Chapter Text
Not that he’d ever made a top ten list, but this is not how Namjoon wanted to die.
He shivers in the high mountain wind, and when the wind dies down, he trembles still. Was the dragon lurking somewhere, watching its offering like a cat watches a mouse? Can dragons lurk? Is that possible for a creature so big?
Namjoon sniffles and doesn’t bother to wipe the tears that fall from his wide, frantic eyes. He peeks down the side of the cliff. The spire of the temple in his little village is just barely visible in the valley a couple of mountains over. The high priestess and the city guards are somewhere below, returning home. Something he’d never do again.
So quiet up here. The sound of his own hiccuped sobs are the only company he has. Nothing but death and wind.
He yanks the flower crown from his head and chucks it into the dust. Fire lilies, the last blooms of autumn. A long robe embroidered with crystals and gems drapes heavy over his body, gold medallions dangle from delicate chains on his wrists and ankles. His hair groomed and scented with rose water, his cheeks and eyes painted in the official pattern of his village so the dragon would know who paid so dearly for the hopes of another ten years of safety.
With dread and trepidation, Namjoon creeps over rocks and boulders to peer over the north side of the mountain. Far, far in the distance a little trail of smoke tells him another village hides in the trees on the horizon, a week’s walk, maybe? He considers dropping all his adornments to appease the dragon and fleeing naked down the sheer cliffside.
A shadow eclipses him. Fear runs cold down to his toes, and though his clings harder to the rocks than ever, a sudden vertigo sends his stomach in a lurch.
Wings beat air and dust his way and he crawls between a crack between the rocks. “No, no, please no, nononono-”
It’s pointless. Claws scrape over stone and a big, reptilian face towers over him. It’d be a beautiful creature, if it wasn’t his death. Black scales shimmer with deep blue iridescence in the sunlight, huge eyes a rich blood red. Fire lily red.
Talons reach for him and he blacks out on the sorrowful wish that his last thought in life wasn’t terror. He had wanted a different death. He had wanted more life.
He comes to in total darkness. Not a sliver of light in any direction, he blinks and breathes, and wonders if he’s really breathing in the afterlife or if it’s a residual habit of the mind.
Is this the abyss? He wonders. The darkness where souls rest unformed? If I walk through, will I find the light and be reborn? Weightless in the pitch black, it’s almost an exciting prospect.
Thinking he has no body, he wills himself forward with his mind to see if that will work. His ankles jangle with coins as thought translates to bodily movement.
A sharp gasp. He touches his chest and finds he’s still wearing the beaded crystal robes, knuckles raw from scraping across rock.
He hasn’t died yet.
“No,” he rasps, broken in spirit. Dread fills him and pushes out a sob that echoes through the cavern around him. He doesn’t know how to go through the fear again, body already aching with the post-adrenaline rush exhaustion. If dragon teeth have to be his death, he’d prefer it to be quick.
“Just kill me already!” he shouts into the black, falling to his knees and feeling his way across the stone floor though there’s nothing to guide him in any direction. A few minutes more of breathless groping and his hand finds cloth. A woven rug, it would seem, odd to find in a cave.
A glow of fire peeks around the corner. “No. No, please, just do it fast, please I’m- I’m so afraid,” he sobs, scrambling backwards until his back hits something hard.
Books rain down around him, tumbling from the wooden shelves he’s up against. The fire comes closer, and Namjoon realizes it’s a torch, not the terrifying breath of a giant, hungry dragon.
Covered in books and unable to look away, he shakes as the torch comes closer and reveals it’s being carried by a human, a man with dark hair and soft woven clothes of wool and fur. For a single, tentative second, Namjoon is relieved. Then the man kneels down in front of him and the firelight glimmers in his eyes. Fire lily red.
“No,” he whimpers, cowering like a dog when the man tugs him up to his feet. He drops back down to the ground in a quivering ball.
The man frowns and sets the torch into a sconce on the wall. Both hands free, he picks Namjoon up and all but carries him to a chair beside the bookshelf. Namjoon thrashes and shoves him away, all attempts at dignity and bravery thrown away.
“Please, please kill me before you do it, I don’t deserve this,” he wails. “Don’t deserve so much pain, please, please just do it quick…”
Clutching Namjoon’s shoulders in a tight grip, the man waits until Namjoon stops sobbing and looks at him.
“Why do you cry?”
