for someone so airheaded, it actually sounded like you have a brain in there.”
Donghae flicked Kyuhyun’s nose. “Shut up, you love me, when did you stop worshipping the ground I walked on?” Donghae turned to Zhou Mi, curled up in a couch corner and moving his mouth along with the words, frowning slightly. “Seriously, Zhou Mi, he used to follow me around like a puppy dog when we were younger, always insisting that we play cops and robbers and then never being able to go on a team opposing me. Cutest thing you ever saw.”
Kyuhyun kicked Donghae’s ankle as he sat down on the other side of the couch. Zhou Mi’s eyes flicked up warily, and he drew his feet in closer. Kyuhyun suddenly felt awkward.
Donghae was playing with a mini train kit on the floor, tiny railways spread over the expensive rug imported from India. He placed a little figurine by a water cooler, precariously balanced on stick-thin scaffolding, and then set the train going. Kyuhyun watched it as it rattled past his bookcase, the fireplace, the sofa seating him and Zhou Mi, and then the water cooler. He watched with detached resignation as the sudden disturbance of air was too much for the scaffolding, and it folded under itself, little stick legs breaking. The figurine ended up face down in water.
Kyuhyun lifted his eyes to Donghae’s. Donghae held the gaze for a sheepish moment and then snapped the goggles over his eyes, grinning weakly and making an excuse about having a date.
Two pairs of eyes watched as he left the room, and then settled back on the disarray of the broken train set.
There was the sound of movement from his left and Kyuhyun looked over to see the slave boy grabbing a cloth from the side and trying to mop up the mess, placing the broken pieces in delicate little piles. Kyuhyun raised an eyebrow.
“What are you doing?”
Zhou Mi looked up startled. “Uh. Cleaning.” He continued to dab at the carpet.
“Don’t. It’s Donghae’s mess, he’ll clear it up.” He watched Zhou Mi’s stricken expression, bottom lip caught between teeth.
“But, uh, cleaning, sir. It’s all I know how to do. Well. That and the, uh, other duties that- I want to pay my way. Sir.” He was earnest and smiling and Kyuhyun noticed a slight cadence to his voice that hadn’t been there before.
“Are you foreign?” He asked, a non sequitur. The boy’s hands stilled.
He nodded and looked a little wan. “Chinese, sir.” The fire crackled behind its grate.
Kyuhyun hummed, thought of the way his people had stormed into Hong Kong and ransacked the place in the name of the Empire. “How old are you?”
“26, sir.” He was two years older than Kyuhyun. He sighed.
“Stop cleaning up his mess, Zhou Mi. And drop the honorific. I’m younger than you, and in my eyes, you’re exactly the same as I am.” This wasn’t strictly true, but the way the Chinese slave suddenly grinned brighter than the flames made it seem worthwhile to tell a white lie. His knees cracked as he got up from the floor and he stumbled a little bit, as though his balance still wasn’t used to such an extra weight on his body. The wings glowed amber in the firelight.
The silence settled uncomfortably and Kyuhyun rolled his shoulders, lolling his head onto the back of the couch. He heard Zhou Mi settle himself back on the seat, reading his book again. Eventually the silence grew familiar and Kyuhyun relaxed. He woke up two hours later with his quilt pulled up around his chin and his pillow cold on the back of his neck. He heard his door close and frowned. Donghae would still be out, which left only one person to carry him upstairs. He turned onto his side and tried not to smile.
---
The next day was a Sunday and the bells rung out at six thirty in the morning. It was wintertime and still dark outside, and the floorboards were cold where his feet touched them. He wondered how much of his clothing Zhou Mi had removed last night and then figured that in his line of work, he would have seen plenty of naked male bodies.
He wasn’t sure if that was supposed to make him feel better or worse.
He supposed, as he got dressed in his best suit, that it was the sexual aspect of the slave trade that he hated the most. He figured that a house and some food was enough repayment for the simple act of keeping the house clean, but couldn’t justify making someone bend over and give themselves completely. An image of Zhou Mi’s smile flashed into his head, frayed at the edges and just too wide to be natural. He couldn’t justify that kind of damage.
The buttons of his waistcoat were small and fiddly and it took him a few moments to do them up. Pocketing the silver wind-up watch, he opened his door and was one step away from the stairs when he heard the door down the end of the hall open. He looked over and had to bite his lip to keep from gasping. Zhou Mi looked pale, drawn and terrified.
He opened his mouth to say something but Zhou Mi caught his eye, started and then pasted a strained smile over his features.
“Morning, s- Kyuhyun.”
He slipped past him to go to the bathroom, and Kyuhyun followed the movement with his eyes. He frowned. Stepping backwards, he turned up the hallway and walked towards Zhou Mi’s bedroom. He peered inside, but there was nothing there, just rumpled sheets and an open window. He shrugged, figuring it for a nightmare, and walked into the kitchen.
The cook had the weekend off, and Donghae was trying his hand at cooking. Kyuhyun opened the door just as Donghae exhaled sharply, jerking his hand back. He grinned, but the lingering memory of Zhou Mi made it slightly sick at the edges.
