I list things a lot in this chapter so apologies in advance… I don’t know why it happened. Heads up for poor quality ending :/

Part 3: A Hidden Past

They spend two weeks at Chunja’s house and during that time three things happen. The first is that Chunja and Hongbin totally hit it off, much to Ravi’s delight. They spend hours talking about just about anything and Chunja has taken it upon herself to teach the couple – to Hongbin’s horror – how to cook. After watching Hongbin’s first attempt at cooking dinner – Chunja tries to save it and fails – Jaehwan can’t help but agree that the sorcerer needs help, serious help. He is then roped into helping and shows great promise in dessert making.

The second thing that happens is that they can’t help noticing the treatment received by those that do magic. Chunja explains it simply, stating that deliberate magic is completely illegal and punishable by death. Accidental magic by children results in a hefty fine to the parents and/or time in an ‘education facility’ for the child. And intuitive magic by humans and creatures is jail time unless performed on a reserve. Leo’s response to all of this is to scoff in disgust and leave the room. Hakyeon’s response is a sort of dread for what would become of his home country and Jaehwan feels it too. Had they done a good thing by getting rid of sorcerers? Creatures were safer, yes, but people who could do magic still existed and now they would be the victims.

The third thing that happens is that Sanghyuk becomes unbearable. Except for meals he doesn’t leave his bedroom and everything he says to Hakyeon is with a sort of contempt that all of them see as unwarranted. They’ve all tried to talk to him but he completely shuts himself off from them.

It’s Hakyeon that decides they need to move on. He can tell that Leo wants to find somewhere to live and with Sanghyuk becoming more uncooperative each day he was running out of time for his search.

“It’s just us for now,” Hakyeon says, entering Sanghyuk’s room to find Leo and try get the Anyegi to do something. “Jaehwannie is going to stay here for a little while, something about making the perfect cake or whatever.”

“‘Just us’?” Leo wonders. “To do what?”

“We’re going to the next country over to look for Sanghyuk’s family.”

Leo casts a worried looks at Sanghyuk, who hasn’t looked up from his book since Hakyeon had walked in. “Okay,” he mumbles.

Sanghyuk tries to stay still but his mind is racing. He wants to run away but instead he just remains where he is like a statue, fighting off the fear that has risen in his chest.

“Anyway, breakfast is ready so let’s go eat.”

Leo squints suspiciously. “Did Hongbin make it?”

Hakyeon can’t help rolling his eyes. “No, I did.”

Leo perks up then – knowing full well that Hakyeon will only cook him the things he likes to eat – and gets to his feet.

When Sanghyuk makes no attempt to move Hakyeon frowns. “Aren’t you hungry?”

“No.”

“Well, pack your stuff while we’re eating then. I want to leave right after, okay?”

Sanghyuk doesn’t answer but Hakyeon takes it as confirmation and drags Leo to breakfast. The teen stays where he is for several seconds before throwing his book at the door, his panic is suddenly something more like anger. He’d never thrown a tantrum before and he doesn’t know if this constitutes as one and he doesn’t care. He rips open his bags and tosses everything around the room. He wants to scream but at the same time he wants some more time to himself to rage so he stays silent.

Once he’s satisfied with throwing things around – mainly clothes to avoid making noise – he sinks back down against the wall. His timing is pretty spot on because it’s only two minutes later that Hakyeon and Leo come back.

“What the hell, Sanghyuk?” Hakyeon demands when he enters the room.

He’s annoyed, very annoyed, because he wants to leave. But he gives Sanghyuk the benefit of the doubt, even with all the off-hand comments Sanghyuk had flung his way for the last fortnight.

“Were you looking for something?” Hakyeon wonders as he walks over to the teen and feels his forehead. “Are you not feeling well?”

When Sanghyuk doesn’t respond he sighs in frustration and picks up the Anyegi’s bags. “Let’s get this cleaned up, okay Sanghyukkie?”

And suddenly Sanghyuk can’t stand it anymore, any of it. He especially can’t stand how Hakyeon is pretending to care.

“Stop acting like you’re my mum!” he yells, pushing himself to his feet.

