Sunggyu blinks, noticing first thing how the silence filling the room is less stifling than usual. He knows the reason alright. The answer to his question is still soundly sleeping, lightly snoring even under his duvet. He gingerly sits up lest he would wake up the sleeping figure. Sunggyu never bothered to wake Woohyun up before since the man usually is an early riser and an even more a light sleeper, but with how yesterday unfolded, the witch decides to let the man rest a bit more before they actually need to wake up if they want to catch the early train.

      He cleans his eyes, and after a few more minutes of staring into space, he walks out his room carefully. The outside light catches on Woohyun briefly and some fuzzy feeling accumulate in his stomach and Sunggyu flustered at the sudden emotion he’s so not used with. He scurries off to start with his morning routine but before he could reach the bathroom, his sight, for unknown reason is directed to the secret library his family has. His legs bring him to stand before the wall. He’s inside before he knows it and a shiny book perched on the highest shelf catches his attention immediately. He never noticed the book before, not in the million times he’s there to study, not yesterday, not ever.

      The book shimmies off the wall and falls gracefully into his grasp. His eyes widen as he looks at the cover.

-----

Sunggyu is already nearly fully dressed when Woohyun wakes up. The man sits at the foot of the bed, towel on his head, and his back facing against the lying man.

      That’s totally normal right. Yeah nothing remotely special about changing clothes in front of each other since they’re roommates. Except that it’s not normal, for them.

      Ever since the incident, and the whole Woohyun avoiding Sunggyu for a week, they have never dressed in front of each other; it's an extension of their unspoken mutual understanding. They would change in the bathroom, and also would go to sleep wearing clothes, as if being half is a no no forever.

      (And so yes, to say Woohyun is shocked is an understatement.)

      Sunggyu is so pale, almost like he hasn’t been under sun before. His backside is wide and smooth and spotless, except for the loner mole next to the left, a tad bit above his hipbone. (If Woohyun has to compare it to anything, he’d say it’s like a dot on a blank paper.) His shoulders a blade; wide and sharp, as if it can cut you effortlessly even if you doing as much as touching it lightly. His honey-brown coloured hair falls a bit under his ear, but he wears it short at the back of his neck. It looks silky-soft. Realizing that brings heat deep in Woohyun’s stomach.

      Crap!

      Woohyun purses his lips together in apparent distress. It seems like he’s invading Sunggyu’s privacy by watching him like this.Sunggyu must have not realized the situation because the man is even more secretive than him. Perhaps being in his bedroom lowers his guard down and therefore disregarding the mutual understanding they have in the past.

      After a definite moment that Woohyun doesn’t want to admit, he closes his eyes again; he doesn’t want to keep looking at Sunggyu. He turns around in discreet, trying to erase the image of Sunggyu’s pale back from his brain but it has been proven unsuccessful.

      Woohyun falls asleep again in between his thoughts – or maybe he lulls in between, tethering around the edge of dream and reality.

      After a moment, he hears a rummage noise beside him and his mind instantly materialising a honey-brown haired boy with a chubby cheeks and eye-smile. The rummaging noise stops next to him, and a hand pries open his blanket, throwing whatever imagination he had out of his conscience.

      “Wake up sleepy head.” A rich raspy voice greets his ears.

      Woohyun snaps his eyes open and instantly his sight is flooded with a smiling Sunggyu first thing – with a shirt on, much to Woohyun relief (and maybe a bit despair if he’s being honest.) He groans grumpily and pulls the blanket to cover his face again. He can’t afford this many heart attack in one morning.

      Sunggyu grins and pulls it down again, leaning too close to Woohyun’s bubble of space, oblivious at the distress the other man is facing because of him. He a brow up when Woohyun’s face is visible to his eyes again, “Mind to tell me what you dream of that you smile like an idiot in your sleep?” Sunggyu’s hair is still a bit wet, he flicks his bang upwards, showcasing his forehead – oddly looking good while doing so.

      Woohyun frowns upon the teasing tone, and he doesn’t appreciate the invasion of his bubble space as it irks his anxiety. And that smile. He wants to erase that smile by all means. He doesn’t understand it himself but Sunggyu is testing his nerves a lot lately.