“Hey.”
Donghae turned and grinned, scampering over to give Kyuhyun a hug. He still smelled like last night, perfume, cigarette smoke and saloons. “Hi there sunshine. How are you on this fine, beautiful, unparalleled morning?” Stepping back, he gave Kyuhyun’s hair a ruffle.
Kyuhyun raised an eyebrow but couldn’t help the smile tugging at his lips. He moved to the table and picked up the newspaper, scanning the headlines. “I’m good. I can tell you had a good night last night.”
Donghae hummed an old tune from the opera and for a moment, Kyuhyun felt content, the spitting on the frying pan, the soft sound of Donghae’s voice, the birds outside. He closed his eyes, then opened them again as Donghae continued. “Mm, actually, last night was boring, all everyone was talking about was Sir James and his lost slave boy. Big news, apparently.” Kyuhyun nodded, though his heartbeat increased slightly. “What makes me so happy is the sun, your cute little face, and the fact that I found my two favourite boys cuddled together on the sofa last night, fast asleep.”
Kyuhyun coughed on the mouthful of coffee he’d just taken. He dabbed at the spilt drink with a napkin, looking up at Donghae warily afterwards. “Sorry?” The small dip of disappointment in his stomach was excused away as hunger pains.
Donghae clapped his hands gleefully, and then frowned quickly and turned back to the hob. “Uhm,” he said, distracted. “You like crunchy eggs, right?”
Kyuhyun laughed. “I’ve had time to acquire a taste for them.”
Donghae whirled around, frying pan in one hand, spatula in another. “Hey! They’re not always crunchy!”
Kyuhyun was grinning when he said, “If they’re not burnt, they’re raw. Trust me, I prefer them this way.”
The door creaked open and Zhou Mi poked his head in, that same strained smile on his face from earlier. “Morning, Mi!” Donghae grinned, waving the spatula enthusiastically. Kyuhyun dodged the oil spinning off in fat globules.
“Morning.” Zhou Mi pulled a chair from the table and turned it towards the stove. “Do you want me to cook?”
Thirty minutes later they were feasting on bacon, eggs and fried tomatoes and Zhou Mi sat down beside them. Kyuhyun looked over and then frowned, swallowing his mouthful. “Where’s your plate?”
Zhou Mi’s eyebrows almost reached his hairline, before a grin, much better than that sickly thing he was sporting, blasted across his face. “I’ll just, uh, fix myself something.”
Donghae waved a hand from where he had speared his tomato on his fork and was busy examining it in the way a scientist would examine an unusual mechanism. “Good, because if we want to catch morning service, we’re going to have to hurry.”
Kyuhyun watched the lines of Zhou Mi’s back stiffen. “Are we - Are we all going?” He asked as he flicked the gas switch on the stove and lit up a hob. The angles of his face burnt orange, and Kyuhyun’s attention shifted to the wings, mind flashbacking to last night. They were looking dirty, and Kyuhyun wondered how you would reach around them to wash.
Donghae was busy slathering butter on toast so Kyuhyun answered for him. “Yes. Do you,” he coughed, “Do you want to go?”
Zhou Mi turned around and it was back, that smile Kyuhyun hated so much. “If you wish.” He could see him physically restraining himself from saying ‘sir.’
Donghae caught Kyuhyun’s eyes, the gaze serious and thoughtful. Kyuhyun returned it, then, laying down his knife and fork, said, “Actually, it would probably be better if you didn’t go. Sir James’ men are on the lookout for you, who knows what will happen. Stay at home and don’t answer the door for anyone, okay? The canary will sing if me or Donghae turn up, but other than that, you stay in here.” Zhou Mi was nodding and Donghae was smiling softly as he bit into the toast.
They left twenty minutes later, as dawn broke over the city and made silhouettes out of spires and turrets, weathervanes and chimneys. Donghae fiddled with the top hat and scowled, announcing in annoyance, “I wish I had worn my goggles.”
“Sunday best, Donghae.”
The absent answer was met with derision. “Once upon a time you would have run back to get me those goggles. Once upon a time, Kyuhyun Cho, you were a fun little lad, just a whip of a boy, who would kiss me in fields and tree houses and over the table at your sister’s tea parties.” Donghae clasped his hands by his head, looking wistful, and then cast them down and scowled again. “But you haven’t kissed me for weeks, you arse.”
Kyuhyun grinned, grabbed Donghae wrist and pulled him close in the street. A horse and carriage thundered past as Kyuhyun leant closer, lips brushing skin as he moved and whispered, “You’re such an attention whore.”
Donghae’s hand moved from where it was grabbing his forearm to the stray curls of hair at the nape of his neck. “You love it,” he whispered back, eyes fluttering.
Kyuhyun smiled against his lips, and kissed him deep and sweet. “Something like that.”
Donghae’s hand went to his hat as he opened his eyes, and grinned. “So, Zhou Mi.” And Kyuhyun stepped back, rolling his eyes. They walked in step to the Cathedral. “Why do you think he’s so scared of church?”
