Golden Sands [FIC] 3/3
Aug. 5th, 2022 05:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
notturnitowarnings:
- some skz, txt, and (g)i-dle members cameo (linooo, hyunjin, felix, beomgyu, and shuhua! with passing mentions of soobin, soojin, and soyeon ooh just realized they make triple s hehe)
- hj, sh, ys, and now felix!! using they/them pronouns (but they don't mind being called with gendered honorifics)
- implied chronic illness with mg's scenes and it's serious enough to cause his death (dont read from And when Mingi nearly died, everything that happened was like a swift blitz. to He's really, really alright.) also err... inaccurate portrayal of illness too im sorryy
- slight body horror (with sh and jh. sh with third eye, jh with spine)
some terms:
- (baksu-)mudang: shamans
- (byeolshin-)gut: ritual performed by shamans to the gods
- in-uh: merfolk. in some folktales their tears can turn into pearls
it's the final chapter already!! i hope you guys will enjoy this!!
*
Yunho considers himself a rather level-headed (er, not really a mer now, is he, and he's not exactly human as well, still)... quartermaster of the Destiny. He gets along well with the crew members, does his job dutifully, spares a friendly banter with his boatswain- and occasionally, only occasionally, that he thinks about the two people whose lives he has saved... and who are precious to him.
The crash of waves. Seagulls’ cry.
“I made you this.” A pale wrist was gently guided forward, dainty and thin, before the same hands that guided it moved in, to fasten something. They fell back after a moment. “There. See, now we match.”
A modest bracelet woven from strong, turquoise threads now sat adorning Yunho’s wrist. Its twin was fastened around Mingi’s own wrist, and though he kept his palms gathered on his lap, the bracelet casted stark and striking against the color of skin.
While Mingi leaned back to watch with cautious eyes, Yunho could not help the exclaim of admiration he let out, when he held his hand up against the sun, admiring the way it fitted.
“Whoa, so pretty!”
“Of course,” he could hear Mingi sniff. “It’s your hair color, of course it’ll be pretty!”
Yunho giggled, before he looked back at Mingi, a grin on his face.
Then, the grin washed away as guilt started to seep in, puddling the bottom of Yunho's heart, as though seawater on the stone floor of grottoes at tiderise, in full moon.
"I'm sorry for asking you the other day," he mumbled, shamefully averting his gaze down. He saw the bracelet Mingi had woven for him, and more shame flooded in. Mingi was so good to him, even after Yunho was being so inconsiderate! "About why you don't hang out with other human kids. I didn't know it would make you sad."
It took a while before Mingi finally replied, and it was as though Yunho could see him, with his bowed head, bowed back, his hands and his nimble hands fiddling. All of his honest hesitance. The thought was as sure as carving upon a stone.
"No, it's okay,” he said. “I shouldn't have yelled at you, too. You know how I'm weak. I get sick pretty easy. So I just… don't like seeing other boys. I can't do what they can do.” When Yunho allowed himself to lift his head, Mingi had his eyes already on him, his smile blooming when he saw that Yunho was looking. Unsure, timid. He continued, “It's more fun when I hang out with you."
"Oh," Yunho said.
He felt heat in his cheeks that he's not sure was all from the sun. Something warm curled up within Yunho; this was perhaps the sort of happiness those seals had when they're sunbathing. "I like hanging out with you too!"
Mingi looked at him, and his hesitance thawed, giving way to a surer, brighter smile that lit up the entirety of his small face.
It was cut short. From afar, Yunho could hear a woman's voice call out. "Mingi-yah! Mingi-yah, where are you?"
It must be Mingi’s mother, as Mingi pouted, hearing her call for him to come back home.
Yunho grinned, patting him on the shoulder with his not-wet hands. "It’s okay, I'll come back tomorrow, Mingi-yah!” He spread out his fingers again, wiggling them. “Thank you for the bracelet!"
"Wait!" Mingi scrambled to his knees, as close as he could without touching the waves that lapped around Yunho’s waist. He spread open his arms. "Gimme a hug?"
Yunho giggled.
He pretended to be aloof, turning his head away with a slight 'humph', though he couldn’t resist peeking open an eye to see Mingi's reaction. Mingi only wiggled himself and his arms when he noticed Yunho, his goofy grin becoming even wider, and it made Yunho laugh.
He grinned as his laughter slowly receded, before he took his position and launched, gently tackling Mingi to the sands.
Mingi yelp-laughed under him, but then returned Yunho's hug with a firm squeeze of his own. Despite the beads of sand sticking to his dry skin, to his itchy, scaled waist, Yunho giggled and only wiggled against Mingi, who laughed even harder at that.
They stayed that way for a while, their silly giggling mellowing down to a comfortable quiet, Mingi softly breathing on the shell of Yunho's ear, before Yunho then released him.
Yunho grinned
"See you tomorrow, Mingi-yah!"
Mingi was still sitting there, still looking on even when Yunho turned around to the waves and ducked underwater, swimming his way to where the Destiny awaited.
And even by the time Hongjoong peeked out from the top of the gunwale, trying to spot him amongst the waves by the broadside, Yunho could still remember. The sands pressed on his arms, the crash of waves, seagulls’ cry. And Mingi, his laughter bright and golden, his happiness bringing forth Yunho’s own happiness, as though Mingi’s heart might as well beat within Yunho’s own chest.
