[Fic] The Life I Live - 6/7
Title: The Life I Live
Author: Coley Merrin
Rating: R overall
Pairings: Zhou Mi/Kyuhyun
Genre: AU, fantasy, angst, romance
Summary: He woke in a world that wasn't his own, to the eyes of a tiger. What he found in an idyll forest was uncertainty, trust, and the most elusive emotion of all...
Fic Archive
***
Part One * Part Two * Part Three * Part Four * Part Five * Part Six * Part Seven
A/N: Darkest before dawn...
***
“What would you do...if I wasn’t here?”
Zhou Mi had been unwilling to speak of it, after their short conversation. With a deep inhalation they had changed course, turning back toward the river and moving downriver along it, toward the direction they had first come.
Kyuhyun had not bothered asking why, as Zhou Mi’s entire posture spoke of tension. It made Kyuhyun tense just looking at him, but he tried to let some of that flow out of him as they walked, rhythmically squeezing Zhou Mi’s fingers. They had kept that connection... That was the one thing that kept him from spiraling into stomach-eating panic.
Zhou Mi slowed at they reached a small pile of stones, almost a cairn, that was beside the river. Pulling Kyuhyun to his side, they knelt in front of it.
“This is a monument to the spirits who are no longer here,” Zhou Mi said a little hoarsely. “Spirits who died protecting their land. Spirits who fell in love.”
Kyuhyun looked at him sharply. “What?”
“Once, two spirits fell in love with each other. It was...taboo. They had come from different creatures, and they eventually began to... Began to fade. Until there was nothing left.”
“So you can’t fall in love with each other,” Kyuhyun clarified.
“It was a terrible mistake, throwing away everything they knew couldn’t be.”
“What happened to them?”
“It does not help to speak of it.” But it was clear that the sorrow of it touched Zhou Mi still. “Before... Before spirits began to disappear, we were able to keep away the death birds. When we were stronger, they were no match for us. But now... There are only four of us left. It’s not enough any more and growing weaker...”
Kyuhyun stroked Zhou Mi’s hand as they sat there, waiting because it seemed Zhou Mi had more to say. Eventually, Zhou Mi inhaled. “I think that my life here is not the only one of mine... As I was gifted the skin of a tiger, I think I will also pass along something important to whatever is next for me. But I think we must die giving ourselves over to someone else. For me, that person is you. I have shared myself without reserve, Kui Xian.”
They studied the stones in silence for some moments before Zhou Mi turned to him, lifting Kyuhyun’s hand to the amulet that rested against the skin of Zhou Mi’s chest.
The normally light cloth was blackened, almost twisted in its deformity. How had he not noticed that?
“What’s wrong with it?” Kyuhyun demanded.
“Spirits were not meant to love,” Zhou Mi said, staring down at the darkened, ugly thing. “Your love consumes me.”
“But you said... You said if you lost your amulet, you would die.”
“Yes.”
“And your amulet is dying? Is that the same thing? Are you dying?”
“Nothing lasts forever,” Zhou Mi whispered.
His brain balked. “That’s cheerful.”
“No. Just the way things are. You love me, Kui Xian. And I love you. If this amulet is my heart or my soul, then I am giving it to you.”
“At the expense of your life!” Kyuhyun nearly shouted, as though that would sink the point home. Was that what Zhou Mi had been asking? What Kyuhyun would do if he were left alone, because Zhou Mi would not be beside him much longer? “What can I do to make it stop? What can I give you?”
“Your love,” Zhou Mi said smiling.
“I gave that, and it’s killing you!”
“What is death?” Zhou Mi asked.
“Stop with that crap. You die, the end. What am I supposed to do here, without you? I can’t take care of myself. That damn crocodile would eat me.”
“Well, you would go back to your world, of course,” Zhou Mi said, as though it were obvious.
“I could do that?”
“Of course. For you, it was always possible.”
Had he ever even considered it? Going back? He had been focused on saving his life, had known where he had come through at, but as Zhou Mi had led him, bonded with him, the thoughts of it had faded away.
“If I went back right now, would it save you?”
“No. What has begun cannot be stopped. It doesn’t matter where you are, my heart is with you.” Zhou Mi smiled and waved around them. “When the tree dies, it enriches the grass, feeds the deer and the tiger... What is happening to me is no different.”
“But you’re young, you shouldn’t...”