Kyuhyun bit his lip, still tingling from Donghae. “He’s scared they’ll take one look at his wings and ship him off to the Vatican?”
Donghae hummed. “You know, I didn’t even think of that.”
“Shocking.” He guided Donghae around a puddle and wondered, not for the first time, why Donghae could only focus on one thing. Then he remembered nights of being the only object of that focus, and shivered.
Donghae carried on as though he hadn’t heard him. “I think it’s something to do with that James fellow.” Kyuhyun smiled at the informal way he spoke about Sir James. Donghae had never been that hung up on status or hierarchies.
“Oh?” he said to prod his friend along.
Donghae was frowning under his top hat, and the sunrise caught the plane of cheek and the dip of his lips. Kyuhyun felt something twist in his stomach. “Well, we all know why men like James buy pretty little slave boys like Zhou Mi, and it’s not because they make a spiffing fried breakfast.”
“Did you actually just say ‘spiffing’?”
“Yes. It’s called expanding your vocabulary. Try it.” Kyuhyun could only laugh. “Anyway, like I was saying. Sir James was the first son so he never really got a choice as to what he would do, you know? But word around the town is that Sir James is one of those deeply religious men who feel the rapture whenever he so much as says the word God, and that he once tried to bribe his brother into swapping places with him. But his brother’s now a bishop and we all know how much money they make.” Kyuhyun nodded. “Anyway, I was talking to Sooyoung last night and she was saying how the men down the Market had been talking about Sir James a few weeks before, about how he was wanting a boy with wings, or the technology to give a boy wings. Well, as dumb as most of the slave traders are, none of them were willing to be illegal, and they just gave him the technology.”
“What’s your point, Donghae?”
Donghae cast him an exasperated look as they walked through the large oak doors and found a pew. They slid along the wooden bench and Donghae leaned in closer to whisper in his ear. “Come on, religious fanatic gives his slave boy, who performs unsavoury duties, wings. What does that say to you?”
Kyuhyun looked at Donghae’s eyes, uncomfortably close to him. “Oh.”
“Yeah. No wonder the poor thing’s worried about this place. The very thought of God probably brings back images of nights spent with that fat heathen.”
They rose for the first hymn.
---
Zhou Mi was curled up on the couch when the first lot of men pounded at the door. He pulled a cushion over his ears and counted the pieces of railway that hadn’t been picked up.
---
The bishop had decided to go back to basics and start with Genesis. Kyuhyun listened to words saying they were all made in God’s image and of clay, and wondered what Zhou Mi was made of.
---
The third time they came around they started battering the door and Zhou Mi gave up on colour coordinating the books and wandered downstairs into the laundry room. He tried to wedge himself in a small space between the wall and a machine, but his wings were too big.
He bit his lip and counted backwards from a hundred.
---
The service ended with the usual fanfare and Kyuhyun and Donghae managed to get out with only five handshakes and a couple dozen nods across pews and musty tapestries. They walked home talking about how Mrs Lawly was getting even more touchy-feely now that her husband had passed on to ‘the Good Lord’ and how her twitch was as disconcerting as ever. Donghae noticed the men first.
“Hey!” He shouted, in the middle of laughing, stopping abruptly in the street and then running off down cobbles and straight through puddles. “Hey, what the hell! What are you doing? Get the hell off of our door!”
Kyuhyun blinked and then ran after him, not knowing if he was going to try to pull Donghae off of the big burly men attempting to use their shoulders as battery rams, or join in. He saw his fist take a swing at some guy’s face and mentally shrugged. He guessed his body was making the decision for him. It was a furious couple of seconds, and he ended up with a bruise on his spine from where someone shoved him into an elbow, and a broken lip from where someone had shoved a fist into his face, but they left eventually when they realised who they were.
Kyuhyun caught hold of Donghae’s jacket so he couldn’t run after them, and dabbed at his lip with a sleeve. The cufflink was cold against the heated skin. “Well.”
Donghae laughed, short and high. The canary sang inside and they waited for the door to open.
---
Zhou Mi was on 23 when the canary started singing, and it took him five seconds to realise what it was, in amidst his own brain and the clanking and hissing of the machinery. He plastered on a smile as he stumbled up the stairs, the wings still making it hard to walk. He wondered when their weight would be normal and when the knot of muscle in his back would go away. He also wondered if it would be terribly improper to ask one of the two men if they could help him wash, and decided that if he was going to try either of them it would be Donghae. There was something intimidating about Kyuhyun.
He opened the door and the canary started another bar. Blinking as he took in their dishevelled appearance, he asked, “What happened to you?”
Donghae shrugged, eyes bright, one now black from a sock to the eye. “There was this rhinoceros, dastardly thing.”
Kyuhyun’s lips were upturned when he said, “Knocked down two stalls back down Church Street, you wouldn’t believe the uproar.”
“A woman offered me her comely daughter if I caught the beast, but to be honest, I caught sight of the daughter, and I’d rather marry the beast.”
