Your fuse is fireside
★Title: Your fuse is fireside for everyone ♡
★Pairing:fem!Kyungsoo/Lay, fem!Chanyeol/Suho and others.
★Rating: pg
★Length:4600 words
★Warnings/Disclaimers:fem!Kyungsoo, sassy peacock Jongdae, implied non-con /(very very slight)/, mentions of slave trade, might have some inaccuracies and inconsistenciesi haven’t read TCoN in forever.
★Author’s notes/Messages for the recipient:i had a semi-hard time writing this but i enjoyed the experience nonetheless. Thank you mods for giving me this opportunity ♥. This is also poop because I wrote a lot and then deleted everything and decided to rewrite in a day, kill me god.
★Summary: Chronicles of Narnia!au. Kyungsoon never thought the stories she read as a child were real and neither was she aware of how sweet a certain Calormen prince would be.
Do Kyungsoon is known for one trait. Despite her small stature, her fierceness is something everyone in K-ARTS talks about. That, and her dulcet tones, how her every note sounds like honey. People like Kim Jongdae's high notes better but after their duet for the year end performances, there was no denying that Kyungsoon had a lovely voice. Every day, at six p.m sharp, you can find Do Kyungsoon on the swing, singing everything from Muse to Passion Pit to Justin Bieber.
This story begins at the swings, Kyungsoon huddling against the cold while she composes her first song. Byun Baekhyun, or rapbyun (not as bad as the freshman who called himself Rap Monster) as they fondly called him, was supposed to have met her nearly an hour ago but he'd cancelled on the account of it being his girlfriend's birthday.
"He's my baby..." she hums, pencilling in lyrics under the existing sheet music, happy .
She's interrupted by Park Chanhee laughing, hanging off her boyfriend's arm. Chanhee has at least six inches on Kim Junmyeon but it works, in a way. Junmyeon is a soothing balm to Chanhee's loud behavior.
"Kyungsoon-yah!Kyungsoon-yah!"Kyungsoon stares at her, mildly annoyed at the interruption. Junmyeon smiles apologetically.
“Working on your new song, Kyungsoon?” Junmyeon calls out.
“Yeah, I am.” Was.Kyungsoon bites on her tongue, resisting the urge to ask Junmyeon to put a leash on Chanyeol. Well, since the muse was already.
She hums, packing up her things.
☽☾
“Kyungsoon! Hey! Sorry I couldn’t make it yesterday,” Baekhyun smiles sheepishly before plopping himself on the grass.
Kyungsoon wrinkles her nose in distaste, reshuffling her notes.
“We’re working on the lyrics, right?” Baekhyun flips through his own copy and Kyungsoon notes the many crossed out lyrics the elder has. More than her, that’s for sure.
“Yeah we are.” They sit together in silence, trading words back and forth. They’ve already decided that the song was going to be about confessions. They’re probably ten, fifteen minutes in when Kyungsoon feels a pinch on her calf.
She kicks her leg out. “Stop pinching me, Baek.”
Baekhyun looks up, puzzled. “I’m not..?” Kyungsoo huffs.
The air is still, almost as if waiting with bated breath for something to occur. The pinching and the prickling is everywhere now, and Kyungsoon throws her sheet music down, glaring at Baekhyun. “Byun Baekhyun,” she hisses in her cute murder voice. “I will -“
Are you familiar with the sound of a whistling kettle? It fills the air and Kyungsoo claps her hands over her ears, squeezing her eyes shut. The sound passes and she opens her eyes.
☽☾
Kyungsoon stares at her surroundings, intricate pillars carved with fleur de lis and inlaid with gemstones. Wherever she is, it isn’t Korea for sure. It looks like something that came out of Game of Thrones, greater than King’s Landing itself. Kyungsoon trails her fingers along the wooden railing, the wood shining as if it’s been polished every day. It’s then that she hears the hurried footsteps of someone walking through the corridor and she flinches. This could go really bad.
The footsteps sound closer and Kyungsoon glances around, searching for a place to hide. There is, predictably, none.
“Stop right there, slave!” A man is
Kyungsoo glares at the man. “I am not a slave! I don’t even know where I am.” She’s dragged along by what she assumes is a guard, shouting at him until they are led into a hall.
"Kneel before the Tisroc Wu Yi Fan and the crown Tharkaan, Zhang Yixing." The herald announces as she is marched into the Grand Hall. Kyungsoo is pushed unceremoniously to her knees, glaring at the guards and shaking herself free, meeting the Tisroc's gaze head on.
"State your name and origins, slave." The Tisroc commands, brows furrowing.
Tisroc Wu has charisma, she notes. Alongside charisma, he also a voice that rumbles with a familiarity of wielding power and status.
Kyungsoo stares at him with a level gaze. "I am not a slave. I am Do Kyungsoo," she runs through a list of cities in her place. "Princess of K-ARTS, from the Far East."
The Tisroc's brows raise to his hairline. "I was unaware that the Tarkheena of K-ARTS was lodging with us." His gaze turns accusatory as he stares at the guard.
"Were you uninformed of the situation, Shi XunTarkhaan?"
The guard kneels, arm crossed over his heart. "Forgive my impertinence, O Greatest Tisroc."
Tisroc Wu clicks his tongue, dismissing the guard. "Yixing, get the Tarkheena familiarized with our customs, as well as garbed into something more..." The Tisroc makes a face, almost as if he's pained to see Kyungsoon's clothes. She glances down at her plaid shirt and leggings. Her clothes were acceptable, unlike some of the other things she’d seen the women of the palace wearing.
The prince nods and leads her away. “Come along now, Tarkheena, we shall find suitable quarters and clothing for you.” The prince, Tarkhaan, whatever, has a nice voice. And a very blank face.A blank handsome face. She turns around, struggling to see if the king has left. He hasn’t.
Kyungsoon is led into a room the likes of which she’d never seen before, or would have the chance to. The room is wide, with soaring ceilings; a canopy bed on one end and a bathtub sunken into the floor at the other. The wall is inlaid with carvings of a man-bird with six arms, and dancing women bearing resemblance to the apsaras famous in Angkor Wat. This palace looked like something of Angkor Wat, or Persia.
“Wow.” She gasps out.
“Astonishing, isn’t it Tarkheena?” Yixing runs his fingers along the bedspread, smiling at her. She notices he has a dimple.