The sunlight is hot, stinging. He is being baked alive.
Yunho cracks open an eye and groans when light directly floods his vision in a white, pure stream. After he turns to his side, kicking off the blanket that now smothers him at daylight, he raises up a hand to shield himself from the sun. Then, he opens his eyes.
A pair of impish eyes look back at him, atop the wooden box that made the nest. Beomgyu.
He hollers out, “Quartermaster Jeong is finally awake!” before scurrying down the ladder with a resounding evil cackle. And with a groan, Yunho sits up awake, rubbing the sleep off his eyes before he looks on properly at the sky.
The horizon stretches as far as eyes can see, its pure, downy blue color setting it apart from the crystalline ocean in a seemingly straight line. It’s cloudless today. The sun is already high up, its heat borne by the wooden structure around Yunho. If he breathes in, he can almost taste the salt in air, and if he closes his eyes, he can almost see the way the waves crash giddily against the forecastle, swimming with playful exuberance along the broadsides.
He can't help the smile surfacing on his lips.
It’s good weather today. Hongjoong must be in a good mood.
“You’re pink,” Minho says, when Yunho finally slides down the crow’s nest, to join the rest of the crew on the main deck.
As he raises an eyebrow, Yunho grabs the plate of morning’s breakfast that Minho has saved for him - boiled pork, with salt to flavor. He grins sheepishly, raising the back of his palm to press against his warm cheeks, “Thanks, hyungnim. Ah, I didn’t cover my face when I was sleeping up there.”
Minho only raises his eyebrows higher. "Wait until your face is raw. See then if you keep to that."
Yet he does not delay recounting today's sailing preparation to Yunho. Still some tarpaulins left for inadvertent storms, the tiller assembly greased and working, guns double-breeched – courtesy of Shuhua, and the anchors well-secured. Hyunjin has made sure as well in the morning that they are still sailing at the westward course that Yongbok has set. Though the Destiny is not a ship that requires mortal standards to man its many equipment, with its masts already rigged even without supervision, with its capstan whirring without any crew members to operate it, it is still the duty charged to Yunho and Minho, as respectively the second- and third-in-command, to ensure the Destiny is still well in order.
As Beomgyu dashes around with wet mop in the background of their conversation, Yunho scarfes up his breakfast with ease, before giving back his plate to Minho.
He makes a face, watching how Yunho wipes his greased fingers to the fabric of his pants. Minho cynically comments, his pretty eyes judgmental. "You don't have to worry about food. All the cattle and turtles we have down the deck are yours and yours only. Well, I guess you have to worry about Shuhua and Beomgyu finishing off your share now."
Yunho wipes his lips with a grin.
"Aish. Just because I'm somewhat human-shaped, I'm not actually one," he teases.
Minho rolls his eyes. "Mortals remain mortals, in one shape or another."
"Have you figured out if you're actually one or not, hyungnim?"
Yunho holds up a pair of hands when Minho directs him an icy glare. "Just because we lost our memories," he drawls, voice soft and dangerous yet dripping in annoyance, "it doesn't mean we forgot what we are, at the core."
"Sorry, sorry," Yunho sheepishly says.
Before Minho can readily retort with barbed, venomous words, heavy footsteps from the quarterdeck draw all of the crew's attention. Thud. Thud. Thud. The boots heavily and assuredly thump on the wood, before the silhouette of a figure is revealed above the quarterdeck, an elegant, ringed hand resting on the railings.
Hongjoong, black hair mussed up with the seawind, their other hand on the head of their cane, sunlight glinting off its skull shape.
The rest of the crew, besides Yunho and Minho, make their way to the main deck at once, filing into a neat assembly. Yongbok and Hyunjin finally stand behind Minho, while Shuhua stands beside them, arms crossed, a scowl prominent on her face. Beomgyu, despite being the youngest, sticks out due to his surprisingly tall stature, as he takes his place behind Shuhua.
Hongjoong's one eye curves in a half-moon shape, as they smile, looking down at the crew.
"All hands on deck already, eh?" Thump, thump, thump. So Hongjoong's boots thud on the deck, then down the creaking stairs as they make their way down to the main deck. The clacks of Hongjoong's cane also grow more audible, until they stop once Hongjoong stills too, making their stand in front of the crew in equal ground. Their eyes sweep everyone with a keen, but good-natured gaze, before stopping at Yunho. "And I trust that everything is in good order, as well?"
Yunho gives a sure nod, which satisfies Hongjoong as they return to address the whole assembly.
"Crew. We remain westward in our course to Fusang. In two, three days, heavens give us no errant demon fugitives or so, a ship shall meet us near the islands." Hongjoong's gaze levels them strictly, commanding. "Avast, you all. Yunho will remind you every day until we reach destination 'n finally weigh anchor, but when we meet you lot will not stay above deck, none of you, 'cept for Yunho and Shuhua. Unless, you have a personal wish to meet face-to-face with the foxes, and have a taste of their charm making you walk down the plank. Then by all means, stay. Is that understood, crew?"
No one makes any protesting noise; everyone understands the well-meaning behind Hongjoong's strict words. No one says anything further except for Shuhua, whose fierce scowl deepens and whose arms press further into herself.
