Dr. Finkelstein’s enormous laboratory-turned-home rose above the smog that covered Halloweentown. It was one of the oldest establishments there—but if one only looked at their outside portions, no outsider would be able to tell new from old. Random rooms perched haphazardly all over, built over the years. The sparks emitting from the chimney told him the doctor was in. A few well-wishing townsfolk bowed and called out to the Nightmare King as he approached the front steps, and he acknowledged them. He had to make his hurry known, unfortunately. Changmin’s bite was beyond his little first aid skills, and the doctor was the only being in the realm that could have a cure.

Prince…once again, you have turned everything upside down in my world. The jury was out on whether it was a good or bad thing.

Yunho yanked on the doorbell’s pulley, and somewhere in the distance a gong sounded. Glass shattered on the other side of the door, followed by extremely shrill swearing. He forced his smile off his face as footsteps echoed in the house, growing louder and louder, until the heavy wooden door was yanked open and a diminutive form, almost like a fairy, glared up at him. “Can’t a woman work in her own home without getting the scared out of her by the damn doorbell?!”

“Hello, Boa,” he chuckled, inclining his head and tipping an imaginary hat.

The small doctor pursed her lips and struck the door with her long, tapered fingernails, painted a beautiful deep violet. She tapped a fast rhythm, still scowling, and his grin fell. Greeted her for all of five seconds and she’s pissed at me. Water’s wet, the sky’s above our heads, what else is new? “How’s your eyesight, sire?”

“I…what?”

“Are you having problems with nearsightedness? No? Then do me a favor and read it.” When he continued to look confused, she a finger at a small board nailed next to the door. PLEASE KNOCK, YOU DUMB S. “Sound it out, I have all damn night long. Here, I’ll help you.”

Rolling his eyes, Yunho stepped around her, shrugging out of his coat and hanging it on a rusted hook just inside the door. “It’s wonderful to see you too, my lady. I hope your evening has been going as well as it can?”

“It was going quite splendidly until some moron came and rang the ing gong. And that’s Doctor to you, by the way,” she added, marching past him to an open door off the entrance hall. Her small hands bound her dark hair up into a neat knot at the back of her head as they went. He followed her down a winding set of stone steps until it opened out into a huge dungeon-like chamber. Slipping into knee-high galoshes, she approached her workspace, still shooting him reproachful looks.

As she fiddled with some instruments on her work table, she barked at him, “You might be able to scrape by with a polite ‘madam’ if I forgive you for that horrible racket. I can’t believe my father kept that stupid ing gong. Loud as hell, we may as well have a truck horn blare out the windows. Now come on.” She snapped her fingers impatiently, and he jumped. “Don’t have all night, your Majesty. Your servants are quite the gossiping bunch. Told my sweet Sally everything. She’s out gathering some ingredients for me,” she tittered, waving her hands impatiently in the air when it looked like he might inquire about Sally’s health. “Cut the small talk. Details. Fire away, I want your version of this soap opera.”

“…Changmin’s here.”

“Uh-huh.”

“In Halloweentown.”

“Strangely enough, I picked up on that when you said the word, ‘here.’”

“He…received a very nasty bite from Yi Xiang’s stupid cat—”

“Bandersnatch, sire. Address it by its name. It’s not a cat, or else it would not have attacked a denizen in your realm without fear of your retaliation. Your black cats may be wily, but they are still obedient to their king. It is a creature unlike any other. And besides, if I were a Bandersnatch, I’d be mighty pissed at such an idiotic comparison.” She lugged a huge vat out from under the work table and began to toss all sorts of items in there; Yunho stared as she de-shelled several shrimp into the pot and followed those with a dash of something that looked suspiciously like gunpowder. “Go on.”

His brow furrowed, but he continued. “The bite’s like something I’ve never seen before. Red and puffy and oozing something dark. It almost looks infected. Nothing can deliver such damage to an immortal. Yi Xiang swore it was not his doing, and I believe him. Someone has tampered with that foul beast, even made it talk, and that someone is behind the door attacks!” He finished with a loud exclamation, crossing him arms with a triumphant smile.