“It is.” She breathes out. And Kyungsoo is impressed, the domed ceiling is painted a dark blue and inlaid with diamonds that shimmer like stars.
“There will be clothes in the dresser, and I shall send the servants to aid you, Tarkheena.”
“Taarkhan?” Kyungsoo asks, more than slightly nervous.
“Yes?” he asks expectantly. “This is Calormen, is it not?” His smile is bright as he nods and leaves the room. Calormen, if Kyungsoo recalls correctly, was something she’d red of in the books, in The Chronicles of Narnia. Perhaps she had been transported to Narnia and was now living a very, very bizarre life.
☽☾
“Shall we visit the Calormene markets today, Tarkheena?” Yixing smiles at her from the doorway of her room and Kyungsoon feels warmth pooling in her belly, the same one she associated with her first crush, Kim Jongin. Last night, she had had dinner with the Tisroc and Yixing. They’d exchanged some pleasantries while Kyungsoon was fed things she’d never heard of before and entertained by music she’d never listened to. She didn’t have to move her hands, not at all, for there were slaves for everything under the sun, right down to feeding them gulabjamun, a sweet delicacy brought out for the so called princess.
“I’d love to, Taarkan.” Kyungsoon pushes the covers off herself; she’d been surprised by how cold it was at night.
Yixing’s smile is like a soothing balm, faintly reminding her of Junmyeon, and yet different at the same time. She watches as he bosses the servants arounddrawing up a bath for her and setting out clothes. Kyungsoon can’t say she’s ever been treated like a princess and she finds herself enjoying it, a lot. He exits the room with a “be fast,” and Kyungsoon finds herself falling fast.
Fresh from her bath, grime and sweat scrubbed from her skin and smelling faintly like roses, Kyungsoon slips into the dress the servants have laid out for her. It’s simple; white, with gold trimmings and a gold belt cinched around her waist. She’d compare it to a Greek chiton, and it was as comfortable as she’d dreamed they’d be.
“You look lovely, Tarkheena. A fitting match for our Prince.” One of the servants says as she braids Kyungsoon’s hair with jasmine.
Yixing is at the courtyard and Kyungsoon can’t resist the urge to twirl in front of him. “Do you like the dress?”
Yixing gives a noncommittal hum and Kyungsoon feels her heart plunging into her stomach.
They have a breakfast of dried fruits and fresh fruits, with plenty of wine and cheese before setting off. They’re followed by even more slaves, 6 males and 6 females who escort them through the winding halls of the palace.
Once they cross the threshold of the palace into the markets, Yixing extends an arm. “Shall we, Kyungsoon?” She nods shyly, placing her hand in the crook of Yixing’s arm as butterflies swarm in her stomach.
Yixing points out places as they go, points out the people haggling over wood and spices. Kyungsoon’ssidetracked by the process of slave trading, watching people clamour over a dainty girl with a golden collar around her neck and her head held high. Her name is Minseok, Yixing says, and she’s the biggest commodity. No one has been able to buy her for every man who offers a price, another places a price thousand dinars more than before.
They stop and buy street food; bananas mashed and fried with flour, gulabjamun soaked in sweetened alcohol instead of sugar, preserved fruits and various types of bread to the point that Kyungsoon feels more than slightly sick. It also sickens her that wherever they go, people make way for Yixing and her, shooting them almost reverential looks.
Further along the road, Kyungsoon is met with an exquisite sight. People are crowding in front of an enclosure, clearing with murmured whispers of “Taarkhan” and “Taarkheena” as Yixing and Kyungsoon make their way to the very front. A peacock is singing and Kyungsoon has a frightful feeling it might be a talking animal of Narnia.
“And you'll be lost, every river that you tried to cross.Every gun you ever held went off,oh and I'm just waiting 'til the firing's stopped. Oh and I'm just waiting 'til the shine wears off,” it sings, in a voice of gold and diamonds. The Calormene are haggling over prices.
“This will be another commodity.” Yixing says as he pauses to look. The peacock stops singing at that shooting Yixing an affronted look before waddling over the fence and pecking Yixing’s hand. Kyungsoon doesn’t stop the surprised bubble of laughter that escapes her lips when she sees the peacock, now smug.
“My name is Jongdae and I refused to be sold.” He spits at Yixing before turning to her. “Kind, kind, Taarkheena, please, do me a favour and spare me from this hell. I am meant to be free,Taarkheena but these barbarians have enslaved me like a pack animal.”
Kyungsoon opens her mouth to reply when the stall owner comes rushing by, chasing the peacock away and apologizing profusely. Jongdae gives her a baleful look and Kyungsoon feels her heart melt; this was wrong in so many ways. Yixing led her away, clearly annoyed as the stall owner called out prices at their retreating backs.
Kyungsoon pauses when she witnesses a man shouting at a horse carrying a load of wood upon it’s back.
“Move, you dumb horse!” The man shouts, bringing the whip down on the poor thing. The horse crumples. “Sire, sire, please, I’m thirsty.” It pants out and Kyungsoo is pained to see such cruelty. Jongdae was right; Calormen was no place for Narnians.
“Yixing, we have to see what’s happening in Narnia. It is cruel.”
Yixing purses his lips and glances disapprovingly at her. “It is the way of the Calormen, TarkheenaKyungsoo, it is not something we can shed just like that.”
“Please.” she pleads, gazing at Yixing with wide eyes.
☽☾
“I intend to observe the trading between Narnians and ourselves, father. There has been a lot of good trade from the North recently, most of it being their wood and their talking animals.”
The king rubs his forehead, brows furrowing in concentration. The Tisroc Wu Yi Fan was a great monarch, according to what Yixing had told her but there was something wrong in how he was ignorant of the plight of the Talking Animals. Then again, in the stories she had read, the Calormen never bore the good of Narnia at heart. It was a society based on caste, with slavery as its core.
“If you were to be harmed-“
“No such harm will befall me, father, for they also claim Tash the inexorable has chosen Narnia as his own resting place for now. This journey will be blessed by Tash the irresistible himself, and seeing as the Crown Prince Lu Han is staying behind, it is only fair if I see Tash the inexorable. He will bless us all, and my sacrifice will be the pilgrimage into Narnia.”
Tisroc Wu exhales heavily, before nodding minutely. “Will you be taking the girl with you?” he gestures at Kyungsoon and for a moment, she feels affronted. She is no girl, she is a young woman, from a respectable family with talents like no other. Then again, she is in an unfamiliar land.An unfamiliar fictional land.
