Chapter Text
“Is everything ready for tomorrow?” Jimin asks. The courtyard of the palace is empty except for the last of the household staff adjusting draperies and floral arrangements, a shadow of what it will be in a few hours.
“Yes,” Seokjin says, hands clasped behind his back. “Are you ready?”
Jimin flexes his fingers, feels them strain satisfyingly against his calfskin gloves. The metal of the rings on his fingers cuts into his skin. His fingertips tingle with warmth, despite the cold.
He looks around at the stage they have set up for him tomorrow. Darkened paper globes ready for lighting, a makeshift platform near the palace entrance flanked in pleasing symmetry by filigreed braziers, the long table set before it where his family will eat and make merry before everyone who will come to witness his accession.
“Of course,” he says.
“Are you certain you don’t want Eunmi here?” Seokjin asks. His voice is carefully neutral but Jimin was already looking at him, and so he does not miss the tension that pinches his brother’s brow just before he speaks.
Eunmi is the very discreet, very lovely professional that Seokjin wants to hire to stand in as Jimin’s date for tomorrow. It would be laughably unbelievable, of course, as Eunmi is not actually dating Jimin, in fact has never even met Jimin, but the suddenness of it, and her presence as an unknown entity ( not one of us , they would whisper) would be a helpful distraction from the performance that is scheduled to take place.
But it would also be utterly humiliating, and that is something Jimin will not abide. Not yet, anyway. Seokjin thinks she can help.
He will be on the front page tomorrow, no question. His family is the second-largest magical household in Korea after the Jungs, and definitely the most powerful one based in Seoul. Jimin is hoping that the pages will mostly be full of gossip circulated and grievances exchanged amongst this insular, elite crowd of the city’s magical families, because even magicians (perhaps especially) are petty and big-mouthed and love to get wine-drunk. He purposely only invited the most painfully predictable reporters, the ones who were more interested in frivolity and fashion than asking questions like, why have you hid your power from us all these years? and what are your strategic plans for the future?
He exhales, feeling the damp of his breath curl in the air in front of him. Seokjin is still waiting for his answer.
Tomorrow, Jimin will testify before the court of public opinion, show that he has control over his powers, and become a fully-proofed magician. Anticipation is high; he’s always been notoriously reticent about his powers, even as the excesses of his social life are brazenly spilled across the pages every week. Jungkook suggested that people love to hear about him because he’s the most un-magician magician Seoul has. A compliment? Probably not.
Jimin’s not a teenager anymore, though, and popularity contests have had a weightier dimension for a while now. Nobody has a gauge on the desirability of an alliance with him. Speculation: he’s being coy on purpose, his secretiveness a calculated move to counter the trend of unproofed magicians showing off and cementing political marriages before they even come of age.
They’re not wrong; the secrecy is definitely calculated, just not for the reasons everyone else suspects. Having Eunmi here would help it stay a secret. But Jimin is allowed one more night to be his own person, and she would be the symbol that he is anything but.
Jimin thinks he has finally figured out the arithmetic of self-defense: there must be a balance between deflection and truth-telling at precise moments. Give something loud and bright, so you can keep the big, dark secrets safe. The sun is what people will look at, if you point them at the sky; they almost never notice the sky.
Sometimes the best way to keep a secret is to come as close to revealing it as possible.
He looks down at the shadow he casts on the floor, thinks about the things he will never admit to, and says, “I am.”
Jimin’s family does things the old way, so Jimin comes of age not in the shadowed glam of a Hongdae club but on the front steps of Gyeongbokgung Palace, in front of all of Seoul’s magical elite. It’s not often the Blue House opens the royal grounds, let alone for a second son’s testimony in the 21st century. Most other families just book out the Grand Hyatt for the night.
But the old ways don’t fold easily, and also the Grand Hyatt is no longer a premium choice, so Jimin would never . Personally, the royal pomp does very little for him, but this is a game he’s been playing his whole life, so he made sure to make the appropriate facial expressions when they held the press conference announcing the date and venue. The cameras flashed, he smiled, and the tide of public approval turned in his favor. The forums (and probably the boardrooms, too) exploded with questions about royal permissions, royal capitulations, royal exigencies.
As Seokjin would say, all press is good press.
“Jimin.” Seokjin appears behind him now, as unobtrusive as a sliding door. A very lacquered, coiffed sliding door, to be fair. His forehead is veritably glowing. “There you are. Why on earth are you skulking around in the shadows when you should be out there mingling, tinkling, and being your generally effervescent self?”
The cheery admonishment is clear in Seokjin’s voice and Jimin is grateful that some things will always stay the same. “Hi, hyung,” Jimin says. “Just admiring the view. Before, you know. Is Jungkookie down there already?”
Seokjin snorts. “Some view. I can’t believe they were petty enough to begin work the very same week of our request. You can be sure some idiot on Naver will be trending it tomorrow! And yes, he is. He’s very excited. Maybe too excited, really.”
“Ah, that’s Jungkook for you. He’ll be fine. And it doesn’t look half bad, don’t sulk. We shouldn’t sweat the small stuff.”
It’s true; the seneschals did their best with what they could work with, and everything looks pretty enough. Whisky-golden lights are ensconced in lanterns hung up in the trees, illuminating spindly tables with banchan laid out around increasingly opulent culinary centerpieces (octopus, beef shank, whole hog for luck). The old families of Seoul circle around each other warily, like sharks who are more used to spending time alone but have now, with no small amount of reluctance, congregated for an unmissable feast. The new families, the ones with only money for power, crowd together like nervous shrimp. (Actual historical lineage has nothing to do with these designations, of course, just the presence of magical ability, but Jimin was schooled from birth by prideful magicians, and so many of their biases have stuck.)
The animosity is par for the course; Jimin didn’t think hors d’oeuvres and fancy lighting would unite those with magic and those without. What Seokjin is annoyed by is, in the middle distance, the crude plastic blue of Official Site Reconstruction and Conservation covering the entirety of the royal gardens.
(“The whole point was the garden,” their mother said when they got the news that the Palace was so sorry, but they simply had to begin renovations, no exceptions made for anyone. The mantle of eggshell-white lilies of the valley upon her shoulders bloomed and wilted in quick succession, a sure sign of her annoyance. “That little asshole.”
Jimin winced. Magicians did not have a good relationship with the royal family, and the Parks were no exception.
“Funny, I thought it was being able to say fuck you to the prince,” Seokjin joked, except not really, because that was actually true.
Their mother rolled her eyes, but her flowers stilled in bloom. She had a soft spot for her eldest. And he was right.)
“Park Jimin, telling me not to sweat the small stuff?” Seokjin laughs. “Now this is real character development. What next, barefaced coffee runs? Pap shots at 3am?”
Jimin raises a perfectly tweezed eyebrow. “Not all of us have your god-given genes,” he says, and adds when Seokjin preens, “And some of us actually do care about preserving the esteem of our house. Don’t think I didn’t notice you sneak out last week.”
"You wouldn’t have if I actually tried,” Seokjin says cheerfully. “Sneaking, I mean.” He leans against the pillar, the long shape of him as agreeable as anything. It’s something Jimin has always admired about his step-brother — not so much the easy nonchalance with which he moves through the world, but the way he doesn’t even bother hiding the effort behind that affected freedom. The best way to hide is to not, he said sometimes.
Jimin is not sure if that’s nonsense or genius, and he thinks that automatically makes it both.
“You feeling okay?” Seokjin checks, because he has to.
The night is sharp with the first bite of winter. That helps. Physiologically, he doesn’t think it makes any sense. Maybe it’s just a placebo, but the piercing cold does make him feel better. Jimin nods.
