Them and Us | Ateez

Clad in coldness

Scent of polished floorboards and cleaning supplies masks the aroma of books Yeosang favours so much. He drags his fingers along the hard covers without finding any signs of dust.
The library is re-opened again and welcomes those seeking for words created by a different tongue or opposed thoughts, yet the letters have less meaning without the smell.

Yeosang believes the scent only intensifies the feeling every writer wishes to deliver from a page to a mind but the chemicals that are the youngest thing in the room only disrupts the otherwise ancient aura.
The vampire hums in wonder as his fingers grab the cover, which seems to be pulling him in. He knows the book by something deeper than heart – a thing he no longer possesses. There of course is a dead organ in his chest but it's simpler to not consider that a heart.

His steps are precise as they tell someone blind that by the sound of it, the male walks closer to a table tucked away in the grand library's left side.
Sitting down, he still glances to his left where the wide glass window greets him in its full darkness. Yeosang's light, grey eyes see through the night's colours, yet he sees nothing he didn't know a place for before.

The grass that surrounds the white fountain would have battled the height of ants if there were any in the territory. Water still flows from the smaller basin down into the bigger one, letting his hearing pick up on small droplets falling in the water just like rain. He enjoys the small pattering sounds in the quietness of the night.
The vampire glances down at the book. It is old but the pages have stayed together despite everything.

It reminds Yeosang of the book's author.

He opens a page and leaves the book on the table, staring in front of him where just an empty chair and a bookshelf stare back. His mind had already imagined the blond male sitting opposite of him.
There is no sun to shine on his freckles and no light to illuminate his childishly glimmering eyes. He sits there, swaying his legs just like he always did when the two of them sat at his mother's bakery.

Yeosang recalls the feeling of noticing his eyes on him as he reached for another page sprawled on the table. He always sucked his breath in and kept it for himself, not giving it back to the air until the black-haired male told him that the words the dry ink had saved, sounded marvellous.
Numerous warm mornings passed by that table in the small bakery, with his mother's heavy sights and bitter remarks, which never quite reached her son's smile since it never wavered while listening to Yeosang.

It was pure friendship between two boys, one a few hundred years older than the other, but still ready to listen about the writers that inspired the blond male before him.
The similarities a lot of artists shared made something bitter grow on Yeosang's tongue as he recalls those times. He keeps on wondering, why must all of them die young.

The book's cover slams shut.

A small sigh leaves the vampire as he decides to leave reading for another night. The library always waits for him again once he leaves it for the day.
Everything around him either didn't breathe or breathed so quietly that he couldn't hear it, so Yeosang finds the scream unexpected, once it settles in his head.

It is obvious that the one letting out such a noise is a mere human. They always could produce the most gut-wrenching sounds from their throats when endangered.
His attention shifts to the window. Scanning the fountain or the well mown grass, nothing stands out simply because nothing is there.

He catches a movement only when he lifts his gaze to the forest. It is close to the Academy so the necromancers could go for their walks and werewolves – enjoy a little run when needed since vampires weren't fond of seeing trees and nothing more for miles.

Yeosang hums.

There is movement in the form of a push and pull going on right by the entrance in the woods. Lifting his hand up, he unlocks the smaller window above before opening it.
The scents came crashing in, yet he didn't smell any moss or firewood. The one's having a fight are either vampires or humans.