Chapter Text
“Joonghyuk-ah!” Kim Dokja cheerily looks up from his work where he’s perched over a desk to pen down something in a ledger, his other hand flicking through the contents of the cash box open in front of him. “I didn’t expect to see you here.” He comments with the same light lull to his voice, though his attention reverts back to counting coins distractedly.
Joonghyuk sets down the crate of books on the floor with a grunt and coughs when it sends a poof of dust up to his face, nose wrinkling lightly. “I make deliveries. You know this.” He reminds him, displeased at being forgotten, as he wipes the sweat off of his face with the cotton sleeve of his shirt. Like the guilty man he is, Dokja hums noncommittally, as if the words had gone in one ear and out the other.
“Am I not allowed to enjoy the sunrise if I know it’ll be there every day? Be nice to your elders.”
Joonghyuk’s eyebrow twitches in mild annoyance. Surely there were better ways to make use of his smart tongue than to toy with him. Looking down at the boxes he’d been instructed to lug over by cart, he glances around the pattern of shelves in the store. “Where should I put these?”
Dokja doesn't even deign him with a precursory glance, choosing to instead tap the pen on his bottom lip in thought as he scratches something out of the ledger and frowns back at the cashbox. “What are they?” He asks instead, not bothering to look.
The fading ink prints reveal little more than branding, but Yoo Joonghyuk takes one of the boxes into his arms again with a motion too careful to be considered a shake. Besides—“what would a store like this sell, if not books and stationery.” Comes his dry response, in tandem with Kim Dokja finally looking at him.
Joonghyuk takes out the paper tucked into the fold of his jacket, and hands it over to the man, who prefers to look at it over Yoo Joonghyuk’s shoulder until he shoves it into his hands to skim through the invoice.
“Mn.” Dokja’s attention has a habit of deviating from him, but only when they’re like this. “You could’ve just mentioned that Ms. Gu sent you.” His voice has a strange far-away-ness to it that Yoo Joonghyuk doubts he will ever get used to, even though he’s often irked by the other’s blatant disregard for his space. Kim Dokja steps back behind the desk, twisting open the lock of some drawer before he rummages through it, pulling out a neat envelope, handing it over to Joonghyuk, whose eyebrows furrow in confusion as he takes it. Dokja snorts, “It’s a cheque, dummy.”
The name-calling prompts an immediate scowl on Yoo Joonghyuk’s face as he tucks the envelope into his jacket; accompanied by an unspoken bristling, ‘of course I know that’. “You usually give me coins.” He says instead, because he was raised to be polite.
—By the very man who gives him another noncommittal hum. Dokja picks up a coin on the table to flip into the air with an easy grin. “Yeah, well, the boss lady believes the future is here, and that coins will be obsolete in a decade’s time.” That calculating gaze flickers back to his, and he leans over the desk to beckon him closer, voice dropping into a secret. “But I think it’s because she realised her secretary has been eating up all the petty cash.”
It makes sense for the security, though not a good indicator by any means, much less for the bookkeeper who’d have to have found out about it—but Kim Dokja’s eyes squint like it’s particularly silly as he pulls back and continues pretending to count the money on the table.
“I’m leaving these on the floor.” Yoo Joonghyuk states in response to Kim Dokja’s lack of response to his questions, and is met with a nod.
“Yeah.” Dokja responds, lips cracking into a sly smile, “not like I’ll be the one sorting it anyway.” There’s an unspoken, humoured, it’s that accursed secretary’s role to ensure that everything had arrived well, after all.
Yoo Joonghyuk does not respond, but shifts his weight from one foot to the other, planted in place by a thought he lingers on for a moment. “What are you having for dinner.”
It’s too flat to be a question, skirting the edge of an accusation about him not having one altogether.
When Dokja’s eyes return to his, they faintly twinkle like it’s amusing. “Joonghyuk-ah,” he twirls the fountain pen in his hands, attention flickering back with an oops when an ink drop splats on the table. He wipes it with his sleeve before it can set any further and smiles back at him as if nothing had happened. “You know hyung has dinner plans.” He chides in that sing-song tone he uses whenever he takes nothing seriously.
“What plans?” The store owner asks as she rounds the corner into the little, single-storey shop, lips pursing as she looks at the new shipments.
“Oh, nothing,” a particular glint shines bright in Kim Dokja’s eyes whenever he lies to anyone, Joonghyuk notes, watching as he smoothly, neatly sorts the things atop the table into place, dropping the coins back into their compartments in the box. “I was just thinking of going out with some friends tonight,” Dokja replies as he caps the pen, twisting the ledger around for the owner to look through.
And, as the icing on the cake, he leans towards her and lowers his voice, “Joonghyuk-ie here is just a bit young for that sort of crowd, you know?” He smiles with a jab towards Yoo Joonghyuk, who still stands there, frowning as he turns to take his leave when the store owner laughs in understanding and pats Kim Dokja’s arm.
A beguiling ‘leaving without saying goodbye? You hurt me, Joonghyuk-ah’ follows behind him, but Joonghyuk’s frown deepens as he grabs a hold of his cart and treks back to return it. The sun is particularly merciless, forcing his eyes to squint under its glare, piercing through his clothes. How humid, too. To think he’d have to walk like this for another hour, only to do farm work under that sweltering sun all afternoon… Yoo Joonghyuk ruminates on his complaints, unable to hold back a sigh, thinking about how Kim Dokja would chide him for being spoiled.
So what if he was? Joonghyuk thinks bitterly, he absolutely deserved it. For how long he’d survived in the slums, raised on the stale rice at the bottom of a forgotten soup pot, being treated like he was precious was a luxury that made up for it. At least it was, for the few years that Kim Dokja had pulled him out of that and tended to him.