“I am very old, Kui Xian. Older than the oldest tree here. And I spent all those years alone. The other spirits are brothers of my heart, but I could not love them. I carved the wooden tiger, and I burned it, and I prayed that it would bring someone to love, to save me, before my life was ended by one of these birds.”
Zhou Mi’s eyes were serious, focused on Kyuhyun, keeping his hands on Kyuhyun’s, and spoke again when Kyuhyun could not. “When you woke in the tree where the wood had come from. So pale and lovely, your eyes so dark. I couldn’t believe that you might be mine. But you chose me... We pleasured each other, and we loved. Nothing in all the years of my existence has given me such joy. Just to be at your side. To die to be at your side, is nothing.”
“I don’t want you to leave,” Kyuhyun said. He knew he sounded like a petulant child. But he could not even process what Zhou Mi was saying.
“Even if this body fades from your sight, Kui Xian,” Zhou Mi said, cupping Kyuhyun’s face in his hands, “I will never leave you.”
“How long have you known?”
“Since we kissed. I knew... I knew before you came there was a chance.”
“So you used me, to save yourself,” Kyuhyun said, feeling bitterness tickle his disbelief.
“No... Kui Xian. Because we would love.”
Even as he wet Zhou Mi’s chest with his startled tears, he didn’t understand.
***
They loved slowly, until pleasure came over them like a solid wave instead of jagged peaks.
He was horrified to find dark flakes, pieces of Zhou Mi’s amulet, on his chest, over his heart.
Zhou Mi merely seemed amused.
“Even now it wants to be with you,” Zhou Mi said fondly.
“It isn’t a joke!” Kyuhyun barked, gathering the flakes in his hand as though he could glue them back onto the amulet. “Why do they stick to me?”
He paused as a horrible thought struck him. The black flakes on his chest reminded him of the charcoal that had been smeared on him. Zhou Mi had seemed so dismissive of it, wiping it away, and the other spirits had sounded upset when it was taken off of him. If their concern had been for Zhou Mi, if Zhou Mi was endangered by him somehow, then maybe it had been there for a reason.
“During the ritual when I arrived, they painted a big black square over my heart. You wiped it away. Was that supposed to protect you?”
“Yes, it was.”
Zhou Mi’s head snapped to the side, skin reddened where Kyuhyun’s opened hand had struck him and both of them were shocked by it.
“How could you? How could you throw your life away like that? I didn’t want you, and then I needed you, and you made me your murderer.”
“No... Kui Xian.” He pressed his lips in a gentle kiss against Kyuhyun’s mouth. “Just that kiss is precious beyond value to me. To hear you say my name. Your body against mine. To see you smile, feel your joy. I never meant to bring you pain.”
“This hurts me.” And it was ripping his heart out to say it. “I hurt so much, Zhou Mi. I don’t know what to do.”
“Love me. Just love me. Until night sets on our time here. I’ve prayed that the dawn comes quickly for us, and that we would be together. Do you understand, Kui Xian? Our time here ends, but you and I are meant. I believe that, Kui Xian. You have to believe it, too. Wherever you are, I will be, too. This time here, it wasn’t enough.”
“No, it wasn’t enough,” Kyuhyun whispered.
***
He slept, exhausted, and when he woke, found Zhou Mi had moved to the river, sitting alone.
“Have I ruined us?” Zhou Mi whispered.
Zhou Mi’s skin was cool to the touch as he sank down behind him.
“Ruin? No...” He wrapped his arms around Zhou Mi’s shoulders, face against Zhou Mi’s neck. “I love you... I want every moment I can have together with you.”
“Do you mean it?”
“Of course,” Kyuhyun told him.
Zhou Mi turned, looking unsure, and so fragile.
“Kui Xian...”
“Don’t cry... Don’t cry. I can’t take it.”
He kissed away the tear that had escaped, holding Zhou Mi close. It had been Zhou Mi’s vitality that had made him seem larger than life, though he realized that Zhou Mi had never been very robust. He didn’t seem small, but to see him like this, feel the weakness in Zhou Mi’s arms as they held each other...
“How long do you have?” Kyuhyun asked.
“Three sunsets. Maybe less.”
Kyuhyun sucked in a shocked breath. “Two days?”
“I did not anticipate it being so...quick. I should have told you, I should have...”
“Shhh,” Kyuhyun soothed.
“Promise me you won’t hate me?”
“You aren’t choosing to fade.” And he had not given up hope that they would find a way to fix this. “What should we do?”
“I think we should walk as close as we can to the tree today,” Zhou Mi said.
“Okay.”
“I don’t know how far I can go.”
