The first thing Seungri did when Jiyong takes off is to grab a binoculars, in order to see most of what was happening hundreds of metters above his head. He noticed that The Noahs is doing the same too, eager to see how their wicked proxy goes. They simply keep their head tilted back, the way he does. 

Seungri saw the moment when the dragon began its dive towards Jiyong, and he cursed under his breath at how Jiyong just hung there, waiting for it to come. What the hell that idiot think he's doing?, he thought, clenching his jaws. 

"Perhaps worried that your champion would lose?" Lucas asked in a calm voice, without taking his eyes off from the fight. 

"He's a Veela, not a champion, your idiocy say so." He snapped. Seungri could feel a rustle and stirring going through the people around him, and Youngbae and Daesung exchanging glances, but he couldn't take his eyes away from Jiyong anymore than Lucas was about to take his from the dragon, so he couldn't see why. 

Noah laughed at this, while Lucas were smirking beside her. "When one is watching the creature that will conquer, its only matters a little what one call it."

At that point, the dragon's flame that Seungri had been so worried about went out, and it began lurching around the sky. Seungri laughed, a sound that he didn't think he had done in these past few month. "So, you were saying?"

They didn't reply, but from the corner of his eyes, Seungri saw Lucas's lips tighten. That was enough to content him as he watched Jiyong attack that dragon. He shook his head, amused by the sign of Jiyong winning this battle. 

The battle seemed to go well for a minute or so. Then, the dragon got so close to Jiyong that Seungri couldn't see what is happening. He shifted around the place, just to get a better view. 

A second later, he saw Jiyong begin to fly in an ungainly motion, all over the sky, jerking closer and closer towards the ground. He clenched his hand so hard that he knew he had broken some of his fingernails. He sees it, from a distance, how Jiyong's face were scrunched up in what looks like a pure pain but he still fighting. 

"I guess, that will be the poison." Noah remarked. 

Seungri put down his binocular to look at them, but they didn't return his look. And there, he saw it, a small, pleased smile lifted at the corner of Lucas's mouth. 

"Poison?" Seungri said. He took a step toward Lucas, but he shook his head and went on gazing at the sky as though what was happening up there was much more interesting than the vengence that Seungri had planned to take on both of them. 

"I really think that you should continue watching," Lucas replied, "This might be the last minutes that you will see your lover alive. And," he added, so softly that it sounded like a whisper of the dying, "I told you that I would do anything to get you back." 

Seungri turned away from him, trembling violently. No. Jiyong was more important that they were, more important than fighting this useless battle or defeating the Noahs, more important than his anger. He tilted his head back and tried to watch, telling himself that if Jiyong is really in trouble, that if Jiyong is really hurting, he'll summon Jiyong down or do anything in his power to rescue the Veela. This duel shall go to hell for all he cares. 

****************************** * ** *** **** ***** ****** ******* ********

Jiyong could feel something thick and throbbing under his fingers, something that squished a little when he squeezed his hand down. He smiled and wrenched his hand sideways, feeling his breathe cutting off, but he don't care. He would crush the dragon's heart, or the thing that stood in for it, and that could mean that the Noahs would still lose. He will make sure their dragon's corspe hit the ground first. 

That way, even if he died, he would still won. They can't touch Seungri, and with that, he'll still die defending his mate. A Veela sometimes hoped to die like that, and it was probably more common is cases where their mate didn't love them. All he hope is that, if its even a little, Seungri will recognize him as his destinied Veela; the one who died protecting his mate's dignity. 

But still, the mate that didn't love their Veela... the one who didn't want to bond with their Veela... had some problem bonding with them... Jiyong didn't know which it was in Seungri's case, and anyway, it was getting harder and harder to think with the poison cutting his breathe off. 

The dragon went motionless, nothing more than a hunk of metal clinging to his chest now, as soon as he tear it's heart out of its chest. Jiyong concentrated intently so that he could pull his arm out and shove the dragon away from him. He watched it fall, and now, all left to do is to keep his own wings beating for a few more seconds. 

