// Chapter 22 \\

Should I have told this immediately? I should've. That figure was the weapon the Takers' had used against us time and time again. It was too important to not say a word. Too many things had just happened— I can agree with that— but this was a mystery that now seemed much more deadly than previously perceived. I was going to tell someone.

I was going to tell Leeyon, Ray of Eastern Court, after her human form made a swift fluid swim to the docking tower where I was. I was about to utter the words when she pried the seal open to the exit of the merger that had left with San and his new accomplice.

But she'd stopped my words before my lips could part with them, hastened to tell me that the three levels of the palace below had been completely flooded from her view outside of the palace. My thoughts of the information I held vanished as I immediately questioned of Hongjoong and Yeosang.

She didn't know.

My heart sank as the worst thoughts came to me, as my recovering form shook while Leeyon scanned me for injuries. She took note of a very evident black vein that spiked out on indented skin from the leftmost silver scab of where a wing would take form. I seemed to feel the pulse of pain from it as an evident reminder of the black arrow that had struck my left wing from that figure— the weapon.

I, once more, was going to tell Leeyon of this, but that was when a guard and healer had called to us, carrying an all too familiar figure with them and these thoughts of the figure vanished once again as I took in the sight of who.

Hongjoong's eyes had lost their fighting fire since I last saw him. They were now haunted and dull as if he were a dead man. He wasn't, but he acted as if he was frozen and limp being carried by the guard and healer, gazing down to his wrist where severed flesh was wrapped up in stained bandage— where a hand had once been. How lost his eyes were as he looked to where a part of him had once been that he lost.

I didn't say anything, unsure as Leeyon got up and ran over to him. It was a blur as I watched my friend with an escalating heart beat at only knowing a fraction of what he was probably feeling. The blackness from my back pulsed as my heart panged before it all nummed away in saddened shock as dull grey ignored the surrounding concern around him and looked up to see me a flicker of blue showing there. Hongjoong now looked at me. But our stare remained silent from the weight of occurrences.

Hongjoong didn't take to responding to them, but he began to walk for himself as I got to my feet a bit shaken but sure to cover the pulsing vein in my back with the buttoned white tunic I wore.

It was a blur of thoughts as they hurriedly coaxed the two of us to another merger at the docking ports there. We wordlessly complied, Hongjoong and I, as we both worked to take the merger to where they'd told us: the docking tower above Venelia.

I didn't question where our destination was and neither did Hongjoong. I did, however, realize it had been Hongjoong's hand that had been severed as I took heavy note of his struggle to use his left hand on the lever of the merger. The struggle he had until I silently and gently took the lever from him.

Hongjoong didn't object. He stayed silent that ride as he stayed silent now, here at the empty docking tower above the palace of Venelia of Eastern Court.

Our footsteps on marble was the only thing heard besides the distant echo of waters lapping and waves crashing in peaceful harmony of the above sea. The entire tower was painted in golden light, reflecting off of the floor or peering in from surface windows. It was a golden light that mixed with the blue ambiance of water's blue light that sent an array of blues, yellows and greens.

But my eyes didn't bother to observe any of that as they looked outside of the perfectly clear limpid glass to a sunset of Eastern Court. The golds, oranges, purples, and slight pinks reflected on the waves as if to seem like streams of silver and gold. I quickly moved to one of the exits from within the tower to look at the true beauty of the sight without the glass's too crisp perfections. The sunset still shone, but the colors now arrayed in the colors of yellow and orange with dark violet and blue and black in the sky. None were quite a gold and the water's reflection was on the border of silver but held a white reflectiveness so pure it would've calmed me to tears.

I sighed then, finally allowing all the horrid thoughts that had clogged my mind to vanish to a shattery-mist for a moment, as I let a blank sense of ignorant peace give me solace.

"S-Star."

I didn't recognize the raspy voice for a moment, but I did know I wasn't the only one here. I spun around to Hongjoong.

His eyes appeared to be slightly misted in their complexion of dull grey staring at me. The light caught on his peripherals with its greens and blues but it never really— truly— met his eyes. His shaggy whiffs of auburn hair tugged slightly in the ocean breeze. He didn't move, save for how his left hand fidgeted on his upper-right arm.

His lips slightly formed into a thin line before he took to walking up next to me. He sucked in a breath, mouth agape for a moment as if he was going to say something— the sunlight meeting his eyes as he walked out— but it all died out once more, his lips drawing closed— the light gone from his eyes once more.

My lips drew into a thin line this time as I turned slightly towards him. My eyebrows were furrowed as I asked quietly, "Are you okay?"

But Hongjoong didn't respond, his head lowering slightly as if to end the conversation he'd started then.

Even without a response, I knew the answer: he wasn't okay.

The pulse from my back sent a bitter chill, almost in agreement. I clenched my jaw to this, shifting with a roll on my shoulders to position myself to look back at the sunset.

"I did it for you." Hongjoong's voice came out clear now, despite the low murmur.

I soon assumed he didn't believe I would hear it when I turned my head to him in a questioning manner and quietly asked back, "What?"

His head had finally raised then, surprise, panic, but the spark of blue that was usually found in his grey eyes came with it— the spark of fire.

"I-I— " Hongjoong took to clearing his throat, but finding himself in a coughing fit— moving his right arm up to cover it when he saw where his hand was once more, face falling while he calmed hiss cough. He composed himself, moving his right arm purposefully out of his view, "I... wh- with... what happened..."

I quickly shook my head. I didn't want to believe him. I appreciate Hongjoong's loyalty and friendship. I loved him like the brother I never had, but I hated to think he'd sacrificed for me.

I wasn't trying to be cold with my response, but my voice came out that way in its low rumble, "Hongjoong, no."