(Wiping the grime off of his face, feeding him the bigger half of whatever he got to eat that day, holding him close enough that the biting winter chill never reached him, the gentle thrum of his humming lulling Yoo Joonghyuk to sleep for many seasons as hands brushed through his wavy hair just as gently.)
(Yoo Joonghyuk never had parents to tend to him, doesn’t know if they’re alive or if they’d merely abandoned him, doesn’t care. Not when there’s someone who’d willingly knock on doors and ask for work just because he wants to give the boy he’d taken in an extra spoon of rice.)
But, like all good things, it came to an end.
For the first time, Yoo Joonghyuk wondered if he was simply made to be abandoned. A dramatised reading of the situation, but ultimately true; like a brand of damnation on his soul, it was a beautiful, prosperous spring with blooming flowers and healthy crops when he’d presented as an alpha.
Kim Dokja had prayed for it, mostly when he was keeled over and heaving everything that dared try to make it past his mouth in the thicket of his heats, around wiry, miserable sounds twisting out into the same coherent sentence as Yoo Joonghyuk would stroke his sticky, heated back: Joonghyuk-ah, I really hope you don’t end up like me. It’d cut off with a sick, wet lurch, and the splash of everything tumbling out of his mouth: in this place, it’s better to be born a dog than an omega.
Once he’d recovered from the heats that’d seize him irregularly just to have him weak and frail, as if a whisper away from disappearance, he’d hum playfully and toy around with something idly to make it seem more like a passing thought whenever he’d say: it’d be good if a kid like you grew up to be a strong alpha.
What Kim Dokja considered to be one of the best days of Yoo Joonghyuk’s life was easily one of—if not the—worst. The full thing eludes him, besides the nausea, the sticky heat, the dizziness, insatiability. An ache in his teeth. A desperate grapple for something he’d already lost. While an omega and a child under the same walls and roof was an expected mercy and kindness, an omega and alpha under one could only beget indecency. Marking or marriage were nothing to the equation, as if all inhibitions would disappear into an obscene wanton mess in the presence of one another behind closed doors.
To ensure Yoo Joonghyuk had an appropriate, timely debut in polite society, Kim Dokja pretended that his nimble administrative tasks for small shops allowed him enough coins to change their boding elsewhere in the neighbourhood. A humble two-bedroom apartment, drawing a clear line with the wall between them that’d only become wider and taller. He had smiled in a way that made his eyes squint, with a terrible excuse about how Joonghyuk was a growing boy and needed his space, as if it was something they could afford to think about, with room for food on the table. Yoo Joonghyuk spent two weeks pacing about the cold floorboards before deciding that he had to pick up work so that Kim Dokja would not stretch himself thin by overworking himself to the bone.
All good things come to an end, and the best in his life came to an end by his own hand.
Among the hushed gossip he’d pick up on between odd jobs to make money, it’s not unusual to hear whispers about himself—unusually quiet, strikingly handsome, newly presented. Residing with an omega.
Yoo Joonghyuk had spent the majority of his life sheltered from the iniquitous whispers on the street, the lanterns of the brothels, the vulgarity of why an omega couldn’t merely live with an alpha. Kim Dokja’s thin hands had made sure to cover his eyes and ears for that, muffling the outside world to him as protection. In fury, Yoo Joonghyuk ripped them off when the whispers had settled and its sediments sunk to clearly spell out promiscuity in the lines of Kim Dokja’s name.
That was when he learnt the cold truth of the world: to others, alpha was synonymous with strength and prosperity, and omega only bore meanings of children and seductive temptations.
He had stormed off in an unsoothed anger so visceral his own scent made him nauseous, and blazed through all the hard labour he could find. After all, wasn’t that the natural benefit of being born as an alpha? Superior genetics, superior builds, endurance, trust, vigour. It made him want to throw up. Pushing through only because there was no other option, not stopping until he could drop a heavy pouch of coins in front of the man who’d raised him and announced his own moving out. Had Kim Dokja flinched? Not at all. Merely blinking at him in consideration, he’d acquiesced with a shrug of his shoulders, as smooth as if he’d shed off a heavy coat, and just demanded that Yoo Joonghyuk find him a smaller apartment since he’d no longer be needing this one.
It had been his stroke of luck, in a way, with the older man being none the wiser to Yoo Joonghyuk’s ploy of finding him a suitable place far enough that those sticky rumours couldn’t follow through. Though he had no clue as to how the other came up with the idea to pass off as a beta by omission—he understands why easy enough, as the one to watch Kim Dokja claw through hell for better conditions. Joonghyuk leaves him to his own devices and his schemes, as long as they don’t include abandoning him.
A heavy hand claps down on his shoulder, startling him from where he’d been brooding in his thoughts. Ochre fields and cloudless ultramarine skies stretch over rolling hills and plains as the ahjussi who’d scouted him for his build grins. His tanned, sweaty skin is shining under the bright sun as he lists off the things he needed to have done by this evening. His jindo dog barks happily, running circles around them. Yoo Joonghyuk pets its head once.
Calloused fingers wrapping around the dry wooden handles of his equipment, he ultimately decides that it’s a good thing to be so occupied, with his mind so distracted. Any more free time would’ve had him vying for success in all the different ways to claw and gauge out his scent glands in hopes of erasing anything remotely alpha-esque on him, in hopes it’d allow him to live as a beta beside his hyung.
Happily ever after, like the pleasant fairytales that hyung would recite to soothe him when he was younger. Joonghyuk spends his afternoon ploughing the farmer’s field, trying to calm his thoughts from straying beyond what was palpable and real in front of him.
“I’ve been growing barley and millets for a while,” the ahjussi rumbles, stroking his chin in appreciation as he watches on from the side of his fields, greying hair catching the sun. “But,” He pauses, sighing thoughtfully, “I really want to have a persimmon tree here one day.”
