Suddenly the sound of the villagers’ cries didn’t sound as deafening as before, the wind didn’t feel as cold as before, the snow didn’t look as beautiful as before. Luhan blinked and stood where he was in petrified astonishment. All he could see was how gorgeously tinged with silver the liquid spread on the ground was. Gorgeously tinged with silver. But it was blood, and the fairy had been killed. The white layer of snow under it had melted softly. Luhan looked at the insect-like wings, so thin and fragile, almost invisible, that were resting there, desperately lifeless. He felt tears gather in his eyes.

                Several people had kneeled down silently while the others were shouting and calling everyone. Luhan shivered when Sehun’s hand met his shoulder. “I don’t understand,” he said, hoping the whisper that left his lips would cover the buzzing sound in his ears. Sehun gave him a gentle squeeze. But Luhan didn’t look up at him. He didn’t look at anything. He wasn’t looking at anything. He was seeing himself much younger, when the sunny smile on his lips was more than the faint reflection of it that it was now.

                He was seeing himself running after Tao and Kyungsoo in the fields, just a day after he’d arrived. He was laughing, happy to have found new friends. “I’m going to catch you!” he cried, so engrossed in their chasing game he didn’t even glance down at the ground to check whether he was stepping on rocks or roots and he was tripping about every two steps. Kyungsoo turned around to stick his tongue out at him and kept running ahead with a laugh.

                “You can’t now, we’re touching a fairy tree!” Tao grinned, his hand resting on a beautifully striated trunk. Luhan looked up at it, a little disappointed, panting.

                “Is that…a new rule?” he asked. “Why are you making up fairies?”

                “We’re not making them up, there are fairies up there,” Kyungsoo replied, pointing at the thick green foliage.

                “I can’t see anything,” Luhan pouted, certain he was being fooled. An expression of sincere surprise painted itself on the two other boys’ faces.

                “But you know, that’s where the air moves like ripples when you throw a rock into the water,” Tao said. He pointed at something up in the tree and Luhan narrowed his eyes in attempt to spot the mysterious thing. He didn’t notice it right away. But when he did, he knew at once that it was something special. The air was waving softly in gentle undulations, and the feeling of it all was really similar to a mirage, or a beautiful liquid mirror.

                “This isn’t what fairies look like,” Luhan said. “Why doesn’t it have wings?”

                “Oh, fairies do have wings. Actually, that’s why the air vibrates around them,” Kyungsoo answered. “But you can’t see their wings. Unless they die. This never happens, though!” he beamed. Luhan smiled and looked up at the fairy again.

                “Wow…that’s something,” he whispered. Then he turned back towards his new friends. “You’ve got to run, now…”

                “Uh – oh…” Tao said.

                “Uh – oh,” Kyungsoo confirmed.

                And they started running against faster than ever, chased by a merry laughing Luhan.

                Luhan still could hear the sound of his footsteps against the ground as if Child Luhan was still running in his head. He only came back to reality when a girl let out a particularly loud scandalized scream, and he started, the icy wind piercing through his thin coat more coldly than before. Sehun had wrapped his arms around his waist and was back-hugging him. Luhan briefly thought they should avoid being too intimate in public, but – how important was that compared with a fairy’s death? “She was killed!” a man shouted.

                “Maybe it was an animal…some fox, some wild dog,” someone else said weakly.

                “Animals don’t kill fairies. They’ve never killed fairies!”

                “What are you implying?” another man replied menacingly.

                “That someone killed her,” the first man said through gritted teeth

                “Please, Dohyun…” a girl begged softly.

                “Everyone calm down,” Kris’ voice exploded over all the others. Silence quickly fell. “A fairy died,” the mayor went on, his frightening eyes sending dark waves of threat into all the villagers’ pupils. “Fine. We’re going to bury her like she deserves to be buried, and it will be over. Understood?” Several villagers nodded. Luhan stood up shakily, not very steady on his feet, and looked up at Sehun, who gave him a comforting look. He sighed and shook his head.

                That was when he saw Kyungsoo. The baker met his eyes and walked to him, apologizing to the people he accidentally touched. He didn’t look happy either, and was actually pretty devastated. He looked at the lifeless fairy briefly before speaking. “This is dreadful. None of them had died in decades,” he said. Luhan only looked down as an answer.

