It wasn't a surprise to say that Baekhyun was overwhelmed with emotions as he took off running towards his mother who dropped the door handle to meet him half-way, their bodies crashing together in jumbled limbs and broken sobs. She was exactly as he had remembered, roughly his height (still shorter) brown hair and eyes and smelling of citrus. He engulfed her in his embrace, lifting her from the ground to spin her around before placing her back down when she giggled ever so softly into his ear.

"My boy.." she cried, running her nimble fingers through his neck hair. "you have grown so much let me look at you." Baekhyun couldn't stop the smile from pulling on his lips as he stepped backwards just enough to be able to keep her in his arms, his mother smiling as she drank in his sight. "Come, there are still a couple more people you should meet!" He pushed his arm out and laughed when his mother jumped to enclose her hand with his, she patted his shoulder before leading him into the cottage.

The bright light stunned him for a moment but he was able to handle it when his eyes adjusted, his breathing catching in his throat at the room filled with people all of which were ready to begin crying at the sight of him. The cottage had an open floor plan so there were no walls to separate the living room from the kitchen, he could feel the heat from the heart in the living room where two women sat on the couch holding one another, their hands by their lips as they watched him walk through the door. A man was standing by the kitchen sink, a proud smile on his lips and a cup of tea in his hands while another was sitting at the table in the middle, holding on tight to another man's shoulder. They looked somewhat familiar but for now his eyes were trained on the man who was ever so close to crying, he dropped his mother's hand and rushed to his side, the tears dripping down his cheeks now. "Dad!"

"Baekhyun." The man's voice was raw from the tears in his eyes but his grip on his son did not loosen up, he held on tight to his son who began sobbing into his chest like he had done with his mother minutes ago. "Oh Baek you really have made me a proud man."

"I'm so sorry." he cried, clutching his father's jumper tighter. His hands forming fists, never wanting to let go. "I'm so sorry for everything, I didn't mean to kill you I swear that I didn't -"

"We know sweetheart," his mother whispered from behind him, hugging him from behind so that he was enclosed by both of them. Baekhyun reached an arm around himself to include her in the embrace, her little giggle making his heart melt. "we know that you had no control over your actions. We don't blame you for what happened."

"I do."

"We know you do, that's why your first life has brought you to us so we can tell you ourselves that we don't hate you for what you did. We knew that Daehyun had a hold on your mind, we knew that he was corrupting you baby. Our death is not your fault."

"I'm so happy to see you both again." he sniffled, pulling away and stepping to the side so he could see them both properly. His mother had both of her hands resting against her chest while his father had a hand around her waist, even though they had their rough parts in their relationship Baekhyun never once doubted the love they had for each other.

A gentle sob from the couch had him turning back to see the two women, one was attempting to comfort the other but it appeared that she was too upset to even allow herself to be embraced. Baekhyun didn't recognize her, he looked at her dark hair and her red-rimmed eyes but nothing was ringing a bell. He then turned to her clothing, a simple but elegant white dress sat on her shoulders draping down to her knees were it bent and cascaded down to the ground covering her feet. Baekhyun was suddenly reminded of the lilies that were planted just outside the cottage, his chest heaving as his legs buckled out from under him. He crawled across the floor, his hands reaching out to touch the cheek of the crying woman who looked up at him through her tearful eyes.

"Eomma?" he whispered, not really confident in his answer. The lilies were the flowers that he remembered from his dream, the hall filled with them as he and Chanyeol were sworn in as King and Queen of Exo Planet. Now it made sense why he didn't recognise her, he had never seen her human face only recalling the moment in his dream when he was born to a white wolf similar to the one he had met outside. Still the woman nodded and pulled the boy into her chest, hugging him tightly before pulling away again to hold his cheeks.

"I never got to fully meet you," she whispered, her breath fanning against his cheeks bringing even more tears to his eyes. "but I have watched over you and all of your previous lives. I was grateful to know that the witches that placed this curse on you would also allow our souls to come back to you when you were ready to accept who you were."

"I'm sorry it took us so long to meet.." Baekhyun tried to swallow the lump in his throat and blink back the tears in his eyes, but he knew that he would return to the sobbing toddler inside him now that he was communicating with the mother he never got the chance to meet.

"I'm not," she giggled, gently swiping Baekhyun's cheek with her thumb. "because I knew that you had to grow before this so I patiently waited for you just like the rest of us. You have made us so proud Baekhyun, I'm so proud of you darling." The tears fell. "Oh my sweet Baekhyun.." she whispered, pulling him closer to press a kiss to his forehead.

