Yi En hadn’t known how’d he feel about the educational aspect of attending university, but found that he really liked it a lot. He’d grown up schooled by his foster mother, and though she had been intelligent and knowledgeable of many subjects, she couldn’t give him a variety of perspectives outside of her own worldview as an Imperial. University was different. He liked being surrounded by other students and all their many thoughts and ideas and opinions. It was interesting to see things from outside the Imperial perspective and understand how people in the rest of the world thought.

The social aspect of it was fun, too. For the first time in his life, he was making friends, and even though there were challenges to this given that he had to lie through his teeth about personal details, there were also so many fun moments like getting hooked on MMORPGs with them and hanging out in the student lounge watching cheesy sitcoms and late night comedy shows.

And of course, there was Junior. Yi En smiled, just thinking of his name. Chatting until 2 in the morning with Junior. Eating breakfast at the caf with Junior. Playing games of ‘answer or pass’ with Junior, staring at Junior when he wasn’t looking, brushing past Junior in their cramped room and feeling the tantalizing sweep of the fabric of his shirts against his skin.

The thought of Junior had taken up permanent residence in that place inside Yi En where heat pooled and want pounded in furious need of attention. It wasn’t just the small similarities to Jinyoung that caught his notice anymore. It was him. Junior was his own distinct person, and Yi En was charmed by all of him there was to be charmed by, from his melodious laughs to his sassy attitude when you got on his case too much. He was the very definition of all the beauty and possibility that existed outside of Yi En’s former limited bubble of existence. Whenever Yi En thought of kissing him, it tasted of pure, unrestrained freedom in his head.

A part of him wanted to rush into it—guns blazing, as Jiaer would say—but he was a little bit relieved it seemed to be progressing slowly. He wanted to savor every minute of being together with him. He wanted a long and rich story, not just a quick-paced and fleeting chapter.

About a month into the school year, Yi En and Jiaer were in the dorm lobby doing homework when BamBam suddenly materialized in front of them. He’d changed his hair again, to the long and flowing style currently favored in the Empire, paired with a pointy chin beard that looked frankly stupid on him.

“So you finally decided to show up,” Yi En said crossly. “For someone who’s supposed to be my guardian, you sure have no problem ditching me only semi-supervised in a foreign country.”

“Come on, dude, you had it totally under control,” BamBam protested. “And I have been keeping an eye on you, I swear, I’ve just been monitoring you through magic since my physical form has been elsewhere.”

“What gives you the right to call the Imperial Prince ‘dude,’ partner?” Jiaer asked, though with a note of good humor in his voice. Not only had he’d been in high spirits lately, but he’d allowed Yi En freer rein that either of them would have probably imagined entering the situation. He seemed to be really getting along with JB, much to Yi En’s pleasant surprise. He’d assumed the two of them would shoot each other within the first week of classes.

“I dunno,” BamBam said with a shrug. “He was raised in hiding, so he still feels more like a regular dude than a prince. And by the way, what gives you, a mere trick-shooter-turned-college-student, the right to call an official Fairy God Dude ‘partner’?”

Jiaer blinked. “Uh…?”

BamBam cackled. “Just playing, man. Call me what you like! But never forget—I technically outrank you, bro!”

Jiaer did not look happy at this thought, but Yi En laughed in amusement.

BamBam shut the door to the lobby and locked it to keep their classmates out while they talked. “So where the heck have you been?” Yi En asked, closing his textbook.

“I’ve been doing a little espionage in the Empire,” he said. “If we’re ever going to defeat the Empress and get you back to your rightful place on the throne, we have to have a better idea of what she’s doing, and we pretty much knew nada.”

“Isn’t it dangerous for you to be hanging around her territory?”

“Yeah, but the things I do for love, man. If I don’t risk my back for you, who will?”

“I will,” Jiaer grumbled. “I’m his bodyguard.”

“But you can’t get anywhere near the Empress, dude. She’s not so happy about that time you were supposed to kill the prince and you helped him escape instead.”

Jiaer shrugged. Yi En was truly grateful he didn’t seem to feel any guilt in the slightest about it.

“So, did you discover anything interesting?” Yi En asked.

“Yeah, quite a few things. For starters, how she found out about you in the first place.”