Zhou Mi was laughing even though blood was crimson on Kyuhyun’s lips and Donghae looked like he was swaying on the spot. He stepped back and the two young men walked inside, heading for the kitchen. “Do we have any steaks in the larder, Kyuhyun?”
There was an exasperated noise. “Right. Ask the only one here who didn’t try their hand at cooking this morning.”
Zhou Mi spoke as he watched morning light stream through the kitchen window and hit Kyuhyun’s lips as they stretched into a smile. “We have a couple.” He wondered, suddenly, if it was okay to say ‘we’.
Kyuhyun was dabbing at his lip with a cloth and spoke vaguely, “Don’t suppose you could get one for Donghae, could you? Nasty hit to his eye.”
“Blasted beast.”
“Spiffing right hook, though.” Donghae laughed, long and loud and Zhou Mi saw the first proper grin on Kyuhyun’s face that he’d been privy to as he emerged from the larder, steak in hand.
He pressed it gently to Donghae’s face, stepping in-between swinging legs while Donghae sat on the table and hummed old nursery rhymes. “You’ve never heard Kyuhyun sing, have you?”
Zhou Mi cast a quick glance to Kyuhyun and saw the man rolling his eyes. “Uh. No?”
Donghae clapped his hands suddenly, making Zhou Mi jump and Donghae reach out to steady him. He blinked at the warm sensation of Donghae’s grip on his forearm and wondered if he should roll his sleeves down. Donghae started tapping his fingers on Zhou Mi’s skin and his feet stopped.
“Kyuhyun! Sing! Sing like the angel you once were.”
His reply was dry. “No.”
Zhou Mi tried not to grin and feel disappointed at the same time. He ended up with a weird amalgamation of the two feelings and a crooked smile on his lips. Donghae paused his tapping for a moment, and Zhou Mi looked up to find Donghae’s one visible eye fixed on his lips. His breath caught and then Donghae was bright and lively again.
“Oh come on, it’s hardly fair! I was graced with it this morning, I don’t see why Mi should miss out.”
Zhou Mi looked over to see Kyuhyun testing his split lip with his tongue, and swallowed against the curl of arousal low in his stomach. “My lip’s split. You try singing like that.”
Donghae hummed, and then grinned, leaning forward slightly into Zhou Mi’s personal space. “Back home, Kyuhyun was in the church choir.” There was an answering groan from where Kyuhyun was leant against the stove. Zhou Mi bit back a grin. “The priest was constantly telling his parents he should be a eunuch.” Zhou Mi burst out laughing and Donghae’s one visible eye widened and then crinkled into a smile.
Kyuhyun cleared his throat and then said, with quiet aplomb, “Donghae used to think he could talk to animals.” Donghae squawked in indignation and flailed a little on the table. Zhou Mi gently pushed him back when he looked like he was in danger of falling off.
Zhou Mi said, quietly, “I used to sing in a choir.” He smiled at Kyuhyun, got a small answering upturn of lips.
Donghae said, matter-of-factly, “I bet you didn’t get chucked out for looking up the organ player’s skirt.”
“Donghae!”
---
They were back in the parlour, Donghae commandeering the study to write some more of his latest book. Zhou Mi had yet another book out that he was trying to read when Kyuhyun decided to broach the subject.
“When did you get them?”
Dark eyes glanced down at him from the sofa, and Kyuhyun played with tufts of weaved carpet, warming his hands against the fire.
“The wings?”
Kyuhyun snorted. “No, your stunning good looks.” He tossed a grin over his shoulder to show that was a joke, and Zhou Mi relaxed a fraction. It was only a fraction but it was there, and it was a little closer to how he was when Donghae was nearby.
“About three weeks ago.” The smile was wan.
Kyuhyun hummed, ran his tongue along his lips and tasted copper. He pulled a face and looked up to see Zhou Mi watching him. He blinked, carried on regardless. “Did it hurt?”
Zhou Mi closed the book, a finger trapped between pages to go back to later. “I guess. They gave me an injection, and then cut the skin there. I don’t know the science of it, but I started growing bone from the cuts, and when the bone reached a reasonable length, the rest of the wings were attached. The feathers and most of the bone’s artificial, just metal covered in white porcelain. The gems hurt the most going in, since they’re in some of my skin as well as the bone. But. I’ve had worse things.” He blinked and then suddenly seemed to regret what he’d said, hurriedly adding, “Not that I’m complaining, I’m a slave, I know that it’s -”
Kyuhyun cut him off. “Are they bothersome?” He knew the science behind the injections. There was a gene in the body’s DNA that was switched off or on, depending on whether there was the need for new bone to be grown. The injection switched that gene on, and it responded to the wounds that the men then caused, bone cells instead of plasma and white blood cells rushing to the scene.
Zhou Mi shrugged and the wings rustled behind him. “Sometimes. I can’t sleep on my back, wash properly, lean back against sofas like this. But, no, not really.” There was something wistful in the small smile he offered. “It’s kind of disappointing, to have wings but not be able to use them.” Obviously the wings didn’t contain nerve endings, and Zhou Mi effectively had no control over them. If he wanted them unfurled, someone would have to do it manually.
