Love In A Sinking Realm ⊰BTS⊱ Steampunk

BONUS CHAPTER ✑ Captured

⊰᯽⊱┈ Three months later ┈⊰᯽⊱

"You arsehole you are, Mr Park!" yelled a young scoundrel with a heavy accent, slamming a deck of cards on the wobbly wooden round table.

The rain downpoured on the muddy road of a pitch-dark, humid night. A single oil lamp hung from the entrance of the Cross Road's Inn, flashing the raindrops and revealing a single rider near two horses tied on the hitching post. The man, drenched from head to toe, was bending over, barely standing on his two legs, holding a bottle of ale, spewing vomit near the hoofs of one of the horses.

The door of the inn sprang open and a head pooped from behind it.

"Seokjin!" hissed Jimin, with the fringes of his dyed red hair covering his forehead, "What are you still doing there?"

Seokjin lifted his torso and anchored himself on the wall, near the oil lamp. His saturated, meant to be light blond, but turned rather mousy, soaking hair fell on his bloodshot eyes. Once a handsome young prince, reduced to a drunk traveler.

Seokjin let the bottle of ale slip his fingers.

"Shite!" he cursed through his teeth, feeling the repulsive taste of his own vomit ferment in his mouth, "What does it look like I'm doing?"

"Get back inside before you catch a bloody cold!" ordered the boy, "Honesty, look at yourself!"

Jimin accompanied his brooding older brother inside. The dimly lit inn felt oddly warm and welcoming. With its old innkeeper polishing beer glasses, the loud guffaws of five clients from a round table at the back of the room, shouting curse words while playing cards, and a half emptied cauldron of stew resting above the dancing flames of the fireplace.

Jimin forced the drunken young man to sit on one of the tall chairs of the bar island. The innkeeper scoffed.

"He looks bloody awful, your friend," he commented while positioning the beer glasses in a row in front of him.

"Don't mind him, he's been like this since weeks," replied Jimin, "Give him a coffee, or something."

"No!" grunted Seokjin, "Ale!"

"Haven't you drunk enough?!"

"Not nearly enough..."

"Mr Park! You owe me another round!" one of the man sitting with the five member company, called out to Jimin.

"Yeah, yeah, I'll be there!"

The boy took off his long coat and threw it on Seokjin. Then he addressed the innkeeper.

"Make sure he doesn't drink anymore!" he requested firmly.

The innkeep shrugged his shoulders.

"And you!" he turned to his brother, "Sober up! We still have a long way to go---"

"In the middle of the damned night?"

"Yes, you fool, in the middle of the night and under the rain!" Jimin said sarcastically, "Book us a room, will you?"

He was about to head back to his card companions when Seokjin seized him by his sleeve.

"What's the point, huh?! We've been traveling for months! No news from anybody---"

"Shut up!" Jimin whispered loudly, looking around sheepishly, "You think you're the only one grieving for Namju---," he lowered his voice, "You think you're the only one grieving for him! Get back to reality and pull yourself together!"

"Reality is that what we're doing is pointless!" the toxins in Seokjin's blood backfired, "This...this little masquerade...facade, whatever you wanna call it...isn't going to last, Jimin," he purposefully toned on the name Jimin.