It turns out to be not even that. Jiyong was able to see the dragon plummet down and slam into the earth, but then his eyes were getting heavier. Black and dark red patches bloomed across his sight. 

He tried to keep his wings beating, but its getting harder and a second later, he could feel himself falling. Jiyong thought he couldn't die like that, so he gather all his remaining strength and beats his wings, enough to slow down his fall and when the ground is getting close, he wrapped his body with his wings just before he slams the ground. 

Jiyong was fighting for his breath, tried to move to dip his wing in one final salute to Seungri. That will be more dignified than simply dying fighting agaisnt suffocation, but his body refuse to move. 

He was still alive, barely breathing but still and whether or not he was a Veela, whether or not he had a mate who loved him, he still had to breathe. Jiyong choked, and then he was fighting after all. It doesn't matter now that the dragon already fallen, but he wished to see Seungri for the last time.  

In seconds, someone runs towards him and crouched beside him. The person slipped a hand behind his neck, and then, he heard a voice which belong to Seungri, whispering to his ear, "This has to work. You fought for me, and you would've died for me. Drink this," said Seungri, and then something cold touched his lips. He could feel how Seungri's hand were trembling at the moment he swallow the bitter tasting liquid. 

Jiyong spasmed as something seemed to stir deep inside him, the way the dragon's inner organ had when he crused them. He tried to grasp out and protest that Seungri shoudln't come close, but instead of words, his blood, that is dark red and almost black, poured out from his open mouth. His throat feels like burning. He trashed, and Seungri reached out, and his wings.

He opened his eyes and he was crouching, with his hands the grass and Seungri had one hand on his back and was forcing the liquid on his mouth again. 

"Drink more," He said and Jiyong did. 

He vomited a moment later after he swallowed it down. It hurt so much that he moaned, but the sound of the moan was lost in the sound of him emptying his stomach. Seungri kept one hand at the middle of his back though, and murmured a words of comforting every now and then. Jiyong reminded himself of who he was and who he cared about, and went on trying to clear his stomach from the poison instead of begging it to stop. 

Finally, nothing more was coming out, and Seungri ceased from trembling. He falls to his side, and Seungri slowly turn him on his back. "There's still some in your blood, but you aren't struggling to breathe now." He muttered, "I think we should take you to your room and get Miss Park to check you further. You should still be seen by someone who knows what they're doing." He laughed, in what sound like he's covering his anxiety. "God know that I don't."

Seungri place Jiyong's head on his laps, and Jiyong manage to turn his head slowly towards Seungri. "What are you doing?" He asked, and then flinched. His throat hurts so much and his mouth feels bitter, and he was sure that he sound horrible. "How did you know?"

"Lucas told me about the poison, and Miss Park apparently had the antidote with her, just in case." Seungri's eyes were damp at the moment they met his eyes, but Jiyong didn't see him crying. "I took it from her and run towards you." 

Seungri didn't talk after that and Jiyong reached up with a shaking hand towards Seungri's cheeks, although he didn't make it, probably due to his weakness at the moment. "How did - why did you act like you care about me so much?"

Seungri paused and blinked, and Jiyong immediately feels sorry for asking. He felt awful anyway, his head reeling and his throat and his stomach is aching uncomfortably. He probably wouldn't be able to appreciate the answer if it was the favorable one, which it wouldn't be. Seungri hasn't realize until now that he's been acting more gentle towards him, and now that Seungri realized, he would distance himself from Jiyong in an attempt to make this bond as what he wanted it to be. 

Jiyong closed his eyes and waited for a moment. 

But then, Seungri whispered. "That must be what they're whispering about," 

"What was the whispering all about?" Jiyong winced a second later, he really should stop talking. His throat hurt so much that his head was starting to trob in symphaty with it. 

"I lost my temper against Lucas," said Seungri. "I had said something that had actual meaning in it. And it was because I was so angry that it looked like you were just hovering in midair, and seems to just about losing your life." There was a long pause when Jiyong could only feel Seungri's warm hand on his and his own relentless hope. "It was - I don't know. I was angry at you before, when I pinned you on the floor that day. I don't know why this time it was different."