“You can’t wash properly?” Zhou Mi started and a light blush dusted his cheeks.
“Well. Uh. They’re hard to manoeuvre around.” He muttered, finger feeling numb from holding his place in the book.
Kyuhyun fell back against the rug and looked up at Zhou Mi. “I can help you with that, if you want.”
Zhou Mi’s mouth went dry. “Sorry?”
Kyuhyun coughed and he looked away, almost embarrassed. “Well, where is it that you can’t reach?” He frowned. “Why are my books in little piles?”
“I was colour coordinating them,” he said, inattentively. “In between my shoulder blades, I guess?” He was frowning.
Kyuhyun said brightly, “Well, that’s no trouble. Heat some water and take your top off, I’ll clean you now.” There was a pause. “Colour coordinating them?”
“Uh.”
Kyuhyun was already heading towards the door, and Zhou Mi followed him with helpless eyes, marking the page in the book by turning down the corner and placing it on his seat. Kyuhyun was staring at the knobs on the stove as though he didn’t know how to use them, and, Zhou Mi surmised, he probably didn’t. He leant over the man to turn the gas on, and flicked the flames to life. Kyuhyun made a soft sound of amusement, and then turned around, almost bumping noses with Zhou Mi.
“So! Shirt.”
Zhou Mi hesitated, and then said, “I’ll need your help getting it off. The rips in the back get caught on feathers.” There was a pause and Kyuhyun’s lips tightened, and then he was smiling, forced cheer.
“Of course.” He stepped around to the back of Zhou Mi and he wondered how that was worse, not seeing Kyuhyun but feeling him in the disturbance of air around him and the heat from another body.
They worked together, teasing fabric over feathers, and then there was silence on Kyuhyun’s end. Zhou Mi wondered how the wings looked from the back. All he could see from the mirror in the bathroom were small fluffy mountains sprouting from his shoulders. He sucked air in quickly as a soft touch down surprisingly sensitive skin shocked him, and there was an oddly terse voice going, “We should probably put some water on now.”
Zhou Mi moved to do so, and they waited fifteen minutes for the water to heat up, opposite sides of the kitchen table. “Was he a bastard to you?” Kyuhyun seemed to be on a roll with probing questions popping out of nowhere.
Zhou Mi grinned. “I’ve had worse?”
Kyuhyun frowned and picked imaginary fluffy off of his shirt. His expression cleared and he started rolling his shirt up to his elbows. “Well. That won’t happen again.”
Zhou Mi’s breath froze in his chest, and he started coughing, body bent over and, shit he really wasn’t used to the wings’ weight. “Sorry?”
Kyuhyun passed him to get the water, and Zhou Mi got a gust of the scent of musty books and ink. He imagined scripture written across Kyuhyun’s body and then felt physically sick, a reminder of Sir James springing images to the forefront of his mind. “Well, you’re here now. There’ll be no more of that kind of business.” The sound of the water trickling into a bowl was strangely calming and he felt some part of him relax.
“He still has my papers.” The ‘sir’ was bitten back on reflex.
He watched as Kyuhyun pressed a small cloth into the water and then wrung it ‘til it was only damp. “Not for long.” The press of something warm to the sensitive nerve endings sent a warm rush of pleasure over his body and he felt his eyes drift close.
“Oh.” He managed faintly, and there was a soft snorting sound behind him, as though Kyuhyun was laughing at him.
He ignored it for the feeling of deft fingers trailing over the definition of his rib bones, knuckles bumping over the ridges in his spine, and a soft, warm cloth washing away the last traces of his owner.
---
It took a while before Zhou Mi became comfortable with them, long enough that Kyuhyun let him clean when he could and was considering firing the cook, long enough that Donghae no longer gave them weird looks when he walked in on Kyuhyun sponging away dirt from his wings or his back.
Being comfortable didn’t mean knowing how to react on opening the door to Kyuhyun licking a stripe down Donghae’s throat, didn’t mean he knew what to do with the image of Donghae looking utterly wrecked, bitten red lips, tousled hair and pupils blown, hands grasping for a purchase on the stove and clicking gas off and on and off again. It didn’t mean he knew what do when he found himself hard inside his breeches, and the image of Kyuhyun’s dark eyes and the strong lines of his back wouldn’t leave him alone.
---
Kyuhyun’s quill skidded across the page when Zhou Mi suddenly, and shrilly, screamed like a little girl. He looked up, levelling a glare at the man. He took a moment to admire the view, new clothes that Zhou Mi had bought without their fashion guidance fitting just a tad too tightly to his body to be decent and his pose making for a very compelling argument for why Kyuhyun’s Gaze Should Never Leave These Thighs. And then Zhou Mi shrieked again and Kyuhyun threw his quill down, lamenting in his head that the whole letter would have to be rewritten now, a long thick black line streaking through the entire first half of the page.
“What are you doing? You’re not playing that game again, are you?” Last week Donghae had come back from a saloon, bottle in hand, and proceeded to get Zhou Mi completely smashed, resulting in a game where they shouted various profanities at a higher decibel than the other.