Boa chewed the inside of her lip as she ground some java beans and threw them into the vat. It hissed and glowed a sick green. “So let me get this straight. Your ex-boyfriend is in town, got himself in a load of trouble, and expects me to bail him out. You expect me to bail him out, too.” Yunho deflated; he had told the story much grander than that, but essentially…that was the gist of it. “How nice.” She let out a derisive snort and shook her head, throwing salt over her shoulder into the bubbling mess. “I see nothing’s changed—or well, some things have. I see the infuriating skinny pant craze has taken you as its victim, too. But still as drunk in love, aren’t you? Hand me that beaker, the one labeled, ah…”

“Tears of the happy,” Yunho read with a chortle.

She snatched it out of his hand. “Don’t laugh at my materials, you stupid cockroach. Drop of that, and a hint of remembrance—” Boa dropped a gold pocket watch, and the contents turned yellow-orange. “A dead man’s finger—” It still bore a ring as she added it. “And the petals of the sunflower picked at midnight by my Sally. Bless her heart, she does errands for me even when I am at my grumpiest. I love her to death.”

“Sally’s quite a wonderful girl,” Yunho agreed, picking a spot on the table to perch on. “And I can’t begin to thank you enough. I would have done something for him myself, but I’m afraid my skills are not on par with your own. No matter how I feel about him, we cannot risk losing the Winter Prince. It would send everything into chaos.”

“No, we don’t want that…” Boa hummed a melancholic dirge as she added one ingredient after another, some Yunho recognized and some he did not. “I’ll walk your back to the manor and deliver this myself, if you don’t mind.”

“You know,” Yunho began, more than irritated now, “I can take two steps without falling onto my beautiful face.”

“That’s exactly right.” Her eyes raked him up and down. “Not much of a nightmare, unless you count the nightmares of every parent wanting their children to bring home someone good. You look like a guy who would set fire to a church if the foundation wasn’t stone.”

His long booted legs crossed at the ankle and Yunho scrunched his nose at her, a little miffed at the comparison. “Thank you…I think…” Setting fires—while fun, not my forte.

“You’re a nice thing to look at, which makes you lucky, but—and I beg your pardon, Majesty—you have for brains.” Another handful of ingredients went into the vat, and it went back to the sick green color. “Intelligence is a nice quality to have. It’s also not hard to obtain. Open a ing book now and then, sire.”

 “And it is your intelligence that keeps me from gushing about how adorable you are when you talk like that, Dr. Finkelstein.”

“Adorable? Debatable, I suppose.” Stirring the pot with a great machete as it burned a violent shade of pink, she stared at him beadily. “Need I remind you that it was my skill and quick-thinking, and not your otherworldly beauty, which saved you from frostbite when…” She trailed off at the murderous look on Yunho’s face. “Just forget it. Back to this . You need a salve, something to spread on the bite area, and then good bandaging.” A sprinkle of spices fell out of her hands, and the concoction flared up, a few jets of steam escaping the lava-like surface. “Let me see…if I do that…and balance it out with…yes…yes that will do…”

And without so much as a warning, she twirled on him and her machete came slashing down.

Something hard hit him on the chest, and Changmin’s eyes snapped open. “What the…?”

“Stop falling asleep on me, princeling.” Yi Xiang clapped his hands together and the studded skull flew back to his fingers, examining it with faint interest. “Alas, poor…” He frowned. “Whoever this was. It certainly isn’t a prop. I should know. I work with a lot of skulls and shrunken heads in my line of work.” Setting it back on the mantle of the fireplace, he looked back at Changmin. “There’s a reason why Yunho told you to sip that. Can’t say I’m not pleased at having heard Sandy Claws snore.”