"You're not handing me over Soyeon, right, Captain?" she asks, the hidden hesitance beneath the steel of her voice seeping out. Yunho remembers the reason she joins Hongjoong's crew - to escape her pack, she said. To find her missing unnie. Soojin.
"I promised you, I won't," Hongjoong reassures her with a firm nod, before their voice turns more consoling. "The matter in Fusang is related to your unnie, however."
It is enough for Shuhua, who gives a reluctant nod.
Hongjoong sweeps their gaze past the crew once more, finding no other remarks from them, before finally they give a nod as well.
"Well, what are you waiting for?" They grin, roguish and breeze-like free. "Back to work, the lot of you!"
And that sets the motion as everyone scrambles to their respective posts. Yunho yells out orders - secure the masts, check again the boats, and he is in the middle of telling Yongbok to rig relieving tackles to the tiller, when Hongjoong calls to him.
"Quartermaster Jeong."
Yunho deftly catches the object thrown to him by Hongjoong, recognizing it mid-air even with the blinding glint of the sun. A corked bottle, filled—instead of liquid—with Mingi's letter. And, of course, as Yunho observes a familiarly-shaped object clanking softly in the bottom of it, there is also Mingi's handmade bracelet for Yunho.
"Thank you, Cap'n," Yunho yells back, grinning when he sees Hongjoong walking already to the helm, the back of their swishing coat the only thing visible as they wave Yunho away. Yongbok laughs their deep, warm laughter at Yunho's giddiness, clapping Yunho's shoulder heartily as they excuse themselves to check the tiller's tackles and do as told.
And so, Yunho spares a bit of time to uncork the bottle, take out the letter, unfold the paper to skim it through— and laugh once he gets to read Dear Yunho my soulmate - You cannibalistic fish bastard, if you tell me once more that your Minho-hyung's cooking is better than Wooyoungie's, I will fight you. You, me, on that beach - save the date: three years from now. My cordial fucking invitation.
Yunho's heart swells as he reads once more the line Dear Yunho my soulmate. Mingi, ah Mingi. How Yunho adores him so.
Carefully, he tips the bottle down, until the bracelet lands perfectly at the mouth and he manages to pull it out. It's a black-and-white beaded one this time. Yunho makes quick work of untying one of the bracelets he's wearing—an older one with wooden beads from Mingi—to tying it on one of his belt loops instead, its beads clinking against other bracelets.
This new, black-and-white beaded one contrasts nicely with the first ever bracelet Mingi's made for Yunho. The turquoise color is worn now, its threads rather fraying. Yet Yunho wears it, still. He likes the way his chest goes soft and warm whenever he spares time to look on his wrist, loves the way the bracelets look under the sun, loves how they are Mingi's gifts for him.
Oh, he should start nagging Mingi to get Jongho write to him as well.
"Loverboy," Minho calls out. When Yunho looks, he is smiling, his catlike eyes fondly looking on. "Come, we still have work to do."
Yunho laughs, tucking the letter in his shirt pocket, right over his heart.
"Be right there, Bos’n Lee!"
That day was cloudless, the sky a pure sort of blue.
The aunt of Mingi's friend – San, Yunho believed – was still the town’s mudang at that time, and she thought this a good omen of the then byeolshin-gut, that both the Deities of Sky and Sea approved of the ritual, its elements fine and complete. And indeed, Hongjoong-nim was terribly pleased as well as Seonghwa-nim, and Yunho would tell Mingi this too, though much later on.
It had been a good several years already after Hongjoong found him as a mere fry. Yunho had been orphaned at birth and been trying to survive from one sea to another, without any shoals that could give him protection. The Destiny loomed beautiful and magnificent over him when he was spotted, though Hongjoong deigned to go down to the seas in a lowered rowboat, approaching Yunho themselves.
Ever since, Yunho had been following Hongjoong, swimming a safe distance away from the broadside of the Destiny, sometimes even taken up above deck in a seawater-filled wooden tub whenever speed was crucial for the ship, or whenever danger was looming on the horizon. He'd also wait by any safe shallows whenever they would dock, on the occasions Hongjoong and Seonghwa descended to partake in mortal rituals and demand their oblations.
That time the Destiny anchored in Geumseong, he was waiting for Hongjoong to come back from the gut .
The sea was warm that day.
The sun pleasantly shone on blue-green waves, the crest of tides reflecting back light, the surface of the sea looking as though a stretched out, glittering sheet of a giant fish's scales - or perhaps, dragon scales. And Yunho saw the reefs, standing proud among the playful waves, the perfect place to warm the upper part of his body that wasn't mer. He swam gliding through the tides, and when he got there, palm pressed down to measure how heated the rocks had become, the cliffside shore was still empty.
Yunho pushed himself up, just up to his waist, before laying back on his elbows and letting the sun bathe him in warm light.
Splash of waves, crest of the tides. A moment passed.
When Yunho looked again, there was a boy there, standing on the beach.
("You're a human! Hello, hello, human, you can call me Yunho!"
"I'm… my name is Mingi.")
