OMG LOOK AT MY BEAUTIFUL BANNER ;~; All credit goes to Minseung and Rosie for the art and the editing. I've put their contact info on the foreword in case anyone wants to go shower them with praise for being awesome *hint hint wink wink*.

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“Mother!” Jiyong whined, smile fading once again. “Isn’t it a bit soon to be asking about his intentions? We haven’t even slept together yet!”

Seunghyun could feel every capillary in his face fill with blood. Somehow he’d forgotten how frank fairies could be. What a lovely reminder.

“You haven’t?” Soojin squeaked, clearly in disbelief. “Why not? Does he not like boys?” She zoomed up to join her brother and mother, and peered questioningly at the writer. “Do you not like boys?”

“He does too! He’s just… Seunghyun says is special.” Jiyong bit at his lips and gave Seunghyun a pleading look.

Seoyun frowned at her son. “Jiyong, as long as you are the village muse, you have a responsibility to be open and honest about every aspect of your life. Surely you can’t be happy in such a less relationship?”

Those words prompted Seunghyun to action. He wasn’t expecting to have a conversation with Jiyong’s mother and sister about their life (or lack thereof), but it was something he was willing to do. Obviously, Jiyong had neglected to tell him he was the village muse. What that meant, he wasn’t sure, but the fact that Jiyong had to disclose to his mother possibly intimate details of their relationship had him opening his mouth to find out.

“I don’t understand,” he cut in. “What does Jiyong’s position as your village muse have to do with whether or not we’ve, uh, been intimate?”

“Because the morale of the whole community depends on my brother’s ability to inspire pleasant feelings in others, and is a very integral part of our society, especially in the kind of relationship you two have,” Soojin explained. “If Jiyong is unhappy, then everyone will suffer.” At Seunghyun’s increasingly confused look, she sighed. “I’m not sure how to explain it any other way. We’re magical beings. Ever since Jiyong sprouted his wings, he’s been able to motivate or discourage those around him through his own emotional state. When Youngbae left him for another, he sank into a deep depression that affected every fairy in our village. Relationships began failing, no one fell in love, and the food tasted awful.”

“Because no one felt motivated enough to prepare anything tasty,” Jiyong whispered, wringing his hands anxiously.

“So what you’re telling me is that Jiyong has to be happy at all times, or your people will fall into chaos?” Three tiny heads nodded. “What happens when he decides to leave one day?”

“Leave?” Seoyun asked, as though she had no idea what he meant.

“Yes. You know, what if he decides to move away? Live somewhere else. Hypothetically speaking, of course.”

This time, three pairs of bright blue eyes blinked at him in confusion.

“But… no one has ever left the village in my lifetime,” Jiyong began slowly. “I don’t even know if it’s possible for a fairy to live away from his or her people.”

“It isn’t. A fairy cannot survive apart from its fellow fairy folk,” Seoyun confirmed. “The last member of our community who tried... well, let us say he didn’t last an entire season before he came crawling back quite literally on his hands and knees, magic entirely depleted. It took the healer nearly a month to restore his strength enough to be able to fly. His magic never returned.”

Jiyong and Soojin, apparently never having heard this story, gasped and grabbed each other’s hands. Seunghyun felt a bit shellshocked. It was a lot of information to take in all at once. The realization that the fairy would always have such a heavy burden to bear pulled at his heartstrings; played them like a master harpist plucking out a particularly doleful fugue. Being responsible for the happiness of one’s entire village was a weight no one should have to carry alone.

Seoyun patted both of her children’s cheeks, then turned to face Seunghyun. The atmosphere under the lush dome of pine needles had turned somber; he could feel the change as if it were a physical thing.

“In light of this, I trust you understand why I must ask you what your intentions are toward my son?”

Seunghyun nodded. Even if he didn’t like it, he understood. And, more importantly, he felt like he could give an honest answer. Jiyong’s pretty blue eyes were focused on him, and instead of making him feel nervous, it gave him a welcome sense of calm. He took one deep breath, and began.

“Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?

Thou art more lovely and more temperate.

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,

And summer's lease hath all too short a date.

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,

And often is his gold complexion dimmed;

And every fair from fair sometime declines,

By chance, or nature's changing course, untrimmed;

But thy eternal summer shall not fade,

Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st,

Nor shall death brag thou wand'rest in his shade,

When in eternal lines to Time thou grow'st.

     So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,

     So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.”

His eyes never left Jiyong’s, and by the time he reached the end of the sonnet the fairy’s big blue orbs were swimming in his face. He couldn’t look away; he was transfixed. Jiyong’s little hands moved from where they’d been cupping his burning cheeks, and tiny fingers covered his mouth. Seunghyun watched as tears began rolling down his face. His own eyes started watering then. But he wasn’t done, hadn’t said everything he wanted to say, so he cleared his constricted throat and continued.

“I can’t promise you forever, Jiyong, and I can’t tell you I’m in love with you. Yet,” he clarified, with a gentle smile. “But what I do know is that I’m falling a little further every time you fly into my home, and the only intention I have is to make you happy when you do.”

Jiyong fluttered over to him, hands still hiding his face, and buried himself in Seunghyun’s hair. His little sobs and hiccups might have been alarming at any other time, but all Seunghyun could do was grin like an idiot. He’d made Jiyong cry. From happiness. His heart felt two sizes too big. Soojin was batting her eyes at him like he was the most amazing person on the planet, and even Seoyun was giving him a very appreciative look.

“That was beautiful, Seunghyun. Jiyong has shared some of your work with us. Did you write that, as well?”

“Unfortunately, no. But it describes exactly how I feel every time I look at Jiyong.”

