Samhain

chapter twenty eight: when the stars return

Warm.

Everything is warm.

A cocoon of plush blankets and smooth sheets envelops his tired frame. Strong arms wrap around his shoulders, loose enough to spare him discomfort but tight enough to give a sense of reassurance.

There's a strange dissonance between the amount of time that has passed and how long he's actually been asleep. He feels like he's been sleeping for a thousand years and a few hours at the same time.

What day is it, anyways?

Wooyoung sits with himself for a while, untangling his thoughts like he's untangling a string of lights. In the quiet unraveling of his memories, he remembers the cold. The faces trapped behind the ice, the golden flash of his magic. Pain and heat burning through him.

His eyelids slowly lift like the lid of a heavy casket, revealing a simple room flooded with very dim, warm light. A gentle buzz sounds from a lamp, and every few seconds the light flickers from a bulb that needs replacing.

The room bears lingering traces of recent activity. Several chairs are scattered around the bed, one with a winter coat hanging on the back. A medicine cabinet stationed in the far corner stands slightly ajar, while a half-eaten microwave meal sits on the nightstand by the bed.

These bed sheets are familiar. His fingers weave through the fabric, which once upon a time covered a werewolf dying from a silver stab wound.

He was so nervous the day he met San. Wooyoung remembers the way his hands trembled when he brought the ingredients for the healing ritual out of his tote bag. If it weren't for his begrudging moral obligation to help his best friend Yunho, San wouldn't have survived.

And now he's the one in need of healing.

Wooyoung's body aches from laying still for so long. He wants to move or open his eyes a little more, but his muscles are too sore. Every little movement results in a shock of pain shooting through him.

Wooyoung gets deja vu. Strangely, this is the second time he's waking up half-alive in a dimly lit room, but this time he's not in the church, and this time there's no sign of the priest.

Wait. Jongho.

Where is Jongho?

Wooyoung's chest tightens with urgency as the memory of his friends on the battlefield comes back to him all at once. He stirs uncomfortably.

"Shhhh." Warm breath whispers across his ear as soon as he starts to move.

At this point, Wooyoung fully realizes that he's not alone in the bed. He should've known that the vanilla scent in the air wasn't just a candle.

Not that he cares. Everything hurts. His pain is bone-deep. He tries to sit up, but all he manages to do is make himself wince in pain.

Wooyoung groans and trembles like a leaf. A dull, throbbing pain reverberates through his limbs as if he were torn to pieces and haphazardly put back together again.

"Jongho?" Wooyoung strains to speak, voice scratchy and hoarse. Even his jaw hurts when he opens his mouth to talk.

"He's okay," San replies, unmoving. Wooyoung can tell he's choosing his words carefully. "He managed to teleport us out of there right before the ice caved in on us."

Wooyoung shuts his eyes, fighting off a headache and fighting off his panic. He's glad San is here with him. Otherwise, he'd be much more of a disoriented and confused mess than he is already.