“I will be, sire.” It is as though Yi Fan knows he has no say in his son’s plans now, and that the most sensible thing will be to give in.
“Very well then, the two of you may travel under the guise of merchants. You may leave as soon as you’re prepared, with the blessing of Tash and my own.”
Yixing drops to one knee, crossing his right arm over his chest. Kyungsoon follows and they wait on their knees until his father rises, and makes his leave from the throne.
“Your brother-Lu Han, why does he bear a different name from yours? Yours is Zhang, isn’t it?” Kyungsoon asks, taking two steps for every stride of Yixing’s. The prince is not that much taller than her but his legs are still longer and she always has been slightly short.
“The Tisroc, my father, he has three wives, as demanded by Calormen law. Lu Han was born of his second wife, the eldest. His first wife bore me and my youngest brother, Zi Tao, was born of his third wife.” Yixing takes a turn to the left and Kyungsoon follows behind closely. Its funny how he’s so focused now, opposed to how he was yesterday.
“Where are your brothers?” Kyungsoon gasps out.
“Lu Han is on diplomatic business in the South and Zi Tao is on his yearly visit to Archenland.” It is then that Yixing slows his pace down, and Kyungsoon catches up.
The prince whirls around, beaming at her. “Pack for the dessert, Tarkheena for we are going on an adventure.”
When Yixing said adventure, it really meant the Tisroc insisting the pack satchels of food and water, alongside clothes made for the desert weather in the afternoon. Their leave was a quiet affair, and for the first time, they aren’t flocked by slaves.
☽☾
The Fords of Beruna are calm, calm enough to ride past without getting drowned and despite the fact that Kyungsoon has never been to Narnia before, it feels too still, too quiet. In all the stories she’d read, there always was joy and merriment. The trek between the desserts and Narnia had been hard and rough but once they’d crossed the Archenland pass, most of the hardship seemed to cease.
They’d also had word -word that had excited Yixing for many had said Tash was visiting Narnia, where the Calormen were felling trees and selling slaves in her name. It was the one thing about Yixing that Kyungsoon chose to overlook; his mindless dedication to Tash. He was not to be blamed, she supposed, but there was still something about it that upset her deeply.
“Yixing?”
“Yes, Tarkheena?”Kyungsoo purses her lips. “How many times have I told you to not call me that.”
The elder smiles guilelessly. “Countless.” He breaks into a peal of laughter, urging his horse forward. Kyungsoon giggles as she tries to catch up, leaning parallel to the horse’s body and digging her heels into the stallion’s sides. While it took a while to get familiarised with horse-riding, she considered herself an expert at this point.
Kyungsoon hears nothing as they race ahead, until Yixing’s horse whinnies and Yixing is thrown off as the horse canters away. Kyungsoon yanks on the reins of her own horse, forcing the stallion to dismount as she dismounts and rushes to Yixing’s side.
The ford is filled with the sound of cantering and men jeering as they’re surrounded.
“Bandits.” Yixing hisses as they dismount from their own horses. Kyungsoon is pulled to her feet and away from Yixing, watching as the other men hoist Yixing upright. There are four of them, and she’s willing to give all the provisions they have if the bandits would leave them alone.
“Well, well, well, looks like Chanyeol has a fine haul today. And what do we have here?” the man Kyungsoon assumes is Chanyeol says. Chanyeol has unruly hair, curly and in an awful shade of red-orange, with a body toughened from years in the jungle. His voice belongs in a level of its own, sending ice down her spine.
“I am the son of the Tisroc, shame be upon you for treating one from the lineage of Tash as such.” Yixing shouts, struggling against the men holding him captive.
The leader of the bandits, Chanyeol, sneers at them. “Son of the Tisroc, and yet you bear the pallor of the Northernmen, of the filthy white monkeys.”
“Don’t hurt him!” Kyungsoo pleads, struggling against the men holding her back.
“Don’t hurt him?” Chanyeol tilts her face up. “Do you want to see what we do to the bitches of the white monkeys, Tarkheena?”
Chanyeol leers, pulling her in by the belt of her dress. His bandits surrender her to him and the fear is there, coursing through her veins and paralyzing her. Some things are genuinely things to be afraid of and this is one of them.
She closes her eyes when Chanyeol leans in to nose at her neck, his putrid scent filling her nose. She can’t breathe, tugging the sleeve of her dress down. She stiffens and that’s when the sound of grunts fills the air, of metal clanging. She opens her eyes to find Yixing swinging his scimitar at the bandits, body as fluid as a snake. They all drop like dominoes, one after another until it’s only Chanyeol and her left. Kyungsoon breaks free from her captor and runs behind Yixing, trembling from fear.
“I don’t believe in using my prowess with the sword to harm people,” Yixing says, one hand holding Kyungsoo protectively behind her, shielding her from view as she adjusts her sleeves and fastens her belt. She’s relieved, so relieved that Chanyeol hadn’t done anything.
“Now tell us where Tash is.”
☽☾
When they arrive at the clearing Tash is rumoured to be, all that greets them is a dying bonfire and creatures, humans, Talking Animal, dwarves, in various states of distress. The animals were moaning and groaning. At the very top of the hill however, stood a stable. They witnessed a shadow picking up a man, and flying away as the stable door burst open in a flood of light. Illuminated by that light was Aslan, and the great Kings and Queens of old.
Kyungsoon and Yixing watch in fascination as the great Lion, the son of the Emperor-Beyond-the-Sea step out of the stable door, alongside the kings and queens of old. He shook his great mane, roaring “Now it is time! Time!”
The Earth was black, and Kyungsoon felt a fear like no other grip her heart. She squeezed tightly onto Yixing’s hand, watching as the stars were blocked by a black shadow, rising and rising. The great shadow rose a horn to his mouth and blew. The sound-it wasn’t something you heard often, high and terrible, filled with a peculiar beauty.
Instantaneously, the sky was full of shooting stars. Kyungsoon couldn’t compare it to a meteor shower, there were hundreds, maybe thousands of stars falling down like silver rain. In the light of the stars, Yixing looked as regal as the kings of old, mouth open in astonishment, in wonder.