He allowed himself to settle against her for a while, drinking in her features so that he will never forget her face. She had a cute little mole on her upper lip, directly mirrored to the one on his own. The small detail brought a giggle to his lips, his vision still blurry from the tears in his eyes.

Before he had the pleasure of turning to the woman beside his mother, the faces of the men he had caught a glimpse of before his eyes found that of his father finally registered in his mind. Baekhyun jumped to his feet, his eyes searching for them both only to find them in the kitchen sipping their tea. Their eyes grew comically wide as he stared at them, his hands forming fists as he glared.

"What was with you two playing the heroes!?" he screamed, marching across the room to where both of them stood like wooden planks. "We had powers that could have helped you but no the both of you just had to give up your lives to save us, how selfish and idiotic of the both of you!"

"Baekhyun.." Joonwoo tried to interrupt the rambling boy but the vampire merely raised his hand, halting him from saying any other words.

"I know why you did it and I don't think that it was selfish or idiotic but I hope the both of you know that I hated you for what you did but I understand why you did what you did, you both knew that Daehyun was the cause of attack and he hoped that by doing it he would allow our powers to be seen and therefore studied. He would have known how to destroy us, before we had even got a hold of them ourselves. I just wish that it didn't have to cause you both your lives.." he muttered, his chest aching as they both opened their arms. Baekhyun stumbled over his feet but allowed his body to rest between them, soaking in the warmth from both of the men who had been with him through so much of his second life.

"We're sorry too kiddo." Sejoon whispered into his ear, making the smile replace the frown on Baekhyun's face. Seeing his father and Chanyeol's again was refreshing, knowing that it wasn't a dream was even better.

"I forgive you." he whispered, nuzzling against their necks before pulling himself away. He still had one more person to figure out, yet the moment his eyes fully landed on her the face was almost too hard to forget.

Her dark hair was curled and resting against her pink cheeks, she was picking at a loose thread on the pillow she had placed on her lap. Her lips were reddened from the amount of times she had bitten them, but she still showed off her teeth in that sparkling smile. "Hello again Baekhyun." she bowed her head.

"Hi Katherine."

--------------

"Aren't I supposed to get my powers back now?" Chanyeol wondered, tilting his head down to see the wolf by his legs. It felt weird addressing his past life as himself so he figured that it would be better for everyone if he only saw this wolf as an all knowing creature who would annoy him one moment before giving him some pretty sound advice the next.

"Not until you find Baekhyun, this isn't a test but you should probably hurry since time runs differently here than it does back in your reality." Chanyeol stopped walking in his steps, his eyes blowing wide as he watched the wolf continue on before noticing that the human he was travelling with was behind him rather than beside him. "Oh jeez what now."

"How much time has passed?" he demanded to know, his steps heavy as he reapproached the wolf who blinked back up at him.

"A couple days by now, in this place time only feels like only a day has passed but in your reality a day has been over a least three times now."

"Are you meaning to tell me that Baekhyun and I have been stuck in this hellhole for three days?"

"Three days, four nights." The wolf nodded its head, the lips pulling back to expose its teeth and tongue. Chanyeol turned his gaze away, his eyes scouting out the forest before him. He didn't have a clue where Baekhyun could be right now, he figured that the boy might travel towards the school but if that was the case he would have found him by now. "What's wrong?"

"I need to find Baekhyun, that's what's wrong, you won't give me my powers until then and we need to get home. I don't know why but I feel like there is something wrong.."

"I don't know where they are, somehow you're supposed to know.."

Chanyeol's eyes narrowed at the wolf, the creature continued to blink up at him waiting for him to figure things out. The werewolf huffed out a deep breath, his eyes scanning through the trees. He honestly didn't know where to go, his mind telling him to continue on through the brush while his heart was begging for him to listen to it. Instead of doing either Chanyeol simply placed both of his feet shoulder width apart from each other and closed his eyes, he could hear the wolf next to him breathing but he was able to shut that out easily. Perks of living with his two noisey best friends.

His mother used to tell him that when he didn't know which way to go the stars would always lead him home, but in this land he couldn't exactly count on the stars to bring him to Baekhyun. Nope he would have to rely on the cheesiness of their love, he knew that his feelings towards Baekhyun would be enough to bring them both back together again.

However, before he was able to cringe at himself for thinking such a thing Chanyeol caught a very faint scent in the air. "You said that the other Baekhyuns were gone now that I've completed my test right?"

"Yeah?" The wolf drew out, not completely sure what that had to do with anything. He didn't get an answer since the human took off through the woods, not afraid to use his werewolf speed. The creature dropped its head between its shoulders, allowing a sigh to escape his lips before he took off after his reincarnated life.