His fingers on Zhou Mi’s skin left pale marks, the skin itself paler than he could have imagined. It was like Zhou Mi was fading right in front of his eyes.
“We’ll go as far as you can,” he said, helping Zhou Mi to stand.
Once on his feet, Zhou Mi seemed sturdier, busying himself with the tiger fur.
“Do you need help carrying it?”
“No,” Zhou Mi said, smiling and lifting the heavy weight. “It is part of me. But thank you.”
They joined hands, walking in silence along paths, some of which they had traced before. They stopped for Kyuhyun to eat, and for the first time, Zhou Mi rested his head in Kyuhyun’s lap and slept while Kyuhyun fed himself. He slept for almost two hours, standing slowly, and smiling sheepishly.
Kyuhyun wondered how much Zhou Mi had been hiding this growing weakness from him, and the pain he must have endured to do so. The trembling arms after the rain... Little things he hadn’t even considered.
***
Kyuhyun had a thought that night. “We don’t have to go over that cliff you had to help me up, do we?”
He imagined he could get down the cliff, but could Zhou Mi? It had taken Zhou Mi’s strength just to get him up it, and he knew he didn’t have enough to get Zhou Mi down.
“No, we don’t... We’re going around it.”
Zhou Mi took his bland stare with ease.
“If we could have gone around it the first time, why didn’t we the first time?” he asked.
Zhou Mi bit his lip. “I wanted... I was hoping that you would come to trust me, if I could show you I could care for you and protect you. Did it work?”
He was so hopeful about it, Kyuhyun thought wryly. In another life he would’ve made a joke, but he couldn’t crush that hope, not in a million years.
“As you were hauling me up the side of the cliff? Yeah. I thought you were probably... I would’ve been sure you weren’t human at that point, if I hadn’t know already. I was pretty sure by then you weren’t going to kill me... That you took so much care for me showed... Even when it seemed like you only wanted my body.”
“I could feed you, and protect you... Show you a crocodile was nothing to fear, or a tiger was my playmate. But to show you...” He curled his arm tighter around Kyuhyun. “It wasn’t all about the pleasure, you know... Even if I couldn’t understand you, I wanted to be close to you... I’d never felt anything like it. Like I had found half of myself. To be with you, or to look at you and see that spark in your eyes. Your worry for me... For the first time I felt a different sense of...worth? That to you I was something. I’ve worried for the animals, for the others or myself, but for you...”
“I’m sorry...” Kyuhyun whispered.
“Never. I will not regret a moment. I wish... I had the energy to be with you one more time.”
“Maybe in the morning,” Kyuhyun told him, fussing with the cloth at his hip.
“Maybe...”
“Sleep now then, okay?” He kissed Zhou Mi, kissed his cheek, his forehead. Zhou Mi breathed against him soft and quiet, as though even the energy for that was not being wasted. Kyuhyun stayed awake as long as he could, as though Zhou Mi might slip away during the night. But Zhou Mi still was warm against him, and he slept easily within the circle of Zhou Mi’s arms.
***
But Zhou Mi’s strength had not returned by morning. They walked slowly, Zhou Mi still pointing out things as they walked. Every hour they stopped, letting Zhou Mi rest. It was as though the skin of Zhou Mi’s body was paling again, sickeningly. The amulet, crumbling and disintegrating seemingly without assistance. The glittering black stone underneath the leather was just as quick to disappear. And Zhou Mi’s strength was disappearing with it.
Zhou Mi slept for hours that afternoon, hands desperately around Kyuhyun’s thigh as though he would wander off without him. They had gone just a little further before resting again. It was hard for Kyuhyun to watch Zhou Mi walk. Once so confident, he picked his steps with care, hand painfully tight around Kyuhyun’s for steadiness. When they rested that time, that was where they stayed, in a small clearing just within hearing of the running river. Zhou Mi had settled for a moment in a tangle of limbs, and wrapped himself around Kyuhyun. Promises were whispered into Kyuhyun’s ear until they faded, Zhou Mi sliding into an exhausted sleep.
***
Zhou Mi could not walk the next morning, though he struggled to get up from the tiger skin. But even with Kyuhyun’s help it had been futile. Kyuhyun observed it almost with detachment, as though he were not looking at someone he loved who was barely able to lift his head from the ground to meet Kyuhyun’s kiss. But inside he was screaming, unable to let go of Zhou Mi’s hand because the minute he did, there was a struggle, Zhou Mi fighting to follow, to be close, to hold on. He couldn’t do this, he decided. He couldn’t just sit and watch Zhou Mi...die. But he couldn’t leave. The thought tore him into shreds, to imagine leaving Zhou Mi crying out for him.
