Stifling a yawn in the predawn light of the next morning, Jongin unceremoniously woke the sleeping Luhan at the worship hall he regularly visited.  “Somebody better be dying,” Luhan practically growled as he cracked one tired, coffee colored eye open to glare at his unexpected visitor.

                “Not yet,” Jongin snorted with a smirk while he swatted the older male on the arm before dancing back out of range.  “Come on old man.  I’m heading out and I need the use of your magic hands before I go,” he explained with forced cheer, rolling his left shoulder stiffly.

                “Patch…” Luhan warned, sitting upright with an admirable glare for someone who almost always looked ersely innocent.  The bed hair look didn’t help either, giving him an y appeal that Jongin could only wrinkle his nose at.  He could achieve such a look sometimes, but the healer managed it on a regular basis…

                “Please?” the younger male asked with a slight shrug, already peeling off his shirt so the just waking acolyte could get a better look while he stepped closer.

                “Move,” Luhan groaned, swatting Jongin’s torso hard enough to sting.

                “Ow!”

                “Back.  Now,” he pointed with one hand and rubbed at his eyes with the other before he shuffled after the adventurer, eyes scanning the bare, marked flesh.  “You are seriously more trouble than you’re worth, you know that?” he grumbled when they came to a stop and Jongin sat on the usual table.  Luhan inspected the most recent wounds from the dryad before he redid the wrappings and moved on to older but still noteworthy patches that hadn’t healed over completely yet.

                “Unplanned return trip home,” Jongin added by way of a hasty, apologetic explanation.

                Luhan’s hands stilled on the lean from for a moment, pensive.  “Oh?”

                “Hopefully nothing serious.  Won’t know until I get there,” he sighed, glancing at the other male over his shoulder.  “Ow!  What was that for?” he muttered while he rubbed the stinging spot on his arm where Luhan hit him.

                “I figured I’d give it one more try to smack some sense into you before you left,” the healer responded, head tilting to the side.  “Did it work?”

                “No,” Jongin grumbled with a frown.

                “Too bad,” Luhan sighed around pursed lips, folding his arms over his chest as he regarded his handiwork.  “Alright you.  Shoo!  So I can actually get some sleep.  Maybe with you gone for a while I can finally enjoy a normal schedule!”

                “Aish,” the younger male wrinkled his nose again, laughing under his breath.  “I know the drill.  Don’t die unless it’s somewhere you can’t find my body,” he waved.

                Luhan rolled his eyes with a long suffering sigh.  “I’d actually prefer you just didn’t die but that’ll work too.”  Covering his mouth against another yawn, he gestured for Jongin to get moving while he shuffled back towards his bed, pausing before the other male had gotten very far.  “Jongin.”

                “Yeah?” he paused to look over his shoulder, tugging his shirt back into place.

                “Reinforcements.”

                Jongin blinked at him for a moment and then opened his mouth in silent understanding.  Giving himself a good shake, he waved at the young healer once more and headed out, ready to meet his new traveling companion.

                At dawn the newly outfitted Jongin, fully packed and ready to go with his hard leather armor and sheathed sword, greeted Kris at the edge of the city on horseback.  His gray gelding shook his head and snorted, pawing at the ground with one hoof when they paused before the other adventurer who gave him an appraising look in turn.  The taller male still looked considerably less armored, wearing only a heavy overcoat that draped over the majority of his travel gear, looking odd atop the placid brown gelding with tired, glassy eyes.

                “Ready to go?” he asked in a confident tone, nudging his mount towards the road, not bothered by the creature’s almost delayed response in moving as directed.

                “As ready as you are,” Jongin agreed, taking the lead on his more fidgety than usual mount so he could set the pace.  He didn’t want to spend any more time with Kris on the journey than necessary, though he was nervous about moving too quickly since he wasn’t sure the other’s horse could keep up.  Another concerned glance at the partially oblivious mount made him wonder how long the sorry beast was going to last.