Hwanin, the Lord of Heaven up high, descended on earth with eight hundred men and women. Upon looking at the prosperity on the lower plane made by his lord-father, Hwanung was overcome with such yearning to live among the valleys and mountains, to live with the people. And so the heavenly prince descended down, bringing forth his own retinue, and what was his kingdom would be called the city of gods.
To Yunho, who lived with Hongjoong and Seonghwa, these were but facts. The sun rose and set because Haemosu dragged it with his dragon-drawn chariot across the sky. Jeju Island came to be for Halmang, as earth giant goddesses were, willed it be - with all its hills and mountains and rivers and valleys. Rains ceased and rivers flooded because humans angered dragons and imugi. And, as Hongjoong would gently whisper in his ears, just before Yunho would drift off to sleep in his seawater tub, all the divinities would watch over all the creatures from their realm of Sabaek-nyeok.
Yunho and Mingi's first fight was over their disagreement on the myth of the moon.
“Dalnim was a girl who climbed up and got stuck in the sky, though?”
They had met for a good several times already, by then. Despite Mingi having told Yunho that they were the same age, Yunho frowned at his surprising lack of knowledge. Humans were supposed to be rather smart, weren’t they? Having been ones to conquer lands, to discover sailing - despite their lack of gills and tails, and very, very recently, to even soar in air. Yet Mingi seemed normal to him, if not a little bit weak. He did not swim, did not run, did not walk much. He did not even know this common bit of Dalnim's myth.
“Hongjoong-nim didn’t say it like that,” Yunho said. “I told you, Dalnim was the pearl given by the primordial Dragon King to the night sky, as symbol of their love, before it gained sentience.”
Mingi pursed his lips in displeasure, the way Yunho would learn how he’d show his disagreement. “I’m right, though! Dalnim was a girl! A human, you seaweed brain!” Yet before Yunho could protest further, Mingi frowned. “... But what does gaining sentience mean?”
Gaining sentience? Yunho closed his mouth, then looked back at Mingi.
“... I don’t know.”
A beat of silence. Then they burst into laughter together.
Seonghwa once told Yunho, were Hongjoong and them mortals living on earth, they would not have needed fate’s red strings tying their pinkies together, to find each other. The sea and the sky would remain side by side, and even if they had taken mortal forms, they would draw to each other in a single horizon, until the end of all times, until all would turn into dust and then nothingness.
But if there was a divinity in Sabaek-nyeok that would tie those red threads of fate, Yunho thought, wished, that they would tie the one on his pinky to Mingi’s. So that whenever he had to leave, fate could lead Yunho back to Geumseong waters, again and again and again.
No matter what should happen to them, he would return to Mingi.
The course remains set to Fusang. Yunho and Minho have checked the equipment again prior to rigging lifelines from fore to aft, helped out by the rest. In the case that the foxes manage to charm any of them… the ropes will come in handy. Yunho ensures as well that Beomgyu has checked and cleaned the scuppers, so water will not collect in the bilge.
Before they know it, it is time for their second meal of the day.
Yunho rolls his eyes when Beomgyu and Shuhua crowd him for meat, before proceeding to lock their heads with each of his arms as they screech and cackle, both slapping Yunho's arm to release them in mercy. Beomgyu is nearly driven to tears from laughing too much by the time Yunho lets them go, and Minho shakes his head at their antics. It's with that thought that Yunho carries himself down the deck to where they store supplies.
Minho, Hyunjin, and Yongbok are rather similar to Hongjoong, in the way they all do not seem to eat, to drink, or even to sleep. In the way they do not seem to need it. Unlike Shuhua and Beomgyu, who joined the Destiny's crew as a mean to achieve their own ends (Shuhua to look for her missing unnie, Beomgyu as he waits for a human called Soobin to remember him), they showed up on the Destiny one by one, unconscious, carried by Chan - whom Hongjoong said to be the Divinity of Day, one of the many heavenly princes after Hwanung. And when Chan left, they awoke, heads filled with all possible knowledge except for their own memories.
Though Minho cooks for the rest who eat, Yunho wonders at times if he would like to partake with them - he, Shuhua, Beomgyu. Perhaps it is moot point, but Yunho decides to ask once he is abovedeck again.
He fills a large basket with cured pork meat, before picking four good oranges for everyone. Four– ah.
Yunho smiles at himself; he keeps forgetting. Jongho is no longer on board with them at the Destiny. He's with Mingi now in Geumseong.
Throwing an orange to the air before snatching it again, Yunho is about to put it back in place, just as a gust of wind scrapes his nape and the wooden floor behind him creaks from the weight of foot.
Yunho turns around. Blinks.
Chan smiles at him; Yunho thinks it might've looked sheepish, even.
"Yunho–yah," he warmly says. "Apologies for the intrusion, but I was wondering if you could let Hongjoong know that I'm here…?"
Yunho dazedly finishes his lunch.
Before going above deck, he’d left Chan in the berth, the only place respectable enough for a Divinity, though he should bear with several swaying hammocks there. However, just as Yunho was about to fetch Hongjoong from the helm, they appeared before the entrance to go below deck, as though having sensed the need for their presence. They had frowned at the direction of the berth, before telling Yunho that Chan and them would be at Hongjoong’s cabin.