“The sky!”Kyungsoon gasped out. The sky indeed. There was a blackness spreading and with trepidation, Kyungsoon realised the blackness was the sky, void of its stars. Aslan was calling them home. In science, Kyungsoon had learnt that stars were glowing balls of hydrogen. Here, she learnt that the stars were people, with hair of silver and skin of moonlight and eyes bluer than the Mediterranean sea. The stars lit up the furthest edge of Narnia, up to the boundaries of Ettinsmoor.
Then came the noise; the wailing, the shrieking, the rustling, the sound of wings. It came nearer and nearer and Kyungsoon watched as all kinds of creatures, by the thousands came rushing up the hill -Talking Animals, Satyrs, Giants, Dwarfs, Centaurs, Calormenes, men from Archenland, Telmarines, all of them ran up the hill, standing before the doorway of the stable.
Yixing and Kyungsoon were carried in the fracas, but as they drew closer to Aslan, one of two things happened. The creatures were forced, compelled to look to his face, and when some looked, their expressions changed terribly. Kyungsoon was afraid, she was just a simple girl who believed in the stories she’d read. Their expressions bore fear and terror, lasting for a fraction of a second before the Talking Animals ceased being talking animals and were just animals. They disappeared into Aslan’s great shadow.
Yixing and Kyungsoon were drawing closer now, a few Dwarfs and a leopard separating them. Those who looked at Aslan with love, with adoration, and more than a little fear made it past the door. Two dwarfs, one dwarf, she stood before Aslan.
Kyungsoo didn’t know what she’d done right in her life but as Yixing and her crossed the threshold into the world beyond the stable door, her breath was stolen.
“Further up and further in!” Yixing shouts, grabbing her hands in his as they run across the green, green meadow. For some reason, everything is much more colourful, every rock and flower and blade of grass looked as if it meant more, as if it would steal your breath. Yixing smiled and picked a pear from a tree.
“Here, Kyungsoon.” She glanced beseechingly at him before biting into the fruit, astonished by how it tasted. No pear of her world could compare to what she tasted in this land.
They kept running, following the other creatures and never felt the urge to look back. Soon, they reached before great, golden gates and Kyungsoon was shocked when a Talking Mouse stepped out. It bowed and greeted them, “Welcome, in the Lion’s name. Come further up and further in!”
Kyungsoon could recall the taste of bedtime stories her mother had read her, of the valiant Reepicheep who’d sailed to the end of the world with Caspian the Tenth. Her breath caught in her throat.
The mouse kept urging them to come in and they passed through the gates, into the delicious smell that permeated the air and into the cool sunlight and shadows of the trees, watching the Dryads dance and raise the Earth for a feast. In the middle of the field, at the foot of a great oak stood two thrones, and seated upon them were King Frank and Queen Helen from whom all the kings and queens of Narnia and Archenland descended from.
Yixing and Kyungsoo bowed before making their way to the edge of a cliff, staring at the lands beyond them. Everything seemed interconnected, like a delicate ring.
“This place is much bigger than I thought it would be.” For some unsaid reason, Kyungsoo feels the need to whisper.
“Indeed it is.” Yixing grips her hand tightly, and Kyungsoo feels all the supressed muse for her song flow in her veins. This was what she has been looking for her entire life.
There are footfalls behind them, silent, but shaking the earth. They turn and Kyungsoon is greeted by the Son-of-The-Emperor-Beyond-The-Sea, Aslan.
“My dear,” Aslan’s voice rumbles, washing over her. Yixing stands quietly by her side. “Your beloved,” Kyungsoo’s face flushes at the great Lion’s words.“Zhang Yixing, is permitted to stay with me. However, you are still young, with the world open to you.”
The lion’s voice washes over her and she breathes in the scent of courage and sacrifice, if it ever had one.
“I shall give the two of you a moment to yourselves before I send you home.” Aslan pads away, towards the old kings. One of them, Caspian the Tenth, she thinks, is staring at Yixing. Yixing nods once in his direction before pulling her to the edge of the cliffs.
“I will miss you, Kyungsoon.” Yixing’s voice sounds as gentle as it did when they met at the palace of his father, when his only god had been Tash.
“And I will miss you, Yixing.” Yixing smiles, dimple popping into existence before leaning in to press his forehead against hers.
“Never forget me, and Narnia.” She breathes in his breaths, watching as Yixing pulls out something and fastens it around her neck. It’s a thin silver chain, with a lion locket settling in the hollow of her throat.
Her voice catches in her throat. “Yixing--”
“Yes?”
“I love you.” His responding smile is brighter than the dying sun she had witnessed.
“Are you ready, child?” Aslan murmurs behind them. For an enormous lion, he moves around silently.
She nods, throat too dry to voice a positive affirmation. Aslan nudges her over the edge of the cliff with his head and Kyungsoon screams, wonders if the lion had made her plunge to her own death. “Faith, my child,” the lion seems to whisper to her as the howling of the wind rushes past.
☽☾
“-Kyungsoon?” Baekhyun is staring at her, snapping his fingers in front of her face.
Kyungsoon coughs viciously. The stories were true; time in Narnia didn’t pass the same way time here did.
“I’m fine.” She gasps out. “Can we continue tomorrow?” Baekhyun’s brows furrows in concern and she smiles reassuringly, trying to get a moment to herself.
“Alright then.” Baekhyun pats her back as he leaves, the creaking of the swing filling the evening silence.
Aslan had promised she’d return there.
☽☾
Kyungsoon is forty-five when she feels the familiar prickling on her back. She's driving to the convenience store and somehow, she knows. She knows she's going to meet her prince again. The sky seemed bluer in the winter morning, the snow made everything ephemeral and there was a tang in the air, something she associated with the blues and greens of Narnia.
The traffic light at the familiar intersection flashes red and Kyungsoon stops. The air is thick with tension, and static for some reason, goose bumps rising on her flesh. It’s at that moment the familiar pinching sensation begins; behind her neck, on her thigh, her cheek, and everywhere, all at once. She doesn’t notice the speeding car, or the fact that her own has stopped several feet outside the box. The car slams into the driver's side of her own as the traffic light turns green again. Kyungsoon smiles. She doesn't feel a thing.
When she opens her eyes again, Narnia lies before her in all its glory. Her entire left side hurts but nothing, nothing compares to the man that greets her. Yixing is standing at the pass and it's all it takes for Kyungsoon to start running towards him. He hasn’t changed in the slightest and when Kyungsoon looks at her own hands, all the lines and wrinkles of age has faded. She’s 19 again.