Hakyeon isn’t that surprised by the outburst but at the same time he’s sick of it, not to mention the words strike a nerve. “Maybe if you’d stop acting like a child then I wouldn’t have to,” he retorts shortly, motioning to the mess the room was in.

“Hakyeon,” Leo warns.

Hakyeon ignores the warning and moves straight on to complaining. “The sooner he stops holding us up the sooner he can be with his family and I can stop acting like his mum, since that’s what he wants so much. I don’t even know why I’ve been copping from him for the last month anyway.”

Sanghyuk doesn’t respond, torn between yelling back all the things bothering him and correcting Hakyeon’s thinking. The eldest scowls at the teen and Leo’s ears fold back against his head, worried about all of this.

Chunja sticks her head though the doorway, concerned by the raised voices. “Everything okay?”

Hakyeon tuts and folds his arms over his chest. “It’s fine.”

“No it isn’t,” Sanghyuk says, hating that he feels like crying now.

He regrets it, how he handled this all. Maybe if he’d just spoken up when Hakyeon had announced that they were going to find his family he wouldn’t be in this situation. Why had he treated Hakyeon this way when Hakyeon was the one he’d been closest with?

Hakyeon is beyond surprised when the Anyegi hides his face, a soft sob being muffled by his hands. Weirdly it’s Leo the teen goes to, tucking his face into the Anyethi’s shoulder. Leo wraps his arms around Sanghyuk comfortingly.

“Why are you glaring at me like that?” Hakyeon asks, anger melting away to reveal hurt. Hurt from what Sanghyuk was saying, hurt because of his own words to Sanghyuk, hurt because he was trying to do the right thing for Sanghyuk even if it wasn’t what he wanted.

Chunja clears . “I think maybe you boys should sit down and have a talk about what you actually want,” she tells them before leaving.

Leo pulls Sanghyuk off him and wipes away his tears, then he turns to Hakyeon with folded arms.

“Why haven’t you ever asked Sanghyuk about what he wants?” the Anyethi demands.

The hurt Hakyeon is feeling gets multiplied by Leo’s words and suddenly he’s also fighting tears. “I thought he would want to go home.”

“I already was home,” the Anyegi sobs. “Why did we have to leave? I don’t want to go.”

Leo is entirely unsure what to do when they both start full out crying. He flounders for something comforting to say but in the end it doesn’t matter because Hakyeon is pulling the teen into a tight hug.

“I’m sorry, Sanghyukkie.”

Sanghyuk’s response is to sob harder, returning the embrace. It takes a long time for them to calm down at which point they’re ready to talk.

“Is this why you were ignoring me?” Hakyeon asks.

“It felt like you were throwing me away.”

“I’m sorry,” Hakyeon says again.

“Me too. I should have just told you.”

“Let’s come up with a plan then,” Hakyeon suggests.

“A plan?” Sanghyuk asks, instantly tensing. “I’m not going.”

“Just listen,” the ex-sorcerer sooths. “I still think we should try find your family. You don’t have to live with them, that would be unfair, but you should at least see them. They probably think you’re dead.”

Frankly Sanghyuk had a bit of trouble caring. He doesn’t remember much of his family, he doesn’t even remember his last name, and he doesn’t know how he’d ended up in a different country as an ingredient.

“Hakyeon,” Sanghyuk mutters. “There is a possibility that my family sold me.”

Hakyeon had considered that all before, in fact it had been the first thing he’d considered after taking Sanghyuk in, but he had never thought that Sanghyuk would think the same thing. It’s suddenly clear to him why the teen had completely withdrawn from them at the mention of going back to his family.

“We can always find that out,” Hakyeon replies softly. “Wouldn’t it be better knowing for certain than just guessing?”

“I suppose…”

“Good. I’ve been asking around a bit and there are three options. First, your family lives on an Anyegi reserve in which case we’ll have to visit each one individually but we’ll get quick answer. Second, they live in one of the communities in a city, if so we can just ask about missing persons but it could take a while. The third option is that they’re a part of the effort to further integrate creatures. If that’s the case then they could be anywhere in any country.”