Yoo Joonghyuk doesn’t deign him with a response, yet the old man continues. Talking back or requesting him to shut up would end badly, so the boy lets him ramble. It’s probably been a while since they had company, considering it was just the elderly couple and their dog on their fields.
The one-sided conversation continued to roll around persimmons. About how the ahjussi grew up in a farm with big orchards of them. In some place a bit too far away that soon grew desolate with droughts. How his reunion with the fruit came in the form of special compensation for his efforts when he was in the military, as a proud naval officer. “—the best way I had it, though, was at this gentleman’s lounge—“
Ears perking up at the words, Yoo Joonghyuk pauses. One of those had opened up on the ground and basement floors below Kim Dokja’s apartment, making for a curious sight as the uptown socialites of their town would flock in after sundown. Something about it always rubbed off wrong on him, worsened when Kim Dokja joyfully declared his long contract with the place in exchange for lowered rent. The most he said was that he just had to dress up fancy and sing, but the more he concealed it, the more it ticked Yoo Joonghyuk off. Especially because he’d take any and every chance to dismiss his questions with a sing-song remark about how he’s too young to know.
If there was nothing inappropriate happening, why couldn’t he tell him? It’s not like drinking, smoking, gambling, and fighting are unheard of, not when it happens so often right on the streets Joonghyuk grew up in. That only left more concerning probabilities. Disregarding how rudely he’d droned out the farmer earlier, Joonghyuk interjects with a question. “That lounge you mentioned… how old do you have to be to work somewhere like that?”
Thankfully, the old man doesn’t seem to take offense to his ignorance. Probably because there’s far too little people to just idly chat with. He laughs instead, with a hand on his belly, a mischievous twinkle in his eyes as he slaps Joonghyuk on the shoulder. “Ahh, that’s it,” he wags his finger, and Yoo Joonghyuk wonders if he’s being accused of greediness, as if a hole in his pockets ensures he never has enough. “That’s the look of an alpha right there.”
Or perhaps his greed is moreso wishing to hide any traits of that. The way Kim Dokja does, with thick layers that cover his scent glands and conceal all the ways where people easily make assumptions. He absentmindedly scratches at his wrist, waiting out the label everyone insists on placing on him since he’d presented.
A full-bodied laugh and praise about his determination only worsens his discomfort. As if his efforts were only achievable because of the blood in his veins, and not the blood that he’d shed in sheer effort to get here. Like his strengths, his drive, everything he wants, everything he’ll never have, never achieve, are all determined from genetic predisposition. He swallows down the discomfort swirling in his throat, and feigns ignorance to it as he prods more questions.
“Not to drink—make deliveries. Or security. Anything.” He must sound like a desperate try-hard with pheromones about to explode in excitement at the thought of seeing pretty omegas in fanciful fashion and the idea of lounging amongst the elite in their humble town, another one of the many alphas in the ranks. It must be true, from the grin he’s sent.
He doesn’t bother to correct it, having long since decided that Kim Dokja was the only one worth evading misunderstandings with. Everyone else seemed to have preconceived ideas of him, what he should be. With Dokja hyung, he was simply Yoo Joonghyuk.
(Though he doesn’t know how much longer he can carry that privilege. The embrace that kept him warm and sheltered him morphed into a walled separation, connected only by the same fireplace, until even that was extinguished; the wall between them widening into roads, neighbourhoods. Until the only lingering granule of that memory existed in their sparse interactions during the day when Kim Dokja pretended to be a beta, in the playful teasings of a child he’d watched grow, bound to fade once he’d grown enough for the difference in their age to be negligible, distance having made them strangers.)
“Back in my time,” the ahjussi responds, “nobody gave a damn if the bus boy was 14. You just had to be legal for more serious work. Like bartending.” He strokes his chin in thought, careful consideration before he proceeds, “but times ‘ve changed. They’re a lot stricter now. But if you’re gonna turn 18 some time before the new year…” He shrugs lightly, “should be fine.”
Yoo Joonghyuk is 16, in the middle of puberty’s woes, and still physically adjusting to the changes happening to him as a result of his presentation. His plans and whims are as short-lived as the seasons, with the sole mission of jumping to a higher degree of work. Something that’d give him more money and teach him a skill to refine and live off of, only to be discarded in favour of the next one to champion it. For the simple reason of having a bed and keeping himself fed.
For the first time in his admittedly short life, he looks forward to a future of work—one that would exist as long as Kim Dokja’s employment there did, with a reason that dips his toes into greed.
That thought occupies his mind all evening. Working beside Kim Dokja would ultimately mean getting to see him more often than he already does. The thought makes him stumble when the rake gets caught on a rock. Glimpsing into the life he keeps under wraps, a life that Yoo Joonghyuk can’t wrap his head around. He slips on a muddy patch of soil. He wonders what kind of songs he’d sing, having only heard meaningless humming and lullabies with missing words. He wonders how Kim Dokja would look dressed up, because he only sees him in worn, plain clothes, with his hair almost falling over his eyes. His legs ache, his trapezius burns. The ahjussi’s worrisome eyes rake over him and ask if it’s too much for one day. He ignores him.
He wonders so much about Kim Dokja because he fears he’s increasingly knowing less and less about him. He wonders how Kim Dokja would react to seeing him there. If his eyes would squint up into that smile if he saw him, if he’d call him Joonghyuk-ah and pinch his cheek, mess with his hair, laugh annoyingly and pat his shoulder. He wonders if Kim Dokja would go still, like a deer in headlights, perturbed and uncomfortable at two parts of his double-life converging.
He wonders, and wanders around lifelessly with clumsy, mechanical movements as if it’ll make the years go by faster. Until he’s lightheaded. Maybe dehydrated.
