A Tiger Called Rapunzel ✓ || TaeGyu || HYBEPride 2021

Recovery of the Thief

Taehyun woke up feeling like ass.

This is it. I've died, for sure this time.

He found himself staring at a white ceiling, in a bed with all white sheets save for the royal purple duvet. He felt exhausted, like he had been traveling on Brenna for days nonstop, and his mind was very fuzzy. The last thing he could clearly remember was getting captured by the guards after kissing Cholongkkoch. No -- Cholong. He's a guy. And I still think he might be the lost Prince. But...where in blue blazes am I?

He waited until someone in a white outfit arrived; she was a nurse, who confirmed he was in the medical ward of the castle. "You probably don't remember anything, sir, so let me bring in someone who can fill you in." That person was Taehyun's brother in crime, Choi Soobin, looking fantastic and with a fresh set of castle clothes. They hugged as brothers do, then Soobin sat by the bed.

"So, I heard you died."

"I...maybe?"

"And then you came back to life."

"Yeah, that seems to be a condition of dying here."

"You really don't remember anything, do you?" So Soobin filled Taehyun in on their imprisonment; that Yeonjun had been on their side the entire time, aiding them from the inside with the Magic Island Network; that there had been a huge magic explosion near Shinkisoku and nobody could find it; and that Taehyun was the only one who knew how to get to the secret tower.

"King Namjoon seemed pretty desperate," Soobin said. "He hadn't seen magic be used in the kingdom in years, and if he was gonna get a tip from a criminal, then that's just how it was gonna be. But then you told him you were in love with his son."

Taehyun found himself blushing. "I really said that?"

"You really did," Soobin said with a laugh. "That mobilized things really quickly, though! You were super out of energy because you hadn't eaten in weeks, so they had to strap you to Namjoon's lion, and you all ran off. I joined up with the guard, and we followed. Turned out there was some big magic battle that we missed most of, and you were dead there for a bit, but the King revived you with his magic. You've been sleeping here since then."

"Oh? How long was I asleep?"

"...it's been...five days?"

"Five days?!"

"Yeah, you didn't recover fully at first. You were breathing, but not fully conscious. They had to feed you magically so you would get your strength back. And now you're awake." Soobin had a few tears in his eyes. "I thought there for a while that you would never wake up again. I have so much to tell you."

Taehyun nodded, eating some bread that the nurse had given him. "So there was a magic battle?"

"They were saying that Namjoon and Yoongi's daemons had to join together and defeat Heulin and her daemon. She was captured and held at trial in the courtyard. It was very public. I got to see that, and it was fun. She didn't stand a chance after all she'd been through. The King did something to take away Heulin's magic, and Mae is a normal bird now. They were exiled from the Naeil Kingdom to the United Colonies, where she will be kept in a prison house there to live out the rest of her life."

"Wow," Taehyun said, in shock. "Did anybody find out what was up with Cholong? His mom attacked him, right? That's what the magic disturbance was?"

Soobin chuckled. "Turned out you were right all along, Taehyun. That girl was the lost prince Beomgyu."

Taehyun nodded. It wasn't fully a surprise to his brain, especially with all they had been through. "Is he alive?"

"Oh, yeah, he's alive, and he's being treated in the medical ward, same as you. They're working with therapists to make sure he recovers fully from everything he's been through. It's no secret that the Prince is back, but he has yet to show his face in public."

Taehyun nodded again. Prince Beomgyu was okay. But his inkling had been right, and he needed to leave the Prince be. Beomgyu needed to recover without thinking about a wanted criminal --

"Oh, wait, how am I not dead?" he asked again. "I get that I helped everybody find Beomgyu, but I'm a thief! We should be the ones exiled, not Heulin!"

"Someone else can explain that better than I can." And Soobin and Taehyun talked together until Captain Yeonjun paid them a visit. Taehyun noticed that Yeonjun was notably sitting very closely to Soobin. "So yeah, I knew about the Magic Island Network all along."

"That...explains a lot, actually," Taehyun had to admit.

"Soobin knows about this, so I get to tell you now as well. Since you are both wanted criminals, there must be a punishment. Therefore the King has decreed that neither one of you are allowed to leave the castle walls for a year, until the next Tiger Festival. You will repay for your crimes by serving the Royal Family."

"You can do anything to do that," Soobin said. "For example, I am probably going to join the Guard! It seems like an easy enough job to do, and since we've been running around for years evading the Guard, it makes sense to join them instead. We already know how they work!"

"And now that the Guard isn't preoccupied with trying to find the thieves who keep stealing all the gold, it'll be a much easier job," Yeonjun said with a smile. "There are more changes that will come, but we're waiting on a few confirmations from the Royal Castle. Notably, we want to see if Prince Beomgyu will make a public appearance, and how castle life will change after that."

Taehyun nodded again. It seemed like everybody was getting a happy enough ending. He just hoped Beomgyu was doing well. Taehyun could live out his year of service, then leave the castle and the Naeil Kingdom behind, go start over somewhere new. There was no place in the Prince's heart for him, that was for sure. Even if there was -- even if by some weird stroke of luck Beomgyu somehow felt the same way about Taehyun -- Beomgyu wasn't Cholongkkoch anymore. He wasn't a commoner. He would need to be married to a princess, or at least to another magic user, and Taehyun was neither of those.

The sooner he completed this year and left, the better. Someday he would get over this heartbreak and start over.

--

Asterhythm: Aww, Taehyun, don't give up yet! At least he's stuck in the castle for the next year... :)