They go downstairs after that, because Seokjin hadn’t just come up for a chat, of course. Jimin separates from Seokjin to make his rounds below. The crowd descends immediately with their chameleon questions and toothy insinuations: Winter weddings are so beautiful, aren’t they? Wouldn’t it be nice to have one! His mother looks stunning this evening, but you know what would make her glow even more? A grandchild! Has he had dinner with anyone recently? The latest venture by Chef Soo just opened up in Gangnam, would he like to go?
Maybe, a shrug, an airy who knows?
Jimin knows how to keep his balance.
He smiles at ladies in damask and silk, nods at men who are transparently annoyed by the outsized power he holds in his comparatively small stature, and commits to memory the rare guests who keep their gaze a little too studiously trained on their drinks, who meander just conveniently enough to always skirt the edge his sightline, but not enough to fall out of earshot.
These are the guests who are here because the Parks had to invite them and because they could not turn down an invitation from the Parks; these are the guests who are not here to congratulate. Jimin recognizes most of them: Chan Jiwoo, heiress and Instagram influencer, subtle as a scream and of no ultimate consequence; Kim Jihun, youngest scion of the Kim-Soo fishing empire, with his big shoulders and an even bigger smile to hide all his secrets behind—
Someone across the courtyard catches his eye. It’s a stranger. Jimin blinks. Strangers are rare in their circles. The magical families of Seoul keep close counsel, and one does not just get invited to the testimony of one of their own without becoming a familiar face first. Whether you are invited as friend or foe is one thing, but the principle stands: known entities only.
This stranger is...strange, too. Jimin can’t quite tell what it is. He’s dressed impeccably, dark hair coiffed with just the right amount of fashionable rakishness, but there’s something about the way he’s standing, straight-backed with one hand resting lightly on the table in front of him, that reminds Jimin of a big cat poised to pounce. A big, patient cat in the middle of a cluster of soft-pawed, sniping kittens.
Their eyes meet, and a shiver runs down Jimin’s spine at the look of frank appraisal. The man raises his chin. The barest movement, but Jimin recognizes a challenge when he sees one. His gaze is electric. The back of Jimin’s neck heats up. He turns away to take a breath, to calm down, and the man is gone when he looks again.
Before he can do anything about it, or even process his own reaction, the dinner bell rings out from the dais where his family is seated. White-suited waiters stream in from the sides and begin carving up the giant food centerpieces, fanning gauze-thin slices of fish and honey-braised meat out on low-rimmed platters, garnishing them with pickled radish and onion. Jimin lingers on the floor, perturbed and reluctant to leave before he can get another look at the stranger. To keep their friends and enemies straight, he tells himself, even as he gives up and turns away.
At the family table, steaming hotpot has been laid out and his mother and brother are already knocking back cups of milk-pale soju. Madame Park smooths a manicured hand down his back, and he allows himself to lean into her touch for a second before straightening in his seat. When he scans the crowd below, there is still no sign of the strange man. Jimin wonders if he’d imagined him, and stabs at a rice cake forcefully.
As carefully as possible, Jimin consumes the bite-sized pieces of food on his plate and tries to think about anything other than the task that lies before him. The catty conversation in the crowd had eased him into a false sense of comfort; now, up on the dais with the weight of their eyes on him, he feels awfully exposed. He’s used to people looking at him — but this time they’re looking for something he can’t give. Every time his thoughts start to list into dangerous territory, he can feel his skin heat up. It’s more than nerves, of course. He has to forcibly stop himself from playing with his rings. Control yourself.
Well-wishers come up to congratulate and coo. This is technically not allowed, but fortune favors the bold, right? Or the oblivious. They are a good distraction, regardless, and so are the multiple glasses of ice-cold water he downs.
“Thank you,” Jimin says, as yet another twice-removed cousin of a chaebol’s son yammers and bows in what he suspects is an approximation of flirtation. “I do hope you’re enjoying the food.” The cousin, whose name Jimin does not know, who was in the middle of describing, with utter flaccidity, the new yacht he’d just purchased which he would love for Jimin to see, stutters to a stop, awkward.
Jimin waits. Two seconds later, the cousin scrapes himself away. Stupid; if he’d bothered doing his research, he would have known Jimin can’t swim.
He’s barely taken a breath before someone else steps up. “Pardon my boldness,” the man in front of him starts as he takes a breath to (undoubtedly) say something unpardonably bold, “but I can’t help but wonder, Jimin-ssi, if you have your eye on anyone tonight. It’s just that it’s so unorthodox for one from as prominent a household as yours to be unengaged, up till the testimony, even!” He giggles nervously and casts a significant look at their sparsely populated table of three. No Eunmi in sight. “Perhaps…you’re going to forego a marriage? Like the rest of your family?”
The glittering woman on his arm gasps softly, and swats at her partner with a silver-gloved hand. On their left hands are wedding rings; on their wrists lie matching metal bands with a little starburst dancing in the glass orbs affixed to them, the mark of her modest magic. So it was a marriage of love, too, not just economic advantage. Not unheard of, though rare and unpublicized these days. Some say it proved the strength of both individual commitment as well as the unity of the families. It would certainly cause a lot of chatter, and perhaps cast the spotlight on both their households, for a time. Jimin wonders, not very nicely, if this was a calculated maneuver, and the answer he lands on is ungenerous to say the least.
The lady’s eyes are keen, though, and Jimin doesn’t fail to notice how the background conversation dips slightly. He recognizes her now — third daughter of a minor magician family, married into obscurity to this plain man in a suit. He thinks they might have attended the same kindergarten, long ago. Maybe she had been one of the kids who had been unkind to him.
When he speaks, Jimin ignores the man and speaks to the woman, and makes sure his voice carries.
“Shin Nayeong-ssi, I remember you. It’s good to see you. What an unexpected pleasure after so long.” He doesn’t smile, just tips his head to the side. “To answer your partner’s question, the family takes marriage very seriously, as you know — we must always think about the good of the household. Hasty decisions do no one any good. How sweet that you have such a loving one,” and here he tilts his chin just so, so that she can see him looking at their double matrimony on display, “How proud you must be. Truly, congratulations. I hope it was worth it. One can only hope I am one day as happy as you.” Now, he smiles. Just a little, to show that he doesn’t really mean it.
Nayeong flushes. She knows what Jimin is really saying, even if her husband remains blissfully clueless. Jimin doesn’t care that people gossip about him, but they should know to stay away from his family.
What a clumsy line of questioning. If Nayeong were really in love with this fool, Jimin has nothing but pity for her.
And Nayeong knows it, because she, at least, has good breeding. “Of course,” she says, already backing away. “We apologize for taking up so much of your time. Congratulations again, Jimin-ssi.”
No one else asks him about marriage plans after that, political or otherwise.
"Only a few more minutes,” Seokjin says with his mouth full next to him. He sounds too pleased with himself. He has been silent this whole time, his only task clearing the soup dregs.
“This is tiresome,” Jimin mutters. He’s used to people fawning over him, of course, but it’s as if the fact of tonight, his testimony, has bent the rules of the game. So many people overreaching so gracelessly — thinking they can get to him — god. How astoundingly irritating.
“Don’t pretend you’re not enjoying playing with your food,” Seokjin says, and they both know he’s not talking about the crumbs on Jimin’s plate.
Out of the corner of his eye, Jimin spots a familiar figure in the crowd below. About time. He brightens up, though he knows better than to wave or do something equally childish.
Jungkook is, for once, not dressed like a cryptid, or a mad scientist. Nothing adventurous, because the whole point is for him not to stand out, but Jimin can appreciate how nicely his best friend cleans up in black-tie formalwear, especially when he’s much more used to seeing him in sweats and ridiculously oversized hoodies, covered in streaks of engine oil and soot.