“Through her mirror, right? When she did that TV broadcast demanding people to surrender information about me, she held up the mirror and it had my reflection in it.”

“Well, yeah, but now I have a better idea how the mirror works. She didn’t just demand it to show her if her puppet-husband’s fetus was still in the grave. I mean, technically she could—she can ask it to show her specific people when she wants. But when the mirror found you, she wasn’t looking specifically for her dead husband's child. She’d asked it an unrelated question. One that has to do with a little obsession of hers.”

“Power? She asked it to show her a threat to her power?”

“You know what, I really don’t think she’s into power for the sake of power like we thought. I’m thinking now she’s into power because it puts her at the center of everyone’s attention and gets her admirers. She just wants everyone to worship her for being beautiful, I think.” BamBam cleared his throat. “Mirror, mirror, do your duty, show my rival in love and beauty. That’s what she asked when she found you the first time. And what she still asks, whenever she searches for you.”

“What?”

“Are you saying Empress Blue Rose found out about Yi En because he’s hotter than her?” Jiaer asked.

“Well, when you phrase it like that it sounds stupid, but yeah,” BamBam said. “If she wants to be the most beautiful there is, she has to eliminate anyone who ranks ahead of her, yeah? I bet she had no idea the person the mirror would show when she asked that question would be someone so close in appearance to the Emperor she'd just killed. I'm sure she did a little hunting and found out the truth of who Yi En was and what happened at his birth…and the rest, as they say, is history. Or…the present.”

“Great,” Yi En said. “So maybe if I just cut off my nose and make myself uglier, she’ll stop bothering me?”

“Doubtful. She still wants to be Empress, and you’re still a threat to that. And now she knows who you are, she can ask something like Mirror, mirror don’t be a liar, show the heir of the Empire if you stop showing up for the other rhyme.”

“Does it have to rhyme?” Jiaer wanted to know.

“Seems like it.”

“I’m a little lost,” Yi En said. “If she wants to be the most beautiful, why did she have to tear apart my family and steal the Empire? How does that help her cause, other than getting her more attention and admirers like you said?”

BamBam sighed. “I’m still trying to figure that out myself. I still think it has something to do with the palace. In my vision, it’s practically blazing with corrupt magical power. I just don’t know why yet, but I think she must be doing something effed up in it. And there are so many strange things going on around her, but I can’t connect the dots and get them all to make sense yet.”

“Like…?”

“You know how people keep going missing in the Empire? Well, when I staked out her palace I saw tons of commoners entering it for no apparent reason—she didn’t seem to be throwing any balls or feasts that I could tell. And once they went in, they never came back out. I think she’s responsible for everyone going missing, but hell if I know why. And even weirder…well…Empress Blue Rose doesn’t even look like she used to, when she first came to the kingdom. She was, what…twenty or something when she married your father?”

“Yes.”

“Which would make her about thirty-eight now. But she doesn’t look a day older than eighteen. She looks even younger than she looked in the press pics during her wedding eighteen years ago.”

Yi En frowned. “Can she do that with magic?”

“No magic I’ve ever heard of.”

“But can’t you do something similar? You’ve looked the same age for as long as I’ve known you.”

“Fairies are immortal. We don’t age. Our entire being is magic, so we can do whatever we want with our appearance. But she’s just a human with a human’s limited capacity for magic. Unless she sold her soul to the devil, she shouldn’t be able to just do whatever she feels like with her magic.” BamBam paused. “And…there’s one more thing. You’re probably not going to like this, but I think this is why her rhyme refers to you as her rival in love as well as beauty. Remember Prince Jinyoung and how he went missing recently?”

Yi En looked at him sharply. “Yes?”

“Empress Blue Rose is looking for him. She searches for him in her magic mirror as often as she looks for you. And when she looks for him, she says Mirror, mirror white and red, show Prince Jinyoung who I will wed.”

Yi En paled. He didn’t still fancy himself in love with Prince Jinyoung—how could he, when Junior was in his life? —but he didn’t like the thought of him marrying his stepmother in the slightest. It went against nearly everything he had thought Prince Jinyoung capable of doing.

"Be that as it may, I don't think that's what she could possibly mean by calling me her rival in love," Mark said stiffly. "I'm not in love with him anymore, and Jinyoung doesn't even know I exist, so even if Blue Rose did know I used to have a thing for him, I'm still no 'rival' to their relationship. But how on earth did the two of them wind up engaged, of all people?"

