Chapter Text
“Yeah. This is no good.”
The resignation in Aran’s voice is deeply uncharacteristic of him, and it activates something primal inside of Atsumu before he’s even aware of it.
“Haah? What the hell d’you mean no good? I’m here to get fixed, aren’t I? So fix it! Fix me!”
Aran levels him with a very unimpressed glare and scoots back a bit on his rolling chair, wisely out of reach of Atsumu’s flailing hands. Such is a good thing, because if he doesn’t give Atsumu a good reason as of right now, he’ll wrangle the annoying doctor.
“Cut it out,” Aran says, tugging his latex-free gloves and face mask off in one quick motion. “I meant it, Atsumu. It’s no good. What you’ve got there—I can’t fix it for you.”
Under the cold, sterile blaze of the clinic’s fluorescent lights, Atsumu gapes at the doctor, because time and time again he’s shown up at Aran’s doorstep, dripping blood, sweat, and other unnamable fluids, sometimes with his arm dangling in pieces by his side, and once even with his midsection cut open from a job gone terribly wrong. And every time, Aran had pulled through, stitched him back up with no small amount of complaints, but with precision and care nonetheless. But this time…
“What the hell am I supposed to do then?” Atsumu demands, staring down his bare chest, at the mangled, cursed patterns of knotted rope burnt like a brand across his skin. It prickles and aches with every shift of his arms and every turn of his torso, and it’s already feeling worse than it was when he first dragged his sorry ass into Aran’s clinic. “This isn’t just any ol’ curse! It’s serious! I can’t go back to the Master like this!”
Aran grimaces. “You know, that’s precisely the reason why you ended up in this whole pickle. Your Master is doing jack all for you.”
“Don’t say that,” Atsumu growls, an instinctive motion to defend his Master, even as something unpleasant inside him squirms at the truth in the doctor's words.
Aran, bless his tired soul, doesn’t even bat an eye. “I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again; Atsumu, your contract with that person is a piss poor excuse of a bond. You’re being made to do far too much in exchange for far too little with your human counterpart. This is what, the third? Fourth? Time you’ve shown up at my clinic with a major injury after a job in a month. The contract is meant to protect you as much as it is compelling you to do the tasks your Master orders you to do. You’re being taken advantage of.”
“You think I don’t know that?” Atsumu demands. His nails dig painfully into his palms, no doubt drawing blood, but that’s the last thought on his mind right now. “I know it’s a shitty contract, but I’m still bound, you know. I can’t just up and leave.”
“Then break it,” Aran argues back. “It’s unorthodox but it can be done, especially if the logistics of your contract with your master is crap to begin with—what the hell did you bargain for anyway? And don’t give me that stupid 'a contract is sacred’ nonsense. You need serious help right now.”
Atsumu gnaws his lower lip and grinds his teeth. It takes him a second to work the words up—speaking of the binding process and exchange of a demon-and-master contract is still such a deeply ingrained, taboo feeling.
“My services in exchange for all ten of the Master’s fingernails,” Atsumu grits out.
Aran nearly falls over. “Just fingernails?!” he yells. “Atsumu, forget being taken advantage of, you’re being straight up insulted.”
“You think I don’t know that?! It’s shameful! It’s bullshit! But I can’t do shit about it! The second I abandon my contract, the Master’ll have me headhunted like a duck! He’s powerful, and he’s got more than just me at his bidding. You fuckin’ know that.”
Aran inhales and pinches the bridge of his nose, muttering something that Atsumu can’t make out but is definitely unflattering to him. “You’re hopeless. Hopeless, I say.”
“Thanks, doc,” Atsumu deadpans, flopping back onto the cold wall behind the examination table he's sitting on. “Makin’ me feel real good right now.”
“Oh, shut it.” Aran rolls his dumb office chair over to his desk, yanking open drawers and lifting folders and notepads and other miscellaneous office junk out of its confines, seemingly content to ignore Atsumu for now.
Atsumu grumbles and tugs the hem of his undershirt back down over his chest, gingerly avoiding touching any of the curse marks as he shrugs his dress shirt back on and does up the buttons. He should’ve known this job was going to be just as bad as the others, should’ve asked his Master to send him in with one of the lower-ranked demons for backup, but that probably would’ve changed nothing. The curse haunting the warehouse was old and strong; if Atsumu had brought anybody else it would’ve just eaten them and made his job harder. But even in death, the curse has still left its mark.
Maybe he could try and visit one of the shrines or hot springs up in the mountains before checking back in to the Master, and hope for the best.
Even as he thinks it, he knows it’ll be useless anyway. He can already feel the end creeping up on him (along with an exhausted kind of despair he’s trying very hard to ignore right now), and the Master has no use for a downed demon.
“Ah! Found it.” Aran spins around and waves something small and rectangular at him; Atsumu scowls and snatches it out of the doctor’s hands.
It’s a business card, weathered at the corners and wrinkled with time. Printed in faded ink are the words Banquet Fields Rice Farms. Underneath that, in a smaller font, is the just the surname Kita, an address, and a phone number.
“The hell’s this?”
“A friend of mine,” Aran says. “He’ll make a new contract with you.”
Now it’s Atsumu’s turn to almost fall over. “Huh? You’re kidding, right?!”
“Why on earth would I joke about something like that,” Aran fires back. “He lives down in Hyogo—”
“He works on a rice farm.”
“—and yes, he works on a rice farm, but he’s still got the chops to make a contract with demons. He’s made a fair few of them before, for ones in the same situation as you. In all honesty, he seems quite fond of picking up stragglers and loners.”