"There he is,” Seokjin says, spotting Jungkook too. He whistles lowly. “Looking spiffy, JK!” As they watch, he unceremoniously shoves two crostini into his mouth. Jimin winces. Seokjin just laughs.
Jungkook doesn’t see them looking, but he’s got his own work to focus on this evening. Jimin sees him circle the outer ring of the party twice, hands casually trailing the pillars from which the lights are festooned. Anyone else would have looked suspicious, but Jungkook is wide-eyed and round-faced, with boyishly curled hair and a natural pout — perfect for subterfuge.
A few minutes later, Jimin’s phone buzzes. The text from Jungkook reads: Let’s get it!!! Jimin suppresses a smile.
Jungkook’s okay comes at just the right time too. It’s two minutes to midnight. Jimin exchanges a look with Seokjin, who looks as unfazed as anything. Only his hand on Jimin’s own, briefly, belies his nerves.
Madame Park, following some silent cue, stands up.
Everyone below the dais rustles into quietude. Jimin’s mother has never asked for attention a day in her life, and does not even need to command it; it is simply hers when she wants it, for even the dullest, plainest suit in Seoul can surely feel the power unfurling from her, as magnetic as the earth’s core and just as inevitable. Mantled on her shoulders, her cape of flowers open and close inexorably. Next to her, Jimin feels as soft as a sapling.
“Welcome, everyone,” she says, hands clasped neatly together before her. “Thank you for coming. I’m going to skip past the niceties since I’m sure we all know why we are gathered here tonight.” She turns to Jimin, who sits up straighter and thumbs over the wishbone at his neck once, twice, for luck. Your unyielding center, she used to tell him, tapping the base of his spine where he used to slump. Control it . Once you let the smallest thing slip, you will have no recourse . These days, his posture is impeccable.
“Jimin-ah,” she continues. “My boy. You’re finally becoming an adult. More than that, you’re entering society as the newest member of the Park family. You’ve always been my son, of course, but today, you become a true son of Seoul. I can’t wait to see what you do. I know you won’t let us down.”
Seokjin will probably say that the speech is a tad dramatic in their debriefing tomorrow, but Jimin can’t help the warmth stirring in his chest at his mother’s words, even as he very deliberately keeps himself still. (He can’t afford to let go, not now.)
His mother really is a consummate performer, in her own way.
When it’s Jimin’s turn to stand up, he knows what everyone else sees. He styled himself very deliberately: a cropped jacquard suit jacket shot through with pearlescence that hits him precisely at the waist; a pressed white shirt with just the right amount of ruff; his usual one single silver earring, dangling, and the thin metal bands on his fingers, of course, the mark of every unproofed magician. He dyed his hair ash gray, too, and suspects he will never wear his natural black again (it makes him look too young).
It’s important to present a cohesive image, if one wants to impart the impression of stability.
Slowly, he peels his gloves off. They fold slightly onto the table, still warm from his hands. He slips off all his rings. The symbolism of it is clear: these are his wards, collected over the years since his first instantiation, greedily documented by other magical families with eligible sons and daughters looking for strategic marriage opportunities; the government and its spies; himself. There are eight in total. Most magicians only needed one hand.
By removing them, he’s saying: I am in control. I am ready to testify.
He raises his arms and spreads his fingers, feels the wintry breeze slice through the gaps in between. Then Jimin closes his fists.
The row of lights at the very edge of the courtyard blink out, as if instantaneously snuffed. There is a split second where nobody knows quite what they are looking at or waiting for, and then the lights come back on, and there is no doubt.
Orange fire blazes in the metal scones used to hold the paper lanterns, lanterns which are now crisped dust in the air, their thin inner layers of wax strong enough only to withstand a gentle candle’s flame. Not this roiling conflagration that the candlelight has been transmuted into, leaping wild and spitting loud. It warms no hands nor hearth but devours, licking down the pillars, hot and hungry. The guests closest to the flames shy away even as they stare, unable to look away from its awful beauty. Good. Everything is going according to plan. With practised ease, Jimin flicks his wrists, and watches as some of the fire spindles off from the main columns. (“Show-off,” he hears Seokjin mutter quietly, and knows it’s not meant for him.)
Jimin concentrates on opening his right hand with a flourish and matching the movement of his fingers to the multiple lines of fire twisting in the air, and coalescing above the crowd. He’d felt foolish practicing in the front of the mirror at home, but now, watching the way the flame mirrors the fluttering of fingers, he can almost see what everyone else sees, too. It’s what makes the most sense, after all.
Somewhere in the shadows below, Jungkook, with his stupidly big brain and even bigger heart, is working his own magic.
The fire is so bright it looks like daytime in this little pocket of the city, the softly edged silhouettes of people standing in the dark now etched sharp. Jimin traces a circle in the air as the fire turns, melting through in the sky like a liquid dragon, finely outlined and fiery. The crowd below murmurs, some of them clapping even as they start to sweat in their winter finery. A few of the older guests are frowning, though. Jimin knows what they are thinking: Fire? This is his testimony? How unbecoming. How destructive. They’re waiting for him to flame out in disaster, to lose control.
He won’t.
His mother sits serene, calmly confident. Jimin dare not look her way, every muscle in his body poised with the dual effort of maintaining his tracery in the air and keeping control over the liquid heat singing in his veins, desperate to be let out. But this spectacle will have been for nothing if he slips now, so he clenches his jaw, focuses on the shifting sinews of his hands, and holds his fire in.
It’s getting harder to ignore the warmth bubbling inside his bones and the spark of pain building against his breastbone. Jimin scans the crowd below for Jungkook, recalling how he’d wondered if their carefully choreographed performance had felt too ephemeral, too brief. Now, his arms burn as if he’s been working out for hours.
Instead, he sees the stranger again. He almost falters, then, at the confused outrage on the man’s face, his anger so naked and startling in an otherwise uniform sea of polite appreciation. Apprehension from the elders, Jimin can understand, and disdain from those who expected something more...gentle, from the son of his greenhand mother and his forgotten lightbringer father. Fire is an intriguing but contentious magical ability, not immediately useful or lucky. Logistically, it begged the question: which governmental division would he be attached to? Politically, and perhaps of more concern to his guests, who would want him? As a husband, as a partner.
But nothing about this should be enraging . (Not to his guests, anyway. A long time ago, it had been plenty enraging to Jimin, but he moved on to grim determination a long time ago.) So why does this strange man look like he wants to throttle Jimin? More than that, why does he look so vindicated ?
A cold line tightening down his spine pulls Jimin upright. Maybe he guessed the truth. Impossible. How could he have? Maybe he saw something in Jimin’s aspect when their eyes met, and now he knows . Maybe his big cat eyes can see right through him. More improbable things have happened. Suddenly Jimin’s hands feel awkward in the air, like the wooden ligaments of a puppet suddenly severed from its master. He has to resist the urge to throw them in the air and break the spell. Control , he tells himself. This is the hardest lesson and you have learnt it well.
As he watches with one eye, Jimin sees a dark trickle make its way down the man’s nostril. Blood. The man raises a hand to touch it, as if surprised by the evidence of some exertion he hadn’t even known he’d been undergoing, and then he walks away, shoving through the enraptured crowd.
Jimin has to wrench his gaze away from him. Jungkook. He has to keep his eyes on Jungkook. There. Jungkook is by the edge of the crowd, and this time he’s watching Jimin. The cue to stop comes. They make eye contact for a split second, and then Jungkook raises a hand to casually tug at his ear. Time to wrap it up.