“I don’t know anything more than that about the engagement, or what it has to do with Prince Jinyoung’s disappearance,” BamBam said with a shrug. “I’m going to assume Blue Rose has a reason to want to marry him, and him in particular. She wants an heir, I bet, but any other prince could give her that, so it must be some other reason. I’m just hoping she doesn’t plan on using him to somehow get to you.”

“She’ll have to do better than that. She’s not going to lure me out with an old crush I’ve already put behind me.”

“Don’t tempt fate by saying that! She’ll rise to the challenge, and no one wants that.”

Yi En bit his lip. “I’m curious, though…what does the mirror show when she asks for Jinyoung?”

“That’s the curious thing. It shows the exact same distorted static it shows when she asks the mirror to show you or Jiaer. Which means there’s a fairy protecting him, too…or else he’s hiding in the exact same place you are.” BamBam chuckled, lightening the heavy mood. “Check under your bed when you get home just to be safe, Mark. Or do you have any frogs hanging out around your dorm? You might want to dole out kisses and find the missing prince.”

Yi En was in a mood when he returned to the dorm. Talking about his stepmother and the threat to his life she posed always did that to him—which meant he’d been in a mood for most of his recent history. He’d never found a way to reach that ‘at peace’ feeling other people could about their own mortality. It deeply terrified him that there was an ever-present possibility that he would die young before ever really getting to live. His place in history would be wiped away by Blue Rose, and within years his family would be forgotten, and the Empire would only remember her, their brilliant overlord. That kind of end, one where he had made no difference to the story and had been unable to change anything or save anyone, was the scariest thing Yi En could think of. It was just like the answer he’d given Junior when he'd asked what he was most afraid of: irrelevance.

As soon as he made it through the door to his room, he threw himself down into bed and buried his head in his pillow. He wished he really was more into the scene music ‘Mark’ was supposedly obsessed with. He needed something emotional and noisy to both provide catharsis for his angst and drown the noise of it out in his head.

“Mark?” he heard Junior saying from his half of the room.

“Nnnnn,” Yi En responded. That was how bad his mood was—he didn’t even feel like talking to Junior.

“Are you OK?”

This time he couldn't muster the energy to answer.

He heard Junior crossing the room and sitting down on the edge of his bed. A moment later, his hands were on Yi En’s back, rubbing in slow, comforting circles. Yi En was nearly impossible to yank out of one of these moods, but almost instantly he felt something inside him soften. All in a rush, he very much did want to talk to Junior. But what could he tell him if he couldn’t tell him the whole truth? Hey, I’m definitely a totally normal, average guy, but oh, my stepmother murdered my family and became Empress, and she discovered my existence as the true blood heir of the throne and totally wants to kill me?

But to his surprise, Junior never asked him to explain his feelings or account for himself. He just continued to rub circles into his back in silence. It felt like a good five or so minutes before he finally said, “Want to go grab a milkshake with me?”

Yi En glanced up. “A milkshake?”

“Yeah. Have you tried one yet from the Union? They’re heavenly.” He gave him a little shake on the back. “Plus, it’ll be a new experience. You like those, right?”

“I do…”

“And milkshakes always cheer me up. Come on. I’ll treat.”

Yi En sat the rest of the way up. “What did I do to deserve you, Junior?”

“Who said you deserve me?”

“Touché.” Yi En slid out of bed and back into his Converse. “Are we going to be notifying Jackson and JB that we’re leaving?”

“They’ll know. They set up a monitoring system on our door that alerts them whenever we leave. I don’t know about Jackson, but JB put a tracking chip in my student ID so he can tail me at a distance if I leave campus.”

“Wonderful.”

“Don’t worry, they’ll give us enough space so that we can talk. Or just drink our milkshakes in silence. Whichever you want to do. It’ll be like no one’s there at all but us.”

Yi En liked the sound of that. The Union was filled with so many people that it felt like they could outnumber the stars in the sky, but he believed that he and Junior could carve out a quiet place for themselves somewhere in the midst of all the chaos.