----------

"So you found a way to save my baby?"

"I did," the woman smiled, her fingers rubbing the back of Baekhyun's palm from where it was resting on lap entwined with her other hand. "but my explanation is going to be a little hard to understand so if you can be patient with me I will try my best to go through every detail with you."

She waited patiently for Baekhyun to take a deep breath, his eyes scanning the room taking in the reassuring smiles and the small nods of trust before he allowed her to go on. "Shouldn't we wait for Chanyeol?"

"I'm sure your mate will appreciate it more if it came from you instead." Katherine offered him a smile, Baekhyun taking another moment to register her words before deeming her decision reasonable.

Ever since he had found out about his pregnancy Baekhyun couldn't help but wonder about his child, he wondered if they had a good life and if they settled down. He wondered how they died and if they were resting wherever they were since they weren't one of the spirits in the cottage with him right now, it was somewhat reassuring in a way - knowing that they were at peace and not waiting to see him like the others were.

"Okay so I suppose that I should explain that as I am a witch I have a special connection with the world you currently live in and the one we used to live in, I took my power from nature quite like your friend Kyungsoo."

Baekhyun nodded his head. "I remember Kyungsoo telling me about that and how he uses his herbal drink to obtain his energy, like blood for vampires."

"That's right we did have a drink like that, horrible stuff if you were to ask me..." Baekhyun couldn't help but shiver, his tongue tingling from the memory of the bitter taste. "but anyway! I wanted you to know that first before I go on."

Baekhyun nodded.

"You might have noticed or can recall my discomfort with you when we were first introduced to one another, I noticed how you were carrying yourself and how your hands were settled on your stomach as if you were protecting something. I'll admit that in the beginning I didn't completely understand why you were doing something so strange, it wasn't until my sisters had already begun the curse that I realised what was wrong with you. I realised too late that you were pregnant with an innocent soul who had no chance of escape, I figured that your baby would have died with you and I quickly realised that my sisters had never allowed either of you to share your story. They were blinded by the anger they had for Daehyun and they were scared that you both being there would cause him to lose even more of his control, I am not trying to defend them here because I knew their intentions weren't the greatest at the time but I cannot deny that their actions were made out of fear."

"I've come to realise that Daehyun sprouts that in people, he drives people crazy whether or not he did it intentionally." Baekhyun nodded his head, shooting an apologetic look to Sejoon who simply waved off the comment like it meant nothing to him. Like Daehyun meant nothing to him.

"I know this may sound extremely weird but when you were cursed the three of us were suddenly overwhelmed with sadness, none of us could stop crying and it didn't take us very long to realise our mistake. The Earth was scolding us for what we had done to you, it was slowly taking away our power refusing to grant us access to our magic because of what we had put you through. I realised then that none of you were meant to be there, you had gone against the story destiny had written out for you. Daehyun was never meant to come to Earth but he did and that brought the both of you here and from my sister's anger that's what brought you to be cursed, we were losing our magic because Daehyun went against his destiny."

"I'm not one for believing in destiny," Baekhyun voiced out his thoughts, the elders from his lives looked at him with raised brows. "obviously with Chanyeol I do but everything else being 'written' out for me I don't really like the sound of that. I like having free will now thank you very much."

"Well you should be thanking the universe right now because it was this destiny that spared the life of your son, I used the last of my magic to save him but even then I could only do so much. A baby needs a womb to grow and since yours was gone until you were reborn to an Earth mother I had to find something else, and quickly. I had found a potential parent but the spell ran out because of my magic, which ultimately placed your baby in my womb. I was the one that carried your baby to full term, researching everything I could about our spell and the potential loopholes but as you know I didn't find many. When your son was born I gave him a name but I quickly realised that he wasn't a simple werewolf prince, he had magic coursing through his veins."

"How? None of us had any magic apart from our powers, is that what you mean?"

"No." Katherine shook her head. "Your son was a warlock, or at least he was when he came out of me. I suppose that since I was his oven for a while I must have transferred some of my magic into him, I was grateful to the universe for unblocking my magic by then because I can tell you one thing a toddler warlock is not something that a woman without magic can control."

"You should have seen what two boys were like.." Sejoon muttered under his breath only to be hit in the shoulder by his best friend.

"Try seven!" Baekhyun was suddenly reminded of the fact that he had six other brothers, their presence a mere flicker in his memories. Joonwoo seemed to notice his son's inner turmoil and bit back a small smile. "They've been watching over their little brother, don't you worry Baekhyun they're at peace now."