With a look a lot like he’d just been slapped, Namjoon blinks and sniffs. “Because you’re going to eat me, and I don’t want to die this way.” He shudders a sob and begins to beg. “I have so much, not much to a dragon I’m sure but, I have friends, and I was going to study woodcrafting in Veil and- and- I wrote a book, I- please,”
“I will not eat you,” he scoffs like the notion is ridiculous.
What kind of dragon trick is this? Namjoon wonders, anticipating the next words from his mouth being “I will rip you to shreds and roast you and then I will eat you.”
But instead the man drops to his knees in front of the chair and takes Namjoon’s hand. His red eyes trace over the design painted on his face, no doubt muddled by tears now, and he doesn’t smile, exactly but he… glimmers. Slow, with something like greed or reverence, he turns Namjoon’s palm up and carefully removes the ruby ring and gold bracelet, and then the other, placing them one by one on the table beside them.
The tears start up again in quiet, resigned sobs. Of course the dragon would remove the treasures before eating him. “Oh gods. No, no…”
He watches Namjoon watch him with curiosity, sitting back to remove the anklets as well, Namjoon’s foot propped up on his thigh. Eyes glittering in the firelight, he traces his fingers over the intricate crystal designs beaded over Namjoon’s chest, down and down to the emerald waves patterned over the thighs.
Chest heaving with fear, Namjoon’s eyes go bigger as the man leans closer and, one by one, unbuttons the tiny buttons down his chest until the heavy robe falls open. It pools around his waist with a slinky thunk, and two more tears roll down his cheek. That’s it. Naked now, nothing standing between him and death. He shuts his eyes and waits.
“I brought you more comfortable clothes,” the man says, eyes lingering on Namjoon’s bare skin before he stands to retrieve a stack of cloth nearby.
He beckons for Namjoon to take them, and frowns when he sits frozen in the chair. That scares Namjoon into motion and brings him to his feet.
“Thank you for the gifts.” He scoops up the robe when Namjoon stands and inspects the tiny crystals, fingers tracing over them as his gaze glitters in reflection.
“They’re so you won’t attack my village. Please, please don’t attack, at least don’t make my death be for nothing, please honor it.”
“I said I will not eat you,” the dragon laughs, eyebrows furrowed. “Put them on,” he urges, pushing the clothes into Namjoon’s arms, eyes trailing down Namjoon’s bare body. “I did not expect… I assumed they would send the most beautiful of their village, but I did not expect someone this beautiful.”
Namjoon pauses his harried dressing, eyes bugged out in confusion at the compliment, at the shyness in the voice.
“What?” he says dumbly.
He steps forward and admires the burgundy silk pants on Namjoon’s long legs. Taking the shirt from Namjoon’s clenched fists, he tugs it down over Namjoon’s head and threads his arms through the sleeves like he’s a child.
Satisfied in his choice of outfit, he looks Namjoon over and hums. “I said you are beautiful. Though, I would like to clean your face. And then I will leave you alone, as I can see you are very afraid, though I don’t know why.”
Across the cavernous little room, there’s a sound of water splashing and dripping in a basin, and the man returns to where Namjoon has glued himself to the wall. Towel in hand, he holds Namjoon’s face still and gently wipes the red paint from his eyes and cheeks.
“It has stained your skin,” he frowns. “Why are you painted like this? Tomorrow I will bring you some oil.”
He continues to stand there, frowning at Namjoon and the way he shakes and heaves panicked breath. “I wish you were not afraid, I don’t like that.”
“Sorry,” he gasps automatically.
He reaches for a little box on the table and takes a pinch of some kind of sweet-smelling dried herbs. “Open your mouth,” he asks softly.
Namjoon complies, too deep in fear to question. It’s sweet when it hits his tongue.
“It will help you sleep,” he tells him, brushing the excess over Namjoon’s bottom lip. “Don’t take more, it is very potent.”
He takes Namjoon by the arms and leads him to the bed against the far wall, deep in warm shadows, and sets him onto the soft woolen bed. Hands so hot.
“Lay back. I think I brought enough furs for a human to be warm. I hunted for weeks, and traded my gold for a hunter to turn them into blankets, because I knew you were coming. Though, I did not know it would be you, ” he trails off, eyes taking in the features of Namjoon’s tear and paint stained face.
Namjoon’s eyes begin to fall heavy, and he smacks his lips to taste the sweet licorice taste of the herbs.
“The herbs will make your dreams sweet, too,” he assures him with a smile. “My name is Yoongi, if you need to call for me.”