The farmer hands him a large steamed bun as Yoo Joonghyuk’s in the midst of putting away the ladder he used to climb up and fix their barn roof. The one he almost fell down from because he thought of Kim Dokja growing to dislike him. Perhaps it’s a good thing the ahjussi moves him to sit down on the overtly dry, dusty bench, guiding him by the shoulders.
“M’ partner’s still gettin’ dinner ready,” he gruffly mumbles around his own mouthful, “but this oughta keep you full ‘till then.” He settles down next to him, under the awning’s shade. Old wood creaks in protest under the added weight like limbs that haven’t been stretched in a while, and Yoo Joonghyuk bites into the fluffy dough. The meat filling has a strong, savoury taste that makes his mouth water. His stomach growls, rising to attention like a dog.
The people he works for often feed him snacks after handing him a handful of coins, usually with a friendly pat on his muscled arms and a comment about how a growing alpha like him should be well-fed. There’s a half-coherent thought there about the social ranking, a disgruntlement that he would’ve gone ignored if he presented differently, that Kim Dokja would have been much less fortunate if his mother hadn’t taught him how to read. Considering his appetite, Yoo Joonghyuk can’t deny the merits he’s handed. Hunger was the first feeling he’d known. Even when his stomach is warm and full with a nutritious, filling meal, it lurks. Insatiable, starving.
He doesn’t think he’s fully grown out of being the boy with drool dripping down his chin, staring at the tea house beckoning him with an irresistible aroma.
(Because, just like then, it’s something entirely unattainable that consumes his every waking moment, makes hunger prowl in him and ache in his teeth, wet his tongue. Entrancing him in a captivating scent that makes him want to sink his teeth in and savour the bite.)
He’s sent home a few hours later, after a large bowl full of chicken noodle soup and dumplings that the ahjussi had got from an old comrade—a noble from Murim who’d ended up retiring to a small house nearby. One of the Empire’s best. Yoo Joonghyuk can’t fathom why someone with such fortune would choose such a desolate, backwater area to settle down in, but he pockets the information he deems useful—such as: the dumplings are delicious, and that the Murim noble was likely stripped of their titles and informally banished to such a place, exacerbated by family tensions, because no one would live here of their own volition—and bows politely to the couple before he takes his leave.
‧₊˚♪ 𝄞₊˚⊹. ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁˖ . ݁
As months pass, people gradually begin to mention the knights, igniting a trend with the younger generation and the middle-aged who could benefit from it even if they were no longer as physically capable as they would have been in their prime. Housing provided in the cities in promise for loyalty and service, higher pays for working for the empire, pension.
“It’s a scam,” Kim Dokja resolutely states as he shakes a newspaper open, pupils hurriedly running over the text like ants though his face remains calm. “Don’t fall for it. They’re just trying to recruit more people to make up for the fact that we lost badly, and that only little more than half the troops returned alive.” His gaze is unusually steely as he peers up from the paper, as if to pin Joonghyuk in place with fear and intimidation.
That sickly, lankly man would be the furthest thing from imposing to him. That’s not why he listens to him, anyway; his wits were formidable, the urge to keep him satisfied even more so. Yoo Joonghyuk remains expressionless, just blinking at the other as he stacks the firewood he’d cut into a neat pile in the corner of the older man’s room. He watches as Kim Dokja’s breath condenses into small clouds, thinking back on the town elders grumbling in the past weeks about how this winter would appear to be particularly harsh.
While he’s not particularly enthusiastic by the prospect of dying on the front lines, there's a reason people flocked to join. Immediate benefits aside, it was a given that only the most skilled would be truly deployed for matters regarding border security and conquests. The average knight would be stationed by the gates and governmental offices, maybe patrolling the city. As people who’d been fighting for something stable and secure, from the roofs over their heads to the food in their mouth, he’d thought Kim Dokja would be less opposed by the ratio of risk to reward.
“It would be good,” he comments honestly, straightening up after he tosses the last chopped piece into the small fire. Avoiding Dokja’s surely appalled look, Yoo Joonghyuk dusts his gloved hands off for splinters. “I’ve been thinking—”
“Absolutely not!”
Kim Dokja’s hands smack down on his bed in protest. Joonghyuk pokes around the burning wood with the fire iron and continues, something between a counter and a statement, “I need to become stronger.”
“For what?!”
“Be quiet.” Even if he was working for the…club? Lounge? Downstairs, the owner’s temperance was another matter. Settling the iron back down, Yoo Joonghyuk turns around to meet his dearest hyung’s face twisted in disbelief, looking enraged. It’s something he’s mulled over in his head for many months, regarding the stagnancy of his efficiencies. He could learn by experience, but proper techniques would always outweigh that. A nasty sprain in his forearm in the spring that haunted him to the end of summer taught him that. He stretches it, rotates his wrist to crack the bone. A tingling numbness lingers that he shakes off.
He quietly mutters, “I can’t afford to be weak.”
In his peripheral, he sees Dokja’s gaze soften momentarily before it hardens again. “So your solution is to join the knights?” An accusation. Yoo Joonghyuk neither confirms nor denies it; far less than ideal, all things considered—mostly too far away—but there are limits to the practicality of his fitness without a tried and true order for it. The knights’ discipline and training were the most valuable thing he noted. Strengthen his muscles, his endurance, grant him the skills needed to protect what was important to him.
Silence as enough of an answer makes Dokja scoff, crossing his arms and looking away. The cold spice of juniper permeates the air, signalling a displeasure so profound the man loses his grasp on keeping his scent controlled.
“No.” gaze plastered passionately to his frosted window, Kim Dokja forbids him, “You don’t meet the age requirement.” is his best excuse.