“I ain’t—”
“Go to him,” Aran interrupts, an underlying note of seriousness in his voice as he taps the business card. “And tell him I sent you, and the shit you’ve gotten yourself stuck in. He’ll sort you out.”
Atsumu grips the card so tightly it creases down the middle. “If he’s your friend, Aran, I gotta say I ain’t too comfortable putting him in the line of fire once my Master comes for my head.”
Aran shrugs. “Kita can hold his own,” is all he says, and Atsumu scoffs, loudly.
Whatever. Atsumu isn’t in the habit of getting worried or sentimental over the dumb shit. If Aran wants to send his sorry ass to this rice farmer and get him involved, that’s on the doctor. But if this guy could actually break his current joke of a contract and get him a new one…
Well, whatever he chooses, he’s good as dead anyway. It’s worth a shot, isn’t it?
He lays low, but he doesn’t wait long before making his move down south. There’s usually leeway between the start and end of his jobs; sometimes there’s injuries to take care of, sometimes there’s witnesses or bystanders to eliminate. Sometimes he’ll get too hyped up and he’ll need to hide out in the outskirts of the city to calm down—a lot of demon masters don’t like seeing their charges out of human form. Atsumu finds that his Master in particular gets ridiculously peculiar about that. No blood, no pointed teeth, no horns, no extra eyes, no whatever—anything that doesn’t belong on a normal human body cannot be shown before him or on the mansion property.
He shapeshifts out of his normal form and goes for something that’s totally left field: a stay-at-home mom look complete with one of those ugly neon sun visors and a tacky windbreaker with a polka-dot scarf. He looks hideous. He looks nothing like himself.
The train ride from Tokyo to Hyogo is a three-hour journey, one that he spends slouched in his seat, doing his damn hardest to ignore the growing pangs of pain running up and down his chest. The curse has definitely spread to his shoulders, if the irritating prickling is anything to go by. It’s moving fast, faster than he’d anticipated.
By the time he left the bullet train station and boarded the bus for the rural parts of the prefecture, the prickling had gotten even worse. His temperature’s high, his limbs are weak and shaky, and he pours all his focus into maintaining his disguise and just lets the pain roll over him in waves. The lumpy springs of the bus seat digs into his back, discomfort on top of his agony. When he stumbles off at the indicated stop at a lonely, unpaved and unmarked street corner in the middle of nowhere, he’s almost at his wits’ end. It’s late, too—the sun is starting to dip low in the sky, partly hidden by the cloud covers, casting long shadows onto the ground.
It hurts. It hurts like a motherfucker, and Atsumu’s knees buckle underneath him as he’s halfway down some shitty, dusty side road. He face plants into the dirt, no strength left to lift his arms and break the fall, and ends up with a mouthful of sand and gets the front of his outfit dirty.
Atsumu turns his head to the side, just enough so he’s not inhaling dirt for the time being, and stares at his own hand. Even the disguise has worn off now.
It’s too bad. The Master will figure out he’s dead soon enough—the contract will burn up and vanish when he ceases to exist in this world. The slightly lucid part Atsumu finds enough in him to regret not seeing his brother again before this. Ugh, this sucks. He would’ve wanted to eat one of his brother’s delicious meals one last time, but instead he’s here, snorting dirt and messing up his jacket, dying in the middle of bumfuck nowhere.
What a way to go.
The world is tipping unsteadily underneath him, the swaying motions making him ill.
His chest burns and burns, and he grunts, turning his face to the side. He catches a whiff of sweat, not his own, and the heat of the sun and an underlying hint of soap. Then, deeper, there’s the scent of old wood, incense, and the boiling, fiery undertones of something oddly supernatural.
His eyes snap open, but only for a second before exhaustion takes over again. Blearily, he can see the ground beneath him, his arms dangling in his fuzzy vision, and the legs of the person carrying him over his back taking one steady step after another.
Who the hell are you, he tries to say, but it comes out more like wherughra?
“We’re almost there,” a man says, closer by his head. His voice is quiet and sounds slightly muffled, like Atsumu’s hearing him from underwater. “Please hold on.”
Atsumu’s head lolls, and he must’ve blacked out at that point, because the next thing he knows he’s being slowly submerged into hot, steaming water. He’s naked, limbs floating akimbo just beneath the surface, and it’s heaven on his burning skin. He gazes blankly down, staring at the alarmingly jet-black markings all over his chest, arms, and now down to his lower torso, stopping just shy of his hip bones. He’s floating in some kind of a hot spring, leaning against the edge of the enclosure. The stones are cool against his overheated back, and there's a fluffy towel tucked under his head.
Movement over his right shoulder. Something blurry enters his field of vision, and then deep, blessed relief over his burning front.
“That’s it,” the same, quiet man’s voice says. It’s very calm and soothing to listen to. “Please relax. You’re going to be alright.”
Atsumu has no idea if that’s true or not, but it’s hard to think with the heat of the hot spring and the earthen, fragrant scents of herbs and medicine floating around him. He sinks further into the water and fades out again.
He dreams of Aran’s clinic, the cold fluorescent lights and the permanent smell of clean bandages, freshly torn from sterilized packs.
He dreams of the mansion, the hostile atmosphere of the sprawling historic house and the perpetual white noise of the shishi-odoshi methodically tipping over and back as it fills with water and drains itself of it.
He dreams of his brother’s scent, familiar and calming from when they were babies, and the sweet summer heat curling around them in the forest like a spell.