"Further up and further in," her prince whispers as they kiss for the first time in twenty-six years.
★Pairing:fem!Kyungsoo/Lay, fem!Chanyeol/Suho and others.
★Rating: pg
★Length:4600 words
★Warnings/Disclaimers:fem!Kyungsoo, sassy peacock Jongdae, implied non-con /(very very slight)/, mentions of slave trade, might have some inaccuracies and inconsistenciesi haven’t read TCoN in forever.
★Author’s notes/Messages for the recipient:i had a semi-hard time writing this but i enjoyed the experience nonetheless. Thank you mods for giving me this opportunity ♥. This is also poop because I wrote a lot and then deleted everything and decided to rewrite in a day, kill me god.
★Summary: Chronicles of Narnia!au. Kyungsoon never thought the stories she read as a child were real and neither was she aware of how sweet a certain Calormen prince would be.
Do Kyungsoon is known for one trait. Despite her small stature, her fierceness is something everyone in K-ARTS talks about. That, and her dulcet tones, how her every note sounds like honey. People like Kim Jongdae's high notes better but after their duet for the year end performances, there was no denying that Kyungsoon had a lovely voice. Every day, at six p.m sharp, you can find Do Kyungsoon on the swing, singing everything from Muse to Passion Pit to Justin Bieber.
This story begins at the swings, Kyungsoon huddling against the cold while she composes her first song. Byun Baekhyun, or rapbyun (not as bad as the freshman who called himself Rap Monster) as they fondly called him, was supposed to have met her nearly an hour ago but he'd cancelled on the account of it being his girlfriend's birthday.
"He's my baby..." she hums, pencilling in lyrics under the existing sheet music, happy .
She's interrupted by Park Chanhee laughing, hanging off her boyfriend's arm. Chanhee has at least six inches on Kim Junmyeon but it works, in a way. Junmyeon is a soothing balm to Chanhee's loud behavior.
"Kyungsoon-yah!Kyungsoon-yah!"Kyungsoon stares at her, mildly annoyed at the interruption. Junmyeon smiles apologetically.
“Working on your new song, Kyungsoon?” Junmyeon calls out.
“Yeah, I am.” Was.Kyungsoon bites on her tongue, resisting the urge to ask Junmyeon to put a leash on Chanyeol. Well, since the muse was already.
She hums, packing up her things.
☽☾
“Kyungsoon! Hey! Sorry I couldn’t make it yesterday,” Baekhyun smiles sheepishly before plopping himself on the grass.
Kyungsoon wrinkles her nose in distaste, reshuffling her notes.
“We’re working on the lyrics, right?” Baekhyun flips through his own copy and Kyungsoon notes the many crossed out lyrics the elder has. More than her, that’s for sure.
“Yeah we are.” They sit together in silence, trading words back and forth. They’ve already decided that the song was going to be about confessions. They’re probably ten, fifteen minutes in when Kyungsoon feels a pinch on her calf.
She kicks her leg out. “Stop pinching me, Baek.”
Baekhyun looks up, puzzled. “I’m not..?” Kyungsoo huffs.
The air is still, almost as if waiting with bated breath for something to occur. The pinching and the prickling is everywhere now, and Kyungsoon throws her sheet music down, glaring at Baekhyun. “Byun Baekhyun,” she hisses in her cute murder voice. “I will -“
Are you familiar with the sound of a whistling kettle? It fills the air and Kyungsoo claps her hands over her ears, squeezing her eyes shut. The sound passes and she opens her eyes.
☽☾
Kyungsoon stares at her surroundings, intricate pillars carved with fleur de lis and inlaid with gemstones. Wherever she is, it isn’t Korea for sure. It looks like something that came out of Game of Thrones, greater than King’s Landing itself. Kyungsoon trails her fingers along the wooden railing, the wood shining as if it’s been polished every day. It’s then that she hears the hurried footsteps of someone walking through the corridor and she flinches. This could go really bad.
The footsteps sound closer and Kyungsoon glances around, searching for a place to hide. There is, predictably, none.
“Stop right there, slave!” A man is
Kyungsoo glares at the man. “I am not a slave! I don’t even know where I am.” She’s dragged along by what she assumes is a guard, shouting at him until they are led into a hall.
"Kneel before the Tisroc Wu Yi Fan and the crown Tharkaan, Zhang Yixing." The herald announces as she is marched into the Grand Hall. Kyungsoo is pushed unceremoniously to her knees, glaring at the guards and shaking herself free, meeting the Tisroc's gaze head on.
"State your name and origins, slave." The Tisroc commands, brows furrowing.
Tisroc Wu has charisma, she notes. Alongside charisma, he also a voice that rumbles with a familiarity of wielding power and status.
Kyungsoo stares at him with a level gaze. "I am not a slave. I am Do Kyungsoo," she runs through a list of cities in her place. "Princess of K-ARTS, from the Far East."
The Tisroc's brows raise to his hairline. "I was unaware that the Tarkheena of K-ARTS was lodging with us." His gaze turns accusatory as he stares at the guard.
"Were you uninformed of the situation, Shi XunTarkhaan?"
The guard kneels, arm crossed over his heart. "Forgive my impertinence, O Greatest Tisroc."
Tisroc Wu clicks his tongue, dismissing the guard. "Yixing, get the Tarkheena familiarized with our customs, as well as garbed into something more..." The Tisroc makes a face, almost as if he's pained to see Kyungsoon's clothes. She glances down at her plaid shirt and leggings. Her clothes were acceptable, unlike some of the other things she’d seen the women of the palace wearing.
The prince nods and leads her away. “Come along now, Tarkheena, we shall find suitable quarters and clothing for you.” The prince, Tarkhaan, whatever, has a nice voice. And a very blank face.A blank handsome face. She turns around, struggling to see if the king has left. He hasn’t.
Kyungsoon is led into a room the likes of which she’d never seen before, or would have the chance to. The room is wide, with soaring ceilings; a canopy bed on one end and a bathtub sunken into the floor at the other. The wall is inlaid with carvings of a man-bird with six arms, and dancing women bearing resemblance to the apsaras famous in Angkor Wat. This palace looked like something of Angkor Wat, or Persia.
“Wow.” She gasps out.
“Astonishing, isn’t it Tarkheena?” Yixing runs his fingers along the bedspread, smiling at her. She notices he has a dimple.
“It is.” She breathes out. And Kyungsoo is impressed, the domed ceiling is painted a dark blue and inlaid with diamonds that shimmer like stars.