Zhou Mi looked like he might be scowling under the mask of fear. “No.” He shifted away from the corner of the couch, peering over the edge.
“Then what, pray tell, is it? Pansy.”
Zhou Mi glared back, and looked like he might retort (which in itself would be hilarious, because Zhou Mi hadn’t quite got the hand of insults yet, and tended to say things like ‘rose picker’ or ‘porridge lover’ with as much vehemence as a man of the cloth would say ‘sinner’), but then he drew in a quick breath and toppled back against the padded back of the sofa. “There is a mouse! In this room!”
Kyuhyun stared. “You are joking, right?”
Zhou Mi looked at him, all indignant anger and irrational fear, and Kyuhyun felt the side of his mouth twitch up.
“Stop laughing at me, this is entirely reasonable!”
Kyuhyun lowered himself to his knees and tried to look under the couch. “It’s about as reasonable as that rose-patterned shirt you bought.”
Zhou Mi looked crushed when Kyuhyun raised his eyes. “I thought you liked that shirt?”
Kyuhyun blinked and felt stupidly guilty for a second. “I do. I love that shirt.” He left the unspoken for a girl in his head.
Zhou Mi’s face brightened, and then dissolved into horror again just as Kyuhyun clocked a grey blur from the corner of his eye. “Blimey, fast little bugger, isn’t she?”
Donghae’s voice came from the door. “What’s this? Kyuhyun on his knees for Zhou Mi? I thought I’d only see that in my dreams.” Kyuhyun flushed a little and walked on his knees to the coal bucket, face away from Zhou Mi. The squawk from Donghae and the soft thud told Kyuhyun that Zhou Mi had thrown something at him, possibly a cushion. He shrugged his jacket off, placed it over a quivering grey lump and lifted it up to show to the room at large.
Zhou Mi blinked at him. Kyuhyun looked back, unimpressed. Donghae whistled. “Wow. Well done, Kyuhyun. You caught a jacket.” They both gave him a look. He sighed. “Well hey, don’t welcome me home all at once now.”
Some moments later, Zhou Mi was crowding around a saucepan, complete with an old cuddly toy that Kyuhyun claimed must have found its own way into his luggage when he was moving here, and some cheese shavings. The mouse was tucked into his chest, courtesy of his arm and a finger gently lulling the little rodent into complacency.
Kyuhyun wrinkled his nose from where he stood by the door. Donghae caught the look and grinned. “Oh come on, look at him. He’s as happy as Larry.”
“I never understood that phrase.”
“You’ve never met Larry.” Kyuhyun turned a dry look on Donghae. He grinned back, unrepentant.
Kyuhyun folded his arms. “Still.”
Donghae huffed a sigh and wrapped an arm around Kyuhyun’s waist. “Look at him. He just needed something to love.” Kyuhyun couldn’t help the stray could have loved me. He switched his expression to blank a second too late and Donghae’s eyes widened, startled. “Oh, you are kidding me.”
“Don’t.” He pushed Donghae’s grip off and turned to walk down the hallway.
“What? Why? This could be beautiful.” Kyuhyun rolled his eyes and reached for his coat. Donghae moved in front, and Kyuhyun could see two mini-hims in the goggles. He looked to the side.
“What?” He said, sullen, and for a moment he thought Donghae would laugh at him, and make some comment about how that was more like the boy he used to know, holed up in his bedroom playing board games and mastering chess.
Donghae’s grin was blinding. “What do you mean, ‘what’? You haven’t seen the way he looks at you? It’s, god, it’s intoxicating, all respect and affection and at times, pure lust. You’ve seen it, right?”
Kyuhyun closed his eyes and rocked back on his heels. He hadn’t. Sometimes he got so caught up in politics, in his sky shipping business, in himself that he forgot to look at the people around him, even the ones with wings.
Donghae was looking at him when he opened his eyes, a small bit scornful and a lot amused. “You are a blind idiot sometimes.”
Kyuhyun gave a weak shoulder shrug. Donghae adjusted his goggles, gave Kyuhyun’s hair a quick ruffle and said, “So go get him.” And smiled.
Kyuhyun frowned. Donghae looked blank. “What?”
“You don’t think I’m doing this alone, do you?” His fingers formed a loose circle around Donghae’s wrist and pulled him close. Donghae’s eyes dropped to Kyuhyun’s lips, flicked back up again.
“Oh.” His voice was lower than before.
---
Donghae had insisted that Kyuhyun be the one to initiate something, and that was how Kyuhyun found himself with Zhou Mi’s mouth opening under his, his tongue a slow drag against Kyuhyun’s. He shuddered, reached up to get a hold of Zhou Mi’s hair and licked into his mouth, moaning when Zhou Mi sucked on his tongue and pleasure made him heady.
It hadn’t exactly been the way Kyuhyun had wanted it to go; he’d expected maybe a cup of tea, some casual chat, getting to the point and then some easy persuading, maybe with a blowjob on Zhou Mi’s part. Instead Zhou Mi had been cooing over the mouse in the saucepan and turned to Kyuhyun to say something, and instinct had just taken over.