He dreams of the curse, tightening around him, squeezing him and dragging him into the depths of the warehouse, the sounds of his claws raking into the plaster of the floor below him and the hollow, sucking noise of the entity in the darkness.
He thinks he dreams of calloused hands on his face and the smell of the sun lingering in the room again, but—that might not have been a dream at all.
It’s the late afternoon when Atsumu slowly blinks awake.
It takes him a moment to regain his bearings, but it comes to him in slow, steady increments: a soft pillow and futon beneath his back, a plain but clean yukata wrapped around him, and a light spring blanket draped over his front. There’s the miscellaneous sounds of nature, including the buzzing of insects and the rustle of leaves in the wind.
He’s lying in a plain, sparsely decorated room. Traditional, with tatami mats and a low ceiling, the wooden beams painted a deep, sophisticated brown. The sliding doors are closed on one side but the ones facing a stretch of hallway are open, and the outside doors are open in segments too, letting a warm summer breeze drift into the room. Atsumu tilts his face up and sniffs. Water. Earth. Plants. Soap, and sunshine.
He smells the human before he appears, but that’s enough warning.
The man that walks into view along the hall is surprisingly young, probably no more than thirty in human years, and rather average. He’s tall, but not too tall. His eyes are keen, but the colour is plain. The only interesting thing about him is his hair, curiously grey for his youth and tipped with black. It’s fluffy and sweat-damp, as is the rest of his jumpsuit and the towel tied around his neck.
“Oh, you’re awake,” the man blinks. That same, quiet voice. Atsumu frowns and tries to sit up.
“Take it easy,” the man says, stepping into the room. “You’ve been asleep for three days.”
“I’m fine,” Atsumu grunts, because he does feel fine—in fact, he’s felt better rested than he’s had in a long time. There’s still a soreness all across his chest and arms, but it’s not stinging and painful anymore. It feels more like a harsh bruise than anything else. “I don’t need your help.”
The man purses his lips, but he doesn’t approach any further; he folds his legs beneath him and sits at a respectful distance away, waiting for Atsumu to struggle upright, pushing the blankets off him.
Hm. He’s wrong about the eyes—there’s a bit of gold in them, mixed amidst the brown. It’s subtle, and easy to miss.
“I’m guessing you're Kita?” Atsumu says, taking in the human man before him.
“I am,” the man known as Kita nods. “Kita Shinsuke. I own the Banquet Fields and this rice farm you’re currently staying on. Aran told me someone might drop by.”
“Yeah. He, uh, told me to find you. I have some issues with a curse.”
A humourless smile tugs at the corner of Kita’s lips. “That you did. A terrifyingly aggressive curse too. You’re lucky to be alive.”
Atsumu scowls. “I’ll thank you only once. Don’t get ahead of yourself, human.”
The smile ticks up a little higher, sharper. “Aran also warned me that this individual will probably be ‘moody, irritable, and massively deplorable company’. He might be right about that.”
“Hah?!”
“I’m joking,” Kita cuts in, with the flattest intonation Atsumu’s ever heard. “Well, he did say all those things, but you’ve really just been silent company. Battling curses does take up quite a bit of energy.”
Atsumu’s hand moves instinctively to his chest, and he looks down, parting the front of his yukata with both hands. To his shock, the marks have faded significantly, no longer thick and angry looking, but more like blurred, smudged lines wrapped around his front. He touches them gingerly, bracing himself for pain but mostly just feeling the same, low-grade ache that just sits all over the front of his body.
“How’d you stop it?” he asks. “Even Aran couldn’t do shit.”
“It’s not quite healed yet, but I’m practiced in old spells and ancient remedies,” Kita replies. “It’s a bit of a side gig to my rice business.”
Atsumu licks his dry lips. “Aran also said you could help me out.”
“So it would seem,” Kita nods. “You’re looking to break a contract, yes? I wouldn’t mind doing so, but it wouldn’t happen right now.”
“Why not?” Atsumu narrows his eyes. “Surely you must know that nothing good comes out of housing a runaway demon. Especially a contracted, runaway demon that’s violating its terms. I’d suggest we get it over with before my Master comes breaking down your door.”
“That won’t happen,” Kita says, so full of certainty that it makes Atsumu curl his lip. Who is this hillbilly rice farmer? “First of all, the process of breaking an existing contract is extremely strenuous. Your condition is a lot better, but as you can see, the curse is not fully broken. Given your current deposition, you’re more likely to die during that process than you are of your current curse.”
Well, when he puts it like that.
“Secondly,” Kita continues, undoing the towel around his neck. “This property is very well protected. It’s old lands, filled with ancient magic. Nobody, demons or humans or otherwise, can just come wandering in on their own, even if it’s your Master hunting you down. You’re safe here.”
You don’t know my Master, Atsumu wants to say, but he himself doesn’t know this land, and something deep down inside (animal instincts, perhaps) says it’s a wrong move to challenge this Kita fellow on it.
“And lastly, in order to form a proper contract with you to help you escape from your Master’s clutches, I will need time to prepare my end of the terms. I’m not in the habit of making deals and keeping demons with me, as you can see. In fact, this farm employs only humans—none of my workers are supernatural beings of any kind. Also, depending on how strong you are, I will have to adjust my part of the exchange accordingly. And I have a feeling you’re not just any random demon wandering about the countryside.”
