Oh, Rati - Oneshot (5/5)
Title: Oh, Rati
Chapters: oneshot
Pairings: Sehun/Luhan
Rating: NC-17
Genre: AU, romance, angst
Warnings (SPOILER WARNINGS! highlight to see): explicit content, violence, incest, character death
Summary: Sehun leaves his land in search of adventure, and finds a little too much of it in a neighbouring village where he meets a veiled enchantress that has hips too sinful to be legal.
a/n: i'd really advise against reading the warnings if you want to enjoy this thing at all lol. set in some fictional time/place idk where they have kingdoms and such.
this is a rati and it’s a metaphor for sehun’s dick. nah i’m just kidding. or am i.
45,000 WORDS LONG have fun
*
When he came too it was on hard ground; hard and cold, very cold. And slightly irregular. The side of his face had numbed from lying down on the cold floor, and he could barely peel it off while trying to shift and sit up. As he opened his eyes he was met with dim light; definitely not the kind of the desert where he'd been what felt like a second ago.
He groaned as he crouched up in a hunched over sitting position, his entire head throbbing with a splitting headache. Goosebumps were rippling up his skin and he could feel cold, damp air fill his lungs. He was definitely not in the East anymore.
A few more blinks made he realize where he was. There was cobbled stone all around him, as well as a large, wooden door with a window of bars on it upfront. He turned his head to the sides and saw people chained to the walls by their hands and feet, young people mostly that he recognized from the marketplace under the blazing sun. Now they were all there in the dark; in the cold. Their heads were bowed down and their faces were wiped of emotion.
It was the virgins they'd stolen. Taken. From the village.
He looked around desperately for a tuft of blond hair, his eyes scanning the area for that familiar, beautiful face, but he came up negative. It sent him into a mild frenzy, panic gripping him once he realized Luhan really had been given to Kai, his brother, to keep.
"Looking for our marigold, are ya?" A deep voice spoke up in the room, and he turned around to find the source of it. He spotted a boy sitting there, no older than sixteen, the right side of his face bleeding while his hands were tied behind his back. "Well that's a little too late, isn't it, prince? You already gave him off to that other man. Shame on you."
"This isn't my doing!" Sehun yelled desperately, his whole body stinging at the reminder that Luhan was in his brother's hands. If he didn't get raped from the very second they stepped foot in the palace, he was sure to be tortured, or even worse; killed. Sehun felt tears prick at his eyes again and had a hard time steadying his voice when the image of any of those gruesome thing happening to his Luhan passed by his eyes. "Please believe me! I would never do this to any of you! To Luhan...I swear on my life...I would never..."
"You got the Chief killed, you know," the boy commented, his voice rather monotonous. "You got our people killed. You caused the bloodshed of hundreds; young, innocent souls too. Are you happy? Was that what you'd waited for all this time, while you were stringing Luhan along?"
"Never! I never wanted any of this to happen!"
He looked around the sunken faces of the girls and boys who were all tied up, trying to find a comforting face, but they all looked away from him.
"Are you here to bed all the virgins, then? Is that why you're in here with us? For your little harem of untouched? Because you already had Luhan, right? That was his job, after all. To be given to you as a gift. Too bad he didn't know you were a lying, insatiable dog. You could have spared him his dignity." Sehun turned to face the foul-mouthed boy, suddenly angry.
"Look...I don't know why I'm in here. But I have nothing to do with my father and his army. Nothing." He stared the boy hard in the eyes. "The royal family is evil, malicious at best and destructive at worst. I left the Kingdom to escape this filthy place, believe me."
"I believe you, Sehun."
He turned around as the familiar voice, and saw none other than Chen sitting against the wall, his head leaned back and his ankle chained to the stone. Sehun felt like crying, like screaming and tearing into his own flesh, because all of these good people were hurting, and even Luhan's best friend, who had done nothing but show him kindness, was taking his side while thrown in his family's dungeons.
"Y-you..."
"Look...you're a good guy. I know one when I see one." He smiled half-heartedly at the ground, and then flicked his eyes up to lock with Sehun's. "This isn't your fault."
"Like hell it isn't!" The angry sixteen year old boy cut in, but Chen sent him a silencing look.
"Shut your bitter mouth, Chanyeol. Finding someone to blame won't get us out of here any time soon. Or reverse the tragedy that has already happened." Chanyeol stayed quiet at that, frowning and glaring away to the side. Chen turned back to Sehun, and then continued speaking with a forced smile. "I know Luhan wouldn't have wanted us to blame you. He would have wanted us to stay positive and help you like one of our own."
Sehun frowned deeply, clutching the end of his vest. "You speak of him like he's dead..."
"You don't think he is?" Chen raised an eyebrow. "What state do you think he’s in, then?"
Sehun bit back a sob, digging his nails into his kneecaps. Probably naked. Bleeding. "Tortured. My brother wouldn't spare him the courtesy of ending his life when he can still make him scream. Kai is the devil himself; he likes playing with his food and has no empathy."
Chen paled at that, quietening up quickly. Sehun just sank down on the ground and heard himself begin to cry, grappling at the cobbled floor in desperation. Nobody spoke again that night. His low and mournful howling was the only sound that filled the room, running on until the break of dawn.