Yunho did not see Chan going above deck from the entrance he’d used, but seeing that he’s able to manifest behind Yunho just fine earlier, he was already talking with Hongjoong at the moment in the captain’s cabin, over matters serious enough that it made him visit Hongjoong.
Yunho frowns. Though Hongjoong has been tight-lipped about the entire ordeal, he knows that something must’ve been going on in Sabaek-nyeok, something serious enough to warrant these stray gods – as Seonghwa once referred to Minho, Hyunjin, Yongbok – to remain with the Destiny. But what can possibly happen, to make deities hide and even not even remember anything about their duties…?
A hand appears in front of Yunho, and he blinks, thoughts of divine realm ebbing away as he gradually returns to the present. To the buoying ship; to Yongbok’s light-hearted laugher.
“Land to Quartermaster Jeong,” they joke, their deep voice good-naturedly teasing. Yongbok directs their gaze meaningfully down to Yunho’s lap, where he has two oranges in hand. “I would say not to let your mind take flight along with the wind, but I see it would be futile.”
Yunho laughs sheepishly. “I don’t know what’s gotten into me today, really.”
Hyunjin cranes his neck from where he is walking to the kitchen, stacked plates in hand, hair falling past his shoulders. “Had a dream, dear Quartermaster?”
“Not really,” Yunho shouts back. All he remembers from before he woke up are… the sound of crashing waves, seagulls, and… golden. Something golden, beating inside his chest, light filling him. “At least, I don’t think so.”
Hyunjin shrugs as he continues to walk away. “Feels like it!”
Meanwhile, Yongbok hums in curiosity, their eyes curiously searching for something in Yunho’s face. And that something they’ve found makes Yongbok’s smile turn kinder, more understanding. “Missing Jongho-ssi?”
Yunho blinks. He… does he miss him? Turning his gaze down to the oranges, Yunho drops one to his lap before he starts peeling the other one he is holding. As he does so, his ragged sleeve falls down, revealing marks of fanged teeth on his arms.
Yunho pulls it up again.
“Not really, I suppose,” he says, wondering aloud, before popping a slice of orange into his mouth. As he chews thoughtfully, he holds out more slices at Yongbok, to which they decline with a gentle shake of head. Yunho pops two more slices in. “I guess, just wondering if he’s coping well. Mingi-yah says so, though, in his letters. San and Wooyoung– the new baksu-mudang pair of Geumseong, you know, they adore him. And so does the entirety of the Choi clan, it seems.”
Yongbok leans down, chin pressed against their gentle palm. They say, “But still, you wonder.”
“Still, I wonder,” Yunho agrees.
It is not an everyday occurrence that the divine weapon their crew fetched from the nether oceans will turn out to be… alive, having slumbered for many, many years. When they took Jongho on board, the sword-spine in Yunho’s hold transformed- until a giant, scaled body taller than human height revealed itself, draping over the entirety of Destiny’s deck in sharp sea brine scent. An imugi through and through.
Jongho did not settle in well, at first, though he did not show it. At least, not until the rains, when he would freeze as though he had been cornered. And then his hand would reach for the sword-spine on his belt.
It was Yunho who would bring him down the deck, to the berth, where the rain would be muffled and there would be enough light from the oil lamps that they both would not be enclosed in darkness. And once Jongho stopped thrashing against his hold, his jaws slowly loosening around the meat of Yunho’s arm, they would simply sit together under the low light, still and bone-tired the way one would be in the aftermath of a storm. Their customary exchange; Jongho’s hoarse, You should go, and Yunho’s following reply, They can handle themselves, I’ll stay with you, Jongho-yah.
Once Jongho became more accustomed to the sea lifestyle, Yunho began to show him the ropes. Showed him how to tie up a knot for certain masts, to haul taut the tackles to double-breech guns, to secure anchors during off soundings. Told him not to be surprised by the lone, revolving capstan or the occasional self-steering helm. “It’s a god’s ship, after all,” Jongho said to him, eyes rolled.
At some point, Yunho learned that he would find Jongho by the fore, leaning against the gunwale as his red jades tinkled from the caressing wind. When Yunho approached, he would look up, his eyes with slitted pupils bright, shining under the light of the nether sun.
Once, he’d seen Hongjoong give Yunho the sealed letters from Mingi.
“What’s that?”
Yunho smiled. “It’s a letter from Mingi.”
“Who?”
Dear Yunho my soulmate. The smile on Yunho’s lips did not grow any bigger when looked at Jongho, but Jongho’s eyes went to his mouth, anyway, and lingered.
“He’s…” Yunho laughed, “Mingi-yah… he’s a very important person to me.”
Jongho’s eyes flicked up, meeting Yunho’s gaze. There was an emotion in there that Yunho could not seem to fathom.
“I see,” he’d merely said, and left it at that.
Despite the nonchalance he had exuded, Jongho would find ways to ask around about Mingi. Whether he’s a mortal or not. Whether he’d also like oranges. How both of them met. Whether he’s the reason Yunho traded his tail for feet and had to serve under the Destiny for… evermore.
When they last anchored in Geumseong, two years ago, Yunho asked Jongho if he could stay and take care of Mingi.
“Naturally,” Jongho said, looking at Yunho with raised eyebrows. “He is half of your life. Of course I would protect him.”
And that was that.