Thank god. With a gravitas he does not feel but can exactingly fake, he brings his hands together, curling them into loose fists. The fire thins, shimmering like alien lights in the sky. Jimin brings his hands to his chest just as the fire winks out, as if it had never existed. For a moment, it’s as if oxygen has been sucked from the very air around them, and then the wind sluices back into the courtyard, cold and cutting.
The crowd erupts with noise, a frenzy of exclamations and laughs that coalesce into Jimin’s name, but Jimin barely notices. It takes all of his concentration to lower himself back onto his seat in a controlled way and not simply collapse into it. He doesn’t feel any different now that the testimony is over, but he definitely feels a new kind of shitty after that little performance. Not because he’d overexerted his magic, of course, but precisely the opposite.
The fire under his skin is thwarted and unhappy. His fire. It does not recognize Jungkook’s technical mimicry, this pale imitation. It runs frenzied, so close to the surface of his body that Jimin, staring at his arms, wonders if he’s hallucinating the bright streaks pressing up against the thin skin of his wrists, the soft bend of his elbow, as if testing the juts of his body for a tear it can escape through. He wonders what would happen if he helped it, let it spill out of him like it so clearly wants to.
The wishbone hanging from his neck, tucked beneath his shirt, is ice cold.
Sometimes Jimin swears his fire has a mind of its own, like it can tell that it has been deliberately denied and will make him pay. A part of him welcomes it, would love nothing more than to let it pour out of him, but the other part — the part that remembers how his mother had held him, scared and sparking, as a child, after something that happened that he can no longer recall, the part that knows the fire will never come forth again — those parts are what keep Jimin still, even as his insides writhe.
If he cannot control anything else in this world, at least he can control this: his treacherous, wrecked body.
When Jimin slips his rings and gloves back on, he is thankful that they are enough to hide the trembling of his fingers against his thighs. He closes his fists under the table even as he smiles and nods at the admiring crowd below, so no one can see the wisps of smoke rising from them.
He really should say something pithy for the tittering masses to bring back home, or at least muster up a smile. It’s taking all his concentration to stop himself from trembling, though, so he just hopes everyone looking at him will see the exertion on his face and come to the obvious, easy conclusion. After all, it’s normal for new magicians to tire easily, even eight-ringed ones.
Easier to pretend exhaustion, than to break from the lie now.
Ever since his mother sat him down and told him his magic was dangerous , Jimin had not let his fire out. He may have, as a child — he can’t quite remember — but there would not have been many witnesses anyway to the fact that his fire burned not orange, but pure white.
Only after every guest has left do they begin to make their way back home. Madame Park goes first, in her own car. She pats Seokjin on the shoulder and kisses Jimin’s cheek, her lips dry against his skin. “You did well tonight, Jimin-ah,” she murmurs. “Come to my office on Monday, and we’ll talk business. In the meantime, enjoy your weekend.”
“I will,” Jimin says, smiling as his mother steps back, playing along for the cameras that are flashing in the periphery of his vision, documenting this scene for tomorrow’s front pages. “Goodnight, eomma.”
Seokjin’s car angles smoothly into the driveway, sleek and discreet, and they both get in the back. Soon Jimin will have his own driver, his own household staff, his own seneschal. He doesn’t care about any of that, though.
“Will we discuss tonight?” Jimin asks Seokjin in the smooth silence of the ride home. His brother loosened his tie the minute he’d stepped into the privacy of their car, but Jimin suspects his work has only just begun.
“No,” Seokjin says. “I thought we’d all get together tomorrow morning. Have Eunmi meet Jungkook, too. Jimin-ah, you don’t have to do this—”
“Hyung, I know,” Jimin says. He tries to sound authoritative; he doesn’t want to argue with Seokjin again about this. Not tonight.
He hadn’t wanted Eunmi at his testimony because he’d wanted to do that last, important thing on his own. But he’s never been under the illusion that he would get to keep all of his freedoms and his secrets. Seokjin thought he should live his truth, or whatever. Seokjin had a good heart. He did not have Jimin’s eye for the movement of power.
Once, after the rings came on and before cold-eyed acceptance set in, when they were opposites — Jimin raw at the idea of love , Seokjin on the brink of a difficult decision — he’d lashed out at his brother, who was choosing to give away what Jimin was coming to realize he’d never have.
“Why do you care so much?” Seokjin asked, exasperated as Jimin paced furiously in front of him. “Calm down, you’re going to burn up.” This last remark was a mean-spirited jab, and they both knew it.
“I am in control ,” Jimin snapped. These days, the only thing he could take pride in was his competency, and he was not about to have even that questioned by his brother of all people. “And I care because you can fix it. You can get him back. He wants you. Needs you. If you just ask—”
“You have no idea what he needs or doesn’t need,” Seokjin said calmly. “And you don’t have the faintest clue what these fucking families will do to him. It would ruin us. I’d rather we live our lives on our own terms, even if it means we can’t do it together.”
Seokjin swearing: a sign of his fraying temper. Seokjin’s implicit message, if casual callousness was something Seokjin indulged in (it was not, but Jimin’s mind tended towards despair): just because you can’t live life on your own terms, doesn’t mean we can’t.
“What about Yoongi, then? Have you asked what he wants?” Jimin raised his chin. See: despair soured into cruelty too easily.
“Yoongi understands where I’m coming from.”
Jimin laughed. “You don’t seriously believe that. Yoongi would never—”
“Jimin,” Seokjin said, and this was the first time he’d ever said Jimin’s name that way, cold and hard as a stone at the bottom of a lake. “Frankly, my relationship with Yoongi is none of your business.”
He stayed perfectly still where he was seated, one leg elegantly crossed over the other, eyes that usually were bright with generosity and good cheer hardened now as they pinned Jimin mid-motion. That was one of Jimin’s first lessons: that just because his brother was agreeable, didn’t mean he was weak. For him, any show of anger was precisely that — a show. This time, meant for Jimin, so that he would understand: stop now, or we will cross into uncharted waters.
For a brief moment, Jimin wonders how easy it would be, without the shackles around his fingers and his neck, to make Seokjin hurt, to make him see he was being stupid and condescending and he that he didn’t give a fuck about Seokjin’s warnings.
It was that impulse that frightened Jimin, so much so that he swallowed, nodded, and didn’t bring Yoongi up again.
“Okay,” Seokjin says now, very measuredly, unaware of Jimin’s quick sojourn down memory lane. “Just—breakfast at nine tomorrow?”
“I’ll see you at the Barb,” Jimin answers, and turns to press his forehead against the window. Tells himself he’s not his brother; he’s going to accept his fate and live with it, no matter how fucked it is. Tells himself that it’s because he has made peace with who and what he is, and not because he’s terrified of what will happen if he doesn’t.
Tomorrow’s headlines will read: Park Jimin: The Phoenix of Seoul.
(“Why are you frowning?” Jungkook asks with three grapes in his mouth. “That’s, like, as massive a hard-on as you’re gonna get from the papers.”
“I was going for a dragon,” Jimin says. He tries not to sound like he’s pouting, but this is Jungkook, so he doesn’t have to pretend for once. Everything had gone as well as it could have and he should just be pleased that nothing catastrophic had happened, but for some reason this irked. He and Jungkook had put a lot of effort into preloading the shapes the fire would take, and he had not counted on journalistic misinterpretation. “A phoenix rises from the ashes. I never died .”
“Maybe you shouldn’t have dyed your hair like an old man about to, then.”
Jimin throws a grape at Jungkook’s head.)
Over the next few days, Jimin meets too many new people to count. Ministers, statesmen, technocrats, journalists, sycophants, Eunmi (she is nice, and polite, and Jimin never wants to see her again in his life). After the meeting with his mother where they agree on what they are going to do, he gives an exclusive interview on his future plans to a reporter from the Herald that’s friendly with the Park family, and smiles extra prettily when he announces he’s going to take the summer to go on a global grand tour, so no, he cannot say for certain which public division he will be working with in the foreseeable future.