*
The days passed to slowly when there was only misery. After what felt like the third day in captivity, he thought his innards were going to eat themselves because he hadn't had a lick of food touch his tongue in what felt like years. Nobody stopped by to drop off food. Not even a crumb of bread or a drop of water. Everyone's faces were hollowing up slowly, fingers turning blue and spindly, and Sehun could hear stomachs screaming and see people who were too fatigued to even lift their eyelids. He also saw and smelled the rotting flesh of one or two of the virgins who had died from bleeding wounds that they'd carried since the army had attacked. Flies were gathering in a corner.
Sehun just didn’t understand why he was down there in the first place; it didn’t add up. Hadn’t they made a big show of ‘coming to rescue him’? Had they just forgotten about him and he’d ended up on the dungeons with the others by mistake? He was so certain he would have been forced back to his bleak room, forced to take classes and be guarded from leaving forever. Maybe this was punishment, being down here.
But in all honesty. Sehun only wished to be out of there so that he could see Luhan again and hopefully save him from whatever gruesome fate was inevitably planned out for him. He had agonizing pangs in his heart whenever he thought of him, filled with guilt and sadness, so he tried not to, but then again Luhan’s beautiful and happy face was the only thing that kept him going, that stopped him from just sinking to the floor and giving up completely. Because he had to find him. And he had to help him. And he had to make sure nobody touched a hair on his head.
He tried to call for help several times, call for his father, reluctantly; even call for Kai, but his throat was too parched to even produce any sound. He managed to sit himself in the corner of the room against the wall, next to Chen, who just couldn't seem to stop smiling, for some reason.
One day Chen started shaking his head and chuckling to himself and Sehun asked him what was the matter.
"It's kind of funny, now that I think about it...in a really morbid way,” he said, eyes unfocused and his voice sounding oddly hysterical but excited at the same time. Sehun feared he might be going crazy, slowly but surely, from the darkness and tragedy and lack of food. All the signs were there. "I just remembered...I actually know how Luhan came to our village, and where he's from." He laughed loudly again, and Sehun turned his lips down, feeling weary and anxious. Nobody else bothered to turn or listen; Chen had been babbling on for a few days already. But only now did he seem completely eloquent. "I overheard the Chief talking about it to someone one night, on a fine spring day." He smiled, as if reminiscing, but Sehun noticed he also had two tears trailed down from his eyes. "Do you want in on the secret, Sehun? I haven't told him because I’m afraid he'll be hurt, you know. He thinks he's a part of our clan, our family, and he loves it. I simply can't break it to him. The Chief would probably have me killed if I did too; it seemed like such confidential information. Funny I should remember it all now when it almost seems funny. See, Luhan thinks his mother was a nomad from the area, who dropped him off here because she couldn't afford to raise him."
Sehun used all the strength he had to sit up straight. His back was aching and his lips were cracked and painful bleeding from dryness, but he grit his teeth, humouring Chen. "Where is he really from?"
Chen held up a finger to him, looking at him pointedly. "He came to us one night many years ago; I remember it as clear as day. This woman, a foreign woman, she came waddling to our town after having crossed the desert -the entire western desert!- and collapsed on the ground as her water broke for everyone to see. She was beautiful; stunning woman she was, just like Luhan. The Chief had her carried into his hut and asked for the aid of all the people he knew. Sadly, she died during childbirth. Tragedy, really. Do you know where she came from, though? Who she was? I should have recognized her. It was so obvious from her appearance and clothes."
Sehun held his breath, and only by some miracle managed to ask. "Who was she?"
"Our Luhan is the son of the Queen from your kingdom!" Chen yelled into the room, his eyes wide and his mouth drawn into an open, toothy grin. He clapped his hands. "The Queen who used to live with the King and his two sons. He's a royal, can you believe it? The Queen gave birth to him right there, in our little village, of all places, after being cast out by your King. Our little Luhan is a prince. Ha! I always knew he was special! Oh, the irony! This would make a great play, don't you think? I find it rather funny. How often do you come across coincidences like this?"
Sehun was so stunned and couldn't feel his face, nor his hands or feet, for that matter. He couldn't breathe. His brain was refusing to process any of what he'd just heard, and he only focused on the scent of death and decay infiltrating his nostrils like some sort of passive diffusion. He felt dizzy. He felt sick. He felt like expelling the entire inside of his body out of his mouth.
He heard Chanyeol laugh loudly in the distance.
He had to lay down on the floor, his senses clouding up and his whole body going weak.
So his father had exiled his mother because she was pregnant with a third child. He'd probably though she was bearing a girl. Third children were always girls, everybody knew that. At least that was what the rumour was. And his father hated women. The biggest misogynist to ever live. Except Luhan had turned out to be a boy. Luhan was a boy...and Luhan was his brother. One he never knew he had.
He was in love with his brother. He'd kissed, sucked, and fucked his brother. He lusted after his brother and was enamoured with him beyond reason, beyond doubt.
He was going straight to hell.
Luhan was his brother.
*
Sehun didn’t get up off the ground for another three days. The only reason he hadn’t died was because the boy who had been angry with him and laughed at him, Chanyeol, had stuck some dry food in his mouth that they’d been spared with on their fifth day as guard brought a plate of nourishment to their cell. He’d passed him some water too, maybe out of pity, maybe for no reason at all, but all Sehun knew was that he had yet to be choked in a sea of black as death crept up on him.