His eyes flicker over Atsumu’s form, almost approvingly, and the primal, ancient side of Atsumu wants to preen in satisfaction at those words. “Okay, so you’ve put some thought into it. But if you’re not gonna want me working on your rice fields, and since this contract is only temporary, you can just pick any ol’ body part and I’ll just agree to it. I won’t even care if it’s, say, the skin off the back of your neck or some of your hair. I just want my damn contract broken before my Master comes bustin’ down on the both of us.”
“I see,” Kita says, face impassive. “You don’t trust me.”
“Huh? When did I say that—”
“I’ve already told you about the lands here,” Kita says. “And I don’t make promises I can’t keep. You will be protected here, because I will see to it. As a guest on my property and my patient, please have some faith in my judgement.”
Atsumu bites back a growl, but says nothing. Something prickles up his arms and his neck. There’s a weird tension around Kita, oddly intimidating for a plain human. He’s a strange one.
“And I understand that you are in a rush to break off the unbalanced contract on your end. I can sympathize. Aran filled me in on some of the details; needless to say it’s quite an offensive metaphorical collar around your neck. I will take it upon myself to remain as fair as possible in this situation, so long as you are fair to me. However, there is one thing you should know.”
Atsumu tilts his head. Kita smiles, that same, humourless smile.
“I don’t contract out any part of my physical body with demons.”
Wait. What?
“How the hell does that work?” Atsumu demands, scanning the man from head to toe—that’s not possible, there must be something missing, even if it’s miniscule. An internal organ? A series of blood vessels?
“I assure you it’s the truth. I need all of my limbs and my body to function in order to run my business. It’s a very labour-intensive job. But aside from that, I have other reasons for not contracting body parts. Trust me, it actually causes more problems in the long run.”
“Then how’re we supposed to get a contract together? You said it yourself. I ain’t just any ol’ demon, and you’re the one who keeps insisting that you need to offer something just as good to keep me.”
Kita’s eyes flash. “I assure you I’ve got something lined up. But as I said, it will take time. During that period, I would like for you to return to full health before we go through the arduous process of breaking a contract and re-negotiating one between us.”
“And how long will that take.”
Kita’s gaze darts down to the exposed skin on Atsumu’s chest, and Atsumu has to suppress a shiver. It’s not like he’s afraid of nudity or bothered by another man looking at him, but it’s just—something, about those eyes, that make him feel like Kita is seeing more than he’s letting on.
“If you follow my instructions and take your medicine routinely, I’d say we’d be ready in a week’s time. Please get some rest for now. My lunch break is over, but I’ll be back in the evening to make dinner. Are you partial to human food?”
“I’ll eat it,” Atsumu grumbles. “D’you have fatty tuna?”
Kita raises his eyebrows. “No. That’s way out of budget, but I’ll keep any eye out on any sales in the marketplace the next time I go.”
Atsumu sighs and flops back down onto the futon, wiggling until the blankets are to his chin. To his surprise, Kita doesn’t actually seem offended by the snub; if anything, a faint sparkle shows in his deep eyes.
“Before I go, what would you like me to call you?”
At Atsumu’s blank stare, he adds, “Aran only gave me a nickname to call you by. I’m not in the habit of exchanging names with those I don’t know about, and I respect that you may not necessarily want me to presume your name without your consent. We’ll have to exchange it during the contract, yes, but I still wanted to give you that choice.”
“...Atsumu,” Atsumu says slowly, slightly dumbfounded. “You can call me Atsumu.”
Kita inclines his head. “Pleasure to meet you, Atsumu. If you need it, there’s a bathroom just through those sliding doors, and the kitchen is further down the hallway. I think the day’s newspaper is still on the kitchen table if Manami-san hasn’t taken it to do the daily sudoku. I’ll be back by sundown.”
And then he’s gone, leaving Atsumu to blink rapidly at the place the human once stood, trying to come to terms with everything that’s just happened.
Protected lands? Bodiless contract terms? Waiting for Atsumu to consent to giving his name when he damn well knows he’ll have to fork it over in a week if Atsumu would like to keep his head attached to his shoulders? What the hell.
“Arrgh,” he snarls, digging the heels of his palm into his eyes, and kicks his feet out in agitation.
Stupid Aran. Stupid Kita. Humans are so stupid.
He spends the next few days alternating between sleeping and lounging restlessly.
The days are boring and largely uneventful; Kita wakes before dawn and prepares a human breakfast for them both while Atsumu sleeps. He's washed up and gone in the fields by the time Atsumu crawls out of his room and wanders into the kitchen, where a traditional meal awaits him at the table—a fresh bowl of rice with soup, maybe some natto, and a small side serving of vegetables. Kita has given him free reign of the house while he toils away under the sun, and Atsumu wanders between the sitting room and the front porch when he's not sleeping in what he's figured is a guest bedroom.
The week drags on at an agonizing pace. Atsumu is antsy about sitting in plain view outside the house, but he's irritable at being cooped up too. Kira's awful at small talk, but he's diligent with meal prep and always tells Atsumu when he's going to the market, or into town, or the post office. He cleans the kitchen after every meal. He bathes thoroughly every night, leaving a scent of soap and aftershave trailing behind him in the evenings.
That Manami-san person comes in during the lunch break like clockwork every day for the daily sudoku, so Atsumu avoids her altogether by hiding out in his room at that time. He's sure Kita must've mentioned having a guest to his workers, but Atsumu is not interested in making any kind of small talk with humans.
There’s also a medicine that he takes with every meal, strong and earthen and tastes vaguely of ginger. Kita keeps a large stock of it in a massive thermos, tucked away in the back of the rattling old fridge, but he heats it up properly over the stove for Atsumu at every meal. He's not really sure what it does, but over the course of the week his muscles have begun to stop aching so badly and his mobility is getting a little better, so he doesn't complain.