Zhou Mi’s heartbeat was rapid and shallow, breathing slow, and Kyuhyun pressed kisses along his ashen skin, whispering words of love. It was not to be long. There was barely any of the amulet left.
“She’s coming,” Zhou Mi worked hard to say.
Kyuhyun didn’t have to ask who “she” was, because in the next moment the regal tigress had stepped out of the bushes.
“My only darling, sweet,” Zhou Mi whispered, sighing as the tiger nudged his cheek. “You came to see me... Your time is soon? Your cubs will be born in a better place. Do not fear for me... Kui Xian is with me.”
The tigress looked up at Kyuhyun, and for a long moment their eyes were locked. She looked away, chuffing softly, moaning, as Zhou Mi stroked her ear.
“They are waiting to send you, go,” Zhou Mi whispered. The tiger disappeared as silently as she had come, and Zhou Mi strained for more of Kyuhyun’s contact. “Don’t leave me...”
“I won’t,” he said tenderly, stroking Zhou Mi’s face. “I love you.”
Zhou Mi’s eyes closed, breathing as deep as he could. “Kui Xian...”
Still holding Zhou Mi’s arm, Kyuhyun strained toward the bush nearest him. Reaching for something he knew Zhou Mi had not seen.
When he opened his hand, a small butterfly sat there, gently flexing its wings. Zhou Mi had said once that the sight of a butterfly sustained him.
In the end, it brought him one last smile.
He did not even know he was crying until Zhou Mi whispered to him.
“Do not cry, beloved. This is not the end of us.”
“Then tell me how to keep you here,” he demanded.
“Ask me the question, Kui Xian...”
Even his whisper was getting weaker. It was as though he were fading away.
“Do you...” he swallowed, choking on his words. “Do you mate for life, Zhou Mi?”
“Only with you...” Zhou Mi whispered.
And with a rush of wind, Zhou Mi was gone, the ground in front of Kyuhyun empty, the tiger fur fading and all but gone, running through his fingers like sand.
He looked around him, as though Zhou Mi could have leaped to his feet and were hiding nearby. What he saw was the butterfly alighting from his hand and beginning it’s tentative journey away. Leaving him alone.
Somewhere in the forest, a tiger roared, faltering and fading away, and it echoed his heartbroken cries.
***
Warm hands lifted him, holding him upright. He stared, needing to see who it was, who held him. And saw only bright eyes and blurred features. The others. The others had helped him to stand.
“Where is he?” he asked desperately. “Where did he go?”
They did not answer, crooning at him in the way Zhou Mi had done when he had first come. They led him through the forest for what seemed like hours, away from where he had last seen Zhou Mi. Away...
They stripped him, dressing him with very little help from himself, in the clothes he had come in. His pajama bottoms and boxers, his t-shirt. And they pushed him until he stood in front of the great tree that he had emerged from.
He had come out of that tree with Zhou Mi beside him. And he faced it now alone.
He had harbored some deep fantasies of returning here, of tugging Zhou Mi inside with him, of there being some little enough magic about this place to take them both to Kyuhyun’s world. That he could show Zhou Mi that there was worth there. But the thought of leaving without Zhou Mi had ultimately stopped him.
He could not have saved him.
He walked inside, leaving the ironic brightness of the day for the shadowed interior of the tree. He saw the hollow where he had first seen the tiger, and turned from it. There, where he had woke, was the small wooden tiger, just where he had dropped it in his fear. The tiger had come to him, had shed its skin, knelt there, pale skin and dark eyes, painted as he had never seen a person before. Staring at Kyuhyun... In wonder.
His hand lifted as though he could go back in time, where instead of huddling in mind numbing fear, he had reached out and touched that face, feeling it turn and worship against his skin. Warm and real, and somehow his.
He snatched up the wooden tiger, stared at the dark lines scored in it. It was all the fault of this insignificant thing. He had loved, and it had brought him...what?
“Take me to him!” he shouted fiercely at the tiny figure, hurling it from him. Where it struck wood, it seemed to spark as though it had hit stone. He sank to his knees, resting his head against the smooth wood of the tree. “Just take me to him. Why did you bring me here, if all there was was this...”
Darkness curled around him like cradling arms, warm and deep. He wondered if he imagined the voice in his ear that bade him sleep, promising that the morning would soon come.