Jiyong shook his head. He know what he hoped for, that seeing him in danger had made Seungri realize that he didn't want to lose Jiyong. If it was related to his past, then probably Seungri needed to focused more on his attempt to moved on from it before he would feel ready to love Jiyong.

And even then, Jiyong doubted that their bond would be the same as any other Veela bond that he had seen. Most dominants didn't give up and die like he had done; they would at least fight their way back to their mate's side. Most submissive didn't come and rescue their Veela the way Seungri had done to him. 

On the other hand, how had Jiyong been able to weild the same magic a dominant Veela could only use in defense of their mate, if Seungri wasn't the one for him?

Jiyong sighed and focused on his breathing. He didn't know, right now, thinking makes his head hurt. He would like to yield and let someone else care for him a while. 

The last thing he felt was Seungri's finger, caressing his hairs. 

*************************************************** * ** *** **** ***** ****** *******

"Is all the poison out of him?" Seungri asked. If he sound ridiculous, he thought as Miss Park gave him a sideways glance and pressed her stethoscope on Jiyong's bare chest, then he could put up with that. 

He would put up a lot, not to have Jiyong dead. 

"Most of it, and he's breathing just fine now," she said, after spending a few minutes examining Jiyong so closely that Seungri had to hold his breath the way he would if he was underwater. "Some of the poison got absorbed into his blood, and I'll keep him overnight and make sure he's not still suffering the effect of that." She walk to the nightstand and retrieve a small flask of some silvery liquid. "This will keep him from suffering too much," she added, as she poured the liquid down Jiyong's throat. "He'll get the remaining poison out through sweating, instead of having to vomit it out."

Seungri nodded, his eyes is still on Jiyong's face. He don't think that Jiyong was fully unconscious because, sometimes the Veela groaned and stirred, and he would reached a hand toward Seungri whenever Seungri moved even a short distance away. "What kind of poison is that?"

"Cyanide, but this one had been mixed with something else," said Miss Park casually, and she stepped back to consider Jiyong from a different angle. "I see it often enough, when someone want to kill something as powerful as Veela. They might as well make the poison more deadly than its already is."

Seungri was worried, but he had to remind himself that Jiyong is alright now. Sandara seems to know her way around and that must be the reason why the Kwons family trust her so much. 

She gave him a close glance, then added, "There is one more thing, Mr Lee."

"Yes?" Seungri sat up. He had to wonder if the Noahs had added something more horrible than a substance that would inflitirate the bloodstream into their poison. It wouldn't suprise him anymore if they did. 

"One of my ability that allow me to serve Veela bloodlines is I can sense a bond when it's in its first year of formation," Sandara said carefully. "Veelas bonds, wedding bonds, all sorts. After that, it will usually slows and settle, and then, it'll be hard to detect anymore. But this feels like a broken limb than a settled bonds."

Seungri sighed. "Yeah. I'm afraid that was my fault. I didn't - I can't be the kind of submissive mate that most dominant Veela would want, and I told him that. Our bond hasn't taken and another Veela said that it looked tanttered, and we can't feel each other the way we ought to be able to."

"Have you considered the method that might help the bond settled?" Sandara ask gently. 

Seungri shrugged at her. "I've tried to spend more time with him, talking about harmless things, and learning to trust him. But I can't become the kind of kneeling, order taking submissive that he hoped for. I care about him, and I don't want him to die, but that are the things I can't do. Even for him."

"Yet you still care about him more than you did at the beginning," said Sandara, and she hesitated for a long time before she continue. "So Hyung told me about you and Jiyong, and how you went all out rejecting your bond with her brother."

"She did?" Seungri asked after a moment, but then, he decide to let it go. Maybe they were friends and it only neutral for her to share some of her concern with her friends. 

Sandara nodded. "I remember thinking that you might not care about Jiyong, even a bit and you're probably hate Jiyong for forcing the bond on you."

Seungri shrugged a little. "I poured all my effort into my plans after I graduate."