The fairy clinging to him let out a little wail, and he couldn’t stop the chuckle that escaped his own lips. Seoyun watched the two of them for a moment. She seemed to come to some sort of conclusion, because after observing Seunghyun use one careful finger to Jiyong’s hair comfortingly, she nodded quite decisively and beamed at the both of them.

“Well, if this is an indication of how you feel about my Jiyong, I’ll expect grandchildren any day now!”

After a few more hours of pleasant chatting, during which Seunghyun successfully kept his mouth shut about what Seoyun had meant about grandchildren, and learned that Jiyong’s father was not present because he had died just after the boy was born, it was time to leave. The sun was still fairly high in the sky, but autumn evenings could be bitterly cold in the hill country, and even the layers of sweaters and woolen scarf Jiyong had insisted he wear couldn’t keep the chill from Seunghyun’s bones. Soojin and Seoyun bid him farewell when his teeth began to chatter.

“Next time you come, we’ll have to see if we can’t invite you into the village,” Soojin had whispered to him. Her eyes sparkled mischievously as she flitted away down into the earth, giving him one final wink before disappearing.

Seoyung kissed his cheek, and hugged her son tightly. She wished them safe travels, and then she too flew back from whence she came.

By the time they made it back to the house, the wind had picked up. Seunghyun, shivering as he was in his layers of winter clothing, was amazed that Jiyong seemed completely unaffected by the chill. All he was wearing, all he ever wore, was a tiny grass skirt that ended at mid-thigh. Magic or no, it was still baffling. Even more baffling though were two things that had come up in their conversation earlier, but had never been explained to him. After learning what he had that afternoon, Seunghyun wanted to know everything there was to know about Jiyong, his family, and their culture.

“I didn’t ask earlier, because I thought it might upset your mother, but how did your father die? You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to, but-”

“He was taken by a hawk,” Jiyong blurted with a shrug. “He was out collecting berries in the woods with my uncle. A hawk came out of nowhere, and-” he snapped his fingers, “snatched him right out of the air.”

Seunghyun stared at Jiyong as the fairy unwrapped his scarf for him, flying slowly around his head with one end of the soft material in his hands.

“I’m sorry,” he mumbled.

“Don’t be. I don’t remember him; Soojin doesn’t really, either. My mother and uncle, though… my poor uncle had to watch him be carried off. He’s never been the same, Mother says. If my mother didn’t have such a strong will, she wouldn’t have made it through the loss.”

Jiyong hung the writer’s scarf on the coat rack beside the door, and darted off into the kitchen. He felt like a bit of a jerk for asking so many personal questions, but if they were going to try to make a relationship work, Seunghyun didn’t want any more big surprises. He rounded the corner into the small, tiled room, and sat down at the table with a smile. Jiyong had set out his favorite mug, and was in the process of turning on the tap and stove so the larger man could make his evening tea. He glanced over his shoulder and gave Seunghyun a toothy grin. They both downed two mugs (actually, a mug and a thimble) of the hot, sweet liquid before Seunghyun decided it was time to ask the big question; the one that had been knocking around inside his brain since Seoyun had brought up the subject.

“Jiyong, what did your mother mean about having grandchildren soon?” The fairy looked up at him from his thimble with wide eyes. Apparently he hadn’t expected that to come up again. “Not that I’m against it or anything, but I just… don’t see how it’s possible. We’re both men,” he continued, when Jiyong’s pink brows drew together in confusion. A look of understanding, and then, predictably, mischief, made its way onto the fairy’s fine features. He gulped down the last of his tea, then flew to the middle of the room. The bright flash of light that signaled Jiyong’s transformation nearly burned Seunghyun’s retinas to a crisp.

Before the spots cleared from his vision, he found himself with a lapful of amorous fairy. Jiyong’s lips skated over the sensitive skin of his throat before sliding upward to nip at the lobe of his ear. A shudder wracked the writer’s frame at the way the other boy’s hot breath moved against him.

“If you’re trying to distract me… you’re doing a really good job,” Seunghyun groaned. “What were we talking about?”

“Making babies,” the fairy chuckled, mouthing at the skin just under his ear. He pulled away, only to lean in close again and press several chaste kisses to Seunghyun’s lips. “But we don’t have to worry about that right now.”

“You can’t get pregnant, can you? I can’t even imagine the biology involved in that.”

“No, that isn’t how it works. Not with fairy folk.”

“Then how would we-”

Jiyong slapped a hand over his mouth. “Trust me. If the time ever comes when a child is something we both desire, then we’ll have this conversation again. Until then, the only thing these lips need to be doing is…”

He completed his sentence by doing something Seunghyun appreciated as a writer: showing, not telling. He appreciated it even more as a man.  Lips slid together; tongues danced against the ridges of teeth and the line of gums. A little moan escaped the fairy when Seunghyun pulled him closer to his chest. Jiyong’s heart beat erratically, thumping against his own ribcage and sending little sparks of pleasure down his spine. If kisses riled him this much, he couldn’t even begin to imagine what would happen when he finally touched him. Just the thought of Jiyong’s pretty blue eyes rolling back in his head as he came caused a stirring low in his belly. The fairy seemed to sense his spike in arousal, and, in a move that surprised them both, pulled back first.

“I want you,” he said, no trace of shame or embarrassment on his face. Seunghyun’s nostrils flared as another bolt of lust shot through him at those words. “But not tonight. You always tell me is special, and I want what we have to be the most special to you, because you’re what’s most special to me.”

His breath left him. Air refused to inflate his lungs. Jiyong grinned at the look of utter adoration on his face, and leaned down once more to brush his petal-soft lips over the apples of Seunghyun’s cheeks.

“And if that means I have to wait until you fall in love with me, then I can wait a very long time.”

Jiyong pecked at his mouth again, then smooshed the writer’s cheeks in his hands, a mischievous twinkle in his cerulean eyes.

“But I don’t think I’ll have to.”