***
Author: Coley Merrin
Rating: R overall
Pairings: Zhou Mi/Kyuhyun
Genre: AU, fantasy, angst, romance
Summary: He woke in a world that wasn't his own, to the eyes of a tiger. What he found in an idyll forest was uncertainty, trust, and the most elusive emotion of all...
Fic Archive
***
Part One * Part Two * Part Three * Part Four * Part Five * Part Six * Part Seven
A/N: Darkest before dawn...
***
“What would you do...if I wasn’t here?”
Zhou Mi had been unwilling to speak of it, after their short conversation. With a deep inhalation they had changed course, turning back toward the river and moving downriver along it, toward the direction they had first come.
Kyuhyun had not bothered asking why, as Zhou Mi’s entire posture spoke of tension. It made Kyuhyun tense just looking at him, but he tried to let some of that flow out of him as they walked, rhythmically squeezing Zhou Mi’s fingers. They had kept that connection... That was the one thing that kept him from spiraling into stomach-eating panic.
Zhou Mi slowed at they reached a small pile of stones, almost a cairn, that was beside the river. Pulling Kyuhyun to his side, they knelt in front of it.
“This is a monument to the spirits who are no longer here,” Zhou Mi said a little hoarsely. “Spirits who died protecting their land. Spirits who fell in love.”
Kyuhyun looked at him sharply. “What?”
“Once, two spirits fell in love with each other. It was...taboo. They had come from different creatures, and they eventually began to... Began to fade. Until there was nothing left.”
“So you can’t fall in love with each other,” Kyuhyun clarified.
“It was a terrible mistake, throwing away everything they knew couldn’t be.”
“What happened to them?”
“It does not help to speak of it.” But it was clear that the sorrow of it touched Zhou Mi still. “Before... Before spirits began to disappear, we were able to keep away the death birds. When we were stronger, they were no match for us. But now... There are only four of us left. It’s not enough any more and growing weaker...”
Kyuhyun stroked Zhou Mi’s hand as they sat there, waiting because it seemed Zhou Mi had more to say. Eventually, Zhou Mi inhaled. “I think that my life here is not the only one of mine... As I was gifted the skin of a tiger, I think I will also pass along something important to whatever is next for me. But I think we must die giving ourselves over to someone else. For me, that person is you. I have shared myself without reserve, Kui Xian.”
They studied the stones in silence for some moments before Zhou Mi turned to him, lifting Kyuhyun’s hand to the amulet that rested against the skin of Zhou Mi’s chest.
The normally light cloth was blackened, almost twisted in its deformity. How had he not noticed that?
“What’s wrong with it?” Kyuhyun demanded.
“Spirits were not meant to love,” Zhou Mi said, staring down at the darkened, ugly thing. “Your love consumes me.”
“But you said... You said if you lost your amulet, you would die.”
“Yes.”
“And your amulet is dying? Is that the same thing? Are you dying?”
“Nothing lasts forever,” Zhou Mi whispered.
His brain balked. “That’s cheerful.”
“No. Just the way things are. You love me, Kui Xian. And I love you. If this amulet is my heart or my soul, then I am giving it to you.”
“At the expense of your life!” Kyuhyun nearly shouted, as though that would sink the point home. Was that what Zhou Mi had been asking? What Kyuhyun would do if he were left alone, because Zhou Mi would not be beside him much longer? “What can I do to make it stop? What can I give you?”
“Your love,” Zhou Mi said smiling.
“I gave that, and it’s killing you!”
“What is death?” Zhou Mi asked.
“Stop with that crap. You die, the end. What am I supposed to do here, without you? I can’t take care of myself. That damn crocodile would eat me.”
“Well, you would go back to your world, of course,” Zhou Mi said, as though it were obvious.
“I could do that?”
“Of course. For you, it was always possible.”
Had he ever even considered it? Going back? He had been focused on saving his life, had known where he had come through at, but as Zhou Mi had led him, bonded with him, the thoughts of it had faded away.
“If I went back right now, would it save you?”
“No. What has begun cannot be stopped. It doesn’t matter where you are, my heart is with you.” Zhou Mi smiled and waved around them. “When the tree dies, it enriches the grass, feeds the deer and the tiger... What is happening to me is no different.”
“But you’re young, you shouldn’t...”
“I am very old, Kui Xian. Older than the oldest tree here. And I spent all those years alone. The other spirits are brothers of my heart, but I could not love them. I carved the wooden tiger, and I burned it, and I prayed that it would bring someone to love, to save me, before my life was ended by one of these birds.”