                On the ride, Kris tried to make small talk with Jongin, who did his best to answer as short as possible without coming off as rude.  He still wasn’t thrilled about their joint venture, he didn’t want to know more about Kris, and he certainly didn’t want to just hand feed him additional information about himself.  And if he didn’t stop ‘admiring’ Jongin’s sword, he was really going to start getting annoyed.

                Disgruntled with his predicament, Jongin hardly ventured to ask many questions of his own and called brief stops only when necessary.  One of the few saving graces was that they were both agreeable to eating in the saddle, though he was confused by the meager bit of food Kris ate as they rode.  For someone as big as he was, by height alone, he would have figured he’d need substantially more to get by on than a couple pieces of dried beef.

                In the latter portion of the day after considerable silence between them, Kris ventured another observation.  “You seem nervous.”

                 “What?  I’m not,” he retorted, looking over his shoulder at the absurd idea.

                “You just look tense.”

                “I have family this direction,” he muttered in annoyance.

                “Ah.  What part?” Kris inquired, completely at ease.

                Jongin narrowed his eyes but again, he had no good reason not to answer.  It wasn’t like his hometown was all that important.  “Evnore,” he answered in a clipped tone.

                “Never heard of it,” Kris shrugged, coming abreast of him to glance over, his height equal to Jongin’s since his mount was shorter.

                “Not surprising,” Jongin admitted with a roll of his eyes.  Very few people had ever heard of Evnore considering it had nothing to draw attention to it.  “Hey,” he grumbled at his horse, jiggling the reins when his mount started getting fidgety again.

                “Small village?” Kris asked with a chuckle, far more relaxed than Jongin was.

                “You could say that.”

                “So.  Have you ever come up against a demon before?” he inquired, watching Jongin’s reaction with interest.

                Jongin felt a trace of panic streak through him at the question as he immediately wondered why Kris was asking about it but then he recalled they were on their way to investigate a possible sighting of one.  He wasn’t asking about Yixing in particular and really, in that sense, he’d never come up against one so it wasn’t even a full lie when he said, “No.  Why do you ask?”

                “Just curious.  I’ve had a run in with one or two when I was younger.  Mostly I’m just wondering how you know if you can beat one or not?” he added, again watching his response.

                Jongin could feel his eyes studying him.  It was downright creepy and he refused to look back over to meet his gaze until he had to.  “I guess we’ll find out,” he added, finally shifting his gaze as he readied a question of his own.  “Have you killed any?”

                “Eh.  The last one I came up against got away,” he shrugged, annoyed but not particularly alarmed by the happenings as he patted his side again.

                “Really?” Jongin couldn’t help but ask, cursing himself for prompting more words from his already too talkative companion.  Unfortunately, he was honestly curious about a fellow adventurer who had faced a hostile demon and survived.

                “Yeah.  Fast silver-eyed bastard.  He had long claws and kept changing forms so I couldn’t get a good look at him, but he took a swipe at me and fled.  I don’t think he liked my weapon,” he chuckled, patting the sword on the left side of his mount.

                Jongin had yet to see him draw it but it was longer than his and it looked broader too.  While he carried a longsword, Kris’s looked a lot like a claymore or something equally intimidating…  At least he hadn’t successfully fought a demon either.  That was something.  Technically Jongin had but Yixing had never been out for blood and he wondered if things would be different if that was the case.

                The first night on the road, they were forced to camp out in the open and Jongin had his reservations on the matter.  Kris was damn near as quiet as he was, which he wasn’t used to, and it felt odd to have another person nearby when he wasn’t under a sturdy roof.  He didn’t trust the other male, knowing little more than the meager basics, so he slept with his sword against his body, ready to be drawn at a moment’s notice.  Needless to say, his evening was not restful, waking at the slightest provocation, which was usually the result of one of the horses shifting during the night…

                Even worse, after the first couple times of waking, as soon as he closed his eyes, he started seeing a very familiar pair of silver eyes peering at him from the depths of his unconsciousness.  Maybe it was just because he was worried about the stupid demon or perhaps it was the fact he hadn’t seen him in a year and his mind was trying to piece the puzzle together, but mesmerizing eyes moved closer at every failed attempt to sleep, revealing more and more of the demon he’d left behind.  Blonde hair, black shirt, white pants, dimpled smile…  By the time he woke up to see dawn’s light staining the horizon, he could vividly remember Yixing lying on his side staring at him with that serene smile he always wore in Jongin’s presence, slender fingers buried in his hair tenderly.

