Princes in Love

✾14✾

Face to face with a demon from the past. Hongjoong felt like time itself stopped as he and the masked bandit faced off in a stare down, the prince was not expecting to see one of the intruders from that day.

The man was still clad in all black with chains that hung on certain parts of his clothing, the black fedora, and the chained black mask.

"What were you doing in the town?" Hongjoong asked, as he pointed his sword towards the masked man.

"Ah that, well we wanted your attention and I gotta say we did an excellent job, don't you think prince?" Answering the prince non-chalantly and mockingly, the man slowly stood up and started to grab his dagger, that was rested at his belt. But Hongjoong knew better than to let his guard down.

"What do you want?"

"Why don't you come and find out for yourself?"

As if challenging the prince, the intruder made the first move by moving forward and tried to attack, fortunately the blonde prince managed to dodge his opponent in the nick of time. Regaining his balance, Hongjoong swung his sword trying to hit the man, but like the prince he stopped the other's sword with his dagger, both men were trying to attack one another or atleast tried to disable them of their weapon. Luck must have ran out for the prince as he got slashed on his left arm, hissing at the pain he felt that had him distracted for a moment, that gave the masked man an opportunity to kick the blonde's legs causing him to fall on the soiled ground.

Finally at a vulnerable state the man in the fedora hovered above the prince and pressed his boot covered feet on Hongjoong's chest adding a little pressure.

"Let this meeting be a warning boy, we have yet to see more of each other in the near future" Adding a bit more pressure the intruder left, leaving the blonde laying on the hard ground with a bleeding arm. Groaning as he felt the pain on his chest, the prince tried to make his way back to his horse, and hopefully back to town as he and the criminal just fought somewhere in the nearby wood.

Back at town the blonde saw all three of the guards at the stall that got robbed.

"Your majesty, the bandits unfortunately got away. We lost them after some time of chasing them in the woods, it was liked they suddenly disappeared"

"Its fine, did anyone got hurt?"

"Fortunately no one got injured, just the owner of the stall still shocked. But sire you are the one whose bleeding, you need to get back to the castle"

Hongjoong nodded at the guard, thinking that they can handle the town for the time being and climbed back on his horse to leave, until he said something to the guard.

"Also, do not report this to my father, let me handle it, you hear me?"

Confused on why the prince did not want the king to know about the incident, the guard just nodded and bowed.

-
Back at the castle Seonghwa and and the younger princes were still at their picnic, just laying in the shade and on the blanket.

"So Seonghwa hyung, where did Hongjoong hyung go?" Jongho asked

"His father asked him to do patrol in town"

Humming in response, they just continued lazing around. Not even five minutes, Wooyoung broke the comfortable silence.

"Guys, I'm getting bored again. What can we do around here?"

"Let's just go at the front and wait for Hongjoong, maybe he tell us what we could do"

Not having much of a choice, they packed up the things from their picnic and gave it to some maids and went to the entrance where they would wait for the blonde prince.

After about twenty minutes of waiting at the castle entrance, the princes started to hear a horse coming and looking at the gates, it was Hongjoong. The others were excited to see their hyung coming back, but Seonghwa felt something was off from the younger prince so he quickly made his way towards him, and Seonghwa was right, he saw crimson red blood dripping from Hongjoong's left arm and before he knew it he caught him in his arms before the younger prince could hit the ground.

"Hongjoong! Hongjoong wake up! Stay with me!"

Hearing no response from Hongjoong, Seonghwa carried him back into the palace bridal style to get him in the medical ward with the others following right behind them. Arriving at the infirmary, the oldest prince bursted through the doors with the blonde prince in his arms.

"I need the doctor quick! Prince Hongjoong is injured!"

Explaining their sudden entrance to the female nurse who was present, she guided them to a medical bed where Seonghwa layed the younger down.

"How did this happen?" The doctor appeared from a door at the back of the room when he heard all the commotion.

"We don't know, he just came back from patrol and then when he came towards us he just fainted"

Seonghwa explained to the man as he along with the six other princes watched as their friend was being treated.

"From the looks of it, his majesty just fainted from the blood loss. Nothing too serious... And there that should do it, for now the prince needs rest, he should wake up soon"

The doctor explained as he and his assistant left to give the princes some privacy.

"We should let hyung's parents know about this" Yeosang suggested.

"You guys go, I'll watch over him"

Understanding the older's words, the younger princes left the two eldest in the room as they know how much they care about each other.

"Please wake up soon"