Chapter Text
So… Heck. I don’t really know where to start with this one.
It was about a year after I lost my arm, give or take. I guess that’s a place to start. We’d been handling various cases for Les and the Enforcers, and this one seemed like more of the same — human teenagers going missing across Australia and turning up Behind under contract. We were supposed to catch the contractors.
We did our best: pinned down a couple operating in each city around the time of the disappearances, running a “shelter” that wasn’t quite right. They looked different each time, but the MO was the same, so we figured it was a case of glamours.
Then I got a bit too close. Long story short: it wasn’t glamours, it was tricksters.
And my immunity to fae glamours? Doesn’t work on trickster magic.
This is the part I don’t want to talk about. I know, I know, I’ve definitely been through worse, but there was something about trailing after them like a lost puppy, convinced they were my new best friends… Yeah. No. That part’s not important, anyway.
I did find their home base, anyway. And Zero and JinYeong found me, though they had a bit of a hard time at first.
I’d been hunkered down in a corner since the alarms started, like we were supposed to do here until the bosses came and got us. The first I’d seen of JinYeong was a pair of shiny shoes stopping in front of me, followed by crouching legs in very nice trousers, and finally two warm hands lifting my face to meet his.
“Ruth,” he said, dark eyes boring into mine. “My Ruth, are you all right?”
“Sure,” I said, staring back at him. It was funny, but I hadn’t so much as thought of JinYeong since last night, when I’d met the bosses of this place. Hadn’t thought of much, except for them — just floated along in a pink haze of contentment. “What’re you doing here?”
He blinked. “I am here to take you home,” he said slowly.
I laughed — couldn’t help it. “I am home,” I said, twitching away from his grip a bit. “I belong here now. Maybe they’ll let you stay too if you ask nicely, though.”
His eyes went wide and he reared back on his heels, hands falling to his sides. Then he took a breath and stilled — and let me tell you, when a vampire goes still, it’s the real deal. “Aight,” he muttered, his eyes dark and uncertain as they flicked back to mine. “I… do not know what to do with this.”
“Don’t have to do anything,” I said, feeling a bit sorry. “I’m stayin’ here now, but it doesn’t have to be a big deal, yeah? It’s just — I really love it here. I love the people here.”
At that, JinYeong scowled. “That is not true,” he said positively. “You will not even say you love me — do not say it about them.”
“You don’t get to tell me who I love,” I shot back. I didn’t like the way he said them, like it was a bad taste in his mouth. It gave me a queasy feeling. “They’re — they’re my favorite people. They’re everything.”
He shook his head. “After one day? You are a more suspicious person than that. Listen to yourself.”
“I know what I feel,” I said stubbornly. When he reached for my hand, though, wrapping it in both of his, I let him. I didn’t want to fight. “They make me so flamin’ happy — you don’t know what it’s like. You can’t talk me out of that.”
He smiled, but it was an unhappy little smile. “Ani? You are very stubborn. But love is not a feeling. You know this.”
I scowled at him. “What d’you mean?” I did so love them. They were the most important. They made me happy just by existing — by giving me the chance to be around them, to listen to them, to do what they wanted.
But a quiet little voice murmured, in the back of my head, All that can stay true, without you loving them.
JinYeong had been silent for a few moments. Now he squeezed my hand, and said, “You love Hyeong, ne?”
“‘Course I do. He’s my uncle.”
“Does that make you forget other things, and people, and what you think is right?”
I frowned. His questions were sinking in through the pink haze, hitting some of the stuff it was covering up with a blanket of happy; I remembered my eighteenth birthday, walking away from the only home and family I had. “No, s’pose not,” I answered slowly. “But that’s not a problem here. They wouldn’t ask me to do that.”
JinYeong made a small, dismissive pft of air. “Ruth. Have you not already done that? You left me and Hyeong without saying a word.”
“They wanted me,” I told him patiently. “That was more important.”
“Ah.” He was scowling again. “So whatever they want is right?”
That made me pause. “Well, I suppose so,” I said, slow again. “Haven’t really worried about that.”
Isn’t it worth worrying about? said that soft voice in the back of my head again. If you love them, you should want to help them do what’s right, after all.
JinYeong had been watching my face. Now he squeezed my hand again. “Ruth,” he said insistently. “You are squishing yourself down for them. You are not being you for them. That is not love.”
“Isn’t it?” I asked, but my voice was more uncertain than I meant it to be.
He heard it, too; his face was glowing. “Just come home with me—” he started.
But that shut me down entirely. I shook my head, trying to shake all the confusion out of it.
“Can’t,” I said, falling back on what I knew for certain. “They asked me not to leave, and I promised. I shouldn’t even be talking to you, I don’t think…”
I didn’t want to pull away from his hands, warm and sure around mine, but I couldn’t help it. JinYeong let go, reluctantly, and sighed.