“Why are you even still—agh.” Changmin let out a long exhalation as pain thrummed in his side. Holding his breath in dread, he kicked the covers off. He needed a look at the bite under his shirt—and it was as grotesque and inflamed as he had imagined. A shark bite would be less worrisome than the oozing, punctured chunk of flesh that was his side currently. What kind of venom dissolved flesh like that? Something very small occurred to him and he grumbled, “I was downed by a cat. I’ve never had a soft spot for cats—they usually hiss and swipe at me when I deliver presents on Christmas Eve—but this does not put them any higher on my list.”

“Who can blame them? If an intruder broke into my house on the same night once a year, I’d be ridiculously outraged too.”

“Do you genuinely think you are remotely amusing? Because I have news for you,” Changmin began in a waspish voice, but his verbal sparring partner cut him off with a laugh.

“My my, you are so very touchy!” Changmin’s annoyance flared further when Yi Xiang settled himself in the chair Yunho had just departed. Something does not sit right with me about you, bastard…and once I figure it out, you might as well be a broken icicle beneath my boot. “You know, I do wonder if this is irrational or if you are…”

“If I’m what?” Changmin had to hiss through clenched teeth; would Yunho hate him if he reopened his wound by attacking this filth?

The purely wicked glint in the man’s eyes became brighter as he said, “Jealous.”  Yi Xiang cackled as Changmin glared up at him, mouth parting in confusion. “What an expression on our usually icy cold prince! About time you showed a bit of emotion. You really are too much. I was starting to think you didn’t know how to express anything but general indifference and disgust, especially towards our beloved king.” He crossed his arms, clicking his tongue, and Changmin had an urge to kick his foot out and send the stupid demon tumbling to the floor. “But jealousy…it is curious to think you jealous of me, prince. I’m sure you are no stranger to the relationship I have with him.”

“Had,” Changmin corrected before he could help himself.

“Oh, you’re more aware than I thought!” Two booted feet appeared on the side of the bed as Yi Xiang tipped the chair back onto its hind legs. “Yes, there were quite a lot of murmurs around the realm about what all occurred in this bedroom and in mine.” His hands went behind his head, completing the picture of total relaxation. “But I wonder how much you actually care. Or rather, I wonder if you know why he ever sought my company. It’s no secret that the Nightmare King and I hardly got along in the past.”

“Even we distant folk in Christmastown knew about your strained relations once upon a time. You were a thorn in his side, but you were valuable.” Something he told me himself. “But obviously, he got over it and…sought you out,” he spat, using Yi Xiang’s words in favor of much more inappropriate ones. “It does not concern me why he and you…” Had an affair that must have had some passion behind it, or you would not be here now. And just what about you is so…so…

“But it does concern you,” Yi Xiang interrupted; whether his widening eyes was theatrical or not escaped the prince. “Please tell me you are joking! You were the one to rip his heart out of his chest cavity and tear it to unrecognizable bits. Surely you know that, at least. Left him without a second thought. Gone in the dead of night, never to be seen here unless by force…or no other choice, as is our current situation. The Nightmare King, so obviously in love, now heartbroken and tormented by the abrupt departure of his pretentious, droll, overly cautious, controlling—”

Changmin shook. “Enough. Get out. I’d rather be alone with this injury than in your company.”

“Oh, and I was just getting started!” In a flash, Yi Xiang’s strong hands pinned him to the bed; the sheer strength of the other being startled Changmin. Though he fought to get free, he could move no more than a few inches without his wounds making him cringe. “Listen here, princeling. You have the king fooled. You have everyone on his side under the impression that you are the biggest on this side of the world. But you haven’t fooled me.” He straddled Changmin’s waist—the prince winced when his knees brushed his injury—and leaned in, mouth dangerously close to his ear. “I know why you left, sir…and it was for a reason no one would dare believe for a second.” Somehow, his voice dropped lower, no more than a hot breath on his neck. “They were going to overthrow him, weren’t they?”