                “I’m sorry,” Sehun said all of a sudden, surprising him and surely Kyungsoo as well. “I mean, I haven’t lived here for long but I know the fairies are really important to all of you. So, sorry,” the young man finished. Luhan gave him a tiny trembling smile that sadly faded almost instantly. Kyungsoo looked at Sehun for a minute or two, not saying anything, then he tilted his head and the corners of his lips tucked up slightly. He was probably going to reply, but before he could do so, someone else  came to the three of them and interrupted.

                “Thank you for that, Sehun.” It was Baekhyun. Luhan looked down, wringing his fingers behind his back. He knew the short man was up to no good; he could hear it in the tone of his voice. “This is truly kind of you,” Baekhyun said. Sehun’s head tilted in a puzzled angle and he looked at the little devil silently. “Truly kind of you.”

                There was a relatively short ceremony after someone came back with a spade; everyone walked into the misty forest until they found a fairy tree, so similar to the one Luhan had been thinking about not long before, to bury the fairy under it. No words were said. All was silent, even more compared to the screams that could’ve been heard when the wings had been found. Even the other fairies had stopped to watch and weren’t fluttering like they usually were. Luhan wasn’t even looking. A clumsy grave was dug, and a little girl put a small rock on it after the hole was plugged, for lack of flowers. The villagers weren’t moving.

                Sehun had lowered his head and inaudible whispers were leaving his lips. Luhan could only hear them because the two of them were standing so close. Sehun did the strange gesture with his fingers and his head and his chest and his shoulders, and his lips stopped moving. He was pallid. Slowly, one by one, people started walking away. The first ones were surely embarrassed to – maybe they believed the others would think they didn’t care about the fairy – but a sort of unspoken agreement to leave was made, and all the villagers were soon gone.

                Luhan resigned himself to doing the same, and Sehun followed him sadly. He had the feeling he was coming back from a member of his family’s funeral. The young man had wrapped an arm around his shoulders, as much to help him walk straight as to comfort him, and was murmuring gentle words into his ear. Luhan found a sad smile forming on his own lips. It’s okay. She’ll be fine now. By the time they got back home, it was the middle of the morning. Luhan was feeling so exhausted mentally he didn’t want to do anything else than lie down and sleep.

                “You…can do whatever you want to do, I – I’m going to have a rest,” he said weakly. Sehun didn’t do whatever he wanted to do. He followed him to the bedroom. Luhan lied down on his bed, fully clothed, and put his head on the soft pillow with a sigh of weariness. Sehun sat down next to him, his lower back almost brushing Luhan’s waist. He and petted the blond boy’s hair, running his fingers through it, or gently pushing it to the side and off his forehead. It made Luhan feel deliciously light – he could almost pull his thoughts away from the dead fairy. Although he had kept his eyes open, he didn’t look at Sehun. Maybe he was too afraid of how intimidated he would surely be by the softness of the young man’s gaze. Just when Sehun’s lips brushed his forehead, Luhan shut his eyes. He fell asleep barely three seconds later.

                When he woke up, Sehun wasn’t by his side anymore, but an exquisite smell was floating in the air. Luhan waited until he gathered enough strength to get up, and he slowly walked downstairs. Sehun was standing in front of the stove, visibly cooking. Luhan waited, leaning against a wall, taking advantage of this moment to watch him without him knowing about it, because Sehun hadn’t noticed him yet. Then, as discreetly as he could, he walked to him on tiptoes, his socks silent against the floor. Sehun was so engrossed in his cooking he didn’t realize Luhan was standing next to him, only slightly aside. It wasn’t until the blond-haired boy whispered his name that he started and smiled sweetly.

                “You surprised me,” he said.

                “I know,” Luhan said. “What are you cooking?”

                “Soup. With potatoes and leek. And chicken,” Sehun answered.

                “It smells good,” Luhan said. He nodded to himself and took one step closer to Sehun. Clumsily, he wrapped his arms around the young man’s waist and rested his head against the back of his neck. Blushing a little, he held him tight. “Thank you. For comforting me,” he said timidly.

                “It’s nothing. I love you,” Sehun replied. Too moved by his words, Luhan only nodded silently, rubbing his cheek against Sehun. He’d never been good with words, anyway. But he still tightened his arms around Sehun’s body to give him the silent message. They ate what Sehun had prepared, and it was really tasty. The steaming soup was too hot when Luhan raised the bowl to his lips, and it burnt his tongue before running down his throat like a lava flow, but he absorbed the whole of it hungrily.  He was still feeling sad, but much less than before, and it was all thanks to Sehun. Luhan gave him a little smile, to which Sehun smiled back softly.