Passing thoughts flashed by his head of how much he wished he’d grown up with Luhan. But then those images were intercepted with pictures of him fucking Luhan and coming inside him like one would breed, and he had to scrape at his face and pull at his hair because everything was making him nauseous and absolutely crazy. He kept moaning to himself in agony, because he’d lost something he didn’t want to lose, in the most horrible and tactless way, and everything was going wrong. He couldn’t see anything easing his pain.
He wasn’t sure if Chen was still alive, because he hadn’t had the energy to turn around and check on him. He was sure he’d heard him sing some silly tune yesterday, what had sounded like a kid’s song or something of the like, but other than that people were decaying left and right, and the space grew gradually more quiet, like a sail losing wind. Somehow, Sehun still managed to flex his fingers and suck in air into his lungs, and he could feel his heart still beating -quickly and stuck in some sort of panic- but beating nonetheless.
At night his mind went to a dark place, where everything came to spite him, and he kept yelling, taking to himself and crying; so, so angry. He mostly yelled at Kai, because he wanted him to drop dead and have his limbs ripped off as they were thrown into a burning inferno.
"You're fornicating with your own brother, you sick pig!” He roared, hitting his clenched fists into the ground. It was probably making him bleed. “And you don't even know it! I hope you come deep inside him and recognize the smell of his skin, you bane-tongued demon! I hope you hear our mother's painful screams in your ears every second you're with him! He's mine! He's mine, and you took him from me!"
Oh, he wailed long into the night. He wailed and wished he had Luhan to hold beside him, because he missed him, his small body and fiery spirit, his brilliant eyes and playful smile.
He only gained his wits back slightly when there one day walked in a guard of the prisons, leaving yet another batch of food for them to get by on. Sehun sat up instantly, staring at the man. Then he got to his feet, even if his joints ached and he was drenched in chilling sweat.
The guard noticed him this time, and he stood there gaping. “Young master...”
Sehun nodded at the name. He’d been called that many times. It had replaced his name entirely as a child, the only exception being when his father or his older brother called for him, when he went by his given name.
He walked forwards slowly, keeping his eyes locked with the man. They were nameless to him. Faceless too. They had no purpose but to do the Royal Family’s bidding, and still no feeling of familiarity reached him.
Sehun grabbed for the guard’s dagger, unsheathing it from his waist where it was perched, then without warning rammed it forward right into his solar plexus, seething. The guard sputtered, making choked noises and eventually coughing up blood, until he fell forward like a dead weight to Sehun’s feet.
Nobody said anything as Sehun left the cell, holding the bloody dagger down from his right hand.
*
There was only one place Sehun wanted to go; where his legs were taking him on auto-pilot through the rather empty and silent palace halls. It was a wonder that he even remembered the way; he’d never had to walk to Kai’s room much except for when he’d try to steal some of the ‘important documents’ his father had passed on to him, never letting him get even single whiff of what they were about. But he was headed there now, with only one thing in mind: to find Luhan. Alive and well, hopefully. He prayed while he walked, and even though the walls were looking a little out of shape to him and his surroundings were bending slightly, he widened his eyes so he’d be able to see better.
It was a miracle how nobody had seen him yet; it was like the whole castle was asleep. Well, maybe they were. Was it night time? Sehun hadn’t checked the light of any window, storming straight up the spiral stairs instead, one foot in front of the other like he’d never done anything else in his life. The door to Kai’s room was right in front of him, slightly ajar, and Sehun tread up to it, trying to control his rather loud and deep breathing.
He peered inside, looking for moving figures and listening for any sound. He didn’t know what he had expected to see. Chaos, maybe. Gore and violence. But everything was silent, and he couldn’t see anything in his line of vision, so he let his free hand push open the door, getting a wider viewing angle.
Kai was nowhere to be seen, he noted. The room was quite stuffy, an interesting change from the coldness he’d been locked in for so long, and he kept himself alert as he entered, treading softly, like that would keep anyone from seeing him.
“Luhan?” He asked into the room. What if he was mistaken? What if Luhan wasn’t even there and Kai kept him someplace else to play with or torture him? Sehun shook his head. He couldn’t think like that. He had to focus and use his eyes properly, because there was still a chance that Luhan would be somewhere in there.
And then he saw him. He didn’t know how he hadn’t found him earlier, because he was in such an obvious place, but his presence was almost invisible. He was lying on Kai’s grand bed, on top of the sheets, his arms tucked in near his head. To Sehun’s surprise, he was still wearing the clothes he’d been captured in. They hadn’t been ripped or torn, and even his jewellery was still in place, sitting snug around his thin limbs. There was also no blood as far as Sehun could see, and he didn’t know whether that should make him relieved or more worried, but he ended up with worried, because there was no way nothing bad had happened. And his eyes...as soon as Sehun found them, his chest tightened. Luhan was staring straight ahead, spotted to somewhere on the far off wall, and his eyes were so empty, so distant, it was like his soul had left his body.
“Luhan?” He tried to get his attention, walking up to him with slow steps. He should hurry, because Kai could be back at any moment, but he didn’t want to startle him, because he looked so fragile.
As soon as he stepped into Luhan’s vision, Luhan’s chest rose like he was inhaling a big bout of air, and his face cracked a smile, the smallest he’d ever seen him wear, but still better than the empty expression he’d been sporting. “Sehun,” he said, more gentle than a gust of summer wind. His voice sounded a little strained; a little weak. Maybe he hadn’t been fed either. Sehun had been weak, but he was strong now, because he had a job to do.