Even now, if asked - why he would do such a thing for Mingi, giving away half of his life, and then spending the remaining half of it in constant separation, Yunho still doesn't know the exact answer to that.
It's not because Mingi is Yunho's only mortal friend, someone he's finally found in a long while. It's also not because Mingi is particularly good to him, though Yunho also likes that - that Mingi is very good and that his heart is terribly kind. Yet Yunho suspects that even if Mingi had turned out a person of lesser character, if he had turned Yunho away or had befriended Yunho only for his own benefits, the outcome would have remained the same.
What he knows, though, is that it all comes down to a very simple reason: because it is Song Mingi.
Hongjoong and Seonghwa will know what this means. As immovable deities, they understand that it is due to a core that makes up an in-uh. Merfolk, Seonghwa will smile as they fondly shake their head. They are creatures with such transient lifetimes, such as those of humans, and yet they feel and live their lives in accordance to their emotions, which are as laden as the likes of divinities.
Laden, as in what compelled Hongjoong to give Seonghwa their right eye. Laden, as in what drove Yeosang to relinquish their divinity, and wait hundreds of years in a small coastal town for Wooyoung to appear again.
A merfolk's loyalty is the cord that ties Yunho to Mingi, even if he passes on long before Yunho's own time will come. He does not let go of things; it's just not in his nature to.
Yunho thinks that Mingi has explained it best too, though he doesn't know how it ties back to Yunho’s self. He once told him that… a chick that just hatched, would follow the first thing that it saw, no matter if it’s the actual mother hen or not.
Yunho is that chick. Mingi… is the first thing he saw.
And when Mingi nearly died, everything that happened was like a swift blitz.
The sea might have been storming, or it might have been placid. The waves relentless, or reef-like silent. Yunho could not remember. All he could remember was that he found Mingi, lying unmoving on the beach instead of sitting, his body a foreign ridge composition.
His breath was shallow, rapid; his chest rose up and down as though a fish out of water, gasping strenuously.
On that golden sands, Yunho prayed to all the divinities he’d ever known and learned. Only Hongjoong answered.
“I cannot help, Yunho-yah,” they had shaken their head, gaze affixed forlornly at the small, curled up vulnerable figure of Mingi. “The sea can only take, not give on demand; the sky watches on with indifferent eyes, despite its willingness to interfere.” Yunho didn’t answer them. He remained as still and as voiceless as the Geumseong full moon, when it rose above heads. “You understand, don’t you? Human lives are beyond my meddling, and the best I could offer to you, is to ferry him across the nether oceans, so he could move on to his next life. Everything has a predestined fate that is meant to be followed. If you alter his…”
Yunho looked up to Hongjoong, and Hongjoong’s voice fell silent, their words taken in by the crashing waves along with Yunho’s own laden invocation, voiceless might it be.
In the end, they sighed. Wait, they had told Yunho, before they were gone in a blink of an eye. And Yunho did wait, hand clutching Mingi’s limp palm, eyes remaining watchful on Mingi’s figure, watchful at the blue tint his lips had taken, the pain in his face. Waited as the golden sands of time trickled slowly, slowly through the hourglass, as though condoling, bargaining with the gradual ebbing of Mingi’s life.
When Yeosang appeared, a blond-haired figure in tow with Hongjoong, Mingi’s breath was already very faint.
“He doesn’t have much time left,” they’d stated with clipped voice, before gazing at Yunho with limpid and profound eyes.
“Can you help?”
That gaze turned towards Mingi, now filled with assessment. When they turned to Yunho again, there was a pause, as they seemingly took in the way Yunho held Mingi’s hand, the turquoise bracelets on their wrists, before Yeosang finally spoke up again. “I can save him,” they gently said. “But not without a price.”
“Anything,” Yunho replied without skipping a beat, without even a bat of his eyes. “You can take what you need from me as long as Mingi is safe. I’ll pay you with all of my life.”
Yeosang did not answer at once. They looked at Yunho, into Yunho—as though by doing so they could gauge enough the extent of Yunho’s sincerity, his soul.
Then they turned their gaze to Mingi.
“A life, it is,” they softly agreed, before kneeling down on the sands, next to Mingi’s body. They raised their palm, resting it on the dip in between Mingi’s shoulder blades. “For him, I’ll only need half of it.”
They pressed down.
Perhaps it was noon, then; the sky was ashen and filled with flat clouds. But as Yeosang did their thaumaturgy, and, as Yunho would later learn, gave half of his life to Mingi, the fabric of the universe seemed to shift. It seemed as though it was nightfall already, everything blotted dark with the last afterglow of sunset falling apart, leaving them only with what seemed to be Geumseong's eerie full moon, glowing so bright Yunho thought it was the sun.
Or perhaps it was.
When Yeosang's hand fell away from Mingi's back, all evidence of the night seemed to have been blitzed away, into a particular chasm in the universe, as though what he’d thought the blooming moon was in fact merely the glaring sun, hovering over the steady tides with its yellow flare.
Yunho was still at the boundary of the shore as he watched Mingi, eyes shut as though sleeping, softly take a full breath.
"He will be fine now," Yeosang said.