                “It’s delicious,” Luhan said, and Sehun’s face brightened. They spent an hour cuddling by the fireplace, playing story games and making the stories so silly and happy it could only cheer the blond-haired boy up. He liked story games almost as much as Nim. But they had something more convenient and it was that they could be played anywhere and didn’t need you to be focused. One of the two players would create a character with a name, an age and a few adjectives to describe him or her, and would choose a date, as well as decide what he or she would say. The other would create another character without being told about the first one, and choose a sentence too, then a place. The two characters would meet at the precise date and in the said place, say their things to each other, and here – there was a little story.

                “Kaleen, boy, eighteen, funny, forgetful, likes music…”

                “Lily, nine, intelligent, loves magical creatures, has two cats…”

                “Meet by the riverside.”

                “In 1920.”

                “Can you see the pink clouds?”

                “Hmm. I love chocolate.”

                This made absolutely no sense, but it was sweet and Luhan enjoyed it. It wasn’t long before he was sitting down onto Sehun’s lap and holding him so tight in his arms that he had trouble speaking. The young man gave him repeated kisses all over his cheeks and his forehead. Luhan felt like he’d drunk a whole bottle of honey liquor; a fantastic euphoria had seized him suddenly, and he felt so, so much better than in the morning. “I can’t feel my leg,” Sehun chuckled, nodding at where Luhan was sitting.

                 “Oh,” Luhan smiled embarrassedly. “Do you want me to get up?”

                “We could go for a walk outside,” Sehun laughed.

                “Hmm,” Luhan said. “I guess we should go and see Kyungsoo to ask him if he’s okay.”

                “Yeah,” Sehun replied. He didn’t really look overly-enthusiastic, but less disappointed than Luhan had thought he would be when he’d realized, a split second after speaking, that the suggestion was putting an end to their time alone. It wasn’t really a good idea to go back on his words anyway, so Luhan got to his feet and Sehun did the same soon after.

                Outside, there was snow everywhere. Sehun’s feet were shaping oblong hollows in muffled sounds. Luhan’s hand was curled in a little ball in Sehun’s gloved one. It felt good. Fortunately, they didn’t walk past the place where the fairy had been found. The small circle of melted snow would have been too hard to look at. Luhan would wait until it snowed more to cross that one path again. When they reached Kyungsoo’s house, their fingers slipped apart on an unspoken agreement, until Luhan’s arm bounced against his side when he let go completely.

                As soon as they rang the doorbell, he knew something was wrong. Usually, the door would have opened straight away. But that time, nobody came. Luhan knew Kyungsoo was home, because there was light through the windows, and he could hear a voice – no, voices inside. He glanced at Sehun and bit his lower lip nervously. After several minutes, a key turned in the lock, and the door opened at last. “Oh. Luhan. Sehun,” Kyungsoo said. He looked weirdly surprised. “What’s bringing you here?” he asked. Luhan didn’t even manage to put a smile on his lips.

                “We’re…”

                “Hah, speaking of the devil,” a voice came from inside the house. Kyungsoo turned pale. Now, Luhan could hear other voices, and he recognized at least two of them. Baekhyun’s and Chanyeol’s. He tensed, dreading to see what was happening inside. “He’s there, he’s at the door,” Baekhyun said. “Shut up, Yixing!”

                “Who – who’s there…?” Luhan asked feebly, and Kyungsoo swallowed. When the baker remained silent, Luhan stepped in slowly and headed to the living-room, each step taking him closer to where the voices were coming from, and leaving Sehun and Kyungsoo at the door. Whispers, exclamations, sniggers. What felt like hours later, he walked into the living-room and he froze. Four pairs of eyes were staring at him. There was so much tension in the air that he had trouble breathing properly.

                Baekhyun. Of course, he had to be there for their secret conspiratorial meeting. Luhan was almost sure he was the instigator of it. To his immediate right, on the sofa, Chanyeol. Ha – the hunter had surely followed Baekhyun. But Luhan wasn’t that surprised to see him. If he could rip off people with the game, why not this? Yixing… Luhan didn’t think he was that kind of man. Though it confirmed he didn’t know him that well, apparently. Luhan looked at the fourth person and his heart dropped. “Tao…” he said in a whisper, almost begging the black-eyed man to tell him he wasn’t actually there. But Tao looked down silently.