       “Can you back off a bit? You’re too close.” Woohyun snarls, letting out a subtle growl.

      “No,” Sunggyu sticks his tongue out, “tell me first what you were dreaming about.”

      Since when is Sunggyu this annoyingly persistent?

      Woohyun settles with a huff in reply and pushes Sunggyu’s face out of his bubble. He sits up quickly to avoid Sunggyu from taking his previous spot. “Can you stop being annoying first thing in the morning?” Woohyun blurts out, he might or might not have just averted Sunggyu’s question with another question. The other man doesn’t notice it though, or if he does, he doesn’t push on the matter further.

      “Ohho,” Sunggyu stretches the syllable as he backing out a bit, giving Woohyun his space. “This is how you were acting before you know?” If anything Sunggyu learned from their truce, is that Woohyun huff a lot when he being grumpy.

      Woohyun huffs again but doesn’t say anything because it’s true, to an extent at least. He doesn't think he's that annoying. His eyes wander around the room lazily, it still seems too early for them to wake up. The room is lit up by the light from the ceiling lamp since the outside world is still dark. The windowsills are already opened notwithstanding the cool breeze waltzing inside.

      That’s Sunggyu’s alright – he would draw the windows open first thing in the morning, no matter how cold it might get.

      Woohyun shivers lightly. He has always been weak to cold weather before, easily getting sick, but somehow he gets weaker lately. It’s like his endurance ability has reduced gradually. He wonders if it’s just his paranoia thinking.

      Sunggyu sees Woohyun shivering and he closes the windows pane with hushes spell and a flick of his hand.

      Woohyun turns to look at Sunggyu, surprised but feeling thankful by the act but acts nonchalant about it. “Why are you already dressed up? It still early isn’t it?” He observes the guy in front of him.

      The young witch's grin faded into a small thin lazy smile, and he leans his arms backward to hold his weight, his legs are next to the pillows bridge, and one of it is laid on the pillows. “We need to go back home. We've got what we wanted anyway.” Sunggyu pats the magic pouch next to him.

      Home.

      Woohyun likes how that sounded.

      Don’t get him wrong, he likes Sunggyu’s hometown and Sunggyu’s mother has been nothing but kind towards him. His dad in return – well Woohyun wouldn’t say he treated him badly, but something about him is giving off the vibe ‘I’m a witch and I will sacrifice you for your blood’. (Not that he would ever mention it to anyone.)

      “You should go clean yourself now. I need to return the other books.”

      “Wait why are you returning them?” Woohyun’s brows knit into confusion at Sunggyu’s words. They have gone through an ordeal to get those books yesterday and now the witch wants to return them again. He doesn’t understand his thought at all.

      “I found another book.” An important one that is. But he doesn’t tell Woohyun that.

      “What kind of book?”

      “I can't tell you yet.” Sunggyu’eyes is laced with urgency and Woohyun nods in understanding. It’s not a matter to discuss so openly. Not with Sunggyu’s dad in arm length and hot behind their trail.

      They couldn’t risk getting caught like that.

      “It's nothing dangerous is it?” Woohyun asks sceptically. He knows Sunggyu enough to know he’s hiding something. There’s worry hidden in his question too, but of course the oblivious Sunggyu overlook it.

       “I’ll explain everything later,” Sunggyu says calmly, though his face shows nothing of sort. He tries to stand up but Woohyun stops him. Sunggyu does that a lot Woohyun notices; averting subject that he doesn’t want to talk about.

      “You can confide in me anything okay? We’re doing this together you know?”

      Sunggyu offers a soft smile to the normal human “Okay Woohyun.” He whispers as soft as he look, and it is so out of character from how he’s usually is and Woohyun’s heart thumps a bit faster at that.

      Just what is happening to me?

-

Woohyun is done with his morning routine and is on his way to Sunggyu's room when he meets Mr. Kim. Woohyun stops on his way, and bows a little as a way of greeting. Woohyun internally cringes at the skin-crawling feeling but he gets no reply from the latter for a moment. Time seems as if frozen and the next word Mr. Kim utter to him sounds like thunder.

      “Woohyun-ssi.” Mr. Kim's voice hangs heavily in the open space; Woohyun startles, and then freezes rigidly on his spot. The grave tone of Mr. Kim runs a shiver in his bones – the same one you get when you detect danger.