He wakes with a gasp, no dreams to memory. It feels like it has been half a moment since his eyes fell shut in the weird, shadowy, firelight terror of red eyes and soft silks and gentle hot hands.
“Why am I still alive?” he whispers to the stone walls. A sickening dread, being dressed up and kept as a pet before he’s killed and eaten alive by a dragon.
Odd, though, that no one knew the dragons took human form as well. Huddled under warm furs, Namjoon contemplates the stories everyone knows, giant scaled beasts perched atop hills of gold. It didn’t make sense, now that he thinks about it; what does a flying lizard want with gems and money?
Still, what does a dragon man want with a human offering if not a meal? The walls of the cavern shake with a sudden bang, followed by the distant scraping of claws on stone before it falls quiet again. Curiosity is smothered by terror. Nothing is right, nothing is familiar, he’s held hostage by a monster and he desperately wants to go home and forget what it feels like to wish for death.
The dragon man soon walks into the room, shallow basket in hand. “Good morning. I have breakfast here.”
Not at all hungry, but he’s too afraid to turn down the offer. The berries are sweet, though he can hardly taste them, the meat juicy and well cooked. An odd breakfast.
“Did you sleep well?”
“I think so,” he mumbles nervously.
“What is your name?”
“Namjoon.”
“Namjoon,” he repeats. “I brought oil for your face. Why did you paint it like that?”
“I didn’t!” Namjoon grumbles, offended. “The priestess paints the official pattern of our town, so you know who not to attack.”
“What does a dragon know of town patterns,” he scoffs, dabbing oil on Namjoon’s red cheeks and rubbing a clean cloth at the faded design.
“Then, why have you never attacked, if not for our ten-year offerings?”
Yoongi pauses and stares at him. “Because, I do not attack villages,” he answers simply. “I’m a dragon, I hunt and collect pretty things. I haven’t been in this area for long, six season cycles. Other dragons have told me that towns leave gifts for them, sometimes, pretty things or companions. The traditions seems odd, but I like pretty things,” he shrugs, back to rubbing at Namjoon’s cheek. “And I come back from hunting yesterday to find pretty things left on top of my mountain, and you. You are very good treasure, I think.”
His stomach swoops in unease. “Companions?”
“Yes,” he agrees, frowning at a stubborn spot on Namjoon’s nose.
“Not- not food?”
“Why would you think your village sent you to be eaten? Wouldn’t that be very cruel?”
“They called it a ‘necessary sacrifice’, an ‘honor to protect the people’.”
The frown on Yoongi’s face deepens. “And so you were willing to die a painful death?”
“No,” he laughs, an angry bark. “I would’ve escaped in the night, had I known, and let them choose someone else. But they don’t tell, of course. They make it a ceremony, drawing a name in front of the whole village with the guards surrounding so you can’t run away.”
Yoongi’s brows are furrowed deep as he processes the information. “Then… you are not the most beautiful of your village? I was told-”
“I’m not even the most beautiful in my house,” he laughs at his lap.
“Are you sure?” The disbelief in the dragon’s voice is so earnest Namjoon can’t help but stare back with a funny quirked little frown.
“Yes? I’m not- not… I guess you haven’t seen many humans.”
“I have seen plenty of humans. At least a hundred!”
“At least a hundred…” Namjoon laughs, looking away from the indignant pout. It’s cute, and he doesn’t have the mental capacity to process that feeling just now.
“For a companion, you are very ornery,” Yoongi mumbles, wiping at his other cheekbone.
“I’m not meant to be your companion, I’m meant to be your dinner. Dinner is ornery.”
It feels a little better, directing his angst toward his captor. He doesn’t trust any of this, doesn’t trust that the dragon doesn’t mean to eat him, or won’t do it anyway when hunger strikes or when Namjoon wears out his welcome. What is a dragon companion anyway? Is it like the stories of vampire thralls? Would some arcane power submit him to this red-eyed monster’s will? In a month’s time, would he be mindlessly strolling around the cavern, organizing heaps of gold and polishing gems and… he doesn’t want to think of what else.
“Why do you eat your own lip?” Yoongi asks, pulling at his jaw with a frown.
“Sorry. Just a nervous habit when I’m, you know. Terrified for my life.”
“I told you, I will not eat you!”
“Then what will you do with me?” he whispers. He immediately regrets asking, not prepared for the truth.
“I will care for you, like I care for all my treasure.”