“There will be clothes in the dresser, and I shall send the servants to aid you, Tarkheena.”
“Taarkhan?” Kyungsoo asks, more than slightly nervous.
“Yes?” he asks expectantly. “This is Calormen, is it not?” His smile is bright as he nods and leaves the room. Calormen, if Kyungsoo recalls correctly, was something she’d red of in the books, in The Chronicles of Narnia. Perhaps she had been transported to Narnia and was now living a very, very bizarre life.
☽☾
“Shall we visit the Calormene markets today, Tarkheena?” Yixing smiles at her from the doorway of her room and Kyungsoon feels warmth pooling in her belly, the same one she associated with her first crush, Kim Jongin. Last night, she had had dinner with the Tisroc and Yixing. They’d exchanged some pleasantries while Kyungsoon was fed things she’d never heard of before and entertained by music she’d never listened to. She didn’t have to move her hands, not at all, for there were slaves for everything under the sun, right down to feeding them gulabjamun, a sweet delicacy brought out for the so called princess.
“I’d love to, Taarkan.” Kyungsoon pushes the covers off herself; she’d been surprised by how cold it was at night.
Yixing’s smile is like a soothing balm, faintly reminding her of Junmyeon, and yet different at the same time. She watches as he bosses the servants arounddrawing up a bath for her and setting out clothes. Kyungsoon can’t say she’s ever been treated like a princess and she finds herself enjoying it, a lot. He exits the room with a “be fast,” and Kyungsoon finds herself falling fast.
Fresh from her bath, grime and sweat scrubbed from her skin and smelling faintly like roses, Kyungsoon slips into the dress the servants have laid out for her. It’s simple; white, with gold trimmings and a gold belt cinched around her waist. She’d compare it to a Greek chiton, and it was as comfortable as she’d dreamed they’d be.
“You look lovely, Tarkheena. A fitting match for our Prince.” One of the servants says as she braids Kyungsoon’s hair with jasmine.
Yixing is at the courtyard and Kyungsoon can’t resist the urge to twirl in front of him. “Do you like the dress?”
Yixing gives a noncommittal hum and Kyungsoon feels her heart plunging into her stomach.
They have a breakfast of dried fruits and fresh fruits, with plenty of wine and cheese before setting off. They’re followed by even more slaves, 6 males and 6 females who escort them through the winding halls of the palace.
Once they cross the threshold of the palace into the markets, Yixing extends an arm. “Shall we, Kyungsoon?” She nods shyly, placing her hand in the crook of Yixing’s arm as butterflies swarm in her stomach.
Yixing points out places as they go, points out the people haggling over wood and spices. Kyungsoon’ssidetracked by the process of slave trading, watching people clamour over a dainty girl with a golden collar around her neck and her head held high. Her name is Minseok, Yixing says, and she’s the biggest commodity. No one has been able to buy her for every man who offers a price, another places a price thousand dinars more than before.
They stop and buy street food; bananas mashed and fried with flour, gulabjamun soaked in sweetened alcohol instead of sugar, preserved fruits and various types of bread to the point that Kyungsoon feels more than slightly sick. It also sickens her that wherever they go, people make way for Yixing and her, shooting them almost reverential looks.
Further along the road, Kyungsoon is met with an exquisite sight. People are crowding in front of an enclosure, clearing with murmured whispers of “Taarkhan” and “Taarkheena” as Yixing and Kyungsoon make their way to the very front. A peacock is singing and Kyungsoon has a frightful feeling it might be a talking animal of Narnia.
“And you'll be lost, every river that you tried to cross.Every gun you ever held went off,oh and I'm just waiting 'til the firing's stopped. Oh and I'm just waiting 'til the shine wears off,” it sings, in a voice of gold and diamonds. The Calormene are haggling over prices.
“This will be another commodity.” Yixing says as he pauses to look. The peacock stops singing at that shooting Yixing an affronted look before waddling over the fence and pecking Yixing’s hand. Kyungsoon doesn’t stop the surprised bubble of laughter that escapes her lips when she sees the peacock, now smug.
“My name is Jongdae and I refused to be sold.” He spits at Yixing before turning to her. “Kind, kind, Taarkheena, please, do me a favour and spare me from this hell. I am meant to be free,Taarkheena but these barbarians have enslaved me like a pack animal.”
Kyungsoon opens her mouth to reply when the stall owner comes rushing by, chasing the peacock away and apologizing profusely. Jongdae gives her a baleful look and Kyungsoon feels her heart melt; this was wrong in so many ways. Yixing led her away, clearly annoyed as the stall owner called out prices at their retreating backs.
Kyungsoon pauses when she witnesses a man shouting at a horse carrying a load of wood upon it’s back.
“Move, you dumb horse!” The man shouts, bringing the whip down on the poor thing. The horse crumples. “Sire, sire, please, I’m thirsty.” It pants out and Kyungsoo is pained to see such cruelty. Jongdae was right; Calormen was no place for Narnians.
“Yixing, we have to see what’s happening in Narnia. It is cruel.”
Yixing purses his lips and glances disapprovingly at her. “It is the way of the Calormen, TarkheenaKyungsoo, it is not something we can shed just like that.”
“Please.” she pleads, gazing at Yixing with wide eyes.
☽☾
“I intend to observe the trading between Narnians and ourselves, father. There has been a lot of good trade from the North recently, most of it being their wood and their talking animals.”
The king rubs his forehead, brows furrowing in concentration. The Tisroc Wu Yi Fan was a great monarch, according to what Yixing had told her but there was something wrong in how he was ignorant of the plight of the Talking Animals. Then again, in the stories she had read, the Calormen never bore the good of Narnia at heart. It was a society based on caste, with slavery as its core.
“If you were to be harmed-“
“No such harm will befall me, father, for they also claim Tash the inexorable has chosen Narnia as his own resting place for now. This journey will be blessed by Tash the irresistible himself, and seeing as the Crown Prince Lu Han is staying behind, it is only fair if I see Tash the inexorable. He will bless us all, and my sacrifice will be the pilgrimage into Narnia.”
Tisroc Wu exhales heavily, before nodding minutely. “Will you be taking the girl with you?” he gestures at Kyungsoon and for a moment, she feels affronted. She is no girl, she is a young woman, from a respectable family with talents like no other. Then again, she is in an unfamiliar land.An unfamiliar fictional land.