It's still weird though, suddenly having so much free time. Back then his days oscillated wildly between nothing to do and too much to do, usually falling in the latter category, so now that he's effectively house-bound and recovering, Atsumu has no idea what to pass his time with. He's an eons-old demon, he's not about to pick up a knitting hobby or anything.
Kita himself is kind of dull too, his days predictably full of work and his nights spent in his office until he turns in. But Atsumu still avoids his company if he could help it; there's just something about that man that he can't shake off, but it's just not worth his trouble. All he needs to do is to break his current contract, enter one with Kita, lay low until he's no longer a target, and then break everything off and gain back his freedom. Maybe he'll return to the mountains. Or find his brother and piss him off, that'll kill some time.
Then, Kita says to Atsumu over dinner on the night of his fifth stay: "Tonight, after neutralizing the remains of your curse, we'll talk about breaking your old contract and starting a new one."
"Finally," Atsumu groans, slumping dramatically over the table.
"Patience isn't your strongest virtue, is it?" Kita comments mildly, and Atsumu bristles faintly at the light barb.
"I'm the type to go out and get things done," Atsumu proclaims, jabbing his chopsticks mannerlessly in Kita's direction. "Waiting around ain't my style."
"Sometimes, pacing yourself is necessary," Kita replies after swallowing a mouthful of fish (it's not fatty tuna, but it is a very flavourful mackerel, so Atsumu'll take it). "Rushing into things rarely yields good results."
"Yer such an old man.”
"I've been told I have an old soul," Kita shrugs, not bothered in the slightest, and Atsumu rolls his eyes before scarfing down the rest of his dinner.
"You can leave your things here," Kita says, just as they finish eating. "Please go take a shower and meet me at the front of the house. There's someplace we have to go to finish off the curse."
Atsumu frowns, but does as he's told; he showers from head to toe and uses a liberal amount of a no-brand body wash Kita has kicking around in the bathroom but apparently never uses. The dishes are clean but the kitchen is dark when he wanders out, making his way over to the front door.
Kita is waiting on the porch, dressed down in a very old yukata, and holding a basin of supplies: matches, a bottle of ink, a brush, and a thin tangle of bright red thread.
"Whatcha need all that for?" Atsumu asks, and Kita just humours him with a small smile.
"You'll see," is all he says before slipping on a pair of sandals and starting off into the night, leaving Atsumu to scramble after him.
Kita doesn't bring any kind of light with him, but it's unnecessary—the moon is high in the sky tonight, nearly rounded and almost white with its intensity. The unpaved driveway leading to Kita's house is illuminated with no issues, and he leads Atsumu along, turning left at the road towards one of the rice paddies, and guiding them through smaller paths until they reach a small valley.
There, between the dark patches of grass, is a narrow stone path sloping into the dark.
"Where're we goin'?" Atsumu asks as Kita starts to descend.
"You might not remember, but the first night I found you at the edge of the property, I brought you down here for healing. This is an entrance to an underground spring; it's quite useful and secluded. Yokai used to come by quite often, but it's been quiet for many, many years, so it's safe for humans to use too."
There's definitely old magic in the air, that's for sure. Someone as blunt and straightforward as Kita didn't strike him as the type to be able to see yokai of all things, but then again, it seems like there's a lot of things that Kita seems to be able to do.
"Wait, did you carry me all the way down and back?" Atsumu blurts out, incredulous with the realization.
Kita shoots him a bit of an exasperated glance. "I work in the fields all day, Atsumu. And you're not actually that heavy."
Impressed against his will, Atsumu begrudgingly follows the farmer down.
The temperatures rise rapidly the moment they squeeze through the gap between two stone pillars; it's thick and heavy, the air weighing down on him as soon as they vanish from the moonlight. There's a brief noise of a match striking, and then Kita is lighting up the candles situated along the walls. They burn brightly, lavishly, reflecting off the pinkish-yellow hues of the stone and throwing the small cavern and a circular pool into a brilliant glow.
Atsumu peers into the smooth, mother-of-pearl sheen of water. He can practically feel it humming with magic.
"Let's not waste any time," Kita announces when he's done lighting the last candle. He sets the basin on one of the flat rocks at the edge of the pool and ties up his sleeves. "Please remove all of your clothes and submerge yourself in the water. You don't have to put your head in, but I think you'll feel better if you do."
Atsumu shrugs and does as he's told, tugging apart the loose ties around his yukata. The water is hot, just on the light side of scorching when he steps in. It takes a second to acclimate to but when Atsumu sinks to his knees and dunks his head under the water, he feels strangely light and floaty, tension already seeping from his sore muscles.
When he pops back out of the water, Kita is standing a scarce foot away from him, and Atsumu yelps, jerking back in surprise.
"It's just me," Kita says, like he's placating a spooked dog.
"I know that!" Atsumu sputters. "You should really wear a bell!"
Kita is still wearing his robes, though he's pinned up the hem to keep it from getting too wet. Still, he's wading knee-deep in the water before Atsumu, holding the brush in his hand. Suddenly, Atsumu remembers being very naked in this pool the first time around, and determinedly tries not to think about how that came about in the first place.
"Please stay as still as you can," Kita is saying. "This might tickle."