“I do not know what to do,” he said again, his eyes hurt and troubled in a way that bothered me to see. “And there is no one to ask now…”
He paused.
“My Ruth,” he said then. His gaze was fixed intensely on mine. “What should I do? What do you want me to do?”
That made me pause. Somehow, I hadn’t thought of myself as wanting anything in this conversation. Still couldn’t think of anything I wanted aside from what I already had — at least, not really. But JinYeong still looked worried and wounded, and I wished I could make that look go away…
There’s one thing that generally seems to help with that, said a quiet thought. I examined it, and decided I couldn’t find any way it’d make my new friends unhappy.
So I said, “A kiss’d be nice, actually.”
JinYeong’s face lit up with surprise, and then with a spark of joy and laughter that made him look much more like the vampire I knew.
“You want a kiss?” he asked, almost purring, as his hand slipped up to cradle my cheek. “If you wish it, then yes.”
He rose to his feet, pulling me up with him, arm around my waist and his thumb still stroking my cheek. Then he leaned down, and I leaned up, and he kissed me.
I dunno. Maybe it was the vampire spit kicking my system into overdrive. Maybe it works against trickster compulsions, the same way that vampires are immune to fae stuff. Maybe it was just JinYeong. All I know is that when he finally pulled away, I was breathless and uncertain, brain whirling between that haze of happiness and a lot of sharp, stabbing doubts.
“JinYeong,” I gasped out, clinging round his neck. “JinYeong, just — tell me somethin’ solid—”
He bent down again, and very close to my ear, he murmured, “Ruthanne.”
Everything went quiet.
“You are Ruthanne,” he murmured again. “Be free.”
And the haze blew apart like it had never been, and there was just me — all of me — sobbing in my boyfriend’s arms.
So yeah. That helped. After that the two of us went looking for Zero — and found him, unfortunately, facing the trickster couple.
I could take them in a bit more clearly now, without the haze of their words over everything. They looked like a homey, pleasant middle-aged couple: her round-faced and a bit plump with brown hair in a bun, him tall and greying and square-jawed.
They didn’t look like I’d expected, and after a minute, I figured out why; the first time I’d met them, they’d reminded me of Mum and Dad. I couldn’t see it at all now.
That made a hard, hot stone of anger grow in my gut. Was that what they’d done to all the kids here? Dragged out memories of warmth and love and comfort, wearing those memories like a skinsuit, just to trick them into slavery? Stealing their — our — most precious ties, whatever it was we had — for profit?
My parents gave their lives for me. Even before that, they defied the Family to keep me free. Like heck were these two going to use a mockery of that love to snare me, or anyone else, ever again.
I stepped forward, JinYeong at my side, and saw Zero and them pick up on our presence at the exact same time. The tricksters turned and smiled, welcomingly — and so did Zero, though it was smaller.
With a lurch in my stomach, I realized his sword was down at his side, his stance unguarded.
“Zero—” I started, but the man talked over me, and my words died away.
“Look,” he said warmly, “we’ve found your uncle. We’re hoping he’ll stay here with us. Wouldn’t that be a good thing, Ruth? You should all stay — your boyfriend as well. We’ll all be a family together.”
His partner smiled and nodded, looking absolutely sincere, and the pink haze swept over me in a cloud of fizz and sparkles.
It would be wonderful, I felt. It’d be flaming fantastic to stay here, all of us together, with them. I knew in their home, we’d all be safe and happy and well — and wouldn’t that be a relief, to be happy all the time? To see that furrow ease away from between Zero’s eyes, to have JinYeong always perky and pleased, to never feel an ache in my arm or my heart again?
The happiness of those images washed away all my fear, all my sickness, all my anger and pain, and my stance faltered. So did JinYeong’s, beside me, and Zero’s eyes looked dazed and uncertain.
But a little murmur in my head, not contradicting any of that sparkly happiness, said Being happy isn’t always the right choice, is it?
Just a minute ago, I’d been so certain they needed to be stopped. I didn’t feel any of the feelings that went with that certainty — couldn’t even imagine being angry at them, right now — but the facts hadn’t changed, had they? Which meant I could let go of that certainty, because it didn’t match my feelings, and float away on a tide of happiness… or I could hang on to it, ignore my feelings, and fight them even if it wrenched my heart out of my chest.
Not as though it would be the first time, the little voice pointed out.
My breath hitched at the thought.
“What’s wrong?” the woman murmured, holding out a hand to me. “Don’t be upset, Ruth. Trust us. Let yourself be happy.”
Even as my breath eased, contentment and peace flowing over me, a memory murmured like an echo: All you have to do is say you’ll obey my lord, Pet.
I hadn’t been happy then. I’d been sick and stressed and sad and betrayed, even though the pain felt distant now — but I’d had the same choice.
Wasn’t like that was the only time, either.