                “Yixing…” he whispered, swallowing hard upon waking while he turned over as fast as possible to make sure Kris was still sleeping.  Jongin heaved a brief sigh of relief when the other male was still unconscious and groaned to himself when he closed his eyes again, content to let the slumbering giant wake him in a little while.  Why the hell he was dreaming about Yixing was beyond him, but he could still feel fingers against his scalp.  Jongin shivered as a chill went up his spine and took another breath.  It had to be because he was heading home, right?

                When nothing happened during the rest of his night, said dreams notwithstanding, he felt slightly foolish but no worse for wear, if a bit more tired than usual, and haunted by visions of Yixing.  Following nights were addressed in a similar manner, sleeping off the road when shelter was hard to find or impractical.  As often as not, Yixing made infrequent appearances, though Jongin managed to hold his silence on subsequent evenings.  It was easier if he didn’t have to explain who Yixing was and why he might be calling his name in the middle of the night…

                Why was the demon the closest to his thoughts anyway?  Why not his parents… or any of the people he’d formed a close relationship to over the past few months?  It was a question that kept him awake long into the night, though the other adventurer had no such trouble in remaining unconscious and appeared to rest quiet soundly, without the weight of an unwelcome visitor plaguing his dreams…  Not that he wasn’t happy to see Yixing when he closed his eyes, but he needed his rest too!

                Neither opted to take any form of watch, as it was something they never did when they were on their own, and Jongin found Kris to be somewhat quirky anyway.  He was secretive about his packed goods and insisted on handling and feeding his mount without Jongin’s assistance.  Not to mention he preferred to have a very specific amount of space between them when they went to bed.  Then again, Jongin didn’t want the other male near his things or his horse, so they handled their own equipment and goods discretely.

                The journey that had originally taken Jongin a couple weeks on foot took them a matter of days, pushing their mounts hard the majority of the time.  Because the oppressive silence between them was worse than talking to his companion, Jongin reluctantly found himself asking questions and trying to converse with Kris, if only to help pass the time.  Normally he would have been talking to Rocky, his aptly named, grayish colored mount.  Jongin thought it was clever at the time, but even he had to admit having someone who was able to respond was preferable to a creature that was just as likely to hit him with his tail as not.

                Much like Jongin, Kris was from a small place he’d never heard of either, considerably further to the west.  Though from the way he described it, his hometown was a fair bit nicer than Jongin’s with something called a library.  He couldn’t even imagine an entire building devoted to books but Kris explained that was how he knew about the sigils on his sword.  His parents had money and so he’d never really had to work to survive, training and reading for leisure because he could.

                Adventuring started off as a hobby to help kill his boredom but when it had nearly been the death of him by a run in with a demon the first time, he’d started taking it serious.  For the past couple years, he’d traveled around the area, looking for the demon from his latest encounter.  Apparently, they were exceptionally good at hiding when they didn’t want to be found.

                Jongin gave up more information than he intended to but it was so easy with the back and forth banter they established.  He let it slip that he had always wanted to be an adventurer, though the why and how he kept a mystery.  It was a little hard to explain how he was proficient with a sword but he was able to skirt the matter.  And while Kris didn’t ask often about who gave him the sword, Jongin was adamant about not saying.

                More than anything, Jongin focused on retelling his exploits once he became an adventurer.  Those tales were much easier to focus and expand upon since they had nothing to do with his past or demons in general.  Hellhounds didn’t count, as nasty as they were, and Kris laughed about his first encounter with the pack of angry puppies.