It doesn’t so much as tickle as it does shock him with the cold—the ink is freezing against his heated skin when Kita drags the tip of the brush against his skin, scrawling characters he doesn't recognize along the cursed imprints etched into his body. The brush traces over his shoulders, across his collarbones, and then makes its way down his arms, covering each line with what appears to be a spell. More ink, more characters, and Atsumu holds his breath as Kita moves lower and lower. He's submerged down to his waist as he gets level with Atsumu's torso, concentration intense on the expanse of skin before him.
Atsumu takes in the slight furrow of his brows, the closeness of his face, and the way his grey-black hair sticks lightly to his forehead and temples. The slope of his nose is kind of elegant, Atsumu muses. The curve of his lips too, as are the narrowness of his thin fingers holding the brush. Kita's skin is a healthy sort of tan, undoubtedly from his hours under the sun, and the strong line of his back hints at muscle hidden beneath the plain fabric on him.
A warm hand touches Atsumu's hip bone, just barely hovering, and an electrifying ripple runs up his spine from the point of contact.
"All done," Kita finally announces, straightening up. Atsumu almost wants to tell him to stay down, because he wants to see those sharp eyes looking up at him, with all their mysteries and strange perceptiveness. But then Kita turns, fetching the thread, and measures out a good length before snapping it with his teeth. He hands one end to Atsumu.
"Tie it around your waist, snug but not tight."
"Should I be worried about this?" Atsumu asks, eyeing the next item that shows up as he finishes knotting the thread at his bellybutton: a match.
"It won't hurt you," Kita says. "It'll feel hot, but that's the spell burning the last of the curse straight out of your body. And the pool of healing water will cleanse you right after. Are you ready?"
"Only for an entire week," Atsumu snarks back, and Kita smiles before lighting the thread.
It burns instantly, jolting down the line with a shocking speed, and Atsumu grunts and jerks in surprise as he feels the spells light up on his skin, chasing the curse out with a kind of ferociousness he's not accustomed to. The characters burn hotly against his body, making steam rise off him, and just before it got too intense, Kita suddenly seized him by the shoulders and plunged Atsumu backwards into the water.
The heat fizzles out, and for a moment Atsumu floats away on a high, skin tingling, head light. A weight previously unnoticed seems to drift off his chest and arms, disappearing with the bubbles that escape upwards, leaving him weightless and untethered. The only thing he can feel right now is Kita's palm, cupping the back of his neck, holding him steady with strong arms before tugging and guiding him back up. When he surfaces once more with Kita's help, Atsumu feels lighter than he's felt in decades.
"Holy shit," he says, unable to keep the awe out of his voice. He turns his hands over, rolls a shoulder back, and feels the tendrils of his demon strength creep back into him. He feels good. He feels alive.
"Excellent," Kita nods, apparently satisfied. His hair is curling loosely at the ends in the humidity, and when he climbs out of the pool, sloshing water over the stone, the soaked hem of his yukata clings to his lower back and his legs. Atsumu stares, looks away, and then stares again when Kita bends over to retrieve the basin of supplies.
"Come," the human days, jolting Atsumu out of his short-circuited mess of half-formed thoughts. "Let's go back up to the house and get started on that contract you're so eager to set up."
Kita's office is surprisingly cluttered, even if it is an organized mess. He doesn't seem like the type to horde or squirrel things away, but there's just a lot of stuff. His bookshelves are packed with all kinds of reading material, some so old that the pages are yellowed and crisp with age, nearly falling apart at the thin string bindings that hold it together. His desk is stacked full of all kinds of papers and brushes and string and stones, sorted, but still scattered all over the surface. Atsumu hovers off to the side, hands shoved into the loose fabric of his yukata, careful not to touch anything.
Kita sets aside his little basin of stuff and opens a flat drawer under his desk.
"What type of binding medium do you prefer?" He asks. "Most demons I know are fine with a standard paper-and-seal kind of contract, but I get the sense that your existing one is rather complex. We can do the same kind, if you'd like. The only medium I can't do is earthen-based liquor."
"Why not?" Atsumu asks, curious. It's an older form of a contract, but it's useful if the demon and the Master want to draw from the powers of the earth they reside on, usually old properties infused with magical roots. The land they're on more than qualifies for that.
Kita pauses, and the tips of his ears turn a very faint pink. "I'm allergic to rice wine."
Atsumu can't quite hold back the startled snort that escapes him. "Wait, seriously? You're a rice farmer."
"I know," Kita sighs. "It's really quite a shame. The workers already tell me how much I'm missing out, so rest assured I'm aware of the irony. I can do other types, though—there's an old kind of tea that my ancestors apparently preserved for purposes like this. It's quite exquisite. But again, if you'd rather use the same method your Master did—"
"No," Atsumu cuts in, jaw tightening. "Tea's fine."
If he's bothered by Atsumu's blunt refusal, Kita doesn't comment on it. Instead, he reaches deeper into the drawer and pulls out a small, ancient-looking tin, held shut with a weathered red seal, and a measuring spoon.
"Make yourself comfortable," Kita says, like Atsumu could wedge himself anywhere in the room without sending something toppling, and disappears from the office without another word.
Left alone, Atsumu rubs his hand slowly around his neck, where his Master's invisible contract still sits heavily over his bones. It aches, worse than the curse right now, deep and haunting, etched into the very material of his bones and scorched into the marrow. Unbidden, he recalls the weight of his Master's left hand on his shoulder, the biting metal cuffs on his wrists that held his arms down. The spelled knife gripped tight in his right hand dug into the flesh and left fire in its wake as his Master murmured the binding chants and carved the contract—no, the collar—right into his neck.
