For Protection

21. Trickster

The nights grew colder. Seonghwa noticed it by the cold air that bit at his nape in icy pricks wherever his blanket didn't cover. He huddled as tightly into his furs as he could to store heat and fall asleep, but his depleted body couldn't sustain him anymore. His feet were constantly cold, despite the fur in his boots. His fingernails had assumed a permanent shade of blue. And his aching heart numbed every day as the pain spread through him like an infection.

Seonghwa pinched his eyes shut when sleep evaded him. He was endlessly fatigued from the long day and the distress Hongjoong had caused him, but his brain kept him up since it feared freezing in the night.

It wasn't even that cold. Hongjoong sat at the fire and kept it going while he guarded their sleeping bodies. Seonghwa was swaddled in blankets and furs. Yet he felt brisker than ever before.

Frustrated, Seonghwa sent an inner prayer to the skies, pleading for a merciful slumber. The bundled bodies of Jongho and Yunho rested motionless as their breaths rose and sunk.

Seonghwa blinked at them with burning eyes. He was glad to see them at ease. None of them allowed themselves to live light-heartedly anymore. Jongho had bags under his eyes that seemed almost etched into his skin and Yunho lost sleep whenever he wandered off to do... private business in the towns they visited. Or when Hongjoong's and Seonghwa's fighting kept him up.

A fond smile tugged on Seonghwa's lips as they let down their guard to doze. Trust had found its way between them so casually, and Seonghwa appreciated them as his new friends. If only his circumstances didn't shadow their purpose so much.

For a few minutes, Seonghwa lay in tranquillity and waited for sleep. Then he noticed the lack of their newest addition in their sleeping space.

With a start, Seonghwa sat upright. He expected the worst. Hongjoong might have roasted Wooyoung as he had menaced. Wooyoung might have run off to get his mates to kill the group and pillage their dead bodies. Or something else entirely had snatched the lutin away from them.

However, as Seonghwa peered around, he spotted the red hat easily. Behind Hongjoong, who looked bewildered at Seonghwa's crisis, Wooyoung knelt over Yunho's bag and dug through it. Perie perched at his side, wary but appeased by a stripe of meat that hung from her clumsy jaws.

Confused, Seonghwa glanced at Hongjoong. He sat as an idol of peace, so the situation didn't hint at anything bad, but Seonghwa didn't like the way Wooyoung was shifting through their things. When he grabbed something shiny out of Yunho's bundle and slipped it into the pocket of his coat, Seonghwa launched his blanket back.

"What is going on here?" He hissed at the two so Yunho and Jongho could maintain their sleep. Wooyoung cast him a fleeting glance and Hongjoong shrugged.

"Lutins like stealing sparkling things," Hongjoong elaborated. He still didn't move to stop Wooyoung and no shred of fear passed the lutin as he snagged for Jongho's bag.

Seonghwa scrambled to his feet and got stuck in his blanket in the process. He hastened past Hongjoong soundlessly on the soft grass as he caught up with Wooyoung. The lutin's eyes attained a possessive gleam as he scooted backwards. His body wrapped around the bag to hide it away. Like an animal starved of food, he bared his teeth at the priest until he slowed.

Used to this treatment from Hongjoong, Seonghwa lifted his hands to show their emptiness.

"Wooyoung," he began, but he didn't get far.

"It's mine!" Wooyoung hissed. As if the bag were his newborn he had to protect, he clutched it to his chest. Busy hands relieved it of anything shiny on the side.

Seonghwa crouched, careful not to draw closer.

"It's not, and you know that. Is this why you came along?" Disappointment marred Seonghwa's voice. Wooyoung's betrayal came as no surprise, but it still dug through Seonghwa's chest maliciously as he had hoped for more.