“I will be, sire.” It is as though Yi Fan knows he has no say in his son’s plans now, and that the most sensible thing will be to give in.
“Very well then, the two of you may travel under the guise of merchants. You may leave as soon as you’re prepared, with the blessing of Tash and my own.”
Yixing drops to one knee, crossing his right arm over his chest. Kyungsoon follows and they wait on their knees until his father rises, and makes his leave from the throne.
“Your brother-Lu Han, why does he bear a different name from yours? Yours is Zhang, isn’t it?” Kyungsoon asks, taking two steps for every stride of Yixing’s. The prince is not that much taller than her but his legs are still longer and she always has been slightly short.
“The Tisroc, my father, he has three wives, as demanded by Calormen law. Lu Han was born of his second wife, the eldest. His first wife bore me and my youngest brother, Zi Tao, was born of his third wife.” Yixing takes a turn to the left and Kyungsoon follows behind closely. Its funny how he’s so focused now, opposed to how he was yesterday.
“Where are your brothers?” Kyungsoon gasps out.
“Lu Han is on diplomatic business in the South and Zi Tao is on his yearly visit to Archenland.” It is then that Yixing slows his pace down, and Kyungsoon catches up.
The prince whirls around, beaming at her. “Pack for the dessert, Tarkheena for we are going on an adventure.”
When Yixing said adventure, it really meant the Tisroc insisting the pack satchels of food and water, alongside clothes made for the desert weather in the afternoon. Their leave was a quiet affair, and for the first time, they aren’t flocked by slaves.
☽☾
The Fords of Beruna are calm, calm enough to ride past without getting drowned and despite the fact that Kyungsoon has never been to Narnia before, it feels too still, too quiet. In all the stories she’d read, there always was joy and merriment. The trek between the desserts and Narnia had been hard and rough but once they’d crossed the Archenland pass, most of the hardship seemed to cease.
They’d also had word -word that had excited Yixing for many had said Tash was visiting Narnia, where the Calormen were felling trees and selling slaves in her name. It was the one thing about Yixing that Kyungsoon chose to overlook; his mindless dedication to Tash. He was not to be blamed, she supposed, but there was still something about it that upset her deeply.
“Yixing?”
“Yes, Tarkheena?”Kyungsoo purses her lips. “How many times have I told you to not call me that.”
The elder smiles guilelessly. “Countless.” He breaks into a peal of laughter, urging his horse forward. Kyungsoon giggles as she tries to catch up, leaning parallel to the horse’s body and digging her heels into the stallion’s sides. While it took a while to get familiarised with horse-riding, she considered herself an expert at this point.
Kyungsoon hears nothing as they race ahead, until Yixing’s horse whinnies and Yixing is thrown off as the horse canters away. Kyungsoon yanks on the reins of her own horse, forcing the stallion to dismount as she dismounts and rushes to Yixing’s side.
The ford is filled with the sound of cantering and men jeering as they’re surrounded.
“Bandits.” Yixing hisses as they dismount from their own horses. Kyungsoon is pulled to her feet and away from Yixing, watching as the other men hoist Yixing upright. There are four of them, and she’s willing to give all the provisions they have if the bandits would leave them alone.
“Well, well, well, looks like Chanyeol has a fine haul today. And what do we have here?” the man Kyungsoon assumes is Chanyeol says. Chanyeol has unruly hair, curly and in an awful shade of red-orange, with a body toughened from years in the jungle. His voice belongs in a level of its own, sending ice down her spine.
“I am the son of the Tisroc, shame be upon you for treating one from the lineage of Tash as such.” Yixing shouts, struggling against the men holding him captive.
The leader of the bandits, Chanyeol, sneers at them. “Son of the Tisroc, and yet you bear the pallor of the Northernmen, of the filthy white monkeys.”
“Don’t hurt him!” Kyungsoo pleads, struggling against the men holding her back.
“Don’t hurt him?” Chanyeol tilts her face up. “Do you want to see what we do to the bitches of the white monkeys, Tarkheena?”
Chanyeol leers, pulling her in by the belt of her dress. His bandits surrender her to him and the fear is there, coursing through her veins and paralyzing her. Some things are genuinely things to be afraid of and this is one of them.
She closes her eyes when Chanyeol leans in to nose at her neck, his putrid scent filling her nose. She can’t breathe, tugging the sleeve of her dress down. She stiffens and that’s when the sound of grunts fills the air, of metal clanging. She opens her eyes to find Yixing swinging his scimitar at the bandits, body as fluid as a snake. They all drop like dominoes, one after another until it’s only Chanyeol and her left. Kyungsoon breaks free from her captor and runs behind Yixing, trembling from fear.
“I don’t believe in using my prowess with the sword to harm people,” Yixing says, one hand holding Kyungsoo protectively behind her, shielding her from view as she adjusts her sleeves and fastens her belt. She’s relieved, so relieved that Chanyeol hadn’t done anything.
“Now tell us where Tash is.”
☽☾
When they arrive at the clearing Tash is rumoured to be, all that greets them is a dying bonfire and creatures, humans, Talking Animal, dwarves, in various states of distress. The animals were moaning and groaning. At the very top of the hill however, stood a stable. They witnessed a shadow picking up a man, and flying away as the stable door burst open in a flood of light. Illuminated by that light was Aslan, and the great Kings and Queens of old.
Kyungsoon and Yixing watch in fascination as the great Lion, the son of the Emperor-Beyond-the-Sea step out of the stable door, alongside the kings and queens of old. He shook his great mane, roaring “Now it is time! Time!”
The Earth was black, and Kyungsoon felt a fear like no other grip her heart. She squeezed tightly onto Yixing’s hand, watching as the stars were blocked by a black shadow, rising and rising. The great shadow rose a horn to his mouth and blew. The sound-it wasn’t something you heard often, high and terrible, filled with a peculiar beauty.
Instantaneously, the sky was full of shooting stars. Kyungsoon couldn’t compare it to a meteor shower, there were hundreds, maybe thousands of stars falling down like silver rain. In the light of the stars, Yixing looked as regal as the kings of old, mouth open in astonishment, in wonder.
“The sky!”Kyungsoon gasped out. The sky indeed. There was a blackness spreading and with trepidation, Kyungsoon realised the blackness was the sky, void of its stars. Aslan was calling them home. In science, Kyungsoon had learnt that stars were glowing balls of hydrogen. Here, she learnt that the stars were people, with hair of silver and skin of moonlight and eyes bluer than the Mediterranean sea. The stars lit up the furthest edge of Narnia, up to the boundaries of Ettinsmoor.
