Soulmate!au/mate!au WARNINGS: slight mention of torture towards the start

Baekhyun had never felt such a painful feeling in his entire life.

He knew the other was in pain too as they were dragged away from one another. They had found and lost each other in the same moment.

Seeing the panicked look in the other's eyes as he was dragged by allies just as Baekhyun was being shoved back by the enemies into a makeshift prison was horrible.

Mate. They had found one another. And at that same moment, they didn't know if they'd ever see one another again.

Baekhyun was glad. He knew that his mate was safe with the allies and he was no longer in danger.

So, as he was dragged back into the cell he had been in for the last couple of weeks, he still remained calm. He didn't speak, even through the torture by the enemies. He just kept mum as he received the lashings every other day. There was no point really of trying to resist since they would just be fed wolfsbane to shut them up anyway.

There was no real certainty whether or not they would be saved, but Baekhyun just kept hoping that they would be. So that he could finally meet his mate.

That was another reason for his silence throughout the torture sessions. No physical pain could amount to the pain which was in his chest from being ripped away from the grasps of his mate.

He stared at the ceiling as he lay there in the cell. He blinked away the slight blurriness. He knew that he was conserving a lot more energy than his fellow captives, but he was going to run out soon enough. He just really hoped that he would be able to meet his mate before he died.

There were a number of loud bangs which woke Baekhyun up from a nap he hadn't realised he had fallen into. He sat up with a slight groan and wondered what all the commotion was. Everyone perked up a bit all of a sudden, because despite the smell of blood and wolfsbane in the stale air of the dungeon, they all could smell the familiar scent of their comrades.

It was a little while later, after all the screams and loud bangs had died down that they heard the dungeon doors opening. One by one, they were taken up and out of the dungeon, this time by their comrades, to the healers who were awaiting in a nearby clearing.

When they finally got to Baekhyun, the alpha had very little strength left in his body. "Baekhyun, stay with me, alright?"

The alpha looked up and blinked away that same blurriness as he heard that familiar voice. "Min... seok... hyung?" he asked, his voice raspy from not having talked in a long time.

"Yes, it's me. Now, stay with me, alright Baekhyun?"

Somehow, without having realised it, Baekhyun had had received the worst of the torture. He took the longest to recover as well.

Most of the others took a couple of days of intensive care to recover to a manageable health, but it took Baekhyun a whole week.

Just as Minseok came into the tent where Baekhyun was being kept, he ran over to support Baekhyun who was standing beside his bed instead of lying down. "What are you doing, Baekhyun? You need to rest- "

"I need.. to see him... Please, hyung," the alpha pleaded softly with slightly glassy eyes. He held onto Minseok's shoulder with one hand and held the other at his chest, grabbing his shirt.

Chanyeol had gone into a sudden heat after he had been brought to the safe zone. It lasted over a week, which was somewhat unusual, but when he had managed to tell one of the healers that his mate had been captured, they understood why.

He was no longer in heat now, just a little under the weather from being apart from his mate for so long. He was about to take a nap when one of the healers came in and told him that there was someone there to see him, urgently. He nodded, allowing the visitor to come in. He sat up on the bed and then looked up at the entrance of the tent, only to see two people walking in, one of them supporting the other slightly.

There was a moment of silence before tears began escaping Chanyeol's eyes. "You're alive," he muttered quietly.

Minseok helped Baekhyun walk over to the omega and then l