The place Junior was taking them seemed to be in walking distance since he bypassed the train station and took him down a side street that led away from the downtown district. There were a lot of pedestrians at first, but gradually they began to thin out and the shops got smaller and smaller until they reached an area full of small mom-and-pop stores, one of which was an old building with peeling white paint and a sign that said “Matty’s Milkshakes.”

“It doesn’t look upscale, but trust me, they’re the best when it comes to shakes,” Junior said. He pulled open the door, jostling the bell tied to its handle. Inside, there was a long metal counter with barstools, and a kindly looking middle-aged woman in an apron standing behind. Other than a little girl eating with her father at the counter, the place was empty.

“Can I get a peanut butter shake, Matty?” Junior asked the woman behind the counter. “Mark, what do you want?”

Yi En consulted the menu. “An Oreo shake, please.”

“Coming right up,” Matty said. “Would you like that for here or to-go?”

“To-go,” Junior said. “Thanks.”

Matty went back to the shake machine and emerged a few minutes later with two milkshakes in tall to-go cups.

“It tastes better in the eat-in glass,” Junior said as they went back outside. “But I didn’t think you’d want to be around other people right now. There’s an overlook just down the street. We can sit there.”

The overlook wound up being a small grassy area looking down into a creek Yi En didn’t know the name of. There weren’t any benches, so they took a seat on the wood fence put there to deter anyone from running off the cliff and down into the water.

Yi En took a sip of his milkshake. Junior was right—it was perfect. The shake was just thick enough to satisfy without struggling to make it through his straw, and the Oreo chunks tasted even better to him than the cookies themselves usually did. It wasn’t a heal-all that could fully take the weight of the day off his shoulders, but it sure did make him feel a heck of a lot better.

“Aaahhh, it’s like liquid peanut butter,” Junior said after sipping from his own shake. “Matty should be made President of the Union for her service.”

“How did you even find that place?” Yi En asked.

“I got lost looking for the library. That happens a lot in the Union, I noticed. You lose your way, but there’s always something interesting on the wrong path.” Junior rested his shake against his knee. “So…I don’t think you can actually talk to me about what’s bothering you, can you?”

Yi En nodded, though he wished with all his heart he could. He wondered what Junior would think, if he knew. Would he treat him differently, because he was a prince? Would it not matter to him at all?

“Can I assume that you want to tell me, though?” Junior asked.

Yi En nodded again.

“Good. I won’t be able to listen to something you can’t tell me, but you can also assume that if you could tell me, I’d listen to every word you’d say. I’d try to comfort you somehow, although I’m not sure how good of a job I’d do of it, to be honest.” Junior took a breath. “I hope that means something. That even though you can’t say it and I can’t listen, that both of us want to.”

“It does,” Yi En said softly. “It means a lot.”

“To me, too.” Junior paused. “We don’t do a lot of comforting where I’m from. You’re not supposed to feel sorry for yourself. It’s not actually a rule, but it’s this kind of unspoken code we have. Our ancestors had it worse, so we have no right to be sad or cry.”

“That’s stupid. Having it bad isn’t a competition.”

“I know. But that’s just how we were. I never told anyone when I was sad. I just…swallowed it back.”

Yi En was suddenly reminded of that episode of Real Royals of the Minor Realms in which Prince Jinyoung had first appeared, falling into the creek during his riding lessons. Yi En remembered how his chin had wobbled seconds before he’d lifted his head up high and said ‘I’m fine’ in a strong and determined voice, even though you could see in his eyes just how embarrassed he was. Maybe it took a special kind of strength to live like that, but Yi En couldn’t help but wonder if it was also a form of weakness not to allow yourself to experience your own emotions.

“In the Empire, how would you comfort someone?” Junior asked.

Yi En wasn’t someone who had lived his life the way most other people from the Empire did, but all the same, he remembered all of his ‘it’s not fair’ temper tantrums from being a child and how his foster mother would squeeze him tight in her arms until he calmed down.

“With a hug,” Yi En said. “That’s how you would comfort someone, where I’m from.”

Junior set down his milkshake cup on the grass and reached out to enfold Yi En in his arms. It was somewhat of an awkward gesture at first—Yi En got the feeling that Junior had never actually hugged someone before and was only mimicking something he’d seen someone else do—but after a moment of adjustment, Yi En melded right into his arms and it felt perfect. He rested his head against Junior’s chest and Junior nestled his cheek against Yi En’s hair, and he was so warm that he felt almost like a blanket wrapping Yi En up on a freezing night. He felt at peace at long last, other than the stirring in his heart that wanted something far wilder than peace to flood through him from contact with this body.