Then came the noise; the wailing, the shrieking, the rustling, the sound of wings. It came nearer and nearer and Kyungsoon watched as all kinds of creatures, by the thousands came rushing up the hill -Talking Animals, Satyrs, Giants, Dwarfs, Centaurs, Calormenes, men from Archenland, Telmarines, all of them ran up the hill, standing before the doorway of the stable.
Yixing and Kyungsoon were carried in the fracas, but as they drew closer to Aslan, one of two things happened. The creatures were forced, compelled to look to his face, and when some looked, their expressions changed terribly. Kyungsoon was afraid, she was just a simple girl who believed in the stories she’d read. Their expressions bore fear and terror, lasting for a fraction of a second before the Talking Animals ceased being talking animals and were just animals. They disappeared into Aslan’s great shadow.
Yixing and Kyungsoon were drawing closer now, a few Dwarfs and a leopard separating them. Those who looked at Aslan with love, with adoration, and more than a little fear made it past the door. Two dwarfs, one dwarf, she stood before Aslan.
Kyungsoo didn’t know what she’d done right in her life but as Yixing and her crossed the threshold into the world beyond the stable door, her breath was stolen.
“Further up and further in!” Yixing shouts, grabbing her hands in his as they run across the green, green meadow. For some reason, everything is much more colourful, every rock and flower and blade of grass looked as if it meant more, as if it would steal your breath. Yixing smiled and picked a pear from a tree.
“Here, Kyungsoon.” She glanced beseechingly at him before biting into the fruit, astonished by how it tasted. No pear of her world could compare to what she tasted in this land.
They kept running, following the other creatures and never felt the urge to look back. Soon, they reached before great, golden gates and Kyungsoon was shocked when a Talking Mouse stepped out. It bowed and greeted them, “Welcome, in the Lion’s name. Come further up and further in!”
Kyungsoon could recall the taste of bedtime stories her mother had read her, of the valiant Reepicheep who’d sailed to the end of the world with Caspian the Tenth. Her breath caught in her throat.
The mouse kept urging them to come in and they passed through the gates, into the delicious smell that permeated the air and into the cool sunlight and shadows of the trees, watching the Dryads dance and raise the Earth for a feast. In the middle of the field, at the foot of a great oak stood two thrones, and seated upon them were King Frank and Queen Helen from whom all the kings and queens of Narnia and Archenland descended from.
Yixing and Kyungsoo bowed before making their way to the edge of a cliff, staring at the lands beyond them. Everything seemed interconnected, like a delicate ring.
“This place is much bigger than I thought it would be.” For some unsaid reason, Kyungsoo feels the need to whisper.
“Indeed it is.” Yixing grips her hand tightly, and Kyungsoo feels all the supressed muse for her song flow in her veins. This was what she has been looking for her entire life.
There are footfalls behind them, silent, but shaking the earth. They turn and Kyungsoon is greeted by the Son-of-The-Emperor-Beyond-The-Sea, Aslan.
“My dear,” Aslan’s voice rumbles, washing over her. Yixing stands quietly by her side. “Your beloved,” Kyungsoo’s face flushes at the great Lion’s words.“Zhang Yixing, is permitted to stay with me. However, you are still young, with the world open to you.”
The lion’s voice washes over her and she breathes in the scent of courage and sacrifice, if it ever had one.
“I shall give the two of you a moment to yourselves before I send you home.” Aslan pads away, towards the old kings. One of them, Caspian the Tenth, she thinks, is staring at Yixing. Yixing nods once in his direction before pulling her to the edge of the cliffs.
“I will miss you, Kyungsoon.” Yixing’s voice sounds as gentle as it did when they met at the palace of his father, when his only god had been Tash.
“And I will miss you, Yixing.” Yixing smiles, dimple popping into existence before leaning in to press his forehead against hers.
“Never forget me, and Narnia.” She breathes in his breaths, watching as Yixing pulls out something and fastens it around her neck. It’s a thin silver chain, with a lion locket settling in the hollow of her throat.
Her voice catches in her throat. “Yixing--”
“Yes?”
“I love you.” His responding smile is brighter than the dying sun she had witnessed.
“Are you ready, child?” Aslan murmurs behind them. For an enormous lion, he moves around silently.
She nods, throat too dry to voice a positive affirmation. Aslan nudges her over the edge of the cliff with his head and Kyungsoon screams, wonders if the lion had made her plunge to her own death. “Faith, my child,” the lion seems to whisper to her as the howling of the wind rushes past.
☽☾
“-Kyungsoon?” Baekhyun is staring at her, snapping his fingers in front of her face.
Kyungsoon coughs viciously. The stories were true; time in Narnia didn’t pass the same way time here did.
“I’m fine.” She gasps out. “Can we continue tomorrow?” Baekhyun’s brows furrows in concern and she smiles reassuringly, trying to get a moment to herself.
“Alright then.” Baekhyun pats her back as he leaves, the creaking of the swing filling the evening silence.
Aslan had promised she’d return there.
☽☾
Kyungsoon is forty-five when she feels the familiar prickling on her back. She's driving to the convenience store and somehow, she knows. She knows she's going to meet her prince again. The sky seemed bluer in the winter morning, the snow made everything ephemeral and there was a tang in the air, something she associated with the blues and greens of Narnia.
The traffic light at the familiar intersection flashes red and Kyungsoon stops. The air is thick with tension, and static for some reason, goose bumps rising on her flesh. It’s at that moment the familiar pinching sensation begins; behind her neck, on her thigh, her cheek, and everywhere, all at once. She doesn’t notice the speeding car, or the fact that her own has stopped several feet outside the box. The car slams into the driver's side of her own as the traffic light turns green again. Kyungsoon smiles. She doesn't feel a thing.
When she opens her eyes again, Narnia lies before her in all its glory. Her entire left side hurts but nothing, nothing compares to the man that greets her. Yixing is standing at the pass and it's all it takes for Kyungsoon to start running towards him. He hasn’t changed in the slightest and when Kyungsoon looks at her own hands, all the lines and wrinkles of age has faded. She’s 19 again.
"Further up and further in," her prince whispers as they kiss for the first time in twenty-six years.