jongin remembers every forest meeting, remembers because he writes a letter to sehun after rushing home each time. he never gathers enough courage to tear the letters out of his journal and give them to him. he dreams of the day he will take the entire collection of letters with him and shove it into sehun's hands, but never does he make this a reality, for he is the prince of ignis, and he would rather burn his words

to ashes

than throw proof of his love into the open.

guilt is all he feels when sehun is caught, and the iron

sears

until sehun cannot feel the ice in his blood, can only see fire, can only feel it roar in the pit of his stomach and spread, spread until he is consumed by the flame, until he is fire, fire,

fire.

jongin remembers every forest meeting because sehun still has the same wry smile on his face as he lies half alive on the floor of the palace prison, coughing out a chuckle when jongin wraps his burnt body against his.

“don't worry about me. get yourself out of here,” sehun wheezes, “before the glacies river freezes your cities.”

jongin rests sehun's back against his chest and listens to him breathe. “is that the plan? is that all?” he whispers. he shuts his eyes and chokes as sehun nods. what's left of sehun's hair is soaked in jongin's tears and apologies that sehun knows he does not deserve.

jongin stays, does not respond when the guards ask why, threatens to burn out their eyes if they dare come closer. he shakes his head when sehun urges him to leave while he is able to, but sehun can only say so much before his body goes limp and he drifts out of consciousness again.

it is a full twenty nights before sehun is well enough to hold entire conversations without his eyelids falling shut in the middle of a sentence. on the twenty-first, jongin carries him past the palace guards and up the palace staircase, countering protests with the seething crimson of his irises.

sehun laughs as jongin places him on his mattress and pulls the covers over his body lightly. “what'll your father say when he learns your rival prince is sleeping in your bed?”

the mattress gives a slight dip as jongin seats himself on the edge and looks at sehun, who smiles softly at him. he pushes away the tightness beneath his ribs and avoids forming a response. “when's the attack?”

“one week.”

jongin lets him hold his hand and play with his fingers like he did when they were children until sehun falls asleep, hand warm in jongin's grasp. he lies with him, leaning into sehun gently as he can, wishing to turn back time, to revisit each forest meeting again.

but as he lays his head against sehun's shoulder and places his palm flat against sehun's chest, feels the slow thrum of his heartbeat, it is with sehun, he realizes, that he wants to be. the cities of ignis, of glacies—they are a small matter to him as he lets his eyelids fall. jongin knows this is selfish, can feel his guilt, his conscience, gnawing at him, hissing its disapproval at him, but he holds onto sehun a little tighter and escapes for a moment—they will not end like this, he reassures himself. fire and ice will unleash destruction in all forms, but they will not end like this, he chants silently to himself, to the rhythm of sehun's heartbeat beneath his touch:

this is not the end, this is not the end, this is not

the end.

--

So sorry it's been super long since I last updated!  Thanks for reading!