"Water's ready," Kita announces, striding in with a circular tray in his hand. An old clay teapot sits in the center, along with what looks like two handmade cups. Atsumu senses they're a twin pair.
"Have you done a tea binding before?" Kita asks, measuring out an appropriate amount of leaves before dumping them into the cups. Atsumu shakes his head. "It's quite simple. The leaves steep for three minutes. During that time, we'll recite the terms we will exchange with each other for the contract."
He takes a small, red ink pad out from somewhere in the desk and sets it on the table between them. "If we both agree to the terms, we'll write our full names, mark our thumbprint on the seal, and dissolve it into the tea. Normally, we'd just drink and let the contract bind together, but in this case, I'll have to break off your old contract just before the new one settles."
"And how're you gonna do that?" Atsumu asks, eyeing the human warily.
"I prepared an interruption seal," Kita says plainly, waving another small slip in the air. This one is heavier, the paper denser, and the characters written on it are in black ink. "Where was the point of contact your Master used for your old contract?"
Swallowing, Atsumu lifts his hand and silently frames his neck with his thumb and index finger. Kita looks him over, and his brows draw together faintly before it smoothes into his usual impassive expression.
"Then that's where I'll place this seal."
The scent of the tea is slowly filling the small space between them, surprisingly aromatic for what appeared to be practically ancient tea leaves, and Atsumu has to blink away the slight fog that's crept up on him without noticing. He's jittery, both from the anticipation of breaking his contract and forming a new one with Kita. Distantly, he wonders if this is a good idea—would Kita be a good Master? Was Atsumu simply leaping out of the frying pan, and straight into the fire for a second time?
"Let's talk about the terms," Kita says, and Atsumu perks up. "What are yours?"
"The usual," Atsumu shrugs. "My strength is your strength, and the like. I'm an old demon, I got plenty of spells and curses of my own that I can use. My Master wanted me to use my powers as a bodyguard or a hunting dog most of the time. I can do the same for you. I'm strong, I can use my innate magic, but I’m best at shapeshifting and mimicry. After you make the contract with me, you won't be fooled by my tricks. My only stipulation is that you only get my half of the powers."
"Your half?"
Atsumu lifts his hand and holds up two fingers. "I got a twin brother, but he ain't part of any contract, ya hear?"
"Perfectly," Kita says, looking amused. "Are you the older or the younger—?"
"Older," Atsumu hissed, puffing up indignantly, and Kita laughs. He's a pretty laugher—the sound wholly polite but still full of mirth, like Atsumu had just told him the joke of a lifetime. His eyes crinkle at the corners and his whole expression lights up. It's a very dynamic look for someone with the eyes of a dead fish most of the time.
"That's something an older twin would say," Kita muses. "Very well. As for my terms, as I've mentioned, I will not be negotiating any parts of my body for the contract. What I'll use instead are my memories."
Atsumu opens his mouth, and closes it, and then blinks rapidly at Kita for another second, just in case he's heard wrong.
"Memories?"
"Memories." Kita repeats. "I assure you, while it is unorthodox, hold up just fine in a contract."
"But you can't just give your memories as your terms," Atsumu sputters, still grasping at straws. "You won't—you don't get those back."
"I'm fully aware," Kita nods. "But it is an agreeable alternative to, say, an arm, or a necessary organ. It's just not possible for me to give any of those up. I've chosen carefully and picked out a very specific set of years for this contract. It should match up to your terms agreeably."
"But…" Atsumu's not really sure why he's questioning it so—what's it to him that Kita is essentially lopping off a couple years' worth of human interaction, experience, and mundane reconciliation in exchange for Atsumu? People have given much worse. He's heard of an old Yakuza clan that gave up ten generations' worth of infant daughters to tie down a particular demon they wanted, to disastrous results.
Still, though.
"Don't worry, my life is not so interesting that I'll be devastated by the memory loss," Kita says, matter-of-fact. "In most cases, I can usually just get away with only using a month or so, sometimes even a week. But you're strong, so my terms must reflect that as well."
"What're you giving up?" Atsumu asks, unable to help himself. "What're you willing to forget to break my contract?"
"I think the two years I spent on this farm after my university graduation would work well," Kita replies. "I inherited this land from my grandparents, and during those two years, I simply spent my days toiling these lands and fixing up the house, the machinery, and the storage units. It's rich with activity, but nothing that will be too damaging to my current state of self when I give those memories away. I won't, let's say, forget how to do the basic math I learned in elementary school, or the necessary tax forms I need to fill out for this farm to run."
"You've thought this out."
"Believe it or not, I am quite apt at forming functional demon contracts. Are you satisfied with these terms?"
Atsumu swallows. This is insane. "I am. Are you?"
Kita's smile is like an unsheathed sword in the dim light of the room. "Of course."
They press their thumbs into the inkpad and leave their marks on the seals; Kita takes the pair and dissolves them in the tea. The scent grows stronger, more heady. The cup is warm against his palm when Atsumu picks it up, steam curling in mischievous patterns in the air.
"To your good health," Kita says, clinking his cup with Atsumu's, and the both down their tea in one gulp.
