Prince of Flour

23. Witchcraft

Smut in the second half of the chapter, the last sentence is important though!

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Seonghwa would deny the sudden wave of panic he felt when he awoke in a foreign bed. What he would deny even more though, was how the soft laughter of Hongjoong sounding not far from him made him calm down immediately and even got his heart to beating a bit faster.

How was he supposed to teach his heart that no, there was no time to be going all mushy inside right now? This was the harsh reality of life, of pirates and fights. There was no time for him to question his feelings.

Seonghwa sat up slowly, grimacing when his back cracked warningly. Even more deliberate than before he pushed back the thin blanket resting above his body, searching the room for Hongjoong.

There he sat, next to that stranger at his make-shift desk (a flat piece of driftwood on a rock) and smiling at his companion brightly.

Seonghwa never saw Hongjoong smile like that and he took a moment to stare.

Hongjoong's smile was radiant, making him seem much more younger and much more bright. His eyes seemed affectionate and his nose did a little scrunch that Seonghwa hoped did not hurt his injury further. He smiled with a lot of teeth, blinding Seonghwa with their odd cleanliness (he already noticed Hongjoong having interests in particular topics such as keeping himself clean, what Seonghwa appreciated).

Even if that smile was not directed at him, Seonghwa felt oddly struck by it. He wanted to make him smile like that too, his brutal captain who finally showed his soft side.

The other man had been laughing too, the deep timbre of his voice mixing with Hongjoong's. Now though, he turned around as if he had felt Seonghwa sitting up, locking their gazes with a polite curiosity.

Hongjoong lifted his eyes then too, his smile not quite dying down fully when he saw Seonghwa.

"Good morning, sleepyhead. How do you feel?"

Seonghwa clumsily ruffled his hair, getting up to stumble over to them. Hongjoong patted his lap invitingly and Seonghwa only threw a quick glance at their desinterested host, then he sunk down on the captain's warm thighs. Hongjoong lifted his hands then, one coming to settle around Seonghwa's hips and the other carefully touching his lips.

"How's it feel? It looks nasty but should not hurt much. Bbang gave you some numbing medicine over it."

Seonghwa blinked at him, not quite sure what he was talking about. Thankfully the other man at the table did however. They had not really talked yesterday, Seonghwa just wolfing down some food and then falling asleep so he did not quite catch his name.

"You were hurt while on the ship. Hongjoong and I assume your counterparts did those to each other and they projected on you. Tell me if it starts hurting again." Seonghwa scrutinized that man with his tanned skin and generally dark aura again, the same kind of unsettling energy radiating off of him as when they first met. It was different from the clones but Seonghwa could not put a finger on it at all.

"What did they do?"

Hongjoong carefully kept caressing Seonghwa's jaw, looking worriedly between his eyes and his mouth.

"Those cuts... We will show it to you after it healed a bit. Right now it looks pretty bad."

Seonghwa could only imagine.

He nodded weakly, not able to keep himself from carefully probing them with his tongue. The corners of his mouth felt strange indeed, the cut open flesh not smooth at all and he carefully retracted his tongue again before the feeling ingrained itself too much in his brain.