He shifted, placed his thigh in-between Zhou Mi’s and grinned when the mouth under his went slack at the slight friction against his groin. A hand slipped to his hip to steady him, and Kyuhyun felt his heart clench a little at the gesture. He pulled back.
His hand was still in Zhou Mi’s hair, and the mixture of that and Zhou Mi’s red lips and flushed cheeks almost made him pull him closer. Instead he bit his lip and ignored the twist of his stomach as Zhou Mi’s eyes tracked the movement. “There’s something I’ve got to tell you.” He started cursing himself for being so cliché but was distracted by the way shock and guilt flitted across Zhou Mi’s expression as he started to back away. Kyuhyun hooked an ankle round Zhou Mi’s and said, maybe more strongly than he intended, “No.” He slipped his hand down to Zhou Mi’s hip, reminded of the warm weight of Zhou Mi’s hand, and pushed up his shirt a touch, rubbing with his thumb at the skin there. He was too close to miss the way Zhou Mi’s breath caught. “It’s not, well, it could be - just.” He sighed, and looked up, tried to start again.
“Donghae.” Zhou Mi said, and it wasn’t a question, but it should have been.
Kyuhyun blinked. “Yes.”
Zhou Mi gulped and stepped out of the neat embrace Kyuhyun had had him in, sitting down on a kitchen chair instead. Kyuhyun’s hand dropped lamely to his side. “You’re with him.” There was a finality about that that Kyuhyun didn’t like.
“Sort of.” Zhou Mi’s head jerked up. “Donghae’s not really a one person kind of boy. He likes to have his fun, he likes to go out and see someone he likes and not worry about bringing them home.” He stopped when Zhou Mi opened his mouth.
“You deserve better than that.” And really, Kyuhyun reasoned, people shouldn’t be allowed to go around saying statements like that.
Kyuhyun shrugged, smiled crooked. “Donghae’s who he is, I love him like that. But, you see. I want you.” He paused, breathed past the lump in his chest. “So does he.” He moved closer, sitting on a chair beside Zhou Mi’s. “We both do. Together. Want you, that is.” He swallowed and looked up, taking in Zhou Mi’s shocked expression.
“What?”
Kyuhyun sighed, stood up suddenly and then sat down in one fluid movement, a leg swinging over Zhou Mi’s, and then the other settling comfortably on the other side of his thighs, bracketing him in. He kissed him, sweet and heavy, felt their chests knocking together and the wet, hot slide of their mouths as it became not enough friction. He rocked forward and watched as Zhou Mi broke away with a hiss of pleasure. “We want you, like this.” He rocked forward again, bit his lip as his eyes fluttered closed at the sensation. “I want to do this,” and he slid a hand down to Zhou Mi’s inner thigh and squeezed, “with him watching.” Zhou Mi blinked drowsily up at him and Kyuhyun smiled as he bent down to lick at his lips, as he moved to whisper in his ear, “I want to suck you off while he takes me from behind, want you to fuck my mouth while you -” He was broken off when Zhou Mi moved to crush their mouths messily together and push him forward, his hands on Kyuhyun’s cheeks. He shuddered at the sensation and the slight vibration of Zhou Mi saying ‘yes’ against his mouth at every roll of their hips.
---
Kyuhyun was tapping his quill against the table in front of him and wondering whether or not he should offer an opinion on the debate when the air around him shifted, and he looked to the side to see Sir James sitting there.
He looked back to the front and tried to ignore him. The older gentleman leaned forward. “They’ve passed the legislation for wings, you know.” Kyuhyun did know, had been keeping up with that piece of legislation since six foot of man and wing had landed in his kitchen one day. He made a non-committal noise. “So I would like my boy back now.”
Kyuhyun shifted in his seat so he was angled as far away from Sir James as possible. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” He murmured, chin in his hand and speaking through his fingers.
Sir James shifted closer and said, “Is he being good to you? Getting down on his knees and making you feel like God? Are you fucking him into your bedsheets every night?” Kyuhyun bit back the retort on his tongue, stood up and gathered his papers.
“If you say such vile things to me again, you will live to regret it.” It would have been a good parting shot, if Sir James’ hammy fist hadn’t descended upon his arm and the old man hadn’t continued.
“If you are, you know, you’re no better than me. Maybe you don’t have the papers, but he’s hardly a free man, kept up in your pretty little gilded cage. Got yourself a pretty little bird there. Little parakeet.”
Kyuhyun swallowed back sour-tasting saliva and walked away. The words didn’t stay in the room; they followed him out and into the cab, so that when he got home he was a mess of too-straight lines, tension coloured in carefully. Donghae and Zhou Mi were in the living room, Donghae’s hand looped around Zhou Mi’s ankle and rubbing at the bone. Zhou Mi’s eyes were dropping shut and he smiled sleepily at Kyuhyun.
---
The words stuck in his head.