The reporter pivots to asking him about which countries he’s most excited to visit, as if Jimin had not just dropped a bombshell on national TV. To be fair, it’s only a bombshell to those who know how these things work. The general public will not care; it’s likely they will be more interested in Jimin’s travel itinerary and whether he prefers the Hilton or the Ritz (obviously, the Ritz).
Oh, and the proposals start coming in; first a trickle, then as news travels about who has submitted one, a flood.
Most of them are insipid. Either fawning, false words, poeticizing Jimin’s porcelain skin or his radiant smile (boring), or literal business proposals, appended with an official prognistician-stamped gunghap chart like an afterthought (less boring; at least he could take notes on acquisition strategy). His proof is a tricky one, Jimin concedes, and admires some of his suitors’ deep coffers and creative symbolic interpretations ( Fire and water seem like unlikely compatriots but the combination creates steam — an engine of power, a sure sign of future prosperity! ) before throwing the documents into the trash.
One of the more interesting ones simply had the man’s name and number and a request to meet; the card stock is a heavy cream, the penmanship horrendous. It is intriguing, and therefore the most tempting. It’s the first one that he discards.
All of this is moot, anyway. Jimin’s secret could ruin his family; he cannot be held as collateral for another.
When he has a few spare minutes, he gets his seneschal to fetch him the guest book from the party so that he can cross-reference it against the invitations they’d sent out. A few declinations, but no unexpected new entries—ah. Jimin rests his finger on a familiar name scrawled in unfamiliar handwriting. Contemplates what he’s to do with this little nugget of information, and decides to tuck it away. For now.
Meanwhile, the calls he’s already been avoiding from the Ministry (the only one that matters) double in volume after his little announcement. He ignores all of them, and avoids going back to his apartment. He spends most of his time with Jungkook holed up in his workshop, helping him plot out hypotheticals and construct magical models as Jungkook works on the more technical aspects of the problem he’s been trying to solve since he first became friends with Jimin and entered his strange new world: what, exactly, is magic? How does it work? What are the principles on which it exists, mostly predictable, sometimes irrevocably unpredictable?
Jimin has tried to tell him it’s not something that can be explained by math or physics or clever engineering, but Jungkook is curious and craves stimulation, so he is not so easily convinced. “If it exists in our material world,” he argues, “then it must be possible to explain it with the rules we already have. If not, we’ll just have to make new rules,” as if it really were as simple as that, and the chaos of magic would eventually bend to his stubborn view of the world. Jimin, who spent too many nights when he was still in school constructing theorems and watching them fall to pieces in front of him, leaves him be.
He’s not sure, at this point, if he wants Jungkook to find an answer or not. Either way, he will still be a freak, an anomaly: a magician who cannot control his powers, who is destructive and full of disharmonious energy. But that’s impossible; the Park bloodline has been magic-true for centuries — there is a fancy scroll in their main hall that says so. Jimin’s name is scheduled to go on there tomorrow.
The Ministry decides it’s tired of being ignored by him when he’s having dinner at the Barb with Seokjin and Jungkook. The only warning they get is the sound of Seokjin’s seneschal protesting loudly in the hallway outside, “This is a private residence —” before the door to the living room swings open and the Officers of Magical Intervention spill in.
Seokjin pauses with a piece of beef halfway to his mouth. Jungkook tries to discreetly slurp up the remaining half of his noodle. Only Jimin appears to be prepared, sitting cross-legged and steady as a snake. He imagines the tableau they must present — the eccentric eldest son; the long-lashed, cow-eyed normie kid; and himself, with a look of what he hopes is arch surprise on his face.
“Park Jimin.” One the officers steps forward. There are about eight of them in total, crowding inside the apartment, clunky and crass in their reinforced uniforms and aggressively macho group — sorry, elite squad — formation. “We’ve been trying to reach you for quite some time now.”
“Sorry,” Jimin says, affecting a confused moue. “My phone automatically screens spam calls.”
Behind him, Jungkook chokes on his laughter and makes a wheezing sound as the noodle goes down the wrong way. “Um, just gonna—excuse me,” he stammers, and pushes off his seat to scurry into the bathroom. Jimin doesn’t hide his chuckle of amusement.
“Is this a joke to you?” the officer demands.
“Of course not,” Jimin says, very seriously. “Since you all took the time to come all the way here, how can I help you, Officer…?”
“Officer Nam,” the man says gruffly. “Park Jimin-ssi, the Ministry has some concerns regarding your...unconventional conduct. Namely, your refusal to meet with division representatives and your unilateral decision to leave the country without first confirming your appointment.”
Exactly what Jimin expected, almost word for word. He sighs, sounding bored. “Can’t a man take some time off before being shackled to bureaucratic servitude for the rest of his life?”
“It’s an honor to be able to serve the country,” Officer Nam says stiffly. “Your predecessors had a great amount of respect for their work in the public service.”
“As I’m sure I will,” Jimin concedes. “But surely you can see the appeal of a holiday.” He gestures at the intrusion arrayed before him, rings glinting on his left hand.
“It’s only a holiday if you’re planning on coming back.”
It’s the perfect attack if it were true, and for the same reason it’s the perfect opening that Jimin has been waiting for.
“Why wouldn’t I come back?” he asks, and snaps his fingers. Fire sparks in his right hand, dancing on the points of his fingers like little hot stars. Officer Nam flinches, and visibly reins himself in.
“Isn’t that a fire hazard?” he asks, trying to sound flip. Jimin isn’t fooled; he can tell the man is nervous from the way he instinctively leans back on one foot and tightens his hand on his hip holster.
Jimin affects an insouciance he does not feel, elbows pushed back on the table and chin tilted, the lines of his body slowly laid out and relaxed. He observes, with a surgical eye, the fire flaring on his hand and down the naked lines of his fingers to run loops around his palm. “Do you doubt my control?” he asks.
Officer Nam says, “If I did, I would have even more reason to question your unwillingness to cooperate with us, and your plans to travel overseas so soon.”
The man was as subtle as a scripted Hollywood villain, but he sounded like he believed every word he was saying, Jimin will give him that.
“I’m just playing with you, boys,” Jimin says, winking. He closes his right fist with a twirl. The fire goes out with nary a hiss. “A little show, for our hardworking officers of the law.”
“Do you mock us?” one of the officers bites out, stepping forward just enough to present the gun at his hip. The tension that has building in the air between them strains against the bit of Officer Nam’s control, control that he decisively asserts.
“You speak out of turn,” he says quietly, one hand on his officer’s chest, and there is an undercurrent of steel in his voice that helps Jimin understand how exacting Officer Nam is at his job. It’s this very exactness that Jimin has been counting on this whole time. With a look of frustrated chagrin, his man acquiesces.
“Well, this has been fun,” Jimin says. “But I would really like to get back to my dinner, and I’m sure you gentlemen have more important affairs to see to than shepherding an errant baby magician.” He turns his head to the side, eyes Officer Nam with a look that is half gentle curiosity and half casual disregard. “I would also like to point out that today, still, I am a private citizen, not a public servant. And that this service that every member of my family has entered—that I will soon enter—we do so out of our own volition. For the respect we accord our ancestors, and this country that has birthed us. In return, I only ask for the same.”
The silence that follows Jimin’s quiet speech is thick with the expectation of rhetorical reciprocation, the first obligation of mutually acknowledged civility. He’s read Officer Nam quite right, he thinks.