They stayed like that a long time before Junior finally murmured into his hair, “Our milkshakes are going to melt.” Yi En drew away slowly and picked his milkshake back up, though he wanted to stay in Junior's arms just a little bit longer. The milkshake still tasted perfect, but it was nowhere near as perfect as the comfort he’d just stepped away from.

He thought for a moment about not saying anything that could potentially shake up the peace between them and just leaving it at that, but he couldn’t stop himself. “Junior,” he said.

“Yes?”

“You’re the most incredible person I’ve ever met.”

“No, I’m not.”

Yi En snorted. “Oh? What if I’ve met only really unextraordinary people my whole life?”

Junior laughed a little. “Somehow I don’t believe that.”

“Maybe, maybe not. But I mean it. You’re an incredible person. Today, I felt more like a plot device than ever, but as soon as you stepped in, I felt…” He flushed. He wasn’t sure he could say that Junior had made him feel like a leading man out loud without cringing at himself. “I just felt like I counted for something,” he said instead.

“You do,” Junior said firmly.

“If I believe that now, it’s because of you. And I want…” He drew his tongue across his lip, trying to choose his words. “I want to know if you think it’s possible for two people like us…two liars who can’t even talk about a bad day properly…is there any hope that we could maybe…be together? Because I think I might…I think I might be starting to fall in love with you.”

Junior didn’t have a big reaction upon hearing this, so he must have known. He must have felt it coming, the same way Yi En had. He simply looked at him, eyes deep and serious as if he was approaching a philosophical question rather than a shaky love confession.

“When you say you’re starting to fall in love with me,” Junior said slowly, “I wonder which parts you mean. If it’s the real parts or the fake parts, or the things you’ve tried to guess. I wonder the same thing when I start to think I’m falling in love with you. Do I really love you, or is the real you someone I haven’t even gotten to meet yet?” He swallowed. “If you asked me right in this moment if I’m attracted to the person sitting beside me, I would say ‘yes.’”

“But…?”

“What if I say ‘yes,’ and it works for awhile as ‘Junior and Mark,’ but we can’t move forward as us? What if we can’t survive the truth? What if….” He sighed in frustration. “What if the way the world is now has no place for us, and the moment we stop lying, it’s all over?”

“I don’t know,” Yi En said honestly.

“I don’t either.” Junior exhaled. “And that should scare me, but right now, all I want to do is say ‘yes’ anyways. Yes, we can be together. Yes, I really think what I’m feeling is for you and not just someone you’re pretending to be.”

Yi En felt his heart pounding raucously in his chest, even though he knew better than to get his hopes up. “I feel another ‘but’ coming.”

Junior reached out and gently touched his arm. His fingers were cold and damp from holding onto the milkshake, but there was still a warmth to it. “Just a little more time,” he said softly. “I don’t want everything to all be over when the time comes for me to tell the truth. But I need a little more time to…change things. I can’t say anything more than that right now, but…can you trust me?”

That was a dangerous question to answer for someone like him whose existence was constantly under threat, now more than ever, but he knew in his heart that Junior was someone he could trust, whoever he was. “I trust you,” he said immediately. “You can have whatever time you need.”

“Thank you,” Junior said. He squeezed Yi En’s arm, smiling slightly. “We can keep having experiences until then, too. And if you’re ever feeling down again and need one of those hugs, you know who to ask. In fact, I’ll feel offended if you ask anyone else.”

Yi En smiled back, marveling at how such a bad day had turned so good. “I wouldn’t dream of asking anyone else but you.”

Yugyeom appeared so abruptly out of nowhere that Jaebum almost plugged him full of bullets.

He and Jinyoung had a weekly ritual of reserving the common room in their dorm to camp out in front of the TV and watch any news report they could find on the state of the rebellion in Solitude so they could keep abreast of any possible development which could influence Jinyoung’s situation. Before Yugyeom had shown up, they had been watching a press conference held by the King and Queen, Jinyoung’s parents, about the whereabouts of their two sons.

