“You’re a fool.”

Looking at the young man strung up beside him facing the same miserable fate as he now held, Jinyoung couldn’t help but scoff. “You are aware we’re both in this together, right?”

“I knew they would come for me one day. You, however, think you’re still protecting that girl and all those townspeople,” he mentioned with a hollow laugh. “You’re a fool, like I said.”

“Have you no hope in this world?”

“Why should I? No one has ever looked out for me once.”

Jinyoung glanced down at his clothing and then that of the young man beside him. There was a stark difference between the worn, tattered pants and shirt he wore to Jinyoung’s cleaner, newer outfit. Sighing, he wondered if you hadn’t saved him years back if he would be in a similar situation to the fellow prisoner, or worse off.

Jinyoung nodded sadly. “Is it bad to be a fool?”

“Only if you don’t wisen up to the way people use you. That girl really made you forget who you are, didn’t she?”

“Do you have a name?” Jinyoung asked and the man shrugged. “Mine’s Jinyoung. I was gifted my name by the person who led me to have hope.”

“And now you’re here and she’s back there. Doesn’t that anger you?”

Jinyoung shook his head. “Not if it keeps her safe.”

The man mumbled under his breath incoherently and then turned to look at Jinyoung. “How did she give you a name?”

“Part of it was from where she found me. The rest she gave me. Do you want one too?”

Thinking for only a moment, the man gave a short nod. Glancing around the surroundings as they trudged towards the closest camp for their kind, Jinyoung spotted a circus wagon abandoned in the nearest field. He then looked to the sign outside the farmstead they passed. He grinned. “Jaebum.”

“What does it mean?”

Jinyoung frowned, gesturing his head in one direction and the next. “Jae and Sons from the wagon. And Eunbum Estate. That’s how it works.”

“That’s how those people name one another?”

Jinyoung nodded. “That’s how I got my name.”

“Jaebum,” he repeated, looking at Jinyoung, smiling for the first time along their journey. “It looks like I might become a fool much like you.”

 

“Being a fool paid off,” Jaebum mentioned the following morning as he stopped at Jinyoung’s side, the pair watching as you helped with hanging out the washing. His friend’s sentence irked him, Jinyoung clenching his jaw momentarily. Jaebum noticed and clapped him on the back. “You need to relax. We both know they played us over the safety of that town. We stupidly did as they told us, mere puppets on a string, when their promises were as empty as our pockets remained. By some sort twist of fate, she lived. Isn’t that something to celebrate?”

“At the cost of all she knows and this wretched Rebellion. Doesn’t that bother you?”

Jaebum shook his head. “Not while I’m here. It just feels like a peaceful settlement.”

“Except all the men here are owned by the Rebellion.”

“We’re going to break free,” Jaebum proposed and Jinyoung looked at the man smiling at Youngjae running with the stray dog that had chosen this place as its home recently. “We’ll take the ones we care for the most and we’ll leave to someplace else entirely.”

“Nowhere,” Jinyoung murmured. He chuckled before nudging Jaebum. “Now who sounds like a fool?”

“Someone told me a long time ago being a fool isn’t a bad thing if you remain wise about your situation.”

“Wait, wasn’t that you who told me that?” Jinyoung corrected as Jaebum started towards the gathering of people.

He glanced over his shoulder, grinning mischievously. “Sounds like I’ve always been wise then!”

“And I’m still a fool?!” Jinyoung griped, dashing off towards Jaebum and shoving him playfully.

As his longest friend in this world, Jinyoung knew he could count on Jaebum to do anything with him. After hearing about your parents and the tragedy he had fooled himself not to believe could have happened all this time, he had gone to Jaebum to announce the need to leave the Rebellion. Dead or alive, he wanted out and wondered if Jaebum was along for the ride.

He needn’t question it; Jinyoung knew all of the names that came to mind would follow him into the depths of hell if he requested it.

Staring over at you now laughing at something Jackson said, Jinyoung chewed on his bottom lip. Would you follow him as well? He was used to leading his men all these years, but there was once a time where it was you who motivated his actions.

You still held that power over him too.

“You’re here,” you commented when you noticed his arrival in the back field, waving lightly. Jinyoung ra