                Luhan turned around and he started to flee, but just as he walked through the door of the living-room, Baekhyun called out to him. “Luhan!” Luhan looked at him, hand on the door frame. Baekhyun was smiling a smile that made him shiver. “We all know who killed her.”

                Luhan let out a horrified cry and ran away. He bumped into Kyungsoo and grabbed Sehun’s arm harshly. “Let’s go,” he said through clenched teeth to hold back his tears. He didn’t even glance at Kyungsoo and stumbled away from his house as fast as he could. It was only when Sehun let out a weak moan of painful protestation that Luhan realised how hard he’d been gripping his arm. He released him shamefully, muttering apologies. Luhan was almost running and when they got back home, his lungs were on fire. He locked, double-locked the door.

                And he dissolved into tears as soon as he was inside.

                Sehun wrapped him in his arms gently and hugged him tight until the sobs stopped shaking his body uncontrollably. “Shh, shh…Luhan…” the young man whispered. “It’s okay, come on. Breathe. It’s okay, shh…” he said. Luhan tried really hard to do so, but he only managed to after long minutes.

                “I – I hate them!” he cried, almost choking on his tears. It hurt so much to have seen people he thought were his friends talk behind his back… Tao who couldn’t even look at him in the eye, Chanyeol who’s thrown him such frightening glances, Yixing who’s stayed silent and faked coolness, Kyungsoo who’s stood by the door like a statue… Luhan wanted to do something bad to all of them. And Baekhyun. We all know who killed her. Suddenly, Luhan felt strong hatred towards the short man. Of course! Blame it on the stranger! Luhan clenched the back of Sehun’s shirt with all his strength. “I hate them to much!”

                “Don’t,” Sehun said softly. “They’re not thinking straight.”

                A bitter laugh left Luhan’s lips. He shook his head silently and closed his eyes. Sehun slipped an arm behind the blond-haired boy’s shoulders and the other behind his knees, lifted him up and walked to an armchair by the fireplace, where he sat down with Luhan lying across him. He smiled a little. Luhan fidgeted and shifted and curled up like a nervous kitten for a few minutes before he found the position in which he was the most comfortable: his head against Sehun’s chest and hugging his knees in a sort of fetal position, warmly circled by Sehun’s arm. “I’m glad I have you,” he said very low. So low he wasn’t sure Sehun could hear him. But maybe this was an unconscious purpose his mind had found.

                However, the young man smiled and kissed the top of his head gently. “I’m glad I have you, too,” he said softly. Luhan snuggled closer against him.

~

                It was hard to face Tao and Baekhyun at work the next morning. Almost no words were exchanged. The only one who actually talked was Minseok. Junmyeon, even though he hadn’t been part of the conflict, only had to be as discreet as usual, and it resulted in an awkward and heavy silence lasting all day. Luhan was really relieved to be able to leave at the end of the afternoon. With Sehun, they bought food before going back home.

                The evening was quiet. When Sehun had decided to stay, a few weeks ago, Luhan had built an actual bed for him, which was much more comfortable than the cold hard ground. Of course, Luhan had nightmares quite often, and crawling onto a real mattress was also a lot easier than groping for the folded blanket to cuddle up to Sehun. So that night, when an image of the young man ripping off fairies’ wings woke him up abruptly, he dragged his sweaty and trembling body to Sehun’s bed and slipped under the covers discreetly. The slight vibrations it produced were enough to wake Sehun up.

                “Did you have a nightmare again?” he murmured. Luhan nodded, the tip of his nose brushing Sehun’s skin. “Here,” Sehun said, hugging him tight. “Do you want to talk about it?”

                “I dreamt you were killing fairies. This is ridiculous, isn’t it?” Luhan laughed weakly, his voice cracking at the end of his phrase. Sehun held him closer.

                “Go back to sleep,” he whispered into Luhan’s hear. “I’m watching over you.”

~

                Luhan thought he was having a nightmare again when a second fairy was found killed the following day. And another one the next week. And another one. And another one. In short, the fairies were being killed by some invisible monster. In the middle of January, all the villagers were in an awful mood. Luhan was feeling terrible too. The only thing that maintained a little happiness in his heart was Sehun. Sehun’s smiles at work, Sehun’s hand outside, Sehun’s kisses at home, Sehun’s arms at night… Without him, he would surely have gone crazy.