Yoo Joonghyuk argues that training begins with assistance to the knights themselves, children included in that pool. It’s not received well, but it’s uncommon to see the man get so worked up when he’s usually so calm and languid, lazing about and flipping a random coin in his pocket to decide something. It makes him wonder just how precious he was, is, for Kim Dokja to be this upset over something he was only considering. “I need to take on more work,” he says instead, “but I can’t keep up like that.” he motions to his arm, shaking the soreness off.
It chips at Dokja’s resolve, gaze crumbling into begrudging understanding. “That’s because you’re always taking the cheap ones.” His voice sounds thicker, and Yoo Joonghyuk develops an abject fascination at wondering if it’s distress. Maybe because he knows why Joonghyuk wouldn’t, Kim Dokja grumbles under his breath, but the younger man picks it up anyway.
You’re always dismissing offers from those dukes and barons when they’re practically begging to keep you.
As if Yoo Joonghyuk had more to live for than eating, sleeping, and being beside Kim Dokja. Doing so would remove a foundational leg on his hierarchy of needs. The freezing crisp of juniper berries only become stronger, nearly palpable in the tension. Yoo Joonghyuk can almost taste it.
A moment passes before Kim Dokja abruptly waves his hands with a snap of his finger. “Aren’t there retired soldiers here?” His sharp, wavering gaze snaps up to Joonghyuk’s, the demand sounding more like a plea, “Learn whatever you need from them.”
Was he referring to the farmer? “That ahjussi is too old.” Not necessarily a stubborn protest, more of a neutral comment. He doesn’t think that he could watch and learn easily from someone who limps while walking and can’t reach very far up any more.
The frown on Dokja’s face deepens, his scent begins to smell smoky and bitter—or maybe that’s the burning wood at his fireplace. “What about the ahjumma from the Namgung clan?” He offers instead. “She lives around here, doesn’t she?”
Yoo Joonghyuk vaguely remembers that family name, though he can’t recall ever having seen the woman himself, despite having worked in every single corner of the area to the point where he could end up blind the next morning and still navigate perfectly between towns and plains. He’s in the midst of recalling whether he’s ever heard about her passing, because he had never seen her and is thus unsure whether she is even alive, when Kim Dokja interrupts his thoughts.
“Go to her and train there instead.” He has his arms crossed, upset. There’s a worry that engulfs the bitterness of his scent, and the care that precedes it makes it richer, softer, almost creamy. “You’re not allowed to enlist yourself.” Dokja resolutely protests, as if his parent. He might as well be.
The corner of Yoo Joonghyuk’s mouth twitches pleasantly, though he makes no certain guarantee; he would try, of course, but if that didn’t succeed, then Kim Dokja would have to simply come to terms with the cohabitation offer that’d come his way if Joonghyuk ended up following through with the knights instead.
(A city would undoubtedly carry more prospects, particularly in entertainment, or even administrative work like keeping a library in pristine condition, or even something else entirely—Kim Dokja was skilled, and his passions would shine brighter in a place more well off, whatever it was he truly wanted to do. If Yoo Joonghyuk was stationed away, then any issues of an alpha and omega not mated to one another wouldn’t even arise.)
(There’s also the thought of disguise, but he thinks it’d be less burdensome. A marriage of convenience was there, too, because Yoo Joonghyuk doubts he would find someone to prioritise in life over his hyung, but he couldn’t possibly be so greedy as to deny him that chance.)
‧₊˚♪ 𝄞₊˚⊹. ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁˖ . ݁
The Murim lady is a recluse, he quickly learns, living in a worn-down shed of a traditional home she’d apparently build herself. At least, that what he knows from the ahjussi who’d been given dumplings by her. Childless, spouseless, an esoteric bastard alpha child raised in high society, who’d been lent the short end of the stick when she hadn’t been a legitimised heir to the warrior family. He gains a faint understanding of why she’d rather live in such a place, now, peace apparently a luxury that cannot be bartered for with even gold.
In a slow pattern, Yoo Joonghyuk raps his knuckles on the dried, dark wooden gates of her home.
He’d been turned away numerous times in the week when he’d approached for anything other than errands. Sometimes the older alpha would pretend to concede just to scam him into running more errands, in a way that faintly reminded him of Kim Dokja, who is also the reason why he had been barred from any official apprenticeship from governmental sources. Of course, he knows that the most reputable did not automatically equate to the best in quality, akin to how expensive things could be poorly made. Exclusivity was a currency of its own, butting heads with accessibility. After his initial inquiry, the farmer ahjussi would be entrenched in nostalgia as he’d watch Yoo Joonghyuk tend to his crops, shovelling stock manure where needed, pouring the rice water left by his husband for the plants.
It was how Joonghyuk gathered information as he worked, likely the only reason he insistently comes back to the run-down building; in the last war, some time before he was even born, Minyoung-kun—as the ahjussi had called her—had defended the borders of her homeland on her own, even when the Namgung clan had already begun to flee. That’s also how he’d learnt she had disciples—back then, at least. Nobody had seen her in a while. She had apparently resorted to the confines of seclusion after the saving of the empire as a whole had left her home destroyed and nothing to inherit, a tree severed at the roots. Prior to that, she had been one of the strongest, most capable warriors that the country had ever known.
It’s irrefutably selfish to pester a veteran like this, but in a dog-eats-dog world, Yoo Joonghyuk believes he’s being reasonably polite in his insistence. He’s quite new to selfishness. He knocks again, louder.
A soft bark emerges through the grain of old wood, muffled.
The gate swings open, creaking out in wary. “You’re stubborn as a mule.”
Joonghyuk just blinks up at her. “Teach me your swordsmanship.”
Namgung Minyoung leans against the frame as if in opposition to even let him in. This was someone who was physically imposing; larger than most, built like an immovable mountain, a sharp gaze with striking clarity and wisdom. Incredible capabilities hidden under the lax demeanour of someone who had nothing to lose. Though he hadn’t meant to, Kim Dokja had once again struck gold for Yoo Joonghyuk in finding him the perfect person to pester into mentorship—a skill he’d learnt from that man.
