purple cosmos || seongjoong

the lovers

It was another dark night. The moon was absent in the sky, the stars the only punctuation to the darkness. Everything was still and quiet. They were making camp once more, and Hongjoong decided, perhaps against his better interests, to bother Seonghwa with a question.

"What did your sister mean when she said 'that sort of thing?'"

Seonghwa turned to give him a quizzical look.

"That day, when you abducted me." Hongjoong elaborated. "She said something about your mother, and how she didn't take you for 'that sort of thing' when she found out that you had captured me."

Seonghwa blinked, understanding dawning. Hongjoong noticed how the other man tensed, visibly uncomfortable.

"That isn't your business."

"It was literally about me." Hongjoong said. "I think I have a right to know."

"You are not 'that sort of thing.'" Seonghwa said. "So you don't need to worry your pretty little head off about it."

Hongjoong snorted.

"My pretty little head worries regardless." He pressed. Seonghwa remained tight-lipped from the other side of the campfire.

Hongjoong waited. Seonghwa stared only at the flames.

"If you don't say, I'm going to assume it's a sex thing."

The sound of a branch breaking pierced the air. The wood in between Seonghwa's hands had snapped in two. He had Seonghwa's full attention now.

"What?" Seonghwa's expression was scandalised. Hongjoong had to press his lips together to prevent a smirk.

Seonghwa noticed the movement, eyes glancing down for a moment at Hongjoong's lips.

"Well, it sounded sexual to me." Hongjoong laid back on his haunches.

"It's..." Seonghwa's skin turned pink. "It's nothing like that."

"Then what's it like?"

The witch hesitated for a moment.

"She would take prisoners, sometimes." Seonghwa spoke slowly. "Even before... before she started the witch rebellion. If someone got too close to finding out about Belrose, or if they harmed a neighbouring clan. She would take them."

"And turn them into toys?" Hongjoong supplied. Seonghwa looked increasingly uncomfortable.

"It's true that she would, um..." The witch swallowed. "...mess them around a little. Play with their heads before letting them go."

"Wow." Hongjoong breathed. "You must be nothing more than a pretty face after all."

Seonghwa's eyes grew in diameter. "W-What?"

Hongjoong gave him a look.

"To know that your mother did that to people, and to still follow her."

Seonghwa's eyes shrank back again, narrowing.

"Speak for yourself." He said. "She didn't kill people. Your father always did."

"Fair." Hongjoong relented. "But my father didn't torture."

"That you know of." Seonghwa cut in.

"Do you know something I don't?" Hongjoong inched his body forward, closer to the fire and to Seonghwa.

"His men weren't exactly the most gentle folk." A shiver travelled across Hongjoong's skin. He remembered Seonghwa's words from earlier. From another time. The allusions to a type of treatment that happened before Hongjoong and he met.