                On the other side of that, Kris had very few tales of slaying monsters other than the human variety, nor was he inclined to show off many of his adventuring scars like his traveling companion.  He claimed to not have them because of the nature of his opponents.  Jongin could relate to those sorts of encounters, usually with appropriate disdain.  So long as they spoke of fighting and tavern experiences, things remained light between them, reducing the unease that lingered for each party.

                While Jongin still failed to feel entirely comfortable around Kris, by the time they reached Evnore, he was at least used to the taller male being around.  He wasn’t happy they hadn’t heard news about the demon from previous settlements but Kris explained that wasn’t uncommon.  He mentioned that he’d gone through several towns on his way to the one he found Jongin in before he’d found anyone willing to look into little more than a rumor.

                “In other words, I was the only one dumb enough to actually come with you on this otherwise completely uneventful journey while I could be off hunting real monsters?” Jongin scoffed before they reached the outskirts of his village.

                “Sounds about right,” Kris nodded from a few paces away, parallel to Jongin as they ambled along the road.  “Though it sounds like seeing your family is something you are looking forward to.  Perhaps it was meant to be?” he offered with a significant look to the smattering of houses.  “You said it’s been almost a year, right?”

                Jongin felt a smile pull at his lips, which he tried to banish immediately.  Yes, he was happy to be coming back, and not just because he was worried about the rumored demon in the area.  He was more worried about his demon than the unlikely danger he posed to his parents and friends, unless there was another one in the area.  Though if Evnore was anything like the other towns they’d come across, it was probably nothing.

                “Right,” he shook himself and responded with a mild delay, aware he’d been lost in his thoughts, feeling nervous tension well up in him at the realization.

                “Then I also imagine they’ll be happy to see you,” Kris supplied once more without looking over at him, inspecting the houses and the woods nearby with keen eyes.

                 “Sure,” Jongin forced a smile, letting his gaze fall to the back of his horse’s mane.  He knew his parents would be, once they got over being mad at him for never writing or anything, but would Yixing?  He’d said he wanted him to leave when they argued the last time.  Jongin could still remember almost every word as if it had happened yesterday and he felt no better about not staying a year later than he had at the time.  Would he still be mad at him?  What if he didn’t even want to see Jongin anymore?  The thought was… painful and left him unsettled upon entering town.

                “You’re right though.  It is a small town,” Kris chuckled as he nodded at the odd villager out and about in the later part of the afternoon.  Jongin seemed an afterthought in comparison to the stranger, though it was possible they didn’t recognize him either.  Garbed as an adventurer, on a horse no less, he looked considerably changed from the last time he’d been here.  “I don’t see any inn…” he trailed off with a curious glance at Jongin.

                “We don’t have one, but you can bunk down in the stable.  The hay loft is comfortable enough,” Jongin shrugged, pointing the taller male off towards the large roofed structure that was the communal stabling area.  He’d spent plenty of time hiding or playing in the straw growing up and unless that had changed, it should still hold true.

                “No recommendations otherwise?” Kris asked with an amused smile, glancing around.

                “Nope,” Jongin shook his head.  He would stable his mount there as well but he intended on sleeping under the same roof as his parents.  Without Kris.  He didn’t dislike him so much anymore, but neither did he want to spend yet more time with him, especially if they might be traveling together after his stop here…  At least his parents would be happy to see him, and he was looking forward to one of his mother’s home-cooked meals.  “I think I’ll be staying here for a couple days.  You know, just spending time with the family,” Jongin added before he’d gotten very far.  “You don’t have to wait up for me if you want to head on,” he encouraged, hoping the other would agree.

                “It’s alright.  I don’t mind waiting,” he shrugged, patting his mount’s shoulder in a familiar gesture while the creature just shifted from foot to foot, not even twitching at the contact.