Zhou Mi’s eyes were serious, focused on Kyuhyun, keeping his hands on Kyuhyun’s, and spoke again when Kyuhyun could not. “When you woke in the tree where the wood had come from. So pale and lovely, your eyes so dark. I couldn’t believe that you might be mine. But you chose me... We pleasured each other, and we loved. Nothing in all the years of my existence has given me such joy. Just to be at your side. To die to be at your side, is nothing.”
“I don’t want you to leave,” Kyuhyun said. He knew he sounded like a petulant child. But he could not even process what Zhou Mi was saying.
“Even if this body fades from your sight, Kui Xian,” Zhou Mi said, cupping Kyuhyun’s face in his hands, “I will never leave you.”
“How long have you known?”
“Since we kissed. I knew... I knew before you came there was a chance.”
“So you used me, to save yourself,” Kyuhyun said, feeling bitterness tickle his disbelief.
“No... Kui Xian. Because we would love.”
Even as he wet Zhou Mi’s chest with his startled tears, he didn’t understand.
***
They loved slowly, until pleasure came over them like a solid wave instead of jagged peaks.
He was horrified to find dark flakes, pieces of Zhou Mi’s amulet, on his chest, over his heart.
Zhou Mi merely seemed amused.
“Even now it wants to be with you,” Zhou Mi said fondly.
“It isn’t a joke!” Kyuhyun barked, gathering the flakes in his hand as though he could glue them back onto the amulet. “Why do they stick to me?”
He paused as a horrible thought struck him. The black flakes on his chest reminded him of the charcoal that had been smeared on him. Zhou Mi had seemed so dismissive of it, wiping it away, and the other spirits had sounded upset when it was taken off of him. If their concern had been for Zhou Mi, if Zhou Mi was endangered by him somehow, then maybe it had been there for a reason.
“During the ritual when I arrived, they painted a big black square over my heart. You wiped it away. Was that supposed to protect you?”
“Yes, it was.”
Zhou Mi’s head snapped to the side, skin reddened where Kyuhyun’s opened hand had struck him and both of them were shocked by it.
“How could you? How could you throw your life away like that? I didn’t want you, and then I needed you, and you made me your murderer.”
“No... Kui Xian.” He pressed his lips in a gentle kiss against Kyuhyun’s mouth. “Just that kiss is precious beyond value to me. To hear you say my name. Your body against mine. To see you smile, feel your joy. I never meant to bring you pain.”
“This hurts me.” And it was ripping his heart out to say it. “I hurt so much, Zhou Mi. I don’t know what to do.”
“Love me. Just love me. Until night sets on our time here. I’ve prayed that the dawn comes quickly for us, and that we would be together. Do you understand, Kui Xian? Our time here ends, but you and I are meant. I believe that, Kui Xian. You have to believe it, too. Wherever you are, I will be, too. This time here, it wasn’t enough.”
“No, it wasn’t enough,” Kyuhyun whispered.
***
He slept, exhausted, and when he woke, found Zhou Mi had moved to the river, sitting alone.
“Have I ruined us?” Zhou Mi whispered.
Zhou Mi’s skin was cool to the touch as he sank down behind him.
“Ruin? No...” He wrapped his arms around Zhou Mi’s shoulders, face against Zhou Mi’s neck. “I love you... I want every moment I can have together with you.”
“Do you mean it?”
“Of course,” Kyuhyun told him.
Zhou Mi turned, looking unsure, and so fragile.
“Kui Xian...”
“Don’t cry... Don’t cry. I can’t take it.”
He kissed away the tear that had escaped, holding Zhou Mi close. It had been Zhou Mi’s vitality that had made him seem larger than life, though he realized that Zhou Mi had never been very robust. He didn’t seem small, but to see him like this, feel the weakness in Zhou Mi’s arms as they held each other...
“How long do you have?” Kyuhyun asked.
“Three sunsets. Maybe less.”
Kyuhyun sucked in a shocked breath. “Two days?”
“I did not anticipate it being so...quick. I should have told you, I should have...”
“Shhh,” Kyuhyun soothed.
“Promise me you won’t hate me?”
“You aren’t choosing to fade.” And he had not given up hope that they would find a way to fix this. “What should we do?”
“I think we should walk as close as we can to the tree today,” Zhou Mi said.
“Okay.”
“I don’t know how far I can go.”