Over a week he couldn’t help but notice that Zhou Mi treated Donghae with a special kind of reverence, soft and unassuming. Kyuhyun didn’t even notice it until he looked for it. Zhou Mi cleaned and cooked and climbed into bed with Kyuhyun sometimes like he didn’t have any choice in the matter. Kyuhyun found himself curling away from Zhou Mi in the morning, found himself uncomfortable in the kitchen when Zhou Mi stood at the stove and hummed old hymns.
When Captain Heechul came back from his voyage for Kyuhyun’s company, he went to the sky port to see if any damages had been done to his ship and then took Kangin and Shindong round to Sir James’ house.
It had been a day since the latest threat to Donghae’s body if Zhou Mi wasn’t returned, and Kyuhyun was tired. He knocked on the door.
Sir James looked jovial when Kyuhyun was shown in by a butler, sitting on a love seat in a French Provincial themed room. Kyuhyun hated how he knew this stuff now, because of Zhou Mi and his interest in interior decorating. “Ah, Mr. Cho. How pleasant to see you again.”
“I’ll buy him,” Kyuhyun said, standing with Shindong and Kangin flanking him. He saw Kangin reach down from the corner of his eye and itch at his leg where a bandana was tied.
Sir James put down his cup of tea and waved a hand carelessly. “Now, I couldn’t possibly have any idea what you mean.”
Kyuhyun gritted his teeth, and then lounged backwards, affecting nonchalance. “Right. Of course. However, if you did happen to have the papers of a certain young slave boy that went missing a few months ago, theoretically of course, you would be willing to sell them, correct?”
Sir James’ moustache quivered above his smile. “Incorrect.”
Kyuhyun sighed, a little surprised but not much. He looked back at Kangin and the sky sailor immediately headed towards the desk, tearing out the drawers and emptying them on the couch. Shindong started sorting through them, ignoring Sir James’ shouts of protest and for his guards. “They won’t come. They’re being investigated about an assault that took place outside of my house a few Sundays ago.”
Sir James sat down slowly. “So, this is what it comes down to. You’re going to steal the boy.”
Kyuhyun managed a humourless twist of his lips. “No.”
Sir James stared and then started chuckling. “Of course. This is all theoretical.”
Kyuhyun shifted, nodded a thanks to Shindong when he placed a wad of papers titled Ownership of Live Good #3478 and a key in his hand, and met Sir James’ eyes. “No. That’s not why.”
He walked out of the room, nodded politely to the butler and flagged down a carriage. Kangin and Shindong started walking back towards the docks. He said, before the carriage left, “Heechul’s got your money, come find me tomorrow if he’s wasted it away on those exotic dancers.”
He took a deep breath inside the carriage, sandalwood and cheap fabric, and when they reached home, he’d almost stopped himself from shaking. Almost.
They were both in the kitchen, laughing over an article in the paper and eating sundried tomatoes. Kyuhyun opened the door further and just stood for a moment, wondering if this would be the last time he would see this. Then he moved forward and cleared his throat.
They looked up and Donghae went, “Hey, Kyuhyun, look at this right, some kid found a funny veg -”
“Later.” He almost winced, because he hadn’t meant for it to sound that brisk and Donghae frowned and started taking closer notice. “I’ve got something for Zhou Mi.”
Zhou Mi’s eyes were wary, hand reaching out as though Kyuhyun was going to drop something disgusting in it. But when Kyuhyun placed the copies of the ownership onto the palm, it shifted into something confused and then something relieved and then Kyuhyun couldn’t see anymore because he was wrapped in a hug and Zhou Mi’s face was buried in his shoulder.
“You’re. This is yours now. You can leave if you want.” Kyuhyun’s voice was vaguely muffled, because of the fabric in his way and the panic in his throat constricting his words.
Zhou Mi tightened his grip and said, “Do you want me to go?”
Donghae said, “Don’t be daft,” at the same time Kyuhyun murmured, “No,” and thought never.
Later Donghae said to him, “You actually doubted us?” Like it was the most incredulous thing in the world, and Kyuhyun felt like a twat. He just shrugged and Donghae said, “You’re lucky you give good head, because fucking hell, with a brain like yours, you’re not going very far.” Kyuhyun laughed weakly and pushed him away. Zhou Mi’s neck looked cleaner without the collar.
---
Zhou Mi was outside in the garden for the first time in four months. It was sunset and his wings were soft orange and amber. Kyuhyun couldn’t feel less deserving. He had raised the issue of slavery today at work, and felt like he made barely a dent in the age old traditions of men who were too tight to pay a pittance for a servant. There was a sound at the garden door and Zhou Mi turned his head towards it, sunlight sliding over the planes of his face and battling with shadow.
For a second, Kyuhyun was worried he’d never be good enough. And then Donghae was knocking into him from behind and Zhou Mi was smiling, that beautiful bright and unrestrained smile, and he was being pulled towards it. His feet moved and his heart stuttered, and he thought he’d always be stuck on this, the feeling of Donghae’s arms around his waist and the force of that smile aimed at him, beautiful and sweet when it curved into a kiss.