"Yes, and So Hyung said you didn't think about Jiyong's feeling except if he died or alive by your actions. As if, his life and death only mattered because it might get you into deeper trouble than the one you already have." Sandara said. 

Seungri blinked at her. She seemed to be closer to him, and she put her hands on her hips and stare at him so sternly that it made him squirm. 

"It was a lot different from the way you're acting now, I see. Concerned about someone who could've been a burden to you. About something that you tried to get rid of," Sandara shook her head. "I think you should consider the possibility that the bond is changing you in some ways, awakening emotions that you locked away. I think you're right when you said that it would never turn you into the kind of submissive Jiyong wanted. But, it might change you into someone he could want, not submissive but someone else. Yourself."

She held Seungri's eyes for a moment, and then she turned around and said, "I need to go and fetch another medicine that will prevent the sweating from hurting Jiyong too much. Excuse me." She left the room quietly and close the door, as if she didn't say anthing at all. 

Seungri sat there, with Jiyong's hand in his, thinking about her words. 

******************************* * ** *** **** ***** *******

Jiyong had to spend a large portion of the next day laying on his back, his wings were spread behind his back to allow himself to lay down more comfortably. Although he didn't like that because thats mean, there is no room for Seungri to sleep beside him. He also had to watch Seungri leave his bedside at times, to speak with his friends, or to Sandara or when he need to do something else. Jiyong felt his nature only settle when Seungri came back and sat down in the seat at his side again, and smiled at him. 

But at least, he's awake for the most important visit; the one where Noah and Lucas came to concede the duel with him. 

Seungri immediately stood up when they came into the room, and his face wasn't the bland mask Jiyong was used to seeing when Seungri was dealing with his touches, or at the times when they met Noah at the orphanage that day. He moved to stand a little in front of Jiyong, and his hand was on the fruit knife that the maid had left on the nightstand. He didn't let it go even when Noah met his eyes and made a little gesture with one hand that Jiyong knew was appealing for someone to put their weapon down. 

"Seungri," he whispered, touching his back, but Seungri didn't turn. "She wants you to put the knife down."

There were a long moment that tilted on the edge of the knife, and Jiyong knew Seungri was seriously considering not doing it what he said. In the end, he stepped out of the way, but keep one sharp eyes on the Noahs all the way. 

If they does anything stupid, Jiyong thought, impressed in spite of himself, then they'll wish they didn't. 

And this... maybe Jiyong was indulging into a wishful thinking, but he thought there was something different about the way Seungri was moving and standing. The consideration didn't seem to come from Seungri's usual calculation of his wellbeing. Jiyong thought he was thinking about something else at the moment. 

Me?

Seungri sat down beside Jiyong, and took his hand again. Jiyong had to bite his lips hard, and not just because Seungri was showing himself more willing to engage with Jiyong more than ever before. He was sitting down, when he should accepted the Noahs surrender standing. It was an insult that wouldn't meant that much to Jiyong, but would have to them who lose the battle. 

For long moments, they just stood there. Then Lucas come forward and held out a steel dagger. Seungri surged on his feet again. 

"This is the sign of the peace treaty," said Lucas, his voice as bland as his face. "There is nothing that says I can harm you with it. In fact, it is enchanted that I cannot harm you with it." 

"Jiyong," said Seungri and Jiyong's heart leaped and thrilled so hard at the murmur of his name that he almost didn't pay attention to what Seungri was saying next. "I read once that Veela can sense harm to their mate, is it true?"

"It depends on how present the threat is," Jiyong said, wondering for a moment where Seungri had read about that, and how come he didn't read about dominant Veela and submissive mates in the same book. "I could sense that someone in a room had murderous thoughts towards you, but I couldn't sense a threat from someone who was only daydreaming about how much convenient it would be to have you out of the way."

Seungri nodded. He had his blank face on again, but his words waren't blank at all. "Then just test the dagger for me, would you?"

Jiyong swallowed and reach out a hand, palm open to receive the dagger. Lucas gives him a look of silent scorn and passed it over to him. Jiyong didn't pay attention to that. He concentrated, instead, on the way that the metal pressed against his skin, and how it make his sense light up and flicker and sparks, and he nodded gravely in the end. 