His fingers on Zhou Mi’s skin left pale marks, the skin itself paler than he could have imagined. It was like Zhou Mi was fading right in front of his eyes.
“We’ll go as far as you can,” he said, helping Zhou Mi to stand.
Once on his feet, Zhou Mi seemed sturdier, busying himself with the tiger fur.
“Do you need help carrying it?”
“No,” Zhou Mi said, smiling and lifting the heavy weight. “It is part of me. But thank you.”
They joined hands, walking in silence along paths, some of which they had traced before. They stopped for Kyuhyun to eat, and for the first time, Zhou Mi rested his head in Kyuhyun’s lap and slept while Kyuhyun fed himself. He slept for almost two hours, standing slowly, and smiling sheepishly.
Kyuhyun wondered how much Zhou Mi had been hiding this growing weakness from him, and the pain he must have endured to do so. The trembling arms after the rain... Little things he hadn’t even considered.
***
Kyuhyun had a thought that night. “We don’t have to go over that cliff you had to help me up, do we?”
He imagined he could get down the cliff, but could Zhou Mi? It had taken Zhou Mi’s strength just to get him up it, and he knew he didn’t have enough to get Zhou Mi down.
“No, we don’t... We’re going around it.”
Zhou Mi took his bland stare with ease.
“If we could have gone around it the first time, why didn’t we the first time?” he asked.
Zhou Mi bit his lip. “I wanted... I was hoping that you would come to trust me, if I could show you I could care for you and protect you. Did it work?”
He was so hopeful about it, Kyuhyun thought wryly. In another life he would’ve made a joke, but he couldn’t crush that hope, not in a million years.
“As you were hauling me up the side of the cliff? Yeah. I thought you were probably... I would’ve been sure you weren’t human at that point, if I hadn’t know already. I was pretty sure by then you weren’t going to kill me... That you took so much care for me showed... Even when it seemed like you only wanted my body.”
“I could feed you, and protect you... Show you a crocodile was nothing to fear, or a tiger was my playmate. But to show you...” He curled his arm tighter around Kyuhyun. “It wasn’t all about the pleasure, you know... Even if I couldn’t understand you, I wanted to be close to you... I’d never felt anything like it. Like I had found half of myself. To be with you, or to look at you and see that spark in your eyes. Your worry for me... For the first time I felt a different sense of...worth? That to you I was something. I’ve worried for the animals, for the others or myself, but for you...”
“I’m sorry...” Kyuhyun whispered.
“Never. I will not regret a moment. I wish... I had the energy to be with you one more time.”
“Maybe in the morning,” Kyuhyun told him, fussing with the cloth at his hip.
“Maybe...”
“Sleep now then, okay?” He kissed Zhou Mi, kissed his cheek, his forehead. Zhou Mi breathed against him soft and quiet, as though even the energy for that was not being wasted. Kyuhyun stayed awake as long as he could, as though Zhou Mi might slip away during the night. But Zhou Mi still was warm against him, and he slept easily within the circle of Zhou Mi’s arms.
***
But Zhou Mi’s strength had not returned by morning. They walked slowly, Zhou Mi still pointing out things as they walked. Every hour they stopped, letting Zhou Mi rest. It was as though the skin of Zhou Mi’s body was paling again, sickeningly. The amulet, crumbling and disintegrating seemingly without assistance. The glittering black stone underneath the leather was just as quick to disappear. And Zhou Mi’s strength was disappearing with it.
Zhou Mi slept for hours that afternoon, hands desperately around Kyuhyun’s thigh as though he would wander off without him. They had gone just a little further before resting again. It was hard for Kyuhyun to watch Zhou Mi walk. Once so confident, he picked his steps with care, hand painfully tight around Kyuhyun’s for steadiness. When they rested that time, that was where they stayed, in a small clearing just within hearing of the running river. Zhou Mi had settled for a moment in a tangle of limbs, and wrapped himself around Kyuhyun. Promises were whispered into Kyuhyun’s ear until they faded, Zhou Mi sliding into an exhausted sleep.
***
Zhou Mi could not walk the next morning, though he struggled to get up from the tiger skin. But even with Kyuhyun’s help it had been futile. Kyuhyun observed it almost with detachment, as though he were not looking at someone he loved who was barely able to lift his head from the ground to meet Kyuhyun’s kiss. But inside he was screaming, unable to let go of Zhou Mi’s hand because the minute he did, there was a struggle, Zhou Mi fighting to follow, to be close, to hold on. He couldn’t do this, he decided. He couldn’t just sit and watch Zhou Mi...die. But he couldn’t leave. The thought tore him into shreds, to imagine leaving Zhou Mi crying out for him.