With tangled emotions in his chest that were yet to ebb away, Yunho gave a tight squeeze to Mingi's palm. It was warm. He watched the black of Mingi's hair fade into grayish strands, the drained color the only evidence that his life had once also nearly drained out of him in some way. "Mingi-yah…" he carefully asked, "he's really fine now?"
"He really is."
Relief finally crashed over him, with Yeosang's affirmation. Mingi was fine; he was going to be alright. See, his face was no longer pained– he looked more at peace. There was color now on his cheeks, his lips. From where Yunho and Mingi's hands were still holding each other, Yunho could still feel heat from Mingi's body. He's really, really alright.
He did not realize that he'd been crying as well, until he saw pearls on the sands and he raised a hand up to wipe his eyes, finding his tears turning into rounded pearls.
"Thank you," Yunho said, and then louder. "Thank you for saving him."
Yeosang shook their head. "Don't thank me for fulfilling my part of our deal. You still have a price to pay."
"I know. I'm willing to do whatever it is you want." As long as Mingi was now safe, breathing.
A pause. Yeosang turned to look at Hongjoong now, their tone considering and deliberate. "I happen to run an antique shop, you see… It's pretty important that I have it stocked with items, so that I could keep my living. Ah, and you are with Hongjoong-noonim, whose domain stretched even to the forgotten waters of nether oceans…"
Hongjoong easily answered for him. "Whatever it is that Yunho-yah finds there, I will make sure that it is delivered to you."
"Mm. Now, the only matter is how long he has to remain at sea." A pause. "I know you don't like it, noonim, but that Yunho changed his fate has been seen by the dwellers of Sabaek-nyeok, by the stray gods. He has to pay for that too."
Hongjoong sighed. It sounded weary. It sounded defeated.
Yeosang was quiet as they pondered over the further intricacies of their deal. Then, they said. "An in-uh is naturally a creature of water, as humanlike as some might look. To meet a creature of land… and break the unspoken laws of predestinations… He should remain in his natural domain. Five years at sea, one day at land."
And so it was accorded.
"Do you agree with the terms?"
"I do."
Five years would pass by in a blink of an eye, and that one day where he could meet Mingi would be worth all the waiting. Yunho wiped his eyes once more, the last pearly tear sharp on the back of his hand– it was teardrop-shaped. Yunho looked at it, before closing it around his palm.
Looking up, Yeosang was giving him a rarely chanced upon smile.
“I can give you another deal," they said. "Would you like to exchange your tail with legs—become a human?”
“Yeosang-ah,” Hongjoong said, warning in his tone.
Yeosang gave them a glance which Hongjoong returned with a flat gaze of their own— until they sighed, shaking their head as they put a hand on their hips, leaned on a leg.
After Yeosang looked back to him, smiling in encouragement, Yunho finally replied. “... what do I need to pay for it?”
“Nothing too much, but I would like your pearls, please.”
Yunho tilts his head in curiosity. “Merfolk pearls that valuable?”
“No,” Yeosang shook their head. “Most merfolk pearls are shed from pain.” They smiled kindly. “The tears you've shed now, they are more precious, as they are shed from a place of love.”
Some perhaps would call Yunho’s deal a curse. He prefers to call it Yeosang’s blessing.
“What are you thinking of?”
Night arrives. Yunho is sitting on the forecastle deck, a kindled lamp seated by the side of his crossed legs. Nearly everyone has gone to their respective quarters, except for Yongbok, who is charting the stars—fulfilling their duties as sailing master, naturally. And, of course, there is Yunho, who is keeping watch while the light from the captain’s cabin is still lit… as well as keeping a certain Divinity of Night company.
He feels heat rising up to his neck, his cheeks, and though the fact that he is flushed is not so easily visible in the dark, he lightly fans himself, still. Turning to a smiling Seonghwa, he takes in their proper and prim posture, their hands neatly folded on their lap, and that their entire figure is an elegant patch of starry night in the ship.
Yunho laughs sheepishly, returning the gentle smile Seonghwa offers with a grin of his own. “Just… past memories.”
Strands of starlight hair fall over Seonghwa’s dark, yet gentle right eye. "You've become an adult, ah, Yunho-yah."
At the teasing, Yunho whines, heat once again flooding his cheeks at once. Seonghwa gives a light chuckle at his slight protest, smiling with infinite fondness, before they direct their soft gaze to the flooded light of the captain’s cabin.
Yunho follows suit, curling up and leaning his cheek on his right palm as he does so. Silence. Yunho spares a peek at Seonghwa’s sharp, calm profile, before he carefully, slowly speaks out. “I know it’s not really my business to pry,” he begins. “But… is everything alright, Seonghwa-nim?”
When Seonghwa shifts, they do it with such silent grace that Yunho cannot hear even a single rustle of fabric. Or perhaps… ah, right, divinities.
But Yunho can hear their hum, filled with consideration. “Sabaek-nyeok… it has been a while since such… an affray happened, in our time, nonetheless. But Hongjoong and I… ah, we are no longer so affected by the affairs of Sabaek-nyeok. Whatever conflict Chan brings, we will be alright.”
Yunho frows, bringing his knees to his chest. Everything that Seonghwa cryptically said… sounds so definite.
“You’re unconvinced?” Seonghwa asks, prods, to which Yunho reluctantly shakes his head, after a moment.