“Where’s Kai?” Sehun just asked, clutching the dagger by his side tighter as he became wary and tense, his heartbeat pounding in his ears like a war drum. He felt anxious and panicked at the same time, and his palms were sweating like he was Icarus flying in front of the sun, melting fast.
“I don’t know,” came Luhan’s reply a few slow seconds later. His voice sounded grated...a little hoarse, maybe. It rendered Sehun even more uncomfortable in any case.
He looked down at Luhan’s limp form, trying to figure out what was wrong with him. Kai must have violated him. He must have. Why else would he be lying in his bed? He must have tortured him, ruined him even further than he already was by Sehun’s filthy hand.
“What did he do to you?” Sehun yelled, almost asphyxiating on his own fast breathing as he stared down at his lover...little brother. “What did he do to you?!”
“Shhh, Sehun, calm down,” Luhan said quietly, raising one of his hands up as if reaching out to him. Sehun could barely hear what he was saying, especially with the annoying thumping in his ears and the way he was sweating. He was so uncomfortable.
He strode over to his bed and sat down, lifting Luhan into his arms and squeezing him into his chest. He squeezed him as hard as he could, with the minimal muscles he had left to give him strength, and sighed into his warm neck. He’d missed him so much. He’d been terrified of losing him, of bad things happening to him in general, because Luhan was his sun and full moon and compass in general, making his head spin and his feel like he’d never felt before. And he loved him; he adored him so much, but when he pulled back from his neck and gazed into Luhan’s eyes, he realized gruellingly just how alike they were his mother’s.
And then he couldn’t see anything else. The skin he was touching on Luhan’s arms and his back, in made him flinch, and felt like he was breathing through a thick film, unable to draw a breath properly. Sehun had ruined him with an evil, and it made him almost tear up. Incest. He’d had his baby brother. Him and Kai. He’d been desecrated beyond repair. They’d done the unforgivable.
Luhan wasn’t his to have. He never had been.
“Oh, Luhan, this is bad. We’ve done something bad. Bad, bad, bad.” He shook his head, drawing back from him slowly. He was torn because he wanted to hold and kiss Luhan so much, but at the same time he would rather have his hands burned with blistering oil.
“What are you talking about?” Luhan asked, and he sounded so blissfully unaware, like his life had never been tainted. It Saddened Sehun to the very core. And considering what he was about to do...
He allowed tears to gather in his eyes, though he was still ashamed. The room was spinning to him again, and he groaned, running his hands down the side of Luhan’s arms. In the next second he pushed Luhan back on the mattress with one arm, pinning him down with his body rested heavily on top of him. He didn’t even care if Kai walked in. He had to do this, the need was killing him, screaming inside his head and making his tongue numb up, decaying his senses one by one like he was being annihilated by a slow-killing poison. Oh, it was creeping.
“S-Sehun?” Luhan asked under him, and Sehun drew his head up, refusing to look Luhan in the eyes. He couldn’t. He absolutely couldn’t. Instead he focused on the bow of his upper lip, trying not to think about how he’d kissed it, and how much he wanted to kiss it now.
He lowered his face so that he could feel Luhan breathing into him, resting his forehead against Luhan’s while still avoiding his eyes. He could sense Luhan’s eyes flickering around, nervous maybe, surprised perhaps, and his inhales were drawing more rapidly, fogging up Sehun’s mind. He was ready.
With a swift shift of his body he gripped steel pushed down to be certain Luhan wouldn’t struggle, then penetrated under his chin and drew the dagger down his jugular, slicing through the skin like it was nothing but paper, revealing an endless sea of red underneath. Luhan didn’t have time to scream but he sputtered, looking up into Sehun’s eyes in acute confusion, his gaze desperate and afraid; terrified, in fact, and screaming in place of his blocked throat. Sehun could almost hear the scream in his ears. In fact, he did hear it. Loud. And he screamed back at him.
Luhan bucked up then, struggling, but Sehun shushed him and held him down as best as he could.
“I’m sorry I ruined you. My own flesh and blood," he kissed Luhan's forehead, smoothing his hair back gently. “You can’t live with this. If I’d known you were my brother...I swear I would have stayed away. I would have never made you sin so badly. But I fell in love with you and I...I-I just got caught up in it- I didn’t even stop to think!” He breathed in near Luhan’s neck and could have sworn he felt a faint waft of honeysuckle. “Oh, forgive me...if not in this life, then in the next one...” Luhan’s skin was still soft, still wonderfully delicate and smooth, and he traced his sticky hands over his sides, feeling his warm flesh glide under his fingertips. He was slightly too thin now, and his hipbones poked into Sehun’s lower abdomen. “Luhan?” He asked quietly, raising his head from his neck.
Luhan didn’t respond. His eyes were staring right in his direction, but he wasn’t saying a thing. The thin flow of air from his lungs wasn’t spilling out of his small mouth anymore, and the little twitches in his body were gone. Dead, like his mother. Very, very dead.
*
Sehun was found by the castle guards, a few hours later, when the palace had started waking up.
He’d carried Luhan into his old room, the one he’d spent many bitter and lonesome nights in, laying him down on the maple hardwood floor, where his feet had tread as a child. He’d pulled out a small chest from under his bed, which had been exactly where he’d left it before he had departed for a new land, and had traced the edges of it with a smile.
He’d been found playing with toy trains from the dusty chest on the floor with Luhan’s cold hand held firmly in his, like he was trying to make up for a lost childhood.