Zhou Mi’s heartbeat was rapid and shallow, breathing slow, and Kyuhyun pressed kisses along his ashen skin, whispering words of love. It was not to be long. There was barely any of the amulet left.
“She’s coming,” Zhou Mi worked hard to say.
Kyuhyun didn’t have to ask who “she” was, because in the next moment the regal tigress had stepped out of the bushes.
“My only darling, sweet,” Zhou Mi whispered, sighing as the tiger nudged his cheek. “You came to see me... Your time is soon? Your cubs will be born in a better place. Do not fear for me... Kui Xian is with me.”
The tigress looked up at Kyuhyun, and for a long moment their eyes were locked. She looked away, chuffing softly, moaning, as Zhou Mi stroked her ear.
“They are waiting to send you, go,” Zhou Mi whispered. The tiger disappeared as silently as she had come, and Zhou Mi strained for more of Kyuhyun’s contact. “Don’t leave me...”
“I won’t,” he said tenderly, stroking Zhou Mi’s face. “I love you.”
Zhou Mi’s eyes closed, breathing as deep as he could. “Kui Xian...”
Still holding Zhou Mi’s arm, Kyuhyun strained toward the bush nearest him. Reaching for something he knew Zhou Mi had not seen.
When he opened his hand, a small butterfly sat there, gently flexing its wings. Zhou Mi had said once that the sight of a butterfly sustained him.
In the end, it brought him one last smile.
He did not even know he was crying until Zhou Mi whispered to him.
“Do not cry, beloved. This is not the end of us.”
“Then tell me how to keep you here,” he demanded.
“Ask me the question, Kui Xian...”
Even his whisper was getting weaker. It was as though he were fading away.
“Do you...” he swallowed, choking on his words. “Do you mate for life, Zhou Mi?”
“Only with you...” Zhou Mi whispered.
And with a rush of wind, Zhou Mi was gone, the ground in front of Kyuhyun empty, the tiger fur fading and all but gone, running through his fingers like sand.
He looked around him, as though Zhou Mi could have leaped to his feet and were hiding nearby. What he saw was the butterfly alighting from his hand and beginning it’s tentative journey away. Leaving him alone.
Somewhere in the forest, a tiger roared, faltering and fading away, and it echoed his heartbroken cries.
***
Warm hands lifted him, holding him upright. He stared, needing to see who it was, who held him. And saw only bright eyes and blurred features. The others. The others had helped him to stand.
“Where is he?” he asked desperately. “Where did he go?”
They did not answer, crooning at him in the way Zhou Mi had done when he had first come. They led him through the forest for what seemed like hours, away from where he had last seen Zhou Mi. Away...
They stripped him, dressing him with very little help from himself, in the clothes he had come in. His pajama bottoms and boxers, his t-shirt. And they pushed him until he stood in front of the great tree that he had emerged from.
He had come out of that tree with Zhou Mi beside him. And he faced it now alone.
He had harbored some deep fantasies of returning here, of tugging Zhou Mi inside with him, of there being some little enough magic about this place to take them both to Kyuhyun’s world. That he could show Zhou Mi that there was worth there. But the thought of leaving without Zhou Mi had ultimately stopped him.
He could not have saved him.
He walked inside, leaving the ironic brightness of the day for the shadowed interior of the tree. He saw the hollow where he had first seen the tiger, and turned from it. There, where he had woke, was the small wooden tiger, just where he had dropped it in his fear. The tiger had come to him, had shed its skin, knelt there, pale skin and dark eyes, painted as he had never seen a person before. Staring at Kyuhyun... In wonder.
His hand lifted as though he could go back in time, where instead of huddling in mind numbing fear, he had reached out and touched that face, feeling it turn and worship against his skin. Warm and real, and somehow his.
He snatched up the wooden tiger, stared at the dark lines scored in it. It was all the fault of this insignificant thing. He had loved, and it had brought him...what?
“Take me to him!” he shouted fiercely at the tiny figure, hurling it from him. Where it struck wood, it seemed to spark as though it had hit stone. He sank to his knees, resting his head against the smooth wood of the tree. “Just take me to him. Why did you bring me here, if all there was was this...”
Darkness curled around him like cradling arms, warm and deep. He wondered if he imagined the voice in his ear that bade him sleep, promising that the morning would soon come.
***