To Jaebum, the King and Queen of Solitude didn’t at all match the global image of what a ruler should be. The King was reedy and haunted looking, with darting eyes and a nervous tremor in his hands. The Queen was highly strung and quick to cower whenever someone spoke to her, and her own voice barely went above a whisper. Both had likely never had an original thought in their lives that hadn’t first been planted there by their Enforcers, one of which was standing behind them on the TV screen in a crisp white uniform, glaring out in front of him with a stern expression. And the Enforcers never had a thought outside of the Law, and in Solitude, the Law was an iron, unshakable fist.

“Criminal 5-7-8-0, former crown prince Junho is being hunted by the full strength of the Law and will be brought to justice the moment he is found,” the king had been saying. “Anyone who supports him and sympathizes with him will also be deemed a criminal and punished as such. As for Crown Prince Jinyoung…we fear he may have been captured by the rebellion and held hostage. However, he is part of a very important alliance we are forging with the Empire, and must be recovered safely at all costs.”

It was right then that Yugyeom materialized. Jinyoung shrieked and Jaebum grabbed his gun, and Yugyeom threw his hands up in surrender. “Please, don’t shoot!” he said. “It’s just me reporting for Fairy Godson duties.”

Jaebum lowered his gun. Yugyeom had been AWOL for so long that he’d almost forgotten about him. Jinyoung’s Fairy Guardian was not a very competent one, which may have been because he had the personality of a particularly sassy and excitable child in spite of the tall and strong body he preferred to give himself—hence Jinyoung’s tendency to refer to him as a ‘fairy godson’ given that Jinyoung’s own mental age was a great deal higher than the supposed ageless immortal’s.

Yugyeom’s role in Jinyoungs life had largely amounted to him getting the Prince out of trouble with the Enforcers whenever he’d make a slip up of duty and obedience while growing up. But now that Jinyoung was actually in crisis, Yugyeom had been surprisingly active in spiriting Jinyoung and Jaebum out of the castle and getting them into the Union without getting caught by the King and Queen or Empress Blue Rose—up until he’d disappeared entirely after getting them settled in, that is.

“Where have you been all this time?” Jinyoung asked anxiously. “I thought something had happened to you!”

“You never called for me,” Yugyeom pointed out.

“Yeah…well…I would have liked to know you were still around for emotional support, you know.”

“Really? It seems like you’ve been receiving emotional support from an alternate source recently.” Yugyeom wiggled his eyebrows. “Don’t forget, I’m in tune with all your emotions in case of an emergency, so I’ve been feeling all your recent hormone spikes.”

Jinyoung flushed. “I’m going to kill you!”

“You’d kill your own Fairy Guardian? That’s so dumb!” Yugyeom stuck out his tongue. “And here I was trying to help you!”

“With what?”

“With your engagement problem, duh! Unless you want to get married to Empress Evil Psycho now?”

“Absolutely, positively not!”

“Thought so. So I went to the Empire to do a little spying. I especially wanted to make sure she didn’t have any clue where you are right now.”

“And…?”

“The good news is she doesn’t. The bad news is she’s got this magical mirror she’s using to help her, and if her magic gets any stronger, I’m worried she’ll find a way to funnel it into the mirror and overpower my magic.” Yugyeom crossed his arms across his chest. “Whenever she looks for you, she says Mirror, Mirror white and red, show Prince Jinyoung who I will wed. Right now, it’s showing nothing but static interference, courtesy of moi.”

Jinyoung wrinkled his nose. “I still don’t understand why it has to be me she weds. She can’t find some other unmarried prince?”

“Yeah, I’m investigating that, too. You know the country she’s from, the queendom of Void? Through history, all the Queens of Void requested arranged marriages with men from Solitude, starting with Princess Aneksi, who married Prince Jumong. I just don't understand why they would do that, though, since Aneksi and Jumong's marriage ended with him cheating on her and her executing him. Definitely not the model of a good, healthy marriage worthy of mimicking. Anyways, Blue Rose is the first Queen from Void to leave her Queendom and come overseas, and the first to break the pattern of marrying a Solitudanese man by marrying the Emperor first before requesting to marry you.”

“I wonder why they would want men from Solitude when men from Solitude are like soulless machines obeying the Law?” Jaebum asked.