Not quite a reassuring answer, but the vagueness feels safe for now.
“Come, you should bathe. Did you eat enough?”
“Not really hungry…” he mutters, wanting nothing more than to huddle back under the furs and disappear.
When he looks up, Yoongi’s face is in a pout. “I cooked that cow for you.”
“You know, usually we call it steak, or beef. When it’s food.” A stupid thing to get high and mighty about, but he’ll take any chance to lash out.
“Why do you not call it cow?”
“I don’t… I dunno. We like to pretend we’re too good to eat animals, I guess…”
“I don’t understand.”
“It’s not something to understand, it just is. ”
Yoongi watches him for a minute but doesn’t speak the thoughts clear on his face. Finally, “Was the- the steak not good? I assumed your village sent the best cow, but I also assumed they sent the most beautiful companion but you insist you are not, so…”
The worry sounds so sincere, and Namjoon is too tired to keep up the aggressive pettiness. And though he wants to scream at him, to insist he’s not beautiful, not a companion, to rage at him for stealing away his life, sullen sounds easier.
“It was fine. Just… not hungry.”
“Well. A bath sounds nice?”
Namjoon just shrugs a shoulder and lets Yoongi pull him to his feet.
It’s cold outside, autumn beginning sooner so high up here. But Yoongi dressed him in warm layers of furs and his hand is like a tiny campfire where it rests on the small of his back as they walk the path through white aspen trees with lemon yellow leaves.
“The hot springs here are always warm, but I heat them. I like a bath to be hot, not warm. I heated it yesterday, so it should be just right. I brought my favorite soaps for you to use, orange or lavender or pine. Or all of them, if you’d like. Taehyung is always happy to make more, if I trade him some… deer beef?”
Yoongi has been chattering on all the way through the woods, oblivious to the scowl on Namjoon’s face, or maybe trying to be oblivious to it. He peeks up at Namjoon for approval and Namjoon tries not to laugh.
“We call deer meat venison.”
“That is very confusing.” Yoongi pouts. “We’re here! Take off your clothes and tell me if it’s warm enough for a human. If not, I can heat it again.”
It sends chills down his neck, knowing “heating it” must mean shifting into the massive scaled beast he saw the day before and breathing fire over the rock pools. The rock he hides behind is a poor cover as he undresses in a nervous scramble, eyeing Yoongi who’s scooping two buckets of water from the nearest pool.
A pointless endeavor; Yoongi carries the buckets over and stares blatantly at his naked body. “I will wash you,” he announces, dropping to his knees in the grass.
“I can wash myself, gods,” Namjoon yelps, more panicked than the intended anger.
Yoongi looks confused. “But you’re my companion. I should-”
“Will you shut up with that! I’m not your damned companion, I’m supposed to be dead. I am dead, my life is gone, I’m-!”
He shakes in the cold, surprised when the warmth of tears roll down his cheek, surprised when he can’t control the rapid shudders of breath.
“If you don’t want to be here with me, why don’t you just go home? I won’t try to stop you, though I’d be very disappointed…”
Namjoon sinks down into a ball on the grass, dragging a fur into his lap. “Can’t. They’d kill or imprison me for escaping you and bringing doom upon the village.”
“I’m sorry,” Yoongi whispers, blood red eyes trained on him but Namjoon can’t meet them.
He sniffles and says nothing besides a weak and petty “stupid damned dragons.”
It’s awkward for a moment, though Namjoon doesn’t notice, too deeply sunk into his sorrow to feel much else.
“I think orange would be nice,” Yoongi says softly, taking a thick bar of soap from his basket and dipping a cloth into the bucket of water. It’s warm when he presses it hopefully to Namjoon’s shoulder, encouraged when Namjoon doesn’t shrug him away.
Slowly, with gentle touch and greedy eyes, Yoongi bathes him and rinses him clean, watching the tears fall with unspoken concern.
“I think you are clean enough,” he says, wiping at Namjoon’s wet eyelashes. “The water spirits get angry if anyone enters the springs dirty, but I have washed your feet, and the rest of you was very clean…”
He squeezes the soles of Namjoon’s feet where they rest on his lap and peers into Namjoon’s face. “You are-”
Namjoon looks up at him in time to see the way he frowns and stops himself. The wind gusts and Yoongi blinks up into the sky, nostrils flaring. “It may snow, tonight. Come on, let’s get in the water.”
Relief takes over his face when Namjoon stands and lets Yoongi lead him through the grass, holding his hand steady as he steps into the hot water.