"It could be threatening in the sense that someone else could use it to stab you," he told Seungri, and handed the dagger back to Lucas. He was the one who should give it to Seungri, directly to mark his lost in his attempt to claim Jiyong's right. "But he's right about it being enchanted so he can't use it to harm you or me."

Seungri gave Lucas a smile that exhilirated Jiyong. Where had this defiant and stuborn risk taker been hiding the rest of the times they were together? Where had he been hiding since their college years, in fact? Jiyong shook his head, trying to clear the thoughts out of it. 

Lucas, luckily, was focused on Seungri right then and didn't pay attention to realize that Jiyong is distracted enough and thus not on guard. He grimaced and handed the blade to Seungri, turning it as if he try to get some scratch on Seungri's hand. "Your stakes is claimed," he said as he looked at Jiyong. "I will withdraw myself from any attempt of pursuing Lee Seungri, and ceased on opposing you."

Jiyong nodded and said, "They are claimed."

"Very well." said Lucas, as his gaze lingered on Seungri's face for a moment. "You acknowledge the rules of honor."

Jiyong was smarter to think that it was a congratulations of any sort. He waited, and reach for Seungri's hand and gently pulled his mate to his side. For a moment, he's afraid that Seungri will protest, but he didn't and he complied to Jiyong very well. Lucas will take that as an annoucement of claim. 

Lucas, with his face consumed with disgust and hatred, bent toward Jiyong. "But only the rules. Not the honors itself. I still hate you, for taking him from me. I still wish he didn't get into this bond with you and I hope you remember this, the moment you slip, when I can strike you, then I plan to do so."

"Aren't you a little stupid to be telling me that?" Jiyong asked, harldy moving his lips. 

Lucas and his mother whirled away from them and strode out from the room. Jiyong turn Seungri towards him and drew him closer. Seungri however remained alert until the sounds of their footsteps faded, even to Jiyong's enchanced sense. 

*

"You were magnificient," Jiyong said, when he could listen to something other than threat he thought was leaving. 

Seungri stared down to his fingers and flushed a second later. Jiyong watched in pure delight. He thought Seungri was trying to turn down some of the anger and some emotions that had flowed out of him when he was comforting Lucas, but it was very hard for him to do that.

"Um. You think so?" Seungri scratched the back of his neck and then shrugged and continue to look down to his fingers. "I don't know. It makes me feels uncertain and, I wondered if I'm going to slash his skin any second."

Jiyong smiled and reached a hand to cup Seungri's cheek. "You were never near that," he said gently. "Or else, I would've felt a threat, remember?"

"Including threat to him?" Seungri looked frankly disbelieving, and Jiyong could understand why. It didn't seem to chime at all with what Seungri had read about Veela, wherever he had read that. 

"A threat to yourself, in this case," Jiyong said. "Because that kind of anger could put you in trouble as well."

"Oh," Seungri looked interested. "I didn't know you could do that."

"Well, you didn't ask," said Jiyong, and tried to ignore the urge to flutter his wings in an anxious way on the bed. He had to comfort his mate this way, if they waren't going to have a normal conversation about it later. "And I'm wondering about something. Come." He held out his hand. 

Seungri had started some protest that seem to include the word "But," . He stopped and scoots closer to Jiyong. His gaze was frankly evaluating as he put his hand on Jiyong's. 

Jiyong closed his eyes and concentrated as hard as he could. Before, he can't feel much of anything through the bond except for flashes now and then. He had accepted that as a 'natural' state of the bond after Seunghyun had told him about it. 

Now, he reaches out with senses whose possesion is still new to him and sent a soft throbbing pulse of emotion up the bond, along Seungri's arm. A normal Veela would have been able to do this without physical touches, but then again, a normal Veela would have been able to order his submissive to speak the truth, and the submissive should have, whether or not he knew the truth consiously. 

Jiyong was trying to stop regretting what he didn't have, and instead, rejoicing in what he have. 