<<
a/n: the enddd :)
Chapters: oneshot
Pairings: Sehun/Luhan
Rating: NC-17
Genre: AU, romance, angst
Warnings (SPOILER WARNINGS! highlight to see): explicit content, violence, incest, character death
Summary: Sehun leaves his land in search of adventure, and finds a little too much of it in a neighbouring village where he meets a veiled enchantress that has hips too sinful to be legal.
a/n: i'd really advise against reading the warnings if you want to enjoy this thing at all lol. set in some fictional time/place idk where they have kingdoms and such.
this is a rati and it’s a metaphor for sehun’s dick. nah i’m just kidding. or am i.
45,000 WORDS LONG have fun
*
When he came too it was on hard ground; hard and cold, very cold. And slightly irregular. The side of his face had numbed from lying down on the cold floor, and he could barely peel it off while trying to shift and sit up. As he opened his eyes he was met with dim light; definitely not the kind of the desert where he'd been what felt like a second ago.
He groaned as he crouched up in a hunched over sitting position, his entire head throbbing with a splitting headache. Goosebumps were rippling up his skin and he could feel cold, damp air fill his lungs. He was definitely not in the East anymore.
A few more blinks made he realize where he was. There was cobbled stone all around him, as well as a large, wooden door with a window of bars on it upfront. He turned his head to the sides and saw people chained to the walls by their hands and feet, young people mostly that he recognized from the marketplace under the blazing sun. Now they were all there in the dark; in the cold. Their heads were bowed down and their faces were wiped of emotion.
It was the virgins they'd stolen. Taken. From the village.
He looked around desperately for a tuft of blond hair, his eyes scanning the area for that familiar, beautiful face, but he came up negative. It sent him into a mild frenzy, panic gripping him once he realized Luhan really had been given to Kai, his brother, to keep.
"Looking for our marigold, are ya?" A deep voice spoke up in the room, and he turned around to find the source of it. He spotted a boy sitting there, no older than sixteen, the right side of his face bleeding while his hands were tied behind his back. "Well that's a little too late, isn't it, prince? You already gave him off to that other man. Shame on you."
"This isn't my doing!" Sehun yelled desperately, his whole body stinging at the reminder that Luhan was in his brother's hands. If he didn't get raped from the very second they stepped foot in the palace, he was sure to be tortured, or even worse; killed. Sehun felt tears prick at his eyes again and had a hard time steadying his voice when the image of any of those gruesome thing happening to his Luhan passed by his eyes. "Please believe me! I would never do this to any of you! To Luhan...I swear on my life...I would never..."
"You got the Chief killed, you know," the boy commented, his voice rather monotonous. "You got our people killed. You caused the bloodshed of hundreds; young, innocent souls too. Are you happy? Was that what you'd waited for all this time, while you were stringing Luhan along?"
"Never! I never wanted any of this to happen!"
He looked around the sunken faces of the girls and boys who were all tied up, trying to find a comforting face, but they all looked away from him.
"Are you here to bed all the virgins, then? Is that why you're in here with us? For your little harem of untouched? Because you already had Luhan, right? That was his job, after all. To be given to you as a gift. Too bad he didn't know you were a lying, insatiable dog. You could have spared him his dignity." Sehun turned to face the foul-mouthed boy, suddenly angry.
"Look...I don't know why I'm in here. But I have nothing to do with my father and his army. Nothing." He stared the boy hard in the eyes. "The royal family is evil, malicious at best and destructive at worst. I left the Kingdom to escape this filthy place, believe me."
"I believe you, Sehun."
He turned around as the familiar voice, and saw none other than Chen sitting against the wall, his head leaned back and his ankle chained to the stone. Sehun felt like crying, like screaming and tearing into his own flesh, because all of these good people were hurting, and even Luhan's best friend, who had done nothing but show him kindness, was taking his side while thrown in his family's dungeons.
"Y-you..."
"Look...you're a good guy. I know one when I see one." He smiled half-heartedly at the ground, and then flicked his eyes up to lock with Sehun's. "This isn't your fault."
"Like hell it isn't!" The angry sixteen year old boy cut in, but Chen sent him a silencing look.
"Shut your bitter mouth, Chanyeol. Finding someone to blame won't get us out of here any time soon. Or reverse the tragedy that has already happened." Chanyeol stayed quiet at that, frowning and glaring away to the side. Chen turned back to Sehun, and then continued speaking with a forced smile. "I know Luhan wouldn't have wanted us to blame you. He would have wanted us to stay positive and help you like one of our own."
Sehun frowned deeply, clutching the end of his vest. "You speak of him like he's dead..."
"You don't think he is?" Chen raised an eyebrow. "What state do you think he’s in, then?"
Sehun bit back a sob, digging his nails into his kneecaps. Probably naked. Bleeding. "Tortured. My brother wouldn't spare him the courtesy of ending his life when he can still make him scream. Kai is the devil himself; he likes playing with his food and has no empathy."
Chen paled at that, quietening up quickly. Sehun just sank down on the ground and heard himself begin to cry, grappling at the cobbled floor in desperation. Nobody spoke again that night. His low and mournful howling was the only sound that filled the room, running on until the break of dawn.