You really ought to stop asking for things that will not make you happy, Pet. Life is so much more pleasant when one accepts what is on the surface of life and doesn’t dig too deeply.
Wasn’t that a fitting thing to remember? Not even that hurt, right now — not on the surface, anyway. If I dug — if I let myself dig — I’d feel the ache deep down, but if I stayed here I’d never have to notice it. At least, that’s what they were telling me.
But it wasn’t true, was it? It felt true, but that didn't mean it was.
More importantly, if I could nerve myself up to walk away from my house for what was right — if I could survive regaining my memories because I had an obligation to — then I could definitely stand losing this. Because this happiness, blanketing over the surface of my mind, suddenly didn’t seem nearly as hard to disregard as the ties of love and home and belonging I’d fought through in the past.
So I took another breath amid the pink, happy haze, feeling it wash through me, and said without trying to fight it, “Zero? Zero, they gotta stop.”
My voice wasn’t very loud — it still wasn’t easy to speak against them — but Zero heard me, and I saw his eyes focus on me, troubled.
Slowly, he raised a hand to something fastened on his jacket — hang on, was that one of ‘Zul’s badges, or just something that looked like it? — and touched it.
Something shimmered into being around him, and his face cleared, hardening instantly into stone.
“Stay behind me, Pet,” he said briefly, and turned back to them.
I couldn’t quite do that, of course. Tricksters are flamin’ strong physically as well as magically, and neither JinYeong nor I could watch Zero wade into battle against two of them without lending some kind of a hand. Mostly I contributed magically, though, which meant technically I was still behind the other two.
Caught by a spell I flung at him, the male trickster stumbled and went down on his knees. “Please, Ruth,” he said, reaching out his arm to me, actual fear on his face now. “Don’t let them kill me! My dear — don’t you care?”
And I’ll never know if it was the trickster’s magic or my own brain, that time, but — for a second, I heard his voice warp into a much more familiar one, soft and gentle and fresh from my memories, saying my dear with an imploring affection that stabbed me right in the heart.
The ache of longing I felt then had nothing happy about it, but it made me sway on my feet anyway, desperately driven both toward and away from him.
Then my mind cleared, whether because his power was running low, or because it had been the product of my own memories all along. That ache was replaced with a new rush of blazing anger, because how dare he. How flamin’ dare he?
“Zero!” I said, my voice high and urgent. “Zero, the trickster!”
And then my uncle’s sword was raised over him, and he was dead on the ground, and everything his magic had been doing was gone like it had never been. I felt like I was breathing freely — if not smoothly — for the first time since I’d laid eyes on the two tricksters.
“The other one?” I asked, shaky, but I could already spot a second body on the ground, sprawled and weirdly indistinct. JinYeong was standing over her, shaking his head as if to clear it.
“They should not be able to do these things,” he said.
For a split second, I wondered what I’d missed — what she’d made herself look like. But there weren’t any good answers to that, were there?
So instead I went over and grabbed JinYeong’s hand, and tugged him over to Zero, and tucked myself in between them. “Dunno about you two,” I said, voice still shakier than I’d like, “but I’m about ready to be done with this place.”
JinYeong’s hand closed tight and warm around mine, and Zero looked down at me with eyes slightly lighter than they’d been a second ago. “Agreed,” he said. “There are other Enforcers here — and Abigail’s group as well. They can handle the rest.”
Normally, the reminder of how much more work there was to do would've had me pushing back; I'd forgotten, for a second, about all the other teenagers here, and who better to help them out than someone who'd been in their shoes a few minutes ago?
But... Abigail's group could definitely handle that, and if Zero was okay leaving the Enforcers unsupervised, Palomena must be here as well. And my mind was reeling from having been snapped in and out of happy cloud land again when it had barely started processing the first time, and, well... bottom line was, I was feeling pretty sick and shaky, and Zero and JinYeong didn't look so bright themselves. Going home was about the best cure I could think of.
So we went home. And we made coffee, and I successfully stopped myself from making tea, and we all ended up in the living room like it was a normal night, except that no one mentioned going to bed. Instead, I found myself falling asleep on the couch: my head cushioned on JinYeong’s leg and his arm draped over me, Zero reading on the opposite couch.
It should’ve felt safe. It was safe.
I didn’t need anyone else here, I reminded myself, trying to ignore the tears pricking at my eyelids. So what if neither of them had been able to do too much against this kind of magic? They’d given me all the help I needed to fight my way free. They’d found me, and taken those two down, and brought me home, and they’d face anything they had to for me. We’d all face anything we had to for each other, and if we didn’t know how — well, we’d figure it out on the way.
So it didn’t make sense to want a different kind of safety than Zero’s bulk between me and the door, or JinYeong’s warmth around me. No sense at all, to feel like the empty armchair between the couches was a hole in my comfort.