Sanghyuk doesn’t say anything. He’s almost convinced that his family sold him and the thought of seeing them is not one he wants to entertain, but at the same time Hakyeon could be right. Maybe his family had thought they lost him and needed closure.

“What are we trying first?” Leo asks.

“The closest to us is a community just over the border.”

“Let’s do that then. I can teleport us there.”

Hakyeon is about to argue when Leo speaks again. “It’s only three people and it isn’t too far. We can leave one of Sanghyuk’s bags here if we need to.”

“You look horrible when you cry,” Leo states, wiping at Hakyeon’s face once Sanghyuk is out of the room.

“Shut up,” the elder grumbles, wrapping his arms around the Anyethi. “You look worse.”

They’d delayed their departure for a few hours so that Sanghyuk could have a little longer to calm down. After quickly cleaning up the result of the Anyegi’s tantrum they wander downstairs to take over the couch.

“Is everything okay?” Hongbin asks, joining them in the lounge room.

“Everything’s fine,” Hakyeon smiles back. “Where is he? I thought he wanted to talk to you?”

Hongbin shrugs a little. “He came downstairs, cried for a little, and then went to take a shower. He was probably just feeling a little overwhelmed.”

Hakyeon nods and sighs. “I wish he’d just talked to me about it all.”

“He was scared,” Leo mumbles, not wanting to start another argument. “And you could have approached him.”

The ex-sorcerer threads his fingers through the Anyethi’s hair to show that he’s not offended. “He was avoiding me…”

He knows he could have tried harder, but frankly he’d been hurt that Sanghyuk was suddenly pushing him away, not to mention he’d been distracted by his search. He wasn’t sure how to describe what Sanghyuk was to him. Their ages were too close to go with ‘son’ but he couldn’t deny that it was along that track. He would love and protect Sanghyuk no matter what and it had been the thought of Sanghyuk rejecting that that had hurt the most.

Knowing now what Sanghyuk had been worrying about made Hakyeon feel like the bad guy but he’s relieved when Sanghyuk finally comes downstairs and graces them with a smile.

“Should we go?” he asks and Hakyeon smiles back.

They turn up nothing in the first community they visit. There are no missing Sanghyuks or children reported from around the time Sanghyuk was taken so they move on quickly.

Sanghyuk doesn’t want to admit that he’s nervous about being around other Anyegi. Were there any social norms he was forgetting? Leo is also a little on edge, having never been around so many top level creatures before; and unlike with the humans in the city they’d last been in, the Anyegi have no qualms against staring at him.

From what they’d been able to gather they’d concluded that Anyethi and Anyegi had a long history of not getting along. Leo thought they should have gotten over it by now, what with there being only one Anyethi left – but Hakyeon sees it for something else and redoubles his efforts in his search.

The second place they look is a reserve. From what they know, reserves allow top level creatures to live in a more traditional way and use their magic. Compared to the Anyegi in the community there are a lot more of them in their dog forms.

When they enter the reserve two things happen. The first is that two guard dogs stop them with barks and growls that are nothing short of vicious. Hakyeon – once again realising how defenceless he now is – and Sanghyuk feel their hearts stop in fear. Leo on the other hand refuses to let a dog push him around, even if that is exactly what Sanghyuk had been doing that for months now.

The second thing that happens puts everybody at ease. At first all they hear is a frenzied yapping but eventually a group of puppies come pelting around the corner of a building and in their direction. The guard dogs relax their aggressive stances almost instantly and the puppies run around the trio. It isn’t until they’re close enough to touch that the guard dogs start intervening again, trying to keep the puppies away from the possible danger.

“Um, can we talk to someone in their human form?” Hakyeon asks.

Both of the Anyegi turn to look at Sanghyuk who awkwardly stares back, unsure of what they want from him. After almost a minute one of the guards turns and walks off. It isn’t until he’s several meters away that he barks at them to follow.

The reserve is small and most buildings are simple and communal, however the building they’re taken to is more official looking and Hakyeon figures it’s some kind of administrative office.

“How can I help you?” an Anyegi behind the counter asks when their guide abandons them.