                On the other hand, his friends were still giving him the cold shoulder. Luhan wasn’t even sure whether they suspected only Sehun of having killed the fairies or both of them. So he waited, hoping that the kills would stop once spring came. Sehun was sometimes going out to pray. He said it was something that could help protecting the fairies. Luhan appreciated his good intentions, but so far, it wasn’t working really well. He still let him do it, though.

                Luhan didn’t have a particularly strong body or immune system, and he was used to catching colds easily every winter. Hence, it wasn’t a surprise when he woke up one morning with a sore throat, a runny nose and a headache. Sehun saw right away he was sick and he forbid him to get out of bed. Luhan protested for a while, but when the young man tucked him in, he gave up and resigned himself to not going to work that day. Not before giving Sehun precise instructions about what he would do: go to the farm of course, then buy bread and flour, because he wanted to bake a cake –

                “You’re sick, Luhan. You can’t bake a cake,” Sehun said softly, sitting down on the bed. Luhan rolled his eyes. Before he left, Sehun brewed a cup of hot tea with a spoonful of honey for him.

                “Thanks. Come back soon,” Luhan said.

                “I will,” Sehun smiled.

                Luhan had a very boring day. He slept for several hours, but whenever he was awake, he had nothing to do. He fetched his diary to write a little, but what? There wasn’t anything new. So he spent all his time daydreaming about random things involving living fairies, flowers and always Sehun. When said Sehun came back, Luhan was about to hang himself to be less bored.

                “Had fun?” Sehun asked.

                “So much,” Luhan croaked.

                Sehun laughed. “I bought brioche for you,” he said.

                Luhan found himself smiling at the sweet intention. “I’d kiss you right now if I weren’t sick,” he said.

                Sehun chuckled again. “Are you hungry? I can prepare dinner now if you want me to,” he replied. Luhan nodded. After giving his hand a tender squeeze, Sehun got up and went downstairs; soon, the delicious smell of a hot meal reached Luhan’s nostrils.

                He also stayed at home the two following days while Sehun went to work. Even if his time alone was dull, it was really pleasant to be pampered in the evening. Sehun read a story to him. Sehun cooked broth for him. Sehun massaged his back. Luhan felt like a fat lazy pet. The next day, he wasn’t actually sick anymore, but Sehun told him not to go out yet. Luhan wanted to refuse, but a sort of selfish idleness crept up in him and he decided to grant himself one more day of rest.

                Though he wasn’t inactive and in the beginning of the afternoon, he kept himself busy in the kitchen and baked a yoghurt cake they would eat for dessert that night. It gave him a delicious feeling of being taking care of something, of the house, of Sehun. Sehun would be happy to get back home and find a warm cake just out of the oven. Luhan baked it, and proudly wrapped it in a tea towel for it to be protected.

                He was about to find something else to do, when his heart jumped in his chest. Someone was beating on his door. Startled, Luhan walked towards the hall and turned the knob. He found himself facing a panting Baekhyun. Luhan stared at him silently. “You better come right now!” the short man shouted. “Come on!” he pressed. Luhan stammered something that made no sense and he just had the time to grab a beanie before Baekhyun dragged him out of his house. “Shut up!” the little devil snapped when Luhan asked what was going on. His heart filled with a sense of foreboding, Luhan walked in the snow with him towards something unknown.

                They reached their destination about ten minutes later. It was near the path leading to the village. There, a crowd, even bigger than the other times, had gathered and was yelling and pointing. “Why am I here?...” Luhan said weakly. He was incredibly cold and the icy air was biting his bare hands like teeth of a winter monster. Baekhyun gripped his shoulder hard and pushed him towards the crowd.

                “Go away!” he screamed to some villagers. “Go away!”

                Once he’d made a way, he pushed Luhan forwards so violently the blond-haired boy nearly fell to the ground. When he recovered his balance, Luhan looked in front of him. Another fairy had undoubtedly been killed. But what was different was that apparently, the culprit had been caught red-handed, or rather silver-handed. Luhan looked up at the young man who was crouched there, with silver liquid all over his fingers, making the snow melt every time it dripped down onto the ground. He was tall, he was dark-haired, he had sharp features.

                Luhan blinked. He couldn’t hear the screams anymore, nor could he feel the cold eating him. He only stared. One, two, three silver drops crashed on the snow. Luhan’s heart had stopped. He had recognized the young man with blood on his white hands right away, of course. He would always recognize him.

                It was Sehun.