“We thank you for your family’s service,” Officer Nam says, stiff as a wax seal, and Jimin wonders at the kind of man that accepts, and probably enjoys, the will-bending, word-shaping weight of polite society’s call and response. He supposes it is not that uncommon. Of all people, he can surely appreciate the relief that comes with being able to smooth over the jagged, uncertain bits of yourself with a script. “And yours, in the future. We’ll take your leave now, Jimin-ssi. Good evening.”
And then just as quickly as they’d poured in, the squad turns on its collective heel and parts for Officer Nam to lead the way. With a sharp half-bow (lower than strictly necessary) in Jimin’s direction, he leaves.
“Are they gone?” Jungkook whines from the hallway. “That was fucking dope.”
“Wasn’t I right?” Jimin says, once the seneschal comes back up to confirm that all the officers have left the premises. He can’t help the smile of satisfaction stretching across his face. “Wasn’t it much better to have been prepared and waiting? It’s always better to let the enemy come to you.”
“That was lucky,” Seokjin starts.
“That was smart ,” Jimin says, frowning. He plays with the four on his left hand, watches the light bounce off each gilded edge, before fishing out his remaining rings from his pocket and slipping them onto his right hand. “Hyung, c’mon.” There’s a whiny tone to his voice that he dislikes, but he can’t help the flush of triumph at having bested those officers, the deep, toe-curling fuck you glee that he so rarely gets to experience. He’d bet on two things: that the Ministry would come, and that they would come because they were scared. He’d been right.
“Fine, that was smart,” Seokjin says, “ but it’s not really a scalable solution. It’s not like you can measure how many rings gives you how much control. And next time, it won’t be your hand on fire they want to see. It’ll be what you can do with it.”
“Hyung, you were actually pretty badass for once,” Jungkook pipes up. “I think I would have thrown up if I had to get them to back down.”
“Jungkook-ah, we both know that’s what you were doing in the bathroom,” Seokjin says. Jungkook goes, “Hey!” and then the two of them are scuffling, their food and Jimin’s fate momentarily forgotten.
“We’ll figure it out,” Jimin says as lightly as he can, half to himself. Yesterday, he had bought a return ticket to Korea for appearance’s sake, and also because deep down he didn’t believe it would come to that, to living abroad in indefinite exile, but his brother was right. Sooner or later, something would have to give. He could not put off the one thing that was expected of him as a magician, the one thing that all the magical families in Korea had agreed to in exchange for all the other leniencies and privileges afforded them; if he deserted, he would bring even more shame to the Park family than his father had. But the truth — that he’s not a coward but a danger — would destroy their family. Shame would be an irrelevant consideration. “We have to.”
As it happens, Jimin does not have to figure out what to do next, because what happens next is very much out of his control.
Jimin lives a few minutes’ drive from the main Park complex in Hannam-dong, a cluster of residential buildings and shops owned by the family and run by their affiliates — the metropolitan police likes to grumble about how the Parks essentially operate as a gang, but these definitions are conveniently blurred most of the time. The Parks have a very good lawyer, and there are always policemen with empty pockets waiting to be filled.
This will probably be one of his last nights in the apartment he’s lived in for the past five years. He leaves for Singapore, his first stop, in a few days, and by the time he’s back in Seoul (if he’s back in Seoul), his new rooms in the family complex will be ready for him. He doesn’t think he will miss this place; it’s still bare-walled and fresh-scrubbed, with the faint odor of new paint and wood varnish that hasn’t yet been exhumed by the smells of someone making a home there.
Inside, the apartment feels stuffy; Jimin hasn’t been back home for the last two days, too busy meeting ministers and preparing press releases, and the windows have been closed this whole time. With a sigh of relief, he removes his gloves and slips the rings from his fingers. Immediately, his body flushes warm. The fire undulates over his skin, stretching like a cat, if the cat were made of flame and could not leave his side. It’s ticklish. Jimin almost whimpers with a full-body shiver. He hates that he enjoys it when the fire is out, but it feels as good as standing up straight again after spending hours bent out of shape.
It had taken a long time for him to accept his body, harrowing and incendiary as it was. Jimin remembers when he was twelve, and he realized he was different.
By then, his classmates’ powers had started manifesting intermittently. Just small, party trick-type stuff. Nothing as comprehensive as a full instantiation. That came with puberty, and hormonal rage. But while everyone delighted in glow-in-the-dark body parts and the childish brattiness of targeted rain cloud formation over playground enemies, they shied away from Jimin’s sunflare hands, the hot sparks that flew too close for comfort whenever he laughed or screeched or just—felt too much emotion. Those were small hurts, both the over-enthusiastic lick of flame against a playmate’s hand and their subsequent withdrawal of friendship — Jiminie hurt me, eomma! — but the difference was that the body healed itself, and Jimin never did.
He came to the only conclusion he could come to, lying awake in bed one night thinking about how his magic theory tutor had quit the other day, murmuring something about overpowered abilities and safety concerns . Madame Park had shut the door calmly in his face, but Jimin saw the way the decorative vines around their door frame tightened and choked the wood panelling, and understood she was displeased, and that he, for the first time in his life, was the source of her displeasure.
Jimin was not normal. He hurt people, when magicians were supposed to help. He would never be a good instrument. Who would want a flame that had no direction?
He had slept fitfully, fog-thick unconsciousness pierced through with sharp black shapes and lightning-strike lines. When he woke up, his sheets were scorched, fine flakes of ash scattered around his body. His fingertips, when he brought them to his face, were furred black, like they had been dipped in soot.
Two weeks later, he got his first ring. Then his second. Normally this would be a marker of pride, a show of strength that had to be curtailed in prepubescence, yes, but oh, what potential in adulthood! The proof would be glorious, strong lineages and good blood tested when the magician came of age. Most tested themselves in adolescence, slipping their lonesome bands off in secure training halls to learn control and patience in the flex of a fist or the meter of their breath. But Jimin was too terrified of himself to try. Because Jimin could feel the fire inside him even then, and he knew that the rings would not stop at two.
“This is just temporary,” his mother had said, hand gentle against his head. “Until you learn control, and learn it well.”
(He did not.)
The hardest lesson, Jimin now knows, is the one that does not let itself be learned.
So. The tally on his countertop: eight rings, collected over eight years. Nice and numerically neat, to hold back everything that wasn’t. Plain against the ostentatious flash of his other jeweled rings and stacked earrings. Technically, he would have to give them up now that he’s successfully proven himself (yet another problem he has not found a solution for). Around his neck, the fire’s final, secret leash: a wishbone, family heirloom, heavily warded. Jimin’s mother paid a hefty price for the work, and an even heftier price to keep it quiet.
The weight of the wards is not exactly painful, but it’s not nothing, either. The one time Jungkook asked, this is how Jimin described it: Imagine sitting in a room that suddenly feels like a box. Then imagine that box shrinking with every breath you take (with every ring you put on). Jungkook had made a sad, sympathetic face, but he had not understood.
In his own apartment, Jimin’s box is as big as it can ever get.
It’s a relief to be able to shuck off his clothes and take a long shower, to close his eyes against the scalding water raining down on him. Jimin never gets burnt by his own flame. Afterwards, he changes into a pair of boxers and his ratty high school dance team t-shirt. The neck is fraying and there are strange stains on the hem he can no longer identify, but the familiar softness against his skin and the tickle of the laundry tag against his neck are almost humiliatingly grounding.
