The Final Verse

"Mrs. Neisseria," Joonyoung immediately stood up, "I can explain! Roy and I are merely friends."

"Friends?" she stammered in a displeased and astonished tone.

"Friends!?" she repeated in a voice that clearly did not belong to her. "You are a fool to believe that I would be deceived by such a lie!"

Her voice was terrifying. It was poisonously shrill; the sound of it crawled through his skin and made him jump. It was unfamiliar to Joonyoung's ears. He had never heard it before.

Yet Roy was able to recognize that same biting tone. 

"May you never return to this house!" 

The memory of that voice was vividly fresh in his mind. The air suddenly became thicker, almost suffocating. It started to storm; rain fell harder than it ever did before.

Neisseria was the witch.

 

"Stand back, sorceress!" Roy commanded as he protectively pulled the pianist back. "Don't you dare harm Jonyoung!"

"Oh, I could never hurt him," she cackled.

"Plasmodium vivax falciparum ovale!" Neisseria cursed upon Roy.

He fell to the hard, wooden floor. 

"Roy!" Joonyoung exclaimed as he rushed to the prince's side. The prince's temperature had spiked; his entire body shook as his breaths became labored and shallowed. "What have you done, Neisseria!?"

"I could never hurt him, your highness," she continued to address Roy, talking to him with mocking respect, "I love him."

"Neisseria, stop whatever you are doing!" Joonyoung pleaded.

The candles in the room began to burn extremely--dangerously--bright. The dresser which they stood upon started to catch flames.

"You have been blind, Joonyoung," she did not heed nor listen to his pleas. "I have loved you...for so long!"

"Yet look what you've done! You married that Yoomi. So I had to take her away from you," she continued.

"You murderer! You killed my wife! How could you when she was nothing but good to you?" Joonyoung's words remained unheard.

"And that boy over there," she pointed at Seungwoo, "takes too much of your time. He has been everything to you since he was born...I decided to inflict a little curse upon him. You could watch him die everyday, until you would ultimately lose him--and realize you only had me.

"But your male lover came along," she shook her head in disapproval. "I always thought I only had to keep women away from you. I was clearly wrong. I sensed it from the night I saw the two of you together...the way you looked at each other. Disgusting! I was mistaken in thinking that reporting your relationship to the authorities would fend him off."

"Now I will have to kill your little boy and that worthless prince," she raised her arms to cast a spell upon them, but Joonyoung was quick to his feet. 

He held her down with a deadly grip and stared at her dead in the eye. "Stop what you are doing. This will get you nowhere."

Neisseria gave him a devious smile and easily throttled him off.

"Choose," she told him. "Whom shall I spare? The prince? Or the child?"

Joonyoung knew he did not have much time. The flames had spread across the room; in less than a minute, it would reach the bed where Seungwoo and Roy lied. 

He could hardly breathe. He was asphyxiated by the witch's hold on his throat. 

"Take me instead," he managed to choke out. "It is I that you want. You can take me with you...leave them alone."

Joonyoung's vision became blurry. He could feel himself slipping away. Everything turned to black.

 

There was dark magic. It was the kind that harmed its victims and claimed innocent lives. It caused plagues and diseases. It was the nightmare that haunted dreamers at night.

Then there was white magic which overcame the darkness of the night and brought brightness back into the world.

And there was Love. It was the greatest and most powerful of all. It surpassed all magic, revoked all curses, and toppled down every boundary.

Love is stronger than any spell; it is the bond which keeps the broken man together; it is the hope in the most hopeless situations. Love is the cure to the deadliest disease. Love is the Savior.

 

Joonyoung made a choice to forfeit his own happiness, and perhaps even his life, in order for his son and for the prince to be spared.

It was a choice made because of love; love so powerful and mighty.

Joonyoung had broken the spell.