*
The days passed to slowly when there was only misery. After what felt like the third day in captivity, he thought his innards were going to eat themselves because he hadn't had a lick of food touch his tongue in what felt like years. Nobody stopped by to drop off food. Not even a crumb of bread or a drop of water. Everyone's faces were hollowing up slowly, fingers turning blue and spindly, and Sehun could hear stomachs screaming and see people who were too fatigued to even lift their eyelids. He also saw and smelled the rotting flesh of one or two of the virgins who had died from bleeding wounds that they'd carried since the army had attacked. Flies were gathering in a corner.
Sehun just didn’t understand why he was down there in the first place; it didn’t add up. Hadn’t they made a big show of ‘coming to rescue him’? Had they just forgotten about him and he’d ended up on the dungeons with the others by mistake? He was so certain he would have been forced back to his bleak room, forced to take classes and be guarded from leaving forever. Maybe this was punishment, being down here.
But in all honesty. Sehun only wished to be out of there so that he could see Luhan again and hopefully save him from whatever gruesome fate was inevitably planned out for him. He had agonizing pangs in his heart whenever he thought of him, filled with guilt and sadness, so he tried not to, but then again Luhan’s beautiful and happy face was the only thing that kept him going, that stopped him from just sinking to the floor and giving up completely. Because he had to find him. And he had to help him. And he had to make sure nobody touched a hair on his head.
He tried to call for help several times, call for his father, reluctantly; even call for Kai, but his throat was too parched to even produce any sound. He managed to sit himself in the corner of the room against the wall, next to Chen, who just couldn't seem to stop smiling, for some reason.
One day Chen started shaking his head and chuckling to himself and Sehun asked him what was the matter.
"It's kind of funny, now that I think about it...in a really morbid way,” he said, eyes unfocused and his voice sounding oddly hysterical but excited at the same time. Sehun feared he might be going crazy, slowly but surely, from the darkness and tragedy and lack of food. All the signs were there. "I just remembered...I actually know how Luhan came to our village, and where he's from." He laughed loudly again, and Sehun turned his lips down, feeling weary and anxious. Nobody else bothered to turn or listen; Chen had been babbling on for a few days already. But only now did he seem completely eloquent. "I overheard the Chief talking about it to someone one night, on a fine spring day." He smiled, as if reminiscing, but Sehun noticed he also had two tears trailed down from his eyes. "Do you want in on the secret, Sehun? I haven't told him because I’m afraid he'll be hurt, you know. He thinks he's a part of our clan, our family, and he loves it. I simply can't break it to him. The Chief would probably have me killed if I did too; it seemed like such confidential information. Funny I should remember it all now when it almost seems funny. See, Luhan thinks his mother was a nomad from the area, who dropped him off here because she couldn't afford to raise him."
Sehun used all the strength he had to sit up straight. His back was aching and his lips were cracked and painful bleeding from dryness, but he grit his teeth, humouring Chen. "Where is he really from?"
Chen held up a finger to him, looking at him pointedly. "He came to us one night many years ago; I remember it as clear as day. This woman, a foreign woman, she came waddling to our town after having crossed the desert -the entire western desert!- and collapsed on the ground as her water broke for everyone to see. She was beautiful; stunning woman she was, just like Luhan. The Chief had her carried into his hut and asked for the aid of all the people he knew. Sadly, she died during childbirth. Tragedy, really. Do you know where she came from, though? Who she was? I should have recognized her. It was so obvious from her appearance and clothes."
Sehun held his breath, and only by some miracle managed to ask. "Who was she?"
"Our Luhan is the son of the Queen from your kingdom!" Chen yelled into the room, his eyes wide and his mouth drawn into an open, toothy grin. He clapped his hands. "The Queen who used to live with the King and his two sons. He's a royal, can you believe it? The Queen gave birth to him right there, in our little village, of all places, after being cast out by your King. Our little Luhan is a prince. Ha! I always knew he was special! Oh, the irony! This would make a great play, don't you think? I find it rather funny. How often do you come across coincidences like this?"
Sehun was so stunned and couldn't feel his face, nor his hands or feet, for that matter. He couldn't breathe. His brain was refusing to process any of what he'd just heard, and he only focused on the scent of death and decay infiltrating his nostrils like some sort of passive diffusion. He felt dizzy. He felt sick. He felt like expelling the entire inside of his body out of his mouth.
He heard Chanyeol laugh loudly in the distance.
He had to lay down on the floor, his senses clouding up and his whole body going weak.
So his father had exiled his mother because she was pregnant with a third child. He'd probably though she was bearing a girl. Third children were always girls, everybody knew that. At least that was what the rumour was. And his father hated women. The biggest misogynist to ever live. Except Luhan had turned out to be a boy. Luhan was a boy...and Luhan was his brother. One he never knew he had.
He was in love with his brother. He'd kissed, sucked, and fucked his brother. He lusted after his brother and was enamoured with him beyond reason, beyond doubt.
He was going straight to hell.
Luhan was his brother.
*
Sehun didn’t get up off the ground for another three days. The only reason he hadn’t died was because the boy who had been angry with him and laughed at him, Chanyeol, had stuck some dry food in his mouth that they’d been spared with on their fifth day as guard brought a plate of nourishment to their cell. He’d passed him some water too, maybe out of pity, maybe for no reason at all, but all Sehun knew was that he had yet to be choked in a sea of black as death crept up on him.
Passing thoughts flashed by his head of how much he wished he’d grown up with Luhan. But then those images were intercepted with pictures of him fucking Luhan and coming inside him like one would breed, and he had to scrape at his face and pull at his hair because everything was making him nauseous and absolutely crazy. He kept moaning to himself in agony, because he’d lost something he didn’t want to lose, in the most horrible and tactless way, and everything was going wrong. He couldn’t see anything easing his pain.