Hongjoong slightly stiffened from the tone, taking a moment to flick gaze to the ground before he took a deep inhale of breath, shooting his gaze back up to mine. His tone was clear, and full of an emotion I'd never heard it in.

"I remember how much San had hurt you," Hongjoong started, the blue of his eyes becoming more apparent, "I remember seeing how emotionless you were, the hurt in your eyes. I'd seen him before with the attitude that I ,too, mistaken to be just a normal Court citizen. I-I— may have not been there to see what he'd done to be a monster of a taker, but I saw what effect it took on you." Hongjoong's brows were upturned now, misty eyes blinking and now tears were rolling down them. His voice broke when he spoke again, "And I hated it."

I continued to shake my head, face contorted in slight sorrow as I was appalled by the emotional confession he was giving. I murmured once more with a slightly broken voice, "Hongjoong..."

He shook his head then, pursing his lips as he finally exhaled that breath he'd been holding, "So I knew I had to do it— I knew that I at least had to do something—" but his own words were cut off by his sobs.

He'd done it for me— my own issue— and he was the one to take the punishment. He sacrificed himself in my own issue to gain a consequence he had no right having. My gaze momentarily flicked to his right arm that merely ended in a wrist.

No, no, no. It was my punishment. My punishment. Not his.

I now realized I was sobbing with no tears.

I continued to shake my head and Hongjoong walked closer, seeming to try and calm down his own tears with no luck.

"Why?" I barely croaked in my tearless sorrow.

Hongjoong seemed to calm down his own sobs, a few tears streaming down his cheeks as he took a long moment to silently look at me, the blue of his grey fully returned to his eyes, catching the glimmer of orange and yellow from the sunset.

He murmured, "Because I love you."

And I had no time to stop anything as he put his lips on mine.

A warm fire-crack of passion had been placed on mine of night silk. He'd closed his eyes with streaming tears, but mine were wide open in a state of shock and realization. I was kissing Hongjoong.

I pushed myself away from him, my eyes wide as I stared into Hongjoong's eyes which were also wide as he fumbled back, struggling to steady himself.

He... loves me?

"Hongjoong, I— " I shook my head as I tried to grasp the feeling of his lips that had been on mine. His lips had been there— on my lips. Perhaps I should've felt ecstatic. But the image— the image of us— he was like my brother...

I calmed myself, willing my eyes to give a gaze of sympathy, though I swore I always had a forever-growing cold edge, "I... I can't accept this."

I could see the hopeful light fall from his eyes. That blue of his grey that had reflected the sunset wavered. He eased his shoulders from the stiffness they took, but it seemed more like it conveyed the dying hope within the fire of his passionate soul. His eyes then slowly fell to the ground as he murmured, "Oh."

I bit my lip as guilt flooded through me, as the thoughts of everything I'd escaped from returned once more. I was truly upset with myself, with Hongjoong, with everything. Maybe that's why I couldn't bring myself to say something more in that moment. So it carried on with silence, letting my own gaze fall to the ground.

"Star," Hongjoong muttered

I hesitated to look up to him, but, when I did, his eyes weren't on me. They gazed out to the more saturated sunset of Eastern Court, pinks and violets now truly dashing the sky in a very real color.

I was now the one stiffening as I gingerly kept my gaze on him, "Yes?"

A glimmer of blue was hinted in his eyes again as I acknowledged him, "Remember when Yeosang, you, and I would visit here as little kids?"

When we visited Eastern Court for the sea adventures we always wanted to go on, whether it was the underwater wonders or the harsh crashing waves of the surface above. The memory now seemed foggy, unclear in my mind, but I recalled it.

I gave Hongjoong a nod with a soft tone, "Yeah... I do." My brows furrowed as my thoughts finally focused onto one of the many things I had questions for, "Yeosang— I never saw him— and the flooded palace—" I whirled to Hongjoong with evident concern, "Is he okay?"

Hongjoong met my gaze for a brief moment before he grimaced and shook his head, muttering, "I don't know, but I'm sure he's fine."

But his tone wasn't one of annoyance as he usually feels for Yeosang. I could tell then with even the glimmer of his eyes that he was genuinely worried for Yeosang. His words conveyed he had the assurance of his friend's capabilities, but his eyes betrayed the worry he had as well. Part of me believed his words were partially put out to comfort me, and that slightly made me bristle with the evident fact of what Hongjoong had just told me ingraining on top of everything else that happened.

This only seemed more evident with his next words, changing the subject, "Remember when we all sailed on these waters— when Yeosang and I had gone out sailing together in the night while that storm came through."

"Yeah, you... guys scared me half to death," I sighed, slouching my shoulders a bit. "But I pulled that same exact stunt."

"And we were both worried then as you'd been worried about us." Hongjoong slightly nodded, taking in a sharp breath as he looked at me in a bit of a question, as if this conversation was doing well to distract him. "Weren't... Weren't you crying when we returned?"

Suddenly, everything stopped in my mind when Hongjoong spoke.

It wasn't natural for me to cry. My eyes were sealed open, and they prevented me from crying. But it felt like there were so many exceptions for grief. Exceptions like today and exceptions of ones I barely remembered from a young age. But, even now, I knew I'd already gone through Court selection.

My mind posed an answer in a drift of dense fog to my own stream of question-statement thoughts. I stared off into the hazy sunset from my vision, caught in its gaze as I thought before I looked back to Hongjoong with a nod of confirmation that didn't meet my eyes, "I was crying."

REMEMBER:​​​​​​

1. Smack dat butiful star

2. Leave a comment talkin abt dis tea

3. Share dis tea induced book with yo fwends

WHY? Because I appreciate it 🥺

\\ See u in the next chapter! \\