Moments pass before he’s suddenly tossed a pouch of coins from somewhere in her robes. He catches it, but it’s clearly meant to be a surprise that hits him—Yoo Joonghyuk is learning her ways, and Namgung Minyoung is forced to face the fact that she’d met her match in stubbornness. “Go fetch me three chickens from the butcher.” She says instead, unfazed. She’s also getting used to him catching whatever she throws at him.
Training begins with assistance, and it wasn’t an excuse. Though, it’s strikingly clear that the middle-aged woman is just waiting for Joonghyuk to get tired of her antics, get frustrated, and quit. His first lesson in patience had been Kim Dokja, so Namgung Minyoung would simply have to learn a lesson in patience called Yoo Joonghyuk until she is forced to concede and accept his drive, and make her his student.
He fetches the chickens. She makes him clean them, then uproot the vegetables in the poor patch of land she calls a garden.
Yoo Joonghyuk does not learn swordsmanship that day, but he learns how to make the best dumplings he’s ever had. He eats two bowls shamelessly, and Namgung Minyoung huffs in disbelief.
He sees her resolve begin to crack after three more weeks.
Yoo Joonghyuk is a few months over seventeen when he gets the gift of mentorship.
He is eighteen when he is given a birthday that isn’t just the vague encompassing of summertime—a humid night when his teacher becomes curious enough to ask about him, a humid enough night where he finds himself talking more than usual. With a sagely nod about how he had the audacity of a parentless child, she’d taken the blade at her side and written the characters for three and eight in the sand, in the old, complex script, before telling him: Then, today is your birthday. What lucky numbers.
When he sees Kim Dokja next, he announces it. With a slight smile that was happy for him and confused at the same time, the older man responds, “Is that so? Let’s celebrate again next year.” He gives Joonghyuk a friendly pat on the shoulder and walks off, idly flipping through the book in his arms—one he’s meant to deliver instead of peeping through, if the lovingly penned note on the first page is any indication.
He seems unaware of the fact that Yoo Joonghyuk’s making his way to his home. Or maybe he’s simply ignorant to it, unquestioningly complacent to the face he’d grown up seeing almost every day; doesn’t have a reason to suspect him in the first place.
To be more specific, Yoo Joonghyuk is not targeting his home, per se, but the gentleman’s lounge that’d opened up right under it. Kim Dokja’s place of work, where he would get an answer to his question: just how close would Kim Dokja allow him to get, before he’s pushed away again? And his secondary question: because the environment now differs greatly to the last time, would he be pushed away again?
‧₊˚♪ 𝄞₊˚⊹. ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁˖ . ݁
“Hmm,” the establishment’s manager gives Yoo Joonghyuk a thoughtful, scrutinising look. “What kind of work are you looking for?”
“I can do anything.” is the young man’s resolute, immediate reply. His response has the manager’s eyes carefully analysing him; the tanned skin and toned build of his hard work, the look in his eyes.
(After all, if everyone insisted that his capabilities and effort were all hand in hand with being an alpha, an immediate promotion in his social rankings, his opportunities, should he not pull those strings in his favour?)
(The thought nearly makes him nauseous.)
Raising an eyebrow, the manager counters, “But you haven’t worked at a place like this before.”
Joonghyuk replies right away, “I can learn anything quickly. There's no one in this town who doesn’t know me.”
“Arrogant.” the manager scoffs, but there’s a pleased expression on his face. “That’s true, though. You’re that errand boy, right?” an unmistakable hint of derision lingers on the term, as if to say that for all his work granted him fame, it bore little fruit; an assumption that this was him begging for a rope from above, a way to struggle up to the top.
Whatever. Other people’s thoughts don’t matter. Yoo Joonghyuk only nods.
Hand on his hip, the manager rakes his eyes around the lounge that remains closed during daytime, seeping sunlight only emphasising how dim and dark the place truly is with all its hickory furnishings and deep velvet decor. He peers around for a while, putting on a show of looking for task availability. His gaze catches on the polished floors for a while, and then to the shelves of neatly arranged liquor.
He doesn’t ask about Yoo Joonghyuk’s age, another bitter feeling surfaces up at the remembrance of being told he’s mature and capable for his age, older than he seems.
“Say,” the manager begins, with a small smile void of any light, “how good are you at cleaning?”
An obvious jab to his social standing—if the fancy patterns decorating the man’s tailored suit, the shiny buttons on his cuffs, the neatness of pomade-laden hair combed back without a single hair out of place, the shine of his unscratched shoes, are all any indication. but Joonghyuk deems it no mind. “Very.” He keeps his words clipped, stare vigilant. The other could just ask anyone in the area and find out, anyway.
He has no shame in his work, and thus no reason to cower in front of pettiness. Nothing is beneath him, except for what brings harm. He can afford at least that righteousness in his choiceless life.
The manager smiles wide, one palm on the bar’s counter as he leans against it languidly in a display of power. Ownership, maybe. “Hm,” he raises his eyebrows, peering back over his shoulder at the display, fingers rhythmically tapping on the polished wood, “What about doing dishes?”
Was he looking for more work to dump on him? Fine. “Yes.” Yoo Joonghyuk makes sure not to let his eyebrow twitch.
“You know what our patrons are like,” the manager splays his fingers and gestures around them to all the furnishings and decor. Wealthy, he means to say. Rub more salt in where he wants it to hurt. It’s a good thing Joonghyuk has thick skin. “nouveau riche.” the foreign words fly right over his head, much to the manager’s delight as he places a hand on his chin as if thinking how to explain this to someone so uneducated. “They’re new to money, don’t know what to do with it, and show it off in bad taste.”