He wasn’t sure if Chen was still alive, because he hadn’t had the energy to turn around and check on him. He was sure he’d heard him sing some silly tune yesterday, what had sounded like a kid’s song or something of the like, but other than that people were decaying left and right, and the space grew gradually more quiet, like a sail losing wind. Somehow, Sehun still managed to flex his fingers and suck in air into his lungs, and he could feel his heart still beating -quickly and stuck in some sort of panic- but beating nonetheless.
At night his mind went to a dark place, where everything came to spite him, and he kept yelling, taking to himself and crying; so, so angry. He mostly yelled at Kai, because he wanted him to drop dead and have his limbs ripped off as they were thrown into a burning inferno.
"You're fornicating with your own brother, you sick pig!” He roared, hitting his clenched fists into the ground. It was probably making him bleed. “And you don't even know it! I hope you come deep inside him and recognize the smell of his skin, you bane-tongued demon! I hope you hear our mother's painful screams in your ears every second you're with him! He's mine! He's mine, and you took him from me!"
Oh, he wailed long into the night. He wailed and wished he had Luhan to hold beside him, because he missed him, his small body and fiery spirit, his brilliant eyes and playful smile.
He only gained his wits back slightly when there one day walked in a guard of the prisons, leaving yet another batch of food for them to get by on. Sehun sat up instantly, staring at the man. Then he got to his feet, even if his joints ached and he was drenched in chilling sweat.
The guard noticed him this time, and he stood there gaping. “Young master...”
Sehun nodded at the name. He’d been called that many times. It had replaced his name entirely as a child, the only exception being when his father or his older brother called for him, when he went by his given name.
He walked forwards slowly, keeping his eyes locked with the man. They were nameless to him. Faceless too. They had no purpose but to do the Royal Family’s bidding, and still no feeling of familiarity reached him.
Sehun grabbed for the guard’s dagger, unsheathing it from his waist where it was perched, then without warning rammed it forward right into his solar plexus, seething. The guard sputtered, making choked noises and eventually coughing up blood, until he fell forward like a dead weight to Sehun’s feet.
Nobody said anything as Sehun left the cell, holding the bloody dagger down from his right hand.
*
There was only one place Sehun wanted to go; where his legs were taking him on auto-pilot through the rather empty and silent palace halls. It was a wonder that he even remembered the way; he’d never had to walk to Kai’s room much except for when he’d try to steal some of the ‘important documents’ his father had passed on to him, never letting him get even single whiff of what they were about. But he was headed there now, with only one thing in mind: to find Luhan. Alive and well, hopefully. He prayed while he walked, and even though the walls were looking a little out of shape to him and his surroundings were bending slightly, he widened his eyes so he’d be able to see better.
It was a miracle how nobody had seen him yet; it was like the whole castle was asleep. Well, maybe they were. Was it night time? Sehun hadn’t checked the light of any window, storming straight up the spiral stairs instead, one foot in front of the other like he’d never done anything else in his life. The door to Kai’s room was right in front of him, slightly ajar, and Sehun tread up to it, trying to control his rather loud and deep breathing.
He peered inside, looking for moving figures and listening for any sound. He didn’t know what he had expected to see. Chaos, maybe. Gore and violence. But everything was silent, and he couldn’t see anything in his line of vision, so he let his free hand push open the door, getting a wider viewing angle.
Kai was nowhere to be seen, he noted. The room was quite stuffy, an interesting change from the coldness he’d been locked in for so long, and he kept himself alert as he entered, treading softly, like that would keep anyone from seeing him.
“Luhan?” He asked into the room. What if he was mistaken? What if Luhan wasn’t even there and Kai kept him someplace else to play with or torture him? Sehun shook his head. He couldn’t think like that. He had to focus and use his eyes properly, because there was still a chance that Luhan would be somewhere in there.
And then he saw him. He didn’t know how he hadn’t found him earlier, because he was in such an obvious place, but his presence was almost invisible. He was lying on Kai’s grand bed, on top of the sheets, his arms tucked in near his head. To Sehun’s surprise, he was still wearing the clothes he’d been captured in. They hadn’t been ripped or torn, and even his jewellery was still in place, sitting snug around his thin limbs. There was also no blood as far as Sehun could see, and he didn’t know whether that should make him relieved or more worried, but he ended up with worried, because there was no way nothing bad had happened. And his eyes...as soon as Sehun found them, his chest tightened. Luhan was staring straight ahead, spotted to somewhere on the far off wall, and his eyes were so empty, so distant, it was like his soul had left his body.
“Luhan?” He tried to get his attention, walking up to him with slow steps. He should hurry, because Kai could be back at any moment, but he didn’t want to startle him, because he looked so fragile.
As soon as he stepped into Luhan’s vision, Luhan’s chest rose like he was inhaling a big bout of air, and his face cracked a smile, the smallest he’d ever seen him wear, but still better than the empty expression he’d been sporting. “Sehun,” he said, more gentle than a gust of summer wind. His voice sounded a little strained; a little weak. Maybe he hadn’t been fed either. Sehun had been weak, but he was strong now, because he had a job to do.