It's strong, and the taste punches Atsumu straight in his gut as he swallows. He coughs, rubbing reflexively at his chest, and feels the familiar summons of a new contract brewing in his veins. Across from him, Kita grimaces as he sets his cup down, eyes squeezed shut until he opens them again, and Atsumu is startled by the sudden, milky blankness in those dark eyes. It's like a film has settled over them, and Kita jerks his head once, as if shaking himself free of something. The bubbling sensation in Atsumu's veins calms momentarily, taking in the terms Kita has offered. It's strange—normally, the demon would eat the proffered body part, or dissolve it, or burn it, but memories aren't tangible, aren't physical. Atsumu inhales and watches as the colour returns to Kita's eyes, along with determined awareness. He steps forward, holding the interruption seal, and places his hands over Atsumu's neck.
The pain is instantaneous and blinding.
Atsumu roars, dropping helplessly to his knees. The tea cup hits the ground and shatters. His neck is a white-hot ring of pain, and he feels like his skin must surely be in fire, if not his flesh, or his bones, melting away and draining off his writhing body.
Above him, Kita's eyes widen with shock and panic; he regains his composure a moment later and his hands tighten against Atsumu's neck.
"Atsumu! Atsumu, hold still—"
Atsumu's back bows and his jaw unhinges; a fox's unearthly shriek escapes from him and rattles the windows and the shelves. Kita's hands slip from his neck, and it feels like blades slicing down his throat.
"Shit—shit, Atsumu, hang on—"
He can't. It's too much. Is this what forcing a contract to end feels like? It's harder to say which he'd prefer: to crawl back to his Master and die a slow, painful death, or whatever the fuck this is.
Kita's face appears before him again—he's down on his knees too, another seal folded and held between his lips.
"Sorry, Atsumu," he says, voice slightly muffled by the paper, and he seizes Atsumu by the face and slams their mouths together.
Atsumu tips, caught off-balance by Kita's sudden weight against him, and grabs at the man reflexively. To his horror, his claws, unsheathed instinctively as he reacted to the pain, sank right through the flesh on Kita's shoulder and arms like he's made of butter. Fuck, humans are too soft, too breakable—
Kita's grip tightens on his face and he presses closer in spite of Atsumu's claws in his arms. The seal breaks apart and melts between their lips, and then Kita is shoving his tongue into Atsumu's mouth with alarming skill and dexterity.
All at once, it feels like something cold has melted inside his mouth. It slips downward, casting a chill, and settles somewhere around the base of Atsumu's neck. He feels weirdly submerged, but only from the neck and above. His head clears, and that blinding pain simmers down to a faint pulse, pounding in time with his heartbeat, a million miles away from where Kita holds his face. His tongue traces the inside of Atsumu's mouth, slow and steady and soothing, less like a struggle and more like a caress. His hands are gentler now, thumbs stroking Atsumu's cheekbones in a rather comforting manner. He tastes like tea, something rather herbal, and at the same time something indistinct, neither human nor supernatural.
Atsumu shakily lifts his hands, now void of the claws, and wraps them around Kita.
The muted bubble around them seems to pop, and something shatters around Atsumu's neck, dropping in pieces onto the floor around them. It's blood—his blood—crystallized.
Kita hums quietly against his mouth, the sound curious and small, and when he starts to pull away, Atsumu has to fight against the urge to chase him, fight against the overwhelming desire to tug him back, melding their mouths together once more—
Kita's teeth snags lightly against his lower lip, and a burning kind of shiver runs down Atsumu's spine.
"It's done," the human whispers, breath coming out in quiet pants. "You old contract has been broken. Congratulations on your new one."
"With you," Atsumu croaks, throat oddly tight despite the definite loss of his former bindings. He suddenly realized that Kita's sitting astride his legs, thighs spread, their fronts pressed close. He gulps.
"With me," Kita agreed, and though he looks immensely satisfied, he also looks very, very tired. As tired as Atsumu's starting to feel, too.
"Can you stand?" Atsumu asks. Kita's weight moves off for a moment, only to fall back onto him a second later with a small grunt.
"...Nope."
"Okay then," Atsumu sighs, and he places his hands under Kita's thighs, hosting him up as he staggers upright on wobbly feet. Fuck, he hasn't felt this jelly-kneed since he was but a tiny pup, tripping over himself in the woods. Kita's not light by any means; he's actually stupidly heavy, dense muscles weighing down on Atsumu's exhausted form as they lurch out of the office. He nudges the sliding doors open and barely keeps from dropping them both onto the futon he's been sleeping on all week.
Kita hits the bedding and groans quietly, face contorting slightly in pain.
Atsumu swallows when he sees the red on the man’s arms and shoulders, and something dark and anxious wells up inside his chest.
"Humans," he grunts, pushing his sweaty hair out of his face. "Don't freak out."
Kita makes a vague noise of confusion, but Atsumu ignores him and moves to part the front of Kita's yukata, lifting aside the bloodstained material so he could get a good look at the puncture wounds.
They're not deep, thankfully, just bloody. Atsumu takes one of Kita's wrists in his hands, pulls his arm up, and drags his tongue across the wound.
Kita makes another noise, this time a little more urgent with surprise, and Atsumu gives his wrist a squeeze.
"I said not to freak out.”
Kita's arm tenses, but goes limp in his hold after a second. Exhaling, Atsumu continues his treatment, laving his tongue over the wounds, tasting the tang of blood and sweat, until it gradually lessens with every lick. He traces over the muscles in Kita's arm and over the expanse of his shoulders, thorough with his movements. A fox demon's saliva has healing properties, even more effective now that they're contracted together, and Atsumu watches on until the wounds knit together and close seamlessly without even a scratch left behind.
Job's done. He's fuckin' exhausted.
Atsumu flops over on his side and curls up against Kita's slowly rising and falling chest, even and calm in sleep, and closes his eyes.