As Yoo Joonghyuk is about to wonder why the man is showing the underside of his clearly ostentatious customers to a man he looks down upon and hasn’t even hired yet, he hears a scoffed backwoodsmen under his breath. So he wasn’t from here. A mildly annoyed thought crosses his mind about how it’s arguably more embarrassing for someone from the city to end up in a comparatively poorer town if such a place is beneath him, but he holds it in.
“—they order everything they can see, and…” the man’s mouth twitches, like it’s humouring, disgusting, and exciting all at once.
“Well, they throw it up.” he claps his hands. “That's where you’ll come in, I assume? Our cook’s a little…busy having to do everything herself, so—“ cutting off his words, he casts a sly glance at the young man, certain to find humiliation on his face with no choice but to grovel for better pay than what he gets, “—what do you say?”
There is no shame in work to live was one of the first lessons Kim Dokja had taught him. Yoo Joonghyuk has long since forgotten how old his hyung was, then, but he knows with certainty that he was so much younger than him. So Yoo Joonghyuk steels himself on his impassiveness and nods. “Deal.”
“Wooow,” the manager drawls out, holding his hand to shake. “Not a lot of people your age are excited about…such work.” there’s a glint in his eyes. “Especially alphas.”
There it is.
The man laughs, “Usually it’s omegas who do the, uh, dirty work, you know?” he says the word omega like it’s dirt itself, soiling his tongue. Strengthening his grip, he clasps his other hand on top of Yoo Joonghyuk’s.
Ah, Joonghyuk thinks in resigned bitter understanding, another alpha. Or a beta who wanted to seem like one for the power. One that prided himself on false similarities whilst looking down on him, keeping him in place. It didn't matter. Joonghyuk’s fingers almost tighten into a crushing grip at the thought of this being Kim Dokja’s boss. It leaves a terrible taste in his mouth.
Taking his silence as submission, the manager takes it as a sign to continue, letting go of his hand with a satisfied look. “Most of the staff are performers or servers, so you might have quite a bit of work on your hands, though…” he leans away, and laughs, clapping a hand on Yoo Joonghyuk’s shoulder, “Nothing an alpha like you can’t handle, right?”
Not backing down from his stare, Joonghyuk blinks, “Yes.”
For all his derision and condescension, the manager has the decency to give him a run-down of the ground rules, his to-be colleagues, the layout of the floor, in the few hours before opening.
He can exercise authority over noncompliant servers and the cook on sole account of his secondary gender. An innate trait of leadership, or something, he doesn’t listen. He’s not allowed to use it on the patrons, even if they were omegas, because it’d mean less money––the only exception being the case wherein a nasty fight breaks out, in which they are to be politely escorted off of the premises. Even that is just to assist the others truly assigned to the task, the pseudo-guard waiters with burly builds lurking in the shadows near the entrance. It is prohibited to engage in sexual relations with patrons and performers; considered financial extortion of the establishment, brand damage to it, if a performer were to carry the scent of another, much less a child. Dulling the lustre of exclusivity, as if they were courtesans to be bought and rescued by the highest bidder.
That disturbing thought quickly falls into place when he learns the cook is a middle-aged omega, a former courtesan, who had done the heavy lifting for the design and functionality of the space––inspired the owner who bought her out for it to begin with. Yoo Joonghyuk does not know how to feel when he sees the woman in question trudge in an hour before opening with worn clothes, sunken cheeks, and tired eyes—especially when he looks at the manager benefitting from that work. His jaw tightens with the force it takes to keep his mouth shut, whipping his head around to focus on something else.
Paying no mind to anything around him, the manager continues, listing the performers, brushing off the musicians as unimportant––that is, unless they had a patron with a passion for the arts who was willing to spend an exorbitant amount to sponsor further refinements of the skill.
“Now, onto the real sellers, the performers,” rattling on, the manager includes minor points of importance; the establishment's backbone was, ultimately, the pretty faces putting on makeup and fancy clothes to sing and dance on stage. Pivotal. Some bragging comment about how all of them were scouted omega beauties, with the exceptional beta.
“These faces would hardly suffice as background performers in capital theatres, but for a place like this…I suppose it’s like seeing real gemstones up close for you guys, hm?” The manager laughs, scornful, and the way he talks makes Yoo Joonghyuk’s skin itch, scratching at a fading scar on the back of his hand.
Eyes squinting slyly in a gross, gasconading glower, the other continues, “The real star of the show goes by Gu Minho––” he cuts off with a barked laugh, sharp and unsettling, “––ha! that one’s really a gumiho. Anyway, he goes by Guwon, here. He brings in the most customers.” A smile twists on his lips, as if he’s bragging about a racehorse. Those glinting eyes waver back to Yoo Joonghyuk, patting his shoulder uncomfortably as both his eyebrows raise. “So be nice to him.”
Did he think Joonghyuk was here to glare down others?
“Actually,” the manager rubs his chin, staring down more intently at him than he’d ever like. “I think you two should be the same age, or something, so don’t worry about speaking informally. Well, not that it’d really matter,” there’s a bitter scoff, a wry smile, a thinly veiled threat; for all he was an alpha, this prized omega was leagues above him in worth, something that stood higher than any social ranking ever could.
Pushing down all the uncomfortable feelings that float up to the surface with every interaction, Yoo Joonghyuk diligently listens to all the slight advice he’s given in understanding of the small mercies. The rhetoric seeping into everything he’s told tugs him in opposite directions; a part of him feels visceral aversion to such a place, wanting to run back out over dirt and bricks and rocks back to what he knows, where he won’t get paid more unless he runs further away, further from Dokja hyung, and––that’s where the other side tugs him, in a mirrored fear; run closer to the older man, dig out a space for himself beside him, plant his feet into the ground and pull him away from all this if he has to. Like a teetering swing barely balanced in the middle, hinging on the outcome of seeing at least tonight through.