It feels good, too, to partake in small pleasures: a glass of wine, a plate of tangerines, sinking into the sofa, legs pulled up to his chest. The white walls and floor-to-ceiling windows of his apartment make it feel a lot bigger and emptier than it actually is; Jimin looks out the open window at the sky, suddenly feeling very small. Everything has changed. Resolutely, instead of thinking about the things he cannot control, he runs through his actual itinerary for his trip: the usual business conducted on behalf of the family’s various foreign subsidiaries, of course, but also his own personal, surreptitiously scheduled meetings with the American wizards, the Catalan thaumaturges, and the hive of techno-mages in Southeast Asia that all think they have a solution to his problem. He does not think about what will happen if it turns out he’s not an interesting specimen after all, just a shoddy, malfunctioning magician. After all, when Jungkook first suggested their neat little illusion, with eager eyes and a fire spinner already reconfigured (“Had it lying around, hyung!”) in his workspace, Jimin had jumped at the chance to avoid public humiliation. They had not thought this far ahead.
Jimin peels a tangerine with a knife and lifts his glass, watching as the moonlight illuminates the liquid within; the diluted glow of the wine is a good match for the lines of pale goldenrod running over his skin. Sometimes, in the quiet, he thinks his fire is beautiful, actually.
A slight breeze blows in through the open window, ruffling the streams of flame. He downs the wine quickly; it’s warming from his touch, and will soon taste unpleasant.
It’s when he sets the glass on the table that he realizes: when did he open the window?
Then, too slowly: he hadn’t .
Suddenly the apartment feels too silent, like the hush right before a tiger leaps.
Jimin’s only warning is a faint whoosh of air behind his neck. Instinctively, he ducks. Something slices through the air above him. When he looks up, there is a massive sword impaled in the plush of his armchair.
“What the fuck ,” he says, and turns around just as a great, dark weight barrels right into him.
As he’s bowled over onto the floor, the only cogent thought in Jimin’s head is, Fuck , am I going to die in my boxers ? And then there are gloved hands around his throat, squeezing, and Jimin doesn’t know what to focus on first, his imminent death or the shadowed face in front of him or the heat curling in his belly, and— oh .
His bare fingers. His rings, left on the table.
The fire senses his panic, tries to leap from his skin, burbling in the air around him. It pops like bubble wrap with a hiss; it cannot escape the confines of his frame, not with his wishbone still hanging from his neck. It’s still hot, though, hot enough to burn, which is why Jimin doesn’t understand why there are still hands around his throat, squeezing, possibly even harder than before.
It’s lucky, then, that Jimin has never relied on his magic to get things done. When his classmates were playing with their powers, Jimin mastered his body in other ways.
With a grunt, he pulls one leg up between his assailant’s body and his, digs his foot into what he hopes is a sensitive area, and jerks up with all his strength. At the same time, he puts the heel of his hand against the intruder’s chin and pushes, hard. The grip around his throat loosens just enough for Jimin flip them over with another shove of his leg, and then he’s scrambling to get upright and away.
“Who the fuck are you?” he wheezes, when he’s a safe distance away. The assailant is slowly getting to their feet, wincing. Ah, Jimin guessed right. Viciously, he hopes the damage is long-lasting.
The man doesn’t reply. When he straightens, Jimin sees with a twist in his stomach that he’s taller than Jimin, with broader shoulders and a heft that Jimin has never managed to achieve, no matter how much he’s tried to put on mass in the past. He’s dressed in black, with the bottom of his face obscured by some kind of mask, the only color on him the muted shock of his pale hair and the whites of his eyes.
Silently, the man walks over to where his sword is still stuck in Jimin’s chair and pulls it out. Oh, shit. Jimin should probably have flipped him the other way around. The way he lifts it easily — like it doesn’t weigh anything — does not bode well for him.
There’s no time to think, though, because the man is coming at him again. He swings his sword down in an arc, and that would have gone more than halfway to cleaving Jimin in two if Jimin didn’t dodge in time. He sees surprise flicker in the man’s eyes, and then annoyance; he clearly didn’t expect Jimin to be trained to do anything but sit and look pretty. Jimin spins around, grabs the half-empty wine glass from the table, and throws it in the intruder’s face. He doesn’t have any fucking weapons with him; he’s in his goddamn pajamas.
The man dodges the glass easily, though it distracts him for just long enough that he lowers his guard and Jimin swipe the paring knife from the table and tackle him from the side. He doesn’t have enough weight to inflict any damage except a stumble, but he has to keep close or the longer, sweeping reach of that ridiculous sword is going to find its target sooner rather than later. Legs scrambling for a hold, Jimin locks his elbow around the man’s neck — his flames, they’re sputtering and dying, what the fuck is happening? — and brings the knife up. Now, while he’s got the element of surprise, while he can see the pale gap of collarbone he should strike.
Jimin has never been in a real fight before, but he always thought he would be strong enough to do what had to be done.
Well, he’s shit out of luck, and apparently a bad judge of his own character, because at the sight of that thin unmarked line of exposed skin, he falters, for barely a second. It’s all it takes.
A clatter as the sword falls to the ground, then a strong grip on the back of his t-shirt and Jimin is flying through the air. He lands on the floor of his apartment with a muted thump and the breath knocked out of him. His shirt is falling off his shoulder and it’s almost definitely irreparably ripped and Jimin definitely shouldn’t be upset about that right now. He forces himself to lie still, listening to the intruder catch his breath. Stupid; if it had been him, he would have rushed him immediately, not stood around giving him the chance to regain his senses. Jimin won’t hesitate next time.
The man walks over slowly, and Jimin lolls his head, keeping his hands open. From between his half-closed eyes he can see the barest flicker of white fire dancing on the tips of his fingers. With every step the man takes closer, the smaller his fire gets.
No time to worry about that now. When the intruder is standing almost directly over him, Jimin makes a quick estimate, grabs for the ankle closest to him, and yanks . The man falls, and then they’re both rolling on the floor, Jimin with his tiny blade and the man trying to avoid a stab to the eye as he fumbles for the hilt of his own weapon on the floor.
Jimin thrusts the knife down, and it barely misses, scraping the side of the man’s cheek. A thin line of blood opens up, cartoonishly red against moon-bleached skin. He draws back to strike again, and then finds he can go no further. The man is gripping his knife by the blade. The sharp edge cuts into his gloves, and Jimin sees blood pooling.
Are you fucking kidding me?
“Let go,” he hisses.
The only response he gets is a silent, stubborn stare. It’s a fuck you stare if Jimin has ever seen one, the kind that promises it will drag you down with it to hell. Jimin can see the fire clinging to his body reflected in the man’s eyes, and so he can also see that this man is not even the slightest bit afraid.
The blade shifts, digging deeper into meat. There’s blood everywhere.
Fuck. Jimin drops the knife.
Their eyes meet over the man’s red hand, and it’s only the hours Jimin has spent sparring with Jungkook in the hall that helps him avoid a fist to his face.
He almost doesn’t, because he hesitates. He’s seen those eyes before. Some kind of feline, some kind of feral.
As he dodges, Jimin shoots his hand out to grab ahold of the man’s wrist, to try to flip him over. For a second, the shock of his hot touch against the man’s cold skin stops everything.
For a second, everything burns.
It burns like the cold void of space, like the ancient waters of a deep sea, spreading through Jimin’s body like molasses; it burns like revelation.
Then the fire inside him banks, gutters out, and for once in his life, Jimin can let go.
The box becomes a room.
For a moment, he feels utterly powerless. He feels normal .
Then the man yanks his hand away, and the heat comes slamming back in, stronger than ever, and Jimin doubles over on the floor. The pain is astounding. He blinks back tears, and the man is looking right at him. His mask is skewed; there is blood smudged on his cheekbone and his eyes are wide with a now-familiar mix of anger and confusion. Jimin has just enough time to notice how dark they are, before the man grabs his sword, straps it to his back, and leaps out Jimin’s window.
Jimin is left sprawled on the floor. For a few seconds, he can only focus on his utterly incongruous bare feet, stretched out in front of him. There’s a cut on one of them that’s oozing blood.