"When he found his mate it was like things had changed," Katherine's eyes were locked in the air around them, her brows furrowed in the centre of her forehead like she was trying so hard to cling to a memory in the back of her mind. "he stopped helping me with my research claiming that he would have to go and see his lover. I didn't think too deep into it," she admitted snapping herself back into the room, her eyes locking with Baekhyun's. "but then I heard the Earth again. It was whispering its plans to me and I honestly had never heard such things before in my life, your son came home a little while later his mate linking his arm. It was at that moment when I realised what the universe was telling me."

"What happened?" Baekhyun whispered, edging closer to the woman on the couch.

"You were never meant to die and he was never meant to grow up without you, sure he had found his destined mate but that was the universe trying to give him a good life after the mistake we had put him through. The universe had figured out a way to make sure that you two would see each other again-"

"What?" Baekhyun gasped, blinking through his tears at Katherine whose lips finally displayed the smile she was trying so long to hold back. "You mean that I will get to see my son again?"

"Since we cursed you to live and die and live and die the universe knew that there would come a time where you both would be able to break the curse we inflected, it knew that you would eventually get to go home and then be able to fall through with the way things were meant to happen. Baekhyun, when you get pregnant again your baby's spirit will be reborn into the same body he lived in when he was with me, kind of like how you and Chanyeol have been reincarnated. He will have the same mate obviously, nature likes doing that sort of thing. When we figured it out he was ecstatic, he was desperate to know you and his father. I wasn't able to tell him much since I didn't know you but from my research I was able to tell him bits of information, he was always so attentive whenever you came into conversation. Sadly our paths never crossed with Haeun so he never got to meet his grandmother and I kept him away from Daehyun whenever I knew of the guy's location. He and his mate were gone before your first life, I'm sorry that you never did get to meet him..."

"But you're telling me that I can? That I will?" Baekhyun spoke, his voice shaky with the next round of tears threatening to spill from his eyes. "I will be able to be pregnant with him again?"

"Just like it was intended." Katherine grinned, her heart happy as Baekhyun rushed to her wrapping his arms around her figure. "But there is something else that I have to tell you."

"What else is there?"

"I know that you know that I never married and that I never had any children of my own and yet there is a girl back in reality that is claiming to be my descendent, haven't you asked yourself why?"

"I haven't really had time to think about it.." he admitted, his head heavy against her shoulder. "Wait..."

"She isn't a bloodline descendant of your son, but her ancestor did get adopted by him. He liked children and when there was an orphaned witch baby he couldn't pass up the chance of being a father since he knew that he was never really meant to exist, that thought took him a while to get over. Knowing that he wasn't supposed to exist in time yet kind of messed with his head but I have to give it to his mate, he was able to keep him anchored into the world even though they both knew that it would only be for a while until they died and their souls would have to wait for you and Chanyeol to reconnect. Skylar is your adopted, however many great grand-daughter."

Baekhyun could stop the laugh from escaping his lips when he realised that Sehun was getting a sister, the thought really made his body shake from the giggling.

"Baekhyun?!" A loud voice screamed from outside the cottage, the vampire's ears blowing off the side of his head as he jumped up from the couch. He sent a glance around at the people in the cottage, each of them frozen at the shout. He took a deep breath and began making his way towards the door, a spring in his step as he opened it and came face to face with his mate.

"Chanyeol!" He pushed off the handle like his mother did and rushed to his lover, Chanyeol's arms wide and welcomed him into his embrace. They clung to each other, holding each other as they cried rivers of joy for finding one another. "We did it Chanyeol!"

"We passed the tests baby, I'm so proud of you and us!"

"How did you find me?"

"I told you, you're my beacon, I'll always find you." He chuckled, tilting the boy's chin up to press their lips together. Baekhyun would have rathered they dry their tears first but he did appreciate the kiss and Chanyeol's sudden bold but appreciated move. "I love you baby.." he whispered against his lips when they pulled away.

Baekhyun's lips curling upwards in a bright grin, his fingers curling through the hair on his boyfriend's neck. He gently pulled him closer, allowing their foreheads to touch. "I could really get used to you saying that now."

"But you have to admit that it is a little weird now right? I mean I think that I still prefer our code words instead, it made us original."

"I think we can have this conversation at a later date, right now I think there are some people that you need to see."

Although he was still a little hesitant Chanyeol couldn't deny that the man standing before him was his Baekhyun, a little rougher around the edges from all that he had endured but he was still the same Baekhyun he knew and loved. Which is why he allowed himself to be taken by the hand and led towards the cottage door, not knowing at all what to expect on the other side of it.