Joonghyuk familiarises himself with the equipment and storage, mostly with help from the cook, who quietly just points him in the necessary directions. He bows his head with a murmured thanks every time.
Business hours commence shortly after he’s done mopping the floors and wiping down any shiny surface sure to catch the light. Candles flicker warmly in lanterns and chandeliers as they’re lit by other staff members, and by the time Yoo Joonghyuk casts his glance outside, the sky looks like a stretch of cobalt and indigo, the sun nowhere in sight as the stars blink to life, the same way they do on stage under the glimmer of reflective jewels.
A number of people shortly begin to trickle in, fresh out of busy workdays, and Joonghyuk begins to understand what the manager had meant by new money. From their brazen attitudes that come unnaturally, like walking around in shoes too big and looking like fools as they make any gesture possible to flaunt the money slipping from their pockets, to the accessories dangling off of them. He recognises some of them, insides twisting as he registers the familiarity––he is often hired for chores by their households, most of them married, with children of their own, as they beckon the cabaret performers and flirt with whoever will attend to them.
“Haha,” the slimy manager slides up to him, grinning, “is this the first time you’re seeing these things?”
Not at all, Yoo Joonghyuk thinks as he remains expressionless where he stands. Not the cigar smoke casting a hazy veil, not the patrons escorted to small, private rooms to gamble in, not the illicit advances. Humans would be humans whether those exchanges occurred in dark, musty alleyways, or in expensive velvet seats. It didn't mean it was any less disturbing, though.
“It’s expected in this line of work, sir.” is what he settles on through his teeth, remembering how Namgung Minyoung would whack him for excluding his honourifics. He'd need that to survive here. He finds that grin widening in his peripherals like a grotesque ghost, and decides it was the right choice.
“Looks like you’re settling in well.” the manager murmurs to him before slipping away to take place beside a gaggle of businessmen attempting to covet the current singer to their table. A face Yoo Joonghyuk doesn’t recognise, but he notes an impressive professionalism in their balance of rejection whilst remaining coquettish enough to keep them pleased; the fur boa draped over their shoulders slides down in a graceful move for one of the ends to land in the outstretched hand of one of the alphas. An immediate, overjoyed riot. Barked, sharp laughs.
One of the servers taps him on the shoulder to pass over a bottle with expensive-looking calligraphy. Joonghyuk complies, drowning out the sea of noise.
Piano keys meld with the glare of the lights reflecting on every polished piece in the room, melting into the buzz of obnoxious chatter that sounds as if the louder their voices, the bigger their knot. The instruments change, on occasion, foreign sounds broken through with the occasional zither, gauzes and silks fluttering on stage in endless performances.
The haze of work is cut through when someone knocks over a large bottle, too drunk and too engrossed into an overzealous conversation. Someone else warily nudges Joonghyuk’s back to push him in that direction to clean it up. Must be an intimidating customer, he gathers as he takes a rag and tucks another into his belt, reaching for the broom to brush away the mess. It's a table closer to the small stage, and in the brighter light, he notices the drunkard is in uniform. One of the duke’s legions, red in the face without a care for the world.
Yoo Joonghyuk wipes the shattered glass off of the table onto the floor, as he was told to. Prioritising their customers, the manager had said, make it as comfortable for them as possible. He crouches down, carefully picking up the pieces and placing them into the rag. The music softens into a lull, signaling a change. The patrons above him mention something like that, muffled murmurs blended into a conversation about how they want more drinking snacks––the actual part Joonghyuk focuses on.
He gathers the edges of the rag together as the sound of heels softly clack on the stage. A foreign rhythm he can only assume is trendy kicks life onto the stage.
I alone fell for a beautiful face.
I’m falling deeply.
Thinking about you keeps me up at night.
A unique warmth in the voice singing. Something itches at him to look up as he secures the mess of glass in the soft cloth, locking onto the pair under the spotlight.
Entirely different to everything he’d known.
But unmistakable.
Kim Dokja.
It almost feels like the world pauses, at that very moment––no, it’s Kim Dokja that pauses, mouth forming a soundless word before the expression on his face vanishes, gaze cast elsewhere as he masquerades a smile and continues like nothing had happened. Catching up to the melody he fell behind on.
Yoo Joonghyuk remains frozen, knelt on the ground, unable to put a word to the feeling in his chest.
(He’d never been closer to him, this side of him that’d brush off any curious questions Joonghyuk would cast his way with a mysterious smile and lulling, teasing, I’m not doing anything bad, Joonghyuk-ah, don’t worry.)
(At the same time, Yoo Joonghyuk doesn’t know if he’d ever felt further from him. As if someone had drawn a picture of him composed entirely of words, every stroke a complex calligraphy in a language he doesn’t know; he has an innate understanding that the portrait is Kim Dokja, he just doesn’t know anything about it, can’t read a single line on his face, on what makes him up.)
Kim Dokja had torn his eyes away, but Joonghyuk’s follow his every move in earnest, committing to memory his complexion, the carefully carved contours of his face, the brushstrokes brightening his eyes, the curl of his painted mouth. He takes in the appearance of the hyung he’s known for most his life anew, and thinks that he likes the man better when his face isn’t hidden from view under his hair; when it’s shiny and styled, when he’s not hiding under drab robes and layers of shirts, styled in neat silk and accessories, shining brightly.
He thinks Kim Dokja was meant to, better suited to, live lavishly like a young noble. His knees feel unusually weak as he staggers to stand. A distracted grip clenching tight around the rag sends a sharp jab to his palm, yanking him out of the mess in his head. Ah, he thinks as he sees the fabric darken, he needs to get a grip.