He hisses at the bite of heat at his skin, easing in deeper and deeper until he’s waist deep in the burnt orange waters. With a sigh, he sits on a submerged rock, eyes falling shut as the water loosens tense muscles.
Yoongi watches, satisfied that Namjoon is comfortable before shedding his own clothes and filling a bucket of water and grabbing the soap for himself.
Cheek resting on a warm rock, Namjoon stares lifeless at the flutter of yellow leaves and swaying trees, barely blinking when the splash of feet enter the water behind him.
“I’m not from here,” Yoongi begins, peeking at Namjoon for any interest.
There is none, but he continues anyway. “I’m from the southern islands, but it is very beautiful here, isn’t it? The trees and- and the… rocks…”
“I know it is, I’m from here.”
“Right, of course. Well, your homeland is very beautiful.”
Namjoon picks his heavy head up from the rocks and stares at Yoongi in the water. So pale in contrast to the rusty water, burgundy eyes and dark hair. Watching him so intently, that eerie dragon greed hinting around his eyes.
“What do you want from me?” he says, blunt and shaky.
“Want from you? I… to be my companion, of course.”
“I’m not going to be your… your sex slave, so kill me right now and get it over with.”
Yoongi jolts like he’s been slapped. “Sex slave, I-! I will not eat you, why do you wish to die so badly?”
The tears bead in the corner of his eyes again. “I don’t,” he pleads. “I don’t. I want to live, but being some monster’s thrall is not living.”
His gaze falls to the water at that, lips pressed firmly together. “I am not a monster,” he says quietly. “I do not keep thralls, or slaves. I simply was happy to have a companion. I thought- I thought that- it seemed a very nice gift, to have someone to... to share with you, and care for you…”
“Like a mindless pet? Because you’re bored? I had a life,” Namjoon spits out bitterly.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know, I thought- I was excited to share with you my- my treasures, my hot springs and my fairy soap and the… I didn’t know you did not want to know them. I am sorry,” he whispers and rises from the water, looking like he might cry himself.
He’s barely out of the water before he shifts. Namjoon watches on in horror and awe as he melds and stretches into shimmering scales and vast wings. Claws scrape over rocks and the beat of his wings send dried leaves floating into the clear water. He’s into the air and it’s quiet.
Namjoon sniffs and watches as he disappears into the sky, a dark creature growing smaller and disappearing over a mountain peak.
“Go Namjoon, go,” he gasps to himself, rising out of the water in a cloud of steam. He tries to feel the rush of freedom, but he’s too numb from so much fear and hurt.
Eyes to the sky, he rushes to pile on the warm clothes and furs Yoongi dressed him in, though his heart tells him Yoongi wouldn’t try to stop him. He almost feels bad, but there’s no time for that. He scrambles up the highest rock in sight and tries to scan the horizon for the stream of village smoke he’d seen to the north the day before.
Nothing. Still, he’d definitely identified the opposite direction of his village, so it was a good place to start. He scrambles down the steep slope, falling on his ass and skidding the last few yards before the ground levels out to a flat stretch of trees and bushes. Breathless and increasingly covered in scrapes and bruises, he scrambles over creeks and stones and thorny bushes.
He pauses to catch his breath and pick brambles out of his fur coat that jab straight through to his skin. Night is falling around the forest, darker than the sky far above the tree tops. He exhales and looks around, a white puff of breath in the shadows of the woods. It’s so quiet. Quiet like the forest is watching him.
Then the snow starts. Silent, tiny flecks that quickly fatten up into fluffy clumps that stick to the ground and fall faster. Namjoon scrambles down slopes and over logs, panicked mind focused on the sole mission of making it to lower elevations before the snow begins to accumulate.
Panic and exhaustion settle in, making it difficult to navigate the dark landscape disappearing under a blanket of white. Close to the edge of a steep slope, he slips over a rock he couldn’t see and lands hard on his side, tumbling through the snow and muddy loose leaves until for one breathless second, he’s freefalling.
With a strangled grunt and wail of pain, he hits the ground several feet below. When his lungs can take in air again, he frantically feels over his skull for any cracks or gashes.
He’s relieved to find none, but then he tries to stand. A scream of pain leaves his lips and he crumples back to the ground. He clutches his leg. Definitely broken.
This isn’t the death he wanted either. Cold and alone, nothing but pain to accompany him as he waits for the abyss to take him. As silent as the snow, he cries.