      “Yes Mr. Kim?” Woohyun replies, he lifts his gaze to see Mr. Kim eye to eye but finds it too intimidating he averts his so quickly. He settles on looking down, gazing at the floor. His inside shakes with tremor.

      Instead of answering, Mr. Kim reaches for his left shoulder. The act is so sudden that Woohyun flinches, but he can’t move when the older man grips on his shoulder. Mr. Kim taps on his shoulder twice, Woohyun's arm straightens as if it holds weight and the following painful electricity scorching through his bones renders him speechless. It feels like hot raw wire is pushed into his shoulder, hotly flushes up through his pores, across his bones – and woeful. It's so excruciatingly painful Woohyun has the utmost urge to scream but he doesn’t, or more like he’s unable to.

      His lips stuck together for a reason and he can’t feel his body after a while. He panics and tries to trash around but failed. The necklace he’s wearing is rattling and shaking tremendously – as if whatever magic inside is trying to get out.

      Woohyun is beyond terrified. He's at the verge of passing out when a loud and clear voice rings in his ears along with the sound of thumping footsteps filling the space.

      “Dad! What are you doing? Let go of Woohyun.” Sunggyu roars pierce the air.

      Mr. Kim lets his shoulder go and Woohyun is rendered boneless in a matter of seconds. Sunggyu catches him into his embrace and he’s thankful for the support – he can't feel his legs at the moment. His mouth tastes like smoke and he isn't sure what's what in front of him but he can decipher Sunggyu's angry face and Mr. Kim stoic expression. Mr. Kim has the demeaning looks on; he looks like an emotionless villain in action movies. Woohyun wants to call for Sunggyu to tell him that he's fine but he can’t move his lips. His muscles all sore.

      The father and son duo engage in staring contest before the older man vanishes without a trace. Woohyun thinks that he teleports somewhere else but he couldn’t care less about that at that moment as the darkness engulfs him not even a second later.

-

It's evening. Woohyun and Sunggyu are currently in a taxi, on their way back to their dorm. Both bask in a complete silence, both losing into their own thoughts.

      Sunggyu sighs to the rolled-up window again for the umpteenth time; it's raining heavily in Seoul right now. The beads of droplet water fall on the glass surface, blurring his sight, not that he's seeing any anyway. Sunggyu knocks his head softly on the hard material as his mind conjures up bunch of his dad’s possible (and rational) excuses for hurting Woohyun. His mom was in a complete shock when he told her. But there isn’t much she can do when the matter involves the Minister. (Sunggyu thinks it's none of the Minister, just his dad's action alone – but it's just his theory.)

      Their plan to travel back in the morning changed as it took Woohyun hours to properly rest and be okay again. Sunggyu even had to sing the nursery rhyme-spell at Woohyun’s request.

      His dad didn’t come back for the day and Sunggyu’s mother promised them she’d talk to him once he gets back.

      He has a hunch that today's incident is just a start of something worse to come.

      Sunggyu shifts his view and glances to the quiet man next to him after he's bored steaming with his thoughts. Woohyun's eyes focus on the moving road, but his mind seems to be lost somewhere. Sunggyu wonders what he thinks. When his curiosity wins the best of him, he nudges on Woohyun's bicep (it's the closest part he can reach him with his elbow.) The black-haired man snaps out of his trance at the sharp jab and his eyes find Sunggyu's instantly. He tilts his head to the side and back in question to the witch.

      “Are you still feeling sick?”

      Woohyun blinks like he’s confused for a second but he shakes his head after, “No,” he mumbles, “I’m just tired.” Woohyun rubs on his shoulder subconsciously, keeping their eyes intact while doing so. He still feels the numbness caused by Mr. Kim’s electricity-like magic. It’s so different from Sunggyu’s comforting one.

      Sunggyu hums, “Hold on a little longer,” he shifts his gaze to the window, to inspect their current location, “we’re almost. . .” Sunggyu’s word dies on his tongue tip when he notices something is out of order. He doesn’t realised it earlier as he’s too deep in his thought but now that his mind is not in a jumble, he finally notices the fact that they are currently traveling on a dirt bumpy ro