“We’re looking for his family?” Hakyeon says, pointing to Sanghyuk.

The Anyegi’s eyes hold Sanghyuk’s for uncomfortable amount of time before she sighs. “He’s not from here.”

“What? How could you possibly know that?” the ex-sorcerer demands.

“Because he’s not part of any packs we have here. Anyegi can always tell what pack someone belongs to. It cuts down conflict, especially now that multiple packs live in the same territory.”

Leo and Hakyeon give Sanghyuk a look. “What?” he mumbles. “I didn’t know that.” He’s starting to realise there are probably a lot of things about being an Anyegi that he doesn’t know.

“He was taken as a kid. Can you search for missing persons or something?”

The woman sighs and opens a draw. “Name?”

“S-Sanghyuk?” Sanghyuk provides.

“Surname?”

“I-I don’t know…”

For a second the Anyegi seems to pity him but she searches through her information. “What’s your age and how old were you when taken?”

“Almost nineteen. And I was maybe three or four.”

The Anyegi’s eyebrows shoot up. “How can you remember that but not your own name?”

Sanghyuk swallows tightly. “It was on the label,” he whispers.

Leo wraps an arm around the teen’s shoulders and Hakyeon crosses his arms over his chest. “Would you please stop interrogating him?” Hakyeon asks.

She tuts and continues her search. Three minutes later she closes up the draws she’d been looking through. “Sorry, couldn’t find anything.”

Hakyeon’s disappointment is expressed by a sigh. “Well, thanks anyway.”

“No problem.”

“How many other reserves are there?”

“Three in this country and there’s one just over the eastern border. Well, it’s practically on the border.”

“Thank you.”

They don’t see the puppies on their way out of town and the other Anyegi ignore them. Hakyeon nods his thanks to the two guards and they start the two hour walk into the small town they’d chosen to stay in because it had been close to both the community and reserve. Before Hakyeon can argue against it, before he even realises what the Anyethi is doing, Leo grabs the both of them and teleports to their hotel.

“Leo!” Hakyeon scolds.

Leo shrugs and kicks off his shoes. “It was a two hour walk…”

“Isn’t the eastern border the country we just came from?” Sanghyuk asks suddenly once he’s orientated himself.

He hadn’t realised when they were in the reserve, still tense from the environment. Hakyeon on the other hand had realised as soon as the receptionist had said the words.

“Yeah. Chunja didn’t mention anything about there being a reserve nearby though.”

“Maybe she doesn’t know it’s there,” Leo offers.

“Maybe.”

“How long are we going to keep this up?” Sanghyuk asks as they walk into the hotel they would be staying at tonight.

It had been another useless day added to their now three weeks of searching. After learning that one of the reserves was on the other side of the country Leo had convinced Hakyeon to let him teleport them there and get it over with. Leo had then spent four days in bed after arriving and they didn’t find a thing at the reserve or the community nearby. He’d then had to teleport them back resulting in another few days in bed.

They’d already searched five communities and two reserves and Sanghyuk was getting a little tired of it. It was exhausting to try and be positive about something he just knew wasn’t going to be. Also he didn’t want to say anything right now, but it was like Hakyeon was looking for something that wasn’t his family.

Hakyeon considers Sanghyuk and what it must be like for him and thinks that maybe he should give up his search. Was he being selfish by doing this? In the end he makes his decision.

“How about we at least check the reserves? The communities have been useless anyway and they take so long. How’s that?”

Grudgingly Sanghyuk agrees. He can’t help but feel that whatever Hakyeon was searching for was important, maybe he should hold out for Hakyeon, besides, there are only two reserves left.

The third reserve they visit turns up even less than the last two but the fourth reserve, the one on the border, is very promising from the moment they arrive. Upon asking about Sanghyuk’s possible family they’re met with some grim looks from two receptionists and are then shown into the reserve leader’s office.

He’s surprised to see them and when his eyes land on Leo they widen. “Are you from the Anyethi reserve?”

So, this part was getting too long so the ending was cut down a whole heap, I’m sure you can tell because the end is so ty. The rest of this part will be in Part 4.

Part 4 will be up the day after tomorrow :)