“It's not that, just…” Yunho lifts his chin from where it rested on his arms, meeting Seonghwa’s questioning eye. “Seonghwa-nim, you will tell me if there’s anything, right?”
A beat of silence, but then Seonghwa smiles again. They bump their shoulders gently against Yunho, sending sparks that slightly numbs Yunho’s arm from where both their shoulders meet, leaving a slight smell of ozone, of burn.
“We cannot promise the exact truth, but… you have been helpful as you are now.” When Yunho presses his lips into a thin line, Seonghwa smiles again, their visible eye curving into a half-moon shape. “Truly, you have been. Yunho-yah, we both… Hongjoong and I, we are grateful to meet you in the span of our existence."
Yunho narrows his eyes at them, before giving up, huffing out a laugh. “I’m getting the feeling that we are no longer talking about the same thing here.”
Seonghwa merely gives him an innocent look, one that does not seem convincing.
Unbiddenly, Yunho’s eyes are directed to a vertical line on Seonghwa’s forehead, an empty slit of a blinking third eye, where Hongjoong’s eye is supposed to be.
“I wanna ask something else too, though. Where is Hongjoong-nim’s eye?”
The way Seonghwa gathers their palms to their lap, and then brings them to their sides… looks almost human-like guilty. They say, haltingly, “I may… have lent it. For safekeeping. That is not quite right. For healing.”
Yunho gapes. “With who?!”
“... it’s with Jongho-yah.”
“But-” Yunho blinks, gears starting to turn in his head. When Jongho was recovered from the nether oceans, Hongjoong had frowned at his condition; something about how they would have to wait a thousand years, at the very least, for him to grow a new spine. Yet, after the night, Jongho had miraculously done so—even managing to wake up and then fashion himself a nice, good-looking human form.
Catching Yunho’s eyes, Seonghwa hurriedly adds. “Don’t tell this to Hongjoong.”
“... I won’t.” Knowing them, they will readily give away their other eye to Seonghwa instead. Yunho itches with another question, from this sudden knowledge. He asks ahead, “But… you won’t be able to find Hongjoong-nim, then?”
“I can,” Seonghwa says. They gesture at themselves, aboard on the Destiny, and– that’s true. They are here now, Yunho supposes. “As long as there is a lamp kindled aboard the Destiny, it will act as my guide. It… ah, might take me longer to reach my Hongjoong, but I will always find the wind that leads me to them.” They smile, peacefully.
Their next words are mist-like wistful, as though they are reciting from a gentle dream. “I will always await the day that earth and heaven will intertwine… where the sea and the sky shall no longer be separated by a single horizon line… and we shall be truly together, until the end of all times…”
Suddenly, Seonghwa gives Yunho a nudge. It makes his arm buzz, down to his elbow. “The stars are bright tonight. Make sure you reply quick to Mingi, before Fusang’s clouds obscure our sight.”
“Oh, true,” Yunho immediately gets to his feet. “I’ll take my leave, then, Seonghwa-nim.”
Seonghwa raises an elegant hand in dismissal. And so, Yunho makes his way to the modified crow’s nest.
As he climbs up the ladder, Yunho spares a backward glance to Seonghwa, who has made their way across the deck for the captain’s cabin, their starry, dark figure gliding through, blending the ship’s shadows and the night sky alike.
When Yunho gets to his compartment, he doesn’t waste time taking the letter out of his chest pocket, before reading it through, its pages full of familiar, messy handwriting.
It’s true what Seonghwa said: the night is particularly bright, the constellations visible to the naked eyes with their bright and twinkling stars, the darkness of the nether oceans instead a reflective mirror that is as equally dotted by starry reflections of asterism. If Yunho extinguishes his lamp, all of the darkness will melt into each other, and the Destiny will seem as though afloat in heavens—perhaps, as it is meant to.
Up in the Northern hemisphere, the Big Dipper winks down at Yunho, beautiful and white-bright.
However, it is not the constellation that Yunho keeps a weather eye on. Instead… his gaze is affixed slightly lower… more to the left corner of the Alkaid.
There is a star there, less visible to the eye, as the North star overshadows its shine. Yet, Yunho easily finds it with his trained eyes.
This is something Yunho has yet to tell Mingi, but Yunho learns… if you follow that nameless star, it will lead you back to Geumseong.
Afterwards, he bends down, uncaps his ink bottle and licks the dip of his quill. Flattens a couple of parchment papers that Hongjoong has given him.
Dear Mingi, he writes on one paper. Then, after a split-second decision, he scribbles a different line on another paper. Dear Jongho.
Satisfied, Yunho returns to his initial paper, where he will jot down his reply to Mingi’s letter. He begins to write.
.
.
.
It was the day the insects awakened,
and the petals filled the air…
Notes:
ch title & last lines are taken from zhou shen's song asking flowers, which makes up the core of yungi's relationship here.
what can i say?? thank you for reading up until this far! i know some of you might be unsatisfied with the ending, but... this piece is always meant to conclude rather "openly", bc ive always thought only to write this for the vibes and to establish some worldbuilding. regardless, im very happy that ive finished this! so thank you for you guys for going through this with me!
if u guys wanna know what ive been listening to while writing this fic, here you go!
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