“Where’s Kai?” Sehun just asked, clutching the dagger by his side tighter as he became wary and tense, his heartbeat pounding in his ears like a war drum. He felt anxious and panicked at the same time, and his palms were sweating like he was Icarus flying in front of the sun, melting fast.
“I don’t know,” came Luhan’s reply a few slow seconds later. His voice sounded grated...a little hoarse, maybe. It rendered Sehun even more uncomfortable in any case.
He looked down at Luhan’s limp form, trying to figure out what was wrong with him. Kai must have violated him. He must have. Why else would he be lying in his bed? He must have tortured him, ruined him even further than he already was by Sehun’s filthy hand.
“What did he do to you?” Sehun yelled, almost asphyxiating on his own fast breathing as he stared down at his lover...little brother. “What did he do to you?!”
“Shhh, Sehun, calm down,” Luhan said quietly, raising one of his hands up as if reaching out to him. Sehun could barely hear what he was saying, especially with the annoying thumping in his ears and the way he was sweating. He was so uncomfortable.
He strode over to his bed and sat down, lifting Luhan into his arms and squeezing him into his chest. He squeezed him as hard as he could, with the minimal muscles he had left to give him strength, and sighed into his warm neck. He’d missed him so much. He’d been terrified of losing him, of bad things happening to him in general, because Luhan was his sun and full moon and compass in general, making his head spin and his feel like he’d never felt before. And he loved him; he adored him so much, but when he pulled back from his neck and gazed into Luhan’s eyes, he realized gruellingly just how alike they were his mother’s.
And then he couldn’t see anything else. The skin he was touching on Luhan’s arms and his back, in made him flinch, and felt like he was breathing through a thick film, unable to draw a breath properly. Sehun had ruined him with an evil, and it made him almost tear up. Incest. He’d had his baby brother. Him and Kai. He’d been desecrated beyond repair. They’d done the unforgivable.
Luhan wasn’t his to have. He never had been.
“Oh, Luhan, this is bad. We’ve done something bad. Bad, bad, bad.” He shook his head, drawing back from him slowly. He was torn because he wanted to hold and kiss Luhan so much, but at the same time he would rather have his hands burned with blistering oil.
“What are you talking about?” Luhan asked, and he sounded so blissfully unaware, like his life had never been tainted. It Saddened Sehun to the very core. And considering what he was about to do...
He allowed tears to gather in his eyes, though he was still ashamed. The room was spinning to him again, and he groaned, running his hands down the side of Luhan’s arms. In the next second he pushed Luhan back on the mattress with one arm, pinning him down with his body rested heavily on top of him. He didn’t even care if Kai walked in. He had to do this, the need was killing him, screaming inside his head and making his tongue numb up, decaying his senses one by one like he was being annihilated by a slow-killing poison. Oh, it was creeping.
“S-Sehun?” Luhan asked under him, and Sehun drew his head up, refusing to look Luhan in the eyes. He couldn’t. He absolutely couldn’t. Instead he focused on the bow of his upper lip, trying not to think about how he’d kissed it, and how much he wanted to kiss it now.
He lowered his face so that he could feel Luhan breathing into him, resting his forehead against Luhan’s while still avoiding his eyes. He could sense Luhan’s eyes flickering around, nervous maybe, surprised perhaps, and his inhales were drawing more rapidly, fogging up Sehun’s mind. He was ready.
With a swift shift of his body he gripped steel pushed down to be certain Luhan wouldn’t struggle, then penetrated under his chin and drew the dagger down his jugular, slicing through the skin like it was nothing but paper, revealing an endless sea of red underneath. Luhan didn’t have time to scream but he sputtered, looking up into Sehun’s eyes in acute confusion, his gaze desperate and afraid; terrified, in fact, and screaming in place of his blocked throat. Sehun could almost hear the scream in his ears. In fact, he did hear it. Loud. And he screamed back at him.
Luhan bucked up then, struggling, but Sehun shushed him and held him down as best as he could.
“I’m sorry I ruined you. My own flesh and blood," he kissed Luhan's forehead, smoothing his hair back gently. “You can’t live with this. If I’d known you were my brother...I swear I would have stayed away. I would have never made you sin so badly. But I fell in love with you and I...I-I just got caught up in it- I didn’t even stop to think!” He breathed in near Luhan’s neck and could have sworn he felt a faint waft of honeysuckle. “Oh, forgive me...if not in this life, then in the next one...” Luhan’s skin was still soft, still wonderfully delicate and smooth, and he traced his sticky hands over his sides, feeling his warm flesh glide under his fingertips. He was slightly too thin now, and his hipbones poked into Sehun’s lower abdomen. “Luhan?” He asked quietly, raising his head from his neck.
Luhan didn’t respond. His eyes were staring right in his direction, but he wasn’t saying a thing. The thin flow of air from his lungs wasn’t spilling out of his small mouth anymore, and the little twitches in his body were gone. Dead, like his mother. Very, very dead.
*
Sehun was found by the castle guards, a few hours later, when the palace had started waking up.
He’d carried Luhan into his old room, the one he’d spent many bitter and lonesome nights in, laying him down on the maple hardwood floor, where his feet had tread as a child. He’d pulled out a small chest from under his bed, which had been exactly where he’d left it before he had departed for a new land, and had traced the edges of it with a smile.
He’d been found playing with toy trains from the dusty chest on the floor with Luhan’s cold hand held firmly in his, like he was trying to make up for a lost childhood.
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a/n: the enddd :)