“Maybe that appeals to them. I’m sure some women wouldn’t mind a husband who never does anything bad.”

“If that’s what she wants, she’s chosen the wrong person in me,” Jinyoung said fiercely. “Doesn’t she realize that, after I ran?”

“Maybe that turns her on,” Yugyeom said with a shrug. “Catching you and making you beg for mercy.”

“Gross!”

“It could happen.” Yugyeom plopped down on the couch, kicking out his long legs. “Interesting thing is, you’re not the only one she’s constantly looking for."

“Oh?”

“Yeah. There are two others. The first is: Mirror, mirror, do your duty, show my rival in love and beauty. The second is: Mirror, mirror precious tool, show the lying huntsman fool.”

“Does she come up with those rhymes herself? They’re terrible!” Jinyoung paused. “Who could she mean?”

“No idea. Well, she's apparently looking for a huntsman and a very attractive person she sees as a threat to her 'relationship' with you, if that's what she means by 'a rival in love and beauty'.” He looked at Jinyoung curiously. "Maybe it's the person causing all your hormone spikes?"

Jinyoung shook his head. "That's been...a very recent development. There's no way she'd know about it unless she knows where I am and what I've been doing, which she doesn't. It must mean someone else. She's probably not even really in love with me, so perhaps there's someone else she has romantic feelings for." 

“That huntsman thing sounds familiar,” Jaebum said. “I don’t remember from where, though…” He tried to dig through his memories, but turned up empty.

“Well, it’s worth keeping in mind, but it doesn’t sound like it has anything to do with our part of the situation, other than the weird 'rival in love' reference maybe.” Yugyeom looked at Jinyoung solemnly. “I’ll be honest with you. The Empress is growing powerful at a rate I can’t match, and I can’t understand how it’s happening and how she’s capable of doing the things she does. It’s not a question of if she’ll find you anymore. It’s of when. And I want to do everything I can to protect you, but it’ll get to a point where it’s out of even my depth. And when that day comes, you need to be ready for whatever she has in store for you."

It’s all happening too soon, Jaebum thought. We’re not ready. The rebellion isn’t any closer to retaking Solitude, and even if they did, Junho probably couldn’t stop Blue Rose from taking Jinyoung if she really wants him. Not to mention what a horrible, soulless life that would be for Jinyoung. I can’t let that happen to him.

But he didn’t know how he could stop it either. What was one bodyguard and his guns in the face of a queen even stronger than a Fairy Guardian?

One time, back when the King and Queen had grudgingly allowed Real Royals of the Minor Realm to film footage of Prince Junho’s daily life ‘to showcase the glory and superiority of Solitude,’ Jaebum had worked with Junho’s bodyguard to form a security plan to keep the foreign cameramen and production teams in line. Jaebum had reviewed the details of the personnel that would be coming, tossed them aside, and declared that they should just shoot anyone who caused trouble.

Junho's bodyguard had looked at him a bit sadly after that, shaking his head. “One day, Im Jaebum,” he’d said, “you are going to wish you were a better protector.”

Jaebum could still remember how he laughed in his face, bragging about his skill with a gun which far outstripped all the other bodyguards, and how no one could possibly touch Jinyoung as long as he was around to shoot them dead. How could he possibly be a better protector to Jinyoung than he already was?

Now, he finally understood. All he could do was shoot, but sometimes Jinyoung needed more than a gun to be safe. He needed a plan. He needed a strategy to outmaneuver those who tried to cage him. He needed a key to a free life that would never crumble to dust in his hands.

But Jaebum didn’t have any plans or answers or keys to anything. He just had a shotgun with a target he couldn’t defeat by shooting, and someone to protect who was about to have his world cave in on him. And Jaebum wished with all his might that he could have been a better protector, just as Junho's bodyguard had said.

When he was back in the dorm, Jaebum tried to think of an answer as he polished his shotgun, but came up with nothing more creative than hiding Jinyoung somewhere else. There had to be someplace in the world that was so far and so hidden that even Empress Blue Rose’s power couldn’t reach it.

“You’re in a bad mood,” he suddenly heard Jackson say from across the room.

Jaebum’s head shot up. He was normally vigilant beyond reproach, but somehow he’d missed Jackson coming into the dorm.