Through the open window, the wind whistles like a friend around the corner.
What the hell just happened? With a trembling hand, he reaches up to touch the wishbone. He focuses on its rubbed-smooth face, always cool to the touch no matter how hot the fire in him burns.
If he doesn’t pay attention, the lightbulbs are going to ignite.
He’s not sure how long he sits there before he gets tired of aching and clambers up to the balcony to slide the window closed. Logically, Jimin knows he should be calling security, calling his brother, calling someone. The intruder could come back. He could have reinforcements. But he doesn’t even know where his phone is and he feels like he just got flattened by an anvil and something tells him that he’s not the only one spooked by what just happened. Call it instinct or call it foolishness, but he does not think anyone else will come knocking tonight.
The apartment is fucked. There’s a gigantic hole in Jimin’s favorite armchair and it’s leaking stuffing, frothy white and obscene against the dark red of the upholstery. Glass shards from the wine glass he’d thrown at the intruder glint on the floor in the moonlight; ridiculously, his uneaten tangerines are safe and perfectly whole, rolled into a corner by the television. Amongst the detritus, the blood-slicked paring knife.
With a grimace, he tosses it in the trash.
Jimin wishes he’d gotten close enough to see the man’s whole face properly: all he has is black eyes, the hint of a strong nose, and the realization that his hair had not been white, as he’d first thought, but an unlikely shade of blue. Pale enough that it had been easy to mistake from afar, in the low light. The blue of bleached forget-me-nots, or glaciers, or an endless midsummer sky.
He slumps against his kitchen table. Tomorrow. Tomorrow he will go to Seokjin’s and they will figure something out. Tomorrow he will clean up his place and—oh. His fire is flickering. He’s about to go out. Literally.
Jimin retrieves his rings (now, the box is the only thing holding his shape, and he feels a bitter thankfulness for the familiar mold it provides) and just about manages to collapse in bed. Curls up under the covers still in his torn-up t-shirt and boxers, now sweat-stained and quite undignified, and passes out.
☾☾☾
Where has he seen that blue before?
(Cold, like stars in his veins. His hands, reaching up into black. An infinity later, the pink of a mouth. Where is the blue coming from?)
☾☾☾
Jimin wakes up feeling and looking like a disaster. There is no way he can leave the apartment without doing something about the utterly tragic state of his fucking face. He looks exactly like what happened to him: almost skewered, three-quarters of the way to fully strangled, and thrown across his apartment.
Carefully, he tapes up the cuts on his feet, applies concealer to the purpling on his throat and cheekbone, pulls on a long-sleeved shirt, tucks it into a pair of neat slacks. There. He looks more like himself now. Anyway, it’s just so that he won’t attract undue attention on the way over to Seokjin’s. A very practical reason.
When Jimin arrives at the Barb — Seokjin’s townhouse — with its worn oak paneling and the gremlin sculptures in the front yard that Seokjin thinks are hilarious, it is so solidly familiar that Jimin can scarcely believe that the rest of the world spent the night so unchanged. The seneschal lets him in with a murmured good morning. The Barb’s wards recognize him and usher him into their gentle hold; he undoes the top button of his shirt, finally feeling like he can breathe. More than his own apartment, the Barb is home.
Inside, his brother is making japchae, humming under his breath as he chops up vegetables. Jimin lingers for a few seconds, taking in the quiet domesticity before him: the muffle-thump of Seokjin’s indoor slippers against the floorboards as he shifts his weight from one foot to the other; the sweet sizzle of onions in sticky sauce; morning light slanting in at the same angle as always, leaving one edge of the couch a perpetually paler shade than the rest of it. He feels out of place, discombobulated, watching his own body cross the threshold of the kitchen.
Seokjin turns around to grab some salt and sees Jimin standing silently by the door. “Oh, morning! Get in here!” Seokjin says, voice too loud and cheery. “There’s coffee in the pot if you want some.” He goes back to the stovetop, throws some carrots in.
Jimin shuffles over and clears his throat; it hurts to do so. “I’m good, thanks.” He doesn’t know how exactly he’s supposed to break the news to Seokjin; in the movies everyone just seemed to realize that they had entered a narratively significant scene and turn somber automatically.
Thankfully, Seokjin must hear something off in his voice, because he turns around again. Pauses. “Um,” he says, eyes dancing from Jimin’s neck to the way Jimin is holding himself gingerly atop the counter stool. Then he squawks, ears turning red. “ Jimin ! Did you go out last night and pick someone up? You know there must have been paps crawling all over—”
“What?”
“I see you!” Seokjin shakes his head, spatula waving judgmentally. “God, you can’t even sit down. This is terrible. Were they good, at least?”
“I—oh my god, I did not fuck anyone last night,” Jimin says, disbelieving.
“That’s a shameful waddle if I’ve ever seen one,” Seokjin says, delighted.
“Hyung, I’m serious,” Jimin says, dropping his head into his hands. “ Listen —someone came into my room last night—”
"I’m sure,” Seokjin snickers. “I can’t believe you actually got laid , what has it been, literal years—?”
Jimin groans. “Shut up, and no, can you be serious for once—”
“Jimin, you hooked up last night?” Jungkook shuffles into the dining room, hair fluffed up like a chaotic cloud and eyes squinty with sleep. He stretches, big sleep shirt lifting up so it reveals the barest hint of tummy. Jimin blinks. He didn’t know Jungkook had slept over; the brat probably had been too lazy to schlep back home.
Automatically, Seokjin corrects, “Jimin- hyung ,” even as Jimin pokes Jungkook in the side, hard, and says, “ No. ”
“You truly are a bloodhound,” Seokjin marvels at Jungkook’s good timing. “Did you like, smell Jimin’s post-coital pheromones and come scurrying over?”
“Ew,” Jungkook and Jimin say at the same time, Jimin with disdain and Jungkook with mild fascination.
"Anyway, morning,” Jungkook says, collapsing into the chair next to Jimin and making grabby hands for Seokjin’s tea. He gulps some down and blinks up at Jimin, seemingly taking him in for the first time. “Hold up. You look fucking wrecked , dude.”
“I’m sure he was,” Seokjin purrs.
“No, hyung, fucking—look at him,” Jungkook says, grabbing Seokjin by the chin and forcefully pulling him closer. “Jiminie-hyung looks like he got fucking torpedoed. And not in a sexy way.” He pauses. “Is that foundation on your neck?”
“Well, someone did try to kill me,” Jimin deadpans, and has the small, petty satisfaction of seeing both Jungkook and Seokjin choke on their beverages. “Literally. Like with a sword. And yes. Obviously. I looked hideous.”
“ What the fuck,” Seokjin spits, staring at Jimin. “Are you joking?” Jimin’s silence is its own answer, and Seokjin’s eyes go wide, and then hard, as he catalogues the bruised skin peeking through the makeup, the ragged line of his entire body.
“Oh wow, what the fuck ,” Jungkook whispers, managing to look surprised at his spilled tea.
Jimin slumps on the table, suddenly exhausted. He slept maybe three hours. His home, that had never really been a home but had been one of the few places where he’d felt safe, had been violated. In the clear light of day, he’s more confused than ever.
But on the way over, he had time to think. And Jimin has a hypothesis, a fulcrum on which everything will pivot. He holds up his hand to count off his fingers. His rings shine in the morning light.
“Look, here’s what I know. Someone broke into my apartment. He came at me with a truly huge sword. I think I saw him at my party. And, well,” he takes a deep breath, aware of how crazy he’s going to sound, “I think he’s a rogue magician, with very weird powers. So yes, what the fuck indeed. Who is he and why is he trying to kill me?”