                Jongin groaned on the inside but forced a smile anyway.  “Suit yourself,” he waved on his way out with the pack over his shoulder, leaving his saddle over the stall next to his mount.  As nervous as he was about it, he would prefer the opportunity to find Yixing without Kris on hand.  Whatever Kris’s complaint was with demons, all of them probably fell under the same light, but he’d figure something out in the meantime.  At least as soon as he found a moment to do so.

                As expected, his parents were more than happy to see him, berating him for not sending word of his condition or his arrival.  His mother almost fainted when she demanded he remove his armor in the house and became privy to his numerous battle scars.  He was glad he declined to mention anything more than his adventuring tales as his earlier stories were much less glamorous.  Vicious monsters were bad enough, never mind the horrors of ill-intentioned men.  Despite his objections, she insisted upon inspecting all of his scars herself, with some exceptions, but he was grateful for the welcome.

                With Demon Killer at hand as usual, Jongin reluctantly asked them about rumors of a demon in the area.  His mother shook her head, looking more confused and fearful, but his father admitted he had noticed some strange tracks of late and an interesting fog that lingered at the edge of the woods but nowhere else.  He’d only confirmed both occurrences recently but they were unlike anything he’d seen in the area before.  Further elaboration revealed they were focused more around the pond, though he noticed them in the woods as well.  Nowhere near the village though.

                “Really?” Jongin asked, blinking in concern while he peered at the horizon of the trees nearby.  That was new.  He’d never seen strange tracks when he’d been around Yixing…

                “Yeah.  Just odd,” his father shrugged, throwing an arm around his wife’s shoulders while he pulled her close as she burrowed against him.

                “Odd like how?” Jongin asked, leaning forward with a furrowed brow, trying to make sense of it on the barest of information.

                While his mother looked between them in complete confusion, his father gestured with his hands, trying to find a way to explain it.  “Sorta like a weird horse hoof.  Roundish but with odd knob things, givin it a funny shape.  Ya know?” he asked, expression frustrated when he couldn’t describe it better.

                Jongin frowned.  Kris had mentioned that the rumors included a strange equine beast and his father claimed to have seen tracks resembling strange horse prints…  That couldn’t just be coincidence could it?  “I’ll take a look tomorrow,” he promised them, is hand resting in a comforting gesture on Demon Killer.

                “Oh do be careful, love,” his mother urged, leaning forward to clasp his hand in hers across the tiny kitchen table.

                “I will, momma,” Jongin replied, chagrined he still called her by that childish term.  She didn’t seem averse to it and actually smiled wider upon hearing it.

                Unlike usual, the trio stayed up late talking about some of his adventures and his mother couldn’t help but ask if he’d met anyone in his travels.  His father chided her in amusement as Jongin rolled his eyes so she let the matter drop but it was obvious that topic wasn’t dead in her mind.  The answer was still no, to which she gave him a skeptical look and it was all he could do to scramble for a safer topic which happened to include Kris…  Irritatingly, they were intrigued by his companion who had met a demon and survived.

                Jongin very much wanted to say that he had too, on far more occasions and much closer, but that wasn’t a secret he was free to tell.  He was even more perturbed when he had to promise to bring Kris over and introduce him tomorrow at a more reasonable hour.  While it was true they were both going to be in the area at least until they’d looked into the tracks, he didn’t want to introduce them…  At his reluctance, his mother berated him and he apologized, resorting to sulking and hoping they would just drop the matter soon.

                Lucky for him, the evening was late and Jongin was used to evening hours, since he could sleep longer in the morning.  He smothered a smile when he saw them starting to yawn.  Once they were asleep, it would give him the opportunity he needed to slip out and visit the pond in the woods before anybody else.  Not only could he investigate the tracks, but more importantly, he’d be able to speak to Yixing…  The silver eyed demon who loved him and the stupid friend he couldn’t stop thinking or worrying about, especially now that he was home.

(a/n: Back home and already there's trouble.  *sigh*  lol  But I hope you enjoyed the update.  Thanks for reading and please look forward to the next chapter!  ^_^)