He slowly traced the line of his consiousness up and down Seungri's arm, and the pulse came back to him at last. Jiyong opened his mouth, and it filled his tongue with the coppery taste of adrenaline and anger. 

He opened his mouth more fully, then he swallowed it down and stared at Seungri as he murmured, "I think I might have found the true reason why our bond didn't work out."

Seungri stiffened. The mask of wariness he wore on his face was painful, but nothing like the true indiferrence that Jiyong thought he had felt before. For one thing, Jiyong could feel the pulse slamming away in Seungri's wrist. "What is it?" Seungri asked tightly.

Jiyong looked down and traced his finger for a moment over Seungri's wrist, trying to calm him down but it didn't work. Seungri just keep watching him. 

"It's nothing like a secret from your past," Jiyong finally said, having decided that was ultimate source of Seungri's tension. "Or if its is, it's only a secret from the part that you already told me about. You've changed since the duel began. You know that right?" Jiyong said as he took Seungri's hand into his.

Seungri nodded, eyes still guarded. For a moment, he looked down their clasped hands, then back to Jiyong's face. "Miss Park said that maybe our bond have finally settling. But I don't know what the difference was."

"You're feeling so much emotions now," Jiyong saod quietly. "You didn't feel much of anything before, except when you pinned me on the drawing room floor, and even that didn't lasts long. You were trying to put up with what happened to you instead of either accepting or rejecting this bond fully," he added, when Seungri squinted his eyes as if he don't understand what Jiyong is saying. 

"But that is what I have to do," Seungri said. "I mean - If I didn't you would've die and I don't want to cause it. But I can't accept it the way it is, with all of its stupid prejudgement, or give up when I didn't know anything about it."

Jiyong smiled at him, relieved and truimphant. "I know, but you told me before that you're holding back all of your anger and trying not to feel it at all. You got angry at Lucas during the duel right?"

 Seungri blinked. "Yes, I do. When he was taunting me about you, and then when he told me about the poison." His face is turning red now, and Jiyong didn't think it was from embarassment. 

He nodded at Seungri. "Well, I think that you have been unconsiously holding in not only anger,but a lot of emotions too. All the emotions that might interfered with your plans. Impatience, boredom, regrets... and maybe, pleasure too. Because it might distract you. And - well, until yesterday, its all came out. So, all these emotions is coming back, and that was what had been intefering our bond all this long. Its your own will to hold back these emotions that might have you react to this bond in a deep way, positively or negatively."

Seungri stared at him with his mouth open a little, but he didn't say anything to reject Jiyong's explaination either. Jiyong gently tightened his hold, glad for a chance to just hold onto Seungri's hand and gaze at him.

Then Seungri whispered, "So, what happens now?"

"I start to know the real you," Jiyong said. "And get to bond with the real you, not some submissive out of my imagination or the person who is hard to love you were trying to imagine yourself into being."

Seungri stared at him and smiled. "Well, I gues it'll be interesting to see what happens to us next," and there, for the first time, Jiyong sees the crack on the tough facade that Seungri had always wear.

He could've called this other things, but for now, he'll agree with this. "Yes." He said simply, pressing his lips on the back of Seungri's hand as he basked in those smile. 

* ** *

A.N : So firstly, until now I can't believe that the news about Jonghyun was true. It was a defastating lost, after Chester Bennington. And the heart to this sadness is what cause it was depression. My hearts feels heavy when I think about him, and chester, the way they left because of the burden and just out of loneliness. I lay awake at night, after the news comes out, thinking to myself how it feel to know that right at the moment, no one could come and save you. How horrible it must've feel when you feels like there is no more hope in your life, no more light that you could cling onto. What horrible now is depression really has no face and how it can happens to anyone. 

I hope that SHInee members, his family, friends and also, Shawol could handle this well, although I believe that its a hard process but I hope that they can get back on their feet and smile in respect of Kim Jonghyun. He's an amazing artist, a great songwriter and performer... he'll forever be loved and remembered by everyone. Rest In Piece Kim Jonghyun.