“A bad mood,” Jaebum repeated. This wasn’t a phrase one used in Solitude, where one was supposed to be quiet and obedient without even a hint of a sour attitude. “Why do you think so?”

“You’re polishing your guns, partner.”

“I often do that.”

"And when you're happy to be doing it, you polish them lovingly. When you're in a foul mood, you do it roughly, just like you're doing now."

"And you're an expert on my emotions?"

"Naw, you just have the same damn body language of millions of other riled up people on the planet. It ain't rocket science, figuring it out."

“If it’s so evident, that means I need to control my emotions more. Thanks for alerting me.”

“No, you don’t.”

“Hm?”

“You don’t need to control your emotions more. There’s no shame in being riled up. Or even sad. I’ve been feeling a bit of both myself.”

Jaebum nodded slowly. He’d noticed Jackson polishing his guns a bit roughly too lately and had known something was off, but not what, specifically. He’d hadn’t identified the anger or sadness for what it was, and as a result had left Jackson to stew in it on his own. He felt a little guilty for it, suddenly. When Jinyoung was stewing, he inevitably wanted to talk so he could put it behind him—what if Jackson was the same, and had been waiting that whole time for Jaebum to say something?

Before Jaebum could say anything, Jackson cleared his throat. “You don’t strike me as the hugging sort,” he said.

“Hugging?” Jaebum repeated, mystified.

“You know, putting your arms around someone?”

“I do that only when I put someone in a chokehold.”

“I expected as much. It’s not the thing for you.” Jackson rubbed his chin. “Well, there’s nothing else for it, then.” He sat down on Jaebum’s bed. “Put your head on my lap.”

“What?”

“You heard me, partner. Lay down that head of yours.” Jackson patted his lap expectantly.

“Why would you ask me to do that? Do you want to have me vulnerable so you can…” Jaebum trailed off. He didn’t really suspect Jackson of wanting to shoot him anymore, so what would he do if he had him vulnerable? He almost didn’t want to know.

“Come on,” Jackson persisted. “You’ll feel better.”

“Why?”

“Why? Well, why don’t you figure it out for yourself, partner? Or are you just going to squawk at me to give all the answers to you?”

Jaebum grit his teeth and abruptly fell back and slammed his head into Jackson’s leg. He was determined for it to feel terrible, and it first it did thanks to his hard landing. But Jackson simply readjusted so Jaebum’s head was properly in his lap, then gently wove his fingers through Jaebum’s hair and it in a rhythm. And as much as Jaebum wanted to dislike it, there was something about it that brought back an old feeling, something he hadn’t felt in a very long time. What was it? He thought back, cycling through memories. He remembered a smaller hand in his hair, a woman’s voice singing to him in a sweet soprano.

A lump formed in his throat. There was only one person that could be, the mother he had lost what felt like a lifetime ago. But just as quickly as that pang of sorrow swept over him, Jackson’s hand swept through his hair again and brought back the sweetness of it, of being held gently and…comforted? Was that what this was?

And then Jackson began to sing. His voice was nothing like Jaebum’s mother’s—it was rough and husky, unpolished but beautiful. He was singing what sounded like a folk song. I will lay my burden in the cradle of your grace and the shining beaches of your love and the sea of your embrace...

Jaebum wasn't a person who cried. His eyes hadn’t felt the faintest trace of tears since he was a child freshly orphaned and brought to the Enforcers to hear what his new place in the world would be. He’d turned himself as cold and unemotional as the first gun they’d placed in his hands.

But tears were pricking in his eyes now. He didn’t want them, but they somehow felt as if they belonged, as if there was room for them in this moment. He closed his eyes, nonetheless thinking he would swallow them back.

He couldn’t, though. He couldn’t swallow. He could barely breathe. It should have felt painful, but it didn’t. It felt like the best thing he’d ever felt in his entire life, and he had no idea why.

A/N: Just some housekeeping before the holidays! There will NOT be a 2SotSL update next week since I will be vacationing in Tennessee for Christmas. It's a *particularly* good update though, and is well worth waiting for so I hope you'll forgive me ;)

To make up for it, I will be posting 2 one shots on Monday and Tuesday! One is a With New Eyes crossover, and the other a fun little romcom. Stay tuned~